Has Hell Always Been Forever?

Posted on 09/13/2011 by Paul Pavao

I’ve been putting up Christian history "news" posts on my Christian History for Everyman site. That’s not really a blog, though, and I’m learning there are some benefits to the blog setup.

So I’m moving those here, and I’ll just link to them from my Christian history site.

Today, Google Alerts informed me of a blog that I immediately liked (and subscribed to). It turns out the guy, George Sarris, is a professional speaker as well as a trained theologian, so it’s not surprising he’s so interesting. In fact, he has an excellent blog post on the Nicene Creed and unity, a subject on which I wrote an entire book.

But the post I wanted to comment on is called Hell: It Hasn’t Always Been Forever. In it, he writes:

Actually, Origen was not the first or most noted “universalist” in the early years of the Christian Church, and the belief was not a minority view held only by him and a few isolated followers. According to nineteenth century pastor and theologian Edward Beecher (1803-1895) – son of Lyman Beecher, brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe, and one time pastor of Park Street Church in Boston – four of the six theological schools in the ancient church favored some form of ultimate restoration, while only one favored endless punishment.

I can’t blame Mr. Sarris for this deceptive piece of information. He did get it from someone else, but this paragraph paints, in my opinion, a very inaccurate picture.

The blog goes on to mention Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Basil the Great, and Gregory Nazianzus as fellow universalists, along with Origen.

Let’s take a look at what that really means.

Origen … of Alexandria

Origen belongs to the first half of the 3rd century. Basil and the two Gregories belong to the middle and late 4th century. Further, Basil was the brother of Gregory of Nyssa, and all three were friends. They are also all from the Middle East shortly after the Council of Nicea when the teachings of the church in Alexandria, the place where Origen was trained as a teacher, reigned as the supreme example of intellectual orthodoxy.

Clement of Alexandria was a lot closer to Origen’s time, preceding him by one generation. However, Clement of Alexandria directly trained Origen, who spent most of his adult life in Caesarea only after he was excommunicated by the church in Alexandria. (He was excommunicated for teaching in Caesarea at the invitation of the church in Caesarea. Apparently the bishop of Alexandria at that time was a slave of jealousy. Too bad, a long line of truly gifted and gracious men came after him.)

Clement was one of the most notable teachers of his time, and he helped make Origen one of the most notable teachers of his time. In fact, throughout the third century the church of Alexandria was famous for its scholarly nature and its great teachers, who were all acquainted with and highly influenced by Origen’s writings.

The Influence of Alexandria on Fourth Century Scholars

Thus, it is no surprise, really, that the great controversy which led to the Council of Nicea began in Alexandria. After Nicea, the leader of the orthodox party was Athanasius, the bishop of Alexandria. All eastern scholars had to be acquainted with the Alexandrian way of thinking, and those eastern scholars would have included three leading teachers, the friends Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzus, and Basil the Great.

The point of all this is that it does no good whatsoever to add the names of Clement, the two Gregories, and Basil to Origen’s name as supporting universal reconciliation. That is not "four schools out of six," but is one stream of thought beginning with Clement and spreading because of the influence of Origen.

Reading History Without Wishful Thinking

If someone wanted to really answer the question of what early Christians believe without muddying the waters by throwing out fancifully speculated numbers like "four schools out of six," he would address Origen’s position in his own time. The fact is, only Clement and Origen make any suggestions of universal reconciliation in their time. There are at least a dozen writers still extant from between A.D. 150 and 250, and it would be no problem to gather quotes proving that all of them believed in eternal punishment after death for the majority of human beings.

These authors can be shown to represent Christianity in general much more than Clement or Origen, who are both known to be willing to speculative on a wide range of subjects. Irenaeus, for example, was raised up under the teaching of Polycarp in Smyrna in Asia Minor, but later was highly influential and involved with many of the western churches because of his stature after he became a missionary to the Gauls in what is now Trier, Germany.

Irenaeus’ apologetic writings are an attempt to keep church leaders holding to the apostolic faith against the powerful influence of mystical, self-centered gnosticism.

Justin Martyr wrote apologetic writings defending Christianity against Roman paganism, and as a traveler he was widely familiar with the faith of the European churches. Theophilus was bishop of Antioch in Asia Minor, the apostle Paul’s home church. His work is an explanation of Christianity written to an unbeliever.

On and on the other writings of Clement and Origen’s time can be shown to have no purpose than to describe and defend Christianity as it was understood by all the apostolic churches in harmony.

Not so Clement and Origen. They were teachers writing instructional books to other believers in which they clearly felt free to interpret the Scriptures as they felt led.

In general, this was not a problem, nor were they under obligation to avoid doing so. Irenaeus, whom I mentioned above, makes it clear in his writings that outside the basics of the apostolic faith, teachers should feel free to speculate as long as they don’t change the nature of the faith itself.

Did Clement and Origen go too far?

Did Clement and Origen go too far by suggesting that the will of God is that all should be redeemed in eternity?

I think so. I think they overstepped their bounds, and I believe that any honest historian has to conclude that they stood alone on several of their views, including the subject of universal reconciliation.

I should point out that at this point, having read most of what Clement of Alexandria has written, I am not prepared to admit that Clement allowed for universal reconciliation, despite the quotes given. Such quotes are easily misinterpreted. I have not yet had the time to read back through Clement’s writings to verify things on my own yet.

