 |
 |
 |
||||||||
|
|
|
||||||||
|
 |
The following is the text of a newsletter sent to the congregation of Covenant Fellowship on Thursday, June 26, 1997 Dear Friends of Covenant Fellowship, A year or so ago an old friend from Clemson called. I had known him in my “in between years,” the four years in between the time I had first been introduced to the gospel when I was 16, and the time that I knew I had become a new creature in Christ when I was 20. Apparently I had given my friend a Bible for a present and written something in it, although I can’t remember doing either. My friend was now attending church and wanted me to know that I had had a big influence upon him. He called me again recently. He was talking about the virtues of living according to certain principles, and then said something that chilled me. he said something to the effect that even if Christianity were not true, it had provided for him a great approach to life and great rules to live by. Therefore, because it seemed to work for him and his family, it was therefore quite commendable, and he wanted to thank me for helping him to see that. I can’t imagine having ever said to anyone that even if Christianity were not true it nevertheless provided great rules to live by and was thus worth adhering to for that reason. Frankly, the more I grow to understand the radical demands of the gospel, the more I am very sure that the only reason I would commend Christianity to anyone would be that it happens to be real and objectively true, that is, that there is a God who is the God of the Scriptures, that He did create the world which then fell away from Him, that he did send His Son to provide redemption for His people, that Jesus is the Son of God, that He did live a life of perfect obedience to the Father, that He did die as a substitute for His people, that he was raised bodily from the dead, that He did ascend to the father, that He is coming back to judge the world, that all who embrace and follow Him will experience a life of everlasting fellowship with Him in a renewed Heaven and Earth, etc. But let’s say for the sake of argument that none of these things I have just said about God is true, and that there is in fact no God at all. Well, one can imagine that it might not do any great harm to a person simply to affirm in the quietness and confidentiality of his heart that the things presented above are all true, even if it were silly to do so, seeing that, in this imaginary case, these things aren’t true at all. One could quietly believe all sorts of silly things the believing of which did him no great harm. I suppose many of us believe things to be true which are false, and false which are true, about this or that, the wrongness of which brings to us no great adverse consequences and causes no great harm. But what if this person’s belief in the silly ideas outlined above did in fact bring to him some harm. What if his belief compelled him to all sorts of actions and behaviors he would in no way pursue apart from his belief. What if these beliefs led our friend across the world to tell people all about what he understood to be true. What if on account of being really excited about telling people what he believed, that he was disowned by his family, stripped of his property, beaten, ridiculed, imprisoned, and all the while he kept acting as if the thing he believed were true, which in our scenario, it isn’t. What if one of the reasons he pressed on and endured such affliction was because he believed in a reward in the next life, in a resurrection from the dead, in a return to earth of the Son of God, none of which in our scenario is going to happen at all. Would it not be better for our friend to learn to adjust to the truth that there is no god, no hereafter, no judgment, no resurrection, no supernatural, and simply enjoy his little life as best as possible, retaining his family, friends, job, and life as long as possible? Again, we would respect our friends courage but shake our heads at him in pity. What if on the other hand our person lived in a country tolerant of what people said they believed, that this person affirmed quietly that the things listed above are all true (which they aren’t in our scenario), and maybe even got together occasionally with like minded folk, but that the person did not in any radical sense live according to the truths (that is, was not so taken and gripped by it that he told others, went overseas, etc.) of what he said he believed, but followed more or less the societal and cultural norms, inserting some personal moral choices like chastity or honesty or whatever here and there. In that case we would say that the person’s beliefs did him no real harm and maybe did him some good in that some of those beliefs kept him out of trouble or kept his life from slipping into chaos. But, we might wonder, why would a person believe something and then not act upon it. Something would seem odd to us about that. We would consider that the person lacked integrity, that he did nor really have the courage of his convictions. But then, what really would it matter. The person would get on well enough I this life, then cease to be. No harm done really. (This scenario is more or less where my friend finds himself.) Or say now that in our scenario that there is in fact a god, but a very different one than our friend understood there to be. Say that this god was very holy and jealous, desiring to be worshipped according to the truth of who he (or she or it) is, and say that there is in the future going to be a final judgment that separates people out according to what people believed. All that our friend affirms about Jesus as God and Son of God is wrong. Then not only would it be silly and counter productive in this life for this person