Threads from Henry's Web

Category: Christianity

  • Incarnation Essentials

    In a previous post I started a discussion of what I think are the essentials of the Christian faith. I think it’s going to be a bit difficult for me to keep clear when I’m talking about essentials, and when I’m talking about how I apply those in broader detail, but since I believe that is precisely what we, as Christians, must do, I will make every effort.

    In simple form, the orthodox doctrine of the incarnation states that Jesus came in the flesh, and that he was wholly human and wholly divine. Many Christians are unsure what this means, as they are about many doctrines. I’d like to restate what I consider the essentials of the doctrine of the incarnation:

    God was present on earth in Jesus of Nazereth. Jesus was human enough so that he is able to understand us completely. Jesus was divine enough so that he is able to redeem us.

    Now I accept the 100% divine/100% human formulation for myself, but this is what I believe it is essential to believe. Stated even more simply: God wants to save you. God can save you. A Biblical statement is: God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself (2 Corinthians 5:19). I’m going to expand on that, but my expansion is not part of the essentials.

    Now as I understand it this reconciliation was the ultimate reconciliation; there is no conceivable reconciliation that could cross a greater gap. God is infinite, we are finite. No matter what you subtract from infinity, it remains infinite. God bridged that gap. In bridging that gap he made all other gaps irrelevant. As Paul put it, “There is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). From the incarnational perspective all gaps have become infinitessimal, because they are all to be seen from the perspective of the incarnation, an event that spans infinity.

    This is one reason why I reject the complementarian position. I do not believe it is worthy of the incarnation, and I don’t believe that we can accept any doctrine that is not worthy of the full meaning of the incarnation. Coincidentally, Suzanne McCarthy has again been writing about this on the Better Bibles Blog where she comments on the theology of the incarnation, and specifically about the use of male terminology in translations related to it. Why does the ESV translate terms related to the incarnation with male specific references?

    In a comment on Suzanne’s post, Peter Kirk calls attention to 1 Peter 1:21, in which qelhmati anqrwpou is translated “will of man,” when the contrast should be “human will” as opposed to divine will. This is a clear focus on the minor human differences which should have been overwhelmed by the reality of the incarnation. In a more relevant case, Philippians 2:7-8, the ESV translates en omoiwmati anqrwpwn as “in the likeness of men” rather than the more precise “in human likeness,” though oddly they use “human” for anqrwpo" in the next sentence. This is thinking that is clearly not worthy of the full impact of the incarnation.

    I’m going to reflect more on this later, although I need to move through the essentials in just a few posts, so I’ll leave that further comment for a few days.

    Right now I’d also like to relate this concept of the incarnation to the notion of legalism, total depravity, and our ability to save ourselves. I think the doctrine of total depravity is one that again misses the point. It doesn’t matter if we can be righteous. The Bible calls Job righteous, for example. Modern Christians are uncomfortable with that, but the Bible writers had no such concern. The problem is that no matter how righteous one becomes one is still a finite, limited, human being. It is not merely a matter of being wicked that separates us from God; it is a matter of being not-God. No matter how good we can became, we will still be not-God. Any element of eternity must, by nature, be God’s gift. (Note that I do not refer to us becoming gods; rather I refer to all those elements that fall on God’s side of the line, such as eternal life. There is no possibility that we, who are not eternal, could somehow earn eternity. It doesn’t belong to our reality, but to God’s. It is, by definition and by nature, only attainable as God’s gift.) The gap cannot possibly be crossed from our side. It has to be crossed from God’s.

    In my next entry I’m going to discuss the two laws given by Jesus, love for God and love for neighbor, and tie them to the definition of the incarnation. I think we can hardly find anything more essential than what Jesus said were the first and second laws.

  • Christian Essentials: Incarnation at the Center

    One of my principles of constructive criticism is that one should generally be prepared to propose something positive. This doesn’t always work–sometimes you know one solution won’t work before you have an alternative, but generally I think it’s a good rule. So having said some negative things about the Together for the Gospel statement, I think I should say something about what I do believe.

    As I thought about this project, I came to realize more and more that there are differences between what I consider the core of my experience and the logical center of my beliefs. But as I thought even more about it, they seemed to come back together. I see both now as kind of the layers of an onion, but we start at the center and move out, the core being the most essential, and the outer layers less so. I have previously discussed the importance of distinguishing essential and non-essential doctrines in order to have some unity or coherence of the faith, but at the same time be able to include and celebrate appropriate diversity. I think my best reasonable length statement on this is Unity, Diversity, and Confusion. You can follow some links from there. I also listed four doctrinal items that I hold as essential, which I derived from Elgin Hushbeck Jr.’s Consider Christianity books. (You can see a brief summary at Understanding Christian Apologetics.) But neither of those provides either the reason why I would consider those things essential, nor does it put the life into it.

