Part One On Baptism and Church Membership
In 2010 we in Immanuel Fellowship are giving more significance to Baptism as incorporation of new believers into the life of the Fellowship. By this we mean that we are seeing Baptism not only as an individual's public affirmation of private faith in Jesus Christ but also as an initiation into the life the Fellowship. In other words when we speak of membership in the Fellowship we mean this to come primarily through Baptism.
Reading the New Testament we see the importance that it attaches to Baptism. Our response to the call to salvation through repentance towards God and faith towards the Lord Jesus (Acts 20:21) leads us to Baptism. Through Baptism we identify ourselves with or participate in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (Romans 6:4). In answer to the question, “Shall we persist in sin so that God’s grace may abound in our life?” Paul answered: “How can we?” In baptism, he said, we participated in Christ’s death, burial and resurrection. So the Christian life is not a constant demand for the grace of God for forgiveness but the outworking of our participation in the life of Christ unto righteousness (Romans 6). Beset by a temptation we can always look back to Baptism and ask ourselves the same question, “How can I?” Baptism is the watershed from which flows the entire ethical dimension of the Christian life.
This life “In Christ” has another dimension, however. Christ has a Body, the Church. Participation in Christ also involves participation in the Church. This participation also begins with Baptism. In 1 Corinthians 12:12 and 13, we read, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.”
The Christian life is not only a life of prayer and worship or a matter of personal integrity. It is also a life that we live together with other believers in the context of the local church. Everybody passes through the same gate when we enter into Fellowship and that gate is Baptism. It is not the signing of a membership card or the public profession of the church’s tenet of faith. It is the joining of our life into a new spiritual reality—the Body of Christ.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
The Mind Under Grace
From a Christianity Today article authored by Darren Marks
Doctrine. The word conjures in the modern mind a string of negative images: The Inquisition. Boring professors debating the number of angels on the head of a pin. Bloggers arguing endlessly while the church flags in relevance in the once-Christian West. Doctrine is a bludgeon, a curiosity, a rearranging of the deck chairs while the ship sinks. Vibrant Christians want little to do with it, and instead focus on spiritual disciplines, works of mercy, and authentic Christian living. Doctrine belongs to the past, when it was used mainly to divide believers. How many Protestants spend time pondering whether it is acceptable to chew Communion bread (a major issue for the first Reformers)?
But we have to ask: Is it possible to live out discipleship without a good measure of heady doctrine? I see doctrine not as a boundary but as a compass. Its purpose is not to make Christians relevant or distinctive but rather to make them faithful in their contexts. Doctrine is a way of articulating what God's presence in the church and the world looks like. It can orient us by helping us, like Jon, major in the majors.
In addition, I believe the crisis in the Western church is not about information itself but about the kind of information we absorb in our churches. Philosopher James K. A. Smith put it best: "Theology is not some intellectual option that makes us 'smart' Christians; it is the graced understanding that makes us faithful disciples."
Default Buddhists
I'm using the terms doctrine and theology interchangeably. To be exact, doctrine is more or less settled theology. You find doctrine in creeds and statements of faith. Theology or "doing theology" is about the process and rules we use to talk about things that may end up as doctrine. A doctrinal statement (Jesus is "true God from true God," as the Nicene Creed testifies) is always a theological statement. But not all theological statements become doctrine. Still, in this essay, I will use doctrine and theology to refer to our intellectual grappling with the faith, which, as Smith notes, can give us graced understanding and lead to faithful discipleship. Doctrine, while static at times, is meant to help us think about our lives more deeply by considering alongside other Christians the implications of our thoughts and deeds. Doctrine is wisdom that helps us clarify our mission.
Yet we seem decidedly uninterested in such wisdom today, both inside and outside the church.
Sociologist Steve Bruce has observed that Western spirituality is "Buddhist by default": that Westerners, even Christians, are obsessed with what goes on inside, with spiritual experience. We don't usually welcome any external testing of our thoughts or actions. Subjectivity takes the ethical and doctrinal teeth out of every religion. Doctrine can help us think.
Bruce does not mean that we are actually Buddhists. We don't practice its asceticism. Instead we prefer a pallid, easy Buddhism, a series of feel-good statements supposedly culled from the Buddha. Our culture does this with all religions, Bruce says. It boils them down to one basic principle: Do what makes you feel good about yourself, and preferably in 10 minutes or less. As religious consumers, we warp every tradition by subjecting it to our needs. The Christian West's consumer needs, he notes, have by and large led us to abandon traditional Christianity, and the Eastern spirituality we adopt is actually the vapid form of Christianity created by modernity. This is a Christianity of self-experience.
In this sense, Western Christians are children of Friedrich Schleiermacher, the 19th-century Enlightenment thinker who built his theological system on the foundation of spiritual experience. In many cases, we find his influence unwittingly embedded in our church leadership, our seminaries, and our theological faculties. A theology grounded in experience ultimately fades into soft moralism, humanism, or, in the unique case of American Christianity, a civic religion wherein God and country are easily confused.
As I write this, the top three best-selling books in the Christian nonfiction category of Amazon.com are also listed (and number one) in the personal transformation, New Age, and self-help categories. All three books also appear on the New York Times bestseller list. It seems we believe that what we experience is more important than what we think, and we buy accordingly. The authors and their fans would likely say that they are addressing needs. But do we best serve our culture by becoming increasingly theologically illiterate?
