Believers Armed and Dangerous

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

Christians are often asked by skeptics to prove God’s existence scientifically.  Our answers are seldom satisfying to the non-believer and often frustrating to the Christian offering them.  We show the order of the universe as evidence of His planning and intellect.  We point to the universe itself to show it must have a cause.  But, these attempts so often fall short and we blame ourselves as poor representatives for our Lord. 

It turns out the non-believer is asking for something very unreasonable.  He’s asking for physical evidence, scientific evidence of a non-physical Being.  That’s the core reason for the frustrations of both the believer and skeptic.  Science is wonderful.  It has provided so many answers over the centuries, but it is not the be all and end all.

Trying to prove God’s existence scientifically is what philosophers call a category error.  We do this all the time in figures of speech.  We say “my car doesn’t want to start.”  But, my car is incapable of “wanting”.  It’s not in the “wanting” category. 

A Category Error is when something in one category [God] is represented as belonging to another category [the physical universe].  It’s irrational to try and use one category to explain another unless the spiritual realm steps into it as Jesus did when He took on human form.

Jesus told us of the spiritual world.  He said God exists, that He loves us, and that He would pay the price for our sins so we might enter His realm and join Him forever.  But why should people have believed Him?  He may have been just another itinerant preacher telling stories.

The difference, of course, was that Jesus gave physical proof of what He claimed by combining the spiritual with the physical.  He used the superiority of the spiritual to heal, to walk on water, to change lives.  Likewise, some of the most powerful evidences of God’s existence are the changed lives of His followers.  We call these anomalies in nature “miracles.”

Because science won’t look outside the box, outside the physical universe, it can’t deal with many things Christianity has the answer for.   J.P. Moreland gives some examples of these in his book, Scientism and Secularism:

• Science alone cannot explain the origins of the universe.  It believes there was an origin but can’t explain even the existence of matter, where did it come from.  Examination shows it’s not eternal.  And if energy and matter are interchangeable as Einstein said, where did the energy come from as well?
• Science alone cannot explain the fundamental laws of nature.  There are laws keeping nature in check.  Those laws are not physical.  So, where did they come from and how do they govern physical matter?
• Science alone cannot explain consciousness.  Consciousness is a mystery to science.  They can measure it, observe it, even see the evidence of it working , but they can’t tell us how molecules in motion [the origin of life/evolution] became conscious and arrived at E=mc².
• Science alone cannot explain objective moral values.  Why does the most pious priest and the most backward native both agree torturing babies for the fun of it is wrong?  How did they arrive at the same morality if there is only the material world?  Where does morality come from then?
• What science cannot explain, philosophy and theology can.  Theology tells how God is responsible for all the items listed above, yet science will discount that answer because it limits its area of study to the physical.

Scientists take these issues as matters of faith.  They have faith that someday a woman in a white lab coat will solve these issues and show science as supreme over the metaphysical.  They’re wrong, though, because none of these involve the examination of the material world.  If a scientist stands on his faith, a faith in science alone, disappointment will be the result.

 “For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance, he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”   

NASA scientist, Robert Jastro, in his book God and the Astronomers

Some ask why churches should be exempt from taxes.  “They do nothing,” they say.  “They just sit there in their ivory towers telling everyone how to live and thinking they’re better than we are.”

That’s a very cynical and – it turns out – incorrect view.  Churches are much more valuable to the community and perform more services to our society than would the tax money they would otherwise have paid. 

The local church offers marital counseling lowering the divorce rate, domestic violence, child abuse, and since most criminals grow up in single parent families, it lowers crime.  Churches have programs for youth to help them see a better way of life and help keep them from drugs, crime, and just plain getting into trouble.  These programs often give a male role model to children from families with a single mom.

Church youth programs offer car washes, barbecues, and work days where young people can learn to work and earn money to pay for events like camps and concerts.  One church had a “Rent a Kid” program where church members rent a teen for a day to do yard work, baby sitting, simple household repairs, you name it.  Again, this taught the young people the life value that work produces benefits. 

There are young adult ministries to help college-age people in their drive to become more productive adults.  This helps prevent these folks from losing their dream due to drug addiction, alcohol dependence, or having to leave school or work due to unwanted pregnancies.