to believe in and act upon his belief in Jesus, it would be horrifying in the next life, for our friend would be accused justly of idolatry by this god and cast by that god into the lake of fire. Imagine appearing before the judgment seat of this holy God only to hear, “You are an idolater! You worshipped Jesus! You worshipped a creature. You led countless people away from the truth. I never knew you. Away from my presence forever!” OK, bear with me and imagine one more scenario. Now there is a god such as I mentioned above. Our friend in this scenario affirms these things about this god as true, but really does not act significantly upon these beliefs, does not risk anything to tell others about this god, follows more or less the societal and cultural norms, inserting some personal moral choices like chastity or honesty or being personally pro-life or whatever. Again, in that case we would say that the person’s beliefs did him no real harm in this life. In fact, aspects of his beliefs made his life better in that some of those beliefs kept him out of trouble or kept his life from slipping into chaos. But, again, we might wonder, why would a person believe something and then not act upon it? In this case, those beliefs being basically right and true, the God who is true might wonder the same thing. Since the person would then have to face this God, and then live eternally either with or apart from this God, then, well, it might matter that this person didn’t really didn’t seem to believe what he said he believed. (This scenario is more or less where the majority of professing Western Christians find themselves.) The upshot of all these scenarios is that the only good reason to be a Christian is because the things which the Christian affirms are true. There is no other good reason to be a Christian. A person should be a Christian because being a Christian is in line with what is true. By true I mean real, the affirmation corresponding to something real out there.. But truth in the Biblical sense is more than just a statement that is to be affirmed or denied. To be a person of truth is more than being a person that affirms a true statement or denies a false statement. To say that God is true for example is to say more than that God exists, but that God is true to His word, that He does what He promises, that His “deeds” correspond to Him and those things which can be said truthfully about Him. So, Biblically speaking, truth has to do also with what I might call integrity or wholeness or rightness. If I say that I believe such and such to be true, and then make life choices inconsistent with these affirmations, I am not a person of truth. So when I say that the only good reason to be a Christian is because the things which the Christian affirms are true, I am assuming that “being” a Christian would include acting and living according to these truths, i.e., being true to one’s affirmation. If the Bible’s understanding of truth is itself true, then there should be a serious correspondence between what I affirm and how I live, between my creed and my way of life. Assuming this, assuming one would in fact act and live according to one’s affirmations or beliefs, I can say that the only reason to be a Christian is because Christianity is true. Why? Because if a person really acts according to the fullness of truth, it may well bring that person more trouble than good in this life. As the Apostle Paul said: But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. OK, you say. Granted. It matters what a person believes. It matters that what a person believes corresponds to what is real. Maybe I just wasted a lot of paper saying the obvious. But how do we go about determining what is real so that our affirmations and our lives line up with the real? How is that we know with confidence what is real, what is true? This is the great philosophical dilemma of our day. To delve into that philosophical issue would be worthwhile, bit I cannot do that in this letter. Suffice it to say for now that the Christian affirms that there is objective truth to be known and discovered. The Christian would admit that this objective truth maybe contrary to his own profession. This is possible. For any affirmation to be credible it must potentially be deniable or falsifiable. It is theoretically possible that Jesus’ body could have turned up, which would falsify the resurrection. It is possible that no-one could have seen the resurrected Jesus. The point is that the Christian affirms that some things are real and some things are not, and our job is to live by what is real and true. A Christian is a person who both affirms, trusts in, and lives by a certain set of propositions about reality and about God. This is not to deny the centrality to the Christian of a personal relationship with God. But the Christian must affirm the truth and reality of a personal God in order to have such a relationship. I had lunch with a guy one time who said that he had accepted Christ but that he did not believe in God. HELLO! I am reminded of hearing one time from a Christian leader that it didn’t matter so much what you believed as long as you “loved the Lord.” Another person once said that it wasn’t your theology but your relationship with Jesus Christ that mattered. Granted, people can be nit picky and have an overly intellectual faith. They can worship doctrine. But there are huge affirmations regarding truth and reality that one must assume or make in order to engage in a “relationship with Jesus Christ.” Who is Jesus Christ? Is He alive and present? How do I get to have a relationship with Him? What is His relationship to any god that might be out there? But what are those things which a person must affirm, trust in, and live by in order to be a Christian? We