Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Christianity

  • Experiencing the (Baptism of the) Holy Spirit

    Experiencing the (Baptism of the) Holy Spirit

    This is a topic where I tend to make just about everyone uncomfortable. Long time readers may recall a previous discussion of speaking in tongues, and my own experience of it. Those who expect me to be intellectually oriented and rational are uncomfortable with mystical experiences, and many who are comfortable with the mystical experiences are deeply troubled by my tendency to analyze.

    But the fact is that I am one person, i.e. the same person who examines data about the historical Jesus and expresses skepticism of some of the details recorded in the gospels also claims to experience the risen Jesus in a personal way. So when Adrian Warnock started talking about the experience of Holy Spirit baptism, I decided to say a word or two.

    I’m not going to defend my particular theology in this post, but let me simply state that I believe that Holy Spirit baptism can, and ideally should occur at the time of one’s baptism in to the Christian faith. Nonetheless in the book of Acts we have numerous instances where the two experiences are separated. I believe nobody comes to Christ in the first place without the work of the Holy Spirit, but the idea of the baptism of the Spirit involves one personally experiencing and being transformed by it.

    At the same time I want to guard against the notion that this experience is singular, that one checks off the boxes of conversion, then baptism in the Holy Spirit, and then one has attained. I don’t like the idea of Christians who have “attained.” I think they tend to fall quickly into pride. I know I would, so if I ever get to the point where I believe I have attained, it will be the surest sign that I haven’t. I know I’d fall straight into spiritual pride without passing Go or collecting my $200.

    I do remember a specific experience at the time of my own baptism at age nine. I was in Mexico with my missionary parents and had to convince them and a Spanish speaking pastor that I knew what I was doing. It was the strong conviction that had come on me that made me able to do so. They were very skeptical.

    But I want to discuss a later experience, that came when I was working in the church. This happened several years ago. I was trying to get material written for the early stages of Pacesetters Bible School, and I would be interrupted frequently. But one week almost the whole church staff including the pastor was going to be out of town on a mission trip, and I was looking forward to a week of writing with few interruptions. It was not to be.

    One of the things about “mystical” or “spiritual” experiences that I have noticed is that they do not occur for my convenience. My Monday of that week happened as I had hoped. I got a great deal done. On Tuesday I was praying through my prayer list. I had an extensive prayer list, and was quite systematic about praying for the people on it. Having checked off my list, I felt that I had done my part in praying for the congregation.

    Included on my list were all the college students and all the church leaders. As I began praying through the list that day I was interrupted by a voice. Now all the more intellectual folks and those who are not Christians are permitted here to doubt my sanity. I generally just assume it’s loosely attached. But I did hear a voice. It said, “Stop.”

    So I stopped a moment and then started to pray for that person again. Again, I heard “Stop!” Then the voice began to question me about these persons. What were their gifts? Regarding the students it asked me what they were studying, when they would be finished, and what their ambitions were. For the church leaders it asked me what their specific roles were.

    Now the fact is that I didn’t know most of this stuff. They were on the staff or on committees, or they were students, so their names were on my list. I didn’t have a clue as to who they were personally. Then the voice asked me, “How do you expect to function as a teacher in the church if you don’t even know what these people are supposed to be doing?”

    Good question! But I’m a stubborn person. I argued with that voice for the remainder of the week, from during the morning Tuesday through around noon Friday. By noon Friday I was pretty much done. I think I had a mild idea of how Elijah must have felt when God said, “What are you doing here?” (1 Kings 19:9)

    What happened at noon on Friday? Finally I admitted that I needed to change the way I did business. I was all in the books. I planned curriculum according to what I thought people (in general) needed to know. I didn’t really want to know the people themselves. That was messy and took up too much time.

    It was a transforming moment in ministry for me. I may be insane to argue with a voice for several days. Each day I returned to the office intending to work, and it didn’t happen. When I shut down and went home, things went back to normal. But that insanity was transforming. People noticed the difference. They would ask me, “Who are you and what have you done with Henry Neufeld?” The main obvious difference was that I started taking a personal interest in people’s lives, their call, and their work in the church. I started to try to meet those needs.

