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THE HISTORICAL MATURING OF THE CHURCH
After the Ascended Messiah
through the Holy Spirit created the Church and separated it from the nation
Israel, it began its own distinct history. As an unforeseen entity of the
inter-advent age, the Church revealed a new administration (or dispensation) of
God. This new dispensation features a new relationship between believers and
God the Son. In this chapter we’ll explore that relationship further.
It’s important to clarify at
the beginning of our discussion the term “fellowship” as it occurs in I John
1:1-3. Usually when Christians speak of fellowship we think of relating to
other believers in our locality. The term has a much larger horizon. In the original
text of I John, in fact, it means receiving the gospel message of the apostles
that enables us to have fellowship across spatial and temporal boundaries with
the apostles! Since the Church is one Body existing across the centuries of
time we need to expand our fellowship horizon so we can learn not only the Word
of God that originated with the apostles but also the lessons learned by
previous generations of saints. The formal name of that study is historical
theology. Although this chapter is far too short for any substantial
presentation of historical theology, hopefully it will open the door for a new
dimension of fellowship across the centuries of the Body of Christ.
Toward that end we will
review the stages of growth encountered throughout the nineteen centuries since
Pentecost. Each stage reveals God’s pedagogical administration through the
headship of Jesus and the illuminating ministry of the Holy Spirit. Finally, we
will examine the divinely-designed processes of Christian growth that make use of
the positional work of the Trinity that was taught in the previous chapter.
COMPLETING THE CHURCH’S
FOUNDATION
The first generation of
Christians witnessed the infant stage of Church growth. Although Infancy
doesn’t last, it’s absolutely vital for latter growth. During the infant stage
the foundation was laid on which all subsequent Church growth depended. Often
we romanticize this early stage, expressing our nostalgia to “get back to the
early church.” We must be careful here. Normal healthy adults don’t wish to
return to their infancy. Whereas infancy does possess certain desirable traits,
the stage itself should not be an object of desire. The early Church indeed
possessed praiseworthy characteristics but it also was exceedingly immature,
doctrinally unprepared to meet Satanic deceptions and opposition, and as full
of strife and discord as it is today.
Let’s look at the Church’s infancy to see what God accomplished during those
years and at the same time to see what infantile features needed to be changed.
SENSE OF DISTINCT IDENTITY
As we learned in the previous chapter, it took over a generation
for the Church to realize that it wasn’t part of Israel. In the days
immediately following Pentecost, the period most romanticized in Christian
imagination, believers kept close fellowship with each other and with the Lord.
In fact the grammatical construction in Acts 2:42 indicates that the term
“fellowship” meant eating and praying together. Apostolic teaching prevailed,
wonders and signs occurred, great trust and harmony permeated the group, and
many unbelievers were coming to faith (Acts 2:43-47).
The context of this
fellowship, however, was entirely Jewish and centered upon the Temple precinct of
Jerusalem (Acts 2:46). The Church seemed to be nothing more than a subset of
Jews within national Israel. Only after a series of painful adjustments to
divinely-arranged circumstances did the Christian community expand beyond
Jerusalem and emerge from the Jewish culture throughout the Levant. Rejection
of the gospel in synagogue after synagogue eventually separated the Church from
Israel. Not until the end of the book of Acts does the Church attain a sense of
identity distinct from Judaism.
In several ways the Church’s
infancy paralleled the Israel’s Restoration period that we studied in Part IV
of this series. Just as the OT canon finally was completed in
the fifth century, B.C.,
when God began a four-century long period of public silence, so at the end of
the first century, A.D., the NT canon was completed and God once again began a
period of silence that so far has continued for over nineteen centuries. This
topic of canonical scripture addresses several important characteristics of
God’s historical revelation.
Apocalyptic Revelation
Closes the Canon. When the OT canon was nearing completion, God revealed the future in
apocalyptic terms, that is, in vivid imagery given by vision and dream along
with angelic beings who partially interpreted the imagery to the recipient. OT
canonical apocalyptic literature includes portions of Isaiah, Ezekiel, and
Daniel. Similarly, when the NT canon was nearing completion, God again revealed
the future in apocalyptic terms to John on the isle of Patmos, producing the
last book of the NT, the Revelation. In both cases, the emphasis of the
apocalyptic revelation centers upon enduring hope against a hostile world. The
imagery in both cases reveals that God will surely end the cosmic struggle
between good and evil and usher in a paradise on earth for those whom He
declares righteous.
Appearance of apocalyptic
revelation to John on the isle of Patmos, therefore, signaled to those
knowledgeable of God’s ways that public revelation was drawing to a close. The
time was ripe for collecting all available revelation into a canon.
Historically-Interrupted
Revelation Requires the Canon. In Part III of this series we studied the doctrine
of revelation in connection with the Mt. Sinai event. We noted then that
biblical revelation has at least five characteristics: it is verbal (public
language, not private mysticism), personal (personal response required, not
academically “objective”), historical (only occurs at designated times, not
continuously given), comprehensive (addresses every area of life, not confined
to religious topics), and prophetic (speaks of what lies beyond man’s mental
limitations in time and space). Here we wish to revisit the historical
characteristic of revelation.
By saying that God’s
revelation is historical we mean that He does not reveal Himself publicly to
each generation of man. Since revelation does not occur in everyone’s immediate
experience, God’s revelation must be preserved. When the canon of Scripture,
therefore, is about to be finished, steps must be taken to preserve that
revelation for future generations of man. God designated Israel as the
custodian of Scripture (Rom. 3:2; 9:4). Even the NT came into existence through
Jewish authors (with the possible exception of Luke). And the Jewish Messiah
controlled the generation of the NT documents through these authors (John
14:26). The body of NT revelation Paul calls the “mind of Christ” (I Cor.
2:16).
While the apostles still
lived, the Church contented itself with oral tradition (II Thess. 2:15). As the
apostles died off, however, an obvious need for written documents arose. At
first written and oral sayings of Jesus such as the fragment in Acts 20:35
circulated throughout the Levant. Paul distinguishes his instructions from
those of Jesus’ sayings in I Corinthians 7:10, 12, 25.[1]
In addition to these sayings, the early Church used lists of standard OT quotes
to prove the Messiahship of Jesus (e.g., Pss 2, 16, 110). Eventually, various
records and epistles began to appear (e.g., Luke 1:1-4; Col. 4:16; I Thess.
