© Copyright Steven Ring 1994 - 1998 all rights reserved.
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Mr. Steven R. Ring B.Sc.
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Various versions of the bible are referenced by mnemonics in the text. Prior copyright rights are gratefully acknowledged as follows:
[NIV] New International Version, as follows: Scripture quotations taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission.
[NASB] New American Standard Bible, as follows: Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 Used by permission.
[AV] Authorised Version, rights owned by the British Crown, Crown patentee.
[RSV] The Revised Standard Version, Copyright 1946, 1952 and 1971 National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA. As follows: Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1952 [2nd edition, 1971] by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
[THE MESSAGE] Scripture taken from THE MESSAGE. Copyright © by Eugene H. Peterson, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996. Used by permission of the NavPress Publishing Group.
There are four distinct definitions of the English word 'church' corresponding to four different ideas that can be conveyed by the same word depending on the context. Two of these ideas are biblical, and the other two are not. These are:
The church building idea
The denominational idea
The local congregation of believers idea
The idea of a spiritual communion of all believers dwelling with Christ in God.
The first two ideas do not originate from scripture, either from Jesus or His apostles, whereas the third and fourth do. I intend to major on the ideas connected with the church that originate from scripture. However, in passing, there are some worthwhile observations can be made about the non-biblical connotations of the word church.
Firstly, the idea of a church as a building and the principle of a 'holy place' that underlies it. This idea and the principle behind it are contrary to Christian thought and have no legitimate place in it. Since Christ came to abolish the idea of a holy place and to replace it with the idea and the reality of a holy people.
Secondly concerning the idea of the church being a particular denomination. Where this 'church' idea dominates people's minds, an individual's commitment is divided between the denomination and Christ. Such a denomination therefore becomes an abomination. An idol set up in the hearts of the people that they worship and serve in practice, even if their creed is fundamentally Christian. All such idolatrous organisations are severe obstacles to anyone whose sole commitment is to Christ. These organisations, jealous of their idol like nature in the minds of the people will also act and react strongly to prevent any truly Christian thinking from diverting the people back to Christ. It is a sad fact that many denominations that have fallen into this trap today, exist only because those believers who founded them could not function as believers within the denominations of their own time.
Thirdly, the idea of a church that consists of a congregation of believers from a locality. This idea is often invoked by the writers of the New Testament. Many of the letters of Paul, John and the other apostles were written to specific local groups of believers whom they addressed collectively as the church of that place. Even in New Testament times, these local churches were occasionally fragmented, often internally divided into opposing camps on important issues, and often experiencing one kind of spiritual difficulty or another. Even so, whenever the local Christians assembled, they became the church functioning in that place.
Fourthly, and most significantly of all, we have the idea that forms the Mystery of the Church. This idea was also spoken of by Jesus and His apostles. It is God's idea, it was predicted by the Old Testament prophets and announced and founded by Jesus Christ. The Mystery of the Church is a secret that God will reveal at the time of the second coming of Jesus. In essence the mystery of the Church consists of God extending the fellowship that already exists between the three Persons of the Godhead to include those who believe in Jesus. According to the scripture, those who believe in Jesus, dwell with Him, in union with Him and with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It would be difficult to overstate the significance of this idea or its importance to Christ Himself. Jesus sees His Church as His beloved Bride. He eagerly awaits the marriage whilst His Bride is being prepared. The union of Christ and His Church will be the culmination of God the Father's purpose to unite all things in Christ, (Ephesians 1 v 10). The church we experience on earth today is a passing shadow compared to the radiance of the Church that Christ is even now building with living stones and which God the Father has planned for His Son. This is simply because the local churches that we participate in are not the same thing as the Church that is being built in heaven, they are two related but different entities.
The comparison between the church we experience now and the Church of Revelation 21 v 9 - 14 is like the comparison between the life governed by the law of Moses and the life led by the Holy Spirit as announced in the Old Testament scriptures and brought to fruition by Jesus Christ. For now we function as churches using the spiritual gifts that God gives. But as Paul says, (1 Corinthians 13 v 8 ff.) these are imperfect and they will disappear once the perfection of God's Church appears. As the law of Moses acted as a custodian for us until God's grace was revealed, so the Spirit protects and guides us as churches until we attain the unity of our perfection together as the Bride of Christ. Just as the glorious riches of God's grace brought by Jesus Christ exceeds the glory of the law of Moses, so the glory of the Bride of Christ shall exceed the glory of the spiritual gifts we now enjoy and participate in.
It is possible to confuse the two biblical ideas behind the word church. Nevertheless, a clear distinction does exist between two possible meanings of the word 'church' when encountered in the scripture. These two meanings correspond to two different ideas. For example; there are many churches in different locations, but there is only one Church. You can join in a church meeting today, but you cannot yet see the Church of Revelation 21 v 9 - 14. These two different meanings can usually be distinguished from the scriptural context in which they appear. Any connection with a locality or a plural like 'churches' indicates the assembly of believers in Jesus Christ here and now. If the occurrence of the word 'church' is singular and unconnected with a locality then the Mystery of the Church is the intended meaning. We can see examples of both ideas contrasted in some places within the New Testament. For example, in the letter to the Ephesian local church, (Ephesians 1 v 1), Paul makes clear references to God's plan for His spiritual Church (Ephesians 1 v 22, 3 v 9 - 10) that go far beyond the local church idea, reaching as they do into 'heavenly places', (Ephesians 3 v 10b). Taking Paul's words seriously makes a great deal of sense of other scriptures. Alternatively, if we say to ourselves that Paul is using 'embellishments' and 'philosophizing' about local churches, then we are left with some difficult explaining to do. For example, if the local or earthly church is the only kind of church, then we are forced to say that Jesus' words about the Church breaking through the gates of Hades, (Matthew 16 v 18) must also be non-literal and figurative when applied to the local church. If these statements are figurative references to a localized church, then in what way do they relate to the experience of the early local churches recorded elsewhere in the New Testament? I am not offering these scriptures as proof that there are two common meanings of the word church in the New Testament. I am offering them because they are difficult to understand unless we allow the possibility of two meanings! The possibility that there is more truth buried in the church idea is exciting and potentially very helpful when trying to understand the rest of scripture, church history and the present church scene.
I offer the following scriptures as proofs of the two separate church ideas. Only those who believe in Jesus belong to God's kingdom, (John 14 v 6, Romans 8 v 9). Those who believe in Jesus are not of this world, inwardly they are not even part of the first creation, they are new creatures after God's new creation, (John 17 v 14, Galatians 6 v 15, 2 Corinthians 5 v 17). Now it is clear that a local church can consist of believers and unbelievers, even amongst Jesus' Twelve disciples, there was one who did not believe. There are many other examples of unbelievers abiding in local churches recorded in the New Testament, for example: 'Jezebel' (probably not her real name) mentioned in Revelation 2 v 20 and several false apostles mentioned by Paul in 2 Corinthians 11 v 13 - 15. So we have established what we already know, from history and our own experience; that local churches are not comprised solely of those who believe in Christ. Believers are mixed in with those who do not believe, a situation that Jesus clearly foretold in the gospels, (for example see Matthew 13 v 24 - 29). However there is a Church than no unbeliever can enter, a place no impostor will ever see. Paul states clearly that those who believe in Jesus dwell with Him now, (From the tense he uses in Ephesians 2 v 6). Peter says that we who believe are being built together like living stones into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, (1 Peter 2 v 5). Now, since those who believe in Jesus are spiritually collocated with Christ, and since His household is holy and His priesthood is holy, so it must be that no unbelievers can dwell there, even temporarily. Therefore, Peter cannot be referring to a localized church, but to something else. Both Peter and Paul speak in the present tense about this other kind of Church, therefore it presently exists. Since this Church already exists and it cannot be a localized church, it must be something else. As Peter put it, it is a spiritual house. This then clearly separates the two ideas of a local church and the Church that is in heaven with Christ. They both exist right now, however the heavenly Church is hidden from view. In other words, it is a mystery!
This other Church idea is arguably the most dazzling found in the whole of scripture, as the writer to the Hebrews describes this Church;
"You have not come to a mountain that can be touched ...(note that this church cannot be touched, - Author) .. But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel." [NIV] Hebrews 12 v 18 and 22 - 24 with my note in brackets and my emphasis added.
This wonderful passage is packed with descriptive prose about the spiritual Church that we entered when we believed in Jesus. Let us unpack some statements about this heavenly Church from this passage;
The heavenly church cannot be touched, it is not yet obvious to the world that it even exists.
We have come to this Church who believe in Jesus. We are members too, even before we die!
We have 24 hour access into God's Presence. (Note the present tense surrounding the 'firstborn' in the passage.)
We share the heavenly Church with the angels in the joyful assembly. In the heavenly Church, the angels are ministers sent to serve those who will inherit salvation, (Hebrews 1 v 14) in other words, their purpose is to help those of us who believe in Jesus.
The heavenly church includes the spirits of those who believe in Jesus, but whom are now dead. (Surely there is some comfort here, for believers in Jesus who mourn the loss of a believing loved one, they are not far away!)
Most importantly, the heavenly church is reigned over by Christ.
Because these facts and Paul's words in Ephesians 5 v 32 and other scriptures, the mystery of the heavenly church can be called 'the great mystery,' near to the centre of God's purposes both in this age and also overflowing into the coming ages. Truly, all the power of God is available to us who believe in Jesus; because when we pray, our prayers are heard by Christ and everyone else in this heavenly Church and the angels are working at Christ's bidding to help us. Being part of this heavenly Church by faith, is therefore of great help to us whilst we live on earth. We are also in this Church for ever; we are there now and we will be still be there, even if we die. This Church is therefore our permanent home, more so than any other place we happen to live in.
Having proved that there are two separate ideas behind the word 'church' in the New Testament, let us take another look at the scriptures I referred to earlier. They should now make sense when taken as straight truth rather than figurative or idealized statements. For example; Jesus refers to His spiritual Church assaulting and breaking through the gates of Hades, (Matthew 16 v 16 - 19). Therefore, Jesus says that the heavenly Church is on the offensive, not the defensive. It will engage the forces of darkness and defeat them, gaining control of the who goes in and who comes out of Hades, (this is my understanding of Jesus' words about 'binding' and 'loosing'). Since the doors that imprison the dead are heavenly and spiritual not material, it makes sense for them to be conquered by a powerful heavenly or spiritual Church built and led by Christ Himself upon Peter's confession of Christ's true identity. In the ancient near East, the government of a city was located 'in the gate' of the city. The 'gates of Hades' therefore also means the place where ideas and decisions are debated that are important to that place. In taking the gates of Hades therefore, the heavenly Church is defeating the ideologies and decision making power of Hades. This is where the spiritual powers of God's people really make a difference to the 'place of the dead'. The evil ideas that keep people in Hades and as far as possible from the living God (who would set them free and give them life) are our enemies - and legitimate targets for us. We are to overcome these ideologies with whole lives that depend on the truth of who Jesus really is. If through the Holy Spirit, every aspect of our thinking and every decision we make is based on the truth that Jesus is the Living God, we will be in conflict with every ideology that has ever been voiced in the gate of Hades, (and there are quite a few!). Our persistence and our expression of the truth of Christ will defeat these ideologies, and thereby unlock the gates of Hades for many of the souls trapped inside. This interpretation holds up within the context of Christ's words a little later in this passage: The keys of the kingdom of God that Jesus gave to Peter were to lock and unlock the gates of Hades, other words, doors in the heavenly or spiritual realm, not the temporal realm, (compare Revelation 1 v 18 for further evidence of this). Similarly in the other scripture sited above in Ephesians 3 v 9 - 10, the heavenly or spiritual Church reveals God's wisdom to rulers and authorities in the heavenly, or spiritual realms.
After all, one of the true heritages of the servants of the Lord is to defeat arguments and ideologies that prevent people from finding God in Jesus Christ our Lord, for;
"no weapon that is fashioned against you shall prosper, and you shall confute every tongue that rises against you in judgement. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their vindication from me says the Lord." [RSV] Isaiah 54 v 17
And;
"Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes will rule in justice. ... " [RSV] Isaiah 32 v 1 (the whole passage is relevant and continues to verse 8).
This conflict of ideas and thought is the nature of the spiritual warfare that we are to wage with all the courage, wit, strength and persistence that the Holy Spirit will provide, (see Paul's description of the defensive aspects of this warfare in Ephesians 6 v 10 - 20). We do not fight in the same way as the world does with violent acts, brutality and the weapons of conventional warfare. Instead we are to fight with our minds, with our words and with our pens illuminated by the Spirit of Jesus:
"For though we live in the world we are not carrying on a worldly war, for the weapons of our warfare are not worldly but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every proud obstacle to the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, ... " [RSV] 2 Corinthians 10 v 3 - 5
As a footnote to this discussion, the Roman 'church' claims to be 'the one true church' based on the fact that Jesus gave the keys of the kingdom of heaven to Peter. (For example, this claim was asserted by Wilfred in England during the synod of Whitby in about AD 663. This argument was abused to persuade the Celtic churches in England to accept the authority of Rome). However, in my opinion, this claim and other similar claims made by other denominations, can only be false. It cannot be true, because as I have explained above, the Church Jesus was speaking about in the Matthew 16 passage was the spiritual and eternal one, and not any physical or temporal one, as, for example, the Roman 'church' certainly is.
Having clarified the biblical distinction between a local church, (or even collections of churches) and the heavenly Church a number of other ideas in the New Testament start to become clearer. Not least of these is the idea of joining a local church.
Joining a local church to find out about Jesus, or to see a demonstration of Christ's kingdom in action can be the first step a person takes in response to being attracted by Christ, through His teaching or by the lifestyle of one of His people or in some other way. Some people already coming along may already be Christians who join a local church to find fellowship with other Christians in the locality. As such, a local church can be a busy place, with people coming along for many different reasons. From a spiritual point of view, the local church has some important functions, like fellowship, opportunity for various kinds of service, opportunity to learn more about what it means to be a Christian and so on. The local church is also the place where we can obey the first part of our commission, given to us by Christ Himself, to 'make disciples of all nations,' (Matthew 28 v 19). Disciples are people who learn to follow Jesus, (note, not to follow us!) through the example of others who are already following Jesus. Some of the most basic aspects of following Jesus, like humility, love, faith, forgiveness and respect for others; are better communicated by one demonstration than by many sermons. Notice in Matthew 28 v 19, how discipleship precedes both baptism and teaching for those who are entering the kingdom of God. Since discipleship precedes baptism and teaching, we should allow new people to join in with a local church as fully as possible so that they can find out more and build relationships with established believers. In a healthy church setting, relationships with established believers should direct new people towards Jesus; He is the Person they really need, He is the source of life. Our role is to serve those who need Jesus whilst ensuring that they give their personal allegiance to Christ and not to us, (John 5 v 43).
