But this suggestion of a suffering God and a creation-affirming God of redemption … does this story get carried on by Paul in Colossians or is his gospel the fullness of that gospel? So, we turn to the end of the 6th chp in Colossians Remixed.

Is the kingdom of the beloved Son a Foucauldian regime of truth? That’s their question. Be careful not to get Rick Rolled. 8) .
The exodus liberation of the Son is a new exodus. It is a kingdom of loving inclusion and this is established in a way radically different from a regime of truth. The violence is absorbed by the Son not dispersed on others. Defeat is not by violence but by sacrificial love.
The story of the cross subverts the regime of truth that is found in power and totalizing structures. The cross is the “victory march of the victim” (111). Paul is against the power language games.
The story of the cross subverts exclusionary stories because it is a story for everyone. “And through him God was pleased to reconcile all things” (Col 1:20).
Here’s a question that comes to my mind this week: Is it possible to avoid this Foucauldian sense of violence and not be a universalist? How is the Christian claim to universal truth not violent if only those who accept this all-inclusive, suffering-creational story are the redeemed?
[Added: This is the very theme that Hans Boersma takes up in his book on Violence, Hospitality, and the Cross.]