Spirituality in the Balance
At the heart of Schleiermacher's work lay an important quest: to understand how to be faithful in a particular context. Schleiermacher and his progeny wanted much to be relevant Christians. The problem lies in where he started.
Schleiermacher thought that the essence of Christianity was its spiritual impulse, not its doctrine, which seemed to cause most of the problems. It had fueled violent conflicts between
Catholics and Protestants and threatened to stifle scientific progress and human achievement. For Schleiermacher, as for many today, if one could boil ideas down to a common essence, differences would dissipate and humankind could move forward in harmony. That essence was religiosity—a connection to God that every human being has the capacity to feel and experience. We might call this spirituality or awe in everyday parlance.
Schleiermacher began with internal experiences of God and built theology around those experiences, reconfiguring doctrine as needed. He assumed that by starting with ourselves and our desires, we would glimpse a purer vision of God and perhaps a more relevant church. But how did the project fare?
With some 200 years of hindsight, we see that the ramifications were immense. Take what has been called the only empirically verifiable Christian doctrine, the doctrine of original sin. For Schleiermacher, sin is not primarily about trespassing against God's laws or a moral debt we owe to a divine being. Sin is misspent energy. If we only paid better attention and had better information and better situations, we would naturally want to be spiritual. This kind of thinking defines sin as a mis-education or mis-direction of our innate sense of awe. A sinner is one who is out of continuity with his own sense of self, and a religious founder is one who is aware of higher spiritual truths and awakens them in others.
In this trajectory, Jesus becomes a sage who, among others, came to tell us about our potential and awaken our religious sensibilities. Jesus Christ is a spiritual avatar who may be called the Son of God but is different from us only by degree, not by kind. He is certainly not the unique God-man. Church becomes a kind of group therapy we attend to be told we are all right, to share in the piety of Jesus' example. While there is much positive here, the question remains whether God matters as the agent of changed lives. In the final analysis, core Christian beliefs, even those about Jesus, have to feel authentic or they are discarded.
Let's return to Amazon.com's bestseller list. The current number two bestseller, from a prominent Christian author, claims that belief itself is not enough to overcome bad habits, and that we need to stretch our faith, just as Jesus taught. Ultimately the book points to one goal: achieving our dreams and destiny by dint of effort. Sin is a failure to achieve our dreams, Jesus is a personal sage who helps us experience those dreams, and church is where we go to receive positive reinforcement to actualize our destinies. The book does not mention the Sermon on the Mount, or that God's destiny for us may be martyrdom (Heb. 11).
In hindsight, we can see that the belief driving Schleiermacher's entire theological machine needed correction. Schleiermacher led us astray by proposing that we interrogate theological ideas rather than allow ourselves to be interrogated by them. The emphasis on spiritual experience put us, not God, in the driver's seat.
As far as we remain the children of Schleiermacher, we either unconsciously or actively transform Christianity into something that, while seemingly relevant, is bereft of spiritual vigor.
Interrogated by the Bible
The sharp-eyed reader will note two things missing from my argument so far. One is positioning the Bible as the only guide to Christian faith. The other is looking at the role of the Holy Spirit. Both are integral to theology. Without them, doctrine and theology become propositions or proof-texting. The opposite of experience is dogmatism, staid religious scholasticism that sucks the life out of a relationship with God.
We have to begin by acknowledging a reality that rightly makes us nervous: All Christian theology helps us interpret the Bible. Theology is what helps us read disparate writings that span thousands of years and arise out of cultures very different from ours. Further, the Bible comprises many texts that address specific problems in specific places (e.g., sexual immorality in Corinth). It presents ideas that at times seem current and at other times obscure. One seemingly crystal-clear verse (Gal. 3:28, "There is neither Jew nor Greek …") or book (Philemon on slavery) can be interpreted by the faithful in a variety of ways. The earliest Christians knew this all too well.
The first three centuries of Christianity featured a running dialogue with the Bible. In their theology, the earliest Christians had to avoid reading the Bible as too Jewish, too Gentile, too focused on Peter, too focused on Paul, too focused on faith, or too focused on works. To read the Bible through only one interpretive lens could lead to false conclusions, like denying the Trinity or Jesus' humanity or divinity. In each case, a simple reading of a passage, usually through the reader's cultural lens, resulted in a distortion of Christian life. Those who found little biblical evidence for what was emerging as the doctrine of the Trinity, for example, usually ended up with a Christ who never knew humanity (docetism) or a Jesus who was not fully God (Arianism). Thus, doctrine became a yardstick by which to measure various readings and help Christians pinpoint the essentials.
To some people, this will sound like the Bible is not primary, that theological discourse needs to correct Scripture. This could lead some to see the Bible as an interesting historical document to get us started, not the active Word of God that shapes us. And some argue that Christianity is more a communal practice than a personal relationship with the living God. (Schleiermacher would likely agree with that statement.)
But, at its best, Christian theology has never understood itself to be merely a human reflection on contingent truths. The best theology grounds itself in Scripture as the revealed Word of God, not in the religious experiences of ancient people. Scripture's authority is not something that the community relates to first with its own experience. Instead, as Martin Luther put it, Scripture bears authority because it bears Christ—because it points unequivocally and majestically in grace to the living God. Scripture interrogates the community. Because it can be a difficult task to hear Christ speak clearly in Scripture, the church has used theology to test that interrogation. Some may read or hear Scripture in a new manner under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, as the 18th- and 19th-century abolitionists did regarding slavery. Theology tests such new readings by asking questions of both the text and the church, helping to clarify the movement of the Spirit.