Whereas anyone can join a local church through their own decision, no-one can join the spiritual Church in heaven unless Jesus builds them into it, (John 6 v 43). This is the key practical distinction between the local church and the spiritual Church in heaven. In the great commission, Jesus also commands us to baptize Christ's disciples and teach them to obey Christ's commands, (I repeat and emphasize, His commands, not ours!). This is our part, but there must also be a powerful working of God's Spirit to make the baptism effective inwardly for those being baptized. I have expanded upon this theme in other books [2, 3].
"As you come to him, the living stone - rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him - you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." [NIV] 1 Peter 2 v 4 - 5 "Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit." [NIV] Ephesians 2 v 19 - 22
The spiritual house about which Peter and Paul wrote is the spiritual or heavenly Church. As we come to Jesus and believe in Him he begins to shape us inwardly like a master mason would shape a roughly hewn boulder into a stone useful for building. He begins to build us into his spiritual Church along with others who also believe. Jesus Himself cements us together, we are all linked together spiritually in Him. Jesus is also the chief load bearing stone in the structure, taking the full weight upon Himself as well as holding it all together. We are living stones because we have God's presence dwelling inside each of us. The spiritual Church is thus the dwelling place of God.
Before we came to Jesus we were like pieces of unshaped stone, or rubble. When we come to Him, he takes us and shapes us, carving His design into us. He then builds us into His heavenly church as living stones built upon Jesus as a foundation. We remain individual stones, but the glory is seen in the structure Christ builds out of us all.
All this church building is done by Christ. There is no way that men can do it. In particular, it is not possible for us to build a copy of it here on earth. It is not possible for us to create a denomination or any kind of organisation that could replace the heavenly church or come remotely close to its glory. Furthermore, and for the moment, Christ's workmanship is hidden from our sight. According to the word of the Lord, it will be revealed later, (Revelation 19). What we can do is to serve Christ as He builds His Church. Acting at His direction we can lay and build upon the good Foundation of Jesus in each other's lives, (1 Corinthians 3). Again at Christ's direction we can employ spiritual gifts to build each other up and encourage each other. According to the passage in 1 Corinthians 3, these are the works that we can do now, that will endure forever.
Serving Christ and His kingdom is good, as long as those who serve, truly serve Christ rather than their own ends. True service of Christ is unlikely to be recognised or supported by many of the organisations and denominations in which we find ourselves. Many such organisations and denominations hold their own survival and interest above the interests of Christ, His people and His kingdom. Even if they do pay lip-service, they are intent on piling up the wood, hay and straw of denominational dogma that cannot possibly survive the gaze of Christ's eyes when He comes, (1 Corinthians 3). Not only is such dogma of no eternal value, it is counterproductive to the faith of many, distracting their attention away from Christ and the spiritual life found only in Him, to serve the insatiable needs of the organisation. Whilst Christ would fill with life and bless, many organisations would suck the very life from us if they could. All things that would distract us away from Christ are idols, artifices of human and demonic origin intent on our destruction.
Looking at the mystery of the heavenly Church a little more carefully, we can see that those already in the heavenly Church have a purpose given by God. As Paul said just before reciting an early creed, or statement of belief:
"Although I hope to come to you soon, I am writing you these instructions so that, if I am delayed, you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God's household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth." [NIV] 1 Timothy 3 v 14 - 15. (Note the word translated 'foundation' also means 'a steadfast support,' see Vines [1] page 521 under 'grounded'.)
The heavenly church is the pillar and steadfast support of the truth that Paul is about to summarize in 1 Timothy 3 v 16 and he is writing to support Timothy as he battles with various problems and problem people in his own local church. We too, are supposed to understand the practical outworking of the truth thoroughly, and to know how to behave in a way consistent with the truth we profess, so that we are well able to defend the truth and explain it to others.
"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no-one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command." [NIV] John 15 v 12 - 14
The love of God has been poured out into us by Jesus Christ. This is more than an ideal or an optional extra that it would be 'nice to have.' Whether someone has some measure of Christ's love indicates whether they believe in Jesus or not. Those who love their brothers and sisters in Christ are born of God and God lives in them. Those who do not love in this way, do not know God, because God is love and He lives within all His true children, (1 John 4 v 4, 7 & 16b, Romans 8 v 15 - 17). Love is definitely not an option or a 'nice to have' attitude, it is indispensable and fundamental to the authentic Christian lifestyle; it is one of the characteristics of those who live in God's household. Now lets look at the wider context of Jesus' words quoted above.
"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no-one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other." [NIV] John 15 v 12 - 17
Having and demonstrating the love of Christ is what the bible means by fruitfulness in the Christian life - it is a mark of our maturity in Christ as well as a mark of our identity as children of God. Showing an increasing measure of Christ's love is a sure sign of spiritual growth because it indicates that our knowledge of Him is increasing. Jesus says He will teach us everything He Himself has received from the Father if we obey His command to love one another. Therefore, according to our Lord's own word, loving each other in obedience to Him is the key to His friendship and to our fruitfulness, knowledge, and effectual prayer. Loving each other is so basic, and yet in our sophistication we try to compensate for our lack of it in other ways and so move away even further from our first love for Christ and His people, (Revelation 2 v 4 ff.). Loving Jesus and loving each other is also the highest peak of virtue, (1 Corinthians 13 v 13). Therefore, any journey that takes us away from loving Jesus and loving each other is always a downward journey into darkness. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13, no amount of other 'virtues' can possibly compensate for lovelessness - love for Jesus and love for each other is the virtue that gives meaning to our other gifts and to everything else we do.
Love cannot be abstract. It is always about relationship, how we relate to God and to each other. Loving God and loving each other always shows. Love is both a practical and an emotional matter that must be expressed to be genuine. Love is like a river. A river is only a river because the water flows. If the water does not flow, the river does not exist. In the same way, love is only love if it is demonstrated by one person to others. If there is no rain for years, the rivers will dry up. Just so, if we do not keep going to Christ to receive more of His love, we will have none to give away. We cannot have love unless we give it away, therefore we cannot give love away unless we have first received it. We first receive love from God. We love because God first loves us, (1 John 4 v 10 - 11). Because the Holy Spirit pours His love into our souls, (Romans 5 v 5) we can have an abundance to give away to others, but not otherwise. Our lives can convey the love of God to the world; The Holy Spirit pours it in and we pour it out to the world, expressing it as the Lord provides us opportunity to do so.
Anyone who has tried to cross a river knows about the power of flowing water, it is always trying to sweep you along with it. In the same way, God's love is powerful, it drives you along with its flow, (2 Corinthians 5 v 14). We do what we want to do, we do not necessarily do as we intend or think, (Romans 7 v 15). What we want comes from our souls where all our other emotions come from. If Christ's love is pouring into our souls, then what we want to do will be constrained by Christ's love and our actions will demonstrate its reality. This is the power of Christ in us who believe! The motivating power of an indestructible love, an eternal love that has already shown itself to be more powerful than the grave. Paul says that those who keep coming back to Jesus to ask for more of this love of His, are walking in the most excellent way possible, (1 Corinthians 12 v 31).
"And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. ... We love him, because he first loved us. If a man saith, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?" [AV] 1 John 4 v 16 - 20 (Excerpts.)
An important thing to understand about God is that He is love. He is full of love, and everything He does, (even His anger) is motivated by love. For this reason love indicates God's presence. Anyone who claims to believe in Jesus and to be indwelt by the Holy Spirit but who manifests hatred, greed, treachery (and so on) in their behaviour is lying. Such people are the sons of the devil because they show how they have inherited their father's foul nature.
There are only two things that Jesus asks us to do that point to deeper spiritual actions on our part and on God's part also. These are to be baptised and to participate in communion where we take the bread and wine together. Baptism and communion are similar in that both of these are outward signs that require spiritual and moral actions by God and by us in order to be effective.
In baptism, our part is to declare our faith in Jesus Christ, (spiritual action) and our willingness to be done with our old sinful ways, (moral action). God's part in baptism is to remove the power our sinful nature has over our hearts, (moral action), to give us a new living spirit and to fill us with His Holy Spirit, (spiritual action).
In communion, our part is to confess our sins to God (moral action) and to express our love for each other by putting right any wrongs we have done to others, (moral action). We express our faith in Christ's blood to purify us from our sins (spiritual action) and we remember His love for us which He expressed by sacrificing Himself for our sins and we look forward to His return, (spiritual action). God's part in communion is to forgive us our sins, (moral action) and to purify us from our sins, (spiritual action). Communion differs from baptism because;
Communion is repeated by those who believe in Jesus, who commemorate Christ's death. In contrast, being baptized as a believer is once for all.
Communion is practised together as a church, whereas individuals are baptized.
Of the two signs; baptism and communion, communion has particular significance for the church. It is a corporate act, and it has features concerning our relationships that require it to be a corporate action.
'In the last day, that great [day] of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirsteth, let him come to me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water. (But this he spoke of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Spirit was not yet [given]; because Jesus was not yet glorified.)' [AV] John 7 v 37 - 39 (Note: 'let him come to me, and drink.' is written as the Greek present continuous tense. It might be rendered better, 'let him keep coming to me, and let him keep drinking.')
John's comment about the reception of the Holy Spirit is most helpful to understand this saying of Jesus. John was referring to the wonder of God's presence within the souls of all those that believe in Jesus that was to happen later, after Jesus had been raised from the dead and glorified with God the Father in heaven. Most of the writers of the New Testament expend large quantities of ink to proclaim this mystery to the people of God. I have gone into this mystery in much greater detail in another book entitled, 'The Mystery of Man.' I will mention these things here briefly and without proof; the reader is invited to find the proofs of these things in the separate volume referred to. The Divine Presence had previously resided only between the outstretched wings of the cherubim in one place on earth, the innermost sanctuary of the temple in Jerusalem. John refers to the new glory of God's presence that dwells within our souls by His Spirit, as the Presence that makes us His temple today as believers in Jesus. That Christ's followers are the new temple or sanctuary of God's presence is the key to understanding Jesus' saying above. In the Old Testament we have a clear reference to streams of water flowing out from the sanctuary of God's Presence in the book of Ezekiel ..
"Afterward he brought me again to the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the front of the house [stood toward] the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south [side] of the altar. Then he brought me out of the way of the gate northward, and led me about the way outside to the outer gate by the way that looketh eastward; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side. And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters [were] to the ankles. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the waters; the waters [were] to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through; the waters [were] to the loins. Afterward he measured a thousand; [and it was] a river that I could not pass over: for the waters had risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over. And he said to me, Son of man, hast thou seen [this]? Then he brought me, and caused me to return to the brink of the river. Now when I had returned, behold, at the bank of the river [were] very many trees on the one side and on the other. Then said he to me, These waters issue out toward the east country, and go down into the desert, and go into the sea: [which being] brought forth into the sea, the waters shall be healed. And it shall come to pass, [that] every thing that liveth, which moveth, wherever the rivers shall come, shall live: and there shall be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters shall come there: for they shall be healed; and every thing shall live where the river cometh. {rivers: Heb. two rivers} And it shall come to pass, [that] the fishermen shall stand upon it from Engedi even to Eneglaim; they shall be a [place] to spread forth nets; their fish shall be according to their kinds, as the fish of the great sea, very many. But its miry places and its marshes shall not be healed; they shall be given to salt. And by the river upon its bank, on this side and on that side, shall grow all trees for food, whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall its fruit be consumed: it shall bring forth new fruit according to its months, because their waters they issued out of the sanctuary: and its fruit shall be for food, and its leaf for medicine." [AV] Ezekiel 47 v 1 - 12
The passage above, quoted from Ezekiel is a long one, however notice several key points that coincide with Jesus' words.
The waters in the Ezekiel passage flow out from the sanctuary, and Jesus was saying that in the same way, streams of living waters would flow out from within those who believed in Him who would receive the Holy Spirit. Significantly, the flow starts from under the altar demonstrating how God's love would be poured out through sacrifice, the sacrifice of God's own Son, Jesus, for our sins.
The original Hebrew language words in the Ezekiel passage, (v 9) say two rivers, not just one. The plural agreeing with the plural 'streams' mentioned by Jesus.
The waters of Ezekiel are 'living waters,' just like the waters referred to by Jesus. Everywhere the waters go there is everlasting life, healing, (v 12) and the waters themselves team with abundant life, (v 9).
Concerning the timing of Jesus' proclamation. Jesus spoke these words on the last day of the feast of tabernacles. During the feast of tabernacles, the Israelites built small tabernacles or booths as temporary dwellings for themselves to remember that they once lived a transient, nomadic lifestyle during their wanderings in the wilderness of Sinai and that God's Presence travelled with them. God's Presence went before them and dwelt with them in a tent where He would speak to His servant Moses. Jesus was making a proclamation about a fulfillment of this festival, when God's Spirit would dwell within His people and go wherever they went, pouring His own life out through them to the world.
For these reasons, it seems to me, that during His proclamation at the end of the feast of tabernacles, Jesus was referring to Ezekiel's prophetic vision as well as other scriptures in the same book, (see for example Ezekiel 36 v 26 - 27). It is also mentioned in the margin of the Jerusalem bible against John 7 v 37 that this Ezekiel passage was read by the Jews during the feast of tabernacles, the exact time that Jesus delivered this teaching. We can therefore use the vision that Ezekiel saw, to help us to understand Jesus' words, (and vice versa). Jesus was referring to God's Spirit pouring into and out of, all those who believe in Him.
It is time to draw together some threads in this section. We saw that God is love and everything he does is motivated by love and all those who are indwelt by God, have God's love pouring into their inmost being from His Presence. Love is like a river, it must flow to exist and the more flow there is, the more love there is. We listened to Jesus' commands about loving one another and we saw that the kind of love He was talking about comes only from God. Then we listened to Jesus words at the feast of tabernacles where He spoke about us coming back to Him repeatedly for more of God's Spirit and of living water welling up from within. This living water that brings healing and life wherever it goes is partly the love of God shown forth in good works, worked through faith.
A local church will live or die depending on whether the love of God is being expressed through voluntary deeds motivated by love. Love is the essential link between our faith and our deeds, because 'faith works through love,' (from Galatians 5 v 6). Love is the sweet perfume that turns a sterile faith and dead works into fragrant and acceptable living sacrifices to Jesus Christ, (see all of Romans 12).
How do we affect the flow of God's love in our lives? God's love links our faith to our deeds, but we can hinder or stop God's love flowing if we will. This is why Jesus commanded us to love one another, (John 15 v 13 - 14) and why we must be willing to show God's love. We can also stop the flow through neglect. We can neglect to come back to Jesus for more and more of His Spirit. If we do not continually receive more of the Spirit, we cannot have the love of God, because God's love is shed abroad into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, (from Romans 5 v 5). In short, we must humbly and continually ask Jesus for more of His Spirit and willingly give away the love that His Spirit brings to our hearts.
