New Thoughts (9/29/03-10/1/03)
At what point do discussions of doctrinal differences become empty and foolish disputes? This is the question put before me by this passage. I had thought it answered when I first worked through this, but I see that there is much more that Paul is addressing here. He is not simply reiterating himself to drive the point home, he is actually speaking to a number of different issues, all of which are, as it were, alternatives to sound doctrine. He delivers the same instruction, but on three different fronts. Much as he had addressed the particular ways in which sound doctrine should be addressed to the various groups within the church, he now warns against the particular ways in which various groups are likely to be distracted.
The first group Paul looks at are the intellectuals. Greece was particularly proud of its wise men, and thought highly of the orators and 'debaters of this age.' The art of rhetoric was an integral part of their educational system. Many of the early church fathers came from exactly this sort of background. The great danger and distraction to such men is that they will get caught up in considerations that have no real significance to the life of faith. Oh, how I know this temptation! It is easy, for instance, to look into the four Gospels, and become distracted with attempts to sort out the timeline of Christ's life. But what will this do for our soul? Not much. The significance of the Gospels is not in the chronology presented, but in Him whose life is laid out before us. Knowing the precise order of events in Jesus' life and ministry will not help us to live a godly life, it will merely satisfy curiosity.
We ought to notice that the record of Scripture makes such a determination unlikely if not impossible. We ought, like wiser men before us, recognize where God has placed a limit on our ability to pry into His mysteries, and leave them to His timing to reveal. To do otherwise is to seek out a cause to be proud of ourselves. I would go so far as to say that any man who laid claim to having figured out this chronicle of Christ would only be seeking to bolster his own pride.
I must be honest, here. Not too long ago, I had been reading the Gospels in the evening, and had felt this very desire - to sort out once and for all what order things really did happen in, and what significance was to be found in the differences of the four accounts we are given. The second half of that might be worthwhile, but the order itself is, I think, in the 'foolish controversy' category. It cannot, with the material God has given us, be declared beyond debate.
Thank You, Lord, for bringing me through this passage, to understand this balance point, before I turn my attention to that project. If indeed that is where You next lead me, lead me with a recollection of this lesson You have delivered, and guard me even in the remainder of this study from getting so caught up in the inconsequential that I miss what You are trying to say.
This same problem can be seen in the efforts of the Jesus Seminar, and their attempts to uncover the 'historical Jesus.' I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and suggest that they might actually have begun their pursuits with an eye towards the moral improvement, the increase of godliness, among those who read their findings. Whatever their start, though, the result has been truly terrible. They have become so caught up in this insistence upon uncovering something which cannot be uncovered that they have wandered away from whatever faith they once knew. They have become so enamored of their own vain theories and postulations that the import of Scripture has become meaningless to them. They see with their eyes, yet have no comprehension. They hear, but the words convey no meaning to them. Yet, they will not turn from their vanity, and return to Him who offers them life. Granted, the problems with that particular movement run far deeper, but this, I think, may be at the root of it.
The lesson for us, for me anyway, is to consider the usefulness of the doctrines we espouse. Consider the teaching and the study. Does it do anything towards the production of moral fruit? Are we teaching and being taught things which will improve upon the work which the Holy Spirit is doing in us? There are two proper purposes behind all good doctrine: Promoting the glory of God before man, and edifying man in the sight of God. Any message which does not speak to one or the other of these purposes is idle chatter, 'foolish controversy,' and unworthy of the attention of the children of God.
This is not to say that there is nothing to be gained by considering the history laid out across the pages of Scripture. Paul is simply reminding us to keep our focus on Christ, on the Kingdom, on the mission. While it may not be of use to try and nail down the sequence of events in the life of Christ, to understand the different views which the Gospels give us of His life's work may very well be fruitful. He gave it to us in that format for a reason, to be sure, and it would doubtless behoove us to understand His reason. Again, the message is that we ought always have that question before us in our studies, and in our conversations: Is this to God's glory? Does it help those hearing me to live a more godly life? If we can't answer 'yes' to one or the other of these questions, we must let it go, and make better use of the time God has given us.