5:27; I Tim. 5:18; II Pet. 3:15-16).
The historic nature of God’s
revelation thus requires existence of a clearly-defined record of it, i.e., the
Scriptural canon. Israel’s function in human history once again caused the
appearance of canonical texts. All the NT authors with the possible exception
of Luke were Jews.
The Church Recognizes the
Canon. Very
early the Church recognized the OT books that the Jewish community thought of
as canonical. These are the same books that we Protestants have in our Bibles.
Unfortunately, a few other books written prior to the NT (e.g., I and II
Maccabees, Tobit, etc.), were circulated for general reading in the churches
although they were not intended as doctrinal authorities. These books, while
useful in showing cultural and linguistic background of the centuries just
prior to NT times, contain unorthodox doctrines such as praying for the dead.
Eventually, the Council of Carthage in A.D. 397 included these “extra” books in
its list of canonical OT writings in addition to the standard Hebrew OT canon.
This list establishes the OT collection of books today in Roman Catholic
Bibles. Protestants later purged these extra books from the OT canon and
re-adopted the ancient Hebrew list of books.
Recognition of the NT canon
followed a similar path with a slight difference. By A.D. 366 our present NT
canon was on the verge of definition. The famous bishop of Alexandria,
Athanasius, listed the books which were to be read in the churches and which
“included all and only those that are recognized today in the Roman Catholic,
Orthodox, and Protestant churches.[2]
The Council of Carthage
officially affirmed the NT list. Although the NT canon and OT canon (with a few
additions) were both accepted by the end of the fourth century, A.D., the NT
canon was not at first put on a par with the OT canon insofar as authority was
concerned. NT books were recognized as divinely-written scripture (e.g., II
Peter 3:15-16), but they were also seen as supplementary to oral tradition.
Paul himself received oral tradition which he accepted as authoritative (I Cor.
15:3,11). He spoke of oral as well as written authoritative teaching (II Thess.
2:15). Both Roman Catholicism and the eastern Orthodox churches argue that the
oral part of the apostles’ authoritative teaching continues within their
churches and justifies the authority of church offices as equal or superior to
the NT writings. We will return to the issue of authority later in this
narrative of the historical growth of the Church. Eventually, the Church had to
face the implications of NT canonicity
for the proper location of
authority.
The Disappearance of Certain
Spiritual Gifts. The NT itself gives evidence that the miraculous “sign” gifts of the
apostolic era were already dying away. These were discussed in Chapter 2 above.
Once the Church was founded,
those gifts that had accomplished the work of founding were no longer
necessary. Although it is somewhat controversial, the present author believes that
the event which Paul said would render the sign gifts obsolete was the
establishment of the NT canon (see I Cor. 13:8-10). Since the last NT
book was written just prior
to the end of the first century (Revelation), this identification implies that
the reason sign gifts were disappearing in the first and second centuries,
A.D., was that the NT canon had come into existence and was being recognized
throughout the Church.
This pattern of a relatively
brief period of sign miracles accompanying a cluster of high-profile events in
God’s ongoing plan shows up several times in biblical history. Table Seven
which is adopted from Dillow’s study pictures these three periods.[3]
During the first period
Moses and Joshua founded the nation of Israel and needed divine authentication
of their role and
|
Era |
Starting characteristics |
Authentication of Messengers |
Authentication of Message |
Vivid Instruction |
|
Moses and Joshua (1441- 1390 BC) |
God forming a new nation, Israel (Exod. 19:8;33:13;Deut. 4:6-8) |
Moses (Exod. 4:1-9, 29-31); Joshua (Josh. 3:7) |
To Pharaoh (Exod. 7:17; 8:19); To Israel (Exod. 6:6-7; 14:31) |
Israel (Exod. 10:12; 14:13- 14); Egypt (9:26; 11:7; 14:4); Nations (9:16; Josh. 2:9-11) |
|
Elijah and Elisha (870-785 BC) |
Decline and Fall of Israel not due to false religion (I Kings 17:1) |
Elijah (I Kings 17:1; 18:36); Elisha (II Kings 5:8) |
To Israel (I Kings 17:24;
18:36) |
Prophets of Baal; People of Israel (I Kings 18:39; II Kings 5:15) |
|
Christ and the Apostles (AD 25- 95) |
Separation of the Church from Israel |
Christ (Mark 2:7; John 14:11; 20:30-31); Apostles (II Cor. 12:12; Heb. 2:4) |
To Israel (John 10:37-38; Acts 3:1-8); To Church (Acts 10:44-48; 15:8-9) |
To Israel (Matt. 8:26); To Church (Acts 5:1-11; I Cor. 5:3-5). |
Table 7. The Three High-Frequency Miraculous Periods of Biblical History (adapted from Dillow’s work, Speaking in Tongues).
of their message. Strict
instruction during this early period in Israel’s history was needed in order to
generate a broad enough loyalty to the Word of God to support the founding of
Israel. The second period in the days of Elijah and Elisha shows very similar
circumstances. God was announcing doom upon the Kingdom because of apostasy and
unbelief. It was necessary, however, to demonstrate that the decline and fall
of the nation wasn’t due to the superiority of false religion. Miracles proved
that God was “alive and well” if only the Israelites would believe. These same
elements appear again in the third era of high-frequency miracles during the
time of Christ and the apostles. A new era was beginning with the inter-advent
period and the rise of this new Body of Christ, previously unanticipated. The
infant Church needed a powerful boast in history.
A survey of biblical data
regarding sign miracles quickly shows that the signs were linked strongly to
new revelation coming onto the historical scene. Such miracles were
“attention-getters” primarily directed to Israel (I Cor. 1:22). The Bible,
however, warns us about one restriction on our interpretation of miracles.
Miracles done by heretics and false teachers have no authoritative force (Deut.