Could the lack of God's love in some churches be explained either by;
A refusal to accept the ministry of the Holy Spirit, (Romans 5 v 5)?
Or, making spiritual gifts the desired goal rather than love, (reversing Paul's saying in 1 Corinthians 14 v 1)?
If so, then it is time to think again and bring our thinking into line with God's word. Lovelessness is the saddest and most distressing thing to encounter in any local church. Lovelessness is a certain sign of an individual who remains spiritually dead, (1 John 3 v 14). And if a local church should commit spiritual suicide by forsaking the love of Christ, Christ will Personally close it down, (Revelation 2 v 4 - 5).
What is a chapter about forgiveness doing in a book about the church? I can almost hear this question being asked as I write. We sometimes reveal a great deal about our thinking by the questions we ask! Well, I have three reasons for including a chapter on forgiveness in a book about the Church; forgiveness impacts our salvation, the quality of our community life and our spiritual power.
The huge trading deficit of forgiveness in our churches is a life threatening issue facing us today. I say 'trade deficit' because on the one hand we are expecting God to forgive huge amounts of our own debt of sin whilst on the other hand we forgive hardly anyone's debt who sins against ourselves. We cover up this deficit by imagining two kinds of forgiveness which we keep artificially and conveniently separate in our minds; let me call them 'vertical forgiveness' and 'horizontal forgiveness'. Vertical forgiveness is the forgiveness we expect from God for our sins. Horizontal forgiveness is forgiving another people, (not only other Christians). We separate the two kinds of forgiveness in our thinking as follows: Vertical forgiveness is a matter of our creed - we believe that Jesus died for our sins and therefore we believe our sins are forgiven. Horizontal forgiveness is a practical matter - we show by our attitude, our words and our deeds and even by our body language, whether or not we have forgiven someone else. Most importantly we fail to realize that Jesus has linked vertical and horizontal forgiveness, our failure to forgive others will jeopardize our own forgiveness from God. This is the first reason why I have included a chapter on forgiveness in a book about the Church - unless we learn to forgive each other, we will not be forgiven by God.
Now, let me explore some scriptures with you that show how God offers us only one kind of forgiveness - a forgiveness conditional on our forgiveness of the sins and debts of other people. To start with some famous words of Jesus, familiar to many, from the Lord's prayer:
"Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors." [NIV] Matthew 6 v 12
Could this be just a coincidence? Did he really mean it? Does God forgive us as we are prepared to forgive others? Is our own forgiveness really conditional on our forgiveness of others? Just afterwards in the same speech, Jesus spells out the conditional nature of our forgiveness by God in the clearest possible terms, He says:
"For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins." [NIV] Matthew 6 v 14 - 15
And again He says it a third time in the same speech, this time explaining conditional forgiveness a little more:
"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way as you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. ... " [NIV] Excerpt from Matthew 7 v 1 - 5
Now, how many of us expect to survive if we are judged by God in the same way as we judge other people and against the same moral standards as we use to judge other people? For me personally, this realization about the conditional nature of forgiveness is a grave matter and I share it with humility acknowledging my past failures to forgive. Nevertheless, the gospel that Jesus gave us is very clear; we are to judge ourselves and therefore refrain from judging others. Because, if we will judge ourselves fairly we will understand why we have no right to judge others.
I think it would be helpful to look a little deeper into the teaching of Jesus about forgiving others. Jesus taught about forgiveness directly as we have just explored. He also taught about forgiveness in His parables and also through His actions. We will now take a look at these graphic and narrative media to learn more about Jesus' teaching on forgiveness.
Firstly, Jesus elaborated further about forgiveness in two of His parables;
The parable of the unforgiving slave, Matthew 18 v 21 - 35
The dishonest steward, Luke 16 v 1 - 8
These two parables look at forgiving others from two angles. The first of looks at the consequences of unforgiveness and conversely, the second looks at the result of a forgiving attitude.
Jesus gave the parable of the unforgiving slave as an answer to a question from His disciple Peter. Peter asked Jesus how many times he was to forgive his brother - would it be OK to forgive up to seven times? Considering that Peter might have expected a pat on the head for suggesting seven acts of forgiveness, he must have been surprised at how aggressive Jesus' answer was! Using this parable, Jesus showed Peter the enormity of his personal debt to God and how merciful and generous God was to forgive him his debt. The parable shows the generosity and mercy shown by a master who was moved by pity to forgive a huge debt owed to him by one of his slaves and the astonishing cruelty and lack of mercy of the same slave towards a fellow slave who owed him a comparatively small sum of money. The master says at one point, "Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, even as I had mercy on you?" The master then gets very angry and hands the unforgiving slave over to the torturers, much worse still, the master restores the huge debt he previously forgave and demands full payment from the unforgiving slave. Jesus concludes that God will do the same to us unless we forgive our brothers from our hearts. Thus Jesus repeats his earlier warning that our forgiveness from God will be taken away if we will not forgive those who have offended us. Thus God's complete forgiveness of our sins based on our repentance and faith in Christ is provisional - Jesus warns us that God can and will reconsider our forgiveness if we refuse to forgive the offences done to us by other people.
The parable of the dishonest steward is one of Jesus' parables that can be very difficult to understand because the steward's master seems to commend the steward for dishonest behaviour, despite this, Jesus puts forward the steward's behaviour as a role model for his followers! (Luke 16 v 8). The key to understanding this parable is to realize that the unrighteous steward had been given authority by his master to reduce debts that other people owed his master. In just the same way, morally imperfect Christians like you and me have been given authority by God to forgive other people's sins, (John 20 v 21 - 23). Now, if we choose to use our authority to forgive other people, reducing their debt to God, Jesus says that God will commend us for acting prudently, (Luke 16 v 8). Why is it prudent for us to forgive others? Jesus gives us two reasons from this parable, one negative, to avoid trouble for ourselves and the other positive, so that we can enjoy more of God's blessing;
There is a saying - "those who live in glass houses should not throw stones," and this is the first reason why it is prudent for us to forgive. Like the slave in the parable, we are imperfect ourselves, (Luke 16 v 1 - 2). We saw from the parable of the unforgiving slave (above) that our forgiveness will be removed and we may face condemnation for our sins if we refuse to forgive others who have offended us.
The second reason to forgive others is so that we can enjoy the company and hospitality of other people who are also indebted to our Master, (Luke 16 v 4) - this is the community aspect of forgiveness.
If we will take hold of Jesus' emphatic teaching about the conditional nature of our forgiveness, I am convinced it will change our entire outlook as His followers. Much of modern Christianity emphasises personal salvation and de-emphasises the importance of living in community with other Christians. Sometimes the modern Christian community is shattered completely by sectarianism. A realisation that our personal forgiveness, and therefore our personal salvation depends on our forgiving each other, forbearing each other and showing mercy to each other should redress this imbalance. It will ensure that we give a much higher priority to community, because forgiving others is also about community - as we will explore presently.
Notice that we have established a new moral imperative from Jesus' teaching. The old moral imperative practised by the Jews in those days was to judge others against the law of Moses. Jesus introduced a new moral imperative to forgive other people. Next we shall see how Jesus put this teaching about the moral imperative to forgive others into practice to save the life of a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery, (John 8 v 2 - 11). This situation was conceived by the Jewish leaders as a trap for Jesus - and it was a very clever trap indeed. The Jewish leaders thought that Jesus' teaching was departing from the law of Moses and they wanted to draw attention to this, and thereby to discredit Him, (see John 8 v 6). The law of Moses is quite clear about the death penalty for adultery, (Leviticus 20 v 10). Jesus acknowledged that adultery is a sin, (see John 8 v 11), however He decided to ask the crowd of people holding stones and ready to kill her a question. John records that Jesus wrote on the ground in the dust, probably a few verses from scripture for the people to read; then He challenged them directly about their fitness and willingness to condemn the woman to death. After writing the words in the dust, Jesus asked them this question; "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her;" (see John 8 v 7). The words that Jesus wrote on the ground, whatever they were, convinced the people that everyone who sins deserves to die. So, if they condemned the woman and killed her, they could expect only the same from God, because they had all sinned by breaking the Law of Moses themselves, [4]. Once they realized their situation, those who had intended to kill the woman withdrew - they decided to forgive her. Jesus then talks with the woman directly assuring her that He also would not condemn her and commanded her to repent, (see John 8 v 11). In this way, Jesus turned a clever trap into a lesson on why we should forgive others. Notice that Jesus does not defy Moses' law, He merely questions our fitness to administer the law of Moses and introduces mercy and forgiveness as a prudent alternative response to sin. [The conclusion I have just drawn from this passage has direct bearing upon the political issue of the death penalty - whether or not it is right or not to execute criminals for serious crimes.]
Before leaving this chapter, I would like to deal with some concerns that you might have concerning Jesus' teaching about forgiveness.
Firstly it is important to realize the magnitude of our personal debt before God. The greatness of our debt can be seen as Jesus was crucified to take away our sins. That is what it took to remove the debt we owe to God. It also shows us how much God loves us and how determined He is to forgive us when we ask Him to.
Secondly, our own forgiveness is a specific act of mercy by God - we cannot earn our forgiveness. Nor can we deduce that we are forgiven based solely upon scripture, because the forgiveness of our sins is an act of God towards us personally. Another way of saying this, is that we are not entitled to forgiveness. Also, there is nothing we can do or say to become automatically entitled to God's forgiveness. Otherwise, God would be obliged to forgive us and our forgiveness would not be an act of God's mercy or grace. God loves us, God does forgive, but He is not obliged to forgive anyone.
Thirdly, if God has forgiven you, He has really forgiven you. What Jesus' teaching means is that we are to demonstrate God's grace by being more forgiving and less judgmental towards others. Conversely, Jesus warns us that God will review His gracious forgiveness if we continually punish, judge or humiliate others when they sin. Ultimately Jesus wants us to become like Him, prepared to pay a price to forgive others!
In practice, whether we forgive others decides our eternal fate indirectly. Let me explain. There is a fellowship relationship that we can enjoy with Jesus. This relationship is enabled when we believe in Jesus, however, it can be interrupted and re-established depending on circumstances, (John 15 v 4). When we forgive others, we fulfil an important condition for fellowship with God, (1 John 1 v 6 - 7). However, God has no lasting fellowship with those who will not forgive others, (Matthew 5 v 23 - 24). If we have no fellowship with Jesus over our lifetimes, then Jesus does not know us. If Jesus never knew us, we cannot be saved, (Matthew 7 v 22 - 23).
What I mean is this: Unforgiveness of others simultaneously breaks both our joyful fellowship relationship with God and our relationships with others. If we forgive others, both our relationship with Jesus and our relationships with others can be restored simultaneously. The two relationships, between ourselves and God and between ourselves and others are spiritually linked, (John 15 v 8 - 12, 1 John 1 v 7). Fellowship with God happens when we confess our sins to Him and are forgiven by Him. Fellowship with others happens when we forgive others. The spiritual links between the two relationships are:
that our fellowship with Jesus will be interrupted, if we will not forgive others and
we cannot be fruitful as Jesus intends us to be, unless we love each other.
Fellowship with God and fellowship with each other are therefore two sides of the same coin. This means that the quality of our relationships with each other is a measure of the relationship we have with God and vice versa. How does our fellowship with God shape up when measured by the quality of our fellowship with each other?
Many people are taught that sin breaks our relationship with God and with other people and this is true. What we have now discovered is another similar dynamic that breaks our relationship with God and with other people. This makes our Christian fellowship doubly fragile. There is clearly a link between these two relationship-busting dynamics - if we sin against others the entire complex of community relationships and relationships with God can be devastated. The critical factor is that the original offender cannot put matters right entirely on their own, being sorry is necessary, but insufficient. There also has to be a willingness to forgive from all parties, (including God) before broken relationships can be healed and Christian fellowship thereby re-established.
So now we have started to explore the community impact of forgiveness.
There is a second reason for including a chapter on forgiveness in a book about the Church. If we will forgive each other - there is a great deal of God's blessing in store for us within our families and as communities of believers, for:
"How good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity! It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard, running down on Aaron's beard, down upon the collar of his robes. It as if the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion. For there the Lord bestows his blessing, even life for ever more." [NIV] Psalm 133
Firstly, unity is pleasant! Secondly unity is refreshing, and thirdly unity is the way of eternal life! So how does forgiveness bring unity, how might it work? If we were to recognize that forgiveness must be 'horizontal' before it can be 'vertical', then I believe that God's forgiveness has enough built-in power to transform the quality of community life in our churches and to bless the lives of families also. I have illustrated a chain reaction started by the practice of forgiveness in a diagram, see below.
At the head of this chain reaction is forgiveness - not God forgiving us, but our forgiveness of others. In other words, it is up to us whether we forgive others, this is something we can do when we realize how much God has forgiven us personally. The arrows show the possible knock-on effects of forgiveness, for example, as it could operate within a church or within a family. In the quotation from John, (John 20 v 21 - 23) Jesus gives us authority to forgive one another through personal gift of the Holy Spirit. One might even say that a willingness to forgive others is evidence that we have the Holy Spirit in our inner being, because mercy and a willingness to forgive are two of our Father's characteristics - Luke 7 v 35 - 36. Conversely we can see that a grudge keeper does not have the Holy Spirit in their inner being. As John confirms for us:
"Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. ..." [NIV] Excerpt from 1 John 2 v 9 - 11
This conclusion is also very close to some other things John says in his first letter, (1 John 4 v 7 - 21) from which I have plucked a few more bright gems:
" ... We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. ... God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. ... If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. ... " [NIV] Excerpts from 1 John 4 v 7 - 21
In the diagram I have mentioned that forgiving one another removes the 'threat of exclusion'. What I mean is that we can decide either to forgive others in the church who offend us or we can decide to throw them out of the church. Just so, choosing to forgive removes the threat of exclusion. I would like to digress briefly to consider whether the scripture supports the basic idea of excluding anyone permanently from a Church. Since if the scripture supports permanent exclusion, (surely a demonstration of unforgiveness) my arguments about the importance of forgiving others are wrong and vice versa.
As far as I know, there is only one example of exclusion given in the New Testament. I would now like to look at this example in some detail - to see if it can tell us anything about the community impact of forgiveness and unforgiveness. Two scriptures concern this example of someone being excluded from a church; 1 Corinthians 5 v 1 - 13 and 2 Corinthians 2 v 5 - 11. In the first scripture, Paul gives some general teaching about excluding believers who are living immoral lives, judged using the law of Moses, which he quotes at the end of the first passage. In the second scripture, written afterward about the same moral crisis and the same person, Paul gives some general teaching about the other option we have as communities - to forgive. In my opinion these two passages should always be considered together! Let's now take a closer look at both of them.