Then there are ministries for older adults.  They have problems too.  Many are parents with no experience handling children.  Counseling and classes on child rearing are offered.  Churches are a community in themselves, too.  People who are having family issues have access to other adults who have gone through the same struggles.

Many of the problems and issues mentioned above are also addressed on Sunday mornings along with messages telling Christians to reach out to those who are hurting and in need.

“And the pastor who leads these people, he must make a fortune.”  The average Baptist pastor in Arizona where I live makes just over $47k per year.  That’s not much for a guy who works an average or 60 hours a week and typically has a Masters degree.

When I was a young man, I worked in a paint plant.  One of my fellow workers was a pastor who worked on his sermons during lunch and on breaks.  His congregation was small.  It couldn’t support him and his family.  He had to work in a warehouse driving a forklift 40 hours a week in order to provide for both his family and for his congregation.  Most pastors aren’t in it for the money because it just isn’t there.

Why is this important?

First, the church needs to know it is the visible and physical representation of our Savior.  When we act as He would, we bring glory to Him and to His church.  When we don’t, we bring shame and strengthen the stereotype that churches are a drain on society.

Secondly, the community needs to know the local church is not a building where Christians  hide to separate from the “unclean.”  We’re God’s servants, and as such we are to serve those around us, the homeless, the sick, the lonely, the hurting.  “And such were many of us.”  The larger the church, the more it can help.

There’s an old story that makes this point here. It’s of a stranger who wandered into a church and asked a member, “When does the service start?”  The member answered, “The service starts when the meeting is over.”

The Holy Spirit tells us through James that this is our mission:

James 1:26-27 (ESV)
²⁶  If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. ²⁷  Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.

So, why should churches remain tax exempt?  Those in need are more accurately identified by the church.  Attention to their needs is personal and addressed by concerned people anxious for the welfare of others.  To put it practically, government keeping churches tax exempt is cost effective.

“What about the lost natives who never heard the gospel.  Can they be saved?”

I wish I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard that question.  “Didn’t Jesus say no one comes to the Father except through Him (John 14:6)?  Does God not love everyone equally?”  Of course He does.

If God didn’t love everyone, no one could have been saved prior to the Law of Moses.  That would mean Job who God called “blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil” (Job 1:1).  Others like Noah and Enoch, who walked with God, would have to be condemned to hell.  There was no New Testament gospel or even Mosaic law for them.  So, what was there? 

It turns out God has no thrown aside those who don’t have the advantage of missionaries or Bibles.

Romans 2:14-16 (ESV)
¹⁴  For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. ¹⁵  They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them ¹⁶  on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.

The Law is written on the hearts of Gentiles who have not heard the truth.

There are two types of revelation, General Revelation (Creation), and Special Revelation (The Bible).  General revelation is the fact God has shown Himself in nature.  A native who looks at the world around him and sees the intricacy involved in creation, the design, and the vastness can understand there must be a greater God than the one he has fashioned out of a log or stone.  Paul addressed this again in Romans.

Romans 1:20 (ESV)
²⁰  For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.

Granted, there aren’t a lot of these people, and that’s why so many Christian missionaries seek to enter dangerous parts of the world to share the life-giving Truth with people who have never heard.  God gifts these missionaries with special drives and with endurance. 

People who are “civilized” but following another god or no god at all must also often be led to the Truth.   There are people like this in our own communities with whom we can share.  We can acts as home missionaries and seek to lead these people to a saving knowledge of Christ.

One more point I want to address before I finish this post is the children who die before they are old enough to know Christ.  What happens to them?  This issue is called the age of accountability.  Are children who are not old enough to understand their need for salvation held accountable for their sin nature?  I believe this question also applies to special needs children and adults.  If they are unable to understand the concept of sin, will God hold them accountable?

The Bible says we need to recognize we are sinners and need a Savior.  If a person or child cannot understand that, can they truly accept Christ to save them from a sin they don’t recognize?

The answer is that there is usually there is an age children reach when they will understand and then come under the Law.  This is taken from another remark Paul makes in Romans:

Romans 7:9 (ESV)
⁹  I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died.

Therefore, many theologians believe Paul is speaking of when he was a child then understood the Mosaic Law. It is my belief children and special needs adults, who have not been able to recognize that they are sinners cannot understand their need to seek a Savior and cannot be held accountable.

