Maybe we're the apostate church?

This blog is really a record of changes I've been going through. I'm going through a period in which all sorts of things that feel wrong to me, that have bothered me for some time at some barely-conscious level, are coming to consciousness and I'm willing now to argue the point. The question in my last post about living on credit is just one of the latest.

As I say in my Profile I started out at the beginning of 2007 seeking the Lord and through that seeking being led back to a concern I had dropped a few years previous to that, about the question of whether women should cover our heads in church. That was the one that started it all. I'd dropped it because I'd discovered hostility to it -- specifically a jocular mocking of the idea as a few of the women pranced around coquettishly wearing hats for a while, including the pastor's wife (I'd discussed it with him earlier but not with her). After that I rationalized dropping it as being too much of a disturbance to make an issue of it. But some things SHOULD cause a disturbance. Not that it should come from me personally. (Or maybe it should if there's nobody else. I'll have to pray about that more.)

Some two and a half years later, though, at the beginning of 2007, I was clearly convicted of it and had to begin covering my own head at least, no matter what. I also did a thorough study of the question in order to be able to defend the idea to people, covered all the material available to me including a recommendation by my pastor, found many good articles on it on the internet. I started wearing a simple little beret type hat to church, pretty inconspicuous (and not really quite what the Bible requires either, but a beginning compromise since shocking people with anything more than that is clearly not going to be productive), but again found myself frozen out by the women, mostly polite nonresponse but again with some subtle mocking behavior. Six months later I left that church anyway, for a number of reasons, some of them doctrinal. At first it was accidental: For a while I was without a ride to church. I kept letting it slide and then all my disagreements with them started adding up too. I believe it's the best church around here, nevertheless, the best preaching anyway, on most subjects, and the Lord may yet have me go back.

More recently I got involved in the Bible versions question, which I've covered at perhaps tedious length on this blog already. That was also an issue for me some years before that I'd also dropped -- also because it made me the lone defender of an unpopular idea among the Christians I know, coward that I am. On this subject I find myself almost just as much at odds with the King James defenders as with the multiple-version Westcott and Hort defenders. I guess that's because I'm really a Textus-Receptus defender more than a King James-only defender. But I'd like to see the King James preserved as far as possible for a variety of reasons. On this subject it seems even the best churches and best teachers in my opinion are completely given over to the multiple translations and I probably have even less of a chance of convincing anyone I know of this than of the head covering.

Back at the beginning of 2007 I also started pursuing the question why we aren't having revival in the churches, whether we could still, and how it might happen if the Lord would permit it. Time is getting short it seems, things are looking a lot like we're winding down to the Very End. Many signs of it as I discussed early on in this blog. Really wanting to know why we aren't having revival in such a time as this led me into thoughts about how perhaps the churches are simply too far out of God's will by now for Him to be willing to send us a true revival. Perhaps the women's head covering matters more than anyone wants to think? The last major revivals I'm aware of, a century or so ago, were in churches where women still wore something on their heads. I doubt that could be the only reason we aren't having revival now, of course, but after studying it I can't think it's unimportant. It's a creation-based command of God, it concerns his government for his creation, it involves respect for his order in this universe.

As for other reasons, well, even in the conservative churches you'll find Jesus' teaching on divorce and remarriage compromised. He said, and Paul confirmed it, that there's no reason for divorce except sexual unfaithfulness and no reason at all for remarriage ever, after divorce that is; it's only legitimate if the first spouse has died. None of this was a point of contention a hundred years ago. I've heard it argued that if scripture grants an exception for divorce an exception is granted also thereby for remarriage, but I'm not yet convinced. For one thing it is NEVER stated anywhere that remarriage is permitted. Not that it can't be forgiven once it has been committed ignorantly.

