I am continuing to digest Walter Brueggemann’s interview (found here). His work in the Old Testament draws out the explosiveness of the prophets (which he prefers to call poets). The imagery of the Old Testament is explosive. It is meant to invade our senses and disrupt our lives.

Brueggemann’s contention is the Church over the centuries has closed in the glory of the message with its creeds and doctrines. While creeds and doctrines can be helpful, most of the time they close off the powerful imagery. Creeds and doctrines help us define. Our problem over the years is we allow those definitions just to sit. (The early church fathers warned against this. They desired to define what they believed, but readily admitted it was a shallow attempt and the words they used shouldn’t be set as the limit of the definition of the Holy.)

If we allow our lives to be defined by our creeds and doctrines alone, so we know what we are (and what we aren’t), we may lose the explosive power of the Kingdom. Now, for some, that may be okay. Most of us don’t like explosions anyway. We like nice, neat, clean lives.

But is that transformation?

I have also been meditating on 2 Cor. 3:17 – 7:1 as I’ve listened to Brueggmann. I read this text and I see a man (Paul) who had his life totally disrupted. His whole structure came crashing down. He was ruined. Yet, it transformed him. And that transformation was so powerful, he wanted the entire world to know this power and wanted the whole world reconciled to God.

That holy disruption messed him up so much, he would easily say, “Let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.” (2 Cor. 7:1, NIV)

We need the prophetic power of the Kingdom of God to explode our very staid lives. (They might be very stuck lives.) In other words, we need God to mess us up. Without HIS Kingdom, power and glory, are we really transformed?