The Scriptural evidence is somewhat slim, but I know the God Who saves us.  I understand He is just, merciful, and is love.  I rely on God’s grace for those who are unable to ask Christ into their hearts because of the limitations mentioned above.

Why is this important?

It is important for Christians to know God is the God of everyone.  He watches over us all whether it’s a native who has never heard or a child who could not understand, whether it’s a Muslim who seeks grace or an atheist who is bitter against God.  He loves them all and has made provision for their salvation.  For those who can make the decision, God wishes to use you and me to show them the Way.  For those who cannot, He has also made provisions.

Ever wonder why God chose to take on human form, why God the Son needed to become the man, Jesus?  I’ve wondered about that.  Here’s what I found.

I first looked at the holiness of God.  God is absolutely holy, absolutely pure.  In order to stand in God’s presence, one needs to be absolutely pure as well.  But we’re sinful people.  How can we do this, and how could the people prior to Christ stand before God?

Until the Mosaic Law, men would sacrifice for themselves and/or their families.  Able sacrificed to please God (Gen. 4:3) but for himself alone, no one else.  Job sacrificed for himself and his family (Job 1:5).  In Genesis 8:20, we’re told Noah sacrificed after the flood waters subsided.  Things changed, though, when Moses climbed Mt. Sinai and received the Law from God.  Now God would use an individual to represent His people before Him, the High Priest.

In that Law it as clear the shedding of blood was needed for forgiveness of the sins of Israel (Lev. 16; Heb. 9:22).  Indeed, God requires every human be purified by blood before it can enter His presence.

The High Priest was a sinful man.  He could only stand in the presence of God’s glory once a year.  He could step behind the veil of the temple into the Holy of Holies to offer blood for the sins of God’s people (Lev. 16).  There was a purification ritual before the High Priest was purified enough to be entitled to enter into the Holy of Holies.  This involved blood.

Even then, the High Priest needed to purify the altar upon which the sacrifices for God’s people would be made.  That was done with blood.  When the High Priest was holy enough to offer sacrifice for the sins of Israel by sprinkling blood on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant, he could enter the Holy of Holies.  All this so Israel could have a mediator between God and the people for their sins.

Considering the lengths the High Priest had to go through, it seems clear even after all that ritual, the High Priest was still living on the edge.  According to Lev. 16:13, if the High Priest did something wrong God could strike him dead.  No one else was holy enough to pass through the veil into the Holy of Holies to retrieve him if that happened.  Because of this, Jewish tradition tells us bells were attached to the tassels on the High Priest’s robe and a rope tied to his waist when he entered past the veil.  If no bells were heard for a period of time, the other priests would assume the High Priest had made an error and God had struck him down.  They could retrieve his body by pulling it out using the rope.

So, the point is that God’s mediator must be pure and perfect in his duty.  For man to fulfill that role, he must be unique and pure and that purity only remains for a brief period.

Then Jesus entered our world physically. According to Hebrews 4:14, He is now our High Priest.  He represents God’s people before God.  He is also the perfect sacrifice, the perfect Lamb of God Who paid the price for all our sins.  His blood covers us as the blood ritual the High Priest needed to perform.  The difference is Jesus, our High Priest, is not in danger of error.  He is so pure, He may remain in the Father’s presence indefinitely.  In fact, His sacrifice made us Christians all holy enough to enter the Holy of Holies too and without the priestly rituals.  The veil has been torn to gain us access directly to God (Matt. 27:51).  It was torn from top to bottom, from God to us, welcoming us into God’s presence under the credentials of His Son.

Why is This Important?

The importance of this is that the Mediators between God and man is no longer just a man who was made just holy enough to stand in God’s presence briefly.  Our Mediator is God the Son in human form.  He knows what it is like to be a man and to be God.  Jesus is the only one who is fully qualified to argue our case before the Father.  He is our Advocate (1 John 2:1) who argues for our forgiveness as He stands before the Father, Himself payment in full for our transgression.

God didn’t create some being and send him to take on human form.  He could have sent an angel, a perfect being, but no one is good enough but God.  His love for us is such that He came Himself.

We no longer have to wait a year for someone to sacrifice in the temple for our sins.  We no longer have to wait a year for forgiveness.  Now we have access to the throne of God (Heb. 4:16) to ask forgiveness or to ask for mercy or for healing.