Along with all this compromised teaching in the conservative churches as a reason God might not give us revival, there are plenty of fake revivals going on too, and a real danger that the majority of lukewarm Christians could be drawn into the counterfeits even by a serious seeking for true revival. This is a real possibility because there is so little genuine spiritual discernment among Christians, and because we've all sat under this compromised teaching I'm talking about. Somehow or other the whole church, at least the whole church in the West, is out of step with the Lord. How far out of step? How deep is the problem?

We conservative Christians are used to being able to point to churches we recognize as apostate, all the "liberal" churches that outright deny certain Biblical commands and precepts, on homosexuality for instance. But is it possible that the apostasy is actually closer to home?

One thing that bothers me quite a bit, though I feel bad saying it because it seems so innocent in a way, is all the light sentimental and jokey emails I get from Christian friends. It's just not a Christian tone. I'm also lately getting particularly bothered by the political focus of so many of them -- and I've contributed to that myself. Where is the church that was to be a light to the world? We're just acting like the world. Where is the power? Where is our awareness of the glorious Kingdom and our Lord of glory? Where is the radical self-denial we're supposed to be living? I have to say that I do not see this in ANY church or ANY Christian I've ever known, certainly including myself.

A subject I want to talk about in a blog or two after this is some helpful websites I've discovered and especially what I've learned about the practices of the first couple centuries of Christians. THEY lived what Jesus taught in a way we simply do not. They lived true self-denial, true love of the brethren, true separation from the world in a way that has become sadly foreign to Christians today, sadly and certainly including me.

Is it OK for Christians to live on credit?

Had a very strange conversation (as "CJ") on another blog recently. The topic was how exorbitant credit card fees are, and I responded that at least for Christians we shouldn't operate on credit at all. "Owe no man any thing," said Paul in Romans 13:8. I found myself immediately embroiled in an argument with the Christians there, four or five altogether I believe.

Is it really such a foreign idea that Christians ought not to operate on credit? I thought I might get some guilty apologetic Yes-buts but instead I got out-and-out disagreement.

I do know it is a very foreign idea to many Christians though. I know that most people own their houses on mortgages, also pay for their cars in monthly installments, and that many church buildings are in fact mortgaged. It's always FELT wrong to me but because nobody objects, or few object, I don't say anything either.

The oddest part of that conversation was someone's suggesting that we can't avoid credit because we pay our utilites on credit. I was flummoxed by that one at first but eventually got my mind back and realized, No we don't! Just because we pay monthly doesn't mean we're buying our utilities on credit. Utilities are something that we use over time, and we pay for the amount we used at the end of the month. We get a month's worth of use and at the end of the month we pay for it. We pay at the end because we can't know in advance how much we're going to use, but at that point if we pay it on time we're paid up -- no loan, no credit involved. A mortgaged house and a car loan are a different thing altogether. We are paying on a total amount over many years because we are unable to pay for it outright. With utilities we pay for what we just received. With a house and car, no, we are not going to have paid for them for years though we received them already -- utilities are a matter of time of use, a house is a material thing we have or don't have.

I couldn't get that difference across to anybody. And then they also seemed to miss the point about not being able to afford it or pay for it outright, even just to entertain it for discussion's sake. We are so used to thinking in terms of monthly payments on mortgages we forget it's a loan, we forget we owe for the item we're paying on. They do think of it in the same way they think of utilities payments. They figure that since they can meet their monthly payments there's no problem, it's not as if they've contracted for something they're unable to pay, forgetting that they are unable to pay the whole price outright and that's why it's on loan.

I'm not yet completely sure just how radical to be on this subject, but the conversation was instructive about how much is taken for granted by Christians about the ways of the world. My FEELING is to go as radical as possible and say, no, it IS the world's ways and it IS owing when we should not, and if we cannot afford something outright we have no business buying it at all. But I'm going to have to give it further thought. The reason the radical position appeals to me, however, is that it would mark Christians as truly "not of this world" to live like that, as we're supposed to live. Otherwise we're just living like everybody else and making no impact for the Kingdom of God in the area of money.

