Game. Set. Match. Why bishops were the trump card in early church disputes.

Posted in Liturgical Church by Matt Marino

Source: http://phillipsandco.com/blog/2013/5/6/the-dividend-trump-card/

Source: phillipsandco.com

(Apostolic Succession for Newbies, episode 4)

Christians have a fondness for communicating in threes. Paul told the Corinthians, “but now abide faith, hope, and love,”[1] Anglicans approach theology as a three-legged stool: Scripture, tradition and reason. Baptists love a sermon with a three-point outline. And the early church answered the rise of heresies with a 3-part argument of canon, creeds, and apostolic succession. You might be surprised at which of these three sources of authority was the second century church’s trump card. This has taken three posts worth of setup, but now look with me at the method the early church used to answer heresy…

The first argument: Scripture.

The first argument that the early Christians would appeal to in any argument of belief is, and always has been, the writings of the apostles (2 Pet. 3:14-16). In the first three hundred years of the church, however, which books would make up the canon of the New Testament was still being decided. The earliest known list of New Testament scriptures, the Muratorian canon, is thought to date from around c.200. Although the canon would not officially be “set” until c.381, by the second century churches appear to have been reading the four-fold gospel and rejecting the Gnostic gospels.[1] Still, in the second century, an argument from canon could still be met with “whose canon”?

The second argument: Creeds.

The second argument was the development of creeds (referred to as the “rule of faith” by Irenaeus and Tertullian). Early doctrinal creedal statements were apparently in use by c.150 (forerunners of Apostle’s Creed).[2] They formed a summary of the traditional teachings of the church. A creed is effectively a memorable, simplified statement of “here’s what we understand the Scriptures to teach.”

The trump argument: Bishops.

In response, the Gnostic cults argued that the reading of Scripture and traditional interpretation that led to the orthodox creeds were “flawed.” In a rebuttal to that argument, Irenaeus titles Against Heresies, 3:2: “The heretics follow neither Scripture nor tradition.” That led to the church’s final argument, the trump card that the heretics had no answer for: The succession of bishops from the first apostles. Bishops, as the successors given the teaching of the apostles, had determined the canon and developed the creeds. They alone were first, and they were always present throughout the history of the church. The argument for the succession of the teaching of the bishops was historical and inescapable. In effect, the argument against the Gnostics was, “If Jesus had taught some ‘secrets’ why did none of the apostles pass along this information? If they had heard something else, surely they would have passed it down. We know each and every bishop of the major cities by name and we know what they taught. Why have none of them taught these new things?” This formed the compelling and inescapable argument for orthodox theology and against these “new” ideas.

Conclusion

The early fathers, Ireneaus and Tertullian in particular, make the case against the Gnostics like a tennis player going deep on a combination of long, easy shots – and then, when the opponent shifts their position: Wham-o! An un-returnable drop shot just over the net. The early fathers built a compelling case for orthodoxy: In effect they said, “We start with the Scriptures…and you say you do too.” “We have creeds of our teachings…and you have yours.” And then the haymaker: “It is just that our teachings come from the ones that got them from the ones that got them from Jesus. We can name names. Names we all know.”

In the argument against the Gnostics, the three-point argument of canon, creeds and apostolic succession (bishops), it was the continuity of bishops that was the knockout shot. Game. Set. Match.

So when a church gives up Apostolic Succession to stand on the Bible Alone, rather than protecting itself, it actually opens itself to further theological problems.[3]

[1] Gonzalez, Justo. The Story of Christianity. (Peabody, Massachusetts: Prince Press, 2008), 62.

[2] Gonzalez, Justo. The Story of Christianity. (Peabody, Massachusetts: Prince Press, 2008), 63.

[3]which the first three articles in this series clearly show how unhistoric and poorly thought through this popular sentiment is

16Jul2014

Defending an Unfettered Free Market? Christians give up the moral high ground yet again

Posted in Culture by Matt Marino

“Unfettered Free Markets Suck.”