Jesus is the perfect go-between, the perfect Mediator.  He connects each realm, God’s and man’s.

Jesus paid that price for us around 30 a.d.  Just forty years later, the Jerusalem Temple was destroyed by the Roman general, Titus.  It was of no use anymore.  The needed ultimate sacrifice had been made.  The price had been paid.

1 Timothy 2:5 (ESV)
⁵  For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,

What is grace, and why is it so important to the Christian life?

Until several years ago I didn’t believe in altruism, giving without desire for personal benefit.  I believed even Jesus’ death on the cross wasn’t altruistic.  He died on the cross because He wanted something.  He wanted us.  The promise that we would dwell with Him eternally was reason enough for Him to suffer torture and death.  Paul puts it this way, “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb. 12:2).  Did you know this is the only verse in the Bible where “joy” and “cross” appear together?  And, it speaks of Christ’s love for us.

I’ve come to realize grace is something else.  It gains nothing for God but everything for the Christian.  God blesses us for no other reason but that He loves us.  There are no conditions set upon God’s grace.  It is one of the truly free things in the universe, maybe the only truly free thing.

C.S.Lewis told a story of walking into a room at Oxford where several professors were discussing how Christianity differs from other world religions.  Lewis broke in and said “Grace is the difference.”  And Lewis was right.  The other world religions depend on the works of their followers to gain mercy from their gods.  Christianity does not.  The God of Christianity offers forgiveness for simply believing in Him and making Him Lord of our lives.  That’s grace.

God’s grace has no limits or conditions.  How could it.  What could sinful man ever do to please a holy and infinite God or qualify even to stand in His presence?  The answer, of course, is nothing.

But just what is grace?  Grace is God’s unconditional gift.  We are all sinners.  We’ve all fallen and still fall.  For a holy God to bless us daily, to love us deeply, and use us greatly is what grace truly is.  And, it’s even more.

What about the grace we are to show others?  We as Christians are to be gracious to others, aren’t we?

Proverbs 16:24 (ESV) Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body.

But there are people out there that just push our buttons.  How can we be gracious to them?  We all have these people, people who seem to just tick us off by their very presence.  How do we show grace to them?  While I don’t do all that well in this area, I do ask myself, “With all that God has forgiven me of, how can I hold anything at all against other people?”

Why is this important?

There are actually a lot of reasons an understanding of grace is important.  No one is more aware of who we are and how much we desperately need a Savior than we do.  As a result, we often beat ourselves up, we are convinced we’re unworthy to do God’s bidding, to represent Him in public, to teach His Word, to share His love.  With grace involved, though, worth is irrelevant.  It simply doesn’t come into the equation.  We are used by God not because of our worth but because of His gracious love for us.

It takes a long time for most of us to truly understand God’s grace in our lives.  I know I’m still working on it.  My present level of understanding takes a load off of my heart and mind when I see something God wants me to do.  When I look at how God has used me in areas I’m totally unqualified for, I can only think of one word: “Grace!”

In the last blog, I talked about how we as Christians are united.  I also mentioned there is a line, a doctrinal line, between orthodox Christianity and cults.  One of the essential doctrines that set apart Christianity from cults is the Trinity, so I thought I’d look at there here.

Definition

The trinity doctrine is described like this:  In the nature of the one true God there are three divine Persons, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.  The three Persons are the one true God.  But, where do we find this in Scripture?  Here are some passages:

The Father is God: Gal. 1:1

The Son is God: Heb 1:8

The Holy Spirit is God: Acts 5:3-4

Yet there is only one God: Isa. 44:6; Acts 2:24.

Three persons are called God, yet there is only one God.  Therefore the three Persons are the one God.  It’s defined as simply as that.

Within the trinity, the Son and Holy Spirit are submissive to the Father.  They are not inferior in any way except positionally.  Their submission is voluntary.  We’ll look at that more when we look at the deity of Christ in a future post.

Some History

Throughout church history there have been disagreements on this doctrine.  Mostly the arguments centered around the deity of Christ.  For now, just understand the orthodox (standard) belief was that Jesus is God, equal to the Father.