The church's theological task has never been only to comprehend an impersonal piece of literature intellectually. Theology has always understood itself as being under God's providential grace. It is the result of faithful Christians grappling with Scripture in the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. Just as Jacob wrestled with God, so have Christians wrestled with Scripture as they have sought to articulate core beliefs about the God active among them, active in and through Scripture itself.
In our conversation with the Bible, we've developed shorthand (though imperfect) to articulate what it reveals. We say God is the Trinity and Christ is Savior, and we talk about sin, heaven, and church. We use those meanings to understand Scripture even as those core beliefs have come from Scripture. These are not esoteric abstractions but fundamental ways in which Christians cross-index their spirituality (their relationship with the God who is present) with a faithful reading of the Bible.
This theological method inverts Schleiermacher's. We do not start with "my spirituality" and then identify core beliefs. Instead, we begin with core beliefs—those discovered by the church as it has intellectually wrestled with the truth of Scripture in the dynamic presence of the Holy Spirit. These beliefs, which come from outside myself, correct and shape my spiritual experience.
The best theology grounds itself in Scripture as the revealed Word of God, not in the religious experiences of ancient people.
We have a good example of this process in the theological work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who studied in the era when Schleiermacher's spirit reigned supreme. Most of Bonhoeffer's teachers were in tune with their country's zeitgeist, the swelling German pride that manifested itself in part as anti-Semitism and pro-Nazism. They were reading Scripture, but with personal experience in the fore; thus, their theology merely reinforced the era's powerful sentiments.
But, as Bonhoeffer read Scripture, he began to understand Jesus of Nazareth as "Christ the Center." For him the seemingly dusty ideas of the Incarnation and the Atonement took on life. His theological reflections on Christ helped him see that anti-Semitism and Nazism, especially in the church, were replacing Christ as the center, that they were even anti-Christ. This prompted him to speak out, to actively resist the zeitgeist.
Cultivating Graced Understanding
Bonhoeffer knew, as did Calvin, Augustine, and many others, that dry, seemingly irrelevant ideas like the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, and eschatology are crucial elements of our spiritual formation. Theology helps map a reading of Scripture as Scripture interrogates its readers under the guidance of the Spirit.
For the past 200 years, many parts of Western Christianity have labored as Schleiermacher's children. The mainline traditions have hoped to achieve relevance. The evangelical and free-church traditions have hoped to read the Bible unadulterated and alone. Both traditions, however, have made our feelings—which are, by definition, slippery and transitory—primary. Mainliners have eschewed theology for fear that it imposes another's context and assumptions, while evangelicals have eschewed theology because it might compete with the pristine Bible or become a rigid boundary. Both traditions forget that theology is a kind of memory that allows us to hear God's Word by clarifying our experiences.
Many complain that the church has become incapable of cultivating Christian habits in its people. No wonder, when for so many the starting point is not God but spiritual experience. How can we sustain any spiritual growth if it is grounded in something as transitory as what we feel, individually or corporately?
The decreasing lack of interest in core Christian beliefs is due in part to church leaders who chase after relevance over substance—focusing on the feeling that something is meaningful rather than the truth that something is meaningful. It is also due to church members who imagine that their experience is the touchstone of truth about God, rather than learning to evaluate their experience in light of Scripture and theology.
Over the years, I have found that the students in my classroom grow in understanding by studying "dusty" and "dry" doctrine. They learn to interrogate their experiences, asking how they may find a "theological existence" or mission. I hope that Jon and his peers learn that they cannot have spiritual formation without doctrine, that theology is that business of graced understanding that makes us faithful disciples of Christ.
Darren C. Marks is assistant professor of theology and Jewish studies at Huron University College at the University of Western Ontario. He is the author of Bringing Theology to Life: Key Doctrines for Christian Faith and Mission (InterVarsity).
Doctrine. The word conjures in the modern mind a string of negative images: The Inquisition. Boring professors debating the number of angels on the head of a pin. Bloggers arguing endlessly while the church flags in relevance in the once-Christian West. Doctrine is a bludgeon, a curiosity, a rearranging of the deck chairs while the ship sinks. Vibrant Christians want little to do with it, and instead focus on spiritual disciplines, works of mercy, and authentic Christian living. Doctrine belongs to the past, when it was used mainly to divide believers. How many Protestants spend time pondering whether it is acceptable to chew Communion bread (a major issue for the first Reformers)?
But we have to ask: Is it possible to live out discipleship without a good measure of heady doctrine? I see doctrine not as a boundary but as a compass. Its purpose is not to make Christians relevant or distinctive but rather to make them faithful in their contexts. Doctrine is a way of articulating what God's presence in the church and the world looks like. It can orient us by helping us, like Jon, major in the majors.
In addition, I believe the crisis in the Western church is not about information itself but about the kind of information we absorb in our churches. Philosopher James K. A. Smith put it best: "Theology is not some intellectual option that makes us 'smart' Christians; it is the graced understanding that makes us faithful disciples."
Default Buddhists
I'm using the terms doctrine and theology interchangeably. To be exact, doctrine is more or less settled theology. You find doctrine in creeds and statements of faith. Theology or "doing theology" is about the process and rules we use to talk about things that may end up as doctrine. A doctrinal statement (Jesus is "true God from true God," as the Nicene Creed testifies) is always a theological statement. But not all theological statements become doctrine. Still, in this essay, I will use doctrine and theology to refer to our intellectual grappling with the faith, which, as Smith notes, can give us graced understanding and lead to faithful discipleship. Doctrine, while static at times, is meant to help us think about our lives more deeply by considering alongside other Christians the implications of our thoughts and deeds. Doctrine is wisdom that helps us clarify our mission.