-Adam Smith’s great, great, great, grandson

I have just finished Barry Asmus and Wayne Grudem’s book, “The Poverty of Nations.” In it they argue that prosperity is best arrived at by unfettered free markets, clear titles to property, and the rule of law – all of which make risk taking entrepreneurship possible. I agree with titles and law. I take issue with their first premise: the unfettered free market. I think that defending the unfettered free market is a mistake, especially for Christians. Before I attack it, here are some common arguments for the free market:

1) Free markets allocate resources efficiently. No one person or government can allocate resources the way competition, working freely, can.

2) Free markets take advantage of all of the information in a society, generating stability. No one bureaucracy can adequately plan the way every consumer’s needs can, stimulating through the mechanism of supply and demand, the fulfillment of consumer’s needs.

3) Free markets generate creativity and promote innovation. Steve Jobs says, “I can make a better phone” and we are all better off.

4) Free markets limit the abuse of power by keeping it distributed widely, into the hands of each and every consumer.

These all contain at least an element of truth. And, although I am acquainted with both Barry and Wayne and think highly of them, I would like to push back against the idea of unfettered free markets…[1] Unfettered free markets are simply not, to use a common colloquialism, “all that.”

1) Competition is imperfect. Agents in the UFM (unfettered free market) will naturally conspire to decrease competition – oligarchies anyone?

2) Bidding is also. The UFM assumes that we are all equally free to “bid” for services. Children and future generations, for example, are not. Companies can and do work against their own long-term interest for short-term gain (Chinese air pollution reaching American shores and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch come to mind).

Photo credit: Lea Kelley

3) Cost divergence = markets that aren’t really “free”: The UFM assumes that the nominal cost (what I pull out of my wallet to buy a car) and the real cost (all of the expenses of driving my car: cost to build the roads, lost opportunity cost of land under the freeway, pollution cost of car, cost of administering and policing the roads) are equal. They are not. A government was probably involved in taxing consumers to cover the real cost. Societies’ must provide infrastructures. Do you want that infrastructure planned and inspected by disinterested parties or the company profiting from the bridge you are driving on? Thought so.

4) Socialists are happier. If the UFM was the best economic system then people living in them should be “happiest.” In fact, that is what Dr. Grudem and Mr. Asmus tell us. Unfortunately, the evidence does not bear that out. (http://goo.gl/FZSKVL) Bloomberg reports, The “happiest people,” year after year live in Northern Europe: 1) Denmark, 2) Norway, 3) Switzerland, 4) The Netherlands, 5) Sweden. All are tightly controlled economies. The U.S. ranks 17th.

So color me a believer in some government regulation of economies. Unfettered free market systems regularly create long-term nightmares that people band together and elect governments to solve. Drive up the I-95 toward Philadelphia. It looks like a scene from the movie Soylent Green. Consider also the chemical companies in East St. Louis. Those companies spent 100 years gerrymandered out of the school district of their plant workers so that they didn’t have to pay for schools for their own employees children…even as their toxic sludge oozed up into the basements of those schools. Humans can and should band together to make sure that some decision-making is centralized for the common good – automobile safety regulations, and eliminating lead paint on children’s playground equipment come to mind.) The issue is to figure out which regulations are “doable” (like lead paint) and which are not (a $30/hr. minimum wage) and then give government the teeth for enforcement. A government with no teeth is no government (Insert name of any one of dozens of countries with ineffective/corrupt governments here).

Regulating human selfishness is, by the way, biblical:

1) “The love of money is the root of evil. The UFM assumes that I will love money and my self-interest…not God and neighbor. Do we really want a system that glorifies our sin nature, rather than one which acknowledges but works to moderate it? (1 Timothy 6:10)

2) Scripture assumes that humans, because of sin, are not “free,” but natural oppressors of other humans. (See Amos 2:6-7, 4:1-9). Has an unfettered FM really insured human thriving? Ask the employees of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. O wait, we can’t.

3) We are told to “Bear one another’s burdens.” (Gal 6:2) Let’s employ the hermeneutic principle known as “the clear meaning of words: “Bear”: to carry.” “One another’s”: someone else’s. “Burdens”: That which is heavy.

4) Generosity, the “re-allocation of wealth,” was commanded of individuals (Deuteronomy 23:24-25) in early Israel…but the early government was too weak to provide services. To maintain a completely individualized system leaves aid unevenly distributed-a burden upon those in places with more poor. In an era with more social organization we can do better.

