It's a Paul World

From Generation to Generation

2012-05-26T10:07:00.000-04:00

(Mat 16:18) And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

One of the projects I've been intermittently working on is scanning my notes from my time at Ambassador College into the computer.

It's impressed upon me the lesson of passing on the God's truth from one generation to the next. I've reviewed some of the notes as I've scanned them and I was struck that the concepts in those notes are the same ones being taught today in the Church.

It's each generation's responsibility to pass them on to the next. Throughout history that has happened; at times just barely.

Some of the larger COG's have formalized institutions. The United Church of God has the ABC Program which has been set up to as it says "The program seeks to prepare young adults for leadership and service, and to begin preparing them for the duty of teaching future generations."

I've listened to many of the classes available online. They are quite good and some are equal to if not better than the AC classes.

A couple of the other COG groups have similar ventures.

These are worthwhile and necessary endeavors. While Sabbath services, youth programs and the like serve an important purpose, there is something to be said for focused, intense instruction of a group that has volunteered to be there.

That's also not to discount the role of parents, which is a whole other subject. Not being one myself I hesitate to go there but I was a kid once and I can see what goes on around me. Maybe some day if I'm brave enough...

Entertaining Heresy

2012-05-23T10:08:00.000-04:00

Heretics and the Church of God go hand in hand.

Going back to the earliest writings of the Apostles we see them combatting heresies. Not much has changed except that the social media of today makes them more evident.

Of course not every one that holds a different opinion or even expresses a different opinion is a heretic.

For instance someone new to the faith will not have the same solid foundation as those who have followed the Way for decades. They may also bring baggage or false ideas due to their previous religious background or even from the world. We are all subject to that.

Additionally there are some areas such as application of scripture in the modern era or aspects of prophecy that people of good will may simply understand differently. That doesn't make one a heretic. I can't say that I've agreed with everything that's ever been printed or spoken from the pulpit.

Ultimately what defines a heretic is attitude.

The heretic is on a mission to sway others to their line of thinking.

Now the heretic usually won't admit that. They usually just say they are "asking questions" or just "trying to have a discussion" but a discerning person can spot the real motive. When called on it the heretic usually expresses shock and dismay at our closed mindedness and unwillingness to "come to a greater understanding of scripture."

Many times we find it difficult to do what needs to be done with a heretic.

But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain. A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself. (Titus 3:9-11)

The Greek translated heretick refers to a schismatic, someone looking to create splits or divisions.

They aren't immediately to be given the boot, after all it could be a misunderstanding or they could be ignorant of what they are doing. That's why Paul instructs Titus to give them a couple chances. After that it's pretty obvious what the real motive is.

We all have a responsibility to call out heresy when it is among us.

There are all sorts of church organizations out there from our common heritage that call themselves Church of Gods. Many of them exist because they hold one or more heretical doctrines. For instance there are calendar groups, sacred name groups, people who think the place of safety is in Utah, groups that have differing ideas of the Godhead, new mooners, some that have based their existance on a different interpretation of a minor prophet.

Some from those groups like to infiltrate the social media of mainstream Church of God groups and spread their individual heresy.

We are under no obligation to put up with that. In fact we are told not to.

(2Th 3:6) Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us.

We live in a society where virtually the worst thing we can be called is intolerant. There's nothing wrong with being intolerant of heresy.

Was Jesus Trying to Convert the World? Pentecost is part of the Answer

2012-05-22T09:30:00.002-04:00

So I’m at work yesterday minding my own business when out of the blue I hear someone say “You mean to tell me that when Jesus was preaching he wasn't trying to get as many people as possible to follow Him?”

That kind of talk is pretty unusual at my job so I look up to see what it was all about. Unfortunately I was in the middle of something I couldn’t leave to join the conversation, so I don’t know what the context of that statement was or where it progressed from there.

The answer of course is that it is indeed true that when Jesus Christ was on this earth He was not trying to get as many people as possible to follow. If so He was a miserable failure.

Even Jim Jones had several hundred followers willing to die with him. Around 80 were willing to follow David Koresh to his demise. The Son of God was on this earth and couldn’t do better than them?

Yet it ended up as Christ said in Mark 14:27 (And Jesus saith unto them, All ye shall be offended because of me this night: for it is written, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered.)

Even after His resurrection we find in Acts 1 only around 120 disciples.

All this seems counterintuitive but Jesus told the disciples why in Matthew 13 Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive: For this people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear. (Mat 13:13-16)

He chose out of the world a specific group of people, the disciples, that He taught and explained things to while on this earth. Yet even at the end we still see that the disciples didn’t fully get it because they were missing one key thing; the Holy Spirit. (John 14:26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.)