Yet we seem decidedly uninterested in such wisdom today, both inside and outside the church.
Sociologist Steve Bruce has observed that Western spirituality is "Buddhist by default": that Westerners, even Christians, are obsessed with what goes on inside, with spiritual experience. We don't usually welcome any external testing of our thoughts or actions. Subjectivity takes the ethical and doctrinal teeth out of every religion. Doctrine can help us think.
Bruce does not mean that we are actually Buddhists. We don't practice its asceticism. Instead we prefer a pallid, easy Buddhism, a series of feel-good statements supposedly culled from the Buddha. Our culture does this with all religions, Bruce says. It boils them down to one basic principle: Do what makes you feel good about yourself, and preferably in 10 minutes or less. As religious consumers, we warp every tradition by subjecting it to our needs. The Christian West's consumer needs, he notes, have by and large led us to abandon traditional Christianity, and the Eastern spirituality we adopt is actually the vapid form of Christianity created by modernity. This is a Christianity of self-experience.
In this sense, Western Christians are children of Friedrich Schleiermacher, the 19th-century Enlightenment thinker who built his theological system on the foundation of spiritual experience. In many cases, we find his influence unwittingly embedded in our church leadership, our seminaries, and our theological faculties. A theology grounded in experience ultimately fades into soft moralism, humanism, or, in the unique case of American Christianity, a civic religion wherein God and country are easily confused.
As I write this, the top three best-selling books in the Christian nonfiction category of Amazon.com are also listed (and number one) in the personal transformation, New Age, and self-help categories. All three books also appear on the New York Times bestseller list. It seems we believe that what we experience is more important than what we think, and we buy accordingly. The authors and their fans would likely say that they are addressing needs. But do we best serve our culture by becoming increasingly theologically illiterate?
Spirituality in the Balance
At the heart of Schleiermacher's work lay an important quest: to understand how to be faithful in a particular context. Schleiermacher and his progeny wanted much to be relevant Christians. The problem lies in where he started.
Schleiermacher thought that the essence of Christianity was its spiritual impulse, not its doctrine, which seemed to cause most of the problems. It had fueled violent conflicts between
Catholics and Protestants and threatened to stifle scientific progress and human achievement. For Schleiermacher, as for many today, if one could boil ideas down to a common essence, differences would dissipate and humankind could move forward in harmony. That essence was religiosity—a connection to God that every human being has the capacity to feel and experience. We might call this spirituality or awe in everyday parlance.
Schleiermacher began with internal experiences of God and built theology around those experiences, reconfiguring doctrine as needed. He assumed that by starting with ourselves and our desires, we would glimpse a purer vision of God and perhaps a more relevant church. But how did the project fare?
With some 200 years of hindsight, we see that the ramifications were immense. Take what has been called the only empirically verifiable Christian doctrine, the doctrine of original sin. For Schleiermacher, sin is not primarily about trespassing against God's laws or a moral debt we owe to a divine being. Sin is misspent energy. If we only paid better attention and had better information and better situations, we would naturally want to be spiritual. This kind of thinking defines sin as a mis-education or mis-direction of our innate sense of awe. A sinner is one who is out of continuity with his own sense of self, and a religious founder is one who is aware of higher spiritual truths and awakens them in others.
In this trajectory, Jesus becomes a sage who, among others, came to tell us about our potential and awaken our religious sensibilities. Jesus Christ is a spiritual avatar who may be called the Son of God but is different from us only by degree, not by kind. He is certainly not the unique God-man. Church becomes a kind of group therapy we attend to be told we are all right, to share in the piety of Jesus' example. While there is much positive here, the question remains whether God matters as the agent of changed lives. In the final analysis, core Christian beliefs, even those about Jesus, have to feel authentic or they are discarded.
Let's return to Amazon.com's bestseller list. The current number two bestseller, from a prominent Christian author, claims that belief itself is not enough to overcome bad habits, and that we need to stretch our faith, just as Jesus taught. Ultimately the book points to one goal: achieving our dreams and destiny by dint of effort. Sin is a failure to achieve our dreams, Jesus is a personal sage who helps us experience those dreams, and church is where we go to receive positive reinforcement to actualize our destinies. The book does not mention the Sermon on the Mount, or that God's destiny for us may be martyrdom (Heb. 11).
In hindsight, we can see that the belief driving Schleiermacher's entire theological machine needed correction. Schleiermacher led us astray by proposing that we interrogate theological ideas rather than allow ourselves to be interrogated by them. The emphasis on spiritual experience put us, not God, in the driver's seat.
As far as we remain the children of Schleiermacher, we either unconsciously or actively transform Christianity into something that, while seemingly relevant, is bereft of spiritual vigor.
Interrogated by the Bible
The sharp-eyed reader will note two things missing from my argument so far. One is positioning the Bible as the only guide to Christian faith. The other is looking at the role of the Holy Spirit. Both are integral to theology. Without them, doctrine and theology become propositions or proof-texting. The opposite of experience is dogmatism, staid religious scholasticism that sucks the life out of a relationship with God.
