In Honor of Fleming Rutledge
‘and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.’ (Revelation 22:2)
I recently had the pleasure of attending a gathering in her honor, as a preacher, writer, and encourager of younger clergy. (If you are interested in reading some of her work, you might try the Gospel and the New York Times and the more recent Crucifixion). She has had a life-long burden to renew preaching and teaching by restoring their focus on the cross and resurrection of Jesus as the gravitational center of interpretation of the Scriptures. (She talked about this in the clergy conference she did for us eight years ago). News about God’s work on our behalf, graciously given, invites the response of faith.
All of this is, in theological parlance, the doctrine of justification, in contrast to our own efforts, moral and religious, called ‘sanctification.’ The terms track the Pauline distinction between grace and law. For some this all will have a reformed sound to it, though in fact these terms were the common ones for a millennium of Church teaching between the Fall of Rome and the Reformation. However important that Pauline theme may be, it may sound too narrow- aren’t there many other important things the Bible has to teach us? Why the need to have one heading under which everything can be organized, and why this one in particular? Other refugees from reformed Churches may worry that a strong doctrine of predestination cannot be far behind, while evangelical newbies may feel that justification too easily turns the faith into a formula.
In preparation for that seminar, I reread Fleming’s book on the cross, and was struck by how many different topics it covers- schools of Biblical scholarship, archeology, social and political theory, the prophets on social justice, modern liberal theology, apocalyptic, the pitfalls of the preacher, etc. How then are we to explain her interest singularly in one thing, and yet in many things? The Biblical image of the tree planted and flourishing by the river (Psalm 1:3, as well as Revelation 21) comes to mind. The tree spreads its branches and provides space for a myriad of the birds of the air (Matthew 13:32). This is first of all Christ, of course, but also the space which His Gospel creates, for the diversity of the Church, but also for a diversity of concerns, ministries, pursuits, etc. Justification is not narrow, though it is singular, and that in turn provides a lens through which to see Christian life together and Christian thought.
(Footnote: the gathering I spoke of was sponsored by Wycliffe College in Toronto, which has had a long and fruitful collaboration with Fleming. A seminary too, dedicated to the Gospel, can aspire to the same spaciousness!)
