Theology of Ministry

Based on the Triune God’s Promises in Jesus for Communities and Neighbors

by

Ken Winter

Presented to Professor Mary Hess

Luther Seminary

As a Requirement in

MISSIONAL LEADERRSHIP IN PROFFESSIONAL SETTINGS (LD 0530)

St. Paul, Minnesota

Spring 2019
 Theology of Ministry

Based on the Triune God’s Promises in Jesus for Communities and Neighbors
Ken Winter

If God’s promises in Jesus through the Spirit are for the world, then what does that
mean for our life together as communities in Christ and our relationships with our neighbors in
the world? Another way to ask this question might be; How do God’s promises become enacted
and embodied in our lives for the sake of God’s reign?
Moltman draws on both Old and New Testament sources to discuss the idea of
Perichoresis or mutual indwelling; God in us. We are invited into fellowship with the Triune
God, specifically through an intimate relationship with Christ Jesus which occurs through the
Holy Spirit. Because there is abundant love in the Holy Trinity, there is room, “broad space,”
for the “whole world” in this community. This is a place where all children of God call God
“Abba Father.” (Romans 8:15) and where we received the Spirit of Adoption whereby the Spirit
of Christ is now in us. We now share with Christ this Spirit that works with the Father to create
in us patterns of being or behavior. Biblical sources refer to this Spirit as the God of Israel who is
both Yahweh and Elohim that says, “I will be there.” The Spirit of the Lord God is embodied in
relation to God’s word and wisdom, God’s Torah. God’s relationship to Jesus is empowered by
the Spirit. In the Gospel of John, Jesus exists in eternity in both the Spirit and Wisdom of God;
the one who through which the world was created. In Romans 8, the same Spirit enables us to
conform to a life like Christ’s. This Perichoresis or mutual indwelling in each other is linked
then with koinonia; the act of abiding in a Godly life. God’s love is made manifest in Basileia,
that community of divine love and life that gives us that “broad space.” Here we find rest,
healing, forgiveness, eternal life and a movement out of our old self into our new self; salvation
through the unity with Christ.
How does this community of Basileia happen? What does the Trinitarian experience
look like or how does it take place? We are liberated by grace through faith that comes from
the promises of God. The Word of God frees us and through Christ we are taken into God’s life.
Here we can let go of the forces that suppress us so we can live in Christ’s. When we
participate in God we receive God’s Spirit that frees us and breathes life into all creation. We
are free to live in that public space where there is no distress. God is a God of justice and mercy
and here we can enter into God’ reign of justice and mercy. When we come together in
worship as community, we hear the liberating Word given to us, the Word that is freed from
forces that oppress. With Christ in us, we can confidently proclaim the Kingdom of justice and
mercy. Our whole lives are given to this perichoretic community. We die every day but live into
our baptismal identity. By living out our intimate relationship with Christ each day, we enact

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God’s way of being in the world. Gathered around the preaching of the Word, Baptism and
Communion we find our identities. We are then regenerated, sanctified so that we can live in
love and hope, by faith, for our neighbor. This is how we embody God’s reign.
A Trinitarian understanding of God helps shape our thinking about who God is.
Elizabeth Johnson suggests we pay deeper attention to the biblical sense of who Jesus is. Doing
this causes us to rethink the Classical theory of Christology. Here, we come to realize God is not
distant, God is transcendent yet immanent. God Suffers with the world. Here it is difficult to
see the connection when set alongside the Aquinas order. Johnson argues (with Luther) that
the understanding of the Trinitarian God emerges in the “living vitality;” that is the self-
revelation of God that is seen the New Testament. Here the emphasis is on Jesus’ humanity;
his one being with the Father whereby we find God “deep in the flesh of humanity.”
We are rooted in God’s being! If we come to know God through biblical witness, God’s
triune identity is revealed. This identity is of dynamic of love and the relationship between the
Father and the Son becomes the basis for the very nature of God.