5) There are numerous injunctions to create government. Scripture repeatedly advises the appointment of “judges” – administrators of law and social organization (2 Sam 7:11, 1 Chronicles 17:10, 1 Chronicles 26:29, 2 Chronicles 19:5.) This starts when Jethro sees a need (Exodus 18:13-27). He then creatively solves the problem by generating a new solution: judges for disputes. Why can we not utilize this same method in economics?

6) Did I mention that Jesus told us to share? More than once, too: (Mark 10:21-22, Luke 6:20-21, Matt 25:34-36, Mark 12:41044, Luke 14:12-14, Luke 16:19-25, Luke 11:39-42, Luke 12:16-21).

The question is how best to administer sharing and some regulation for the common good. In Acts, the church gave that task to deacons. Are church buildings and local deacons the most efficient way to care for the poor? Perhaps in some places. Probably not in all places.

And then, there is still that question as to where the “happiest people” live. Again, the data says that Dr. Grudem is wrong. It is NOT the places with the most open and most unfettered free markets, but specifically those places in which markets have some public controls to protect consumers.

The sad thing for me is the way much of the American church defends partisan policies (no economic limits or regulations…Somalia comes to mind) as if this is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Do I really need to say that it is not? I recently posted on FB my joy that a friend, a music minister at his church, and brought to the U.S. as a 9 year old, received Deferred Action to be able to work. Christians railed against this…against a Christian music minister being given the freedom to work in the market as the result of his parent’s illegal actions 15 years earlier. It generated 120 comments in 24 hours.

And we wonder that Christians are no longer seen as crusaders for good? O how we have fallen. In the 1840’s 1/3 of active abolitionists were ordained clergy. The church, once seen as a bastion of care for the less fortunate, is now seen as a tool of tax and charity avoidance. God’s people are commanded to care for the widow, orphan, and alien (Jeremiah 22:3, Exodus 12: 49, Mal. 3:5, Ps. 82:3, 68:5, 10:17-18, Ex. 22:22-23) …And yet we argue for a free market for all…unless, of course, you might not be able to produce papers when stopped for Driving While Brown.

Julian the Pagan, in his (362 AD) campaign to revive paganism wrote, “I think that when the poor happened to be neglected and overlooked by our priests, the impious Galileans (Christians) observed this and devoted themselves to benevolence. They support not only their poor, but ours as well, everyone can see that our people lack aid from us.”

Where did this spirit go? Once upon a time we Christians were known for our love and self-sacrifice. We were known as great defenders of the week and great lovers of those in need.

Will the church reclaim a moral high ground? One in which we love our Lord and His least, last, and lost more than we love protecting our markets, our assets, and our borders?

[1] Barry is a great guy and a friend of Young Life. Wayne is also a very nice man, a best selling author, and has a most amazing array of memorized Scripture.

26May2014

This matters. Stay on your pace.

Posted in Leadership, Youth Ministry by Matt Marino

Does your ministry lose steam at the end of the year? We all know that finishing well is important, but like a fatigued runner, we often lose our stride a bit at the end of the program calendar.

Now we have a fabulous group of youth workers. They love God, one another, and they really care for our students, most of whom are the entry point to the church for their families. But it is the end of the year and…

Games become a little less purposeful…and a few kids stop coming.
Instead of carefully planning the meeting so that all things work together to build Christian community and take kids deeper in their faith, the various components begin to stand alone…and a few more kids drop off.
Bibles aren’t opened and read by students quite as much.
Leaders start doing more – more sharing, more preaching. Students start doing less – and passive kids quickly become disengaged kids.

This happens every year in youth groups all across the country.

For us, this came to a head at our end of the year badminton tournament last week. The kid across the street, a young man we have been inviting to youth group for three years, showed up. O, he joins us occasionally for games and food, but he skips out when students go inside for worship through song and scripture…after eating, of course. Last week he handed me a badminton racquet and asked if I would be his partner for the tournament. I am not a youth leader and had a bunch of stuff to do, but one look at his insistent face and I heard myself saying, “I would love to. But if I do, you stay for Bible study.”