    I’m going to try to be brief on each of these entries (STOP LAUGHING!), but I will make a number of entries in this series. In the early stages I’ll be making statements that I will leave to back up later, and also I will use scriptures without developing their interpretation from the context, but I will try to remember to tie up all the loose ends as I go on.

    So what does put life into it? I believe the life gets there by putting the right thing at the center and then keeping it centered.

    (more…)

  • Newsweek on Billy Graham

    Newsweek has a good article on Billy Graham in its current issue, titled Pilgrim’s Progress. It’s a fairly long article that presents some interesting points.

    While Graham is certainly not abandoning any essentials of his faith, he does admit to softening on some things. I believe that the things he indicates Christians can appropriately disagree on are well chosen.

    For example, he spends less time on political affairs:

    “The older I get, the more important the eternal becomes to me personally.” His mind is on the heavenly more than the temporal, on the central promises of Christianity more than on the passing political parade.

    . . . and . . .

    Others relish the battlefield; Graham now prizes peace. He is a man of unwavering faith who refuses to be judgmental; a steady social conservative in private who actually does hate the sin but loves the sinner; a resolute Christian who declines to render absolute verdicts about who will get into heaven and who will not; a man concerned about traditional morality

  • Freedom of Expression is Important

    Ed Brayton has a wonderful post today titled Answering Ancient Brit on Thought Crimes. I could not agree with Ed any more completely and forcefully. Europe’s response to “thought crimes” is itself extremely dangerous.

    I would add a note for my fellow-Christians. When you pursue religious liberty and the rights of religious expression, you need to also pursue freedom of opinion and expression generally, especially for those you dislike the most. You need protection from people who truly despise you and are willing to engage in violence to put their opinion into action.

    Christians should be front and center in fighting for the rights of Muslims, Jews, Pagans, and any other religious group. In fact, that effort should be extended to non-religious groups. Freedom needs to be protected for everyone. Freedom of religion is not the freedom for Christians to do what they want; it’s the freedom for everyone, Christians included, to practice their faith as they see fit.

  • Francis S. Collins on Religion and Evolution

    Courtesy of the Florida Citizens for Science blog, I found this article on Francis S. Collins, an evangelical Christian who sees no incompatibility between religion and science, including acceptance of evolution. The article can be found at Relgion Today (HeraldToday.com).

    I could add little to what Dr. Collins had to say. I came at the question from the other end, starting from a religious point of view and looking for compatibility with science.

    I do believe that the expectation that people reject evolutionary theory, which is supported by overwhelming evidence as Dr. Collins says, puts a stumbling block in the path of well-educated people who are considering the gospel message. Dr. Collins provides a good response to that problem.

    While I want consensus science, and that means evolutionary theory, taught in the public school classrooms of this state, I believe Christians should regard the “how” of creation as a non-essential, one that can be debated openly in the church without accusations of heresy.

  • Is It About Mel Gibson?

    I’m not an early responder to stories, especially when there’s still a question as to precisely what happened. But this one has gotten pretty clear, and I think there are some things that need to be said. Before I do that, however, as a starting point, you might try looking at this: Arresting deputy didn’t want to ‘defame’ Gibson (AP news story via MSNBC). This brings up the simple question of whether celebrities are treated differently than ordinary people. Of course they are. The situation is different. If I got arrested for drunk driving (as a teatotaller, that’s unlikely) only a few people would be interested. No reporters would camp outside the police station, and nobody inside would be particularly interested in protecting my good name. For the contrast, behold Mel Gibson.

    But that’s an old story, repeated in the case of one celebrity after another. So I move on to what I think is a more important story–Mel Gibson’s anti-Semitic remarks, and their relationship to The Passion of the Christ (the movie) and the passion of Jesus (the historical event). In all the debate over the historical Jesus, the movie, and anti-Semitism in connection with both, I think many important things have been left unsaid and undone.