    Now this seems fairly obvious in hindsight. Isn’t that simply good people skills? But at the time I didn’t exercise that variety of people skills, and due to my knowledge in other areas, and basic teaching skill, people put up with me anyhow. It took this spiritual encounter–in my view an experience of baptism–completely being overpowered–by the Holy Spirit to get me on track.

  • Parsimony of Miracle Assumptions: Matthew 21:1-7

    Or I might title this “Was Jesus a Horse Thieving Magician?”

    I learned this story so long ago I don’t remember just when it was, but I got a Sunday School version that left me with the impression that because Jesus was God, either he knew everything, or his father revealed to him the location of the donkey, and the words to use so that the disciples could get away with it. Probably the divinity of Jesus and his command shone through his disciples, thus preventing their arrest as horse (or donkey) thieves.

    This left a glow in my mind until I thought about the story some more later. I’ve observed this same interpretation in debates online. Someone objects to the story on the basis that Jesus is supposed to be sinless, so how could he steal a donkey? (Or perhaps merely borrow one without permission.) Sadly, in the most recent case I observed, the next comment from the defender of Christianity (non-professional variety) was that Jesus could take the donkey because he was God, and after all owned everything. So who was the owner to object?

    While it’s true that in Christian theology Jesus is God, and God owns everything. But if you think about it a bit, such an argument could make the sinlessness of Jesus pretty meaningless. Why was he sinless? Well, anything he did could be justified by the fact that he was God.

    Now real Christian apologists will generally regard this as a particularly weak stab at Christianity, though I would have to say that I take seriously those objections that objectors take seriously, even though it sometimes requires effort. There is, however, no reason to get stuck on this one.

    There is no need to justify donkey stealing. Let’s go back to the start, sticking with only the version in Matthew 21. There is simply no suggestion of a miracle, such as miraculous knowledge of the donkey’s location. There is no suggestion that divinity needed to flash forth to make the story work. It is simply told bare bones. So supposing this is a modern scene, and you’re walking down a road with someone, and he says, “Go over to that farm you can see off to the left, and you’ll find a horse tied to a tree. Untie it, and bring it here. If anyone asks, say, ‘His owner needs him.’”

    Would you assume that your walking partner had received a vision, or that he knew there was a horse normally tied up there, or perhaps had some valid reason to know there was one tied up there now? Would you assume that he was asking you to participate in a bold act of horse theft, or that he had the appropriate rights to use the animal? I suspect our first assumption would be that the person had naturally acquired information, and that unless he was some kind of criminal, that he was not choosing this casual means to launch a life of crime.

    So why do we assume that Jesus did otherwise? We know he fed the 5,000, but we don’t assume that he miraculously produced every breakfast. We assume he’s sinless, so why would we assume an explanation here that opens him up to the charge of theft?

    Imagine this story instead. The day before, Jesus was going through that village, and a follower there offered him the donkey for his use. He told the man that he didn’t need the donkey that day, but would call for it later, and they agree where it would be. When he was ready to use it, Jesus used this purely mundane information to call for a donkey to which he had every right. And that is hardly the only possible set of assumptions that works with the story.

    So why didn’t Matthew fill in a few more blanks for us? First, I doubt he thought anyone would make the assumption that Jesus was stealing the donkey. Second, Matthew is trying to present Jesus as king, and telling the story in this bare bones way leaves open the impression of a sovereign requisitioning what he needed to accomplish his mission.

    Most objections to scripture result more from what we say about scripture than from what scripture says itself. Don’t get stuck with unnecessary assumptions, even if they sound miraculous and holy.

  • A Difference in Agendas – John 11:1-16

    I noticed a theme in this passage that I think is important. If you look at the response of the disciples when Jesus proposes to go to Bethany (v. 7-8). They believe it’s too dangerous to go there. It appears to me that for the two days that Jesus delayed, the disciples assumed that he was not going to Judea because of the danger.

    It doesn’t say that explicitly at the beginning of the chapter, but since that is their immediate reaction when Jesus says he is going, I suspect they spent those two days in relief that Jesus had chosen not to go to Lazarus, even though he was sick.