13:1-5). Thus the miracles themselves do not have authority equal to the
content of the new revelation being given. Sign miracles existed to confirm
revelation, not to divert attention from it or compete with it.
If the purpose of sign
miracles was to confirm revelation, then it follows that after new revelation
had been given and accepted, one would expect the sign miracles to diminish.
The NT clearly witnesses to the gradual disappearance of certain spiritual
gifts that were of the sign-miracle category. Whereas in the earlier days Peter
and Paul could heal at will (Acts 5:12-16; 19:12), in the latter days Paul
could not heal certain individuals (Phil. 2:25-28; II Tim. 4:20). As Sir Robert
Anderson wrote of this decline:
“I know that if in the days
of His humiliation this poor crippled child had been brought into His Presence
He would have healed it. And I am assured that His power is greater now than
when He sojourned upon the earth, and that He is still as near to us as He then
was. But when I bring this to a practical test, it fails. Whatever the reason,
it does not seem to be true. This poor afflicted child must remain a cripple. I
dare not say He cannot heal my child, but it is clear that He will not. And why
will he not? How is this
mystery to be explained? The plain fact is that with all who believe the Bible,
the great difficulty respecting miracles is not their occurrence, but their
absence.[4]
Other spectacular signs
ceased, too. The miraculous prison escapes stopped so that all the apostles,
except possibly John, died as prisoners of the state. The sudden judgments such
as those in Acts 5:1-11 and 12:20-25 diminished to the point where enemies of
the Church like Alexander (I Tim. 1:19-20; II Tim. 4:14-15) and Diotrephes (III
John 1:9-10) apparently were left unimpeded. During this gradual disappearance
of sign gifts, the apostles were dying off. This is not a coincidence.
According to II Corinthians 12:12, the miraculous gifts were inevitably linked
to the apostles. Along with the apostles dying off, Israel as a nation ceased
to exist in AD 70. The physical and political counter-culture that God
established as the conduit of revelation and custodian of Scripture went down.
Along with the establishment of the canon, therefore, went the disappearance of
its sources.
The infant stage of the
Church came to an end. In I Corinthians 13:8-10 Paul predicted the end of
infancy. The gifts of prophecy and knowledge—so necessary when the NT was being
generated—would be cut off. The gift of tongues would cease in and of itself.
This more mature stage of Church history would feature something Paul called
“perfect” (13:11). Since this maturity is contrasted with knowing and
prophesying “bit-by-bit”, it must refer to a state when all revelation is
finished and available. From Paul’s vantage point at the time he wrote I
Corinthians, he was not sure whether this maturity would be reached in an
imminent rapture (see next Chapter) or over a prolonged period of time. As it
turned out, of course, Israel continued to harden itself so the Church age had
to go on for a long time.
Church history witnesses to
the disappearance of the gifts that founded the Church. John Chrysostom (ca. AD
347-407) when he discusses I Corinthians exposition of sign gifts says that the
passage “is very obscure: but the obscurity is produced by our ignorance of the
facts referred to and by their cessation, being such as then used to occur but
no longer take place.[5]
Protestantism has always
been cessationist because it places the supreme authority in the Bible, not
Church offices and activities. The Westminster Confession of Faith puts the
matter well: “The whole counsel of God,
concerning things necessary for his own glory, man’s salvation, faith, and
life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary
consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to
be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit, or traditions of men.”
(Chapter 1, Article 5) Those today in the Church who crave a renewal of sign
miracles never seem to understand what they are really asking for. They desire
a re-opening of the canon and a return to the infancy of the Church. They
demean the finality of the revelation given once-for-all in Christ (Jude 1:3).
They mimic Philip in John14:7-10 who, not satisfied with the final revelation
of God in Christ, wanted some flamboyant signs. Jesus’ answer to Philip is the
answer to all who similarly seek such signs: “have you not known Me?”
Knowing God in Christ indeed
is the mark of a well-founded faith. Along with the rise of a sense of distinct
identity and the completion of the canon, the last characteristic of the
founding era of the Church has to be its formulation of Who God is and Who
Christ is.
-
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See Notes from Part V
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By the first few centuries
Christ had firmly founded His Church on earth. His promise of further
revelation through the Holy Spirit had come to pass (cf. John 14:26). The
revelational process ended. The NT canon existed. The Church had spread into
the world outside of Israel. As it spread into the Japhetic culture of Europe,
the Holy Spirit led the Church to delve more deeply into the Word of God over
against heretical attacks against it. The first stage of theological maturation
gave a clear understanding of the nature of the God Who Reveals Himself as a
Trinity. At Chalcedon the Church arrived at a clear understanding of Jesus
Christ as the God-man. Thus the Holy Spirit founded the Church with a clear
grasp of both the revelation-source (the OT and the apostolically-generated NT)
and the God Who gave it (Trinity and Christology).
GRASPING WHAT REDEMPTION IS
ALL ABOUT
People often think of the
period from the fall of the Roman Empire (ca. 600) to the Reformation (ca.
1500) as the Medieval Period or Middle Ages. Anti-Christian
historians, of course, call
this period the Dark Ages out of their hatred of the gospel. Regardless of such
negativism, the Middle Ages saw the gospel as the only hope in a very bleak
Europe. During that period much effort was devoted to the task of clarifying
the work of Christ as to its purpose and its result. For the sake of brevity I
will refer to previous Parts of this Series throughout the discussion.
Early Church fathers
continued the apostolic emphasis upon the redemptive work of Jesus Christ.
Their writings show true thankfulness to God for the Cross. The second century Epistle
to Dignetus contains this passage: “O the sweet exchange, O the inscrutable
creation, O the unexpected benefits; that the iniquity of many should be
concealed in One Righteous Man, and the righteousness of One should justify
many that are iniquitous![6]
Clearly, the fathers
rejoiced in the saving work of Jesus Christ. If the foundational stage of
church history featured the completion of the canon of Scripture and exposition
of the Trinity and the God-Man, the next stage of church history shows a maturing
understanding of the work of Christ and its result in our salvation. The
foundational stage basically settled two major issues against all competing
views: the source of authority (divine revelation instead of human reason and
imagination) and the nature of God (Triune and Incarnational rather than
solitary monotheism of Unitarianism). These advances occurred primarily in the
West, the European (Japhetic) portion of the Church. The eastern portion of
Christianity did not so sharply distinguish the canonical Scripture from
tradition nor did it wholly concur with the Chalcedonian Christology. This
trend of clearer and more detailed doctrinal development in the West than in
the East continued into the next stage of history.