    (more…)

  • How to Waste $25 Million

    A $25 million creation museum is under construction in rural Kentucky, with the intention of challenging the scientific consensus view of origins. MSNBC tells us about it in a story titled High-tech museum brings creationism to life. They quote Ken Ham, of Answers in Genesis saying,

    “If the Bible is the word of God, and its history really is true, that’s our presupposition or axiom, and we are starting there,

  • Suzanne McCarthy on Complementarianism

    Suzanne McCarthy has been blogging on complementarianism over on the Better Bibles Blog. I have been following her posts with interest, and I would like to commend them to my readers. The entries to date are: Modes of Communication I, Modes of Communication II, Modes of Communication III. Suzanne obviously doesn’t subscribe to the “snazzy but inaccurate title” school of thought–just tell them what you’re talking about. 🙂

    I’ve written about this topic a few times myself, largely out of my frustration with the number of women I see in the church who are gifted and called from my observations and yet are not being used to their full potential. Even amongst those who claim to affirm leadership roles for women in the church there is often an inertia, or perhaps a sort of default that suggests that women must be exceptional to be in leadership.

    What Suzanne has done in these last several entries is point out some of the inconsistencies in how one applies the complementarian position, and I think she makes some good points. I’m not sure I’m going to get the time or the tolerance any time soon to read her complementarian source material.

    Nonetheless, it seems to me that the key here is that the wrong principles are being used. We’re setting up the category of “women” as a spiritual entity, with a prescribed set of spiritual roles. That ignores the reality that while women and men are truly different–and I’m not egalitarian in the sense of saying women and men are somehow interchangeable!–women differ from women and men differ from men as well.

    The principle I would suggest is that we observe both the men and the women, as well as our children and young people, and simply choose for leadership roles those whom God has gifted for those roles. If we do so honestly, I think we will find that God is, in fact, calling many women to leadership and wonderfully gifting them for it.

    When we ignore the call and gifts of God, we’re putting God in a box and we are a barrier to the building of the kingdom. Let’s not do that!

  • Working in your Call

    And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it spit Jonah up on dry land.
    Then YHWH’s word came to Jonah a second time, saying, “Get up! Go to Nineveh! . . . ” — Jonah 2:11-3:2a

    I knew a man who almost got a law degree, but dropped out during the last year of law school. He was incredibly intelligent and creative. He could have done many things. His parents thought a law degree was a good idea so that he could make money and have a respectable profession. Once he dropped out of law school he lived a life of frustration, always “almost getting there” with the things he really wanted to do.

    In secular life and in the church, you can create a life of frustration for yourself by not doing what it is that you’re actually called and gifted to do, something that usually corresponds to what you want to do deep down in your heart. I’m not talking about that desire to go fishing, or to spend your life on the beach and get someone to pay for it, but your genuine desire the accomplish something with your life.

    Too often, the people who are already out there, living their own frustrating lives, take out their frustration on the next generation by telling them that their goals and their dreams are somehow not respectable enough or important enough. We tell the talented musicians, artists, and actors that the church really needs pastors, secretaries, and administrators, and if they want to earn enough money and make it in the world, they need to be doctors, lawyers, or nurses. Sometimes instead we point them to easier paths than they would choose, because we think they can’t make it.

    I don’t mean we don’t need to encourage our young people to count the cost and decide on a realistic basis what they really want to do. I do mean is that we need to let people look inside themselves, listen to God, and choose where it is that they can really be fulfilled and can really make a contribution that counts eternally.

    As a Christian and member of the United Methodist Church, I believe I see this in our church structure. We are overwhelmingly focussed on the offices of the church and church staff positions that are aimed at maintaining what we already have. If we want to see revival in the United Methodist Church, and in the broader Church we need to start recognizing roles other than pastors and our standard staff. We need to have career paths for evangelists, teachers, apostles, and prophets, the other four from the traditional five-fold ministry. But that’s not enough. We also need paths for artists, dramatists, multimedia experts, and internet specialists.

    And when we have all those paths open, we must encourage people to find their call and follow it, and gear up the church membership to support it financially and with their time.

    Business as usual isn’t working now, and it’s not going to start working. For the church to answer God’s call we need members who answer God’s call. We need to let God out of the box, get out of our box, and be ready to affirm and empower others as they apply and share the gospel in the 21st century.

    Avoid the frustration! Get with God’s program!

  • Professional Arrogance

    Over on Locusts and Honey, John has a post On the Dangers of Being a Professional Wiseman, that I think should be read by everyone involved in pastoring, spiritual formation, professional counselling, or even just prayer ministry.

    The temptation to believe that because one has certain professional training, experience, ordination, licensure, or any one of many professional rites of passage is with us all. I know I don’t have that good of insight into other people, and yet the temptation is there to have the answer without taking the time to get to know the person. That makes me wonder about the temptation level for those who are gifted with insight. The call to go beyond one’s knowledge and wisdom and just solve the problem must be incredible. Time factors get involved as well, and that’s especially dangerous with spiritual formation.

    In any case John has given us all some things to think about.