    But when Jesus announces that he will go to Bethany, the disciples suddenly realize that Jesus is not on their program. He has a kingdom agenda. He is going to do the thing that brings glory to God. Ultimately, this trip is dangerous–so dangerous that it leads to the cross.

    The question for each one of us is this: When we come to that fork in the road, which agenda is first for us: personal safety or advancing the kingdom?

  • Respecting Elders and Adjudicating Church Property

    [Note: I’m fighting the flu, which is why I didn’t post at all yesterday. I’m up to reading again today, and found a few things to comment on.]

    Peter Kirk posts on the church congregation of which J. I. Packer is a member, which has voted to leave its diocese and join the southern cone. This is not in my denomination, but it is becoming a more and more common issue as various denominations turn leftward, and conservative congregations try to leave their denomination.

    There are two issues that concern me a great deal. The first is about the treatment of J. I. Packer. Now you don’t have to read more than a few posts to realize that I’m not very near J. I. Packer on the theological map. But I think those of us who are moderate to liberal in persuasion need to make sure that we treat people who disagree with us with a certain degree of respect. I am open to correction on this, but I fail to see where Dr. Packer has done anything to warrant this type of treatment. It appears to just be an attempt to silence him, and probably not a very effective one at that.

    But second, this reminds me of a number of cases in this country in which property issues have landed churches in court. Now I don’t see that happening here in this particular case, but in many cases here in the United States, congregations are winding up in court over church property. There is very little value, I think, if a denomination keeps a piece of property, but loses the members.

    When the dust has settled, and when we all stand before the great judgment seat of Christ, I don’t want to be the one who took a congregation to court over property issues. I can see some technical justification, but I think with Paul that we should say “It would be better to let yourselves be cheated and robbed” (1 Corinthians 6:7 CEV).

    Where we have to separate in terms of congregations and denominations, we should all be able to agree to make a maximum effort to do so in a Christ-like manner, at least as much as is possible when disuniting. (Christ-like schism? Is that possible? Maybe it’s the flu!)

    From a Christian point of view this treatment of Dr. Packer seems to come from the same angle. It looks like a rather unChrist-like attempt to score points because someone annoys you. Liberals should be in favor of openness. More importantly, Christians should treat one another with respect, and treat an elder with due respect. This looks like scoring cheap points.

    Update: Can I use the illness excuse again? I somehow missed the fact that there is a property issue in this case. So it is more precisely an example of the issue I’m talking about here.

  • Christian Carnival #213 Posted

    . . . at my Jevlir Caravansary blog. I note that I failed to include a post of my own or one from my wife, so I shall have to go over there and add them!

  • A Conservative Christian Republican for Obama

    I found this post via if i were a bell, i’d ring, and find the arguments used interesting. Not being as conservative as the the post author, I have less policy concerns with Obama than he does, but I find his arguments very interesting.

  • The Historical Virgin Mary – II

    In chapter 6 of his book What Have They Done with Jesus? Dr. Ben Witherington continues his discussion of the historical Mary, mother of Jesus. In general this is a harmonizing account based on all sources combined, though primarily it works from John and Mark.

    I have already discussed the issues I have with this approach to establishing the historicity of the specific material, so I will continue simply looking at the general outline Witherington is producing of Mary.

    He begins with he wedding at Cana, which he concludes is not the wedding of Jesus himself, which is probably a good conclusion, assuming the story is accurate as told in John. He also cites a number of incidents showing that Mary did not become a disciple until the crucifixion. He also finds no basis for the idea of the the perpetual virginity of Mary. He believes that the brothers and sisters of Jesus were indeed blood half-brothers and sisters.

    There are two very interesting sidelines. First, Dr. Witherington says of the beloved disciple and Mary beneath the cross that “[w]e may perhaps also see a symbolic foreshadowing here of the equaity of man and woman beneath the cross” (p. 127). If it was anything but the gospel of John I would think he was reaching, but this is precisely the sort of symbolism that one finds throughout the Johannine narratives.

    Second, Witherington includes Revelation 12:1-6, the woman clothed with the sun, under references to Mary in the New Testament, but he sees the possibility in the symbolism of a reference to Mary’s activities here on earth, and not to her position in heaven. It’s quite worthwhile reading this section in particular. (I have previously written about Dr. Witherington’s commentary on Revelation, which I believe is the best currently available for the non-scholar.)

