|
rickymorgan
|
read my profile
sign my guestbook
Name: Richard
Birthday: 8/6/1971
Gender: Male
Interests: Bible study, preaching and teaching, Japanese puzzles
Expertise: Black belt in origami
Occupation: Software Engineer
Industry: Software Development
Message: message me
MSN: rickcymru@hotmail.com
Member Since:
6/26/2006
|
|
| Yes, unlike everyone else, I don't have swine flu. Apparently any sniffle, any slight headache, or if you've stubbed your toe - it's H1N1.
| | |
| I haven't read this book but have read Stephen Snobelen's review of it. Stephen is of course a resident expert on Newton and his prophetical views, which the Temple at the Center of Time goes into. Apparently a lot of people are being hoodwinked by what has been described as a monstrosity of epic proportions in the amount of false statements and inaccuracies that it contains. Has anyone read it? Don't believe everything you read! | | |
| I recently picked up a book entitled "Pagan Christianity?" and have just about finished reading it. The title caught my attention for obvious reasons (well obvious to me anyway) and it certainly, to use a hackneyed phrase, makes you think.
The basic premise of the authors is that modern day Protestant churches use a number of practices that have pagan rather than Biblical routes. There is a lot of appeal to history with good references and they make a number of points which, one can't deny, are correct: a lot of modern day Protestant practice is pagan in origin. Before you say "yes, we know - the Trinity, immortal soul etc." this isn't so much a book about doctrine. Here's the list of things the authors cover:
- the church building
- the order of worship
- the sermon
- the pastor
- Sunday morning costumes
- ministers of music
- tithing and clergy salaries
- baptism and the Lord's supper
- Christian education
There are also a few of chapters at the end on New Testament hermenutics, Jesus the revolutionary and the "next steps". Bascically the book is a call to leave the institutionalized church for the new vogue in Christianity - the home church (or as they like to call it the organic church).
I believe it's always good to re-assess what we do and what we preach as Christadelphians, and for that reason I am finding the book to be useful. There was actually one line in the book that made me stop with an "aha" moment (although I'll have to think about it a bit more) - you'll be able to see what I mean in the section below under Christian education.
The main problem, however, with this book is that it focusses too much on form. While form has its place the writers really shoot themselves in the foot if they're trying to convince people to leave the institutionalized church for the home church environment. While a lot of thie misgivings towards contemporary church practice are valid in that they can very easily hinder a real spiritual relationship with each other, the Lord Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father, you're not going to necessarily solve these problems by changing one form for another. The authors claim that their way - the home or organic church - is the New Testament model. However they seem to place undue attention on Corinth and in particular the first epistle and chapters 12-14. What Paul was dealing with in Corinth, unfortuntely, was an ecclesia gone wrong and he was trying to sort out the mess. The chaos that Paul was dealing with seems to be what Viola and Barna want to adapt as the model for their home churches. I don't quite understand this but I will give them the benefit of the doubt until I read the follow-up book which is more of a positive look at the home church. They do give a little snippet of what goes on at one of their home church gatherings and to be honest it sounds absolutely frightful. There might be some who would be comfortable with someone leaping up spontenously and singing a capella in the middle of a gathering but I am not sure that's what New Testament Christianity is all about however nice if might be for some. Also, and again I should reserve judgment until I read the follow-up book, they seem to be one of these groups who thinks they are spirit-guided. I.e. they'll have someone, again sponteneously, leap up and give some message "from the Lord". Of course it could quite easily be "from the heart of man which is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked".
