Stoned-Campbell Disciple

Beginning With A Story

A couple of high school sweethearts had been dating for a while. He was nervous and she was shy. That night sitting on the swing he decided to “boldly” make his move. “Can I kiss you goodnite?” She looked at him adoringly and simply gave him a big smile but said nothing. Not knowing how to interpret such language he thought maybe he said it badly. “MAY I kiss you goodnite?” Once again she dazzled him with her smile and tilted her head but still said nothing. Totally beside himself the poor fellow blurted, “Are you deaf?” She opened her eyes and simply said, “ARE YOU PARALYZED!”

Sometimes I have to wonder if we, who claim to be in the kingdom of God, are paralyzed too. Why can’t we “kiss” our world? Over the last while I have seen how we in the church have done anything but kiss our culture, our world. Surveying a number of blogs and emails yesterday I quickly noted how often we are seen to be filled with vindictive rather than love. In a world that longs for relationship why do we have a hard time sharing the greatest definition of God ever conceived: God is love (1 Jn 4.8).

Are we as blind as the young man to the “signals” of our world that show that they are in fact ready to be loved … to be kissed by God’s People?

Kissing in Worship

In the Christian tradition the kiss was a sacred and even sacramental sign of love in worship. Not just peace but love. When we look through the New Testament there is in fact quite a bit of kissing. A relieved Father kisses his son (Lk 15.20); Jesus embraces the kisses of a prostitute and rebukes the church going Pharisee for his refusal (Lk 7.45). Paul and the Ephesian elders kissed one another in their tearful parting (Acts 20.37). Paul commands that the assembled Christians to great one another with a “holy kiss” (Rom 16.16; 1 cor 16.20; 2 Cor 13.12; 1 Thess 5.26) and the apostle Peter enjoins the same act upon Christians in northern Turkey (1 Pt 5.14).

In Jewish tradition, according to the Talmud, there were three basic kinds of kisses: one of greeting, leaving, and of respect. However such kisses were carefully circumscribed. In a fascinating article in New Testament Studies “The Sacred Kiss in the New Testament” William Klassen argues that Paul is the first teacher known to “instruct members of a mixed social group to greet each other with a kiss whenever or wherever they meet.” He goes on to say there is no analogy in the ancient texts, Jewish or Greco-Roman, for the transformation of the kiss into a sign of the religious community.

This practice of kissing in worship continued as part of Christian worship. Justin Martyr tells us that after the prayers were completed that believers shared the kiss of love with one another. In the West the kiss was offered after taking the Eucharist or Lord’s Supper. After sharing in the bread and the cup of salvation the church declared its oneness and love for each other with the kiss. Klassen tells us that the ritual of the “holy kiss” was a way of symbolizing to rich and poor, men and women, clean and unclean, morally pure and not so morally pure, that they were loved by God beyond anything they could imagine and that God’s Spirit played no favorites. It is a public declaration of acceptance and radical love … we are family! Kissing in worship was one of the distinctive traits of early Christianity. They shall know you are my disciples by your love. Klassen argues that the ritual must go back to Jesus himself because of its radical nature. I agree with him.

Christianity is a high touch and high love faith. This is radically symbolized by the kiss. When Jesus was willing to kiss the world, and Paul was willing to kiss (and even tell) and Peter was right there too … the question comes to my mind again: Why do we have such a hard time “kissing” our world. Does the world, like the girl above, know we are ready to kiss it? If not then why not?

Just my thoughts for today,
Bobby V

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 26th, 2008 at 6:44 pm and is filed under Church History, Exegesis, Holy Kiss, Jesus, Kingdom, Ministry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.