Is Doctrine that Important/ The Distaste of Doctrine (Part 5)

- QUESTIONS – (I recommend you read part 1,2,3 and 4 before this, unless it makes sense first time)

A Christian with a faith grounded in reality doesn’t steer clear of questions, he runs to them because He knows that God invaded the human world and became a man. He knows that God gave a perfect revelation of Himself in His word so we could have all the questions we need answering answered.

Questions are not daunting

What is daunting is when there are no answers.

What is heartbreaking is a faith that can’t stand up to them.

The other day I was sitting in a university first year philosophy lecture, I got into a conversation with a guy next to me, he saw I was reading a book which argues for the historical proof of Jesus and His resurrection. This guy told me how its good to ask questions about these things but His church doesn’t really let him ask those kind of things ( some churches want questions, just for the fun, but they don’t want to answer them, just enjoy not knowing). He went on to explain how the philosophy classes had made him think, that maybe Jesus wasn’t real, maybe God wasn’t real. After I said that there are answers, he got real excited, for the rest of the lecture he wrote down questions instead of listening, to ask me after the lecture ended.

He asked:

How does one become holy?

How do you know what is right and wrong?

How do you know if your interpretation of the Bible is correct?

Some other questions I have had asked:

Why do good people die in tragic ways?

Why do evil people prosper and good people suffer?

Why is there war and poverty if God is loving?

If God will forgive us when we ask, why not life any way we want, and ask him for forgiveness in our dying moments?

Since God controls all things, why is there evil, does God make evil happen (that sounds terrible right?) or do we have free-will and God has no control (cause that is also rubbish)… What’s going on.

These are a few questions, I have had hundreds upon hundreds thrown at me in my short life. I’ve spoken to heart-broken people, angry people, humble people, intellectual people, philosophical people. Let me tell you, the joy I have knowing that my God invaded this messed-up, crazy, painful, really real world and He didn’t bring a placebo, He brought the truth, a truth that can set us free from the pain, anger, lost-ness, intellectual burnout-ness.

This is why peter goes out of his way to point out that this is all real, he said, “For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.” We were eye-witnesses? He saw it, it was real it happened. What an amazing truth.

Am I saying that I know everything? No.

Am I saying that God has given me everything I need for life and godliness while I’m here on earth? YES (2 Peter 1:3)

I remember at school when I was young, they always said that there is no such thing as a stupid question, but as I got older, they started saying, that smart questions make one smart.

The truth of God’s word being a freedom, a freedom that I’m not lost without answers in a world that is full of questions. However some people ask questions like that ad, where the child just keeps asking ‘why?’ for the sake of it, not really to learn anything.

A question that doesn’t come out of the hunger for an answer is not a real question, it’s a heart with no blood.

Humility is saying, God you have the answer, I’ll accept what you say, no matter how hard it is, because you are the potter and I am the clay.

Trying to deny that there is an answer in the name of humility is like a student who doesn’t want to show his marks, or see anyone else’s, because ignorance is bliss, and I don’t want to know if someone is better then me, and I don’t want others to know I’m not so good.

Oh, that we would humble ourselves like little children and come to God to learn from Him.

Most often God brings questions to our lives about reality so that we have to throw ourselves at Him and learn more about Who He is? Like with Abraham in Genesis 18, God goes to Abraham, and by God’s actions brings a whole lot of questions up in Abraham’s mind, and each time God answers, Abraham knows God a little better.

Central to our Christian Faith, is that we have the truth incarnate. And so we bring our dead daughter to Christ and ask Him to bring healing, we bring our confusion about meaning and hope and ask Him to answer, because that’s part of why He came, to show us the way, the truth and the life.

Robert Brownings wisely said, “I thirst for truth, but shall not reach it till I reach the source.”

The Christian faith is something which makes a difference and is real, but more then that… its true. Otherwise it would be easier to just believing something else, if there was some natural nobility in believing something.

Pauls said that we should answer each person (Col 4:6). The problem is when people sometimes attempt to answer back to God (Rom9:20).

Many people today would like to turn Christianity into a mystery, they would like to turn God’s revealing of Himself and His answers into mystery…

And to be honest, it is, as we saw earlier, the natural man does not understand the things of the spirit! They are foolishness to him. It was once said in the Scriptures that no one understands (Rom 3:11).

But what does it say to believers? 1Co 2:12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.” Wow, what a gift, we have the mind of Christ (1 Cor 2:16).

Where do we discover the mystery? Where do we find the answers? Paul said, “Eph 3:8 To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ,

Eph 3:9 and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things,

Oh, Christians, are you left on earth to reveal in questions? Did the all powerful, loving God decide that the best answer for mankind would be mystery?

Build the boat!

Take the cruise!

It will save you!

Two possibilities: One; oh, wow, God is so big, I don’t understand how he is going to save or bring hope or life, I’m trapped in despair, and now I feel free to share it with everyone.. its so exciting to be lost without an answer and hope!

Two; Rom 16:25 Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages

Rom 16:26 but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith–

Rom 16:27 to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ! Amen.

This has always been the understanding of Orthodox Christianity, a group of God loving holy theologians put this in a plain way in a great Christian confession, they said:

The whole counsel of God, concerning all things necessary for his own glory, man’s salvation, faith, and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men. Nevertheless we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word

This tell s us a very obvious thing: If we are going to travel the distance Jesus traveled, if we are going His way, we need to make sure our ship has the right equipment to travel across the ocean. Then we can take our feet off of the firm ground of this worlds sinful and dangerous ideas, and put our faith in something ‘more sure’, we are aliens and travelers on this world, it is not our home.

