Jason Albertson

1 Cor. 3 uses the word the KJV translates as "carnal." A lot of us in the American Holiness tradition tend to associate "carnality" with "whatever that thing is that needs to be fixed by entire sanctification," so it might come naturally to us to think of entire sanctification when we run into "carnal" or "carnality" in the wild. Problem : entire sanctification isn't always part of what's going on when "carnal" pops up. Example : 1 Cor. 3:1-4 This passage was part of the Sunday school lesson this last week in a curriculum I ran across. The comments in the lesson talked about how the Corinthians needed to be entirely sanctified to get this carnality dealt with. You know what's interesting? Paul doesn't mention entire sanctification as the solution to their carnality. Not a word. Maybe you're like me. Maybe when you hear the word "carnality," it's hard not to just hear it as "t...

My retelling of the legend of Sisyphus in the last post said a few things about how the world works. These are the ones that stood out to me, but there might be more that I overlooked. 1. Justice comes out in the end In my version of the story, Sisyphus’s punishment from the gods matched his crimes against people. The goddess’s judgment highlights the match-up: “In life you stole by trickery . So shall your life in death be an empty trick .” The repetition of “trick” and the comparison-word, “so,” show that the judgment matches the crimes. 2. There is an ultimate authority When he died, Sisyphus was subject to the judgment of the gods. In the story, that’s just how it is. There’s no suggestion of him resisting the gods--they are the ultimate authority in this story. 3. We need our work to be meaningful Sisyphus was condemned to eternal, meaningless labor. That’s a worse punishment than eternal but meaning ful labor. How well do you think these assertions match up to reality...

There’s a legend about a man named Sisyphus. He angered the Greek gods somehow, so they sentenced him to roll a huge stone to the top of a mountain. But each time he attempted to roll it to the top, he would slip, trip, lose his grip, and the stone would roll back down, and he would have to begin again the next day. As it turns out, he had to roll the stone, day after day, for eternity. From the way I just told that story, it’s hard to tell if I am saying something about how life works by telling it. The story itself is ambiguous--it could mean a number of things, but you don’t know whether I mean any of those things. Here’s a retelling. I’m using the same basic story, but emphasizing or adding things to make a few points. What does this story say about the way life works? Once, there was a man named Sisyphus, infamous for his quick wits, quick fingers and hard heart. Through deception, he became king of a large city. He used his power to become wealthy, and then he died. H...

When my oldest two brothers were very young — the second was still an infant , I think— the oldest loved to run a stick along the rungs of his brother’s crib. It sounded cool, kind of like a dull, toneless xylophone. The sleeping brother usually didn’t sleep through this instrumental performance, and after a while, my parents were exasperated, so my dad told my oldest brother a story. It was pretty simple. Once upon a time, there was a boy who woke up his little brother by running a stick along the rungs of his crib. This was bad, because the little brother needed to sleep! With tears in his eyes, my oldest brother interrupted the story. “The boy in the story is me! I did that to Timmy’s crib and woke him up. I’m so sorry!” Stories carry meaning. The meaning can be as specific as the contents of the story itself (“Aunt Mavis finally sold her house this Thursday to the man with the droopy mustache”), but it can also include more general assertions about right and wrong or how th...