Turn Your Head and Quaff
This really should be a comment on The Discovery Sessions, but a title like "Turn Your Head and Quaff" really deserves its own post.
As I was struggling to come up with a better name for this new discovery thing we're gonna do, I thought about all the questions we'll be asking. Some will have rather direct answers, and others will not. But even the direct answers are eligible for questioning. This is not to say there is no real truth, or that God has not given us the right to be certain about anything, because there is, and he has. However, I believe that there is no truth that is "out of the question" so to speak. For the entire duration of the Modern Era, the church has placed certain "truths" out of the reach of deconstruction, doubt and inquiry. And the result has forked history into two paths: 1) the unthinking believer, and 2) the unbelieving thinker. In order to have a Kingdom full of thinking believers, we need to drag everything out on the table, right? Right.
The FAQ is a good, harmless example of Modernistic thinking. It's like Radio Shack... you've got questions, we've got answers. When you need the perfect pair of walkie-talkies, that's great. But when you're struggling through a spiritual journey, the "pat answer" bit gets old pretty fast.
So let's turn FAQ on its head... so now it's QAF. Which could stand for "Questioning Answers of Faith" or something similar to that. Do you know what's even better? The word "Quaff" means "to drink deeply".
So when you come to the QAF Sessions, you can question your own pre-suppositions, question the culture, question the establishment... shoot, you can even question the Church, the Bible and God. I can tell you God's not afraid of it. But in the course of questioning, let's realize that there are some real answers out there, and as we trust God, he'll give us just enough light for the step we're on.
Posted at 12:16 PM
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That sounds pretty nice. I think some of this discovery should be that there is a real answer (absolute) but we just don't know. For example, we don't have to be given the down low on the "trinity" or understanding it. So why do we have to get dogmatic about it and make our faith based on these issues rather than Christ. It certainly should be delved into but to be arrogant and act like we really understand God is silly. To act like we really get the Trinity is arrogant. I, for one, am not into Sabellianism or Arianism but I'm not an adamant follower of the Nicene Creed either. Somehow I think it is just unexplainable because it is not understandable. Might have to do with something like, I'm not God
Most "discovery" classes or things similar to it are simplistic watered down assumptions of absolutes. That is the easy, assuring thing to do. It usually people acting way to sure of themselves or worse yet way to sure of understanding God (who is usually just this little guy they have made in their head).
Phil, your perception I think is dead-on accurate about the simplistic, watered-down nature of these kinds of things. Which is why Ryan seems to be approaching it in Q & A fashion. However, it's important to remember that when we came to know Christ, there was a certain simplicity to it. We didn't understand all the theological complexities, nor was that necessary for saving faith. The real challenge comes when people are cautiously--even skeptically--exploring faith. Basically what they're asking for (whether they admit it outright or not) is for us to be good apologists. Really good apologists who can answer their tough questions. Some people simply want to be loved. But other people simply think Christianity is a hoax, that Christ was just a good teacher, and that Christians are like ostriches with their heads buried in the sand. The latter is the typical urbanite, though love obviously goes a long way.
BTW, believing that God exists in three persons is infinitely different than understanding it. "Just Christ" or "simply Christ" isn't Christianity. It leads to dualistic heresy... well, it is dualistic heresy. Not saying you actually believe it... but try to be a little more scrupulous about presenting the faith that way; otherwise people will get the impression that Christianity is all about Jesus and not God or the Spirit.
Grace, brothers.
I agree, it is more than Christ. It is God and also the Holy Spirit.
What I have seen though, is those who try to act like they are great apologists and think that is achieved by being arrogant and dogmatic in their statements. I think a lot of people are looking just for honesty. I think a lot of people rather hear you just say, "I'm not sure." I don't think convincing someone of the Trinity, in a Nicene way, generally comes before the Holy Spirit convicts someone of their distance from God and their need for Christ in their path to Christ.
I have found, in my personal walk, saying, "I don't know, or I'm not sure" has made me more dependent on Christ, the Holy Spirit and God. Somehow I need them more than my dogma. I fear that we remove this reliance when we think "we are right".