“The human nature of Jesus Christ, always affirmed in traditional Christology, is now
factored in not as an abstraction but as a concrete human life shaped by a real history in
the world. Rethinking the doctrine of God from a Christological perspective entails
allowing this historical humanity of Jesus to affect Christian understanding of the being
of God.” (Johnson, Elizabeth (April 1985) pg. 145)

“Even if one were to keep the classical term and say that the nature of God is the
subsisting act of Be-ing (ipsiim esse subsistens), one would have to specify further and
note that in the light of revelation, being itself is relational, for the being of God is self-
related. This trinitarian understanding of the nature of God expresses the consequences
of Jesus Christ and his history for the doctrine of God.” (Johnson, Elizabeth (April 1985)
Pg.147)

God doesn’t change, yet God can enter another to elicit change. It is Jesus who
becomes something, the Word become flesh.
God as Being and God as Goodness and love tie into the biblical understanding of mercy
and love. Connected with all of God’s other attributes, for Kasper, mercy integrates all of Gods
attribute; they are coextensive.
‘” How God can be simultaneously merciful and just? For, he said, justice would require
God to reward the good and to punish the bad. But how can he then, in his mercy,
forgive sinners? Anselm gives the answer: In his mercy, God conforms not to our deeds,
but conforms to himself and his goodness. God is just, not in reference to us and our

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 deeds, but rather in conformity with himself and his goodness.” Kasper, Cardinal Walter.
Mercy: The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to Christian Life (Kindle Locations 1929-
1932).
Mercy is the justice idiosyncratic to God. Only God can create justice and righteousness.
Mercy is related to God’s omnipotence. For Kasper, biblical testimony reveals God being there
for the poor and demonstrates God’s omnipotence. Omnipotence IS God’s mercy.
“Instead, mercy is the externally visible and effectively active aspect of the essence of
God, who is love (1 John 4:8, 16). Mercy expresses God’s essence, which graciously
attends to and devotes itself to the world and to humanity in ever new ways in history. In
short, mercy expresses God’s own goodness and love. It is God’s caritas operativa et
effectiva. Therefore, we must describe mercy as the fundamental attribute of God.”
Kasper, Cardinal Walter. Mercy: The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to Christian Life
(Kindle Locations 1717-1721). Paulist Press. Kindle Edition.
New testament Scripture always understands God in relation to Jesus and the Spirit.
Doctrine of The Trinity is not a description of how God is actualized but God’s essence is self-
effused love. The Triune God mirrors the Triune essence.
“The triunity of God is, therefore, the inner presupposition of God’s mercy, just as,
conversely, his mercy is the revelation and mirror of his essence. In God’s mercy, the
eternal, self-communicating love of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is mirrored and
revealed.” (Kasper, Cardinal Walter. Mercy: The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to
Christian Life (Kindle Locations 1802-1804)
For Kasper, the indwelling that takes place in the baptized is where we find God’s heart
and where we find rest. Mercy is the source and goal of God’s activity. The breakthrough that
Luther experienced was derived from the book of Roman’s; a biblical sense of justice which he
found to be not punitive but justifying and redemptive.!!!!
Universal Salvation/Human Will
Salvation is offered to all, (John, Philippians and ‘Colossians- Paul’s letter’s) because God
is all in all. With Jesus as judge, we hope with faith for ourselves that he is a creative judge. This
hope is not a hope of in theory but a hope of certainty. There is hope for mercy in face of
suffering. If Kasper understands Mercy as God’ expression of God’s omnipotence, the only
persuasive answer we can give to the problem of evil is the practical evidence of mercy. What
we do becomes representative hope for others. This is the way Mercy is articulated in the
world.
“On the cross, God enters into death, the most extreme antithesis to God, who is life, in
order to conquer death by the death of one who essentially is immortal. His self-
emptying is the revelation of his omnipotence in love.” Kasper, Cardinal Walter. Mercy:
The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to Christian Life (Kindle Locations 1811-1813).
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 For Lutherans, righteousness through faith enables us to participate in life in Christ. It
frees us to love and serve the neighbor. Love is the criteria by which we act. God’s law of love
is abstract unless we think about real people and act it out in real life circumstances. By
exercising our vocations, we become God’s hand and feet. Neighbors give a concrete face to
law and justice. Our neighbor shapes what we will do.