Prior to AD 600 about the
only concept different from the usual substitutionary blood atonement idea was
that Christ’s Cross work paid a ransom to Satan. Historians question how
widespread this strange idea was, but they generally trace it back to Origin
(c185-254). The ransom-to-Satan theory of the Cross apparently arose out of
reflection upon our release from his power as revealed in passages like Hebrews
2:14. However, it never became a major view. By the Middle Ages, however,
powerful competing ideas of the Cross arose and had to be dealt with. As in the
case of all doctrinal advance and maturation, growth came about only because of
heresy and conflict.
We have previously discussed the issues surrounding the atoning
work of Christ on the Cross in Part V. The great theologian of the Middle Ages,
Anselm (A.D. 1033-1109), created the first grand synthesis of doctrine
concerning the atonement in his work Cur Deus Homo (Why the God-Man). Anselm,
you will recall, insisted
- - - - -See
Notes from Part V
- - - - -that
God could not arbitrarily
forgive sin without jeopardizing His character. This is the Anselmic or
Satisfaction Theory of the atonement. It assumes a estitutionary view of
justice and includes the concepts of redemption economic viewpoint), propitiation
(personal viewpoint), and reconciliation (social viewpoint). The Reformers
sharpened Anselm’s Satisfaction Theory by specifying what in God’s nature
required atonement (His justice) and how that requirement was met (penal
judgment). Obviously, European Christianity thought through the economic and
legal metaphors of biblical revelation in linking the sinner, Christ, the
Cross, and fellowship with God. Against this Anselmic Satisfaction Theory, came
the attack of Peter Abelard (1079-1142) who sought to explain the work of
Christ by his Moral Influence Theory. He argued that the Satisfaction Theory
made God into an ogre, demeaned His love, and obliterated the freeness of God
to forgive mankind (i.e., that if God could only forgive on the basis of penal
substitutionary atonement, then He truly wasn’t free but bound by His nature).
He argued that humanity’s problem wasn’t sin before a holy God but lack of love
and selfishness. The purpose of the Cross, therefore, was to demonstrate love
and selflessness. It generates a human emotional response in order to
change human behavior. This
Aberlardian Moral Influence Theory has recurred again and again since the
Middle Ages throughout Unitarianism,
liberalism, and even in
evangelical revivalism.[7]
Fortunately, both Roman
Catholic and the Reformers rejected Aberlard’s view and agreed with Anselm. The
Cross work aimed at resolving an objective God-centered and external to man
rather than one internal to man alone. Nonetheless, Romanism denied the
Protestant contention that Christ’s atonement immediately justified those who
believe and that its benefits pass to the believer directly. Romanism insisted
that Christ’s work, though objective and substitutionary, only provides the potential
for justification and depends upon man’s cooperation through the sacraments
of the Church. We will discuss this Romanist-Protestant difference below. For
now, we merely want to clarify that by the end of the Middle Ages the work of
Christ on the Cross had been clarified as judicial, God-centered, and
substitutionary. The opposing views had to deny God’s just nature, had to
trivialize the implications of sin, and turned the emphasis from God to man. In
emphasizing the judicial nature of the Cross, we mustn’t deny that it does
exert a moral influence upon us as John 12:32 states. However, this moral
influence exists only because the work is primarily judicial. If God’s nature
didn’t require atonement for sin, then the Cross work would essentially be
optional. Christ’s work on the Cross would be unnecessary. Such is the nature
of all unbiblical views of the death of Christ. All such unbelief must, in its
very core, re-engineer God’s nature to form a false idol to replace the God of
the Bible Whose nature demands what unbelief deems unnecessary—viz., the Cross.
It behooves us today as
Bible-believing evangelicals to ensure that the gospel remains true to the
Scripture concerning the work of Christ. Emotional appeals to people that speak
only of God’s love merely reiterate Abelardian heresy. Gospel presentations,
in order to genuinely call sinners to God, must deal forthrightly and clearly
with the judicial issues of fallen man before a holy God. Something far
greater than human psychology is involved here!
RECEIVING THE BENEFITS OF
THE CROSS
Closely related to the purpose and results of the work of Christ on the Cross is the matter of how mankind receives the benefits of that work. Toward the end of the Middle Ages and into the Reformation period, further controversy occurred in the Church that focused on this matter. Note the inherent logic in the sequence of great
debates throughout Church
history: first, the matter of authority (reason, experience, or revelation),
then the nature of God (Unity or Trinity, Christ as mere man, apparition, or
God-man), then the nature of Christ’s work on the Cross (merely a demonstration
of love, or a substitutionary and vicarious atonement), now how man is saved by
that Cross work. Note, too, how departure from the truth at one of these
issues, implies departure from the truth at all going before. Abelardian views
of the atonement, for example, stem from heretical views of the nature of God
and before that heretical views of reason versus revelation. To answer such
heresies successfully, therefore, we must not merely answer the apparent focus
of the heresy. We must go further back and point out the background compromises
and departures from Scriptural truth.
Early Church Fathers
elaborated on their understanding of sin and grace only as they felt the heat of
heresies. In the Eastern churches Gnosticism denied, among other things, the
responsibility of man. The Eastern Fathers, therefore, came down hard on the liberty of volition. In doing so,
however, they avoided delving into the implications of Adam’s fall. Western
Fathers went further in thinking about the implications of the fall. They saw
the fall as corrupting man’s volition but not destroying it. By corrupting it,
they meant that volition after the fall was limited to only evil choices.