We have a moral crisis affecting the whole church at Corinth - a believing man is sleeping with his mother! (1 Corinthians 5 v 1). Initially, Paul takes the judgment option in response to this crisis - recommending that they expel the man from their fellowship, (v 2). Moreover, Paul recommends that they:
" ... hand this man over to Satan, so that his body may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord." [NIV & NIV margin] 1 Corinthians 5 v 5
This is a remarkable scripture. Despite his sin, Paul affirms that this man will be saved at last. What Paul says about the man's body hinges upon his understanding of the make-up of everyone who believes in Jesus - that we have an outer nature that is wasting away and which will ultimately be replaced and an inner nature that is being renewed after the image of our creator, (2 Corinthians 5 v 1- 5, Colossians 3 v 10 and see a more detailed explanation of this in the 'Mystery of Man' book, [2]). He sees Satan as the agent of physical death and that handing the man over to Satan will lead to his physical death without causing any harm to his inner nature.
It is most instructive to compare this scripture with Paul's later statements in 2 Corinthians after, (by Paul's own admission) he has had time to reflect and to calm down, (2 Corinthians 2 v 4 - 11). See how meek Paul is in this second passage, it reads almost as an apology! He asks the Corinthian church to reaffirm their love for the man they excluded and to forgive him, (vv 8 - 11). Paul says he also wants to forgive the man.
To my knowledge these passages in first and second Corinthians are the only references to an exclusion in the New Testament, and even in these, we have clear evidence that it was an emotional reaction by Paul that he later retracted. Having faced an incident that (at first sight) might have blown forgiveness out of the water, we are now we are getting round to the idea that permanent exclusion is not supported by scripture. Now we are ready to review something Jesus said with more receptive hearts:
"All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day." [NIV] John 6 v 37 - 40
This is Christ's teaching on exclusion and Jesus says that he will never drive anyone away who comes to Him. Now, if the will of the Father is that all who believe in Jesus should not be lost, what basis do we have for excluding anyone who has come to Christ? If Jesus will never drive them away - what gives us as forgiven sinners the right to do so? If we, like Jesus, want to do the will of our Father, we clearly have no right or basis to exclude people who come to Jesus. On the contrary, we are to persevere and help those who fail morally to be reconciled to others and to God. Paul's opinion was the same, as he explains so well in Romans 8 v 33 - 34:
"Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died - more than that, who was raised to life - is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us." [NIV] Romans 8 v 33 - 34
Jesus also teaches on the subjects of discipline and exclusion in Matthew 18 in the same context as the parable of the unforgiving slave and the parable of the lost sheep. We have already discussed the importance of forgiving others from the parable of the unforgiving slave. So, if we will read Matthew 18 bearing in mind that God wants us to forgive each other, a number of truths come into focus:
The purpose of rebuking each other is to restore each other, not to exclude each other. This is peacemaking through gentle confrontation as I have discussed elsewhere, (compare Matthew 5 v 9). By helping our brothers we show ourselves to be children of God. If we exclude our brothers, we only assist the Devil, (2 Corinthians 2 v 10 - 11).
Whatever rule we apply to others will be applied to ourselves later in heaven, (from 'whatever you bind on earth ...' etc.). Compare John 20 v 21 - 23 which is also Christ's teaching about forgiving others.
We really must adjust our thinking in line with the Father's thinking on this exclusion issue. We see in Jesus, the Father's loving and merciful heart for truly lost people, the socially excluded, those considered as moral failures by most people. In fact, the Father is more concerned for those who fail than for many more 'righteous persons' who have no need of repentance, (Luke 15 v 7).
Having established that permanently excluding people from church violates the Father's will and disregards our obligation to forgive others we will now explore certain organizational impacts of forgiving others.
Today's Christianity thinks of itself as a religion with rule books and command hierarchies and other trappings that are necessary for any religion. The rules and the hierarchies vary from sect to sect; nevertheless the different Christian religious movements all have them. In these settings, the moral imperative for the hierarchy is to enforce the rules to prevent moral chaos. A shift in our attitude is called for, based on Jesus' teaching about provisional forgiveness. Otherwise leaders who enforce the rules on others will face God's just punishment for their own sins. The new moral imperative is to forgive breaches of the rules, whatever rules exist in a particular setting. This does not mean that the rules disappear, but that they will be replaced by God's rules, enforced not by leaders but by God. For if we believe the truth about the enormity of the debt that God has forgiven us personally, and therefore that only God is qualified to forgive us, so also God is the only Person who is qualified to enforce the rules on us and discipline us. In scripture, God reserves the right to enforce His law Himself or to forgive, (Exodus 34 v 5 - 7, John 15 v 2, Romans 12 v 19 - 21). To make this shift in our thinking we must be certain about a few things:
Our personal debt before God, that He forgave, was serious enough for Christ to die in order to buy our forgiveness.
We must keep the sins of others in proportion. Since the life of Christ was the price of our redemption, our debt to God that He forgave is greater than any debt of sin we could be owed by another person.
That it is moral for us to forgive faults in others. Our forgiveness by God does not mean that God approves of our wrongdoing. In the same way, when we forgive another person, it does not mean that we approve of their wrongdoing, just that we are a forgiven people ourselves and therefore appreciate the importance of forgiving others.
That God is qualified, willing and ready to discipline us individually about moral issues.
That we can therefore refrain from enforcing rules and forgive each other without causing moral chaos.
Love and forgiveness are closely linked, and when found together in someone's life they are a most powerful demonstration of a practical Christian faith. We know this is has to be so because love and forgiveness came together in Jesus suffering for our forgiveness on the cross.
Certainly we have explored two good reasons to forgive others, but there may be yet another reason for us to exercise our God-given authority to forgive others, (John 20 v 23). In one word - power. Jesus claimed to have God's authority to forgive sins and demonstrated that fact by healing the paralytic He had just forgiven, (Mark 2 v 1- 12). In this passage, Jesus teases us with an interesting question that He does not answer for us:
"Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Get up, take your mat and walk'?" [NIV] Mark 2 v 9
Perhaps if we use our authority and prerogative to forgive others their sins against us, God would similarly demonstrate the fact that He has given us the authority to forgive? So then, which will it be easier for us to do? Is it easier for us to forgive one another or is it easier for us to work mighty miracles? I mention this reason to forgive others only as a possibility without proof and invite you to find out the answer to Jesus' question for yourselves by experiment!
In summary, I suggest that we have at least four reasons to forgive others their sins against us:
We might want to retain God's forgiveness ourselves, have fellowship with Jesus and possess the gift of eternal life.
We might want pleasant and refreshing communities growing in our churches.
We might want to show our Father's loving mercy for the lost.
We might want to see more of God's power demonstrated in our lifetimes.
It can be said, that this is the issue for every church. Is God present when the people meet? The glory of any local church is not the architecture or the music or the fancy dress, it is the glory of God as He makes Himself and His grace and mercy known when we meet. This has always been true in one way or another. It was true for the first man and woman, (Genesis 3 v 24), it was true for Israel, (Exodus 33 v 7 - 23) and it is still true when we meet as churches in Jesus' name, (Matthew 18 v 20).
According to the scriptures there are two ways that God is present with us when we meet in Jesus' name as a church. The Holy Spirit dwells within all those who belong to Jesus and when we meet in His name, Jesus is also present amongst us. Let us now take a closer look at these two ways that God's presence manifests itself when we meet as a local church.
"Do you not know that your bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own, you were bought at a price." [NIV] 1 Corinthians 6 v 19 - 20a
This statement by Paul is probably the clearest and most emphatic in the New Testament declaring that the Holy Spirit dwells within those who belong to Jesus. In fact Paul strengthens his words about belonging even further in Romans 8, where he says;
"And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ." [NIV] Romans 8 v 9b
These two scriptures and many others, clearly state that those of us who belong in Jesus have the Holy Spirit within them. This means, as Paul says, that we are God's temple in exactly the same way that the temple in Jerusalem was once God's temple. We are, each one of us, God's tabernacle, His sanctuary. This does not mean that we are perfect, most certainly we are not. However, Jesus' blood atones for our sins, allowing the perfect One to dwell within, (again a parallel with the way the Jerusalem temple was purified by the blood of sacrifices). There are many other scriptures throughout the whole bible that reinforce these statements about God dwelling within those who belong to Jesus Christ, I have expounded many of these in another book entitled, 'The Mystery of Man,' to which the reader is referred for further proof of these claims.
Since the Holy Spirit dwells in each person who belongs to Jesus, our meetings are potentially overflowing with spiritual life; However we often conduct our meetings in ways that conspire to prevent contributions from all but a few believers. This is a tragic waste of spiritual blessing for everyone involved! I believe several things have to happen together before this situation can change. Here are some examples of what I mean;
Leaders must actually lead rather than dominate. Those who claim to lead, must lead others to contribute and resist the temptation to monopolise church meetings, visitation, acts of practical help and so on, themselves. Leaders are people who give a good example of participation that others want to follow; collectively, everyone else does most of the work! This is a mutual assistance exercise, since Jesus ensures interdependence by granting us gifts necessary to help others, whilst our own needs can only be met through the gifts He gives to others, (1 Corinthians 12 v 7). Thus, a leader who tries to monopolize church ministry prevents the needs of others being met and prevents his or her own needs from being met. Neither the congregation nor the leadership can be blessed in such situations.
As individuals, we must realize that there are many others within the church who need our contribution. Christ's love presses us to pray and work so that we can make an effective contribution for the common good. As individuals we must resist the temptation to leave the work to others. If we claim to follow Christ, but refuse to show His love in practical ways, how can our claim to follow Him be genuine? 'Faith works through love.' (Galatians 5 v However, since faith works through love it is wrong to manipulate or push or force people to contribute. Participation must be voluntary. We can encourage and teach and show an example, but no kind of force should ever be used.
Our expectations have to change. The majority should be prepared to contribute and be confident that they will be given space and authority to do so. These three factors are essential together. Here I am not just speaking about church meetings, I am also talking about community action, youth work, assisting people in various kinds of trouble, both believers and non-believers. Assisting other churches, providing hospitality. In most cases, there is no need for co-ordination of these activities, individuals and groups must be allowed to start and retain ownership of their own ministries. The role of leadership is to provide practical support, encouragement and to facilitate the participation of others.
Changes of this kind are not instant, but they might start to happen if we are willing to follow the example and the leadership that Jesus gives us. The list of suggestions above is worth illustrating with a fictional example because it is not at first obvious how it might work in practice.
Let us make some fairly pessimistic assumptions. Let the local church have a congregation of only 40 people. Say there are only 10%, four people, who are established in the faith to a point where they could contribute by employing their spiritual gifts to meet the practical and spiritual needs of a further minority of 10 people in the congregation who are not yet able to participate for one reason or another. In other words the situation is far from adequate, only the needs of about 35% of the people can be met in the foreseeable future and the church is slowly declining, and has been for a number of years. Suddenly the leader is praying and God gives him one of the scriptures about the Holy Spirit indwelling those who believe in Jesus and he realizes that the stronger members might be able to contribute more actively. He decides to start encouraging the four stronger members to participate in various ways. He talks it over with them, and he is amazed by their positive response. One has been wanting to teach for a long time, and volunteers to teach one Sunday a month, the leader agrees to set aside one Sunday a month for that member to teach. The second has sometimes received a prophecy during a meeting, but there has never really been space in the rather traditional services for this kind of participation. The leader agrees to create a time at the beginning of the meeting where anyone can bring a prophecy, a word of knowledge or wisdom that they might have received during the week or there and then. This 'prophetic slot' will include a short time to allow for open discussion and questions about how such contributions might be interpreted. The third person has a young family and a desire to start a Christian youth group for their own children and for the children of others in the church. The leader agrees to use his contacts with the local schools to publicize this initiative and to organize some help from himself and some of the other members and their children to redecorate the church hall and convert it for use by the new youth group. The fourth person had been praying for the church with a few of the others, opening their own home one evening a week to get together for fellowship, prayer and encouragement. The five of them discuss how this mid week prayer meeting could be developed; whilst continuing to pray, inviting the others in the church along to encourage them and nurture a few more people on the periphery of church life. They decide to open the mid week meeting up since the forth person is eager to make their large home available for the purpose of helping others in the church. The leader agrees to publicize the new meeting and to encourage folk to come along to the mid week meeting during the announcements on Sundays.
This is a fictional example of course. In practice the four would have problems of various kinds because they were not used to being more involved in the running of the church, (up to that time in our example, all of it was being done by the one leader). The four would need encouragement and practical support from each other and from the leader over a long period of time. Practical support is very important to prevent those who are now working harder from becoming weary. Practical support might involve covering for people to allow them to go on a holiday and arranging regular sabbatical periods when those who are working can rest, and possibly develop their gifts in a different direction. Later on, these 'sabbaticals' can be converted into opportunities to involve people who are eager to serve and whose spiritual progress fits them to participate more. Everything should be done, (including delaying the start of a ministry until support is available or discontinuation of a ministry) to prevent people from becoming worn out or feeling trapped in one particular role. It is very important to care for the welfare of those who serve in this way so that others are not discouraged from helping.
Another truth we often miss, is that Jesus has promised to join us when we meet in His name. During some teaching about the church, Jesus once declared;
"For where two or three are assembled in my name, there am I in the midst of them." [AV] Matthew 18 v 20
I believe that Jesus means that He is present amongst us in addition to being within us when we meet in His name, (see also Revelation 1 v 12 - 20). The literal meaning of this saying is further reinforced by a brief excerpt from Paul's first letter to the Corinthians;
"When you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit, and the power of the Lord Jesus is present, ..." [NIV] 1 Corinthians 5 v 4
These scriptures indicate that Jesus comes and joins with us, whenever we meet in His name. But in what way does Jesus join with us? I would like to suggest that Jesus Christ enters our meetings in humility, observing His own command in Luke 14 v 7 ff. In this passage, Jesus tells a parable during a dinner where all the invited guests jostled with each other for the best position at the table, trying to assert their own importance at the gathering. I believe Jesus spoke to me by the Holy Spirit once, and said to me that when we come together as His followers, He also comes; but always He finds the lowliest place in our meeting and He waits there. He waits to see whether we too will jostle with one another for the best positions, or invite Him to take the place of highest honour in our gatherings. I will let you judge for yourself whether this suggestion is correct, however I believe that it would be very much like Him to do this, (see Philippians 2 v 5 - 8). Jesus is meek, He never forces His presence on us individually and He never forces His presence to the fore when we meet. He takes the lowest place so that we have the opportunity to glorify Him by denying our own importance and giving Him the place of highest honour. If we will deliberately humble ourselves and put Jesus in the first and best places in our churches rather than ourselves, we will make Jesus the head of our church gatherings and He will exalt us. For, '.. whoever humbles himself, will be exalted,' (Matthew 23 v 12)
We have established two scriptural ideas about church - one which is spiritual and heavenly, ruled over by Christ and another which is locally organized. Let us review the passages in the scripture that speak about leaders in the local church situation to establish what the scriptures actually teach about the status and functions of Christian leaders. In my experience, this is a particular area of doctrine where it has been convenient for some to go beyond what is actually written in scripture so as to artificially strengthen the status and authority of leaders. This would be bad enough, however worse still, most English translations of the scripture may contain subtle changes and additional words which have been added for the same purpose. These may be intended to provide additional (but bogus) authority to Christian leaders. In the first part of this chapter it is therefore necessary to tear away this artificial doctrine and to remove the cultural debris of centuries. Hopefully, this will clear the ground well enough so that we can take a fresh look at what the scriptures actually say about Christian leadership. One of the challenges of the demolition work that follows is that most modern translations preserve significant amounts of non-scriptural material added in translation in order to make the English text more acceptable to the cultures of their day and to preserve the authority status quo within today's churches. For this reason there is occasionally the need to delve into the original Greek text to recover lost original meanings.