“If Jesus' story has an orientation that guides hearers into his paschal mystery, then
preachers must face and act on what precedes and follows from that center. What does
this mean? First, preachers must draw hearers into the story by pointing out that
everything Jesus claims to do and does in the Spirit and, therefore, in obedience to his
Father and for the sake of the neighbor, gets him in trouble and leads to his suffering
and death at the hands of sinners like us. If preachers are to convict their hearers of
their complicity in Jesus' death, they will want to address them something like this:
"Jesus is God's anointed Son, the one who delivers you from the oppression of sin, death,
and the devil. But you will not have God's mercy. You are like the ones who want to
throw him off a cliff' (Luke 4:14-30).” (Sánchez, Leopoldo (March 1, 2003) pg.144)

How does Justification by faith influence love of neighbor? Our baptismal reality is that
the Spirit empowers us to be in service. Our intimate relationship with God gives us power to
live life that enacts God’s reign. The Lord’s Supper enables to live our Christian life. The body
and blood give us benefits of sacrifice and has us bearing witness to one another. In this way
we can bear one another’s burdens. We share and forgive one another. Grounded in Jesus, we
are to care for those who are needy in our midst. We take on our cross in our vocation.
Freedom for the sake of service.
God’s mercy affects the functioning of our society. Seeing each other as free entities is
a basic tenant of Christianity. But we have a tendency toward evil. To break the cycle of
victimization, we depend on reconciliation that enables us to enter into new relationships.
Only God can bring transformation of heart. Through God’s forgiveness of us we can forgive
one another. Forgiveness is a gift. When we proclaim it, we enact a reality onto one another.
We don’t’ own it but we bestow it to another. GRACE is God’s infinite mercy and we exercise
this by faith!!
For Kasper, discipleship is participating in the sufferings of Christ. In our sufferings, God
comforts us so we can comfort others with the same consolation we received from God. This is
not an idea to prove but because of what Christ did, we are empowered by the life of Jesus that
we share consolations with others. Our consolation is always open and inviting. This
Perichoretic nature flows through us. An ethic that is lived out. We hope others will join us in
that discipleship. Discipleship is participating in the reconciling power of Christ’s suffering; the
daily living out of our baptism. That’s where atonement happens. The Lord’s Supper provides
us sustenance so that we can go out and stand up for others

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 “The baptism in the Jordan was a symbolic action that affirmed the call to a radical new
beginning for Israel, and the acceptance of baptism was a symbol that the call had been
heard and accepted. But it was only a symbol. The real thing, when it came, would not
be water but a devouring fire, the very breath of the Lord (Mark 1:8; cf. Luke 3:16-17).
Jesus was one of those who heard and accepted the call.” (Newbigin, Lesslie, pg. 23)

Perhaps this image of Jesus being baptized and his acceptance of the call to a radical
new beginning is the imagery I carry with me as I accept my call to ministry. During the
candidacy process, there is a lot of discussion about how we become affirmed in that call.
Discernment is recognizing the blending of the inner and outer affirmations one experiences
that symbolize a new beginning, a new way of life working in the church. Moving forward is
that commitment we all make to be that devouring fire, the very breathe of the Lord.

Bibliography

Kasper, Walter. Mercy: The Essence of the Gospel and the Key to Christian Life (New York:
Paulist, 2014).

Johnson, Elizabeth. "Christology's Impact on the Doctrine of God," Heythrop Journal 26 (April
1985), 143-163.

Malcom, Lois, (2018). Day 4b: Perichoresis [Power point slides]. Retrieved from
https://moodle.luthersem.edu/course/view.php?id=449
Malcom, Lois, (2018). Day 5a: Ekklesia and Koinonia [Power point slides]. Retrieved from
https://moodle.luthersem.edu/course/view.php?id=449
Malcom, Lois, (2018). Day 5ba: Basiliea [Power point slides]. Retrieved from
https://moodle.luthersem.edu/course/view.php?id=449

Moltmann, Jürgen. The Crucified God’: A Trinitarian Theology of the Cross, Interpretation, 26:3
(July 1972), 278-299 (ATLA).

Moltmann, Jürgen. Perichoresis: An Old Magic Word for a New Trinitarian Theology, in Trinity,
Community and Power: Mapping Trajectories in Wesleyan Theology, ed. M. Douglas Meeks
(Nashville: Kingswood Books, 2000), 111-126.

Moltmann, Jürgen. The Logic of Promise,” Experiences in Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress,

2000), 87-106.

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Newbigin, Lesslie, The Open Secret: An Introduction to the Theology of Mission, Chapter 3, "The
Mission of the Triune God," 19-29.

Sánchez, Leopoldo A. God Against Us and For Us: Preaching Jesus in the Spirit. Word & World
23, no. 2 (March 1, 2003): 134-145. (ATLA)