look around and we see people who profess to be Christians believing all sorts of things, things which differ from one Christian group to another. Not only is there the big Catholic/Protestant/Orthodox divide, but within Protestantism in particular there are hundreds of different groups with differing creeds and practices. This fact is very discouraging and depressing. It seems that the pursuit of truth has run aground. Most of us were born into this situation. We inherited it from our forefathers. But how are we to deal with this phenomenon? How do we determine what the important things are which we are to believe? Maybe you think it isn’t our job to determine who our fellow Christians are. Well, if you don’t think that this is an important thing to determine, let me ask you to be a committee of one to decide who we should and should not admit into the fellowship and worship and membership of the local church? Certainly you would conclude that a person should be a professing Christian, but then you would have to decide how you would determine what it is one must profess to be a professing Christian, and then you must determine if there seem to be any reasons to doubt the sincerity of the profession. Or say you had a desire to be a part of a city wide prayer and worship fellowship of various folks who professed to be Christians. You went to a meeting and several people were praying to God as “she,” several were asking God to destroy all non believers and enemies of the gospel, some were asking God to confound the mean judgmental pro-life Christians, some were praying for God to hurry up and rapture the church out of all this mess, some were using other names for God like Sophia or Baal, some were praying all their prayers in tongues, some were praying to Mary and to various of the saints, some were asking God to encourage everyone out there to know that they are His children, some were calling down judgments against the evils of denominations and baby baptizers, some were claiming prosperity and wealth for God’s children, some were thanking God for being chosen by Him before the foundation of the world, some were thanking God for the spiritual resurrection of Jesus, some were thanking God for appearing in the last days through His servant David Koresh, etc., etc. Well, I think you would leave such a meeting thinking that maybe it does matter what people who call themselves Christians believe! As Christians we must look to our Master for the final word concerning what is true and what should be believed to be his follower. To do this they must go to the book which records the sayings and doings of Jesus, and the sayings and doings of his disciples who knew him the best and who went forth in his name. How do we learn what it means to be a “Christian,” a follower of the one called the “Christ?” We go to the Scripture to sit at his feet and learn from Him. We seek to learn from Him what one must affirm, trust in, and do to be his follower, to be a Christian. Some go to other authorities to tell them how they are to understand what the Scripture says. This ultimately is the problem with the Catholic Church. It is also the problem with Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons. Some have decided to redefine what being a Christian means outside of the Scriptures altogether. This is what theological liberals do. So, going back to our city wide prayer meeting above, we are going to have to figure out who are our Christian family, and then if we really want to pray with power, we will have to gather just with family. Not only do we have no choice but to determine who we understand to be Christian “family” in a general sense. But, sadly perhaps, even within our Christian family we have to determine which areas of difference between Christians hinder our ability to worship and work with others. In other words, after studying and reading Scripture and praying and seeking wisdom from others I determine certain central things a person really must believe (and act upon) to be considered a Christian (and therefore my brother or sister in Christ). I find that also there are other things about which these people who really are Christians may differ, and some of these things are worth identifying, debating or discussing because they do in fact effect the work of the church and the work of the gospel. There are things I can tolerate of fellow Christians at a monthly city wide prayer meeting that would be hard to swallow day in and day out in the life and ministry of a local fellowship. Everyone must struggle with this. It cannot be escaped, whether we have a big tent or a little tent. Even if we try to be very tolerant and inclusive, we will have to draw the line somewhere, even if it is simply to exclude those we consider intolerant and exclusive. No matter how much effort we expend honing what we believe and gathering with like minded people, there are always finer and finer points over which to differ and divide. We will have to draw the line somewhere and say that we agree to disagree. In either case we have to draw a line. So how do we decide where to draw the line. How do we determine that we do or do not have enough in common to worship and serve Christ together? We draw the line too early and we risk profaning the God we worship and destroying the purity of His church. We draw it too late and we risk trivializing the God we worship and destroying the unity of His church. But we cannot escape grappling with this question. We cannot escape drawing lines between the primary and the secondary. To do this we have to have a way of identifying and understanding what the issues at stake are. I spoke in the first letter of my dislike for tags and labels, especially theological tags and labels. But I must admit