The most famous debate in
regard to man’s will and reception of salvation centered around two Christian
leaders in the fourth century. One was a British monk who had come to Rome,
Pelagius (AD 354-418?). The other was the North African bishop Augustine (AD
354-430). Hannah describes the controversy:
“Pelagius. . .opposed the
doctrine of Adamic unity and guilt by birth inheritance. The state of birth, as
it relates to Adam, is merely that of a tendency to follow bad examples, which,
for some reason, we voluntarily emulate. There is no unity in Adam’s fall, each
person being born into the same state as Adam before the Fall and voluntarily
falling from grace. . . .
Grace is an assisting gift
from God if one chooses to avail oneself of it. . .
.
A corollary of Pelagius’s denial
of human inability was the assertion that God’s election of humankind. . .was
dependent upon His knowledge of the actions of the sinner if given a view of
God’s grace.[8]
Augustine vehemently opposed
Pelagius’ doctrine. Again Hannah tells the story:
“Augustine argued that by
Adam’s first sin, in which the entire human race participated, sin came into
the world, corrupting every person both physically and morally. Everyone, being
of Adam, is born into the world with a nature that is so corrupted that they
can do nothing but sin. . . .For Augustine, the need for grace was central. Our
disfigured condition is not so much that we are unable to choose Christ;
rather, it is that humanity does not have a desire to know Christ. . .
.Absolute inability on
the sinner’s part
necessitates a divine initiative and drawing mercies. Further, since humankind
is unable to be aware of God’s grace, God could not have determined to save
based upon a foreseen response of the sinner.”[9]
Augustine’s views partially prevailed throughout later Church councils that condemned Pelagianism’s denial of original sin. However, inconsistently those same councils also rejected Augustine’s teaching of predestination that logically followed from human inability. Medieval theology up to the Reformation, therefore, was partially Augustinian and partially Pelagian. With man unable to receive the benefits of the Cross apart from God’s gracious overcoming of his inability, medieval theology next began to expound the details of how God’s grace worked. A teacher in the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, Peter Lombard (AD 1100-1160), advanced the Roman Catholic doctrine of the sacraments. God’s grace, Lombard insisted, came to man through the sacraments, bit by bit. The term “justification” came to mean a gradual infusion of grace via the sacraments, a meaning that Protestants preferred to label as “sanctification” rather than “justification.” (Watch the terminology here, or you’ll miss the heart of the Protestant-Catholic debate!) Following Lombard, the greatest of all Roman Catholic theologians, Thomas Aquinas (AD 1225-1274), continued the insistence upon God’s grace as mediated to man through the Church via sacraments.
When Protestantism arose
through Luther and Calvin, the issue of human inability and God’s grace formed
the heart of the controversy. Writing his Bondage of the Will, Luther insisted
over against other Protestants such as Erasmus (who wrote Diatribe of the
Freedom of the Will) that the fall’s lasting effects are so profound that apart
from God’s grace no one can receive Christ’s saving work. The sacraments,
Luther held, are only symbols through which the Word of God works. They witness
to man subjectively but have no objective function of mediating God’s saving
grace. Calvinist circles followed similar reasoning.
Protestantism forced Roman
Catholicism to define itself doctrinally as it had never done before. In the
Council of Trent (AD 1545-1563) what we call Roman Catholicism today was born.
Trent affirmed the Adamic unity of mankind but also held that men could be
cleansed from its implications by the sacrament of baptism. Trent insisted
that:
“If anyone denies, that, by
the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is conferred in baptism, the guilt of
original sin is remitted; or even asserts that the whole of that which has the
true and proper nature of sin is not taken away. . . let him be anathema.”
(5.5)
After the sacrament of
baptism, that is said to regenerate, the child is left in a state of innocence
with a free will that, for some reason, still chooses sin. Trentine theology
views sin as consisting of what we call personal sin but not consisting of what
we call the sin nature.[10]
We should also observe that
Trentine theology views forgiveness as applying only to past sins, not
past-present-and-future sins. God’s grace is dispensed bit-by-bit depending
upon one’s choice to obey and receive the sacraments. The Council of Trent,
therefore, retained full organizational control over dispensing Christ’s
meritorious work on the Cross in the Roman church.
As Luther found with
Erasmus, Protestants quickly found great debates internally in the movement.
Protestantism spawned diverse movements within a century or two. Jacob Arminius
(1560-1609) tried to alter classical Calvinism to blunt attacks being made
against Reformed theology. The opposition to Reformed Theology thus took the
name “Arminianism.” Between Calvinism and Arminianism the issues centered upon
the amount of human inability left by the Fall and the interrelationship of the
sovereignty of God and the human volition. Arminianism held that some human
ability remains prior to the operation of divine grace, that men are judged
only for personal sins, and that predestination is based upon foreseen human
response. Whereas Calvinism saw regeneration as the Holy Spirit overcoming a
fallen will, Arminianism saw regeneration as a strengthening of man’s natural
abilities. Through John Wesley, a modified Arminianism came to be expressed as
Methodism and its offshoots, the Holiness and Pentecostal movements.
Along with Arminianism, came
more radical departures from Reformed Theology. The Socinianism led to Deism
and Unitarianism particularly in Colonial America and would eventually lead to liberalism
and modernism in American religion. This movement consistently rejected
orthodox Christian theology at nearly every point. Having rejected biblical
authority, the Trinity, Chalcedonian Christology, and the judicial
accomplishments of the Cross, it went on to redefine sin, salvation, and grace.
Left with the inexplicable universality of human sin, this movement thought of
sin as a mere tendency to follow foolishness that could be eradicated by
education and moral example (Christ being a moral example). The logical
implications of this unbelief for society and political activism will be seen
in the next phase of Church history.
Meanwhile, the Eastern
Churches had completely broken away from Rome (ca AD 1054). Outside of the
Japhetic-European emphasis upon developing an organized body of doctrine, the
Eastern Orthodox groups continued to mix tradition and Scripture as their
authority, adhered to a weaker Christology (only the Father, not the Son, sent
the Holy Spirit), and largely avoided discussion about the judicial nature of
the Cross work. Regarding salvation, therefore, they conceived of it in terms
of spiritual victory and its results. Justification is hardly ever discussed.