We have to begin by acknowledging a reality that rightly makes us nervous: All Christian theology helps us interpret the Bible. Theology is what helps us read disparate writings that span thousands of years and arise out of cultures very different from ours. Further, the Bible comprises many texts that address specific problems in specific places (e.g., sexual immorality in Corinth). It presents ideas that at times seem current and at other times obscure. One seemingly crystal-clear verse (Gal. 3:28, "There is neither Jew nor Greek …") or book (Philemon on slavery) can be interpreted by the faithful in a variety of ways. The earliest Christians knew this all too well.
The first three centuries of Christianity featured a running dialogue with the Bible. In their theology, the earliest Christians had to avoid reading the Bible as too Jewish, too Gentile, too focused on Peter, too focused on Paul, too focused on faith, or too focused on works. To read the Bible through only one interpretive lens could lead to false conclusions, like denying the Trinity or Jesus' humanity or divinity. In each case, a simple reading of a passage, usually through the reader's cultural lens, resulted in a distortion of Christian life. Those who found little biblical evidence for what was emerging as the doctrine of the Trinity, for example, usually ended up with a Christ who never knew humanity (docetism) or a Jesus who was not fully God (Arianism). Thus, doctrine became a yardstick by which to measure various readings and help Christians pinpoint the essentials.
To some people, this will sound like the Bible is not primary, that theological discourse needs to correct Scripture. This could lead some to see the Bible as an interesting historical document to get us started, not the active Word of God that shapes us. And some argue that Christianity is more a communal practice than a personal relationship with the living God. (Schleiermacher would likely agree with that statement.)
But, at its best, Christian theology has never understood itself to be merely a human reflection on contingent truths. The best theology grounds itself in Scripture as the revealed Word of God, not in the religious experiences of ancient people. Scripture's authority is not something that the community relates to first with its own experience. Instead, as Martin Luther put it, Scripture bears authority because it bears Christ—because it points unequivocally and majestically in grace to the living God. Scripture interrogates the community. Because it can be a difficult task to hear Christ speak clearly in Scripture, the church has used theology to test that interrogation. Some may read or hear Scripture in a new manner under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, as the 18th- and 19th-century abolitionists did regarding slavery. Theology tests such new readings by asking questions of both the text and the church, helping to clarify the movement of the Spirit.
The church's theological task has never been only to comprehend an impersonal piece of literature intellectually. Theology has always understood itself as being under God's providential grace. It is the result of faithful Christians grappling with Scripture in the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. Just as Jacob wrestled with God, so have Christians wrestled with Scripture as they have sought to articulate core beliefs about the God active among them, active in and through Scripture itself.
In our conversation with the Bible, we've developed shorthand (though imperfect) to articulate what it reveals. We say God is the Trinity and Christ is Savior, and we talk about sin, heaven, and church. We use those meanings to understand Scripture even as those core beliefs have come from Scripture. These are not esoteric abstractions but fundamental ways in which Christians cross-index their spirituality (their relationship with the God who is present) with a faithful reading of the Bible.
This theological method inverts Schleiermacher's. We do not start with "my spirituality" and then identify core beliefs. Instead, we begin with core beliefs—those discovered by the church as it has intellectually wrestled with the truth of Scripture in the dynamic presence of the Holy Spirit. These beliefs, which come from outside myself, correct and shape my spiritual experience.
The best theology grounds itself in Scripture as the revealed Word of God, not in the religious experiences of ancient people.
We have a good example of this process in the theological work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who studied in the era when Schleiermacher's spirit reigned supreme. Most of Bonhoeffer's teachers were in tune with their country's zeitgeist, the swelling German pride that manifested itself in part as anti-Semitism and pro-Nazism. They were reading Scripture, but with personal experience in the fore; thus, their theology merely reinforced the era's powerful sentiments.
But, as Bonhoeffer read Scripture, he began to understand Jesus of Nazareth as "Christ the Center." For him the seemingly dusty ideas of the Incarnation and the Atonement took on life. His theological reflections on Christ helped him see that anti-Semitism and Nazism, especially in the church, were replacing Christ as the center, that they were even anti-Christ. This prompted him to speak out, to actively resist the zeitgeist.
Cultivating Graced Understanding
Bonhoeffer knew, as did Calvin, Augustine, and many others, that dry, seemingly irrelevant ideas like the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, and eschatology are crucial elements of our spiritual formation. Theology helps map a reading of Scripture as Scripture interrogates its readers under the guidance of the Spirit.
For the past 200 years, many parts of Western Christianity have labored as Schleiermacher's children. The mainline traditions have hoped to achieve relevance. The evangelical and free-church traditions have hoped to read the Bible unadulterated and alone. Both traditions, however, have made our feelings—which are, by definition, slippery and transitory—primary. Mainliners have eschewed theology for fear that it imposes another's context and assumptions, while evangelicals have eschewed theology because it might compete with the pristine Bible or become a rigid boundary. Both traditions forget that theology is a kind of memory that allows us to hear God's Word by clarifying our experiences.
Many complain that the church has become incapable of cultivating Christian habits in its people. No wonder, when for so many the starting point is not God but spiritual experience. How can we sustain any spiritual growth if it is grounded in something as transitory as what we feel, individually or corporately?
The decreasing lack of interest in core Christian beliefs is due in part to church leaders who chase after relevance over substance—focusing on the feeling that something is meaningful rather than the truth that something is meaningful. It is also due to church members who imagine that their experience is the touchstone of truth about God, rather than learning to evaluate their experience in light of Scripture and theology.