That is not bias on my part. Even by modern standards, I could be labeled a liberal. Personally, I cannot agree with the thought that God would eternally torture people for any reason, and especially not for sins committed during a temporal period on earth. Further, I am a huge fan of Origen. He was one of the most committed, godly men who ever lived, and he was tortured for his faith. He was reliable, faithful, and slow to anger despite opposition from both the world and supposed friends (like the bishop of Alexandria who excommunicated him over jealousy against the will of the church in Caesarea).

Historical (and Apostolic) Christianity

On the other hand, the teaching that only a few find the gate of life came from Jesus himself. I do not believe that any Christian teacher, no matter how gifted, is free to change such basics of the faith. I personally don’t feel free to do so, either. The early churches universally believed that only a few would find the gate of life, and they considered part of the definition of the faith. (e.g., Irenaeus, Against Heresies, I:10:1).

Whether you agree with me on that or not, the point I want to make in this post is that the historical facts say that Origen was alone in his view of universal reconciliation in his time. Adding the names of Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Basil the Great, and Gregory Nazianzus to Origen’s and then acting as though this changes anything is an act of historical dishonesty, all the more repugnant because so few Christians are in a position to be able to defend themselves against such chicanery.

Posted in Christian History News in Focus | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

A New Look at the Remission of Sins

Posted on 09/13/2011 by Paul Pavao

I can’t take any credit for this idea. I got a text from a brother today saying:

I was reading in Acts this morning, and in 2:38 Peter tells them to repent and be baptized for the remission of sins. Remission has a whole new meaning since following your experience with leukemia.

By this, he means that my leukemia is in remission. We don’t know whether it might return, but right now I have no symptoms or effects of leukemia.

Initially, I assumed that this use of "remission" is a great spiritual lesson but that it would have no grammatical validity.

My mistake:

From my Online Bible program, which attributes this definition to Thayer’s Lexicon (I incorrectly attributed this to Strong’s earlier):

  1. To release from bondage or imprisonment.
  2. forgiveness or pardon, of sins (letting them go as if they had never been committed), remission of the penalty

Okay, I’m going to ignore the temptation to complain about the ridiculous, redundant parentheses in that second definition and stick to my subject matter here. Notice that the first definition of the Greek word aphesis is the release from bondage or imprisonment, not forgiveness.

Now, I’m not denying that Acts 2:38 is talking about forgiveness. Baptism is for the forgiveness of sins. It’s just that it’s not only forgiveness as we are prone to think about forgiveness.

When I became sick with leukemia, I had symptoms. I had ugly lesions on my back; I was short of breath; I couldn’t play sports; I worked slowly and tired quickly.

When my leukemia went into remission, I was able to spend 3 weeks building up stamina so that I could jog, exercise, play sports, work without tiring, and sleep normally. Each day of exercise paid off in additional energy for the next day, the exact opposite of what I experienced under the power of blood cancer.

From experience I can tell you that remission from leukemia is truly a "release from bondage."

I’ll try to keep this short. You can make your own analogies, and you’ll get more from those analogies creating them yourself than if I do it for you. I’ll probably spend all day thinking about this.

The deliverance that Jesus Christ wrought in our lives (for it is Jesus Christ and not baptism that does the work) is truly a remission, in just the same sense that my deliverance from leukemia is a remission. Everything changes. Sin doesn’t have power over us anymore (Rom. 6:14). Where we used to be in bondage to our own desires, unable to overcome them and choose to do the will of God, now we are empowered by the Spirit to actually walk in the will of God that is revealed to us through the Spirit.

Even the exercise analogy applies. Now that the leukemia is in remission, I can exercise and get stronger. Before you were a Christian, your attempts to live in the righteousness of God would just exhaust you. The commands of Jesus Christ were overwhelming; they could not be done except by the rare few, like Mother Theresa or Gandhi.

No longer. Once we made partakers of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:3-4), our obedience to the commands of Christ builds strength. We grow stronger in the Spirit, not exhausted from overwhelming service.

You’re in remission from sin! Get up and run!

If you’re not, you can be. Find someone where you are who is in remission from sin, and ask them how you can come to Christ for his healing.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

I Wish I Could Dodge the Evolution-Creation Controversy

Posted on 09/12/2011 by Paul Pavao

Soon, or perhaps already, a mutant army of mosquitoes and caterpillars are being unleashed in the Brazilian jungle.

Scientists have used gene therapy to engineer mosquitoes and moths that bear viable offspring, but those offspring are pre-programmed with a suicide gene. They will never make it to maturity. In other words, those mosquitoes and moths will have children, but they will never have grandchildren.

The idea is for these mutants to outcompete their non-mutant comrades and thus to put an end to the grandfather clause for mosquitoes! (Warning! There are several more bad puns in this otherwise very serious post.)

Let’s see dengue-carrying mosquitoes mutate their way out of that one!

The picture above is spider silk.

Spun by E. coli bacteria in petri dish.

It’s not stronger than steel, like an actual spider’s silk is. The E. coli must be lacking some cellular equipment that the spiders have. Further, their production of the silk is so slow—a few hundredths of an ounce in three hours—that the silk currently serves no commercial purpose.

Nonetheless, the common threads (pun not intended, but not removed, either) in these two stories is the transfer of genes between species and evolution.

We’re doing it in a lab.

Can We Really Reproduce Evolution in a Laboratory?

If you have even a small interest in science, you ought to subscribe to Discover.