The problem with focussing so much attention on form is that it is really missing the point. The New Covenant was instituted by Jesus and part of it was to tell us that form isn't important. How we do things on a Sunday morning is a side-issue, or it should be. We have very little to go on from reading the New Testament as to how they did things and the important thing seems to be what they taught and how they treated each other rather than how they conducted their services (or organic home meetings). The authors of this book seem to think that by getting the form 'right' it will make a difference. Well it might, in some contexts and cultures. But it might not, especially since the 'right' form is hard to figure out, if it even exists. Sure there might be evidence in New Testament Scriptures that they met in homes in the first century, but so what? Is there any direct teaching in Scripture that this was the right thing to do? Is there any teaching in Scripture that it's wrong to have a hall to hold meetings? The authors, seeking to get back to first century Christianity, seem to be using extra-Biblical ideas, or at least focussing on things the Bible never emphasises or makes a deal of. In reality this is just another form of legalism - focussing on form instead of substance. It might be on the other spectrum of practice, the organic home church where there is little or not organization, from the normal church experience, but to make a big deal and saying "this is the way, walk ye in it!" seems to be missing the point.
Anyway, I thought I'd offer a few thoughts on each item the authors cover.
The Church Building
Apparently, according to this book and the footnote references, church building didn't really happen until the time of Constantine. Before that believers met in homes and if the congregation got too big they would knock a wall down in a house to make a bigger space. The book goes into the pagan origin of church buildings at length with things like the altar table, pulpit and stained glass windows. Well we'd agree with all that - and to most Christadelphians a hall is just a convenient place to meet. Unfortunately some of us place too much emphasis on the hall and I've even heard it being called the 'Sanctuary'. This is one area where I was in full agreement with the authors - the church building is not a sanctuary. The temple of the living God is now meant to be each believer and if we start to call our halls holy ground then it's one step back into the old covenant. Having said that there's nothing actually wrong with having your own hall or renting one if you're too big to meet in homes on a Sunday morning. The authors seem to think this detracts from the ability to be a living body because it compartmentalizes your life - and I suppose that can happen. In fact I am sure it does when we put on our "Sunday face" at meeting. But I don't think it's beyond imagination to say that the same could be perfectly true for gathering at a home church. The venue is different and you might feel more comfortable and less stuffy at home rather than driving to a hall, but you can still put on your Sunday face when your brothers and sisters arive at your house and be all happy and fluffy... until they all leave and reality sets in. The venue does not good a Christian make - it's a mindset that makes the difference. So for some people physically going to a different place helps them feel holy when the reality is far different - that's bad. But for other poeple physically going to a different place helps them refocus their minds as they get away from normal life and better enables them to establish a frame of mind that can be receptive to the word of God. Also for some people having a home church might enable them to realize that life in Christ is meant to be something true everywhere and not just in some special place called a hall or a church - that's good. But there are other people for whom having a home church is nice and convenient and they are lazy Christians who just want to have a comfy religion. In other words the venue should not make a difference if we have the right mindset. Different people like different things and you can't please all people all the time. So if you meet in a home or you meet in a hall don't make a big issue out of it - developing the mind of Christ is what is important. Yes they might have met in homes in the first century but they also did a number of things in the first century that don't make any sense today and the Scriptures make no point whatsoever that meeting in homes is good or meeting away from homes is bad! At the end of the day, in any case, if you meet in someone else's home it is, to all intents and purposes, just the same as meeting in a hall.
The Order of Worship
The authors go to great lengths to show that the typical order of worship, or liturgy, of Protestant churches, isn't based on the Bible. Don't hold the presses on that one! I think all of us realize this, but the authors seem to think that having an order of worship is a bad thing. Their main objection is that it stifles the ability of the congregation to contribute and offer a sponteneous prayer or "message from the Lord". I suppose if sponteneous prayers or messages were what you were used to then, yes, something as organized as an order of service would be offputting. Personally I would find sponteneous prayers and messages offputting although if someone in the congregation wanted to offer a prayer in the middle of one of our services for something-or-other I don't think it would be objectional, however strange it might be. However this goes back to 1 Corinthians 14 where they were doing it all wrong - and here's the irony - it's about the only place in the New Testament that I can think of where Paul takes an ecclesia by the scruff of the neck and says "you're doing it wrong!" (because form, as I said, isn't important according to the New Testament) - and yet the authors seems to want to use Corinth as a model! The mind kind off boggles on that one but maybe I am just missing their point.
