Category: Christianity

Passion Week: I’ll Never Deny You

Jesus Predicts Peter’s Denial

36 Simon Peter asked him, “Lord, where are you going?”

Jesus replied, “Where I am going, you cannot follow now, but you will follow later.”

37 Peter asked, “Lord, why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.”

38 Then Jesus answered, “Will you really lay down your life for me? I tell you the truth, before the rooster crows, you will disown me three times!

(Jn 13:36-14:1)

How many times have we been in Peter’s sandals? We have committed and recommitted to our Lord thinking that somehow He is not privy to the alternate plans that lie within our hearts. As Holy week progresses toward the history changing events of the Easter weekend, we see the definition of full commitment, unwavering and unswerving. Our Lord expects nothing short from us though He is fully aware of our duplicitous natures. For this He gave us the Holy Spirit, a presence that transfers the full Kingdom commitment to us if we are surrendered to His will. Let this be the week we surrender in full.

Passion Week: The Servant of the Lord

Monday of Holy Week begins with a passage from the passionate prophet Isaiah

The Servant of the Lord

42 “Here is my servant, whom I uphold,

my chosen one in whom I delight;

I will put my Spirit on him

and he will bring justice to the nations.

2 He will not shout or cry out,

or raise his voice in the streets.

3 A bruised reed he will not break,

and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.

In faithfulness he will bring forth justice;

4 he will not falter or be discouraged

till he establishes justice on earth.

In his law the islands will put their hope.”

5 This is what God the Lord says—

he who created the heavens and stretched them out,

who spread out the earth and all that comes out of it,

who gives breath to its people,

and life to those who walk on it:

6 “I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness;

I will take hold of your hand.

I will keep you and will make you

to be a covenant for the people

and a light for the Gentiles,

7 to open eyes that are blind,

to free captives from prison

and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.

8 “I am the Lord; that is my name!

I will not give my glory to another

or my praise to idols.

9 See, the former things have taken place,

and new things I declare;

before they spring into being

I announce them to you.”

The Servant Lamb has obediently faced Jerusalem, redolent of the nard poured over His feet by Mary, the sister of Lazarus. In this singular action, she followed the example of her Lord in costly devotion, not only pouring the expensive perfume over his feet but in letting her hair down in public and gently drying the feet that would carry Him to the Cross later in the week. Isaiah tells of a similarly humble servant who will nonetheless shake the world of injustice, not through shouting or violent display, but through the consistent  display of righteousness. Peace be with you as you discover your own humility and consider what costly sacrifice the Lord calls you to.

Bricks Without Straw

Ministry that is accompanied by struggle, persecution, and difficulty often leads the pastor to what where God’s plan lies. The Lord calls us to specific ministry objectives big and small and we faithfully follow that call only to discover that the ministry that results is fraught with heartache, disappointment, and struggle, sometimes even failure. I was reminded of this in reading Exodus this morning. Moses and Aaron are called to a ministry of confrontation with Pharaoh and leadership to their people. They carry the Lord’s message to him to release His people and, as a result, Pharaoh increases the pressure on the Hebrews.

The result is predictable, given what we know about human nature:

The Israelite foremen realized they were in trouble when they were told, “You are not to reduce the number of bricks required of you for each day.” When they left Pharaoh, they found Moses and Aaron waiting to meet them, and they said, “May the Lord look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us.”  Ex 5:19-21

Leaders in Christ’s church must be willing to remind God’s people that following His plan is a dangerous pursuit and there is always a chance that not all of us are going to come through unscathed. If God calls your church to a specific ministry, no matter how unglamorous, our calling is to lead our people into the fire regardless of the pain, scorn, and fallout that might come our way. To do anything less is to proclaim our lack of trust in the providence of our Father.

You see, we must continue to read on despite the fear of reprisal that a ministry call may generate. When Moses presses Yahweh for understanding, he gets this response:

“Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord.’ ” Ex 6:6-8

We, as followers of the Risen Christ, have the same great promise to undergird everything that the Father calls us to do. Every step of every day may be an incredible struggle as compared to others around us but, in the end, we have the promise of eternal life in the peace of the Lord. We can be faithful to our calling or we can avoid it, God gives us this choice but there is never a promise that either path will be easy.