Christians in our time in the West seem to expect to be comfortable in this world. We're not SUPPOSED to be comfortable in this world. Our comfort is to come from out of this world.

A sense in which Jesus' death paid for all humanity

The subject came up on another blog concerning what happens to infants and young children who die: I just ran across this in a book by George D. Watson, 19th century Holiness teacher, an explanation I'm not at all familiar with, but it's very interesting.

I'll quote him:

"Now the first death is that which is entailed upon us by the fall of our first parents ...

"Now this first death, which comes from Adam, both morally and physically, has been atoned for by the incarnation and death of the Son of God, so that no human being will ever be finally lost because of Adam's transgression. Jesus has purchased, by His sufferings and death and resurrection, an absolute indemnity from the fall of Adam, making ample provision for all the consequences of Adam's transgression, both for the removal of all original sin, and the raising again from the dead of every human being.

"Every infant born in the human race comes into being under the covenant
of redeeming grace. We are expressly told that, "as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." From this we learn that the iniquity of Adam, as an open transgressor, is not imputed to any infant in the form of actual guilt, and that the principle of indwelling sin, which is in the infant, has its ample remedy in the shed blood of Jesus. If the infant dies before reaching the age of accountability, its nature is thoroughly purified on the basis of the covenant which the Son of God made with the Father, as the second Adam, and true Head of the race.

"Thus we see that of all the millions of human beings who may be finally lost, not one of them will be permitted to attribute his everlasting woe to our first parents... [God] has dealt with the human race on such an enormous scale of mercy, justice, equity, redeeming love and impartiality, that every one will be compelled to attribute his ruin to himself."

(Steps to the throne, M.O.V.E Press 1980, pp 29-30)

There's something very satisfying about this way of looking at it. It accounts for those parts of scripture that do seem to suggest that Jesus' sacrifice was effective for the whole human race, while not supporting universal salvation. This salvation from the first death would apparently only apply to those who are incapable of accountability, very young children certainly and perhaps mentally deficient people(?) The second death is for all others, those who reject Christ.

It might even provide an answer to those who complain that people who have no chance to hear the gospel shouldn't be punished for that. It suggests a level of salvation that is not full salvation, yet both provided by the sacrifice of Christ.

Needs more revelation.

Conspiracy Theories gone way too far

I'd rather not have to say anything about this, but since I've occasionally recommended Scott Johnson's talks at Sermon Audio I really do have to note when he goes too far. I've written him about this too.

In recent talks he's repeated the false information that healings had occurred at Obama events. This is a story that was made up by a satirical website, Lark News. I had written him about it earlier and I have to suppose others did too, but he continues to pass along the false information.

Now on his latest topic he speaks very sarcastically of the government's financing of the switch to digital TV, wondering about their supposed eagerness to impose this new technology on us to the extent that they'd finance it. It doesn't seem to occur to him that not everything is a conspiracy and there may be perfectly reasonable explanations for some things. In this case why assume anything more suspicious than that the technology is now available to improve television enormously but since it is going to require a complete switch from the old technology to the new the public needs to be aggressively prepared for it. And since it's going to make all the older TVs obsolete the government has an obligation to help people pay for the switch.

There may very well be conspiracies afoot in the world that we need to know about, but unfortunately there is such a thing as conspiracy thinking that always sees conspiracies where there is really no justification for it. It is a violation of the virtue of charity to keep implying evil motives in people with as little justification as your own ability to imagine that a new technology could be misused. A quote from this same teaching has it that

. . .any television manufactured after 1995 already has a built in feature to send abroadcast signal from your living room of live images of what’s happening in your home.

A bit alarming, no? Does it occur to him to ask whether this is perhaps a POTENTIAL feature that a person could choose to activate or not, the way you can choose to use a webcam or Skype to broadcast yourself as people now do? Does it occur to him that there are civil liberties hounds who would be up in arms at the use of such a technology against the will of the people?