However I have to say that I think we take the order of service too seriously. There is absolutely no basis in Scripure whatsoever for our typical order - or even having an organized service at all (Viola and Barna have a point here) beyond Paul saying to do everything "decently and in order". What we typically do is simply down to tradition and we should be flexible enough to allow for changes as things arise, but often you feel as if there needs to be several committee meetings and an official change of the constitution before anything can be done. I have sensed, at times, that there is a feeling of horror when the speakers asks for a different reading to be read than the reading for the day in the Bible companion, as if to make a change like that would be an unholy thing. Methinks we need to get away from that mindset.
The good thing is that we don't fall into the trap of stifling the ability of the congregation to contribute because we have an order of service. While sponteneity is quelled by having organization (and I think rightly so - sponteneity to me sounds a lot like chaos, and I don't believe these house churches are 'spirit led' any more than Pentecostals are, because they misunderstand what the spirit is all about) we Christadelphians do invite all members of the congregation to join in with presiding, speaking reading, praying, serving etc., all within the confines of New Testament direction on things like women speaking in the ecclesia.
The Sermon
This, I think, is one of the weakest parts of the book. It was even admitted by at least one of the authors that they find sermons boring, so I suspect a little bias has gone into this chapter. They seem to miss all the examples in Scripture of where someone speaks to an audience - and yes, a passive audience. Jesus himself did it! Do you think anyone interupted our Lord when he spoke with such wonderful words of wisdom, for instance, in his sermon on the mount? Well maybe they did and I for one actually like it when someone puts their hand up and asks a question or says something in the middle of one of my talks. But the way the New Testament reads Jesus and the Apostles really did give "sermons" (or talks as we would call them). They might not have had an official exhortation every Sunday morning like we do, but I really find it hard to figure out what's wrong with it. The book goes into the pagan origin of oratory but it's a given that our exhortations shouldn't be about oratory but about delivering the word of God. We know the danger of a really good speaker who has great rhetoric but no substance, but surely teaching the Word of God is a fundamental part of what the New Testament tells us we should be doing? What Viola and Barna want to replace it with is these spontaneous spirit utterances, which probably aren't from the spirit at all, and I am struggling to figure out how the word of God is planted in their hearts when they have removed the sermon. How shall they hear without a preacher?
The Pastor
This section reminded me of reading brother Thomas and his disdain for the clergy so it was one of my favourite parts of the book. Of course we have realized the danger of having a clergy for the past 150 years and so this section would seem to be irrelevant for the Christadelphian. However there is always the danger in having too much office placed upon one person or group of persons. The Arranging Board, for example, does have the potential to abrogate the rest of the congregation from their responsibilities to help with the running of the ecclesia. However even the authors of this book realize the New Testament talks about elders. Another area in which I think we need to apply the principle of the problem of having an ordained pastor, even though we don't do it ourselves, is in preaching. Our seminars tend to be administered by two brethren who do all the work (the actual preaching I mean) - which is of course a logistical necessity because of the seminar format - but it does mean that there is the temptation for that to be all the preaching work an ecclesia does. Such has been the success and popularity of seminars that we can tend to leave it all up to them and in a sense we have created the preaching pastor! We need to always keep on to our heritage that has enabled all of us to be priests (as the authors keep saying - all of are priests) and all of us need to be fully functioning parts of the body of Christ.
Sunday Morning Costumes
Now here's a hot potato. We have fully followed in the tradition of Protestantism as we dress up for Sunday morning, at least in general. As the book shows this is purely a human tradition with absolutely no Biblical precendent, directive or principle governing it. The origin of dressing up on Sunday comes from the development of the middle class who, with the advent of mass-produced clothing, found that they could dress up in finery like the rich. Two reasons are given in the book for why it's wrong to dress up on a Sunday moring. Firstly because it makes a false division between the secular and the sacred. We are meant to be in God's presence and holy every single minute of every single day - not just for an hour on Sunday morning - therefore if dressing up is somehow meant to be a symbol of our separeteness then we should dress up all the time. Secondly there's the whole problem of fostering the illusion that we are good because we are dressed up, and as someone who does feel a sense of pride by putting on a suit I know exactly what that means.