Their view of the fall parallels Roman Catholicism’s semi-Augustinian/semi-Pelagian
doctrine. Hannah
notes:
“The Eastern tendency is to
view the effects of the fall of Adam in the manner of the Roman Catholic
Church; it has caused a loss of righteousness and a disordering of the senses
but not a total corruption of the human nature and an inability to obey God. .
. .Humanity can cooperate with God to become like God, ‘partakers of the divine
nature.’ Salvation is viewed as a process effected by the Scriptures, the sacraments,
and the religious community of increased mystical union with God, not an
identification with His essential being, but one of practical holiness. Whereas
Western Christians would likely use the term ‘sanctification’ to describe this
process, the Eastern churches speak of ‘deification’ or ‘divinization.’
The means of salvation in
Eastern Orthodoxy bears a remarkable similarity to Roman Catholic views; that
is, grace is apportioned through the sacraments. . . .Postbaptismal sin, which
causes the loss of holiness and life, is more grave than prebaptismal sin because
the hopeful are viewed as having a greater ability to resist evil but have
refused to do so.[11]
If we think of the Middle
Ages as bridging the gap from Augustine’s time through the Protestant
Reformation, the central work of the Holy Spirit during this era in maturing
the corporate Body of Christ was to stimulate far greater thought on what
salvation is all about. The Scriptural revelation of the objective, judicial,
substitutionary atonement became clear as well as the heretical nature of
seeing only a “moral influence” in the crucifixion. Also, the Spirit made ever
clearer that salvation occurs in response to God’s initiative in eternity past,
requires overcoming of the effects of Adam’s fall in all men, and justifies
immediately through imputed righteousness distinct from that righteousness
infused in the heart by the Holy Spirit.
DISCOVERING THE PURPOSE AND
GOAL OF THE CHURCH
If the first centuries of
the Church’s existence saw the generation of the canon of Scripture and the
clarification of Who God is, and the Middle Ages revealed deeper understanding
of salvation—its basis in the work of Christ and its bestowal upon men in
justification--, the last several centuries have witnessed the discovery of the
purpose and goal of the Church in history. To perceive the place of the Church
in the plan of God requires one to understand the nature of the Church and its
connection with God’s historic program.
As we studied in the
previous chapter, it took some time for the Church to realize it was an entity
separate from the nation Israel. Throughout the Acts period and thereafter the
Holy Spirit consistently moved NT believers toward the realization that they
could not be defined by their nationality, by their gender, by their station in
life, or by any other convenient labeling device. Whatever the Church was, it
wasn’t an ethnic group or a political body. Early Christians identified
themselves by
participation in a group
with belief in the NT gospel. They were a community that held a very particular
faith in Jesus as the Messiah of Israel and the Creator of the world.
Besides holding to a common
belief, the Church practiced a definite lifestyle of high moral character and
utilized very specific ordinances of baptism and communion. In close
association with the preaching of the Word of God to define the content of
belief and with administration of the ordinances, the Church invested certain
men with leadership positions called elders, pastors, or bishops. Acts 20:17,
28; I Timothy 3:1-2; Titus 1:5, 7; and I Peter 5:1 show that these terms were
used interchangeably.
Throughout the Foundational
and Medieval periods, the Church continued to be characterized by various
ordinances and leadership offices which were becoming more elaborate and
developed. The ordinances were gradually turned into sacraments. Whereas in the
early period baptism, for example, was administered only after the candidate
had been instructed in the faith, by the Middle Ages baptism had become a
sacrament through which forgiveness of sin came regardless of the faith of the
candidate (e.g., infants). The Word of God receded into secondary importance to
the ritual itself. Communion or the Eucharist followed a similar path. In the
early
centuries Christ was thought
to be present during Communion in a special way distinct from all other times.
By the Middle Ages, the elements themselves were thought to become miraculously
the material body and blood of Jesus. His Presence was not only spiritual but
material also. This view led to the problematic result that Christ must be seen
to repeat His sacrifice each time the sacrament is administered—a view that
denies the once-for-all complete sacrifice on the Cross.
This changing nature of the
ordinances logically connects to a changing nature of the Church. The Church by
the Middle Ages had become a powerful organization, a state unto itself. It
gained much of its political power from its religious power. After all, if the
sacraments are the main channels of grace under the control of Church
leadership, then the Church organizationally stands between God and all men.
Besides baptism and communion, the Church by this point had increased the
number of sacraments to seven: baptism, the eucharist, confirmation, penance,
extreme unction, orders, and marriage. All of life was now under the thumb of
Church leaders!
And how was this leadership
organized? In the West, the bishop of Rome grew in influence and power. Bishops
had earlier gained “rank” over other elders and pastors. They were associated
with major cities. Since Augustine insisted upon the primacy of the bishop of
Rome and the collapse of the Roman Empire left the Roman Church in a power
vacuum that it quickly filled. The Eastern Orthodox bishops (the top four
worked in Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem) rejected the
claim of supremacy of the Roman bishop and along with other issues this
conflict led to the rupture of the.100 Church into Eastern and Western branches. In the West the concept of a
“pope” arose as the Roman bishop came to assume power even over the secular
kings.[12]
The Holy Spirit continued
His “lesson plan” in maturing the Church. The pattern by now ought to be
familiar. Doctrinal clarity and faithful submission occur only after
falsehood has its day to stimulate a return to the authority of the Scripture.
Besides clarifying the gospel and the means of salvation, the Protestant
Reformation also began the clarification of the nature of the Church. The sola
fide gospel sharply opposed the Roman/Orthodox sacramental theory. All grace
comes independently of human practice except the practice of faith in the Word
of God. Thus the preaching of the Word, not automatically-working sacraments, is
the primary channel of grace. The early Protestants, however, never finished
reformation of the nature of the Church.
Lutheran, Calvinist,
Anabaptist, and Anglican versions of Church order persisted within
Protestantism. Each of these versions views the Church differently in its role
before God, in its relationship to the world, and in its interaction with the
state or civil authorities. Although strong differences appear among these four
viewpoints, as Protestants they all reject the saving nature of the ordinances
and the primacy of the pope. They all in theory affirm the primacy of the Word
of God. Protestantism, therefore, effected a partial reformation of the
Romanist error. It would take a centuries longer to complete the reformation, a
reformation that requires clarification of the purpose of the Church in God’s
overall plan.