“Deal!” He said, sticking his hand out to shake.

Two leaders were standing behind me. The older one had missed the planning meeting. He whispered to the younger one, “What is the Bible study?”

“We are just having fun tonight.” She said.

His reply, “Hey, our core values include ‘don’t waste kid’s time’ and ‘have fun with a purpose.’ A kid we have been inviting for three years just said he would stay for Bible study. You get a song. I’ll do a message.”

In a highly unlikely turn of events, the neighbor and I won the tournament. As the mob tromped from backyard to living room, the neighbor kid proudly paraded the trophy inside over his head.

When the song finished we passed out Bibles and students read the story of Jesus preaching in the synagogue in Nazareth (Luke 4:14-30). The older leader retold the story of Jesus angering his home town to the point that they took him to the edge of a cliff to toss him off when he turned around and walked away through the silenced mob. He concluded with Jesus, the God of the universe in human form, whose life, death, and resurrection offering us the opportunity to be a Kingdom bringer (a Luke 4:18 life of bringing good news to the poor, proclaiming release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and letting the oppressed go free“). He asked if anyone who hadn’t yet was ready to have “the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:19) by allowing the Lord, Jesus, to become their savior (John 1:12). Three hands shot up. One of them was the neighbor kid’s. He was waving and pointing to himself. The same young man who ignored three dozen invitations…who snuck home early another two dozen times…who had told us repeatedly, “I’m not into God.” That kid, with tears in his eyes, was smiling ear to ear, waving, and saying, “Me! I’m ready.”

And by letting our core values slip in end of the year fatigue we almost missed it.

“how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them?” -Romans 10:14, NLT

So stay on your pace!

Three students had what they experienced as their first God moment Wednesday night. And we darn near dropped the baton in the relay between them and our God.

In track and field finishing well is called having a strong “kick.” Races are won or lost on the final straightaway. Most runners fade. Champions find another gear and shift into it, pulling away from the pack.

The baton we pass is nothing less than the Gospel of Jesus. So end strong friends. Find your kick. Because this race really does matter.

16May2013

Be your own God (in one easy lesson)

Posted in Spiritual Encouragement by Matt Marino

Or…What to do with a Bible that says hard things?

“Then the anger of the Lord was kindled against his people….” –Psalm 106:40

We hear a lot about how “God loves the sinner, hates the sin.” Did you know that the Bible actually says (in 25 places no less) that God is angry with the people doing the sinning?[1] How many times does the Bible say, “Loves the sinner, hates the sin”? A quick search in Logos Bible software found…zero. None. Nada. Zip.

That’s right, according to the Bible, God is angry not just with “sin,” but with the people committing the sins.

So what do we do with a Bible that says hard things? Things that make us cringe when we read them. Or when someone else reads them and asks us about it.

My honest friends say, “I just ignore the stuff I don’t like.” But, unlike our teeth, ignoring Scripture does not make it go away.

We have two polarities: On one side are the uber-fundamentalists who use the Bible as a bat to bludgeon people with whom they disagree. This group tends to be fantastic at seeing past their own logs to other’s splinters. But I fear another extreme: One in which the Scriptures are dismissed outright. As a friend of mine said on facebook the other day, “When my idea of God and the Bible are in conflict, my concept of God wins…because I worship God not a book.”

Huh?

i-love-me-myself-i

The last time I checked I have a finite 5”x 7” head, whereas God, by definition, is infinite intelligence. God, dwelling outside of time and space, can only be known by those of us within time and space if he chooses to reveal himself to us. Luckily God has, through a Son, Jesus. (Heb 1) How do we know this Jesus? Well, the New Testament is not just our primary, but virtually our only source of information on Jesus, God with skin on. The eyewitnesses wrote the Scriptures to reveal that God-in-flesh to us. The Holy Spirit quickens those words in our hearts as faith. When I only believe that which makes sense to me, I am not only cutting myself off from the power of transformation present, but putting my own mind in the role of the definer of reality…i.e. I just gave myself the “god job.” That seems to me to be a place of significant terror.