Over the years, I have found that the students in my classroom grow in understanding by studying "dusty" and "dry" doctrine. They learn to interrogate their experiences, asking how they may find a "theological existence" or mission. I hope that Jon and his peers learn that they cannot have spiritual formation without doctrine, that theology is that business of graced understanding that makes us faithful disciples of Christ.
Darren C. Marks is assistant professor of theology and Jewish studies at Huron University College at the University of Western Ontario. He is the author of Bringing Theology to Life: Key Doctrines for Christian Faith and Mission (InterVarsity).
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Immanuel Fellowship Core Values
1. Loving devotion to Jesus Christ as Lord over all areas of our life
2. Regular Bible reading for personal spiritual growth
3. Joyful response and participation in corporate worship
4. Faithful financial support of our Fellowship
5. Mutual loyalty to each other within the Fellowship
6. Selfless service and devotion to our church
7. Strategic investment in the next generation
8. Honest and diligent work as means of glorifying God
9. Passionate proclamation of the good news to our friends and loved ones
10. Personal integrity of character
2. Regular Bible reading for personal spiritual growth
3. Joyful response and participation in corporate worship
4. Faithful financial support of our Fellowship
5. Mutual loyalty to each other within the Fellowship
6. Selfless service and devotion to our church
7. Strategic investment in the next generation
8. Honest and diligent work as means of glorifying God
9. Passionate proclamation of the good news to our friends and loved ones
10. Personal integrity of character
Assemblies of God Fundamental Truths
Condensed
These are nonnegotiable tenets of faith that all Assemblies of God churches adhere to. This list is derived from the official Statement of Fundamental Truths. Click links below to see the complete original statement with scriptures.
1. WE BELIEVE...The Scriptures are Inspired by God and declare His design and plan for mankind.
2. WE BELIEVE...There is only One True God–revealed in three persons...Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (commonly known as the Trinity).
3. WE BELIEVE...In the Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. As God's son Jesus was both human and divine.
4. WE BELIEVE...though originally good, Man Willingly Fell to Sin–ushering evil and death, both physical and spiritual, into the world.
5. WE BELIEVE...Every Person Can Have Restored Fellowship with God Through 'Salvation' (trusting Christ, through faith and repentance, to be our personal Savior). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
6. WE BELIEVE...and practice two ordinances—(1) Water Baptism by Immersion after repenting of one's sins and receiving Christ's gift of salvation, and (2) Holy Communion (the Lord's Supper) as a symbolic remembrance of Christ's suffering and death for our salvation.
7. WE BELIEVE...the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is a Special Experience Following Salvation that empowers believers for witnessing and effective service, just as it did in New Testament times. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
8. WE BELIEVE... The Initial Physical Evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is ‘Speaking in Tongues,’ as experienced on the Day of Pentecost and referenced throughout Acts and the Epistles.
9. WE BELIEVE...Sanctification Initially Occurs at Salvation and is not only a declaration that a believer is holy, but also a progressive lifelong process of separating from evil as believers continually draw closer to God and become more Christlike.
10. WE BELIEVE...The Church has a Mission to seek and save all who are lost in sin. We believe 'the Church' is the Body of Christ and consists of the people who, throughout time, have accepted God's offer of redemption (regardless of religious denomination) through the sacrificial death of His son Jesus Christ.
11. WE BELIEVE...A Divinely Called and Scripturally Ordained Leadership Ministry Serves the Church. The Bible teaches that each of us under leadership must commit ourselves to reach others for Christ, to worship Him with other believers, to build up or edify the body of believers–the Church and to Meet human need with ministries of love and compassion.
12. WE BELIEVE...Divine Healing of the Sick is a Privilege for Christians Today and is provided for in Christ's atonement (His sacrificial death on the cross for our sins). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
13. WE BELIEVE...in The Blessed Hope—When Jesus Raptures His Church Prior to His Return to Earth (the second coming). At this future moment in time all believers who have died will rise from their graves and will meet the Lord in the air, and Christians who are alive will be caught up with them, to be with the Lord forever. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
14. WE BELIEVE...in The Millennial Reign of Christ when Jesus returns with His saints at His second coming and begins His benevolent rule over earth for 1,000 years. This millennial reign will bring the salvation of national Israel and the establishment of universal peace.
15. WE BELIEVE...A Final Judgment Will Take Place for those who have rejected Christ. They will be judged for their sin and consigned to eternal punishment in a punishing lake of fire.
16. WE BELIEVE...and look forward to the perfect New Heavens and a New Earth that Christ is preparing for all people, of all time, who have accepted Him. We will live and dwell with Him there forever following His millennial reign on Earth. 'And so shall we forever be with the Lord!'
These are nonnegotiable tenets of faith that all Assemblies of God churches adhere to. This list is derived from the official Statement of Fundamental Truths. Click links below to see the complete original statement with scriptures.
1. WE BELIEVE...The Scriptures are Inspired by God and declare His design and plan for mankind.
2. WE BELIEVE...There is only One True God–revealed in three persons...Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (commonly known as the Trinity).
3. WE BELIEVE...In the Deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. As God's son Jesus was both human and divine.
4. WE BELIEVE...though originally good, Man Willingly Fell to Sin–ushering evil and death, both physical and spiritual, into the world.
5. WE BELIEVE...Every Person Can Have Restored Fellowship with God Through 'Salvation' (trusting Christ, through faith and repentance, to be our personal Savior). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
6. WE BELIEVE...and practice two ordinances—(1) Water Baptism by Immersion after repenting of one's sins and receiving Christ's gift of salvation, and (2) Holy Communion (the Lord's Supper) as a symbolic remembrance of Christ's suffering and death for our salvation.