The Dispensational Perspective on Sanctification

Does the dispensational believer hold a unique view of sanctification that differs from those we have examined thus far? Not particularly. For those not familiar with Dispensational theology, it is an interpretive system that separates the interaction of God and His creation into various economies or ‘ages’. In each of the ages, God placed man under a specific trust, the periods delineated by major crisis events. The system maintains that there is a thread of unity that weaves through the Scriptures and proclaims the glory of God. These theologians arrive at this system by a consistently literal interpretation of the Bible.

As with any theological discussion, we must remember that within any group there are a variety of view, and within Dispensationalists it is no different. Many hold a view of Sanctification that is consistently Reformed in its definition. It is seen in two parts, a positional change occurring at the moment of justification and continuing progressively through the life of the believer by the Grace of God. Unique to the Dispensational view is an idea often credited to theologian Lewis Perry Chafer in which the believer’s sanctification is viewed through the filter of their two natures. The progressive sanctification occurs as the believer yields to the work of the Holy Spirit in their lives. This progressive action is separated from the initial justification, requiring a separate act of faith for its initiation.

This view of humankind and its two natures has its roots in Augustinian thought. Used in discussing sanctification, it is presumed to explain why the Christian continues to sin after their justification by God. Moreover, if this powerful influence remains in humankind, how much sanctification can be reasonably be assumed? The old nature, referred to as the ‘flesh’ is not eradicated by the new birth; it exists side-by-side with new nature that is desirous of holiness. As Charles Ryrie succinctly describes,

The moment one accepts Jesus Christ as his personal Savior he becomes a new creation (2 Cor 5:17). The life of God within him begets a new nature which remains with him along with the old as long as he lives. Understanding the presence, position and relationship of the old and new within the life of a believer is essential to experiencing a wholesome and balanced spiritual life. [Balancing the Christian Life, Ryrie]

He argues against the use of nature to visualize two men living side by side as this give opportunity to assign blame for one’s sinful behavior to ‘the little man’ that lives inside of the new creation. Ryrie instead recommends that the word nature be replaced by capacity.  In doing so, we see that despite our new birth, we retain the capacity for sin. The goal of sanctification then is to reduce this capacity by a commensurate increase in one’s capacity for righteousness. The regeneration and new birth leads us to another important concept in understanding Dispensation sanctification and that is the filling of the Holy Spirit. Regeneration coincides with the baptism in the Holy Spirit for the Dispensationalist and it is not seen as a subsequent crisis event. The filling of the Holy Spirit is altogether a separate matter.

In this perspective, all Christians are regenerated, baptized, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit but not all Christians are filled with the Spirit. This vital concept is the explanation for the wide difference in the spiritual power and experience exhibited by the members of the Church. The Dispensationalist states that the infilling of the Spirit, the power for all ministry and the source of sanctification of the believer is a work of God subsequent to the regeneration. It occurs repeatedly throughout the life of the Saint and is the source of fruitfulness. Pointing to Eph 5:18,

Do not get drunk on wind, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.

leads back to the twin capacities suffered by man. Just as wine changes ones capacity to act, the infilling of the Spirit changes one’s capacity and enables him or her to fulfill the will of God. Putting the verse to the grammatical test, it is well known that the verb “be filled” is in the present tense, giving it the meaning to “keep on being filled.”  This filling is not automatic however. The believer must be fully surrendered to the Holy Spirit in order to receive these fresh infusions, making progress in sanctification conditional and sometimes halting.  (Here the Dispensationalist departs from their generally Calvinistic view to realize that human will affects plays a role in this process of the Sovereign God. They would not go so far as to commend Arminian theology but rather, they refer to this a more moderate Calvinism.)

Conclusion

Dispensational sanctification views the process as a twofold occurrence in the life of the Christian. It is at once positional, placing the sinful human being into a righteous relationship with God and progressive, changing the new creature over the span of their life. There is no perfection in this life with that event only occurring when the believer moves into the next life in the presence of the Lord. Uniquely Dispensational is the view that one must act a second time in faith to initiate this progressive pattern of change.

It’s Not Who I Am

Once again we were forced to view the unrepentant proclaim – contrary to their newly publicized behavioral miscue – that “this goes against who I am.” We hear this all the time from those closest to us and those in the public arena. When a wrong idea or behavior is revealed or escapes us, our first reaction is to say, “This is so against who I am and what I believe.” The trouble is, it’s not.

Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. Proverbs 4:23

Everything we do, feel, think – everything – comes from the person we are deep down in our hearts. If an impurity has lodged itself in our hearts or we have left an avenue unguarded, our heart will betray us sooner or later. For Elliot Spitzer (“my behavior goes against my core belief in right and wrong”) it came sooner. For Ted Haggard (who used his pulpit to aggressively condemn homosexuality) it came later. For some, the moment of revelation has yet to come.

But…guaranteed, it will come. No matter how long we attempt to hide our behaviors or our thoughts or our proclivities, eventually a moment of weakness will allow them to surface, revealing for all the world what is in our heart, who we truly are.

Scot Says I’m Conservative

I took the McKnight Hermeneutics survey and scored 51 (despite my Egalitarian answer) which places me in the Conservative Bible reader category. From Leadership Today this means that I am ( !right! )

First, the conservative hermeneutic group scores 52 or lower. The strength of this view is its emphasis on the authority, ongoing and normative authority, of all of Scripture. It tends to operate with the line many of us learned in Sunday school: “If the Bible says it, that settles it.” Such persons let the Bible challenge them with full force. Literal readings lead to rather literal applications. Most of the time.

The problem, of course, is that very few people are completely consistent here. At times one suspects something other than strict interpretation is going on when the conservative is willing to appeal to history to suspend the commandment to observe a Saturday Sabbath, but does not to appeal to history on other issues (e.g., capital punishment or homosexuality).

This is an interesting exercise and it returned to me the results that I expected. Where do you fall?

The Pentecostal Perspective on Sanctification

Summarizing the Pentecostal doctrine on sanctification is either very easy or extraordinarily complex. The reason for this is the wide range of Christians that congregate under this umbrella and the corresponding wide range of application for this important aspect of the believer’s life. The doctrinal range extends from the very conservative two step positional-progressive sanctification to holiness as a second work of grace to be followed by baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Myer Pearlman (Knowing the Doctrines) provides the most general definition of the Pentecostal doctrine as including separation from sin and the world and dedication or consecration to the fellowship and service of God through Christ. This may translate into different practices among the believer groups; some will abstain from ‘wordly’ thing (e.g. tobacco, drink, short dresses) while others interpret this more liberally as simply the search for holiness according to specific biblical standards. In general however, the Pentecostal observes sanctification as occurring in the three familiar events. It is instantaneous at the moment of belief, where the new Christian is immediately set apart from sin. Sanctification is progressive as well, continuing throughout the term of one’s life as we are transformed into the likeness of Christ. Finally, using a term that can have a variety of definitions, there is entire sanctification. This final state is almost universally seen as occurring only at glorification when the believer passes into the immediate presence of the Lord.

Progressive sanctification is viewed as a tri-cooperative effort. Our progress comes through the work of the Holy Spirit, our cooperation as we surrender to His work, and through the Word of God (John 17:17). The Word of truth comes alive only through the intervention of the Spirit as He interprets for each believer how that truth applies to our lives. All of this combines to attain a maturity that God desires for us, continuing in this process until we return to our heavenly home.

Controversy arises when the doctrine of Baptism in the Spirit enters the discussion. Many of the Oneness (Jesus Only) Pentecostals take the extreme position that one cannot be saved (thus be sanctified) until receiving the baptism in the spirit and giving evidence through the gift of tongues. Trinitarian Pentecostals view the Baptism as a secondary event subsequent to regeneration. The Assemblies of God for example, sees the progressive sanctification and the visible change in their life as evidence of the infilling of the Spirit.

Conclusion

As stated in the initial paragraph, there is a wide range of belief in the Pentecostal congregations regarding sanctification and its application. For the most part, the combined instantaneous and progressive nature of this doctrine can be found in the statement of belief of nearly all of the churches. Ultimately, there is a common goal of holiness in the believer that is standard to all of the doctrines, something held in common with the Calvinist and Arminian doctrines as well.