So now we go back to those 120 in Acts. Chapter 2 relates the arrival of the Comforter or Holy Spirit and the beginning of the New Testament Church. Chapter 2 tells us when this happened on Pentecost (Act 2:1 And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.)

We see the Old Testament significance of Pentecost. In Lev 23:15-16 it states; And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven sabbaths shall be complete: Even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the LORD.

Then in verse 20 And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the firstfruits for a wave offering before the LORD, with the two lambs: they shall be holy to the LORD for the priest.

We understand that on Pentecost the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Church, which makes it possible for there to be spiritual first fruits called out by the Father to receive the Holy Spirit.

So happens that the vast majority of the Church of God will be observing Pentecost this coming Sunday May 27th (those who like to dispute the calendar notwithstanding).

For more information on Pentecost check out this portion of Lesson 12 of the Bible Study Course by the United Church of God.

The Topic of Gay Marriage and the COG

2012-05-20T13:22:00.002-04:00

Homosexual marriage, or gay marriage as the politically correct term seems to be, is a hot national topic.

It’s been simmering for a while. If you recall, in the last presidential election cycle then candidate Obama claimed to support traditional marriage however later he said his views were “evolving”.

Well, everyone knew what that meant and most suspected that after the 2012 election the evolution would culminate in his open support of homosexual marriage. After all the administration had already stopped defending the Defense of Marriage Act.

The issue got away from him however after Vice President Biden’s statement on Meet The Press a couple weeks back. Hence President Obama’s open acknowledgment of what everyone knew his real position was anyway.

This topic isn’t going to go away. There are a couple forces at work here.

First is that virtually every time the issue has ended up on the ballot in the various states, the voters have rejected the idea of gay marriage and most recently in North Carolina it was given a firm thumbs down. However national polling data compared over the years shows the idea gaining support among key demographics.

Additionally this issue will not finally be decided by the voters or even by elected officials but instead by 9 unelected people in Washington wearing robes; the Supreme Court.

I believe that trends are such that probably within the next few years, regardless of how the presidential election turns out, homosexual marriage will be the law of the land.

The question becomes, How does the Church of God deal with this topic internally, as well as in it’s warning to the world and proclamation of the gospel?

This week’s Beyond Today program from the United Church of God was titled Marriage: Soon Obsolete? However it didn’t really address the issue. In fairness these programs are taped quite some time in advance and there was no way to know at the time that the President would bring the issue to the forefront.

But, even if they had known, it is becoming increasingly difficult for religion to speak out on the public airwaves against homosexual marriage. In some cases stations refuse to carry those programs. They may also decide to throw somebody off the air once they face the intimating barrage from the activists.

Fortunately there is the internet which can bypass the censors, at least right now. The United Church of God’s daily video commentary on May 10th addressed the topic. It took the perfectly valid approach of comparing physical marriage to the spiritual marriage of Christ and the Church.

However it left out some of the more direct scriptures found in the New Testament such as Romans 1:26 ( For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; ) or I Corinthians 6:9 (Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,)

That's not a criticism. It's not possible to cover everything in a 3 minute time frame.

Some claim the Bible has nothing to say on the subject and some modern day Bible “scholars” have attempted to massage those scriptures to mean something else but the honest person looking at them knows what they mean. The Church of God has a responsibility to speak out directly on the topic as part of a warning.

When I blogged here earlier I wrote about how that in our past instead of pointing out what the Bible has to say that some went from hating the sin to hating the sinner. That’s clearly wrong but so is ignoring the topic.

In some countries laws are changing that will end up prohibiting discussion of the topic. That has happened in Canada, where people can be brought before tribunals for offending a protected group.

Bill of Rights or not, it will end up happening here.

How about internally within the Church of God? Do we just assume that everyone sees it for the evil it is?

How about “civil unions?” That seems to be the fallback position for those opposed to gay marriage.

We live in this world. It’s attitudes and trends rub off on us. The support for homosexual marriage in society is highest among the youth. Looking at that trend I think we might be surprised what would be found in the thinking among our youth and young adults, especially since we haven’t spent much time dealing with it internally.

It’s not just a topic we should ignore.

He That is First in His Cause

2012-05-19T08:27:00.001-04:00

(Pro 18:17) He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him.

In other words the first person presenting their side of the story usually seems right until the other side gets told or more facts come out.

This week more evidence was released on the George Zimmerman shooting of Trayvon Martin. Everybody knows about this case unless they’ve been in a coma or institutionalized the last few months.

Months ago this incident hit the national stage when loud voices began screaming about a miscarriage of justice. It was made out to be a clear cut case of man shooting an unarmed teenager with no provocation simply because he looked “suspicious.” Information was released that seemed to bolster that claim.

Throw a heaping portion of politics and race into the recipe and the narrative was complete.