If you want to get involved in the creation-evolution controversy and have any idea what you’re talking about, you really must subscribe to Discover or something like it. (That is, unless you’re a scientist reading the actual peer-reviewed articles.) Once you’ve started with sources like Discover and New Scientist (though Discover is much more interesting) I can show you how to follow up on and verify their articles with authoritative articles and studies.

So can we really re-create evolution in a laboratory?

Yes. The only reason we haven’t raised a Neanderthal in a lab is because:

  1. We’ve only recently sequenced the Neanderthal genome, and
  2. Most of us think it’s immoral or dangerous.

We already produce insulin for diabetics using yeast that’s been given the human gene for insulin production!

Do you understand that yeast is a fungi? It belongs to a different kingdom taxonomically. It is as unrelated to humans as any plant or bacteria. Yet we can install our genes in yeast and get the yeast to run those genes.

Our ability to convince E. coli to make spider silk and yeast to make human insulin ought to be a slam dunk for evolution. The argument ought to be over!

I’m telling you, folks; we (we being deeply-committed followers of Jesus Christ) are going to look as foolish today as we did back when we said the earth couldn’t possibly go around the sun.

Actually, we already do. What I mean is that it’s not going to be too awful long before the truth slaps us in the face so hard that we won’t be able to deny it anymore.

Learning on Purpose

The other day I ran across a web site on creationism. In other words, it’s against evolution, even though I can’t figure out why a person who believes in creation can’t make room for God to have created by evolution. On that site, I found:

How did a fish get lungs by accident? How did the precise, exact information to build a lung get written into a fish’s DNA code by natural selection? … Lungs are designed for breathing air. Why would a random accident even start building a lung in the first place? How could a mistake – a random accident in a DNA code – just happen to be exactly the right step leading to a DNA code for a lung?

Now that’s a good question, isn’t it?

Even I have to admit it’s a good question. It’s the sort of question that ought to be asked if we have any interest in knowing if evolution is true. (And if we’re going to say evolution is not true or, even more pertinently, if we’re going to accuse scientists of a conspiracy to deceive us, then we better have a good inkling whether evolution is true, or we’re really terrible people who will assuredly be judged by God for our slander against people who have been much more honest and diligent than ourselves.)

But if it’s the sort of question that ought to be asked, then it’s the sort of question that ought also to be answered!

The web site doesn’t answer it. It just leaves the question of how a fish’s lung could evolve hanging out there, suggesting to all of us that the question in unanswerable.

It’s not only answerable, but I know the answer.

We’re Christians, though. We don’t care, so I’m not going to bother with it. Let’s just continue on our awful path, loving our ignorance.

I guess I was in a bit of a mood today. Maybe it’s the chemo. I’m low on blood, the chemotherapy is still working, and as a result my head is swimming and I need more oxygen …

That’s so sad. I just couldn’t resist the last couple puns.

Posted in Evolution and Creation | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Was Cardinal John Henry Newman Correct?

Posted on 09/08/2011 by Paul Pavao

From the blog: Early Church Fathers:

Today, as Protestant theologians study the Fathers of the Early Church, they are awakening to the truth of Blessed John Henry Newman’s conclusion: "You cannot study the Fathers and remain a Protestant."

Is this true?

It’s obviously not universally true because I’ve been studying the "fathers" for over 20 years, and I’m still not only non-Catholic but actively opposed to the Roman Catholic Church. I know many in the same position.

It is true, however, that a lot of Protestants who begin to study the early church fathers soon convert to Roman Catholicism, or perhaps more commonly, to an Eastern Orthodox Church.

Why haven’t I?

I do not believe that a close doctrinal agreement with the early Christianity or even the apostles is the purpose of the Gospel. The purpose of the Gospel is to bring humans into relationship with their Creator through Jesus Christ.

Roman Catholics are correct in asserting that it is not just individual relationships that God is looking for. He is building a church with Jesus as head, which will be his body. As such, unity is critically important.

It is also true that most Protestants are either unaware of this or apallingly negligent of it.

What should be my reaction to this? Because Protestants are divided, should I then consider the Roman Catholic Church the only alternative and return to it?

Should I weigh which group of Christians, Catholics or Protestants, have a more correct view of the Lord’s Supper, of baptism, or of church government?

I think not.

Jesus said that we are to judge a prophet by his fruit.

The goal, as far as I can see in Scripture, is that Christians would received the Spirit of God, walk by that Spirit, and thus experience unity, love, and a holy life, astounding the world by their lovely, united discipleship to Jesus Christ.

I’m sorry to say it, but as a person who was raised Catholic, I never saw such fruit in a Roman Catholic congregation, not even one of them. In fact, I saw nothing remotely resembling it, and I attended Catholic mass regularly in North Dakota, Taiwan, Kansas, and Germany.

I rarely see such fruit in Protestant churches, either.

Here’s the problem:

  • In Roman Catholic congregations, the Mass, rituals, and a few correct beliefs have replaced discipleship. Most members show no signs of having the Spirit of God, and thus they do not have a practical unity, do not live as family to one another, and do not live holy lives.
  • In Protestant churches, meetings and correct beliefs have also replaced discipleship. Further, Protestant meetings have become almost excusively evangelism meetings, not the building up of the body of Christ described in Scripture. Thus, those who are living as disciples feel forced into boring "fellowship" with those who are not disciples. They do not feel free to form as the church with only those who truly follow Christ.