We can't find out the truth about any of this if the person presenting it has a locked-in conspiracy mental set. This attitude compromises everything he says. If he wants to be helpful he's going to have to realize that even if his material is "documented" it doesn't prove that the interpretation of it all is correct. There is no doubt a potential for a lot of technologies to be misused, but technology in itself is morally neutral.

In earlier teachings Dr. Johnson also appears to be much too credulous toward the many-times-debunked Protocols of the Elders of Zion, as well as the "Merovingian" blood lines conspiracy notion. I haven't the knowledge to criticize these things carefully myself but Dr. Johnson SHOULD require himself to have that knowledge before he speaks and should not so irresponsibly pass on such material that has been criticized carefully by others.

You need to be a LOT more careful, Dr. Johnson.

Degrees of Faith?

Stories of escape from the attacks on Westerners at hotels in Mumbai (Bombay) have been going around. I've heard two full reports now and some brief accounts as well, some miraculous escapes in some cases, such as near misses, odd circumstances keeping a person out of harm's way and so on. There were many such stories about escape from the WTC towers on 9/11 too, stories showing God's hand in various rescues, faith-building stories. I appreciate these stories. They are inspiring.

But they also raise a question in my mind whether saving our lives is of such high priority in the Christian life. The emphasis is always on the saving of the life, you see. A hero's death may also be inspiring too of course.

Both of the stories about escape from Mumbai (Bombay) emphasize the person's focused aim of escaping. They don't claim to be Christians exactly, but they do mention God, and there's no doubt that God saved them. I don't doubt that for a moment. But I do wonder about being focused on escaping because Jesus said we are not to try to save our own lives but to lose our lives for His sake.

Didn't He? But people will object if you point that out to them. They will say that maybe we are to try to save ourselves to be of use later or something like that. I think that misses the point of Jesus' teaching.

I'm not talking about the immediate aim of avoiding sure death. I don't think that's what Jesus meant -- unless you have a clear leading from Him to be doing something else in the situation rather than avoiding death of course. I'm talking about the exclusive focus on escape as opposed to seeking God's will in the circumstance.

God may use us whether or not we are being obedient, but obeying Him and dying to ourselves should at the very least mean that we aren't seeking to save ourselves from a calamity but putting His will above our own and seeking what He wants of us in that situation. If we are seeking Him then we can know in our spirit what He wants of us, we don't have to be blind to His will. We may remain blind to His will of course, that's up to Him, but we may not: He may show us something clear that He wants of us. It is possible He simply wants to lead us out of there, but more likely He would have us serve others in some way, as He did when He walked this earth and still does from heaven. This would involve self-sacrifice of course, even if we are protected from harm and eventually escape. It is by definition a sacrifice of self to put others ahead of ourselves.

I've been mulling over lately how easy it seems to be for this kind of teaching to be misunderstood, indeed not even recognized at all by Christians. Someone may accuse me of "seeking martyrdom" by simply quoting Jesus' saying we are to lose our lives for His sake, even if the context is clearly circumstances over which a person has no control. Someone else may think I'm denying that God is in control of whether we live or die if I say that saving onself is not to be our priority, based on the same quote. I'm never quite prepared for such misunderstandings. It makes me think that the Sermon on the Mount is not really taken seriously.

This was the response of a couple of people to what I wrote in response to one of the Mumbai stories, here:

What a story. Touching to hear of all the Indians helping him. I wonder if Alex or his friends were killed or let go?

I'm sure I'd react with full-bore adrenaline too (which would probably give me a heart attack but oh well), but these stories usually make me wonder how as a Christian I SHOULD react, and saving my own life shouldn't be top priority. Of course it sounds impossibly idealistic but Jesus' teachings ARE counterintuitive, clearly aimed at overcoming our natural self-protective reactions by His power, as He overcame when He went to the cross for us. We're to love our enemies and pray for our persecutors for instance, forgive our enemies and not call for their death. It's the Spirit-powered Christian response that wins people, not anything we do in the flesh. Better to convert a terrorist even while dying at his hand than escape. Truly. We're to die to self and saving our lives will lose our lives, but losing them for His sake will save them. Jesus' teaching is full of such paradoxes. We're to fear nothing, not those who can take our physical lives but only Him who has power over our eternal lives. "Perfect love casts out fear." We're to put others ahead of ourselves, those who were milling around dazed for instance. If we really lived like this, something impossible to us and possible only by God's own power, Ducky could have nothing to say against us ever.