I believe the first two texts analyzed here have suffered significantly in translation. A further text shows some evidence of more ancient tampering with the word of God concerning Christian leadership. These texts are:
Hebrews 13 v 17
1 Timothy 5 v 17 - 21
1 Peter 5 v 1 - 4
In view of the importance of these passages, I will now examine each one of them in some detail.
One text that seems to present a serious problem for the otherwise, non-authoritarian leadership message found in the New Testament is Hebrews 13 v 17. I seriously doubt the translation of this verse in all of the following English versions, [see 5, 6]; AV, KJV, AB, Rheimes, NASB, NAB, NIV, RSV, NRSV, Jerusalem Bible. I have managed to find only one version which supports my view, a recent English translation called 'The Message' [7]. This version is also quoted below for comparison. There follows the AV translation, then the version recorded in [7] and finally my own attempt at an alternative reconstruction from the Greek text for comparison.
"Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that [is] unprofitable for you. " [AV] Hebrews 13 v 17 "Be responsive to your pastoral leaders. Listen to their counsel. They are alert to the condition of your lives and work under the strict supervision of God. Contribute to the joy of their leadership, not its drudgery. Why should you want to make things harder for them?" [THE MESSAGE] Hebrews 13 v 17 "Have every confidence in your leaders and be submissive towards them: for they keep watch over your souls as men who will give a reasoned account [from Gk logos] of their views. That they might do this with joy and not with grief, for that would be of no benefit to you." [Author's alternative rendering] Hebrews 13 v 7
It will immediately be seen that there are three significant differences between my rendering and the AV:
The command to obey is missing, (the Greek word peitho does not usually mean obey, see [1] and my explanation below).
There is no mention of rulers or authority, (in Anglo-Saxon culture, leaders rule and have authority and these cultural associations are reflected in English versions like the AV; the Greek text only talks about those who lead).
Giving account in the sense of the Judgment is modified to explaining reasons to those taught, (this is another meaning of logon apodosontes in the Greek which, in my opinion, fits the immediate context better). Thus, the ambiguity of the original text may mean that leaders must give account of themselves to God, or it may mean that they are capable of giving reasons for the views they hold to others.
The first word, usually translated 'obey' is not the usual word for 'obey' in the original Greek. The Greek word peitho is used in the imperative in Hebrews 13 v 17 which is quite different to the usual Greek words used to convey obedience:
where there is a choice to obey or to disobey, the Greek word hupakouo is used,
to convey the idea of obligatory hierarchical obedience where force is sometimes used to ensure obedience, the Greek word hupotasso is used.
For an example of the use of hupakouo see Colossians 3 v 20 & 22 and of hupotasso in connection with obeying the governing authorities, see Romans 13 v 1. To contrast the meanings of hupakouo and the word peitho we can take a look at a passage where both words are contrasted together. The word peitho used in Hebrews 13 v 17 appears in exactly the same context with the usual Greek word meaning 'obey', hupakouo in Philemon 1 v 21. This passage can greatly help us to understand the meaning of peitho. In this quotation from Paul's letter to Philemon, Paul expresses his confidence, (peitho) in Philemon that he will obey, (hupakouo). The peitho word, therefore carries the ideas of confidence, trust and consent rather than any obligation to obey in either the hierarchical or moral senses. This conclusion is shared by Vines, [1]; See under 'obey' in his useful dictionary. Therefore, it is best not to translate the word used in the Hebrews 13 v 17 using the English word 'obey'. It would be better to translate it something like 'have every confidence in' or 'trust'. Our revised understanding of the first word in this verse is supported also by the context, because it is clear from the rest of the verse that no obligation is present since only advantages and disadvantages are the possible outcomes mentioned. Therefore, let us assume then that we can take the 'leadership through service' teaching as underlying this verse; if we do, does the verse still make sense? Yes, it does; in fact it makes more sense. It exhorts us to have confidence in 'those who are serving us more than most' and who are happy to give us the reasons for their views. The verse warns us not to grieve those who lead by serving us, we should not be unreasonable or disregard their views because this would only be harmful to ourselves. This is good practical advice, similar to the modern English saying, 'do not bite the hand that feeds'.
These then are my reasons for translating this verse the way I have shown above. I will leave it to the reader to confirm the truth of what I am saying.
Having restored what I believe to be something closer to the original text of Hebrews 13 v 17, it is instructive to unpack what this verse may be saying to us:
Notice that one way of reading Hebrews 13 v 17 is that a leader has an obligation to others - leaders must be prepared to give a reasoned account of their views. This idea fits with the idea of having confidence in leaders, since those who are able to explain their views engender more confidence than leaders who rule by decree and consider themselves too important to explain themselves. Thus, the Hebrews 13 v 17 passage may say that leaders must be prepared to give a reasoned account to other believers for the views that they have. That leaders should be able to give a reasoned account for their views also has implications for the present. It means that leaders are subject to the word of Christ expressed in scripture like everyone else. It also means that to be a leader, necessitates much personal study and a deep understanding of the scriptures. This is why the scripture warns each of us to test everything we receive, (1 Thessalonians 5 v 21 - 22, 1 John 4 v 1), including things we receive from our leaders, (Matthew 7 v 15, Acts 20 v 29 - 31). Everything we receive must be tested against the word of Christ. Testing things means asking some reasonable questions and perhaps asking for some bible references and looking them up later. A quick look at the gospels will show that Jesus was frequently asked honest questions by His disciples and that Jesus did not despise such questions, but was happy to answer them without accusing anyone of unbelief or dissent. This pattern is also one that we should follow. What this means in practice is that all believers are responsible for their own conduct and beliefs; and we cannot excuse ourselves of this responsibility by the convenience of unquestioningly submitting to the views and wishes of our leaders. I think that one of the reasons authoritarian leaders are permitted to continue is the convenience of those they dominate. To some of these, it is a convenient delusion to think that they will be excused on the grounds that they were merely 'following orders.'
Next we take a look at another passage, this time from 1 Timothy which I believe has been altered significantly in English versions, (including the NIV, Jerusalem Bible and Rheims). Some versions are much closer to the original including the KJV, RSV, NASB though these versions still render the passage 'those who rule well' which does not capture the essence of the original very well. The NAB and especially the AB version, do however have text which seems much closer to the original for this verse. These two versions omit the word 'rule' and replace it with words or phrases more closely expressing the sense in the original text. Here for example, is one version which I believe has significant additional text inserted:
'The elders who [direct the affairs of the church well] are worthy of double honour, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching. For the Scripture says, "Do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain," and "The worker deserves his wages." Do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that the others may take warning. I charge you in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels, to keep these instructions without partiality, and to do nothing out of favouritism. ' [NIV] 1 Timothy 5 v 17 - 21.
The text I placed in square brackets does not reflect the original sense. The Greek text merely speaks about those who lead well. Adjusting the first sentence to conform more closely with the original we get, (and compare my reading to similar ones in the Amplified Bible and New American Bible, [5]):
'The elders who lead well are worthy of double honour, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching. For the Scripture says, "Do not muzzle the ox while it is treading out the grain," and "The worker deserves his wages." Do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that the others may take warning. I charge you in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels, to keep these instructions without partiality, and to do nothing out of favouritism. ' [Author's alternative rendering based on the NIV] 1 Timothy 5 v 17 - 21.
In this passage, Paul gives some instructions about elders who lead well. Notice the significant artificial embellishment of this passage in some translations. The original is very simple and lacks the complex interpretation, especially the bogus ideas about 'director' status sometimes conveyed. Again, the emphasis in this passage is really on the labour and useful service of those who lead, not on their status. Here also there are very clear instructions about confronting those elders who sin - clearly stating that they are accountable to the church. To balance this, notice also that the elders who sin are to be rebuked publicly - they are not necessarily obliged to leave the church or give up their service - the rebuke is enough, (see Galatians 2 v 11 ff. where Paul rebuked Peter publicly!). The words that Paul uses to emphasize his instructions about leaders are very strong indeed. Paul's words about holding leaders to account are as strong as his charge to preach the gospel, (compare 2 Timothy 4 v 1 - 2). I am not so sure whether we give leader behaviour and evangelism the same weight in our churches, though perhaps we should if we recognize a necessary connection between proclaiming the truth and living it, (1 Timothy 3 v 7). The 1 Timothy 5 v 17 passage also (correctly) implies that dealing with bad leaders can be as difficult and dangerous as preaching the gospel!
The passage 1 Peter 5 v 1 - 5 includes important material reflecting on the roles of Christian leaders. This passage also contains some evidence of more ancient tampering with the Greek text of the New Testament aimed at artificially increasing the authority of Christian leaders. Extra Greek words are present in some witnesses of the original Greek text of verse 2 that are not found in other manuscript witnesses of the same original text. This suggests that some words were added to verse 2 in antiquity. The RSV translation preserves the probable original meaning of verse 2, placing the additional non-original material to do with the Greek word episcopi meaning' oversight' in the margin. The Greek word 'overseer' is usually translated as the word 'bishop' in English versions. Also, verse 5a seems very out of place in context. I have three reasons for doubting the originality of verse 5a, as follows:
The Greek verb of verse 5a is strong, it is hupotasso which is used to convey the idea of obligatory hierarchical obedience where force is sometimes used to ensure obedience. Therefore, verse 5 a says that the younger men are obliged to obey the older men as their hierarchical superiors. The verb implies the same kind of moral obligation to obey and consequences of disobedience as we associate with obeying the law of the land we live in. However, in the immediate context in verse 5b, Peter commands mutual humility and a little earlier in verse 3 Peter says that the older men must lead by serving and example and not require obedience in the hierarchical sense. Therefore, in my view, verse 5a contradicts both the essence and the letter of Peter's other statements in the same context.
Peter's own example is against the originality of verse 5a. Both the Apostles Peter and John did not practice verse 5a when faced with the Sanhedrin's judgement, see Acts 4 v 1 - 20. This means that Peter and John did not practice verse 5a in their dealings the combined religious and political leadership of their own nation, Israel.
Paul's example is against the originality of verse 5a. Two Apostles, Peter and Barnabas were also on the receiving end of a public rebuke from a younger man, the Apostle Paul. This confrontation is recorded in Galatians 2 v 11 - 21. This means that verse 5a was not practised by the Apostle Paul in his relationships with two other Apostles who were also older than Paul and men who believed in Christ before Paul did.
For these three reasons, I think the Greek text of 1 Peter 5 v 1 - 5 contradicts itself and conflicts with clear scriptural evidence showing how four leading Apostles, Peter, John, Barnabas and Paul conducted their relationships with each other and with the other religious leaders of their time.
All these things suggest (though I am not yet certain) that the original Greek text written by Peter did not contain the contradictions I have highlighted. The three observations I have listed above, suggest that words have been added to the original texts of verse 2 and verse 5 some time after Peter wrote them. Furthermore, these alleged modifications could be viewed as deliberate and systematic, because, taken together, they connect the ideas of hierarchical obedience with the role of an Overseer or Bishop. As such, these alleged modifications may have been made by powerful bishops in the late first century or second century AD who had a clear vested interest in providing an artificial moral basis for themselves and their power over the lives of other people. Even so, what I have presented is not proof, but rather, evidence that the Greek text of 1 Peter 5 v 1 - 5 has been tampered with. As usual, it is our individual responsibility to gather and weigh the evidence and to decide the matter for ourselves.
Later in this book, I have used the RSV rendering of this passage because at least this version signals some variations in the original Greek of verse 2. Regrettably, many other English versions, (including the NIV) incorporate the doubtful material in verse 2 without even a marginal note to warn readers. I have indicated my concerns about this passage in a special note where I have used it.
During the following review of scriptures relating to leaders, I will seek answers to certain questions which have particular bearing on the leadership issue, these are;
Precisely what is the status of Christian leaders relative to other believers?
Do leaders have authority, (the right to exercise power) solely because of their leadership position?
Do the scriptures command believers to obey their leaders without question?
Will Christ hold believers personally accountable if they sin through following the commands of a leader?
Can leaders legitimately be called to account by other believers?
What are the functions of Christian leadership?
What qualifies a believer to exercise a leadership role?
How should leaders be chosen and appointed?
Firstly then, the question of status relative to other believers, question 1. By status I mean whether leaders are any better or worse off than other believers from a spiritual point of view; Does God view leaders any differently to other believers?
"Not many of you should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. " [NIV] James 3 v 1
In this passage, James says that teachers will be judged more strictly than other believers - so that God views those who also teach differently to other believers. This is in agreement with some of Jesus' earlier teaching given in the context of service to Him;
"From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked." [NIV] Luke 12 v 48b
In connection with those who serve, Paul also said;
"Those who have served well gain an excellent standing and great assurance in their faith in Christ Jesus." [NIV] 1 Timothy 3 v 13
So it would seem to be clear, in terms of the relationship between Jesus and a servant of His, the relationship is stricter and also more trusting for those who serve, since those who serve well are considered trustworthy by the Lord. However, please note: All three of these scriptures speak not about leaders, but instead about those who serve - in fact there is no authoritarian leadership recognized anywhere in the New Testament. On the contrary, as we shall see, the authoritarian leadership we are used to, is specifically forbidden by Christ, (Matthew 23 v 8).
About our relationship with those who lead, Paul says;
"And we beseech you, brethren, to know them who labour among you, and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you; And to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake. [And] be at peace among yourselves." [AV] 1 Thessalonians 5 v 12 - 13
So that leaders are recognized because they work hard in the service of their fellow believers - this is how they can be recognized, (rather than by meaningless titles, robes, domineering behaviours, their position at the front and such like). Those who work hard and serve the believers in this way deserve our esteem. Conversely, those who control others and demand esteem or obedience deserve none of our attention.