The trinity has always been understood within Christianity.  Look at how early the trinity appears in Christian writings.  Polycarp, the Bishop of Smyrna, a disciple and coworker with the Apostle John for years, wrote this:  ” I have collected these things, when they had almost faded away through the lapse of time, that the Lord Jesus Christ may also gather me along with His elect into His heavenly kingdom, to whom, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

So, not only does the trinity appear in Scripture but also in the writings of the early church.

There have been several misunderstandings concerning the trinity and how it works however.

Modalism: This idea was championed by a guy named Sabellius who died around 215 a.d.  The belief didn’t die with him, though.  It continued for several centuries and still appears in sects like the United Pentecostal Church. This is the belief that God is just one Person who wears three hats.  There are two major forms of this.  The first is dynamic modalism where one believes God acted as the Father in the Old Testament times, as the Son when Jesus walked the earth, and as the Holy Spirit today.  Static modalism, the second major form, says God acts as the Father in His creation, as the Son in redemption, and as the Holy Spirit in our sanctification.  This doctrine was attractive to early believers since it solved the problem of three Persons but one God.

Tritheism:  This is the belief that the trinity is actually three separate gods.  It was briefly the teaching of Dionysius the bishop of Alexandria (d. 264 a.d.) trying to disprove the Sabellian heresy.  The church pointed out his error.  He then admitted his error and returned to orthodoxy.  Mormons believe a form of Tritheism.

Arianism:  This doctrine is named after Arius of Alexandria (c. 250-336 a.d.).  Arianism is the teaching which brought about the Nicene Council (325 a.d.) which issued the Nicene Creed. 

Arianism is the belief that only the Father is God.  The Son is His first and greatest creation through which He created the universe.  Normally, very little attention is paid to the Holy Spirit, but some Arians believe He is just God’s force.  Many in the early Eastern church believed God could not be involved with matter.  This solved that problem by teaching it was not God but His creation (Jesus) which created matter.  Jehovah’s Witnesses are modern day Arians.

The church’s orthodox stand on the trinity was not officially and fully settled until the Council of Nicaea in 325 a.d. though, as I said above, it was believed much earlier.  Brave men stood strongly and boldly against the misinterpretations of this doctrine.  Athanasius (300-373) Bishop of Alexandria, spent most of his life combating Arianism.  Arianism was a huge threat to orthodox theology for several centuries.  Even at age 25, Athanasius was a major player at the Council of Nicaea but suffered exile five times throughout his life for defending the Nicene Creed and the trinity doctrine it presented.

So, while the trinity may be a little hard to understand, it is clear from Scripture that God exists in three divine Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit yet is one holy and everlasting God.

Why is this important?

Knowing God better is always important, and understanding Who and What He is adds to that.  Also, God is triune and chooses to exist that way.  He is a God Who is communal.  Maybe that’s why He made us.  I’m sure that’s why He encourages us to gather in families, friends, and churches.  The more we understand God, the easier it will be to relate to Him.

Philippians 2:1-2 (ESV)
¹  So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, ²  complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

Philippians we should be of the same mind, same love, and in full accord.  There are two facets to this.  The first is how do we differentiate between the ones who are of the same mind and love and those who aren’t?  The second is the fact many in the church will have nothing to do with brothers and sisters with differing views.

How do we know who is “of the same mind?”  In my current series of blog posts, we’re looking at some of the basic Christian doctrines we can use to test if someone or some organization is Christian or not.  Things like accepting Jesus Christ as Lord of your life and His bodily resurrection are good tests for an individual to gauge if they are a believer.  According to Romans 10:9, those are the required qualifications.

To tell if an organization is Christian we can add two more tests, does the group believe in the trinity as accepted by the church as a whole, and do they believe salvation comes through grace alone?  Those four doctrines are primary tests for an organization that presents itself as Christian.

But, what about all the other teachings in the Bible besides Jesus’ deity and resurrection?  It’s true the Bible teaches lots of things, hell, water baptism, Jesus’ virgin birth, the inspiration of the Bible.  What about those? 

While those are important, they are not essential for salvation.  As I mentioned earlier, a Christian is someone holding a belief in the Lordship of Christ in their life and in His bodily resurrection.   

A quote that’s been attributed to almost every church leader since Luther goes like this: “In essentials, unity.  In non-essentials, liberty, and in all things charity.”  I think that’s a great rule to live by in our discussions with other Christians and even with non-believers.