PURPOSE OF THE CHURCH
As we learned in Appendix A,
Reformation theology essentially “froze” doctrine at sixteenth century levels,
implying that the maturing ministry of the Holy Spirit ended with the Reformers
and their immediate followers. The problem that remained, however, was that you
can’t understand the true nature of the Church until you understand its place
in God’s overall plan. And to understand God’s overall plan from eternity to
eternity entails another doctrinal area called eschatology—the doctrine of last
things.
Interestingly, the Holy
Spirit since the sixteenth century has pressured the Church to clarify its
eschatology through the rise of the secular nation-state and its grand
aspirations. Pseudo-biblical, counterfeit eschatologies of political redemption
have repeatedly seduced nations’ leaders to assault the Church in one way or
another. One thinks of the divine right of kings, the French Revolution, Marxism
and its Communist dreams, Hitler and the European Fascists. Even today, Muslim
extremists dream eschatological triumph over “Christendom.” All such movements
are eschatological in focus. They envision a total remaking of society that
supposedly rids the world of evil. In short, they dream dreams of a Kingdom
of Man that constitutes the purpose and goal of human existence.
In each case the Church is
challenged to meet the demand to explain where history is going. To do so,
however, the Church must attend to its doctrine of last things. What is God’s
program for the human race? Where will history end? What role does the Church
play in this cosmic drama? Sinful man impatiently rejects the gospel of
believing in Christ for a future blissful existence. They want the Kingdom now.
/ Review Part IV Appendix /
Reformed Protestantism
unfortunately failed to correct Roman Catholic and Orthodox amillennialism.
Amillennialism sees history has struggling along between good and evil, making
no ethical progress, until the end of the world with the Return of Jesus
Christ. During the last two centuries unbelieving skeptics within organized
Protestant circles have sought to redefine the purpose of the Church as the
instrument on earth for bringing in “kingdom conditions” by various social
engineering programs. This is why liberal clergy are often found in every
movement for social change that happens to be viewed as ethically progressive.
In Latin America even Roman Catholic theologians have embraced Marxist
“liberation” movements.
In Colonial America, some
notable Puritans in their optimism over American’s opportunities turned to
postmillennialism.[13]
Unitarian influences and later modernist teachers hijacked postmillennial
visions and transformed them into vehicles of a “social gospel”. As Puritanism
declined and Unitarianism increased, postmillennialism among conservatives
nearly disappeared (although the greatest conservative theologian of America in
the nineteenth century, Charles Hodge, advocated postmillennialism). In recent
years postmillennialism has emerged again among conservative
“reconstructionists.” Severe problems plague postmillennialism, however, viz.,
non-literal interpretation of prophetic passages of Scripture and the
consistent failure throughout Church history of Christian communities to
dominate their societies in any lasting fashion.
Premillennialism had long
been associated with Judaism and extremist cults. Not until after the
Reformation did the renewed interest in Bible study lead to a resurrection of
this view that had dominated the first few centuries. By the first half of the
19th century, Bible conferences
began to emphasize the contrasts between Israel and the Church observed through
a literal interpretative approach to the Scripture. It again received bad press
when the Adventist movement sought to “date-set” the return of Christ only to
be embarrassed by its non-occurrence in 1844. As Hannah notes: “After the Civil
War, a type of premillennialism emerged that eschewed date setting but insisted
on the imminent return of Christ. . . .The teaching of the any-moment return of
Christ in a secret Rapture accomplished the same purpose in that it created
expectancy. This form of premillennialism became increasingly popular through
the Bible conference movement. . . .[14]
This Bible conference
movement spawned what we call today dispensational premillennialism.[15]
This comparatively recent
form of premillennialism has had definite effects upon the Church’s influence
and behavior over the past two centuries.
Premillennialism has exerted
a strong influence upon American culture and its foreign policy. By asserting a
future for the nation Israel, premillennialism tends to be “Jew-friendly”
whereas postmillennialism and amillennialism historically permits anti-Semitism
to rise in societies where those ideas dominate. Thus most of Europe, dominated
as it is by amillennial viewpoint among institutions historically identified
with the Christian faith. A few European exceptions have occurred. Balfour the
Englishman who approved the creation of a Jewish nation in Palestine (the
precursor to the modern state of Israel) was a premillennial Plymouth Brethren.[16]
In Germany during the rise of Hitler, premillennial Brethren were the first
Gentiles to recognize the significant evil in the Nazi agenda.[17]
Today, with the rising hostility to Israel by both the Arab world and Europe,
America is the only country seriously supporting Israel’s right to exist. That
base of support comes not from just the Jewish lobby but comes from both the Jewish
lobby and the premillennial evangelical Christian influence.[18]
Premillennialism also has
played an important role in the battle inside American churches between
Modernists and Fundamentalists during the first few decades of the 20th century. Whereas liberal
churchman could manipulate postmillennialism to further their socialist gospel
among conservative audiences, they never could penetrate conservative circles
which adhered to premillennialism. Eschatology, you see, defines how you see
the mission and role and destiny of the Church. If the Church has replaced
Israel, it must operate as a national entity directing its own politics and
“converting society.” If, on the other hand, the Church is not a replacement
for Israel, its role is not to Christianize the world. Its role is to reach out
to unsaved society by showing grace in its lifestyle and primarily in its
proclamation of the gospel—witnessing to the very heart of all grace in the
finished work of Christ. It doesn’t directly bring about the Kingdom in
history. That work belongs to the returning Messiah of Israel, not to the
Church. Social salvation, like individual salvation, comes not from human works
but from Jesus Christ. It comes not by natural sociology and psychology and education
but by supernatural miraculous intervention.
Another effect of
premillennialism, especially modern dispensational premillennialism, has been
the missionary movement. Although scattered missionary work occurred over the
centuries (e.g., Patrick in Ireland), the vast majority of missionary outreach
and Bible translation has occurred from those societies where the Church has
been heavily influenced by premillennialism, viz., Britain and the United
States.