Dressing up - a purely human tradition with no Scriptural directive - is usually defended with such things as "it shows respect" or "you would dress up if you went to meet the queen", which in my mind are absolutely lousy arguments. Yes it does show respect - to the tradition or to those whose conscience is weak so they judge people harshly if they are not dressed up. But it doesn't show one iota of respect to God to dress up. In fact God has more negative things to say about dressing up in the Bible than positive things. Actually I will rephrase that - God has only negative things to say about dressing up (aside from the very clear instructions regarding the High Priest of course) and yet sometimes it seems as if dressing up is what makes one a 'good' Christadelphian.
Not that I think an issue should be made of it. In my own mind I have realized that dressing up does not make me any better than someone who turns up in jeans and t-shirt (not that we should even have the mindset of being better than someone else) so I wear a suit simply because that's the done thing and I don't want to cause a stir or for the focus of attention to be on me instead of Christ. In fact the best (and only) argument for dressing up on Sunday morning is that we should dress modestly, which can be taken to mean wearing something that doesn't make us stand out. So if everyone is wearing a suit and I don't want to stand out then perhaps I should wear a suit.
Here's a related conundrum: once I went along to a meeting organized by some church outfit (no pun intended) that had put on some preaching event in town. I went along with a friend (I think I mention the event somewhere in the this blog actually) and we arrived in jeans and t-shirts and both felt extremely awkward walking in because everyone was dressed in their finery. And that's coming from two brethren who are used to people dressing up for church. So should we dress normally (e.g. normally for me is business casual) so as not to put people off who come in off the street? Well maybe so, but then again dressing up is so big a tradition for when someone "goes to church" that maybe it would be off-putting if people weren't dressed up. I don't know - but I don't think it should be a big issue and certainly the outward appearance shouldn't be the focus of our religion.
Unfortunately some have shown that a decay in dressing up has often accompanied apostasy in more important areas. That should not be the case: dressing up should have nothing to do with our spirituality. But while that trend continues in some quarters the tradition of dressing up will only gather even more steam for those who are, rightly, conservative when it comes to doctrine and morals.
Ministers of Music
I won't comment much on this one since we don't have these, except to say there is the alarming news that some ecclesias are adopting "worship bands". They sound scary. I believe we should all be singing together - "singing to each other with Psalms..." and not leave it up to people performing on stage. I actually have an issue with so many music CDs being made in the brotherhood lately but I will keep my mouth shut maybe on that because it might just be personal taste.
Tithing and Clergy Salaries
I won't comment on this one much either since we don't do the tithing thing or have a paid minstry. But I will say that I think the authors did a good job on this one and to think that some churches actually keep tabs on their members to make sure they give 10% is frightful.
Baptism and the Lord's Supper
This was a really good section! The book makes a good case for baptism being the symbol of a believers conversion, which we have always believed. A lot of Christians, it seems, delay baptism for sometimes years after their "conversion" or "coming to Christ". I really have a hard time fathoming why this is the case and the only thing I can think of is that they are so aversive to the doctrine of salvation by works that they will avoid doing anything! But baptism is such an integral part of New Testament teaching that it really boggles the mind to think that it is something put on the backburner for so many so-called Christians.