Although the relationship between a leader and the Lord can be blessed if the leader serves faithfully, the leader is still the brother of other believers according to the word of the Lord to His twelve Apostles;
"But you are not to be called 'Rabbi', for you have only one Master and you are all brothers." [NIV] Matthew 23 v 8
So that in terms of spiritual status, the youngest who believes has the same status as the oldest who leads, because in God's eyes we are all brothers. Since we have one Master in Christ, there is no room for hierarchy in the kingdom of God. One Master removes the possibility of intermediaries, even the youngest who believes has only one Master, Jesus. In fact, Christ's claim that He is the 'one Master' implies that anyone who tries to be the master of other believers is committing idolatry - a truth that is made clearer in another place;
"For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, ... " [NIV] 1 Timothy 2 v 5
Paul's reference to the one God, refers of course to the first commandment, (Exodus 20 v 3), where God forbids the worship of any God before or besides Himself. The fact that many leaders do covet real power and control over the lives of believers does not mean that it is right. Answering the second question above, it very clearly is not so that leaders have divine authority because of their position. Jesus defined equally clearly what it really means to lead in the kingdom of God, and it has nothing to do with the exercise of power or control over other believers. On the contrary, He said;
"The greatest among you will be your servant. For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted." [NIV] Matthew 23 v 11 - 12
The tense in the first sentence is a simple future tense, it is not an imperative. This means it can be read as a promise rather than a command - those who do serve the most will be the greatest! As a promise, this sentence is a basis for exercising our faith. If we will serve, if we will humble ourselves, then we will be called great and we will be exalted by Christ. So that if you want to lead, you must really serve and serve faithfully without demanding obedience from others. Christ's teaching is reinforced by His own practical example of what it means to lead through serving:
'Jesus called them together and said, "You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." ' [NIV] Mark 10 v 42 - 45
Interestingly, Jesus starts by talking about perceptions. Those who are regarded as rulers. Political dictators, (however camouflaged they are) rely on how they are regarded in order to rule. They are always posturing themselves to frighten others into obeying their wishes. Dictators have authority given to them by people who are frightened of them. But in the churches, Jesus says; "Not so with you." We are not to seek or possess this kind of authority over others in the church. Neither are we to encourage this folly by being afraid of such people. Nor are we to tolerate their behaviour without rebuking them, firstly in private, then taking witnesses and if they will not listen, they must be publicly rebuked in front of the whole church, (Matthew 18 v 15 - 18). Such people cannot continue to rule if the people are not afraid of them!
Next, Jesus mentions high officials who rule using delegated authority. This amounts to a teaching of Christ against hierarchies of leadership, since hierarchies can only function where there is some kind of political dictator at the top generating the necessary fear-based authority that can be delegated to others lower in the hierarchy. In the absence of such authority and the fear that it is based upon, a hierarchy will break down because there is no reason for anyone to pay attention to higher 'officials'. "Not so with you," Says Jesus. God has called us to serve Him without fear, (Luke 1 v 73 - 75). He has scattered the proud and brought down rulers from their thrones, but He has lifted up the humble, (Luke 1 v 51 - 52). "Not so with you," means having a fearless attitude towards those in the churches who insist on ruling by fear. By submitting to the fear of such rulers in the churches we are perpetuating their stupidity and idolatry as much as they are themselves.
Jesus says; "Not so with you." This means that it is so with those outside the faith and for some inside the churches who do not know God, but, as Jesus said, it is not so with those who know God, who decide that they will put Christ's teaching into practice and are willing to pay a price for doing it. Instead, with us who know God and believe His promises, there is the attitude of a willing servant and the hard work of serving our brothers and sisters in Christ. We trust that Jesus will be faithful to His word to lift up the humble, and we place no confidence in the deceitfulness of worldly power.
Jesus nails all these teachings home with the power of His own life and death. If Jesus would not rule by fear, even though He clearly had the power to do so, then nor should we. If Jesus willingly became our slave, teaching us and giving away His life to ransom us from the hell fires we all deserve, then we also should serve and pay the price for our service to our fellow believers.
I have referred to a price for obedience. Let me explain. Based on the life of Jesus and my own experience, it is likely that believers who serve their brothers, following Christ's teaching in these verses will face opposition from church leaders, many of whom are in fact ruling by fear and neglecting to serve their brothers in any meaningful or consistent way. They defy the might of Christ and His word, but He will deal severely and swiftly with such people. If we face such opposition, we should not be surprised. Since such people persecuted Christ, they will persecute us also, and for the same reasons.
I have also raised the issue of fear; how fearing those in authority enables wicked people to rule. Jesus teaches us to fear God alone and no-one else for some other reasons also, He said;
"I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him. " [NIV] Luke 12 v 4 - 5
This is a wonderful scripture because it proves beyond doubt that we are more than flesh and blood. Since we are more than flesh and blood, physical death is not the end of us. Since our souls go on living after we die, the well-being of our soul is of more importance than our bodily life. Since the world is at war with God, so the fear of men is bad for your soul. Fear of men will enslave you to do the bidding of the world rather than the will of God and thereby put your soul in jeopardy.
The same thread of Christ's teaching about service and leadership runs through Jesus' other teachings and through the teachings of the Apostles. Take for example Matthew 24 v 45 - 51, Jesus' parable about the faithful and the wicked servants. The faithful servant, serves and the wicked servant rules by fear. Jesus says the latter will be cut to pieces and assigned a place with the hypocrites whilst those who serve faithfully will be blessed with greater responsibility. For a narrative example take John 21 v 15 - 17 where Jesus gives Peter some specific instructions about how to put his love for Jesus into practice by serving his brothers and sisters in Christ and by teaching the young. I believe Jesus also shows us how to recognize a Christian leader in this passage. Since Jesus said to Peter; "Simon, son of John, do you truly love me more than these?" A Christian leader is one who loves and serves the other believers more faithfully than the rest. If those you serve can say that you love them and serve them more than the rest, then you are without doubt a Christian leader.
An interesting outcome of Christ's teaching about fear and authority is that neither men nor women should exercise authority over others in the church. The debate about women wanting the same authority as the men over other people in the church must therefore be seen in the light of Christ's wider teaching about authority and leadership. According to the Lord's own words, no-one, that is neither men nor women, should exercise hierarchical authority. Instead, all of us are commanded to serve the others willingly and without fear and to trust God to lift us up. And we are to appreciate the work our brothers and sisters do on our behalf without showing partiality, for if all serve on the basis of Christ's gifts and Christ's will, on what basis is one person's service of greater value than another's? But Christ orders everything in His Church according to His own will. And that is the point - in advocating the evils of hierarchies, I am not advocating anarchy where no-one is in charge. Rather I am declaring that Christ is in charge and we are to serve Him by serving each other and not seek to control others.
One of the questions I started with concerned whether leaders can be confronted about sin. Paul's instructions make it clear that leaders who sin must be confronted and explains how this should be done.
As a set piece example of confronting leaders who sin, have a look at Acts 4 where the Apostles Peter and John confront the High Priest and the whole Sanhedrin saying: ' We ought to obey God rather than men .. '
Let us wrap up this discussion by returning to the questions I asked at the beginning, summarizing them with some brief answers:
Precisely what is the status of Christian leaders relative to other believers?
Do leaders have authority, (the right to exercise power) solely because of their position?
Do the scriptures command believers to obey their leaders without question?
Will Christ hold believers personally accountable if they sin through following the commands of a leader?
Can leaders legitimately be rebuked by other believers?
What are the functions of Christian leadership?
What qualifies a believer to exercise a leadership role?
How should leaders be chosen and appointed?
Some answers in brief:
Christian leaders have exactly the same status as other believers. They are not the anointed elite with Divinely conferred authority to govern that many of them would prefer us to think.
Christian leaders have no authority to dictate to other believers. Only Christ has such authority and He did not delegate it.
Believers are not obliged to obey Christian leaders. They are obliged to obey Christ, (Acts 4 again).
See 3.
Leaders are subject to Christ and should be rebuked if they sin, (but not permanently excluded).
To diligently serve other believers more than most others do.
A Christian leader is one who serves their brothers and sisters more than the rest, (matches 6).
Christ appoints leaders. All we can do is to recognise who they are. They are those who love you and serve you more than the rest.
As has already been established from the New Testament, leadership is primarily a function not a status. I would now like to develop this theme and to explore what makes Christian leaders a success in God's eyes. I would also like to explain how leadership can be expressed in effective practical ways that mean something to real people in the Church outside it.
"For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath {hath: Gr. is he who hath} shone into our hearts, to [give] the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." [AV] 2 Corinthians 4 v 5 - 6
Paul makes a point of not promoting his own right to legislate in the church. He has come to announce and promote the Lordship of Jesus Christ. He closely follows the teaching of Jesus himself about this. This is a key motivational attribute of successful Christian leaders - they want to promote Jesus because they have been blessed by Jesus themselves. Just so, in this passage, Paul seeks the glory that comes from God alone rather than the kind of honour given by men to other men. Jesus said;
"I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not; if another come in his own name, him ye will receive. How can ye believe, who receive glory one of another, and seek not the glory which [comes] from God alone?" [AV] John 5 v 43 - 44
This then is a pattern for good leadership; to express love with our service, to work hard to assist our fellow believers in whatever way we have been given ability by Christ and not to seek the glory or praise of men but rather the praise of God who sees the work we do, even if no-one else does. And also this should be the pattern for our recognition of true leaders; true leaders are those who serve the believers out of their love for Christ and who do not seek to please men, but God. This is an important issue, that I will now develop at some length. It is only right to spend some time developing the theme of good Christian leadership. For, in order for us to change, it is necessary not only to demolish the rubbish of centuries but also to clear the site and build again.
As Peter said:
"So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow-elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as a partaker in the glory that is to be revealed: Tend the flock of God that is your charge, not by constraint but willingly, not for shameful gain but eagerly, not as domineering over those in your charge but being examples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd is manifested you will obtain the unfading crown of glory." [RSV] 1 Peter 5 v 1 - 4 Note to the reader: I have halted the quotation at verse 4 and verse 5 has been omitted, though I must be honest and say that verse 5a contradicts the non-authoritarian leadership interpretation I have established from Jesus' teaching and the rest of the New Testament. The Greek text we have for verse 5a insists that the younger are morally obliged to obey the elders, in the same way as we are all morally obliged to obey the civil laws of our own country. However the immediate context and the entire weight of the rest of the New Testament including Peter's own example is against the originality of verse 5a. Both the Apostles Peter and John did not practice verse 5a when faced with the Sanhedrin's judgment, see Acts 4 v 1 - 20. Both Peter and Barnabas were also on the receiving end of a public rebuke from a younger man, the Apostle Paul, (recorded in Galatians 2 v 11 - 21). This means that verse 5a was not practised by the Apostles in their relationships with each other and again suggests that additional words have been added to the Greek text some time after it was written by Peter.
Notice Peter exhorts, even Peter does not command the Elders to do as he says. Notice that Peter recommends example, not force to be used to tend the flock of God. He also puts his finger on money as a motivation that bad leaders have for continuing their role. Since those who lead the flock of God must lead by example, so their love, their giving, their work, their understanding, their devotion to Jesus etc. must exceed those same qualities of other people in the flock of God. Leaders are not there to soak up resources and push people around. Leaders are there to provide resources and know-how and encouragement etc. to facilitate others to deepen their walk with Jesus. In more prosaic language, leaders are enthusiasts prepared to use their talents, their money, their homes, their time, their prayers etc. to help other Christians to make progress in the Christian life. They are motivated by their love for Christ and their faith in Christ to continue to make a success of their ministry, (because one of the secrets of ministry is that God equips us for it, Ephesians 2 v 10, Philippians 2 v 13, Colossians 1 v 29, Hebrews 13 v 21).
Since the leadership described and demonstrated by the people of the New Testament era was based upon example - what examples did early Christian leaders give? Remember, it is the service of these people that identifies them as leaders, so what did they do? In many of the cases mentioned below, we can also see how those who served were mightily blessed spiritually by God. Notice also, that not all of the examples of service are in the Church context, some served the community outside whilst some served believers within the Church context and some did both. I sincerely believe that the spiritual blessing resulting from practical service and the quality of leadership produced by humble service is one of the largely forgotten secrets of the kingdom of God, a secret that we will be very blessed to rediscover if we will put it into practice. God still opposes the proud, and still gives His grace to the humble.
Here then is a non-exhaustive list of the examples of service that Jesus himself and various early Christian leaders have left us to follow:
Jesus healed the sick, raised the dead, preached the gospel to the poor and gave up his life for our salvation.
Jesus who cooked a fish breakfast for the disciples. John 21 v 10 ff.
Stephen who spoke the truth and gave up his life rather than deny Christ. Acts 7.
James Son of John, Peter and Paul who healed the sick, raised the dead and preached the gospel and gave their lives in active service for Christ.
The Seven who served food, waiting upon poor widows in the community. Acts 6 v 1 - 6
Tabitha who made clothes and clothed the poor in her neighbourhood. Acts 9 v 36 - 39
Joseph Barnabas who sold his field to provide for the needs of poorer people in the Church. Acts 4 v 36 ff. [Joseph Barnabas was a Levite, so the field he sold was probably his birthright.]
Cornelius who prayed and gave gifts to the poor. Acts 10 v 2
Timothy who helped people by transporting books, clothing and money. 2 Timothy 4 v 12
Lydia who opened her home to the Apostles Paul, Silas and Luke and looked after the young church at Philippi in her own home, (Acts 16 v 15 & 40)
Priscilla & Aquila who opened their home, teaching & counselling other leaders and believers, Acts 18 v 26, 1 Corinthians 16 v 19.
The churches in Macedonia funded Paul for some years so that he could preach in Corinth and nurture the young church there without burdening the Corinthians. 2 Corinthians 11 v 7 - 10
Paul raised funds several times for the relief of hunger amongst other believers in Judea. Acts 11 v 29, 1 Corinthians 16 v 1 ff., 2 Corinthians 8 & 9,
Paul worked night and day to support himself whilst he preached in Thessalonica. 1 Thessalonians 2 v 9, 2 Thessalonians 3 v 8 .
Doctor Luke who helped Paul recover from injuries and sickness whilst he was in prison in Rome. Colossians 4 v 14
Zenas the lawyer who gave legal assistance to Paul whist he was in prison. Titus 3 v 13
This brief list shows a host of practical examples left for us to follow by Jesus and the first Christian believers. Their actions demonstrate how leaders gave and used their own resources and talents to strengthen other believers. Their work and sacrifice made a big difference to thousands of people in those days and is still helping millions of us today. Similarly, Christian leaders who imitate this style of leadership will make a big difference to many people today, including themselves. The modern world is hungry for reality. And actions like those in the list above convey the reality of Jesus' love.