that such tags or labels do have their place. They help to define what others believe about God and the things of God, that is, they help as theological markers. You may think that only people who go to seminary or who don’t have much to do “do theology.” Theology is a discipline in which that every person is engaged whether they admit it or not. “Theology” in a narrow sense has to do with the study of or the knowledge of God (“theos” being the Greek word for God, and “logos” the Greek word for knowledge), and in a broader sense the study of and knowledge of “the things of God.” Anyone who formulates thoughts about god or deity is doing theology. We are all in this sense theologians. The question isn’t whether formally or informally we will “do theology;” the question is whether formally or informally we will do theology well. But what does this mean to do theology well? To do theology well means first of all that what we affirm about God and the ‘things of God” corresponds to what is really there, to what is true. To do theology well secondly means that what we affirm carries over into our worship. Theology is unto doxology (“doxo” being a transliteration of the Greek word for worship). The study of God is to result in the worship of God (if in fact it is true that God wants us to worship Him, which I am presupposing). To do theology well thirdly means that what we affirm carries over into our practice. The study of God (and the “things of God”) is to carry over into the way we think and speak and act. Theology which is just the first is barren and empty. Theology which is just the second and third is groundless. Doing theology well involves all three. Theological tags and labels are words which we give to movements which historically have been significant from a theological standpoint. For example, for several centuries early in the life of the church there was a huge debate about whether Jesus was actually God, and whether Jesus was to be worshipped as God. Eventually this debate was more or less settled in the various councils of Nicea and Chalcedon, which affirmed the deity of Jesus and what has become our present day doctrine of the Trinity. The opponent of what eventually became the official position, and whose views had carried the day for a long time was a man named Arius. Arius believed that Jesus, although a great being indeed, was nevertheless a created being, the first being created by the Creator God, and thus having a kind of divinity but a divinity quite secondary to that of the Creator. This general view has been labeled or tagged “Arianism” and is the defining characteristic of modern Jehovah’s Witnesses. The “orthodox” view may be labeled “Trinitarianism.” It is possible that even this distinction between Arianism and Trinitarianism may seem like hairsplitting to some. But not only should one desire to affirm things which are true about the person and nature of God, which is what is at stake when one debates whether Jesus as God the Son is fully God (and whether the definition of who God is includes Jesus), but one can easily see if one has ever been to a Jehovah Witness’s meeting that the difference in belief on this point carries over profoundly into worship and practice. You are going to believe things about Jesus. Thus you are going to have a “theology” of Jesus. Everybody does. What matters is 1) that this theology of Jesus correspond to what is true, 2) that one’s worship properly reflects this theology, and 3) that one’s practice properly reflects this view of Jesus. Since I believe that all of these will be dramatically effected by whether one is in fact an “Arian,” and since my ability to worship and labor together with a person of Arian leanings is limited, it is good and best that we have the tags. It helps both of us. It saves a lot of time and effort. We don’t need to start from scratch every time a new controversy erupts over this question. So within the very broad swath of Christendom, labels have their place as we seek to describe and define positions that various groups take. I do not want to be defined or to define others as persons or as human beings by a theological or denominational tag, but it is hard to discuss some issues without the tags. I need a word to describe those folks who, although they affirm the Nicean Creed, also believe in apostolic succession, papal infallibility, mortal and venial sins, purgatory, etc. So the word “Catholic” is useful as a theological label. There are useful tags which define large streams of thought within “Protestantism” (and which we will explain as we go along) like “Covenantal,” “Dispensational,” “Calvinistic,” “Arminian,” “Reformed,” “Pentecostal,” “Baptistic,” etc. So we have the tags. But again there is the question: “In as much as the tags highlight differences, what differences can we live with in our life together, and what differences can we not live with?” I would say that the Arian/Trinitarian difference is big and primary. Would you? Not only would it be hard for me to labor together within a local church leadership with a person who held Arian views and lived those views out, it would be hard to worship together in a congregation with such a person, and even in a city-wide event that included worship and outreach with an Arian. So having the tag saves a lot of heartache and time. He can go do his “Arian” thing, I can do my “Trinitarian” thing. So we all have to struggle with the question of what are primary, secondary, or tertiary issues. Primary issues to me are those which are determinative as to whether or not a person is really a follower of Jesus. Secondary issues are determinative as to whether people can labor successfully together in local church leadership (Members of a local church can hold differing views on