As far as the Lord's supper is concerned (or breaking of bread as we call it) it really would be nice to go back to the New Testament model of having a meal together - a real meal - and having the bread and cup as a part of it. This is the one area where I really think we could do with some reformation. Apostasy sets in slowly but surely and our breaking of bread service can be such an empty ritual sometimes. The logistics of organizing a meal might seem to be burdensome but for crying out loud - we're meant to be a family and families eat together! Yes we do eat together at our gatherings so what would be better than, before everyone gets up and the tables get cleared, we have a short breaking of bread - you don't need an exhortation or the elaborate things we do on Sunday mornings (and I am not saying we should just replace Sunday morning with this) but we are told "as often as you meet together"...
The authors seem to miss a little of the point of 1 Corinthians 11, however. They rightly say that the Lord's Supper had turned into a shambles (without realizing that 1 Corinthians 14 also describes a shambles!) and they think to eat "unworthily" is to do what the Corinthians were doing in neglecting the poor. Well that's part of it but surely the phrase "you shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord" means more than that. I won't go into it here but sometimes I think the authors only have a cursory understanding of the New Testament.
Christian Education
I was afraid this section was going to be about having Bible Class and that it's pagan but fortunately that was not the case. Instead it was about Bible Colleges and seminaries and teaching theology, which I am sure we agree is part of apostate Christianity. You don't need a theology degree to be a spiritually minded person - you don't need it to read and understand the Bible or to preach it - and in fact it can be a hindrance. One thing really made me sit up and take notice:
"present-day Christian eductation... is serving food from the wrong tree: the tree of the knowledge of good and evil rather than the tree of life".
Wow! I don't know what you think of that but it really caught my attention. Yes - a lot of what is taught from our own platforms sounds like it's from the wrong tree. Intellectualism might make us feel superior Christians but the way of life is what it's meant to be about. Bible exposition is a wonderful thing but if it is divorced from the meaning of the message as it relates to the new life in Christ then it becomes nothing better than worldly wisdom.
The authors also make what I think is a salient point about Sunday School and youth activities. Who could complain about Sunday School and youth activities? Well they do a lot of good, for sure, but they also can take away the responsibility of parents to bring up their own children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. If the ecclesia is doing it then there's the temptation to be lazy and avoid doing it at home. We need both in these busy lives we lead.
Another good point that came from this section is where instruction should come from for those who will work in the ecclesia if it doesn't come from seminaries or Bible colleges. The best example given was of Christ himself who instructed his disciples by being with them for 3 years and instructing them through example and the crucible of life. The idea of mentoring comes to mind and I know I personally benefited from the example and encouragement of those I came into contact with in the ecclesia.
In short I am enjoying reading this book but I will repeat that really I think it's missing the point. Yes - a lot of what we do on Sunday morning has pagan origins. The lecturn, the communion table, sitting in rows and so on. But so what? Wedding rings are pagan in origin but they serve a useful purpose and are not wrong in themselves just because they have no direct Scriptural background. The lesson is, having realized these things have no Biblical basis, not to put undue emphasis on them and not to think having and doing these things makes us holy. They are just tools that we, in this culture, have adopted. The same can be said for home churches - it's just a form that has been adopted and it is neither better or worse than other ways.
| | |
| Well it looks like we're moving house - 4500km away! Yes, after moving out here over 4 years ago we are moving back to Ontario since I just accepted an offer for a job in Cambridge. It's all very exciting, and stressful. We have to get packed up and ready to go by the beginning of September. We are planning to drive across and take in some of Canada we've only flown over before.
We will sure miss this area and wish we could take the mountains, ocean and our friends with us. But we have prayed about this and it's a good move for our family. My new job looks like it'll be really interesting and it will be so good to catch up with old friends. The kids will be going to CHC in Brantford and at first we'll be staying with Esther's parents.
So it's all change again! Waha!
| | |
| This week I took back a printer cartridge that was faulty - must have bought it months ago and lost the receipt. I somehow came back from the store with a better cartridge and a credit of $4.20.
Yesterday I changed my flight and although the fee to change it was $50 I received a credit of $142 overall.
They don't call me the taking-things-back-to-the-store-etc. king for nothing! 
| | |
|