Father, I suspect that there have been many times in my own studies that this guideline has not been followed. Keep me, Lord, from vain pursuits, but especially here in these times we spend together. If I have been caught up in things of mere curiosity, turn me from them. Help me to keep my focus in these times. Help me to keep sensitive to Your presence with me, to keep sensitive to Your interests in what You put before me. I thank You, Holy One, for the many times You have shown me that You are in control of the timetable of these studies, that though it may feel to me that I have settled for slavish pursuit of my own rigid agenda, it has all been by Your timing, for Your purpose. May it also be to Your glory!
You return me, with that thought, to the thing You have made the theme of my life: the celebration of Your Providence! Oh, how I thank You, my God, that You have so arranged the details of my life, that You have devoted so much attention to one as unworthy as I. With what event in my life shall I sorrow, knowing that You have ordained my steps, You who works all things for good! My Rock! My King! Whom or what shall I fear, knowing that You are forever near to me, yes even to the end of the age! You have arranged for me good works to do. You are within me, both to will and to work, working upon my heart that my heart might be the more devoted to You! Oh, may You ever find this servant humbly before You, available, obedient, and awaiting Your call.
I see a number of the commentators focusing upon the Jewish issue when they consider this passage. However, that is but one aspect of Paul's concern here, not the only aspect. Looking back to the opening of this letter, we can see that Paul expressed concerns about all who rebelled against sound doctrine, 'especially of the circumcision' (Ti 1:10). Notice that he is placing an accent here, not an exclusive focus. He doesn't accuse the Jews alone of being rebels against the truth, simply points out that they were a particularly noteworthy problem for the church in Crete at that moment. But the threats to the Church were then, and always are, far more numerous. Satan rarely attacks from a single front.
Indeed, in this focus on the Jews, I see the fallen nature of man displayed once more. It's the age old attempt to turn the attention on somebody else. We are not keen to feel God's focus on ourselves, if it's not a matter of receiving His blessings. All discipline is painful at the time. How often we, like children caught in our misbehavior, seek someone else to blame. It's been that way since the Fall! "It's this woman You gave me." Woe! A double redirection! Not only is it not my fault, God, I mean, she made me do it. But You Yourself gave me this woman. See, God? It's Your fault, not mine! And we've been that way ever since. There's a columnist in the papers who likes to bring out examples of what he terms 'the not-me decade,' a time where every foolish thing we do is somebody else's fault, and we're not afraid to sue them over our own stupidity. This is no new trend, though. As I said, it's been that way since our parents were evicted from the Garden. I wonder who they tried to sue. If anything has changed in recent times, it is only that the courts actually promote such foolishness by agreeing with those who are trying to redirect responsibility away from themselves. We are, sadly, firmly in the age of irresponsibility. It's the national pastime, and it shall go down as the national shame.
Now, clearly Paul does have concerns regarding the Jews who were seeking to intrude their traditions into the liberty of the Church. Any knowledge of his life at all makes that abundantly clear. The Jewish faction, both outside and inside the Church, had made the mission to the Gentiles nearly impossible. Those outside the Church had made Paul's life a life of constant danger. Though he was bringing them words of life, always giving them preeminence in his work, yet he was forever answered with threats of death. Inside the Church, he was faced with problems of a different nature. Few amongst the original group in Jerusalem had come to understand the inclusion of the Gentiles in God's plans. They remained so ingrained in the uniqueness of the Jewish people in God's estimation that they limited God. They were so entrenched in the traditions which had been taught them from the outset that they could not understand where God's command ended and manmade rules began. That this is the group Paul is addressing when he speaks of 'disputes about the Law' cannot be doubted.
What does that have to do with us today? Yes, there is still a Jewish movement in the Church, but the issues of the Law have long since been settled, haven't they? Let's face it, it didn't take all that long for the Gentiles to move from being the outsiders, the newcomers who needed to acclimate themselves to Jewish culture in the Church, to being the dominant force in the Church. Yet, many among us have the very same issues that those early Jewish believers faced. Many among us have been so firmly trained in traditions of what has become dead religiosity that we have difficulty discerning what God really requires. We all know families who show up without fail on Easter Sunday, or on Christmas Eve, but will not be found in the church at any other time. Most of us, if we were raised in the church - whether Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant, have had that particular church's rites and ceremonies so ingrained in our youth that even today, if we wander back into the church of our youth, we can participate with perfect accuracy without even a thought to what we're doing. It became automatic to us long ago, and probably always will be. I can recall church members from my youth who could sleep through pretty much the entire service, and yet still manage to stand up at every proper point in the program. Dead religiosity! A slavish attention to appearances without the slightest consciousness of what really mattered.