Of course until the evidence begins coming out people are pretty much free to make whatever claims they want with no way of contradicting them. However as the real evidence began coming out it apparently began to poke holes in the initial version of events and public opinion seems to be turning in the case. Even yet all the evidence isn’t out. Perhaps that evidence will help the prosecution. Who knows?

Unfortunately this is going to end badly for all involved. Trayvon Martin was killed. Regardless of how it turns out George Zimmerman’s life will never be the same. Nationally this has the potential of being a racial flashpoint similar to the Rodney King beating verdict.

How many times in our lives do we take sides or form hardened opinions based on only one side of the story? Have we ever found out later that had we waited for all the information we’d have come to a different conclusion?

I know I have.

Often times we are tempted to make snap judgments. That’s not the Christian mind. The Christian mind is discerning, sober, not rash.

If we don’t follow those principles we can find ourselves making bad decisions that may have profound consequences.

Do We Value the Word Enough?

2012-05-15T10:30:00.000-04:00

The Church of God today has advantages most of our predecessors did not. For the last couple hundred years or so we have been relatively free in the western world to practice and promote our beliefs. On top of that we mostly live in areas at peace. Although the US and other western nations have been at war for over 10 years now that war is not taking place here and has little real impact on our daily lives. Of course we have had and have members in other parts of the world where that is not the case but I’m speaking in generalities of the circumstances most of us face.

That was not always so. A quick browse through our history would show most of our spiritual ancestors faced varying amounts of persecution. They practiced the way and tried to spread it at great cost to themselves. They lived in lands constantly at war where danger was real.

Additionally they didn’t have the access to God’s word with the ease we do today. I take a quick glance around my area here and I see 5 different hardcopy versions of the Bible plus many others on computer software. Then there are the different Bible helps and the vast amounts of information available to us on the various COG websites such as the United Church of God’s and other of the COGs.

Some time back I was reading a book on Christianity in the middle ages and it mentioned how families or groups would assign different members the responsibility of memorizing large portions of scripture. Since copies of the scripture were rare and sometimes illegal to own, this was a way of ensuring the family or group could recreate them if destroyed.

That’s how dedicated they were and how much they valued what they had.

Today no such scarcity exists. We can have as much access as we want. One of the great lessons of markets is that the more there is of something the less it is valued. You know, supply and demand. I fear the abundance of our supply has lessened it’s value to us.

Sometimes I ponder an irony I imagine; that those of us with the most access to God’s word in all the history of man, probably spend the least amount of time studying it.

I can only guess the amount of time and effort it would take to memorize large portions of scripture. I don’t mean just a few verses but rather chapters and books.

Instead our time is eaten away each day like a moth eating an old coat. Of course we have to earn a living. We have family responsibilities and you know what they say about all work and no play. Before you know it another day has gone by.

Occasionally moments of crisis rise that may compel us to delve in deeper but I doubt any of us spend the time that we should in it.

I would suggest that if we had, the last 20 years or so of our Church of God history would look a lot different.

Social Media and the Christian

2012-05-13T07:41:00.001-04:00

(Pro 10:19) In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin: but he that refraineth his lips is wise.

One of the things I considered while I pondered a return to blogging was what I wanted it to reflect. As Christians we should be reflecting a specific way of life. What we say and what we post in the social media is a part of that.

Just as I can’t say I’m proud of everything that’s ever come out of my mouth, I can’t say I’m proud of everything I’ve ever posted in the social media. So what is the solution?

Some within the Church of God community have said Christians should not use social media and have banned their members from those kind of sites.

That’s one approach, but that seems to me to be like telling people to avoid sinning with their lips by never speaking and as any of us who have ever incurred the wrath of someone on the road knows, gestures can convey just as much as the mouth.

No, being mute is not the answer.

A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh (Luke 6:45)

The answer is to instead work on changing the heart.

There are numerous blogs that claim to be part of the Church of God community. Some are quite good. Others claiming to be part of our heritage seem to be dedicated to tearing others down within the COG environment.

That’s not what we should be doing. What we post is not only read by those familiar with us but those that may be curious or who may hit upon a particular topic. How does what we post reflect to them about us?

Just as not every thought that enters our head is worthy of blurting out, neither is it worthy of posting.

Those of us who make the decision to blog or use other forms of social media have, whether we realize it or not, put ourselves out there for scrutiny. What we post not only tells readers about our topic but it tells them about us.

Let’s do it circumspectly and responsibly.

Back to Blogging

2012-05-13T04:00:00.000-04:00

I blogged here for a few years, with the exception of a brief hiatus or so, up until about a couple years ago when I just didn’t have the time to continue. Another consideration was that I wanted to change the direction of the blog but wasn’t really sure what that would end up being.

After some consideration and some ground rules I’ve set for myself I think I’ve found a way to pick back up the hobby again with a tighter focus and not as frequent posting.