Whereas there is some guidance in the New Testament about the qualities expected of leaders, (e.g. 1 Timothy 3) there can be no law to prevent us showing the love of Christ and no permission is necessary before offering to help. Any disciple of Jesus can start to serve, can start to know Jesus' help with that service and can feel their faith being encouraged thereby. Every believer can experience the joy of helping someone else in the Church or the community. It is certainly God's will that all of us eventually become mature enough to start serving Him in some way, see Ephesians 2 v 10. As such, leadership is open to all believers who are willing and able to serve Christ. It is a good idea to start in some kind of supporting role alongside others who are more experienced, so that you can gain experience and confidence yourself. Though, as Peter said, (1 Peter 5 v 2) everything should be done willingly. If you feel pressured into some service, firmly refuse. Those who are applying pressure to you, do not even understand the basics of Christian service - it is impossible to demonstrate the love of Christ if you are reluctantly compelled to serve.
Leadership based on volition is also releasing for leaders whose changing circumstances mean they wish to stop serving or would like to serve in a different way. They are not obliged to serve, so they can cease without penalty. As children of God we are free. We are strongly advised not to allow ourselves to be enslaved because our freedom was bought with a huge price, (Galatians 4 v 4 - 7 & 5 v 1). As long as God's children continue in His love, they are free. As soon as love is not the reason for action we are heading for slavery again. As long as the love of Christ has got hold of us, we can serve and get stronger, (2 Corinthians 5 v 14 - 15) but not otherwise.
"Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them." [NIV] Ephesians 5 v 11
The sad morphology of bad leadership has been with the human race since the earliest times and the church has not shown itself to be immune. Jesus has already given notice that He will personally sort out, drive out, root out and discard from His kingdom all the wolves, weeds and bad fish when He comes again. These three terms for those who do evil within the churches are drawn from three of Jesus' sayings recorded in Matthew 7 v 15, Matthew 13 v 24 - 30 and 36 - 43 and Matthew 13 v 47 - 50. These malefactors often occupy, or seek to occupy leadership positions in successful churches, since they can best practice their evil from a powerful position. Bad leaders are not often found when the work is small, when fewer people are involved and before society has noticed a new church. Bad leaders tend to manifest when numbers are increasing and society begins to notice the impact of a new church growing in grace, (Matthew 13 v 26).
Bad leadership practices fall into three main categories, as follows:
Idolatrous traits
Predator traits
Lawless traits
Many times, Jesus and the Apostles exposed and condemned the corrupt practices of bad leaders in their teaching. I would like to briefly summarise some specific examples of these and give some scripture references as follows:
Firstly there are practices based upon idolatrous traits:
They establish hierarchical wolf pack like structures to organize their oppression of others, Matthew 7 v 15, Acts 20 v 29 - 30.
They jostle for position amongst themselves, vying with each other for the greater honours, and the highest positions in the hierarchy, Matthew 23 v 6, Luke 14 v 7 - 11.
Everything they do is done to impress others with false piety, Matthew 23 v 5.
They like to be treated with deference and delight in titles and honours from other men, Matthew 23 v 7.
They want to gather a large group of followers for themselves, they become Idolaters, (those who tamper with the devotion of people and collect subordinates for themselves), 2 Timothy 3 v 1 - 9
Secondly there are practices based upon predator traits:
They want to get rich by exploiting people that follow them, (they are financial predators). 1 Timothy 6 v 3 - 10. They have no mercy on the needy, they see vulnerability as an opportunity to exploit people, Mark 12 v 40, Luke 20 v 47.
They become sexual predators, Ephesians 5 v 12.
They operate by instilling fear, they become physical predators and even murderers in order to make people fear them and do what they say, Matthew 23 v 29 - 32, Galatians 2 v 11 - 13, Philippians 3 v 2 - 3.
They shame others to get credibility for themselves, (they prey upon the character of others), Luke 18 v 11, John 8 v 3 - 5.
Thirdly there are the practices based upon lawless traits:
They do not practice the pious laws they enforce, Matthew 23 v 3 - 4.
They practice evil under a cloak of respectability and secrecy, Matthew 23 v 25 - 28, Ephesians 5 v 12.
They deceive people by speaking lies in God's name, Matthew 23 v 16 - 22.
They hinder people who are entering the kingdom of God, Matthew 23 v 13 - 14.
They lead many other people to imitate their evil ways, Matthew 23 v 15.
They are obsessed with details and ignore really important teachings like love, justice and faithfulness, Matthew 23 v 23 - 24.
They drive people away, John 9 v 32 - 35, John 12 v 42.
Coming back to the quotation from Ephesians at the beginning of this chapter, no good and nothing of any lasting value can ever be produced by bad leadership practice, (Ephesians 5 v 11. Matthew 7 v 18). On the contrary, bad practice leads to a great deal of pain and damage to everyone involved including the predators and their victims. Bad leadership practice causes damage and pain in this present age as well as the prospect of fearful retribution for predators in the next.
Note to the reader: In this chapter we have begun to touch upon another mystery mentioned in scripture, the mystery of lawlessness and the characteristics of the man of lawlessness whom scripture predicts will come just before Jesus comes again, (2 Thessalonians 2 v 3 - 12). This person will exhibit all the bad practice described above and will deceive many people to desert Christ and to follow him instead. However, the mystery of lawlessness is already at work and we have begun to expose how it is operating right now through bad leadership practice, (2 Thessalonians 2 v 7). Later in this book I have expanded this topic, dealing with the way that good and bad leadership practices shape the organizational dynamics of churches. In another book, "The Mystery of the Gospel" [3] I have expanded on the perversions of the gospel which have been invented over the years to underpin bad leadership practice and corrupt organizational dynamics.
Churches, in the local sense, are beset with large quantities of traditional practices and ideological dogmas that determine much of their individual character as well as their denominational identity. This organizational and ideological baggage usually contains some elements which present obstacles to those who are entering the kingdom of heaven. Before the second world war, Jewish people all over the world were faced with many difficulties. According to a well known Jewish saying of that era, the world consisted of two kinds of place, places Jews could not live and places Jews could not enter. Figuratively, this is the situation of many Christians today. The churches have two kinds of practices and ideologies, practices Christians cannot accept and ideas Christians can have nothing to do with.
I have already dealt with many of these destructive ideas and practices in my book on "The Mystery of the Gospel" [3], since without exception these things can be recognized by their denial of the truth of the gospel. Neither are these problems new. Beginning with Jesus, and therefore from the very beginning of Christianity, Christianity has subsisted in conflict with every human ideology and all practices based thereon. It has always been so that, as James put it, "Friendship with the world is enmity with God," (James 4 v 4). And it was not long before local churches began to compromise their stand on the gospel by accepting human ideas and developing practices contradictory to Christ's teaching. Indeed, many of the writings that make up the New Testament where letters written by the Apostles to deal with these very same problems.
The problem of ideas and practices that conflict with the gospel is made worse by the fact that not everyone who goes to church believes in Jesus. Of course not! I hear you say, otherwise how would anyone find out about Jesus. But here I am not referring to newcomers who seek to find out about Jesus and enter the kingdom of heaven. Instead, I refer to people who have been on the church scene for some years, who enjoy good standing and respectability in human society and who can often be found in leadership positions within the churches - but nevertheless they do not know Jesus or truly believe in Him. They are supporters of the latest human trendy idea and feel more comfortable with practices based on them. They use their positions amongst us to secretly perpetuate and exacerbate the problem of human ideas and the practices based on them which pollute the stream of the teachings of Jesus. Again, this problem is not new. Beginning with Judas Iscariot, whom Jesus chose, but who even so was a devil. And continuing down to this very day we have people who approach Christ as a means to their own ends in society and in the church. According to Jesus Himself, (Matthew 13 v 24 - 30) it is not even possible for us to remove these people directly without damaging others of genuine faith. Continuing the analogy Jesus uses in His parable of the weeds in the field, what we can do is to cultivate a healthy spiritual setting in our churches that will discourage and thwart these people, (the weeds) and reduce their influence significantly. We can achieve this in a number of ways:
Ask questions, test everything, encourage openness. Do not accept the answers of anyone who tries to avoid answering your questions, for example by saying that it 'is just the way we do things here'.
Identify and expose human ideas and the practices based on them and to gently disagree with them, refuting the ideas through applying the teachings of Jesus.
Refuse to participate in practices that are not taught by the whole of scripture, even if this costs you something.
The cultivation approach to weed control is supported by other scriptures, for example:
Expose the roots of the weeds, to deprive them of nourishment:
"Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them." [NIV] Ephesians 5 v 11 - 13 And:
Remove the seeds of human ideas before they can germinate:
"We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ." [NIV] 2 Corinthians 10 v 5
Remove weed seedlings before they can mature:
"Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil." [NIV] 1 Thessalonians 5 v 21
By cultivating truth and openness and discouraging evil, we will save others who follow our example and we will make it much more difficult for impostors to operate and continue their destructive influence.
Many who love the Lord are rightly perplexed by the divisions and hostilities that exist between various different threads in the modern Christian church. There is absolutely no doubt that this is a problem. It is easy to point to Jesus' words in His great prayers recorded by John in the seventeenth chapter of his gospel where Jesus expresses His vision of the unity of His Church and to conclude that we are manifestly not experiencing what He so fervently sought in prayer. For many, the difference between His prayerful vision and the daily reality of division and discord is impossible to accept - something, anything that has a hope of resolving these differences must be supported at whatever cost. Brothers and sisters in Christ, we are in danger of missing the point of Jesus' prayers. The Person who prayed those things is Almighty God, Almighty God! He does not need our help to fulfill His word and there is nothing, nothing we can do to thwart the purpose of His will. All we can do is to write ourselves in or out of His will for our own lives. It is therefore far more important for us to consider ourselves and humble ourselves before His Majesty than it is to sacrifice our principles to a 'peace' between opposing groups that is no peace if it is not based on Truth, willing consent and agreement. Again if Jesus wanted to, He could impose His will, and a uniform understanding of it upon us with a gesture immediately. Since Jesus does not do this to us, we should not insist on uniformity from each other. Bureaucratic tidiness is irrelevant, we do not believe in bureau-cracy (human government), instead we believe in the theo-cracy, the temporal power of God, and the government of the Son of Man;
" .. the government will be on his shoulders .. Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end" [NIV] Isaiah 9 v 6 - 7
I am not making a case for inaction, I am encouraging your faith in the power of the Son of Man to change your life, to change other's lives, and to bring us all together before His throne with great joy and in peace. As Isaiah predicted, an increase in Christ's government in our lives leads to an increase in our peace. In the interests of peace then, let us:
put to one side our sinful ambition to govern and control one another.
seek an increase in Christ's government in our own personal lives.
An increase in Christ's government in our personal lives means standing for more, not less of His truth. An increase in Christ's government in our lives means challenging and painful spiritual advance, not compromise with one another or mutual appeasement. Ideological compromise is alien to the Christian faith in any case, since Jesus' teaching is not negotiable. Holding fast the truth of our confession, we are to consider how to provoke one another to love and good works, (Hebrews 10 v 23 - 24). How I like that! How utterly godly! To 'provoke towards peace' expresses the true wisdom of God. In a world full of worldly people who provoke each other to make war and sometimes compromise with each other to make peace, the people of God are to provoke each other to make peace and to refrain from any compromise with evil as this will inevitably cause strife! If we want peace, we must reconsider our approach. The world's tactics will not work. They do not work very effectively in the world and they certainly cannot work amongst the churches where worldly tactics are incapable of producing anything constructive and beneficial to the people of God. To highlight this contrast further; Christ is the Prince of Peace, (Isaiah 9 v 6), but how many observers of Christ's teaching would say that he acted to appease the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Elders or the Teachers of the Law? Did He compromise His ideology to please them, even once? On the contrary, He provoked them constantly, fearlessly and ruthlessly - publicly exposing their hypocrisy in the light of God's truth. Did Jesus behave differently toward His own disciples? Did He turn a blind eye to their waywardness? No, He did not. He spoke the truth to them, he showed no favouritism to them, he gave no quarter to evil, even when He saw it in His friends. Did He love His disciples less by behaving so? Of course not. This is the essential point many have missed about 'peacemakers' as described and exemplified by Jesus and the blessing of making peace; Making peace involves confronting ourselves and others with truth, it involves provocation towards love and good deeds, it involves holding fast to the faith we profess. It is not comfortable, it is risky and it can be costly, but God has promised to bless those who make peace like this, (Matthew 5 v 9). But let each man confront himself first!
So, coming back to the title of this chapter, why are we surprised when we fail to achieve peace if we go down the worldly paths of ideological compromise and appeasement? Let us get our own houses in order and then gently but firmly confront each other with His truth and provoke one another to express our faith by works motivated by God's love.
Is Christ's teaching for His Church unattainable? Wishful thinking perhaps? Think again, really think. How can we feel confident about some of Christ's teaching and not all of it? How can we doubt that He meant what He said about the Church?
First, to illustrate the fundamental differences between Christ's idea of Church and modern Christianity. Modern church ideology and Christ's teaching about the Church are so different, they are two completely different ideological paradigms. Summarizing this chapter, the two diagrams below contrast the underlying humanist church paradigm, (HCP) of the modern church with the Christian Church paradigm, (CCP) that Christ actually taught.
Figure 2. Humanist church paradigm
In this diagram I am not being cynical, I am illustrating what I have actually experienced. The paradigm illustrated is based on my own observations over some years. This rather ugly pattern of ideas is usually concealed beneath varying thicknesses of ideological fog - the fog produced when CCP is talked about whilst HCP is in action!
First, look at the leader's role in HCP. The leader's role is key to HCP - they maintain control of the HCP paradigm. They are busy people and face burnout trying to make, communicate and enforce rules on the members. At the same time, they must keep their consumers happy by providing them with assurance of salvation and religious credibility to sweeten the bitter medicine. However, leaders are essentially trapped by the HCP paradigm, since they are often dependent upon it for friends and their jobs.
Next look at the members who are signed up to HCP and on some kind of church membership list maintained by the leaders. Members 'join' the church, pay and obey the leaders, (legalism) and can be struck off the membership list and thrown out of the church at the discretion of the leaders should they fail morally when judged against the rules that the leaders have compiled or if they fail to obey the leaders. Being thrown out is seen as equivalent to loosing salvation, so that leaders can exert a powerful level of control over the minds of members, (idolatry). Members 'have religion done to them', they passively consume what the leaders provide. Members are reluctantly coerced into various duties useful to the HCP paradigm, but since they feel obligated to obey, they lack willingness in their tasks as a result. One of the key paradigm functions the members are given by the leaders is to help recruit new members from society. Success at recruiting people from society is key to HCP, since HCP measures success by the number of signed-up members. Also, new recruits are always needed to replace those who leave. Like the leaders, members are trapped too. Members are trapped because they do not want to leave and be 'posthumously' condemned as fallen from grace.
Next, take a look at God's role in the HCP. HCP does not require God to do anything to make it work, (hence the humanist label and dotted line in the diagram). The convenient (deist) idea of a remote God is used by HCP to reinforce the authority of the leaders to decide things on God's behalf.