This is the dead letter being used as a weapon to destroy the life-giving work of the Spirit. The first battleground was that of the mind wide awake. Now, Paul has addressed the battleground of the mind lulled to sleep. In between these two battles, Paul addresses a third front - one which often gets missed, yet one that is of critical import today. He addresses it in the reference to genealogies.
Our immediate reaction is to look at this as another attack on the Judaizers, for we have been taught from our youth, and the Scriptures also make clear, what great weight the Jews placed upon their lineage. For the priesthood it was actually a necessary requirement of office to be able to trace one's descent from the proper tribe and family. However, I don't think this is what Paul is addressing in this verse. Rather, his attention is turned to another group that was of great danger to the Church in his day, the same group he battles in his letter to the church in Colossus, which is thought to have been written at about the same time. That group is the Gnostics.
They, too, were caught up in genealogical pursuits, but they thought to discern the lineage and ancestry of the gods, those they referred to as the aeons. Clearly, this group began far outside the walls of the church of the Living God, the Holy One, but they had found their way in. Used, as they were, to an endless array of gods, it was nothing to them to add one more, and doubtless it satisfied something in them to place Him in His proper spot in their genealogical map. What was shocking to Paul, and what ought to be shocking to us, is that the Church so readily accepted them into its walls, and allowed their message to pollute the pure light of the Gospel. In the Gentile church, this threat was surely more insidious than that of the Judaizers. Not many were likely to be attracted by a call to greater restriction (although there were probably some who were - asceticism has always had its place in man's ideas of holiness). However, coming from the same Pagan culture with the vast array of Greek gods - gods not so terribly unlike man, in fact, terribly like man - it was probably a comforting message to think that the God of the Jews, the I AM, was simply one more, another god like any other god, worth sacrificing to for safety's sake, but ignorable in the long run.
This same tendency can be seen today in the New Age movement, where the 'faithful' are offered a menu of gods and god-traits they can choose from, allowing them to create their own god, which need not have anything to do with anything anybody else decides to believe in. This same spirit of deception which led to the Gnostic movement, which has now resurfaced in the New Age movement, is also present in some branches of what was the Church of Christ. Whatever may have been the start of the Unitarian denomination, for instance, its evolution into the Unitarian Universalism of today has brought in this same lessening of God to one among many possible options. It is evident, as well, in the many efforts at ecumenicalism in recent decades, which have brought us to the point where many can no longer see the difference between Muslim and Christian, between Hindu and Christian. It's an 'all roads' philosophy that man throws up in the face of the One True God who proclaims that in Him and in Him alone will we find life.
Now, just as one can find traces of the Judaizers in the issue of genealogies, one can also find traces of the Gnostics in the issue of disputes about the Law. It's almost as though each group had its major, but also minored in the error of the other. In the case of the Gnostic and the Law, the issue was not in trying to determine every slightest stricture upon the day to day actions of the faithful. Rather, they were looking for some deeper, mystical meaning. This is what defined Gnosticism, especially as it became manifest in the Church; they were always laying claim to some deeper, hidden, knowledge that the average believer couldn't get at. Necessary rites of initiation were necessary to gain entrance into this circle of secret understanding.
This is perhaps the most insidious of all dangers to the Charismatic wing of the church. It was particularly dangerous in the early church, I think, precisely because the gifts of the Spirit were so active there. Because people were accustomed to 'revealed knowledge,' to Spiritual activities, it was not so strange to think that others might be finding deeper things, things they could then impart to those not so gifted. Familiar with religious rites of every variety, it was no strange thing to think that perhaps some special ceremony was needful before one could enter into this same superior gifting. After all, hadn't even the simplest form of Christianity required such rites as baptism?