When I talk with people with whom I disagree, I have to admit I get a little hot under the collar at times.  The flesh grabs ne, and I have to pause and regain my composure.  Self-control, after all, is one of the fruit of the spirit.  I often put that fruit to the test. Thinking of what Paul said in 2 Timothy helps:

2 Timothy 2:24-26 (ESV)
 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.

Why is this important?

We need to keep our composure when discussing our faith no matter with whom.  Years ago my wife and I visited the Los Angeles County Fair.  The International Bible Students,  had a booth there to recruit folks into their organization.  They’re a spin off group of Jehovah’s Witnesses that left when their founder died and new leadership took over.

I stopped to talk with them and share the gospel.  While we deeply disagreed on essential doctrines, God kept me calm and reasonable to the point that the person I was speaking with asked others in the booth to join us.  “He’s not yelling at us!” she said which made me ashamed this had been their experience with other Christians.  My demeanor made it possible to hold their attention, and we had a wonderful time.  Most importantly, I was given the opportunity to share the gospel.  Peace often can open doors.

I belonged to a Baptist church that stopped supporting a missionary when they learned she spoke in tongues.  Was the missionary a Christian?  Most definitely!  Was she doing God’s work?  Of course she was.  Stopping her support was the wrong thing to do. Brotherhood and sisterhood aren’t just words.  They’re important in the church.  We’re a family.  I sometimes think the Holy Spirit’s most difficult task is not to bring non-believers out of darkness but to bring us Christians. 

1 John 2:9-11 (ESV)
Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness.  Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling.  But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

Easter is the holiest day on the Christian calendar.  But, did you know there were times when even Easter represented conflict in the church.  There was a great disagreement in the early church on what was to be celebrated and when.

Very early on, the churches in the East identified with the Apostle John.  After all, John spent most of his time around Jerusalem, Ephesus, and on the island of Patmos.  Jesus died on Passover, and that was the emphasis of John’s celebration.  The Eastern churches followed this practice celebrating Passover no matter on what day of the week it fell.

The Western church looked to Peter and Paul as their examples since they were icons of the Western churches.  Peter and Paul were said to have emphasized Christ’s resurrection the first Sunday after Passover since Christ rose on a Sunday.  As a result, the Eastern and Western churches seldom celebrated on the same day nor did they celebrate the same thing.  The Eastern churches celebrated Christ’s ultimate sacrifice on our behalf.  The Western churches celebrated His glorious resurrection.  This difference in practice caused each side to argue for the virtue of their own view.

At first, both sides used the Jewish calendar to arrive at a date for Passover.  As the church as a whole grew to be anti-Semitic, the use of the Julian calendar replaced the Jewish calendar, so the Passover dates were often miscalculated.

Now we need to remember the Eastern and Western churches were not divided at the time but were seen as one body.  So, these differing views grew into a division of serious proportions within the body.  In 154 a.d., Polycarp, a disciple of the Apostle John, traveled to Rome to try and persuade the Bishop there that the Eastern Passover celebration should be the universal observance.  The Bishop of Rome, Anicetus, disagreed, and the two sections of the church continued with their own celebrations for years each confident the other was wrong. 

Eventually, tempers flared, and around 195 a.d., Victor, Bishop of Rome at the time, wanted to excommunicate the entire Eastern Church over the issue of Easter.  He called them heretics.  Synods were held and letters sent to bishops in the West asking for advice and consent.  Ireneaus, Bishop of Lyon in Gaul, wrote Victor asking him to be reasonable.  The consensus of the Western bishops was sympathetic with Irenaeus’ opinion.  Victor decided to back off, and the matter was tabled. 

In 325 a.d., a council was called at a town in Asia Minor, Nicaea.  Many things were settled there including the calculation for Easter.  Years prior to the council the church had thrown out the Jewish way of calculating Passover and decided to arrive at it themselves.  The calculation is the one given above.  Easter would be celebrated the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring equinox.  The Eastern practice of celebrating Good Friday as the holiest day ended.  Easter was now universally to be celebrated on a Sunday.  Of course, the new calculations depended on the Julian calendar.  But, that didn’t put an end to the issue.