In a world where the pieces don’t matter, and the focus is more just about the journey, we would be led by a group of people who are very much like kids about to go on holiday with their parents. They don’t know to pack the spare tire, or fill up, or do checks on the car, or pack medicine.

Now, as I have said, somethings are not as important as others….

Whether Jesus comes back before or after the tribulation, or after the millennium, is not an important issue… whether Jesus is coming back at all,, is a very important issue….

This is why Paul under the control of the Holy Spirit wrote these heavy words: Gal 1:9 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.

Is Doctrine that Important/ The Distaste of Doctrine (Part 3)

- PARTS OF A BOAT-

(if you have not read them, then reading part 1 and 2 will be helpful to follow the thoughts)

Not all the parts on my boat were essential, the boat could sail and get to where it going if it was missing a velvet couch, and maybe if I didn’t put the stickers on to distinguish between the guys and girls bathroom (although it make for some weird situations)

Take for example the piece of our boat called ‘baptism’. Some think we can baptism babies, and others think we can’t. I think if we all went honestly to the Scriptures and wrestled it out together we would come out with the same conclusion, but at the moment there are more important pieces to be sure about, so instead of fighting about that specific piece I link arms with someone who might not understand it like I do and fight to get the doctrine of the trinity on our boat.

Some guys make a piece that’s not important become important though… imagine if on a bot a guy put ‘no-entry signs’ with a toxic symbol over all the bathroom doors! That could cause all sorts of major problems and in the end even cause sicknesses and all crazy things on the ship… I’ll leave it to your imagination. That would be like people who say baptism is essential for salvation, they do not build the ship according to the manual, but their mistake in construction will jeopardize the whole voyage

Paul wrote to Titus and said one of the most amazing things about the connection with doctrine and living a righteous life… he said, “…showing all good faith, so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior.” Paul was writing to slaves and telling them to be obedient and not to steal, before that he spoke to young men, young women, older men and older women, telling the Christians of all walks of life to live is such a way that adorns the Doctrine of God our Savior.

I think that’s so beautiful, its like how a husband would not look at other women and always speak highly of his wife, loving her by his actions all the time, and so he adorns the truth of the vows and marriage he is a part of.

The truth that he is married is important, its vital, if he wasn’t but was living like he was married that would be fornication. But if one has the truth as a ‘thing’ its made beautiful by the actions.

Paul when he was teaching Timothy showed the importance of doctrine, he said that Timothy should watch his life (the way he lives) and his doctrine closely, and by doing that he would save himself and those that heard him teach. (1 Tim 4:16)

Wow! The lights come on… Timothy, make sure you follow the instructions in that boat, that why lives will be saved. Paul could have said, “Timothy, the instructions are important, but the boat is a whole lot more then just a set of instructions, the boat is big and glorious and magnificent!” People die on big magnificent things…

But then comes the question…. And questions are vital….. What is the essentials? What pieces does our boat really need?

I may have opinions, you may have opinions, but what did God say?

Paul wrote down God’s out-breathed words and said, “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. ( 1 Cor 15:3-7)

Some people say that it doesn’t really matter if Jesus rose or not, some ‘christians’ say that they could continue to be a Christian if this were not true, if Jesus didn’t historically rise. Well.. Paul said, “And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins (1 Cor 15:17).

From those verses I see some stuff of first importance, do you?

It seems like Christ dying for our sins is rather important as well as His rising.

Because, he explains, both of those have to do with our salvation, that is, with how man is made right with God

So when someone says, you have to be baptized to be saved…. That’s adding a wrong piece to the boat, that’s going to cause people to suffer and never make it possibly

When someone says that you can get your sins forgiven by saying a prayer, or by eating a piece of bread, or doing good things, that’s not Christ dying for our sins. That’s taking things from other parts of the baot and putting it where its not supposed to be.

We can pray to communicate with our heavenly father whom we love and fear

We can eat bread in remembrance of Christ at communion

We can do good things because that’s why God made us His children, to do good works (Eph 2:10)

But if we take those things and put them where they don’t belong, we can make a very dangerous ship, on that can even make shipwreck of peoples faith (1 Tim 1:19)

In history a man named Martin Luther was on a really messed up ship, but he got hold of a manual and saw how wonderful it was meant to be! He tried to get the people who ran the ship to put the right pieces in the right place, but they wouldn’t. They didn’t understand the things of the Spirit and so they treated Luther like Jesus was treated, the rejected him and even tried to kill him.

This was called the reformation, it wasn’t a time of coming up with new pieces for the ship, it was a discovery that things when they are put in their right place, when the doctrines are understood correctly, leads to having a cruise the way Jesus intended it, the way God revealed it, the most glorious and life giving exciting way. Many people, called ;’reformers’ saw how beautiful this was saw how things were meant to be, and they were so amazed at the beauty of how God revealed Himself in His word that many many many of them died painful deaths, trying to show a so called ‘church’ how the boat was supposed to look.

I’m trying to convey a message to you through these blogs, but I’m limited, my vocabulary, the length of the blogs, my background, but there is a good chance that this blog will not convey all that I intend for you to know. Let me ask you a question:

Do you think God is limited by all of the things that limit me and you?