Here was the greatest battle of the early church, training up these new believers, and some of the more senior believers for that matter, to discern between what was of the Spirit and what was merely of the spirits. Over and over again the warnings come. Even though angels come to you with some new message, they are accursed if they disagree with Truth. False prophets and false teachers will abound. They went out from us, but they were not of us. We do well, in light of these warnings, to remember that all Scripture was recorded for the edification of us who live at the end of the ages. The errors of the past are constantly repeating themselves in the present. No heresy has been so thoroughly debunked that it will not be heard again by ears too willing to hear something 'new.'
As I said, this seems to me the great peril of the Charismatic church today, although I gladly count myself part of the same. In some branches of this wing of the church, rites of initiation have been established. I think, for instance, of the Assemblies of God, where speaking in spiritual tongues is considered a necessary precursor to holding office in the church. Find a basis in Scripture for that, if you can! Tongues are fine, and assuredly active today, but nowhere will you find them declared as a requirement for serving the body. No, as we've seen in this letter, as well as in other places where the office of deacon and elder are discussed, the concerns are with character, not with displays of special gifts.
There is also a strong tendency in our particular branch of Christianity to look for some deeper, hidden meaning in the plain text of Scripture. Perhaps it's simply a symptom of teachers trying to remain fresh when the message is millennia old. Perhaps it's something worse. When Martin Luther brought the Scriptures to the people, the great fear of the established Church was that the people would misinterpret the meaning in their ignorance. But the message of the Gospel is simple, delivered by simple people, finely tuned by Omniscient God to reach the ears and the understanding of all whom He has chosen to call His own. Today, the danger is greater that Scripture will be misunderstood by those determined to find some new wisdom, some deeper mysticism, something fresh, in what is, after all, a simple yet powerful message. Therein lies a great danger, the danger that we are teaching not God's word, but man's opinion. When we go prowling about after some deeper, hidden thing, it is not God we are seeking any longer. We are allowing ourselves to fall into the Gnostic error, and seeking something to boost our pride. We love to be in possession of something exclusive, something that sets us apart from the crowd. God longs for us to be in possession of the Truth, which will indeed make us set apart, but set apart unto Him, not from His other children.
More widespread even than this is the willingness to hear anything that claims to be from the Spirit without question. Whatever prophecy comes out is given the amen without thought. In many cases, and in many ways, we have forgotten to depend on the clear Word of God, and come to insist on something freshly 'revealed' by the Spirit. We ought rather to fear such new revelations, to know a holy dread should they come. Such messages place upon the hearer a great responsibility to search out the Scriptures and see if they be true. The gifts of the Spirit are most assuredly alive and well today. God has not changed, and though I have sought to understand the position of those who say they're not, I cannot find, even in their own Scripture citations, cause to think that those gifts were limited to the time of the Church's establishing. It strikes me that they are simply so afraid of the potential for wrongful use of those gifts (and rightfully so) that they would rather avoid them completely. The motivation is, I think, quite honorable, and displays a most appropriate awe and reverence for the holiness of God, and the unique authority of His revealed word. However, I still find it to be in error, for it denies God His sovereign right to speak to His people. It denies His own declaration that He does not change. Throughout the record of Scripture, we find Him speaking most personally to His children. By what right, then, will we insist that He stop speaking now? Are we, like the Jews at the foot of Mount Sinai, so struck with fear by His voice that we will beg Him to be silent?
But the issue which the more traditional Protestants fear is a real issue. If we will not learn to accept the clear meaning of Scripture, rather than insisting on some more mystically pleasing message underneath; if we will not learn to walk in the simple lessons of Christ, rather than seeking the prideful possession of something new to tickle our imaginations; if we will not expend the effort to validate what claims His authority against what His authority has already declared true: if we will not do these things, then the charges of the more orthodox church are laid upon us with full validity. With liberty comes responsibility. If we wish to know the freedom of life in the Spirit, we must take upon ourselves the responsibility of assuring that it is indeed the Holy Spirit with Whom we have to do. We must learn to satisfy ourselves with the message God has chosen to deliver throughout the ages, and not insist on something new. He has proclaimed salvation! What more will we insist He say?