Among premillennialists
there is continuing debate over the details of the Return of Christ. Are the
Rapture and the Return the same event or separate events? If separate, when
does the Rapture come before the Return—prior to the Tribulational prelude to
the Return or during it? If during it, midway or three-quarters? These are
questions we will deal with in the next and last chapter of this series.
To conclude the matter of
Church history: the Holy Spirit has not been idle since Jesus ascended into
Heaven. Gradually, through all kinds of historical adversities, He has
faithfully fashioned the Church’s doctrine and through that process has called
believers to ever clearer faith. The pedagogical sequence of the Spirit
manifests the headship of Jesus Christ over His Body. May we continue to sense
His work.
OUTLINE OF OUR
SANCTIFICATION IN THE CHURCH AGE
If the Church differs from
Israel and represents another stage in God’s ongoing program, it would seem
that sanctification doctrine for the Church Age might differ in some respects
from that of the Old Testament. In this final section, we note the similarities
and differences (see Table 8).
In Parts III and IV of this
series we discussed sanctification under five headings: its phases, its aim,
its means, its dimensions, and its enemies. We associated various historical
events with this doctrine to give imaginative content for application in life: the Conquest and
Settlement, David’s career, and the decline of the Kingdom. Now we will again
note these five headings but will also point out the features unique to the
Church Age.
Sanctification has
traditionally been divided into three phases: sanctification completed at the
point of saving faith (new birth), sanctification being completed from new
birth onward to the end of one’s life, and sanctification required to prepare
us for eternity. Keep in mind that the term “sanctification” must always be
distinguished from the term “justification”. These terms must not be
interchanged as in Roman Catholic theology.
Past Sanctification. As Table Eight shows, in
the OT past sanctification could be pictured in terms of the Abrahamic,
Sinaitic, and Davidic covenants. These covenants spelled out the position of OT
saints in their particular historical stage of God’s ongoing program. Every
Jewish believer in the age of Israel, from the time he or she first believed,
was a promise of the Abrahamic covenant, viz., he or she was an inheritor of
the land, was part of Abraham’s physical seed, and was involved in Israel’s
mission to be a channel of blessing to the world. After Moses’ day, every
Jewish believer also was a citizen of a special nation which had its national
policy, laws, and unique relationship to the God of Creation. The will of God
for his or her political, economic, and social life was spelled out in the
Sinaitic covenant. For a special subset of such Jewish believers who carried
the seed of David either through Solomon or through Nathan it was subject to a
special will of God regarding its relationship to the Messiah. These covenants
revealed the OT believer’s position in God’s plan, explained the meaning of
their lives, and provided “operating assets” available during their lives on
earth. With the coming of the Church, however, each believer shares certain
blessings of the New Covenant given through the Messiah especially for Gentile
and Jewish believers living during the inter-advent age. The New Covenant
itself, made with the literal nation of Israel, has not been fulfilled, but
some of its provisions, such as universal regeneration, have become available.
As Figures 5 and 6 show, at least six items for each member of the Trinity
constitute the “operating assets” of the NT believer. Each of these items
became true for the NT believer at the point of saving faith and applies to
every believer regardless of stature in life, gender, nationality, or
ethnicity.
Present Sanctification. From the time of saving
faith forward until the believer’s death (or Rapture, whichever occurs first),
the Holy Spirit parentally trains each believer as a son/daughter of God. He
initiates the circumstances, controls every detail of his/her life, and does so
with the corporate nature of the Body of Christ in mind. As Figure 6 shows, the
Holy Spirit grants spiritual gifts to correctly locate each believer in the
universal Church and makes requests to the Son that are secure from satanic
scrutiny. All the while the Son makes intercession to the Father to cover our sins and directs the Spirit’s
historical control of the Church. When necessary the Father carries out His
individually-tailored discipline of each believer.
As we noted above, Church
history offers us a clear picture of present sanctification at work. Most of
the time, we learned, God has had to force the Church against its will to
advance spiritually. Various trials, including political pressures and
religious attacks, have prodded the Church to go back to the Scripture again
and again to seek His will, to understand it better, and to apply it by faith.
Church history even offers insight into the sequence of lessons learned. Figure
Seven pictures God’s “lesson plan” as observed so far in Church history. First,
He brings us back to the Bible as our supreme authority when we try to replace
its authority with our private experiences, mysticism, rationalism, and human
organizations. Second, He leads us through various spiritual journeys in order
to learn about what He is like and Who Jesus Christ really is. Only as we know
Him can we worship Him as we should. Third, usually through our failures and
sins, He renews our appreciation for what Jesus did for us on His Cross as well
as the necessity to walk by faith without trying to impress Him with our good
works.
Finally, He opens our eyes
to His coming works, prophesied details of what He alone can accomplish to
fulfill human history. He seems to utilize personal and political tragedies to
restore our hope in the proper eschatology.
|
Grandiose dreams of pagan Hope in the Coming Kingdom of Prod. --------------------à Kingdom of Man’s programs the Lord Jesus Christ. |
|
Personal and group failures Knowing the Finished Work of the
Cross Prod. --------------------à Sins, and disappintments and appropriating it by faith. |
|
Various spiritual experiences
Understanding more of the Divine Prod. -------------------à attempted idolatries, and attributes, the Trinity,
and the Person religious falsehoods of
Christ. |
|
Experience with pseudo Returning to the Bible
as the sole, final Prod. --------------------à authorities (mysticism, authority of
all things Rationalism, people) |
Figure 7. From Church history
we observe the pattern of spiritual growth under the direction of the Trinity.
Future Sanctification. Whereas OT believers in Israel looked forward to the Messianic Kingdom in the land of Palestine, Church age believers look forward to enjoying an unbroken period in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ (John 14:3) whether that presence be on earth or in heaven. Church age believers, however, soberly remember that they each face an evaluation before the Savior for the things done during this life to cleanse the record of our lives from counterfeit good works so that what genuine fruit produced will remain for eternity (I Cor. 3:13-15;