Near the end of the sixth century, missionaries to Britain saw the churches there were calculating the date for Easter using a new calendar, the Gregorian calendar.  The Western church liked and adopted this new method of dating while the Eastern churches continued with the practice of using the Julian calendar as they do to this day.  Once again, the two sides would often celebrate on different dates.

In 1054, the Eastern and Western churches split becoming the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.  They didn’t split over the Easter controversy but over the Bishop of Rome getting too big for his britches. 

The Eastern Orthodox churches continue use of the Julian calendar for their calculation.  As a result, the dates of Easter are usually different East to West.  In 2024, for instance, the Catholics and Protestants will both celebrate Easter on March 31^st while the Orthodox will celebrate it on May 5^th.  The following year both will celebrate it on the same day.

Why is this important?

It is important for us to understand it really doesn’t matter exactly the date of Christ’s death or the date of His resurrection.  The important thing is that He gave His life for us and rose again showing His power over death.

I think this also shows us we can have differences in churches and still be one body.  True, the East and West eventually split, but it was over a fleshly issue, a power grab, not over doctrine.  There are major doctrines which must be agreed upon: the trinity, the bodily resurrection of Christ, salvation by grace alone, and the deity of Christ.  There are also doctrines where we can differ.  A popular saying among theologians goes like this, “In essentials unity, in non-essentials, liberty, but in all things, charity.”  I think that’s a principal we can live by.

Philippians 2:6-8 (ESV)
⁶, [Jesus], though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, ⁷  but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. ⁸  And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Jesus is both God and man.  We call this doctrine the Incarnation and it has been argued since the first century.  Early converts wanted to understand how all this works.  Back then, there were and still are lots of different ideas about it.

Gnosticism, a false belief rampant in the first few centuries of the church, held that God is Spirit, that spirit is good, but material things like humans are bad/evil.  So, if Jesus was God, He could not have a physical body or He would have been evil.  Jesus couldn’t die on the cross since He was not physical in the first place.  This belief can be traced back before Christ to the Greeks who’s religious views taught matter was evil but spirit was good.

Ebionism (Judaizers), another false belief, was also very familiar to the early church.  Paul describes the Judaizers in Galatians 2:4,12.  One of their beliefs was that Jesus was just a man who died a horrible death.  He was not God, just a great teacher.  Sound familiar?  We still hear this today.  The problem is one would need to reject the New Testament and much of the Old to justify this.  That makes it a little awkward in Christian circles to say the least.

Some believe Jesus was just a physical body and the spirit of the Son indwelled it as a driver indwells an automobile.  The body was nothing but a vehicle for God’s Spirit to use for 33 years then leave as it was about to be nailed to the cross.  These folks usually divide the Christ or Son from Jesus.  They believe Jesus died on the cross but the Christ, the Son, did not.  The consequence would be God did not pay the sacrifice, a senseless body did.

Still others believed Jesus was a great man and either at His baptism or at His crucifixion He received the divine Christ spirit and became God’s Son.  This is called Adoptionism.  The Man Jesus became divine as a reward for His good life.  He then died,rose, and was brought into heaven as God’s divine Son.

The Arians, heretics who arose in the third century, believed Jesus was not really God but God’s greatest creation, a sort of lieutenant god. Since God couldn’t be involved with matter, He used Jesus to create the material universe.  This solved the problem posed by the Greeks and their belief that God could not relate to anything physical.   

So, there are lots of odd ideas out there.  Most of these views appear fairly early in the history of the church.  The current evangelical/orthodox view was always understood but settled upon officially by the end of the fourth century when the church came together to denounce these false teachings and even cursed some who supported them.

The biblical view of the incarnation is that Jesus is wholly divine and wholly human.  Josh McDowell put it this way, “Jesus is divine as if He were never human and as human as if He were never divine.” Paul says in Philippians chapter 2, God the Son, second Person of the trinity, emptied Himself (of the use of His divine attributes) and took on human form.  He became obedient to the Father to the point of death on the cross.

Some would ask, “How could He be both human and God?  Isn’t that contradictory?”  We’re talking about natures here.  One can have more than one nature.  Just as a blue ball can have a round nature and a blue one at the same time, Jesus can be God and man at the same time.