This is the point, then, which defines sound teaching, sound doctrine, and sound practice: What the Holy Spirit will teach, by whatever means He may teach it, whether by the illumination of the Word, or by word of knowledge, or by prophecy, or by direct communication; He will never, never declare to us anything that is not in full accord with what Scripture already declares. He can only teach us what the Father has declared True, for He is One. Father, Son, and Spirit, triune in person, and triune in office, are yet One in essence and One in purpose. He is Trinity, yet He is Unity. To deny either is to deny God. To refuse Him the unique position of God is to deny God. To refuse Him His triune nature is to deny God's revealed word. Both errors have been made repeatedly, and will doubtless be made repeatedly until He comes once more.
Test the doctrine you are taught. Test the doctrine you yourself teach. Does it glorify the Lord our God? Does it help us to walk holy before Him who created us to glorify Him? Does it strengthen us in our effort to be set apart for Him alone? Are we being empowered to live godly in this present godless age? If the message is not contributing to these things, then we must give no countenance to either message or messenger. The matters they bring before us are worthless, a waste of time better spent in His presence. John told us to not even give greeting to such vain messengers. Paul tells us here to shun them, to cut off all communication with those who refuse to walk in the light of Truth. Don't even bother with debating with them, because they're not going to hear you anyway, and your efforts at arguing their points only lends them credence in the ears of those listening to the dispute.
This is the tactic Scripture mandates for us, and yet I see that the world has become much better at it than we. This is exactly the treatment Christians are given in the forum of public debate today. The atheistic intellectual elites no longer bother disputing the fine points of theology, nor do they concern themselves in the least with Christian viewpoints on the great moral questions of the day. We don't even enter into the discussion. Moral authority is now sought out in the halls of science which once knew themselves to be under God's authority. But God has been shaken off in the name of facts. Truth has been set aside in favor of perception, and the Church has been sidelined by the very methods it was supposed to use against worldly intrusions. We see in the history of the Church, that rather than following God's prescription for purity, it preferred to use secular means, purging what it considered to be pollutants by means of violence. Now, that willingness to appear secular in its pursuit of holiness has rendered it useless in bringing holiness to the secular world. It is seen as nothing more than another form of the body politic, and God is not visible in her any longer. Until and unless we begin to operate in full accord with God's will, doing things in the way He has commanded, and going only where and so far as He has told us to go, He will remain invisible in our best efforts. When we wake up and begin pursuing His paths once more, we will once again turn the world on its head!
I want to return, now, to the contrast of what is sound and worthwhile in doctrine, and what is no better than foolish controversy. To many in the church today doctrine has become a very negative term. It speaks to them of dry services and dead words. But this is not the case at all, and is certainly not the view Scripture gives us of doctrine. Rather than abhor doctrine as the dull pursuit of cloistered intellectuals, Scripture invites us to fall in love with doctrine. But our love is not to be given lightly. It can only be given to such doctrine as is sound, and what doctrine is sound will be found to be useful in our pursuit of a holy God. How can we not fall in love with what speaks, after all, of the One who has captivated our hearts? Teaching of doctrine can be dry, certainly, but it need not be so. For myself, I have found myself repeatedly brought to a state of wonder by the intricate connections of sound doctrine.
I have compared it before to a symphony, and this still strikes me as perhaps the best human expression of such an interconnection of seemingly unrelated items. In the symphony, we are hearing numerous instruments, most of which are probably not doing anything particularly spectacular. The majority of parts played in such music are not terrifyingly complex. How complex can a cymbal get? Yet, in the interplay of these relatively simple melodies, something wonderful emerges. String sections interweave their parts into something greater than the sum of their parts. The horns, combining their efforts, create something impossible for a single horn to do. The variety within the score seems almost endless, and yet the work remains cohesive in its entirety. Themes emerge, are submerged beneath waves of creativity, and reemerge once more, perhaps restated and rearranged.