Not to say that the Bible isn’t nuanced or difficult or complex. It is all of those things. I am not saying that we do not need to interpret what we read, we do. But shouldn’t our method of interpretation be more faithful and consistent than “I only believe what I like.”

Hildegard of Bingen (1098 – 1179) taught that the revelation of Jesus Christ unified and made coherent all Scripture: “In that same vision (of Christ) I understood the writings of the prophets, the Gospels….”

God gets to determine our reality, and God is revealed in Scripture. Anything else leads to the idolatry of self.

Or, I could just decide to be my own God…to let my 5″x 7″ determine my reality…and when the Bible disagrees with what I want God to be like, I can just go with whatever it is that I like…because, hey, I worship the most holy trinity of me, myself and I.

[1] http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=38069&forum=36

14Nov2012

Youth Ministry after “Cool Church”: Sample Youth Teaching on Genesis 1 & 2

Posted in Youth Ministry by Matt Marino

Youth leaders always want to know what theory looks like in practice. Here is an example of one component of a youth group meeting: the teaching time…

Our church plant has a small youth group (usually about 25 students) with 6 very committed young adult volunteer leaders. They recently began a semester of working through the Old Testament.

For Genesis 1 and 2, instead of a sermon or video, the group was divided into two groups by gender. In one room the boy group read Genesis 1 together several times. In the other the girls read Genesis 2. Each group took notes and discussed what the text said and emphasized for the hearers. Then they outlined the chapter. The leaders gave guidance in the form of questions to take the students back to the text when they started reading into it. On a large poster board with colorful markers, each group drew a graphical/artistic representation of their chapter. Then they came back together and the students taught their chapter to the other group from their poster. Having students teaching one another engaged students in the learning process in a way that was wonderful. By the end, each group knew the contents of both chapters.

Then one of the leaders did a wrap-up to help students get the “big picture” and think theologically about their lives – a 7 minute mini-message on “Have you noticed that the first two verses of Genesis One say exactly the same thing your biology teacher taught you?” After reading Genesis 1:1 and 1:2, the leader gave a message that went like this:

Did you notice that both Christians, who think God is the author of life and truth, and scientists, who observe life, have the same version of what happened in the very beginning of the universe? Does that surprise you? More subtle though is the enormous difference between the two narratives. Science, not as a discipline but as an “ism” (called materialism) follows a very different narrative. BTW, We are not anti-science here, but materialism is a philosophy of life that what you see explains everything that is. When you know what materialism teaches you might choose to reject it. For the materialist, time and chance explain everything. For the Christian, the hand of a loving Creator is the ultimate explanation. For the materialist, because they believe only in time and chance, all of life is an accident. For the materialist, you might be “unique,” but you are a unique accident.

On the other hand, for the Christian, all of life is a gift. Life was made on purpose, with a high and holy purpose. So, in the Christian narrative, you matter. What you do matters. What you don’t do matters. Everyone around you matters to God too.

Think of the difference the narrative you believe about your life makes: Can you see how what you do with your life gets shaped by the narrative you believe about who you are? What choices do you make with your life when life has no purpose? (Discussion)

How does it change your choices if you are absolutely convinced that you and everyone else was created on purpose, with a purpose? (Discussion)

If the materialist story is true, nothing you do matters. You don’t matter. If the Christian story is true then everything you do either spreads our Creator’s beauty and redeeming love or shuts it down.

Which narrative do you see being played out around you? What might life look like if everyone you know, new God’s love for them in Christ? You see, both the Christian and the materialist see the same events, they just interpret them differently.

Which narrative would you rather follow with your life? Thinking about what you said in our said in our discussion, why is it important that your friends know “the hope that is within you”?

As a result of the teaching time students left with the ability to tell us what Genesis 1 & 2 actually says…and what it doesn’t say. They learned something about exegesis: letting the text, rather than other’s ideas of the text speak. And more, they left with a powerful doctrine of Creation and can tell you why that doctrine is important. They went to small groups and prayed passionately that God would help them stay clear on who they are and whose they are…and that they would have boldness to share with their friends the Good News of God’s love in Christ-because of how desperately their friends need a different narrative on which to base their life.