I assert that it is undeniable that the Christians of the second and early third centuries would have been horrified at what passes for the church in this century, and in fact in any century since the fourth.

Would they have been so horrified that they would have left the church to form a new church composed of only those who agree with them?

I don’t know. In the fourth century, I would not have left the church, either. However, like the monks who first appeared in the fourth century, I would have found real disciples to pursue Christ with, and I would have limited my contact with nominal Christians to evangelism (including friendship evangelism).

In the 20th century, however, Christians are already split into thousands of denominations. I have written repeatedly refuting the claims of the Roman Catholic Church (for example) to have succession and to be the only denomination to be authorized by God, so I will not bother with that here.

Suffice it to say that what would have mattered to third century Christians, and possible most third-century Christians, is the local church. They would have known that the Church as a whole consists of united churches, not one hierarchy with a pope, cardinals, and archbishops over it—nor a denominational board, as the Protestants often have.

The goal of the commandment, according to 1 Timothy 1:5 is "love from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith." The early Christians would most certainly have agreed with that, and they would have rejected as Christian all who simply attended services as a spectator.

The earliest Christian writings enjoin daily fellowship, the sharing of possessions, and a walk with Christ so close and holy that reading those writings convicts the most godly of modern Christians. They knew nothing of the sort of Christianity lived by the vast majority of Catholics and Protestants.

Thus, my pursuit has remained to free Christians from their false obligation to attend "services," as though God had called them to a once a week performance. The gathering of the saints is important, but it is for the building up of the body, a place where each member exercises his gift, though most gifts are exercised in the daily lives of believers as they share their course together as one family.

I have chosen as my course to encourage the godly to be in fellowship with the godly and to treat the ungodly, even if they are baptized attenders of church, as those who need to be evangelized and delivered from their false religion as surely as a gnostic needed to be delivered from his false religion in the second century.

I do not agree with Cardinal Newman. To me, the early church fathers—at least the ones from before the fourth century when suddenly anyone could call themselves Christian—do not lead a person to the mostly nominal Catholic churches and to the later invented hierarchy that they wrongly refer to as the Church. The writings of the early church fathers lead us to deep commitment to Christ, to reliance upon the Holy Spirit, and to a Spirit-inspired close family relationship with those who pursue Christ as we do.

Posted in Church, Modern Doctrines, Roman Catholic & Orthodox | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Traditions and Common Sense Versus the Fullness of Divinity

Posted on 09/02/2011 by Paul Pavao

I think most of us have seen and probably spent time considering the following verse.

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the basic principles of the world, and not after Christ. (Colossians 2:8)

We—especially those of us who are Protestants—know to avoid the traditions of men.

(We’re aware we’re supposed to avoid them, but in practice, the vast majority of Christians, including Protestants, live almost exclusively by the traditions of men, turning a purposefully blind eye to Scripture, history, and science alike when they contradict our customs and preconceived ideas. Only culture and politics can turn us from our religious traditions.)

Well, that little aside is a bump in the road that could throw us way off my topic for today!

Well, anyway, we all know that verse tells us not to deviate from Christ because of philosophy, traditions of men, and whatever else seems like a good idea.

But why?

Why did Paul tell us not to deviate for the sake of all these relatively important things, things that most religions lean heavily upon? The "basic principles of the world" are a reference to common sense. They are the things we all know must be true. Paul’s example in this chapter is that we are certain that if we deny ourselves—if we "do not touch, do not taste, do not handle"—then of course we’re doing what God wants.

No, Paul says. Don’t turn away from Christ even for such seemingly obvious things.

Why?

Here’s the next two verses:

For in [Christ] all the fullness of divinity dwells physically, and you are complete in him.

I have no way of knowing if that’s a wow moment for you, but it sure was for me today.

Why are we avoiding the traditions of men and all those things that seem like good ideas to everyone, the "basic principles of the world"?

Because all the fullness of divinity lives in Jesus Christ physically, and because we are complete in him, it would be stupid to turn to anything else. Anything else is not only less, but immeasurably less. Divinity is infinite. The fullness of divinity is in Jesus, and we are complete in him.

Why would we not, then, live by the Spirit he has place inside of us rather than by all our other good ideas?

"As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God" (Romans 8:14).

"You search the Scriptures because you think you have life in them, but these are they which testify of me [Jesus]. Yet you refuse to come to me so that you might have life!" (John 5:39-40).

Posted in Holiness, Modern Doctrines, Roman Catholic & Orthodox | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Taking a Stand

Posted on 08/31/2011 by Paul Pavao

Someone has to say what’s true. Today, I want to point you to two blogs doing just that.

One is mine. I started addressing all the nonsense that people say about Christian history. It’s high time that the truth got more play than rumors and falsehood.

Christian History Blog

That blog also has all the new pages that are put up at my Christian History for Everyman site.

The other one is from J. Lee Grady, who writes way more than his share of powerful, timely posts. All of us who are committed, believing Jesus followers should read his blog, pray for him, and recommend his blog to others.

J. Lee Grady: The Ominous Handwriting on America’s Wall

You may notice that I don’t write or recommend much in the way of "God is judging such and such" blogs. J. Lee Grady is not overboard, a kook, a conspiracy theorist, nor even particularly right wing. He’s just an honest, godly man, of which there are far too few nowadays.