Sound doctrine strikes me in much the same way. The parts, considered in isolation, may not be particularly exciting to think about. Indeed, we may not immediately see any great connection between a particular doctrine and the rest of what we know to be true. But, upon further inspection, connections will be found in abundance. Over time, I have found that I simply cannot consider a portion of doctrine in isolation. It seems that I am inevitably led to consider how that doctrine intertwines with other doctrines, until it seems I must try once again to take all the threads of Truth in at once. Hearing the parts, as it were, (perhaps it could be thought of as hearing the orchestra warming up), the soul begins to thrill in anticipation of hearing the whole. This is the way doctrine has come to be for me. I begin to sense how things fit together, and my spirit within me thrills to consider what the complete picture must look like. Desire burns within to be so completed in Him that the entire symphony of His Truth can truly be appreciated. Fall in love with sound and useful doctrine, indeed! To the soul that has awakened to His delights, to the soul that recognizes that doctrine, where it is true, is the work of the Beloved's hands, the merest glimpse of Truth, the joy of that brief gaze is enough to overwhelm the senses!
Again, though, I must recognize the limits placed on that pursuit. Even as I rejoice in the pursuit of the doctrines of holiness, I find this new piece put in place. There is doctrine which is part of this great symphony of God's goodness, and there are doctrines which have no place in the score. They are nothing more than the empty fancies of men caught up in their own thoughts - vain imaginations. Praises be to God! For He has declared in His own revelation of Himself where that line is to be drawn. He has defined what is sound! He has given us the means of recognizing His Truth amidst all these other claimants to truth. If it is Truth, it will be found to be to His glory, and it will be found to be useful to us as we seek to walk in the holiness our adoption demands.
Now, in this present life, we are children of God, though it has not yet been fully revealed to us what we shall be at His coming. In this present life, we are already His children, and He has instructed us with Fatherly love and concern to live godly here, now. Holiness is not something that can wait until we get home. It needs to be pursued with unmitigated passion while we remain on the road. If we love Him, we will obey His commands, and His command for us is live like a child of Mine, walk as My representatives, stand as living testimonies to the goodness of God. These are the things sound doctrine turns our attention to, and these are the things sound doctrine teaches us how to do. If the course of our studies is not bringing us to a greater shout of praise to God, if our studies are not bringing us to a place of greater godliness, if the words we study are not guiding our course towards the paths of righteousness, then we have settled for vain imaginations. We have been distracted from the Way, and must needs seek His direction to return to the place He has called us to.
Holy Spirit, You have come to guide me, You were sent to guide me into all Truth. I know that I am not always easy to guide, that like any other sheep in Your fold my tendency is to wander. Oh, what peace, then, to know I have a Faithful Shepherd! Oh, what thankfulness of heart to know that when I have slipped away You have been faithful to round me up again! Yet, I would that I would stray no more. Is it beyond me to stay on course, Lord? If You have commanded me to holiness, if You are here (and I know You are) guiding me, how is it that I still break ranks so easily?
Lord, once more I've heard the warnings of this passage, as You have opened my eyes to the distractions that come to the man of God. You know my heart, and You know my thoughts. You know the workings of my mind, for it is the creation of Your hands, the product of Your imagination. Minister to me, then, in Your perfection, that I not be distracted by empty intellectual games. Work upon me, my Craftsman, that these studies will not wander into vanity, but will continue to stir up in me that which will help me to be pleasing to You. That is my one desire, Lord, to be pleasing to You, to be - somehow - a blessing to You who have blessed me so greatly.
Indeed, You have placed me in pleasant fields, my God. When I consider the course I had pursued in my life, and where You have taken me since You came and found me on that path, I stand in awe. I consider this home You have now given us, my family and I, and how can I not rejoice in Your goodness! Has my hand accomplished these things? Oh! If I had remained on the road I was traveling, I doubt I would even be alive today, let alone living in such fashion as You have provided for me. God! I think upon those whom I have worked with in the past, and who have been seeking for a job a year and more now, yet You have provided. Not a moment have You left me without means of income. I am not ignorant of what it's like in the marketplace of man right now. You have done wonders for this family, Holy One, and I stand wholly indebted to Your graciousness towards me.
Once more, precious Lord, I commit all that You have blessed me with, this house, this life, this time, to Your service. Use it, use me, as You will. I am not seeking empty monuments, nor can I find satisfaction in these things, blessings though they be. My satisfaction is in serving Your purposes, Lord. My heart longs to serve You more fully and more perfectly. Attune my senses to know Your least command, that I may do all Your will. In this, Father God, I will know myself truly blessed. Guard my heart, Lord, lest I allow this outpouring of Your abundance upon me to distract me from You. Let not this faith You have given me be weakened or dormant within me, but keep the fire of desire for You burn ever hotter within me.