Lastly notice the society impact and society view of HCP. Society is unhelped and largely unmoved by HCP since a more populated HCP machine is the aim. In fact, HCP sees society as 'outside' since HCP needs a clear 'insider' membership identity to exert control over members. Since HCP is essentially exclusive and therefore isolated from society, what happens in practice is that many mutually exclusive HCP environments exist in competition with each other. (The severity of inter HCP competition can range from friendly rivalry to violence, depending on circumstances.) The rivalry of different HCP environments explains the reason for disunity between different Christian denominations.
Not every modern church operates entirely using HCP, but be honest, how many HCP principles have you seen working in practice? How many HCP principles are in action, that you cannot see?
If you, reading this, are not from a Christian background, but come instead from a background within another world religion, you might also recognise HCP. It is quite possible that paradigms similar to HCP also exist within other religions.
To comment further on the humanist church paradigm, I claim:
Not surprisingly, that HCP stands contrary to Christ's teaching.
Less obviously, that Christ's teaching cannot be understood from an HCP perspective. (Seen from an HCP perspective, most of Christ's teaching makes no sense at all.)
In support of these claims, I would now like to illustrate the church paradigm that Christ taught, so far as I understand it anyway. The differences in pattern are striking, illustrating the light years we are from Christ's teaching. Though there is hope of effecting a paradigm shift from HCP to CCP, as I will now explain.
Figure 3. Christ's church paradigm
This illustration shows CCP. CCP is consistent with a number of threads that run right through Christ's teaching and Christ's lifestyle. For example:
Jesus greatly impressed the people who heard Him and those who saw the powerful miracles that he performed. Part of their reaction was that God had suddenly come much nearer, (e.g. Luke 7 v 16). The idea that God is near and closely involved in our lives is called theism. Just as Jesus seemed to bring God nearer to real people, so we, as His Church have the same purpose, (1 Corinthians 14 v 24 - 25). Jesus brought God near to outcasts, sinners, beggars, prostitutes, drunks, demoniacs and so on. He also brought God near to the poor, the oppressed, the sick and even near to the dead. If this mission and purpose was good enough for Christ, it is a privilege for us.
Look at Jesus' CCP from a distance and you can see that there is a path from God to the world through His Church that is not present in HCP. In essence Jesus saw the church as His City set on a hill, a conduit between God and mankind, (Matthew 5 v 14). Just as Jesus was conveying the grace, power and Personality of God from heaven to earth, (John 1 v 50 - 51), so would His Church, (Matthew 5 v 15 - 16).
The principles of CCP are:
Influence through service. It is the way that Christ showed His love for people that gave moral authority to His message. Not all the people who heard Jesus believed in Him, but they all wanted to hear Him because of what He was doing. Even today, It is the power of the His self-sacrifice on the cross that moves people to hear Him and to believe in Him. This principle works both within Christ's paradigm of the Church and between the Church and the community. Inside the Church, a leader after the pattern that Christ taught, (Mark 9 v 35) has influence voluntarily given to him by others who recognise and voluntarily respect his love for Christ expressed in loving service for them. In the community also, people are not stupid, they know when someone genuinely cares for them and will listen to the good news from that person.
Servant leadership. This was Christ's attitude. He said He had come not to be served, but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many, (Matthew 20 v 28). The CCP leaders are those who help other Christians in any one of many possible ways. The more self-sacrifice or personal cost involved in service, the greater the leader. On this scale, Christ is the greatest, because He sacrificed more and paid a higher price than anyone else, (Philippians 2 v 5 - 11). Those who lead in the CCP sense are recognised by God, not men, though Christians can benefit more from the ministry of CCP style leaders by recognising who they are!
Provisional forgiveness. The forgiveness of God brings us relief and joy and we admit our faults and forgive each other in the same way that He has forgiven us, (Matthew 6 v 14 - 15).
God provides everything needed to make CCP work. God provides everything, including His own Presence to make CCP work. Otherwise CCP would collapse, (John 15 v 4 - 8).
CCP success is measured by the impact of God's grace on the community, since the Church passes on the grace of God that it receives. Jesus saw us, His Church as the salt and light of the earth, a means to spread His grace, not as an end in itself, (Matthew 5 v 13 - 16).
CCP is non-exclusive, (John 6 v 37) and can work better with other CCP environments because CCP's all have the same objective to convey God's grace to society. Rivalry is eliminated because CCP does not have a parochial agenda. (HCP objectives are parochial & insular in comparison.)
What are the functions of the local church? Here are a few examples;
Making disciples of Jesus, baptizing and teaching them His commands, (Matthew 28 v 18 - 20).
Spiritual fellowship, (not merely a social club).
Building mutually supportive human relationships based on Christ's love and forgiveness.
Building one another up in our most holy faith.
Learning how to live right, demonstrating Christ's character.
Carrying out Christ's will in the wider community, (demonstrating His kingdom).
What we practise in a local church should support these (and any other) valid functions of the local church. What we practise matters, because what we practise will either help us or hinder us from faithfully carrying out our function for which we are accountable individually to Christ.
Jesus' teachings about tithes and tithing from the Gospels:
Luke 18 v 10 - 14 Pharisee and Tax collector saying. Jesus casts tithes as something God is not interested in. God is interested in different things as Jesus goes on to explain.
Mark 12 v 41 - 44 Widow's offering and Jesus' teaching. The Widow put in everything she had, other people put in offerings proportionate to their means.
Matthew 17 v 24 - 27 God's children are free from paying obligatory taxes to God.
Taken together Jesus encourages us to give, but insists that we are free from legalistic obligations to give. The widow's gift shows how God is interested only in our motives when we give. She was commended by Jesus for her faith and act of simple worship. This means if we give out of habit, compulsion, self interest, shame etc. God is not touched at all. Jesus prompts us by His Spirit with His compassion, faith, mercy etc. to respond spontaneously in giving.
Jesus' saying, "Then the children are free." (Matthew 17 v 26) has much wider relevance to us than finances, it is a general principle. We are freed by Him from all obligation-based religious duty. This point can be expanded greatly with other scriptures.
Jesus did declare that those who preach the gospel deserve their wages, but the gospel does not include legalistic style giving!!
A chapter that highlights Jesus' ownership of the local church, (Revelation 2 - 3) and which draws out the implications of this fact. For example:
when a local church is founded
Jesus' temporal involvement in building a local church
when a local church is closed down
As well as providing salvation for individuals, Jesus is also working as the Ruler of the whole house of God. As it says in the book of Hebrews:
"Moses was faithful as a servant in all God's house, testifying to what would be said in the future. But Christ is faithful as a Son over God's house. And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast." [NIV] Hebrews 3 v 5 - 6 with my emphasis, highlighting the tense.
There are many in the churches who do not know this truth and there are some that would prefer it not to be true. The truth stands though, Christ is in day to day control of God's house. He appoints humble and faithful people to serve in God's house and He removes those who are unfaithful from their positions of authority and influence, (Matthew 24 v 45 - 51). Christ leads His people - He is their one and only Shepherd, they will not respond to another's voice, (John 10 v 4 - 5). Moses died, and therefore his service in God's house could not be sustained. Christ died, but after three days, He came back to life. He continues to lead and to rule God's house, sustained by an indestructible life.
E.G.
Ephesus: Threat to close the church. This clearly applies to that time, rather than at some later judgment.
Thyatira: Immediate judgment for Jezebel, v23, repayment for evil deeds would also appear to be at that time rather than at some later judgment.
Sardis: 3 v 3. In this context, and very interestingly too, the 'thief in the night' picture is applied to Christ coming prior to His second advent.
Laodicea: 3 v 19 'Those whom I love I rebuke and chasten,' would have little meaning if done outside the situation that Jesus speaks about.
Paul speaks in 1 Corinthians 1 - 2 that starting a new church is like planting a seed and watering it. He also uses the analogy of laying a foundation, (Christ) upon which others have built;
"like a master builder, I laid a foundation"
To plant a church requires supreme craftsmanship which is itself a spiritual gift from Christ - it cannot be easy to do it right! The subsequent growth and health of a new church depends critically on how a church was established in the beginning. In another church that Paul planted at Galatia, Paul needed to demolish Judaistic legalistic ideology as well as lay new foundations upon which to build. In the same way, new church planting today involves site preparation including:
The removal of ideological debris, obstacles and pollutants like legalism, deism, dualism, etc.
The removal of 'weeds', limiting the damage from people who would otherwise prevent growth or damage new growth. In practice this means removing power structures that support unacceptable oppression by leaders, rather than expelling the people concerned.
A new church requires:
A strong foundation which must be Christ himself. From the Matthew 16 v 15 - 19 passage we learn that this is so and that it involves an accurate practical understanding of who Jesus is and also a practical knowledge of what He taught.
It requires clear goals and spiritual gifts in people that support those goals, for example, teaching, prophecy, discipling, leaders etc.
It requires leaders who are established in the faith and who genuinely love the people of God and who have demonstrated that love by faithful service over a significant period of time. Leaders with a humble and teachable attitude who are committed to Christ and recognized as such by the people.
(Reference to Matthew about leader attitudes, Titus about appointing elders & Revelation 2 - 3 and Peter about leader qualifications).
" .. Consider Jesus the pioneer of your faith who made the good confession before Pontius Pilate." " .. The Spirit expressly says that in the latter days men will depart from the faith .." " .. The end will not come until the rebellion comes first and the son of perdition is revealed .. his appearance will be with all .. and counterfeit miracles .." " .. For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect - if that were possible. See, I have told you ahead of time." [NIV] Matthew 24 v 24 - 25 " .. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him." [NIV] Matthew 24 v 43 - 44
The good confession of our faith is the lordship, divinity and sovereignty of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Son of the Living God, God's Anointed One, (Christ) through whom God the Father created everything in heaven and earth. These facts are central to or faith, just as Jesus is the object of our faith. One day, perhaps soon, many in the churches will be deceived into abandoning the good confession to follow a persuasive liar, who will impersonate Christ and perform powerful and unusual miracles.
The churches will face an assault as the time of Jesus' coming draws near. The thief, the son of perdition, is coming to try and break into God's house, His church. The son of perdition must come and work powerful miracles and try to deceive God's people, and he will succeed if we do not wake up and watch carefully! If we are not awake to his deceits, he will get in whilst we sleep - right into the churches masquerading as the bona fide, a powerful and charismatic leader accompanied by many like minded prophets. He will work miracles and capture the worship of many. Since other scriptures say that Jesus will destroy him with the breath of His mouth when He comes, this vile person must come just before Jesus' second coming. However, the scriptures teach that this son of perdition will succeed in deceiving many, and many whose commitment to Christ is now shallow, but who nevertheless come to church, will fall away and go after him. The wise will understand, but they will be few, (Daniel 12 v 10). What I am speaking about is the great apostasy prophesied in the bible. The likelihood of this message ever coming from our pulpits is slim because if we look forward at all, it is to a revival, and may God send one upon us. However, looking further ahead; In the decade or so before Jesus' return there is clear prophetic evidence that much of the church will be apostate. Jesus knew it and predicted it when He said, "when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" (Luke 18 v 8.) Elsewhere He said concerning the end times;
"At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved." [NIV] Matthew 24 v 10 - 13
Betrayal, hatred, apostasy, lovelessness, deceit, wickedness and in the middle of all this, some will stand firm. This is the picture all the prophets and the apostles paint about the church of the end times. This will be the situation within the churches whilst it endures a severe persecution according to the context of this quotation. No wonder that the prophets also say that the saints will be defeated by the antichrist, because at that time we will be a house divided against itself, (Daniel 7 v 21, Revelation 13 v 7). I know this is a hard message to accept, but we ignore it at our individual peril. If this is the situation that we as Christians today will actually face rather than some later generation, then we had better take it seriously. Anyone who has their eyes on the awful situation around them at that time will despair unless they turn their eyes to Jesus and put their hope in Him. 'Churchianity' is going to fail everyone who believes in it, so it is better rather to believe in Jesus now while there is still time! At that time you will not be able to trust your family, your friends or your fellow believers at church, (Luke 21 v 16). None of these factors that support us today will be there when we are suffering persecution and need them most. Jesus will be near us and His Spirit will support us until Christ comes to our rescue, (Luke 21 v 15). If we are to survive that time spiritually intact we must learn to lean on Jesus rather than 'churchianity' now. If we are comfortably supported by our churches, friends and family and neglect our personal walk with Jesus now, we will be perilously vulnerable then. If we go on loving those around us but rely on the Lord Jesus more and more for our support then we will be better equipped to survive spiritually and better equipped to carry on loving and helping others. It will take power to stand firm in the 120 mph wind storm of wickedness that tries to sweep us away, and that kind of power comes only from Jesus. Jesus said that those who survive those times will be those who stand firm, not a hair on their head will be lost, (Matthew 24 v 13, Luke 21 v 18 - 19).
How the Jewish people will come to believe in Jesus. Link to Jesus' prophecies about 'blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord' and 'the first shall be last and the last shall be first' and his sheep in a different flock. Link to OT prophecies about two sticks and Paul's in Romans 13.
OT prophecies about two sticks. Judah and Israel - Israel being no more, (Hosea 1 v 4). Does Israel refer to the church? 'Not my people' has become, 'Sons of the living God,' (Hosea 1 v 10 and Paul's use & interpretation of this passage in Roman's 9 v 24 - 26).
EDITNOTE: Reference to the appendix about the evangelization of the Jewish people in the 'Mystery of the Gospel' book, (or leave this topic out of this book altogether).
Link to Isaiah's prophecy about a king who will reign in righteousness and rulers who will rule with justice and to Jesus' words about how His apostles will judge the people of Israel. Mention Jesus' parables about giving people control of His property and governing cities etc. Mention the heavenly Church coming down out of heaven, as seen by John in his vision.
"Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words"; Vine, W. E., Publ. MacDonald ISBN 0-917006-03-8
"The Mystery of Man"; Ring, S. R.
"The Mystery of the Gospel"; Ring, S. R.
It is conjecture, but given the context of Jesus' teaching on forgiveness, my guess is that Jesus wrote in the stone dust a selection from the Ten Commandments, perhaps a verse from Deuteronomy 5 v 16 - 21 and a quote from Ezekiel 18 v 20 for the people to read and consider. If so, then the finger of God that wrote the Ten Commandments for Moses on tablets of stone, also wrote them in the dust for the people to read in John 8.
"The precise parallel New Testament" Oxford University Press Inc. 1995. ISBN 0-19-528412-7 Contains the Greek text of the NT and 7 English versions printed in parallel.
"The Jerusalem Bible" Copyright 1966, 1967 and 1968 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd. & Doubleday & Co. Inc. ISBN 0 232 48396 5
"The Message: New Testament" Eugene H. Peterson. Publ. NavPress 1993. ISBN 08910-98534