Posted in Miscellaneous | Leave a comment

Why You Get Pushed Around and Why You’ll Miss Out If You Let it Happen

Posted on 08/27/2011 by Paul Pavao

This is a defense of Rose Creek Village … sort of.

It’s not about Rose Creek Village. It’s about you.

I’ve heard, recently, several people complain about some friends of mine—leaders at Rose Creek Village—who are intimidating. I agree they’re intimidating; that’s not just the opinion of the complainers. Pushy is probably a fair description, too. The complainers definitely felt pushed around by my friends, and I am certain that at least a few times those feelings were legitimate.

Of course, these are my friends, so it was self-evident to the complainers, while they were complaining, that however my friends treated them, they would have treated me the same way, at least in the early days of our community. So, more than once recently, I was told, "Well, that doesn’t happen to you, of course. You always spoke up." That’s always followed by some statement about how I don’t let myself get pushed around.

Worse, that’s always said as though it’s some sort of excuse for others. They’re not like me. Indeed, they cannot be. Apparently, I must be bold by nature. My personality innately stands up to others and refuses to be intimidated.

Laughable.

There were very few children more timid than me. I was pushed around by everyone. I stood up for next to nothing. I did homework once for a kid in 9th grade, much bigger than me, because he asked me and I was scared of him. Afterward, he taunted me publicly for doing it. I never did anything about it, and until this day I’ve never even told anyone that it happened. (And now I’m writing it on the internet; go figure.) In fact, it didn’t much matter to me that he taunted me in class, since I was neither friend nor acquaintance of most of the kids in the class. All my friends were from the street I lived on, not from the school.

I never went to a school dance, not even Homecoming or the Prom. I was 21 before I was brave enough to ask a girl out on a date, and I never had an official girlfriend until my wife-to-be when I was 25.

It wasn’t until I met her that I first worked up the courage to return a fast food meal that wasn’t made right. Telling a waiter or waitress in a real restaurant that my meal wasn’t right would have to wait till I was in the my 40’s, and I’m pretty certain I’ve only done that once in my life despite the fact that incorrect meals have happened to me a lot more than that. I was in my mid-30’s when I began to work on looking at strangers in the eye if I crossed paths with them in a store.

Yeah, I was painfully shy and embarrassingly timid.

In other words, standing up to other people does not come naturally for me. It is very easy for me to let people intimidate me. I prefer that to confrontation, even if that confrontation is telling a merchant that they got my order wrong. (To this day, that’s still true. I’d rather pay money I don’t owe than have a confrontation about money. You’d love doing business with me.)

But I’m not allowed to live like that in the church!

Since the day I became a Christian I have believed in God. (Some Christians only believe in God in theory, not in practice.) God is greater than dictators, kings, and especially than leaders of Christian churches, whether real ones or self-serving ones.

Early on at Rose Creek Village (actually before it was called Rose Creek Village) I had my first run in with leadership. They wanted me to be baptized, and I didn’t believe I needed to be baptized by this church. I had been baptized before, understanding what it was, and thus I had been baptized both into Christ and into the body of Christ. There was no need for me to be baptized by Rose Creek Village.

The head elder, Noah, overrode the others and said, "Maybe he’s right. Let’s leave this in the hands of God."

(Over the next few months, the leaders won that one. The story is too long to tell here, and I don’t have answers for all the theology, but God convinced me that they were right, and I was baptized.)

A few months later, a couple leading men came up with a whole morass of rules for the house I was living in. I didn’t like it, but I decided not to say anything. I would wait for God to provide some examples of whether these rules were a good or bad idea.

But one of the other men spoke up. It turns out I wasn’t the only one who didn’t like it, so I felt free to talk. We debated the rules, though I was left as the only spokesman for the anti-rule group. Eventually, a person who’d been around a lot longer than me said that I was taking the gift of God—their rules—and throwing it on the ground. I couldn’t take the conflict, and I just turned and walked out. I went for a drive for an hour or so and just prayed.

When I got back, everyone had decided to put the rules on hold. I think they were concerned that they’d hurt me.

I want to point out here before I tell any more stories, the issue wasn’t just that they felt they’d hurt me. God is in control of my life, and God is in control of the church. God will always show the willing and malleable where to take a stand. If I’m part of the church, then God will ensure that where he makes me stand, he will make the church stand as well. What he’s saying to one, he will say to all.

How could it be otherwise?

A few months after that, it was Noah who laid a bunch of rules on that very same house. Again, I opted not to say anything and to wait and see what would happen.

My wife, who’s a lot braver than I am, wasn’t so willing to sit back and wait.

No problem. I’m the head of my wife. I told her to just give it time. I specifically told her not to say anything to Noah.

So the next morning I walked onto the porch and my wife was giving Noah a piece of her mind. I was surprised, somewhat upset with her, and somewhat afraid of the situation. I was not prepared for this confrontation.

Noah looked at me. He was clearly angry. He asked, "Do you feel the same way your wife does?"

"Yes," I said.

"Great," he replied. "You make me feel like some kind of cult leader ordering people around. I can’t believe you didn’t say anything!"

I gave some feeble excuse, and he stormed back to his room. (Apparently, God was overriding my husbandly authority. Some day we can do a blog on realms of authority and talk about why I was the one who was out of line.)

There was a gathering that morning (the rough equivalent of a church service), and we had the gathering outside. We sang a couple songs, and then Noah stood up.