Wearing the Scarlet Letter C

To critique something carries with it a far different connotation than simply criticizing something. For example, I can criticize Senator Obama for his empty rhetoric about change. That is simply voicing my opinion in a rather negative sense without investing too much effort into discovering what lies behind his words. On the other hand, to critique some means that you have read it critically, paying attention to the arguments of the author and voicing either positive reinforcement or a contrasting position. A critique is often distinguished by the existence of arguments and facts supporting the critical positions of the critic. For this I’ve been condemned.

I do not suffer theological fools lightly. Teaching God’s word, exclaiming His promises, and writing and speaking of Him is something that I take quite seriously. I read many people who have staked out theological positions and yet they are unable to support these positions when challenged. Someone taught them A or they read B in a book and it is therefore assumed to be fact. Theology demands more than this however. To speak of God and His Church and the theological tenets that undergird it requires more than single source scholarship. If, for example, you are going to argue against Arminian or Calvinist theology it is incumbent upon you to be well versed in the correct positions, sources, and scriptures of both before exclaiming one side or the other is correct. What we encounter many times are believers who study in one theological school of thought, read only those sources and their interpretations of opposing positions, and form their opinions and beliefs without determining how correct their sources might be.

I recently critiqued a posting published on another blog that taught the authors beliefs about Calvinism. As I said in my earlier piece, after attempting to engage the author to discover the source of the facts she presented through her comments section, it appeared that she resented the challenge and deleted the comment without reply. BECAUSE false teaching is far more dangerous to those who read and are affected by it than simply poor teaching that is factually correct, I decided that it was appropriate to address the piece and write a corresponding post for anyone who cared to read it. It appears that the author is a bit upset about this, posting two (uncommentable) responses on her blog here and here.  I don’t know why she chose this avenue rather than posting a comment here so we could engage the conversation and I could clarify any issues that arose that brought her distress. I will try to address them here.

She says:

Hopefully people realize that each of us have our own name that’s for the purpose of others to respectfully use when they want our attention. To call attention to a person by using his or her name (especially without that person’s approval) for the sake of degrading him or her is gossip. It’s usually done out of the motive of pride. You can’t look good in the eyes of God by trying to make others look bad in the eyes of the world.

Dear sister, your name is published as the name of your blog. If you don’t want others to know your name, perhaps a nom de plume would serve you better. Regardless, it bothered you and I have corrected it, redacting my original posting so that you name does not appear. Now, on to your other issues of being degraded and gossiped about. If challenging your arguments about the God of the universe, the merciful God of love is degrading to you then all I can suggest is that you stop writing about Him and presenting theological opinions that are not universally shared. (Especially when you refer to those who believe them to be “duped” and “deceived”.”  You cannot expect to post something on a public blog and have no one question it, can you? Gossip is a very serious charge as well but, as I understand it, gossip is speaking ill of someone rather than addressing them directly. Since there is no way of addressing your faulty analogy directly but considering the damage that it might do to a non-believer who accepts it as fact, I decided to address it. No one is trying to make you look bad; we are simply valuing the truths of God above your need not to be challenged.

I take from your later posts that you feel attacked and this is certainly not the case. You are challenged though. Your posting entitled “Are you looking for trouble” goes on to excoriate those (and I assume myself among them because of the clever Jacob jab) who hate you because your beliefs are right. Again, you are taking theological liberty with the word of God. No one hates you or is attacking you or is threatening or denigrating you and your Christian beliefs but if you are associating the word of God with the analogy that you laid out in the earlier post, you had best be prepared to teach others from where you derive this theological position. Calvinists, Arminians, Pentecostals: they all support their theology all the time. You are not being martyred as your post attempt to convey.

My dear sister also wrote:

I knew that my refusal to permit someone, who disagreed with my expression of faith on my Calvinism Analogy post and believed I should permit him to publish his negative comment on my weblog, would seek revenge because of my exercising my right to protect the honor of what I believe on my site, but to do so on a blog he names Love Acceptance Forgiveness?!?! Oh well . . . I guess that says it all — actions speak louder than words. I won’t even mention names. I don’t want to be a hypocrite by not honoring what I said in my post on the Golden Rule found in Matthew 7:12. He knows who he is and so does God, so please don’t google his blog. Such a thing could not bring glory to God.

