Many Christians want to return to the New Testament brand of Christianity.  Many from the heritage I grew up in want to restore N.T. Christianity in theory and practice, and I agree.  I truly believe we need to restore the true religion that Jesus taught about – and preached/quoted from Micah 6:6-8:

6 With what shall I come before the LORD
       and bow down before the exalted God?
       Shall I come before him with burnt offerings,
       with calves a year old?

 7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams,
       with ten thousand rivers of oil?
       Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression,
       the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

 8 He has showed you, O man, what is good.
       And what does the LORD require of you?
       To act justly and to love mercy
       and to walk humbly with your God.

Now, let’s go back and re-read that passage and do the fortune cookie exercise… Except we’re going to put “On Sunday” at the END each sentence of those 3 verses. 

I’m in a class this week at Lipscomb called, “Critical Interpretation of the New Testament.”  We’re talking about a number of issues that had a deep impact on the early Christian atmosphere and experience.  What “canon” did they have to study from?  Did they just flip over to 2 Peter and read about the Day of the Lord?  Far from it… the early Christians may have had the 2nd letter of Peter.  But if so, it would have been rolled up most likely as a papyrus scroll, in the pottery urn with many other scrolls.  They might have had random letters or gospel accounts.  They may have had random Hebrew texts as well, or if they were “rich” and fortunate, a copy of the Septuagint (LXX) – or Greek translation of the Old Testament.

Their faith and Christian walk was far more incarnational than specifically doctrinal; by incarnational, I simply mean that it was far more active in ethical and daily walk than we often may do.  Whether we intend to or not, we often reduce our Christian identity to a doctrinal set of rules, or sometimes a life limited to the building we meet in as a church.  In true restoration thinking, and in Jesus’ true teaching, the kingdom is in US.  Not in the building, nor in some corporate entity that is greater than our own personal identity.  None of this is to say doctrine didn’t matter… quite to the contrary – just read the Corinthian letters or the letter to the Romans, or any other epistle that addressed certain topics.  But our problem is a problem of orientation.  Orientation not in the sense of “learning” – but in the sense of our point of view; our location in time and place versus their contextual period and place and time understanding the instruction much more clearly.

I am learning in this class a deeper appreciation for scripture than I ever have had.  It is precious, and what we have is what the Spirit intended for us to have.  And yet as God’s children today, we must not be guilty of Bibliolatry – that is – worship of the word (or Bible) itself, rather than the God, the Savior, the Spirit, and living the reciprocal life of love and service that the true Word (Jesus) leads us to live.  THAT is what I want to restore.  Not merely the dogma of the early church.  In the coming days/weeks, I’ll try to take several issues from different epistles and contextualize them into their time, place, and application. 

LORD, may you help us to be humble.  You are all powerful and glorious, and Father I pray for your guidance for us all.  For us to glorify you and live in your Son Jesus, and that we will demonstrate the Kingdom’s coming in our lives, by the very presence of our King’s love and perfect teachings. 

Never have I had a clue about the Gnostics until this class I’m taking.  And reading through the Patristics (early fathers) has solidified my understanding amazingly well compared to where it was before!  I knew this about the Gnostics: they were people who didn’t believe in the deity of Jesus, they hurt themselves physically in some sort of effort to appease God or “the gods” or something…  In the last week I have learned the following:

• they were slowly pulling Christians away because of warped twisting of what scripture said
• they truly believed to “harm” the body was holy, and was approved and applauded by the “un-named” One, the Father.  They actually get that justification from the covenant God made with Abraham through circumcision, citing Abraham’s cutting away of his flesh as perfect demonstration of his willingness to sacrifice himself to God.  Interesting twist, huh…
• the Gnostics truly believed that gnosis (knowledge, in Greek) was the true way to come back to God.  Intellectual understanding and enlightenment of the Aeons (creatures the great “mother” created with her tears, not from water of earth) and understanding of one’s true place with God was what true salvation was all about.
• Jesus was “a” son of God, and was a representative of the logos (the Word) as the Father’s communication with his people.  He was indeed SAVIOR, but only for those who needed him… in other words, if you had already ascended to your lofty intellectual understanding of God, you did not need this man’s sacrifice for you.
• Jesus could not have been GOD, because for the Eternal one to inhabit this filthy shell of earth and earth’s humanity would not be possible.  However, they were on the same team, and I’m still trying to understand exactly what the Gnostics believed Jesus’ true role was.
• Jesus did in fact rise from the dead for the Gnostics, but it was the power of the Holy Spirit and the Word, which is far superior than this physical earthly dust.  That power demonstrated the WORD, and showed glory to God… drawing believers closer to the Eternal Ineffible One.