He said. "God has shown me that his people are to be free. They are to be ruled by God, and not by rules. I repent for trying to put rules on the people of God."

He then gave public thanks to God, crossed the circle, and kissed both my wife and I on the foreheads.

We’d been part of Rose Creek Village less than a year. We had no position. We were just some of the new people.

I’ll tell you one more story, also from the early days here in Tennessee. All of this would have taken place in 1996 and 1997.

Originally the house I was living in had 7 bedrooms. We had added a couple rooms in the basement, and we had an RV or two outside, so there were five or six families living out of the house. In 1997 (I think), we built an 8-bedroom, 4-and-1/2-bath addition onto the house. It was three stories tall, and the bottom story became a dining hall. Between all those bedrooms, some additional RV’s, and a cabin we built outside, at one point around 100 people were eating in the 900-square-foot room.

The room wasn’t carpeted at that point, and with all those people, many of them children, it could get very loud. Noah and another brother were having trouble handling the noise, and so they were making extreme efforts to get everyone to be less noisy. I’m pretty sure that most people felt like the biggest disturbance of the peace was not the noise but Noah’s and this other brother’s complaints about the noise.

Once again, I took it upon myself to talk to Noah about it. I never wondered why someone less shy hadn’t already gone to him. I knew from the talk around the house that I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. The question to me, though, was not whether people were doing what they should be doing. The question to me was whether I was doing what I was supposed to be doing.

So I talked to him, and he got mad. There was nothing to do but have a heated discussion with him.

I hate discussions like that, especially with someone a lot braver than I am, so it was easy for me to keep one ear tuned to God. My prayer to him was pretty simple: "How do I get out of this conflict as fast as possible without having to back down?"

I felt like I wasn’t allowed to back down. It was Noah who had taught us that peace comes from God, not from outward quiet.

But reminding him of that wasn’t helping.

Finally, God dropped something to say into my spirit. I said it, and Noah stopped talking and looked at me. Then he hung his head and said, "You’re trying to help, and I’m talking to you like this."

(In Noah’s defense, due to the subject of this post, I am leaving out all the parts where I was in the wrong. He had to talk to me about skipping gatherings, complaining about church activities, exploding on a brother in a situation where I was completely wrong, and other things that I’m sure I’ve forgotten. However, this blog’s about talking when needed, not about my numerous faults.)

How many people would just have judged the rules that were handed down in my first story above? How many people would have let those first rules happen, then let Noah’s rules happen, then let the situation in the dining room remain unchanged, full of pressure and complaints about leadership?

How many would later have walked away from the church saying, "You wouldn’t believe the terrible things that happened! There were all these rules! And then there was complete chaos in the dining room, and the leaders were upset and making it worse. Everyone knew and agreed with me that the chaos was all the leaders’ fault, but do you think they changed?"

The real question, however, does not concern how many but concerns only one.

You.

Would you have just let those things happen? Would you have been wondering about whether those rules were the will of God, and would you have taken it upon yourself to speak up for God if you felt no one else was?

Or would you just walk away later and talk about all those terrible people and the terrible things they did?

There are reasons that you are not allowed to remain a coward, making excuses for not doing the will of God.

Let me tell you one more story.

When I was a very new Christian, attending an Assembly of God church down in Florida in 1982, a very excited evangelist came to town. His name was Danny Duvall, and if anyone ever inspired me to a Christian walk that was both practical and zealous, Danny Duvall did.

He didn’t just preach about being zealous for Jesus, he took us out and showed us how to do it. He took us door to door in town passing out flyers for the revival he was preaching. He also took us to the tourist section of town to witness.

I was terrified. Remember, I didn’t talk to strangers. I didn’t even ask girls out on dates until shortly before this time. Stopping people to talk about Jesus when all they wanted was a good time at the bars along the beach … that was not my idea of something pleasant.

Fortunately, I was with a friend that I knew had no problem talking to strangers. Before we were Christians, he had been a real ladies’ man, chatting up any girl he ran across and every bit as comfortable with men as he was with women.

Danny Duvall explained that the technique was simple. He didn’t bother with smooth approaches. He just picked a person, then told them he wanted to talk to them about Jesus.

I was curious to see whether this would prove effective. Danny sent me off with by brave friend and with another young man who’d been in the church much longer than us. If this blunt method of Danny Duvall’s worked when they tried it. After that I would do it, too, even if it terrified me.

As we walked to the tourist section the young man from the church asked, "Who’s going to go first?"

"Not me!" my brave friend said.

I stared at him. What did he mean he wouldn’t do it?

The young man from the church echoed my friend’s sentiment. Then they made it clear that if it boiled down to one of them being the first to dip their toes in the water, then we might as well head back to the car.

I was shocked. I didn’t know what to do but to volunteer. God sent us out there. We weren’t street witnessing because we thought it was fun!

God made sure the experience would set a pattern for the rest of my life.

The first people to come along were two guys who were everything I wasn’t. They were big, their demeanor made it clear they were tough, and they were at home in the party scene.

I stepped in front of them.

"Can I share Jesus with you?"

The bigger of the two made a face that indicated utter disgust. He raised his hands, sidled around me on the sidewalk, then rushed off with his friend laughing.

I promised myself I would never use the word "share" in public again.

I was utterly dejected, but I was going to give it one more shot without using "share."

The next guy was a shorter, slightly chubby and much more cheery looking young man. I worked up a more masculine demeanor, stood up straight, deepened my voice, and said, "Can we talk to you about Jesus?"