Why is this important?  God the Son has a human nature.  He has been tempted just as we have:

Hebrews 2:18 (ESV)
¹⁸  For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

As a human, He was tempted and faced the trials and tribulations every man has and then some.  There are other benefits for us, though.  He now has been in both worlds, that of God and that of man, so he can mediate for us.

1 Timothy 2:5 (ESV)
⁵  For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,

There is much more to the incarnation than just an interesting Christian doctrine.  It reaches right down to the foundation of our salvation and our relationship with God.

Hebrews 12:2 (ESV)
²  looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

We are that joy.

Joshua 1:8 (ESV)
⁸  This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

The neat package of books we hold in our hands we call the Bible has not always been accepted as we see it today.  And the fact is, of course, that the Bible is not a book but a library of 66 ancient documents written by over 40 authors spanning more than 1500 years.

For much of the first century, the early church had the apostles as their authorities on doctrine.  They were easily accessible since they were scattered all over the empire.  If there was a major dispute over a doctrine, the church need only to seek out an apostle to settle the issue.  As a result, while many churches had letters from apostles or copies of those letters, most saw them as instructional instruments within the local assembly.  By 70 a.d., though, all but one apostle, John, was dead.  Heresies were knocking at the doors of churches and sometimes settling into those churches.  What could the bishops use as an authority now to refute these heresies?  They rightly decided to settle on the writings of the apostles as the final authority.

Like today, though, heresies back then could be supported by Scripture passages taken out of context.  One of the favorite passages for these heretics was 1 Cor. 15:50 “I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.”  

The Gnostics (early church heretics) believed Jesus was not physical, His body was just an illusion, so they used this verse to support that Jesus was not flesh and blood.  The Judaizers and Arians believed Jesus was not God but just a good man.  They used this verse to support their view He could not be God.  So, not only did we need the teachings of the apostles, we needed all the teachings of the apostles.  How do we know which books represent their teachings, though?  There were dozens of documents present in the church at the time.  Which ones were to be followed?

One early Gnostic, Marcion (84-160 a.d.) put together the first canon, a list of books he saw as authoritative.  He believed Christianity was too Jewish and claimed the only inspired books were ten of Paul’s epistles – he left out the Pastoral Epistles – and kept an edited version of Luke where he removed all Old Testament references. 

In response to Marcion’s canon, the orthodox church began to make their own lists.  So far as we know, the first list of authoritative books by the orthodox church was the Muratorian Canon (c. 170).  It included 22 books of the New Testament plus two other early documents, the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas.  The Shepherd was accompanied by a warning that it was to be read for instruction but was not to be considered an apostolic writing.

So, the idea of a canon began late in the second century.  In the years following, other lists appeared, adding other accepted books such as 1 Peter and Hebrews as the church grew.  In 369, Athanasius produced the canon list we use today.  That canon was officially agreed upon by the Council of Carthage in 397.  Even at that council, the agreement was that the canon had been settled prior to the council’s meeting, just not officially.

The Old Testament was agreed upon over time by the church.  Our agreed upon books are taken from the Septuagint which was a Greek translation of the Old Testament translated at least 50 years and perhaps 200 years before Jesus was born.  The church did throw out the Old Testament apocrypha, in the Septuagint, though, believing them to be uninspired.

The New Testament books settled on by the church were not just picked out of a hat.  By the end of the fourth century, the church had tests to retain inspired books and exclude the non-inspired books.

The first test was that of apostolic authority, was the book written by or linked to an apostle?  Luke, Mark, and Jude were not written by apostles although they did have apostolic authority.  Luke was Paul’s constant companion as was Mark with Peter.  Jude was the brother of both Jesus and James the Just who is identified as an apostle in Gal. 1:19.

The second test was if the church had recognized the book as divinely inspired over the previous three and a half centuries.

The third test was if the book carried the power of God.  Were people saved due to its contents?

So, the Book we hold in our hands today and call the Bible went through a lot of history, a lot of testing, and even a lot of battles to reach our hands in the form we have now.

Why is this important?

The history of the Bible shows it has been examined and tested over centuries to be sure the books it contains are indeed God’s Word.  When we pick it up today, we can be assured it transmits faithfully the teachings of the apostles (Acts 2:42) and the teachings and words of Jesus Himself.  All this appears in a library of ancient books inspired by the Holy Spirit.  For more information on the transmission of the New Testament from the first century to us, please check out this blog post.