many secondary issues and labor and worship happily together, as long as there is mutual respect and tact, although some secondary issues are more inherently divisive than others). Tertiary issues are those which leaders at the local level can disagree about and it not effect adversely the life and ministry of the body. I will tell you how I go about deciding what is a primary and what is a secondary or a tertiary issue. Their are various criteria I use. Is the Bible very clear on the matter? Was the issue a high priority item in the teaching of Jesus and the apostles? Does the issue seem to have an undue effect upon the purity or peace of the local body? If you study the teaching of Jesus and the preaching of the apostles in Acts and in their letters, there are certain themes which simply are hammered home time and time again. There is no ambiguity at all. I would direct you to the sermons in Acts – Acts 2:14-39; Acts 3:12-26; Acts 4:8-12; Acts 5:29-39; Acts 7:2-53; Acts 10:34-43; Acts 13:16-48; Acts 17:22-31; Acts 22:1-21; Acts 24:10-26; and Acts 26:1-29. Read over these earliest of Christian sermons and you will quickly see that there are many matters of faith (of “theology”) which were preached unambiguously over and over by the apostles and which were of primary import to the gospel message. One simply must affirm these things to be a Christian. They are clear. They are primary. Usually when an idea was really important to Jesus he made it clear. He repeated himself. Sometimes however a matter may seem to have been important to Jesus, but I just cannot determine what Jesus or the apostles really believed on the matter. Jesus for example preached a very important message about the end times which is found in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21. Since he delivered this message on the Mount of Olives, it is often called the Olivet Discourse. Many groups derive their theology of the end-times primarily from these chapters. As you may know there are four primary views of the end times – postmillennialism, amillennialism, historic premillennialism, and dispensational premillennialism. Now I have read and studied the Olivet discourse over and over. I have diagrammed it, compared the versions in the three gospels meticulously, and compared each of the millennial positions to this discourse. I can say with confidence that I do not really know what Jesus’ primary point was in that important sermon. The reason I think the difficulty exists is that Jesus assumed from his immediate hearers some matters related to the Jewish worldview of the first century that we do not share with them. We try to fill in the silences, but we are left scratching our heads. I can also say that none of the millennial positions fit neatly into what Jesus preached there. This has led me to two decisions. First, I would go elsewhere in the Bible for my view of the end-times, since I can’t make heads or tails out of this passage. Second, I would hold somewhat lightly to whatever millennial position I come to. I take a position I believe to be right (would I take a position I believed to be wrong?), but I admit that the evidence could be better or clearer, and I understand how folks could come to different conclusions. Therefore the matter is of secondary importance. Sometimes a matter which I think may really be secondary or tertiary takes on added importance because it is so inherently divisive. Usually these are issues which bear greatly upon actual practice of ministry. For example, Christians may have differing opinions about the ongoing validity of imprecatory prayer, that kind of praying we find in the Psalms where the Psalmist calls down judgments from God upon His enemies (and sometimes their children!). Although the New Testament seems to me to suggest a different approach, that of loving and praying for and doing good to our enemies, the Scripture is not water tight on whether the Christian can or should pray in this way regarding God’s enemies. It is certainly not a high priority matter in the teaching of the Bible. Certainly whether people prayed in this way was never a key part of the gospel message. So there is no way this can be construed as a primary issue. But if a person insists upon calling down judgments upon others during public prayer, you can bet the sparks will fly in the fellowship! I would call the issue of imprecatory prayer a tertiary issue, but it is so inherently divisive that the practice of it has consequences for the local church beyond what the issue merits. A primary issue really is one that the Scripture is very clear about and which determines whether I can consider a person who holds that view a fellow believer or not. In my mind there can be no doubt whatsoever that Jesus died for our sins, rose from the dead, and is alive bodily today. These are primary issues. One cannot be a Christian and not believe in these things. To use the word Christian and yet not affirm these things is dishonest and disingenuous. This is what the “liberal” churches do (“Liberal” is a legitimate theological tag which I will define at a later date). I cannot consider a genuine theological liberal a brother in Christ at all. I may like him and have lunch with him, but I cannot worship and carry out the mission of the church with him if he denies the bodily resurrection, the substitutionary atonement, the coming judgment, etc. OK, I will admit that some people really are believers despite their bad or unbiblical affirmations. I met one time a Jehovah’s Witness whom I really believed to be a genuine Christian. She used the language of Arianism and she may have been taken in by some of the JW teaching, but as I got to know here I came to believe that she really had repented and believed in the Christ of the Bible