Smoke

Many people's homes just went up in smoke and for many of them their entire lives. Amazingly so few people died. What incredible heroes firefighters are!

Here in Palm Springs, we were relatively far from the fires. Still I have seen our own mountains blazing in the night and so I know that ominous feeling of an approaching fire. There's is hardly a more destructive force in all of nature (Tsunamis not withstanding!). Of course, some of the fires were not started by nature. What kind of depraved individual chooses to light a fire that can destroy life and property I can't fathom.

The Message has an interesting section from Eccl. 5. It talks about working all of our lives for a salary of smoke. It seems many tragically found that out literally these past few weeks.

We feel blessed by God to have our homes and then they may go up in smoke. "Meaningless, meaningless" says the Teacher! Indeed, it might be if all of your life is tied up into your material things. Faith in God keeps one from despair in such times, or so I have to believe. If you life is built upon the rock of Jesus Christ, then everything that has value to you can't go up in smoke. Such disasters cause one to reflect on his/her life and what it is all built on. It also puts many of our religious squabbles in perspective. Faith is where the rubber meets the road. If it can't help me when facing disaster then all the right religious argumentation can't help me. That is why our faith must permeate every facet of our life. Otherwise all that we are might just go up in smoke.

Contemplating Authority

Churches of Christ, though not original with us, see Scripture as the lone authority for Christian faith and practice with a special emphasis on the New Testament. Yet, is this not problematic for us? We claim to restore the Christian faith back to the first century using a canon they didn't have or use! Oh, I know there was some circulation of NT letters and the gospels were used early, but they didn't sit around and seek out a supposed embedded pattern in Acts and the NT epistles to determine how they should 'do' church.

Truthfully, authority for the early church was found in the apostles and, of course, the Old Testament. Yet, they didn't look for how to organize the church or what exactly to do in the assemblies in the OT. Could it be that such things were not so important? New practice was established in the light of the resurrection and direction of the apostles. So, communion was central to the early practice of the church. So was baptism. But is everything recorded in the NT intended to give a pattern of church practice for all of history? I highly doubt this.

This is a crucial question for us today. We all agree that ultimate authority is God's word. But the problem is that it must be interpreted and applied! Who's the authority for that? Can I go into my bedroom and act as if I was reading it for the first time apart from any influence historical or otherwise? Alexander Campbell seemed to think so. I don't agree with him.

I cannot interpret scripture apart from my own heritage and tradition, my own biases and assumptions about even the purpose of scripture. I bring into the text questions that are foreign to the original intent of the author. So, I must acknowledge that there is no such thing as starting from scratch. I also must acknowledge that the community plays a key role in interpreting scripture. I don't get to do this all on my own.

The Bible may be the ultimate authority, but we are fooling ourselves if we think it is the only authority in our lives. We cannot interpret it apart from our experiences, tradition, and reason (cf. Wesley's quadrilateral). I wish the issue of authority were as simple as we think it is. I know I don't buy the Catholic view of authority (i.e. the Church interprets scripture in an absolute sense). I'm still wrestling with all of this. I will write more when I figure something out!

Call Me A Convert

I'm at school and have some reading to do that I've been procrastinating! Hey, you can't read 24/7, though I probably need to in order to keep up! I've only been in grad school for six weeks, but already I've been converted in some of my ideas. One of these "conversions" has to do with scientific apologetics.

I really liked philosophical apologetics and loved evidences for the resurrection. I believe these are important. However, I felt wary of scientific apologetics, because I felt that it made the Bible a science book. I figured that God made the universe and anyone who didn't believe that really had a moral issue and not an intellectual one. So, it seemed to me a waste of time to publicly converse about science with atheists.

What I didn't' realize is how far-reaching Darwinism had become, how it touched nearly every field of study (including theology). I never realized how it seeps in and is an acid (a term from atheist Daniel Dennett) to every other belief. I never realized how much Christians had just turned over science to those with knowledge but lacking wisdom, and the consequences of all of this. I also never realized how much effort goes into Darwinists covering faulty evidence and outright lies.

The light exposes the darkness. We are light. Therefore, we must expose the darkness for what it is. I still don't believe that the best strategy is to argue about dinosaurs, the flood, and the age of the earth. Rather, we should harness our efforts on the concept of Intelligent Design, which actually has much more science than Darwinism supporting it. Of course, there is a strong academic prejudice against ID (or any theory that presupposes a god). Shall we just give up then? No, I believe we must take the battle as far as we can, exposing the lies that hold so many captive, and tell the good news that we have a Creator! Like I said...I'm a convert...thanks again to Nancy Pearcy and her book Total Truth.

Jesus is God!

It used to be easier for me to say. Don't get me wrong; I've always believed that Jesus is God, but the title grew a little uncomfortable for me. Perhaps that is because the New Testament rarely makes such a direct statement and opts rather for "Son of God." I understood the implications of that title as well. I understood what it meant for Jesus to be called the image of the invisible God or "who being in very nature God..." I was moved by the profound declaration of Jesus when he said, "Before Abraham was I AM!" And nothing gives me goose bumps more than that climatic scene of worship in Rev. 5 where all of creation bows before him and sings the seven fold song of praise. I knew all this and would declare that Jesus is God, but I admit that I wasn't completely comfortable saying it so directly.

I feared in my church history class it might not increase my confidence. I was afraid I might discover that the official church statement at Nicea would be more arbitrary than I always wanted to believe. How would I feel if the earliest Christians (after the 1st century) didn't interpret those passages about the divinity of Jesus in the same way we did and then they figured they all had to decide something so that they just voted Jesus is God into Nicea?

My study of history has done just the opposite. Whatever hesitation I felt about saying it as directly as the title of this blog says has vanished. It is evident to me that Clement and Justin were articulating this view of Jesus from early in the 2nd century. It is clear that this was the dominant belief of the church from the earliest of days. The only reason why the church had to do what it did at Nicea was because Arius and his cronies challenged the orthodoxy of what was already accepted. It was further impressed on me that the entire history of the church depended on the Orthodox position (which was in great jeopardy even after Nicaea) winning out!

I feel that I can now say more than ever that Jesus is God (as I said I've always believed this, but can express it with even greater conviction now). There was not a time when he was not...to contradict Arius. It only increases the majesty of Jesus even more in my heart to feel this conviction rekindled in my heart. The Creator of the universe became man and gave his life for his creation. That is good news and there is no good news if Jesus is not God in the flesh!

I also see now how serious this issue was and is. People want to pretend that what you believe about Jesus doesn't matter as long as you live your life in a certain way. Even the Arians knew that was hog wash. The identity of Jesus is the core of Christian faith. Either he's God and is our Savior or he's something other than God and not worthy of our worship or qualified to be our Savior. The early Christians (first three centuries of Christianity) felt that even the semantics of how you expressed the relationship between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were essential. That's how much was at stake in their view.

I may do another post about him, but Athanasius was a hero. You might say he saved the Christian faith. We honor him by not treating lightly what was worthy of an entire generation of church leaders' work. May we not repeat the mistakes of Arius, but rather proclaim with all the faithful Christians of old; Jesus is God!