This, just like anything else, takes moderation. Motive is key. If we are trying to sound like a brilliant apologist, I see it all the time (specifically myself), we're missing the boat. Our confidence becomes arrogance and we can explain God. We look down on those who have a different view, on "non-essentials", and we speak to them as though they are just confused and need our guidance. We've had this discussion before, motive and moderation are key. Moderation is probably not the accurate word here but you get what I'm saying.
The whole "Josh McDowell" movement had validity, but like all movements, became about our enlightenment rather than God's. The church, throughout their history, has been vicious in the splits. They were unable to focus on Christ, the Holy Spirit and God; instead focused on their personal dogma. The first 5 centuries is a wonderful example to us. Too bad we still want to exile those who disagree with us, make sure nobody can hear their horrible misguided statements. I just wish we could learn from the past rather than reinforcing it.*** Ahh never mind, I think I heard Paul say in some letter "If you disagree with your brothers and sisters than thou shalt split over and over again."
***This statement is not in reference to true heretics, some people should of been knocked around and spoken against. They were pretty obvious, such as the Gnostics. There are some issues that are very unclear and should be dealt with in overwhelming grace rather than arrogance. I just feel really sorry for Nestorius. Cyril gave him the real screw job.
One more thing, I think it goes both ways with the intellectual thinkers. I think we know why we believe but I think great misunderstanding is achieved when we act like we know for sure the unknowable. When our attempt to let people have the great joy of knowing God is diverted by us portraying we completely understand him. People know BS when they see it, or hear it. There are some who don't, they're called kool-aid drinkers.
This is great, Matt and Phillip... you guys are like the two little men standing on my right and left shoulders. Although I wouldn't accuse either of you of being the devil, of course. But I feel like you represent the far reaches of each of my two personalities right now. I guess I'm spiritually bi-polar.
I guess I'll call my scholarly personality "Matt" and my simple faith personality "Phillip".
LOL. Yeah, just to be clear:
I am not against apologetics, theology, scholarship- I, personally try to be better at all of them (I study a lot)- I just believe there is a proper balance. Making your faith based on dogma can be a very inconsistent, arrogant world. My challenge is to discuss openly that we don't know some things and cling to those that we are assured of, such as the pure, unblemished lamb of God being sacrificed for our sins and rising from the dead giving you and me life. Or we can split up over whether we should speak in tongues or not.
Phil... VERY well articulated, brother. "Let your conversation be full of grace, seasoned with salt," NOT "Let your conversation be full of salt, seasoned with grace." The necessity of humility cannot be overstated. It's one thing to rigorously pursue truth (and part of the pursuit is dialogues such as these right here). It's quite something else to rigorously pretend that there are no questions we can't answer. You're exactly right, people see through our BS walls of insecurity. And I'll confess my insecurity right now... if the Bible is not infallible, then I don't want to live any longer on this earth. Aside from that, I can "deal with" ambiguity. But I'm gonna fight tooth and nail to disperse it with light, by loving God with all my heart, MIND, soul, and strength. I'm gonna let people know that the reason I'm so rigorously pursuing truth is that I DON'T HAVE THE ANSWERS that are necessary to keep one from despising God when they read things in scripture that seem to paint an altogether contrary God than the one they received by faith.
Very well put. One thing that concerns me, and I've read of your struggle, is you not wanting to live if the Bible is not infallible. I understand your logic but that, fear or dread, isn't what makes the Bible infallible. Most Christians who "argue" over this specific subject are arguing over semantics. I don't know if you have read my view on the Bible but read it and tell me if it makes you wish you were dead. (I'm being completely serious and please don't take that as insensitive, I know to some degree the wish) By the way, I don't think my view is right, it isn't meant to sway anyone, it is just honesty from my perspective. I think it is interesting how both of us have dealt with our spiritual questions to the pinnacle of wishing for death and how we have turned out thus far.
I would wish I were dead if Christ had not come, given his life and raised from the dead. Fortunately, I am sure he did. I used to wish I were dead when I found the Bible inconsistent, didn't get the Trinity, didn't get Paul half the time, didn't know if I were some form of preterist, dispensationalist, etc.- Wow even talking about it now makes me feel yucky :) I still don't get it, but I don't wish I was dead because of it anymore. I almost rejoice in not getting it while simultaneously studying it still.