Crazy!  Irenaeus was one of the first great fathers to view church history as authoritative ONLY insomuch as it was in accordance with Apostolic tradition.  Either handed down verbally or recorded in scripture by Paul, Peter, etc.  He is the first great theologian to represent the Eastern Mediterranean/Asia Minor school of theology.  That school focused on the Father as a God who loved his people, created covenants with them, and in fact was a Shepherd who brought care to his people.  Jesus coming to redeem his people was part of the Father’s master plan to bring us back into communion with him.

I look forward to more study of Irenaeus, and his amazing grasp of scripture, his ability to use logic and rational discussion and dispute and discredit faulty reasoning by the Gnostics and others.  What a great study!

This week in Historical Theology we’re talking about a number of things.  Specifically we’re reading some good stuff by the early church fathers, Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen (of Alexandria).  Also we’re reading Alister McGrath’s Historical Theology as our continual text and a book by Justo Gonzales that takes a fresh look at the typical thought of these great early theologians.

One of the thought questions this week was:  4.      Summarize and comment on Origen’s trinitarianism.  What is the relationship between the Father, Son and Spirit?  What is the economic function of each?

Interesting question…  To save you from going down to the dusty section of the Christian book library, I’ll do my best to summarize Origen’s thought on the subject, and my post to our class in attempt to answer it!

 – I’ll try to summarize and then offer some specific points from the text.  For Origen, God
is the fullness of all things, “admitting within Himself no addition of any kind.”  He is the
autotheos (or God-in-Himself) and he is above all things.  He is the one of preeminence
in the Godhead, and the one to whom the Son and the Spirit submit.  The SON is Theos (God)
but is not the autotheos (God-in-Himself.  The SON is the
incarnational wisdom and truth of the FATHER, and no wisdom and/or truth can be
discerned except what was first brought into creation through the Son.  He is the
embodiment of wisdom and truth, and as John says, Christ is “the way, the truth, and the
life, and no one comes to the Father but by him.”  The SPIRIT is the means by which God
takes up his dwelling in his people.  God cannot dwell with his people except by the
Spirit’s presence. 

In terms of ECONOMIC function, God doesn’t need money.  🙂  The Father is ALL – lacking in nothing
and being far more glorious than we can perceive, almost like the SUN from our human
eyes.  The Son and Spirit are the ways for us to recognize God and come to him, and for
him – in return to COME INTO us. I must say, after reading this amazing document, I am far more “illumined” about the
nature of the Son and Spirit than I am the Father.  When I was a kid (14 or 15) and
became a disciple of Christ, the elders of our church told me, “you can preach/talk about
anything, except the ‘indwelling of the Holy Spirit.'”  I know know they were speaking
tongue-in-cheek, although there definitely was a stigma of mystery surrounding the
nature of the Spirit and His role.  Nobody wanted it talked about because nobody really
knew the mysteries of the Spirit.  Perhaps – according to Origen – that was one reason
many of them did not seem to have God LIVING within them… their deep confusion
about the Spirit being merely a facade for their own lack of God’s presence (the Spirit
himself) in their lives.  The Son, Jesus is REAL!!  How amazing is God that he would send
himself in Human form, and what amazing life would that man have lived, because he
was, in fact, God? 

Far too much for one post.  Maybe a research paper… or a book, or a thousand books! 
Thank you all for reading.