7. WE BELIEVE...the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is a Special Experience Following Salvation that empowers believers for witnessing and effective service, just as it did in New Testament times. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
8. WE BELIEVE... The Initial Physical Evidence of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit is ‘Speaking in Tongues,’ as experienced on the Day of Pentecost and referenced throughout Acts and the Epistles.
9. WE BELIEVE...Sanctification Initially Occurs at Salvation and is not only a declaration that a believer is holy, but also a progressive lifelong process of separating from evil as believers continually draw closer to God and become more Christlike.
10. WE BELIEVE...The Church has a Mission to seek and save all who are lost in sin. We believe 'the Church' is the Body of Christ and consists of the people who, throughout time, have accepted God's offer of redemption (regardless of religious denomination) through the sacrificial death of His son Jesus Christ.
11. WE BELIEVE...A Divinely Called and Scripturally Ordained Leadership Ministry Serves the Church. The Bible teaches that each of us under leadership must commit ourselves to reach others for Christ, to worship Him with other believers, to build up or edify the body of believers–the Church and to Meet human need with ministries of love and compassion.
12. WE BELIEVE...Divine Healing of the Sick is a Privilege for Christians Today and is provided for in Christ's atonement (His sacrificial death on the cross for our sins). [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
13. WE BELIEVE...in The Blessed Hope—When Jesus Raptures His Church Prior to His Return to Earth (the second coming). At this future moment in time all believers who have died will rise from their graves and will meet the Lord in the air, and Christians who are alive will be caught up with them, to be with the Lord forever. [1 of 4 cardinal doctrines of the AG]
14. WE BELIEVE...in The Millennial Reign of Christ when Jesus returns with His saints at His second coming and begins His benevolent rule over earth for 1,000 years. This millennial reign will bring the salvation of national Israel and the establishment of universal peace.
15. WE BELIEVE...A Final Judgment Will Take Place for those who have rejected Christ. They will be judged for their sin and consigned to eternal punishment in a punishing lake of fire.
16. WE BELIEVE...and look forward to the perfect New Heavens and a New Earth that Christ is preparing for all people, of all time, who have accepted Him. We will live and dwell with Him there forever following His millennial reign on Earth. 'And so shall we forever be with the Lord!'
Baptisms at Immanuel Fellowship
A Guide for Ministers
Understanding the role of Baptism
Beginning in 2010 Immanuel Fellowship has given more significance to Baptism as the conscious beginning and incorporation of new believers the life of the Fellowship. When we say conscious beginning we are saying that the Fellowship is putting more Biblical content prior to and after baptism so that individual believers understand not only the significance of Baptism but also the responsibilities that accompany it.
Baptism incorporates the believer into Christ and his Body the Church. Just as we belong to Christ so we belong to one another.
“For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ ( Galatians 3:27);
“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body”
(1 Corinthians 12:13; see also Romans 12:3-8)
Baptism is our rite of passage into membership with the Church whose head is Christ. Our congregation, Immanuel Fellowship, is the local representation of that Body and within it we exercise our distinct and individual functions (or ministry gifts) as members of the Body.
The Baptismal Candidates Seminar explains not only the meaning and the mode of Baptism but also includes teaching on prayer, church attendance, witnessing and giving. We also give more emphasis to Baptism as the individual believer’s introduction and incorporation into the local body of believers which is Immanuel Fellowship. After Baptism the candidates are introduced to the Fellowship in one of the services and are encouraged to join a discipleship program
Types of Baptismal Candidates
Some Baptismal candidates are children of Christian parents who may or may not have undergone a distinct crisis experience called conversion. Baptism for them is a coming of age and a public declaration of their faith and their formal introduction to the life of the Fellowship. Other candidates are young people or adults who have undergone a conversion experience either in the church or in some other church and now want to indicate through Baptism a public affirmation of their faith and a desire to be incorporated into the Fellowship.
Baptism and the Process of Incorporation into the Fellowship
1. Call to Salvation
In every service a call to salvation is issued. There may or may not be an altar service. Although issued in the congregational setting, we understand the response to the call as private. Therefore no names are recorded.
2. Invitation to Baptism
On the third Sunday the pastor announces that for those who have responded to the call to salvation Baptism is the public affirmation of their private faith. They are invited to a Baptismal Candidates Seminar the following Saturday .
3. Baptismal Candidates Seminar
On the Saturday after the announcement the officiating ministers meet with the candidates and the Primer on Baptism is discussed.
4. Baptism
5. Introduction and Incorporation into the Fellowship
The program of incorporation into the Fellowship includes the following:
• Presentation to the Fellowship during a Sunday worship service.
• Home visitation
• Invitation to join a group or ministry team.
• Invitation to attend Purposeful Discipleship Institute.
Officiating Ministers Decorum
The leading pastor may or may not perform all the parts of the Rite of Baptism. He may participate only up to the Profession of Faith (an affirmation of faith taken from the Apostles Creed), and Associate Pastors then will perform the Rite of Baptism itself. Or he may perform all with the assistance of his Associates.
All members of the Pastoral Team are entitled to perform Baptisms, regardless of gender or paid or volunteer.
Baptism is a very important rite of passage for new believers and the joyousness of the ceremony should not be confused with levity. Officiating ministers should wear the required attire and should step into the water only during Immersion. A formal picture of the candidates with the ministers may be taken for documentation before and after Immersion. Only after photographs have been taken and the ceremony is formally ended will ministers join in swimming.