"Sure!" the guy said. He seemed thrilled to talk to us.

He didn’t wait for us to begin the conversation. He explained quickly that he was a "disciple" of Richard Bach.

Have you heard of Richard Bach? People who have read a lot and are at least my age are probably aware of the book Jonathon Livingston Seagull. In 29 years of telling this story, which happened in August of 1982, I’ve never met anyone who has read his other book, Illusions: The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah.

I had, however.

I had devoured it. I loved Richard Bach.

Illusions had completely reinterpreted Jesus, and Bach made a lot of claims about what the Gospels say that just aren’t true. Because Richard Bach had been central to my own thinking as a teenager, I was aware of both his claims and the verses that contradicted those claims despite having only been a Christian for a month.

We talked with the charming young man on the sidewalk for two hours. We were there so long that the police eventually came by and ran us off.

I knew that God had sent that young man along. I also knew why God hadn’t sent him first. The first two guys, representing everything I had been scared of and intimidated by as a school boy, were sent by God, too. He wanted effort from me.

The other two guys? I don’t know what happened to the young man from the church, but I know my friend fell away.

God’s will is dependent on you.

God’s will, in the long run, is going to happen anyway. You, however, will never see it unless you participate in making it happen. It can go on all around you, so that there’s no direction you can look in which God’s will is not happening, and you will not see it if you’re not participating in it.

God doesn’t give his gifts to the lazy.

Nor to the cowardly.

In my day, I was a full-fledged coward. Cowards, however, are the first people listed among those who will be throw into the lake of fire. They are ahead of the unbelieving and the abominable (Revelation 21:8).

I’m not really interested in having my part in the lake of fire, so turning away from my innate cowardice has been a priority in my life for 30 years.

It needs to be a priority in yours. If you can’t speak up, the problem’s not the nature you were born with.

It’s the belief, work, and effort you’ve lived without.

Posted in Church, Leadership, Miscellaneous, Testimonies | Tagged , , | 6 Comments

Bold Humility: A Christian Blogger’s Toughest Target

Posted on 08/24/2011 by Paul Pavao

Last night I made it back to the Bible study I visited a few weeks ago. There, I heard a term that captured my attention.

Bold humility.

I didn’t need an explanation. I knew exactly what he was talking about.

I also knew what a difficult target that is to hit.

So many times I’ve thought, “I wish I would have said something. I wish I would have stood up for what I believe because God cares about that issue.”

On those occasions, I might have been humble, but I wasn’t bold.

On other occasions, I have spoken up. “This is the will of God, and this is what the Scriptures say about it.” Yet it was the wrong place, the wrong time, or there was simply no care, love, or regard for people in my statement. My mouth spoke the words of God, but my timing and attitude spoke only for the accuser of the brethren.

On those occasions, I was bold, but I certainly wasn’t humble.

Worse, I can’t just judge by people’s reactions. Just because I made everyone angry or made a situation awkward, that doesn’t mean I missed the mark. Jesus once got everyone so upset that they tried to throw him off a cliff. In fact, the cumulative result of his message was that the chosen people of God crucified him with vindictive joy.

As a result, sometimes when I’m feeling very humble, wanting to repent, and certain that I’ve gone way further than I should have because everyone is mad at me—sometimes when I feel that way, I’m not being humble; I’m being carnal and cowardly.

It’s important to have the ability to still yourself, wait for your emotions to settle, and get in the presence of God. It’s important to have people you trust to bounce things off of. And finally, it’s important to trust God to work things out in his time.

Bold humility.

None of us are a good judge of what that looks like. As in all things, there is a righteousness that is from God, and there is a righteousness that is from ourselves. As in all things, the child of God is proven to be so by being led by the Spirit of God, not by figuring things out on his own. We hear the Word of God, we believe it, we do it, and we let ourselves be judged by God.

A friend once told me that God is a good Father, and a good Father takes responsibility for correcting his children. He doesn’t write them a rule book, then wait around for them to follow it. He is intimately involved in his children’s lives, correcting or guiding them when they deviate, and taking it upon himself to make sure his children know how it is that they ought to be living.

So I—and we—keep shooting at the target, apologizing when I’ve gone too far, steeling myself for the future when I’ve not gone far enough, and trusting God and the kind rebukes of those I trust to prove safe guidance in the long run.

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Liberal Arts and the Word of God: Emotion and Why God Still Speaks Today

Posted on 08/19/2011 by Paul Pavao

There’s probably some really great title for this blog, better than "Liberal Arts and the Word of God," but I just can’t seem to find it. I thought of titles involving the right brain as well, but I thought that would mystify too many people.

So, let’s get to the point:

God doesn’t just want to speak to your left brain (the logical, exact, scientific, and mathematical side of your brain), but if you want to actually follow through on the commands of God—to avoid being a hypocrite—then you need God to speak to your left brain as well.

A friend (Adam Walker) linked to a great article on Apple and its competition with the PC, and it had the most amazing quote by Steve Jobs (Apple’s CEO):

I’ve said this before, but thought it was worth repeating: It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough. That it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our hearts sing.

This was said concerning the iPad 2.

Last fall I sat and talked with two friends, both of whom work for Apple. They were commenting on how Apple was selling a produce, the iPad, that served no new purpose. Everything the iPad does can be done with an iPhone or a laptop.