and had then gotten caught up in the JW thing. She came to my house a few times with her mentor, and then, as she began to see the biblical portrait of Christ more clearly, was whisked away by her leaders. We never saw her again. Her name was Mary if you ever would want to pray for her. Sometimes we differ on what is or isn’t a primary issue. For example, I would consider the issue of whether one believes saving and justifying faith to be a matter primarily of mental assent (the dispensational view) or of active trust (the reformed view) is pretty close to being a primary issue. But, and I know this will sound terribly patronizing and arrogant here, I don’t know many dispensationalists who really believe that, even though in order to safeguard what they understand to be the doctrine of “free grace” their theological system forces them into that assertion. If they really personally believed that, then it might quickly become a primary issue for me. Christians who agree on primary issues of faith may yet differ on certain significant secondary issues. To use the word “secondary” is not to imply unimportance. Some of these issues are very important indeed and have profound effect on how the church carries out its mission, how the gospel is presented to the world, how we worship when we are together. These issues may be divisive. Differences of opinion on these issues may (or may not, depending on the nature of the issue and people’s tack in dealing with it) keep Christians in different church affiliations. But all would admit that folks on each side of the particular issue are Christians. They can love one another as brother and sister in Christ, they can worship and pray and minister together with a clear conscience. To me the questions of age and mode of baptism are secondary. The Bible is not as watertight clear on the matter as I would wish it to be. To many people of Baptistic persuasion however, age and mode of baptism are primary matters. I could not join their church if I were not baptized by immersion as an adult believer. One time a Baptistic brother even decided he could not have Christian fellowship with me, because even though I had been baptized by immersion as an adult, since I could accept as brothers those who had been baptized as infants, he, my friend, could not accept me as his brother. So, even though I would call age and mode of baptism secondary issues, they are secondary issues that do divide earnest Christians. And one cannot just bury one’s head in the sand and hope the matter will go away. We are more “lenient” than Baptists when it comes to baptism. We can go immersion, sprinkling, or pouring. We can baptize some babies and not others according to their parent’s wishes. No big deal. But we are going to have to decide whether we are ever going to baptize covenant children or not. For parents who desire to present their covenant children for the sacrament of baptism, we are going to baptize them believing it to be a real baptism. We can’t do it and not do it at the same time. How the Christian views culture is clearly also such a secondary issue, but one with huge consequences for how Christians are taught to live in the world. Do we use modern appliances? Do we watch TV? Do we engage in art and music and dance? Do we participate in the political process? Do we encourage people into professions? Do we participate in the public schools? In public civic celebrations? Do we take vows in court? Do we recite the pledge of allegiance? These are all clearly a secondary issues with important implications for the believer. Local church government, which includes the question of whether there need to be elders in each local church, is such a secondary issue, but one that has to be decided by each local church. You can’t have elders and not have elders at the same time. A local church simply has to do it one way or the other. So what is clearly a secondary issue may have important practical aspects. It is quite possible for Christians to agree on primary and secondary issues and still disagree on other tertiary issues which do not hinder their ability to labor together. Even amongst our leadership we have differences in some areas. In terms of end-times views, Dwight (I think) is historic premillenial, I am amillenial, and Charlie leans towards being amillenial! But none of us is dispensational. Now in case you are wondering, all of these labels have to do with or include the matter of how we understand end times events (although the latter, dispensationalism, is really much broader than that. I will speak about this in a future letter.) Although Charlie, Dwight, and I don’t all share the same convictions about end times, we do all agree that Jesus is coming back, that He has been appointed as judge, that there will be a bodily resurrection, a judgment, a New Heaven and New Earth. We agree on those aspects of the end times which seemed pretty essential in the preaching of the apostles. If pressed though we may differ as to the precise order of events and whether there will be a thousand year earthly reign of Jesus prior to the new Heaven and New Earth. There are other things about which we may differ. I think that human beings are “bipartite” (body and soul/spirit) and Charlie that human beings are “tripartite” (body, soul, and spirit). There are other differences I suppose I could think of, but none of these differences hinder our ability to labor together in leadership within the local church. We agree that these are tertiary issues. Well, this is enough for now. Next letter I will start to define what are those larger characteristics of that theological stream given the tag of “Reformed.” Until then, trust and obey.... Joel |
 |
|
 |
|
||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||
