Christianity 101

A Great Western Heresy

Associated Baptist Press reports:

The presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church called the evangelical notion that individuals can be right with God a “great Western heresy” that is behind many problems facing the church and the wider society.

Describing a United States church in crisis, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori told delegates to the group’s triennial meeting July 8 in Anaheim, Calif., that the overarching connection to problems facing Episcopalians has to do with “the great Western heresy — that we can be saved as individuals, that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God.”

“It’s caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus,” Jefferts Schori, the first woman to be elected as a primate in the worldwide Anglican Communion three years ago, said. “That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of being.”

She’s wrong.

Doesn’t John 3:16 say so?

HT: The Berean Call

“Nothing Less Than Prophetic”

For those who have taken our religious freedom for granted or have gradually slipped into lukewarmness or even hypocrisy, this book may jolt us back to reality.

The Whirlwind Cometh“Have you read The Whirlwind Cometh?” asked my Arizona friend shortly after noon today.

He just came across the book and is probably done with it by now. He said reading it in the context of what’s going on in the United States these days made chills go up and down his spine.

“It’s nothing less than prophetic,” he said (and I think that’s an exact quote).

He thinks every young man and young woman in our Mennonite churches should read it. “Required reading for” is the way I recall him putting it.

Maybe some day I will get around to posting some excerpts from this novel, set in Canada.

Apparently written by an Amish author who chose to remain anonymous, this inexpensive little book is published by Pathway Publishers. (Maybe this qualifies as one of the few truly profitable amish novels!)

This is an unusual book, a story you will not soon forget. A new Canadian government under Prime Minister John Smith sweeps into power, and at once begins a program to bring reform to Canada. One result is that the historic peace churches are put to a test to see if they are truly nonresistant and if their faith is genuine. The young people must appear before tribunals before they are granted conscientious objector status.

For those who have taken our religious freedom too much for granted, or have gradually slipped into lukewarmness or even hypocrisy, this book may jolt us back to reality. This gripping story is not a history, but a challenge to examine the present and be ready for the future.

Hey — an idea! You could buy your own copy and post your comments here!

Anabaptist Bookstore: The Whirlwind Cometh

Don’t Be So Negative!

When the law says, “Do not kill,” is it presenting a negative or a positive?

Come now, that isn’t such a difficult question, is it? I mean, you see that not there, right? So that makes it a negative law.

Maybe; maybe not.

Interestingly, I’ve never heard anyone complaining about that law, “Oh, there you go being negative again. You just like to tell people what they can’t or shouldn’t do. Why can’t you be more positive? All this negativity is bad. Lighten up!” No, people don’t respond to “Do not kill” that way.

Do you know why not?

Because they realize that if that law keeps a potential killer from killing them, that law is extremely positive. In other words, they see a positive personal benefit in a “negative” law.

Now think of some other “negative” Biblical commands. For example:

  • “Thou shalt not commit adultery” (Exodus 20:14).
  • “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth” (Matthew 6:19).
  • “Speak not evil one of another” (James 4:11).

You won’t have to think for long before seeing that these are extremely positive despite sounding negative. Don’t allow anyone to mislead you!

(originally written in mid-2001 and posted here: Liberty, Not License)

Prayer Walking?

Behold my first research project in a long time.

Here are the main questions that I’ll be investigating for now:

  1. What is it?
  2. Is it in the Bible as history?
  3. Is it in the Bible as teaching or doctrine?
  4. What are its purposes and goals?
  5. What are its benefits?
  6. What are its cautions if not dangers?
  7. Who uses it?
  8. Who is objecting to it?
  9. Is it in the news?

I hope to post the results sometime. But I have to get them first. Hopefully, it will be before my 50th birthday.

Above all, love God!