Man, I am really enjoying this sharpening! It is a real nice break from studying insurance. Believe me, I would rather be studying the 5 points of of Calvinism right now (yes, it's that bad).
I don't know what your problem is but your, beloved268, doesn't link to your blog:
http://www.theincarnate.blogspot.com/
It's not that unanswered questions take me to the edge... it's the prospect of not having somewhere reliable to turn to answer them. It is the prospect that the only certainty that exists in the world is that there is none.
And I'm keenly aware of the fact that wishing something to be true does not make it true. I fear that many people believe certain things to be true because they believe they have to be true, and that's understandable enough for some people. I'm just saying that if the possibility of certainty does not exist on this earth, then living missionally, for the sake of the Kingdom, for a purpose larger than myself, is utterly a "vanity of vanities." Solomon taught us that humanistic, philosophical straining and striving for wisdom are vain--that it takes a revelation from God himself to make anything meaningful. Solomon got it. He tried existentialism and was found desperately wanting, perhaps even suicidal for all we know. So, in a sense, he would say that because we humans do not have within us the capacity to truly grasp ultimate truth for ourselves, that God's word has to be fully reliable and completely infallible. Without believing this, we have nothing whatsover trustworthy on which to build our beliefs about God/Christ. "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so." Feeling that I'm saved does not assure me that this is so.
P.S. My "beloved268" name is linked to my new gmail address. It's retarded... Blogger won't let me switch the email address attached to my blog account, so whenever I'm signed into my email account, my screen name shows up as beloved268 (because I can't have my screen name attached to two different email accounts).
I never know how to react to converstation about DOCTRINE, in the full, round sense of the word. I've known Jesus for about nine years. Up until about this week I have had the most uncanny ability to simply scrape away everything that happened between the early church, and say, John Hus-Martin Luther. And even since Luther I can blissfully just ignore acres and acres of christian thought and history. In some ways I think this has to do with taking underground music very seriously when I was young. I learned to accept the fact that quite possibly the music store in the mall might contain not even one decent album. I came to accept that the downtown auditorium might be filled to capacity with music fans for a thousand friday nights and that all those poor saps had gathered only to view an ameteur group of musicians engage in basically a moneymaking scheme. Eventually I even tended to prefer a band if they had been forced to, say, play in somebody's backyard.
When I was won over to Jesus I sort of just reapplied this attitude to the christian remnant. It made sense to me that the history books might be entirely filled with disputes, doctrine, teachings, and scandals that had been generated entirely by a furry crust of superficial entrepeneuring half-christians who were the spiritual equivalent of the Spice Girls, or Milli Vanilli.
This week though, my World History teacher at MSU was lecturing on the first 1000 years or so of Christian Europe with it's Desert Fathers and Monasteries and Constantinople and Nicene Creed and Orthodox Church and Popes...And the funny thing was that I felt a bit of affection for our clumsy first centuries. In the history books, at least, christianity seems like such a bungling thing as we get way over our heads into politics, and distracted by peripheral questions.
Anyway, we did better than Rome though! Just like Daniel said we would with his rock that grew into a mountain. So I sort of owned up to my history for the first time.
Nice post, Brent. You and Beloved will get along real well with the underground music preference.
I like your point of view. I guess with my background I expected the first 1000 years or so to be come enlightening experience where I would learn "real" truth. It was interesting to learn our "church fathers" were just as jacked up as I am, they just lived a few years before me.
Once I woke up to the truth that "To whom much is given, much is required," my paradigm has radically shifted from cynicism about the foibles of those who have gone before me to a commitment to be the absolute best steward of every experience, ability, resource, and piece of knowledge that God has given me access to. This is one of the basic convictions of the theology of "progressive revelation". God expects more of people who have more resources at their disposal, and this includes our responses to increasing levels of revelation.
Thank you, Brent, for your honest and thought-provoking story! Look forward to seeing you around. :)
I'll echo Phillip and Beloved in thanking you for a very well-thought-out and well-written comment, Brent. Do you live in Springfield, perchance?
Let me ask a question to the group: if so much is expected of us based on our wealth of resources, both past and present, what is expected of those who have nothing but the order of creation to observe?