Paul concludes the doctrinal portion of this letter with what ought to be a matter of dread to us. He addresses the issue of heretics. There was a time in the history of the church where the mere breathing of this word was enough to cause fear and trembling in the one accused of being heretical. Such charges, in that time, carried with them a death sentence, and that death would not be pleasant or easy. Nowadays, the word seems to have lost its power to overawe us. We have lost much of our concern over the accuracy of our teachings, and have become so accustomed to the denominationalism which has been the norm for the church for centuries now that it's no longer of any great concern to us when churches split. Yet, this is exactly what Paul is talking about at the end of this letter.
He's no longer concerning his thoughts with the critical doctrines of faith. He's made them abundantly clear, set the boundaries and placed the guideposts. It's the little foxes spoiling the fields that now occupy his thinking. There have been, in the course of history, splits in the church which were made necessary by the corrupted doctrines insisted upon by one faction or another. The birth of the Protestant movement was such a case. The true Gospel had become so distorted, the purpose of the Church so thoroughly corrupted, that no choice was left but to depart. A careful study of that time will show that those who became the founders of the Protestant movement were not setting out to break away, but hoped to reform what already was. They longed to correct the error in the one church, and keep the church one. But those who profited by what the church had become would not have it.
I suspect the Episcopalians are facing such a dilemma today, I rather hope they are actually. For, if they are not, then it can only be that all concern for God has departed from that place, and man's opinion holds sway. When men are being placed in positions of leadership who have no concern for God's own requirements for that office, when the clear message of Scripture in regards to the fitness of officers is set aside, and we are told that He accepts any and all men as His administrators, something is really wrong. Such a church is a church of Christ no more, but is merely a temple of man. If that church will not purify itself, it will have lost all credibility and all power. It may manage to hold onto some of the forms of godliness (although how that can be in the face of such immoral practices in the top ranks is beyond me), but the reality of godliness, the power of the presence of Almighty God, will be far from it, except, perhaps, in His wrath.
On the other hand, there have been any number of splits which occurred over the most inconsequential of matters: whether baptism ought to be by submersion or by sprinkling of water; whether the worship music should be organ alone, voice alone, modern or classical; whether communion should be by communal cup, or by separate cups; the list goes on. These are the issues of heresy, as Paul speaks of it now, just as much as the critical matters of faith. A heretic, in the sense of this letter, is any person who seeks division rather than unity. The heretic is a man of pride, bound and determined to be considered right however wrong he may be. He will hear no argument, heed no word of truth, however eloquently and passionately it be delivered, and will reject and refuse all attempts to reconcile. He is committed to setting himself in the place of authority, even if he is the only one to acknowledge that authority.
I should point out that this does not, in any way, require that we all understand every little detail of the Church in identical fashion. Indeed, there are some pretty major points upon which my pastor and I disagree. Yet, we walk in unity. We work as one towards one purpose, the purpose of the One Holy Omnipotent God of all Creation. He has given us different understandings, yet one heart. There have been times when this unity was tried, when I thought I might have to depart, yet God has maintained us in one accord through it all, bringing words of comfort before my eyes, and showing me that division is not the way I am to go. For all that, there are views and doctrines which I hold to be true today which, in years past, I would have denied most vehemently. My understanding is not so perfect that I dare trust myself to myself entire. At the same time, I know my pastor is but human, as well. He is not the revealed will of God, He is not the Gospel, and holds not that level of authority. Yet, he has been placed in the position of spiritual leader over this congregation, and I know it is an office he fills with utmost concern. I know that he labors with all that is in him to walk humbly before his God, and this is enough, for it is what God requires of us.
For myself, I know that pride is one of those things the Lord is forever working on in me. He gently chips away at it, occasionally in painful fashion as a particularly large chunk must be removed. Yet, he is constantly moving me towards the humility that is becoming to a child of the Father. For this I am thankful. I know it is one of my great weaknesses - pride of thought, pride of action, the desire to be right at all times - yet, He makes certain that I know better. He hasn't given up on me yet, nor shall He, for He is faithful as none other.