I know this is all talk coming from me, and the walk would be an adrenaline-powered run same as the writer's unless God gave me an infusion of grace at that moment to obey Him, and I'm truly glad for this man's escape and the story he has to tell, but I can't help at least KNOWING what God would want me to be doing instead. I truly believe that this is the Christian life as God wants us to live it, in His power, and I'm well aware of my own failure to do so. What power the church would have if we learned this life as Jesus teaches it.

I believe this. I yearn for this power, this total self-giving to God's will. Most Christians, however, seem content to recognize God's hand in their lives. I don't mean to minimize such a recognition; it's wonderful. It's faith, it's belief, it's salvation.

But is the Sermon on the Mount to be regarded as something beyond normal Christian life? What gets called the "Higher Christian Life" is really just obedience to Jesus, it seems to me.

President Bush is no born-again Christian

A couple of reports on Bush's admission that he's not a literal Bible-believer, from a site called The Apostolic Report and another from AOL. He doesn't believe the Bible is literally true and he believes that other religions worship the same God Christians do.

Is it possible he is a born-again Christian with such beliefs? He had convinced many of us of that when we voted for him. But can you consider God's word to be inaccurate or incomplete in any way and be His child? Can you consider all religions to be true worship of the one true God and still belong to God? I don't see how. Isn't this denying the exclusivity of the sending of God's own Son to die for us, which is known only in the Bible? If you deny the Son Jesus says you will be denied by God. If Jesus said He is "the way, the truth and the life" and that "no one comes to the Father but by Me," then all those who deny that He is the only way to the Father but hope to get to the Father some other way are not God's.

This ought to have been apparent at the point Bush declared Islam to be "a religion of peace" or even more particularly, when he allowed a Muslim leader to pray along with other clergy in the National Cathedral after 9/11. Having a Jewish leader or a Catholic pray there is really already the same thing of course. 9/11 was already God's judgment on this nation, and there have been more judgments in the form of disasters since then as well, but including false religions in the National Cathedral, instead of mollifying God's wrath against the nation can only invite more. It is no different than the worship of the false god Tammuz in Solomon's Temple as reported by Ezekiel in the Old Testament, or any of the worship of false gods by the Israelites, done along with the true God, as reported for the people of Israel at various times, including King Solomon. We were given the Old Testament as admonition but who is paying attention? This is direct disobedience of the Commandment to "have no other gods before Me." Who can be God's child who does such a thing?

Obama's "Christianity" is even worse, but then Obama's winning the Presidency is God's judgment on the nation in itself (Well, so was Bush's, so was Clinton's etc. etc. etc). Sin begets sin.

A Living Sacrifice

I receive weekly teachings from pastor Zac Poonen of Bangalore, India, whom I discovered a few months ago while looking for inspiring teaching on revival. He has continued to inspire me.

I have been in churches that preach that Christians are to observe a literal Sabbath on Sunday and to tithe a literal 10% minimum to the church, and I've been to churches that "spiritualize" either or both. The preaching on both sides can be quite convincing, but I'm now persuaded that the New Covenant has no literal requirements, but being all a matter of walking by the Spirit would have us live the Sabbath fulfilled in Jesus Christ every day, and to give as He prompts us without reference to an external standard. Pastor Poonen elaborates this view, though I think he goes too far in accusing those of the other view of bad motives:

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Always Put God First In Your Life

Zac Poonen

In Malachi 3: 8-11 The Lord says, "Will a man rob [orcheat] God? Yet you are robbing Me. But you say, `How have we robbed You?' In tithes and offerings. You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing [defrauding] Me, the whole nation of you. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this, if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until there is not room enough. Then I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of the ground; nor will your vine in the field cast its grapes".