In the process of reading According to Plan by Graeme Goldsworthy, I came to understand the essence of sin as fundamentally the improper response to the divine revelation one has been given. In his view (typical of many Reformed theologians), any human who responds sinlessly to the revelation of God via the created order is justified. (Read my fuller treatment of this subject here.) However, according to the testimony of Scripture, no one in the history of creation has ever accomplished or will ever accomplish this (except Christ), because they are incapable.
I got "According to Plan" in the mail today. I look forward to reading it.
I stopped torturing myself with that one. I guess it's God's decision, or possibly his election. My justice is far different from his justice. I'm sure he'll do the right thing. :)
C.S. Lewis had a nice thought on the issue. He essentially said those who recognize God in creation, Romans 1:20 I believe, God will reveal himself and Christ to them if they seek him. I don't agree exactly but I don't know the answer. Stop screwing around and share your thoughts.
Thanks for the friendly responses. I do live in Springfield. My wife, Melissa, and I have come to a few of the open mic nights, which mean an awful lot to me because otherwise there is no culture for us, only toddler issues.
In response to the question about those with zero revelation, out there in the wilds... The first thing that pops to mind is ETERNITY IN THEIR HEARTS by Don Richardson. He was a missionary who eventually was able to tell the gospel to a bizzare tribe of cannibal-headhunters, living in New Guinea, by noticing a peculiar ritual they had of exchanging a little child with a tribe they were fighting with. When the fighting became overbearing, the exchange of a child would signify peace as long as the child lived. When he told the tribes that Jesus was their Peace Child from God (he used their own word for God), many of them accepted Christ.
Then the fellow, Don, went on to research other tribes and ancient peoples looking for bits and scraps of revelation. Mostly what he dug up was that many peoples had, at some time or other, a clear respect for a single God who was grieved with their sinfulness. Often this idea had become old-school and the culture had gotten into some new idol-ish thing. Buddhism was one of his examples of this. The coolest part of that book is a reconstruction he does of the story of the Altar to an unknown God, that Paul found in Athens. It's a long story, but essentially, the Athenians realized that out of all their shrines and gods, there was one out there whom they did not know, and who was the only one that could save them from a particular plague they were in.
It seems like the idea of being redeemed by God is far more rare. I often wonder if it's possible to intuitively, or by some organic revelation, get the basic story of Jesus.?.
Thanks for the friendly posts. We do live in Springfield, my wife Melissa and our boys Blaise (like Blaise Pascal) and Miles. We've come to the open-mic night a few times now. We are fully into it because otherwise we get not an ounce of culture.
In response to the question about those, living in the wilds, who have only the creation...honestly, I had to become that person to be a christian today. I grew up in a fully powered, wealthy church, and even went to the private school, k-12. By the time I was ready to think about anything that heavy it had already been completely packaged up for me. So, it sounds weird, but even though I technically knew the details of Jesus, redemption, christianity...Jesus was locked away in my cerebrum. It wasn't until I was 23, and had dredged up a little handful of friends with true problems that redemption became something to me. I was living in New Orleans with a girl who was making a living stripping, and my other friend was a young buddhist who had periodic spells of suicidal depression: he would often just go live in a homeless shelter. I needed people like this to understand salvation. Even then I couldn't make anything out of Jesus Himself. I really had to go through a process of just starting over with whatever it was that had made the earth and me, and see what it had to say about salvation.
Everything worked out great.
These days I think about King Melchezidek a lot. He seems to me like the righteousness you can get from just feeding the poor, doing right, clothing the naked, that whole angle. Abraham is all about the righteousness we have because we know Jesus' name, and were smart enough to sign our names on the list, and learn about the promises that belong to us now. I mean, when Abraham met Melchezidek, he was just a businessman who was in the right family at the right time, and he was wise enough to believe all the good that God had promised him. Melchezidek didn't have anything, only that he had apparently done a ton of good in his day, so much that Abraham paid tribute to him.
So to me Melchezidek sort of represents all that people living out in jungles and deserts, and who knows where, can understand about Jesus without ever hearing his name or knowing squat. Now and then I'll read a book about, say, Nelson Mandela, and get the chills because who knows how close he's gotten to my faith, while still being technically a stranger?
So I guess my answer is just another question.
Sorry about the 2 posts. I thought the first one hadn't worked, so I wrote a new one.
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