Steve Job, by mentioning liberal arts and the humanities, says that the iPad’s appeal is not usefulness; it is beauty.

The iPad appeals to the heart.

Every good salesman knows that almost every purchase is an emotional decision, not a logical one. (I base that on numerous sales training courses I’ve been through.)

God is not a salesman, but God made us. He not only knows how we’re constituted, but he approves of it. He’s the source of it.

Thus, the Word of God, reduced to it’s left-brained, merely logical, scientific and mathematical basis, is, um, let’s say dehydrated. It’s like Carnation Evaporated Milk™ or a military MRE (Meals Ready to Eat, which are mostly "just add water" powders and dried patties). It may have all the vitamins and nutrients you need, but very few people like to eat it.

Does this produce a different emotion than an MRE?
Produce from Rose Creek Village Farms
MRE; photo by Christopherlin, used with permission
MRE contents

The point of all this?

In the early days of the church, the writings of the old covenant were a rich source of spiritual insight. Christian teachers, across the board, taught that all new covenant disciples, being endowed by God with the Holy Spirit, could look into the words of the Law and the Prophets and glean spiritual truths.

An example used repeatedly in their writings: The food laws, which taught that the only clean animals were those that chewed the cud and parted the hoof, were not about food. God doesn’t care about food, and food can’t defile a man. Instead, those laws taught us that we are to be in fellowship with those that ruminate on the Word of God and separate from the world.

An example from Bible class with my kids a couple days ago: In Genesis chapter one, there is a reason that light and day are created both first and three days before the sun. Light is of first and foremost importance. We are children of the light and of the day, and our lives are to be a testimony of the Word of God. Further, God didn’t want us to think that light for us is physical. The physical light and the physical day would come later and be of secondary important. Our light comes not from the sun but from the living Word of God. In the deepest darkness, the voice of God cries, "Let there be light," and there is light.

Another common early Christian example: When the Israelites defeated the Amalekites on the way to The Promised Land, they were able to be victorious only while Moses’ hands were in the air. Why? It is because we are to learn that our victory over our enemies comes only through the cross. To the early Christians the raising of hands always represented the cross. It represented both our triumph through the cross and our access to God through the cross.

Why such pictures? Why do we have to focus on analogies, and why did God want us to have to dig, search, and be spiritual enough to find those analogies in the words of the old covenant?

The reason is that God knows that obeying his commands is more than a dry, logical choice. We are not dry, logical creatures. We have a left brain, and a right brain, and that is not some physical limitation, but the purposeful choice of God our Creator.

There is a liberal arts side to the Word of God, and that is the purposeful choice of our Father, who had made us like himself. Our life in him is imbued not just with commands and obedience, but with beauty, emotion, zeal, and excitement. We are supposed to be delighted with discovery and deeply satisfied with spiritual insights.

Alone, left to our decisions and commitment, we will falter and stumble. God has put us in the body of Christ, where we all need one another, and where our sharing is not just the nutrition of obedience to God, but the beautiful colors and rich packaging that is allegory, spiritual insight, and participation in the revelation of God.

Excursus: Can God be Silent?

This is one reason it’s so horrifying for me to hear that the revelation of God ended when the last book of the New Testament was written. (Of course, for centuries the churches would never have agreed on what the last book of the New Testament or exactly how many books of the New Testament there were.)

Did God take a vow of silence for the last 2,000 years? As the church has wandered here and there, and as both counterfeit and utterly corrupt Christian movements have arisen, God has had nothing to say in the way of correction? He has waited around for men to know about, find, and interpret a book that’s really a collection of books?

Is that what you would have done if you were God? You’d have sat silently through the last wild 2,000 years of history?

God is not like that. We wrongly attribute 400 years of silence to him in the "intertestimental period." There was no 400 years of silence. God prophesied what would be happening during those 400 years through Daniel, and the incredible and powerful history of Isreal continued as described in the books of the Maccabees. Finally, even when Jesus showed up as a baby, we read of the prophetess Anna in the Gospel of Luke. There were still prophets and prophetesses in Israel until John the Baptist, when the gift of prophecy moved to the church.

God is never silent. It’s horrifying to hear people say that he’s had nothing to say since the time of the apostles.

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The “Easy” Part of the Christian Walk (Continued)

Posted on 08/18/2011 by Paul Pavao

I sent an email today talking about the basics of walking with Christ and of dealing with weakness. I thought it was worth sharing with you.

Any of you that are mature in Christ, no matter what your background, will recognize the following as truth. You will also recognize that we all have to be reminded of this regularly, preferably every few days so we don’t lose sight of what we’re doing and begin walking in the flesh.

So here’s the email:

Walking with Christ is a process. Things don’t change overnight. The fact is, we learn to be faithful in little things, and we grow bit by bit until we can be faithful in large things as well.

At the heart of it all is the simple, daily practice of believing God is merciful, of believing that we can come boldly to the throne of grace and find both mercy and grace to help in our time of need because of the blood of Jesus Christ. We begin there, and every day we practice keeping our eyes on spiritual things, on things that are not seen, and on heaven, where Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father.

In this way, we grow from strength to strength and from faith to faith into the image of the one we long to see.

A friend has often said, “We don’t understand the length of the solution because we don’t comprehend the depth of the problem.” God has a lot to change in us so that we don’t live in the flesh and think with earthly wisdom.

It’s okay to let that process work and to know that his mercies are new every morning.

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