    I am generally less optimistic about the historicity of particular narratives, but nonetheless I found these two chapters on Mary fascinating and helpful.

    The next section discusses “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”

  • Christian Carnival #213 Coming

    . . . and will be posted here tomorrow. You have until midnight tonight eastern time to get your posts in. Come one, come all (qualified folks!) and submit your posts!

  • Would Jesus Do This?

    Ken Hutcherson, pastor of Antioch Bible Church in Kirkland seems to believe that Jesus would respond to courtesy with violence:

    On a Sunday when Tarico was present, Hutcherson was preaching on gender roles. During his sermon, Hutcherson stated, “God hates soft men” and “God hates effeminate men.” Hutcherson went on to say, “If I was in a drugstore and some guy opened the door for me, I’d rip his arm off and beat him with the wet end.”

    “That was a joke,” Hutcherson said Friday, when I asked him about the comment. But it’s not really funny, is it?

    This doesn’t seem like an appropriate, Christ-like statement to me, even as a joke. I think it’s important that men realize they can be Christian and be men at the same time. But we don’t need a concept of masculinity that calls for inappropriate violence.

    When I read that I thought of the many times I have opened the door for a man. Sometimes I do so because the man is elderly. Sometimes I do it because he is carrying a heavy load. Sometimes I do it just because it’s convenient. I don’t think it makes me any less masculine.

    It’s time we reject definitions of masculine that involve senseless violence. Defending my home, yes. Defending my country, yes. Running around attacking people because I don’t like their personality or the way they portray themselves, absolutely not. I can’t even see how it can be a question.

    Bill Engvall talks about handing out “Stupid” signs. Perhaps we need a “violent bigot” sign. Then I could be sure never to open the door for such a person.

    (HT: Dispatches.)

  • The Historical Virgin Mary – I

    After discussing Simon Peter, Ben Witherington, in his book What Have They Done with Jesus? proceeds to deal with the information we have available on the Mary, the mother of Jesus. This continues with chapter 5. (Previous entry in this series is Search for the Historical Simon Peter – II.)

    I should make it clear that while I have been complaining about some of the historical claims that have not been backed up adequately in my view, Witherington is doing an excellent job of covering the details and connecting them. I wouldn’t want to give the impression that this work is careless or poorly written. I have a certain tendency to focus on points of disagreement.

    Mary and the virgin birth is another point of disagreement. While I believe one can make somewhat of a historical case for the resurrection, or at least that something extraordinary did happen Easter morning that changed the disciples from cowards into courageous men. It’s harder to demonstrate just what that must have been. I don’t believe a miracle can be proven historically, but one can point to something that was not ordinary.

    But the virgin birth is much harder to demonstrate or suggest historically. Witherington makes the claim on page 99 that this is all too improbable not to be true. I think this is an odd claim. First he appeals again to the criterion of embarrassment. Why would the disciples make up a story that involved embarrassing information? This use of the criterion is quite good. Indeed, there must have been something to explain. Then Witherington suggests that an easier way to counter the charge of an illegitimate birth would be to propose Joseph as the father. But I’m guessing that Witherington hasn’t worked in politics. I doubt that suggestion would have done anything to counter the original charge.

    As a point of faith, one can accept a virgin birth. For those who accept Jesus as the Christ, it becomes much easier to accept the idea of a virgin birth rather than an illegitimate birth. But as a matter of historical probability, I think we must admit that, even for the mother of an extraordinary person premarital sex is a more probable explanation than a virgin birth. This seems to me to be a place where one must clearly separate the “faith view” from a simple statement of historical probability.

    Witherington continues with some excellent material correcting common misconceptions about the meaning of the early chapters of Matthew and Luke, and the early life of Jesus. He quickly and effectively outlines the material we have, and notes the things that we don’t know.

    Of course the goal of the chapter is to place Mary as an eyewitness to Jesus, and thus to find what we can learn about Jesus from what we have heard about Mary. Witherington even notes that if Luke 1 & 2 comes from any witness, that witness must most probably be Mary.