I am doubly glad that He is so devoted to bringing a greater humility to me, when I consider what Matthew Henry points out in regards to heresy, for humility, he says, is one of the great safeguards against that disease. This humility before God, and before His appointed leaders, combined with a devotion to Truth (and God is Truth) not only in thought and study, but also in life and practice, stands as the antidote to any trace of divisiveness and heresy in us, and serves to inoculate us against those who would spread that horrible disease to us.
As a final note regarding this issue of the heretic, it's worth noting that the perversion of such a one, in that word's definition, stands as polar opposite to the regeneration in which the believer walks. Both words - perversion and regeneration - indicate a complete change. If, in regeneration, you have not seen such a complete change in yourself, I suggest you look harder! I know that for me, though there are too many traces of the former man for my taste, the change from who I was is still so thorough that I doubt those who knew me when would think me the same man now. It's a complete change. It has to be. Corruption must be thrown off that the incorruptible may come! Flesh cannot coexist with stone. The stone must be removed to make way for the flesh.
The perversion of heresy is an equally complete change, but for the worse, not the better. In such a one as would seek purposefully to destroy the unity of the body of Christ, what flesh there was has been excised, and a dead monument of stone put in its place. That man is of no more use than the idols of old - a work of dead materials incapable of responding to any word or deed of the living. This is why Paul tells us to leave off trying to recover such a one. He is beyond hearing. Like Pharaoh, his heart has been hardened, and however much his delusions may be destroying him he will not change course.
As with the rules for office, the rules for official discipline are also plainly stated in the pages of Scripture. There is a course to be followed: first, a private and personal appeal for correction of errors, then, if this fails, a few fellow believers ought be brought along to attempt persuasion once more. Should this not be enough, then the leadership of the church is to be involved, and if their leadership will not be acknowledged, the determined fox in the fields is to be publicly turned out from communion. No hidden act, but done with full transparency, full disclosure, and all compassion. Where Paul had to exercise such authority, yet his heart was filled with the hope that under the cruel discipline of Satan, the one turned out might yet find God' mercy in repentance and be restored.
This is the course we are given to pursue. This is exactly the course Paul is advocating here. We don't simply give up on a man at the first sign of disagreement, but we expend all appropriate effort to restore him. Only when, by the path of God's rule of discipline, he has been shown obdurate in his error are we to give up. At that point, such a one must be removed from the body, for he has become a cancer, and his disease must be excised lest it spread. This is a hard thing, and I cannot imagine that any true minister of God can be glad in fulfilling this particular official duty. It can only bring tears and heartbreak to a pastor to have to turn out any man from the fold, for the whole purpose of ministry is to bring the lost in. Yet, if we are to walk in obedience to our Lord, if we are to be good shepherds tending those he has entrusted to our care, that care and obedience must be shown in doing the job He has assigned in the way He has required.
Lord, once more I am drawn back to prayer. I come in thanksgiving that You have given us just such a shepherd, one whose heart is tender for his charges, but one who is able to be stern in discipline when the occasion demands. I come in thanksgiving that there is one in leadership over Your children whose concern for their wellbeing is so great that he will suffer heartbreak and suffering to keep them from harm's way. God, strengthen him, for the labor is great. Open the ears of we who sit under his teaching, that we might truly hear Your voice in his words, and hearing, put what we have heard into action. Holy Spirit, guide him unerringly. Guard his words and his actions, lest he, all unwilling, lead any into error by some accidental word.
How often, my God, I have seen Your gentle course corrections with this man. There have been times when I've felt something going astray, as You have protected my ears and thoughts from accepting that mistake. Yet, You have been faithful not only to guard my own thoughts, but to bring correction to and from the pulpit. You are indeed faithful to all Your children, and I am blessed to know myself in a house where You dwell. Forgive me, my Father, for having thought of moving out from under such a covering. Yes, there are times when I long for something more attuned to my style of learning, but is that not why You have given me this time? You have ensured that my mind remains as well fed as my spirit. Thank You, though, for making certain that my spirit is as well fed as my mind! Thank You, Lord, for showing me what a pastor is, for teachers are plentiful, but a pastor is a rare thing. Keep him ever in Your care, oh Lord.
Admonish / admonition - An in-depth look (10/2/03-10/18/03)