Did you know that tithing is not mentioned even once after the day of Pentecost (when the new covenant was instituted)? Tithing is not commanded under the new covenant at all – yet multitudes of covetous pastors still preach it today and exploit poor, ignorant believers. Jesus did not teach His disciples to tithe but to give. What do we have to give to God first of all? Romans 12:1 states, "I beseech you, brethren, by the mercies of God, present your bodies (not your tithes) as a living sacrifice to God."

Just as paying the tithe was emphasised under the old covenant, presenting our bodies to God is what is emphasised in the new covenant. Tithing was meant to be a type, just like the Passover lamb and the Sabbath day. The lamb was a type of Christ, and the Sabbath was a type of the inward rest that Christ gives us. These Old Testament rituals were all shadows of what was finally fulfilled in Christ (as Colossians 2:16,17 makes crystal clear).

Concerning tithing, God had said, "The purpose of tithing is to teach you always to put God first in your lives" (Deut.14:23-Living Bible). Under the old covenant, they offered their tithes to prove that God was first in their lives. In the new covenant, we present our bodies to God and thus prove that He is first in our lives.

What does it mean to offer our bodies? It means giving our eyes to God so that we never use them for ourselves again. Is that easier or is it easier to give 10% of your income to God? You know that it is far easier to give 10% of our income each month to God than to keep our eyes pure each day of that month. That is why preachers teach tithing more than keeping our eyes pure. Many pastors are lovers of money and they want their congregation to tithe so that they can become rich from those tithes. Since there is no justification at all for tithing in the new covenant, they use this verse in Malachi to frighten ignorant believers into paying their tithes every month.

The early apostles were poor, as we can see clearly from 1 Corinthians 4:9-12: "God has exhibited us apostles last of all……To this present hour we are both hungry and thirsty, and are poorly clothed, and are roughly treated, and are homeless; and we toil, working with our own hands." But consider the mathematics of how a covetous pastor today becomes wealthy. If 10 people give him one-tenth of their income, he gets one man's average salary (because 10 X 10% = 100%). This is reasonable.

But well-known pastors receive tithes from hundreds of God's people. If even 100 people give their tithes to a pastor, his income will become ten times that of the average man – and very soon he will become a millionaire, at the expense of his supporters! And then in order to justify his becoming wealthy, he will begin to preach prosperity as the mark of God's blessing (from the Old Testament – Deuteronomy 28:5,8,11) – and his flock is deceived. This is the deception flooding Christendom today, all over the world, and it is all being done in the Name of Jesus. The money-changers are back in the temple of God – and there is no-one to drive them out, as Jesus did; and there is hardly any preacher who is bold enough to expose these confidence tricksters.

Then how much money should we to give for God's work? Only what we can give cheerfully – for God does not love those who give money under pressure, or who give in order to get something from Him (See 2 Cor.9:8). First give your body to the Lord and then give whatever money you want to give cheerfully, but never as an obligation and certainly not out of fear. I hope this understanding of God's Word liberates you from false teaching.

So I have to inject here that I don't think most pastors who teach a literal tithe have any questionable motives, but sincerely believe that it is required of Christians. In the average church with this viewpoint the tithe is not considered the property of the pastor but of the church for God's purposes, and managed by the elders for many needs in the church, the pastor receiving a designated salary from it.

There are of course some high profile teachers who fleece the flock but these are not representative, and I'm not sure but I think these don't normally preach the tithe anyway, but of giving the most you can give. Investigations of some TV preachers have shown that they live personally at a level of expense available only to the very wealthiest. I understand why Pastor Poonen would preach against these Prosperity Doctrine false teachers of course. He often laments that Christian leaders in India have a tendency to pick up the worst teachings from the West.