Revenge??!! Why would I seek revenge? I have in no way been harmed by your words. No one challenged your honor or what you believe. I simply asked you to support it scripturally before some other impressionable person read it and accepted it as fact. And yes, sister, in great love and humility I did apply the golden rule as our Lord voiced it:

So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets. Mt 7:12

I would fully expect that if I write or preach on the word of God, on the theological positions that I take, or the way that I live out my calling as a servant of Christ and someone finds something incorrect in it that they will challenge me out of love. I take no greater risk than incorrectly speaking of or for God and I hold others to this same accountability. You included yourself in my purview by posting your theological opinions.

And yes sister, I do know who I am and so does God. Humbly I kneel before him, grateful that his grace covers me and and my family and that he knows my name.

God Bless.

Isn’t He Rightly Named Jacob?

Our Lenten exercise this year is to put off those things that keep us from Holiness and one of the greatest practices of our hearts is the art of deceit. You and I can so easily convince ourselves of our righteousness, justifying every one of our actions and thoughts and saying that God understands, that he overlooks our subtle sinfulness since he has clothed us in His grace. We refuse to call on the Holy Spirit to convict us of our God-dishonoring behaviors and so further deceive ourselves. As we see in the story of Jacob stealing Esau’s blessing, deceit that we might think minor can have long term consequences.

One of the first steps in growing in a life of holiness is to restore the voice of the Holy Spirit in our lives. The internal dialog that He will hold with us will remind us, gently or not, of our misguided thoughts and deeds and give us the opportunity to shift our course back toward the light. All we have to do is listen.

The Wesleyan Perspective on Sanctification

Perhaps no doctrine of sanctification has undergone so many and varied permutations as the Wesleyan view. The Wesleyan’s view is best known by either of the two names given to the process: entire sanctification or Christian perfection. As Holiness churches have grown away from the Methodist beginnings of this theological idea, they have often radically transformed it to the point where an accurate definition is required to state what the idea is and is not. According to Wesley, sanctification is that part of God’s plan in which He renews the hearts of men and women in His own image. By His grace humanity would be turned from all willful sin and restored to the holiness that had been lost in the Fall. John Wesley’s words from a sermon serve to summarize:

Ye know that all religion which does not answer this end, all that stops short of this, the renewal of our soul in the image of God, after the likeness of Him that created it, is no other than a poor farce, and a mere mockery of God, to the destruction of our own soul…By nature ye are wholly corrupted. By grace ye shall be wholly renewed. [ Wesley, Works]

Far from a fabrication of Wesley’s intellect, he points to numerous passages of scripture in support of this doctrine, each one, he says, should bring the reader to a similar conclusion. Here are a pair of examples:

The Lord your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live. Deuteronomy 30:5-6

For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. Romans 8:3-4

Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God. 2 Corinthians 7:1

Taken in whole, Wesley sees in these and other passages the promise of freedom from the dominion of sin for every Christian. He states that God’s grace is ever at work in the heart of the believer progressively sanctifying the entire life of the Christian releasing the heart to fully love God and others. It is critical to note the difference here between Wesley and some later Holiness doctrine. He views entire sanctification as a continuum of grace and response, God giving and the believing transforming, with no conclusion prior to glorification. In other words, while the believer increases in holiness, there is no point of perfection this side of heaven in which every scintilla of sin has been removed and the believer is perfect, as a nominal definition of the word would have the reader understand. Some Holiness movement doctrine has evolved to this conclusion but it never originated with Wesley.

Some are also tempted to link Wesleyan sanctification to works. This can perhaps derive from Wesley’s insistence that the Christian faith is experiential; it is not simply head knowledge in which one believes, it is also practice that is a product of the transformed heart. As the believer was further and further sanctified, the new zeal for loving the Lord and others would be demonstrated through the interactions of the Christian. These actions are not quantitative measures of belief but products of the transformative power of that belief.

Conclusion

Though it has been modified considerably through the years, linked by Charismatic believers to a second baptism, taken to ultimate measures by some Holiness doctrine, Wesley’s idea of entire sanctification is thoroughly rooted in the Bible and the Royal Law of Love. Jesus serves to summarize the objective of this doctrine in his words of Matthew 22:

Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Mt 22:37-40

Despite the name that is often attributed to it – Christian Perfection – Wesley foresaw no moment in which we would be entirely free from the possibility of sinning, only that our love of God and others would lessen our desire.