Officiating Ministers Attire
With the new understanding of Baptism as a rite of passage and a public affirmation of faith, officiating ministers to the Baptism need to give it due ceremonial recognition. The formal attire for such occasion in many churches is a White Robe but until then a formal kind of attire such as a Barong Tagalog is acceptable.
Candidates Attire
In some churches white robes are supplied also to each candidate but until such a time that this is made available, all that is required is for the candidates to be decently dressed.
Immersion
Baptism by immersion can be pose problems because depth of water varies. It must be emphasized that the officiating ministers immerse the entire body in water. To do this it is not enough that the arms are used to immerse the candidate’s body into the water. The legs of the ministers must also bend as the candidate is immersed. If there are two ministers, with one on each side, care must be observed that both move together or one will be holding the back of the candidate while the other minister is pushing down.
The Rite of Baptism
1. Scripture Reading (Romans 6:1-11)
2. A short homily on the passage
3. Individual Testimonies
4. Profession of Faith (Apostles Creed)
5. Affirmation to Immanuel Fellowship Statement of Faith and Core Values
6. Signing of the Baptismal Certificate
7. Immersion
Understanding the role of Baptism
Beginning in 2010 Immanuel Fellowship has given more significance to Baptism as the conscious beginning and incorporation of new believers the life of the Fellowship. When we say conscious beginning we are saying that the Fellowship is putting more Biblical content prior to and after baptism so that individual believers understand not only the significance of Baptism but also the responsibilities that accompany it.
Baptism incorporates the believer into Christ and his Body the Church. Just as we belong to Christ so we belong to one another.
“For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ ( Galatians 3:27);
“The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body”
(1 Corinthians 12:13; see also Romans 12:3-8)
Baptism is our rite of passage into membership with the Church whose head is Christ. Our congregation, Immanuel Fellowship, is the local representation of that Body and within it we exercise our distinct and individual functions (or ministry gifts) as members of the Body.
The Baptismal Candidates Seminar explains not only the meaning and the mode of Baptism but also includes teaching on prayer, church attendance, witnessing and giving. We also give more emphasis to Baptism as the individual believer’s introduction and incorporation into the local body of believers which is Immanuel Fellowship. After Baptism the candidates are introduced to the Fellowship in one of the services and are encouraged to join a discipleship program
Types of Baptismal Candidates
Some Baptismal candidates are children of Christian parents who may or may not have undergone a distinct crisis experience called conversion. Baptism for them is a coming of age and a public declaration of their faith and their formal introduction to the life of the Fellowship. Other candidates are young people or adults who have undergone a conversion experience either in the church or in some other church and now want to indicate through Baptism a public affirmation of their faith and a desire to be incorporated into the Fellowship.
Baptism and the Process of Incorporation into the Fellowship
1. Call to Salvation
In every service a call to salvation is issued. There may or may not be an altar service. Although issued in the congregational setting, we understand the response to the call as private. Therefore no names are recorded.
2. Invitation to Baptism
On the third Sunday the pastor announces that for those who have responded to the call to salvation Baptism is the public affirmation of their private faith. They are invited to a Baptismal Candidates Seminar the following Saturday .
3. Baptismal Candidates Seminar
On the Saturday after the announcement the officiating ministers meet with the candidates and the Primer on Baptism is discussed.
4. Baptism
5. Introduction and Incorporation into the Fellowship
The program of incorporation into the Fellowship includes the following:
• Presentation to the Fellowship during a Sunday worship service.
• Home visitation
• Invitation to join a group or ministry team.
• Invitation to attend Purposeful Discipleship Institute.
Officiating Ministers Decorum
The leading pastor may or may not perform all the parts of the Rite of Baptism. He may participate only up to the Profession of Faith (an affirmation of faith taken from the Apostles Creed), and Associate Pastors then will perform the Rite of Baptism itself. Or he may perform all with the assistance of his Associates.
All members of the Pastoral Team are entitled to perform Baptisms, regardless of gender or paid or volunteer.
Baptism is a very important rite of passage for new believers and the joyousness of the ceremony should not be confused with levity. Officiating ministers should wear the required attire and should step into the water only during Immersion. A formal picture of the candidates with the ministers may be taken for documentation before and after Immersion. Only after photographs have been taken and the ceremony is formally ended will ministers join in swimming.
Officiating Ministers Attire
With the new understanding of Baptism as a rite of passage and a public affirmation of faith, officiating ministers to the Baptism need to give it due ceremonial recognition. The formal attire for such occasion in many churches is a White Robe but until then a formal kind of attire such as a Barong Tagalog is acceptable.
Candidates Attire
In some churches white robes are supplied also to each candidate but until such a time that this is made available, all that is required is for the candidates to be decently dressed.
Immersion
Baptism by immersion can be pose problems because depth of water varies. It must be emphasized that the officiating ministers immerse the entire body in water. To do this it is not enough that the arms are used to immerse the candidate’s body into the water. The legs of the ministers must also bend as the candidate is immersed. If there are two ministers, with one on each side, care must be observed that both move together or one will be holding the back of the candidate while the other minister is pushing down.
The Rite of Baptism
1. Scripture Reading (Romans 6:1-11)
2. A short homily on the passage
3. Individual Testimonies
4. Profession of Faith (Apostles Creed)
5. Affirmation to Immanuel Fellowship Statement of Faith and Core Values
6. Signing of the Baptismal Certificate
7. Immersion
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