What happened?

Just prior to Constantine gaining power as Emperor, the Church actually suffered a very intense period of persecution under Diocletian and Galerius.  But then came Constantine.  The most famous incident was in 312 when he is said to have had a vision where he saw a glowing cross and heard the words, “by this, conquer!”.  He put crosses on his soldiers’ shields and he won a great victory.  Eventually he became Emperor of both the East and West.  He issued the Edict of Milan which gave equal standing to Christianity (and in some senses favored it). Then later under Theodosius, Christianity actually became the official religion of the Empire.

This meant the church was dealing with new questions.  In the past, Christians were living in the world, but weren’t of it.  Now the church was common and accepted.  In the past, they were the strong minority.  Now, thousands of people were joining because it was popular.  Under persecution, they longed for Christ’s second coming and victory over the world.  Now it seemed like in this world they were already gaining victory. They had to make transitions in their practice and faith.

So which was better?

This is a question people often debate today.  One of the accusations you often hear about today’s church is that it’s gotten too comfy with the world and has ceased living counterculturally.  It’s gotten too used to government favor.  The list goes on.  There are certainly truths to this.  And we do have much to learn from brothers and sisters in places where the church isn’t favored or protected.  The way they cling to faith in the face of persecution.  The way they can live simply.  The way they evangelize that much more strongly than we do, even given the consequences, that’s something we need to learn from.

At the same time, there are advantages to living in a world where the church can openly interact with culture and government.  Being able to worship openly and preach openly has huge advantages.  Being able to use the airwaves, the internet, etc to speak Christ’s message.  And even our interaction with culture is dangerous but holds potential.  In examining music, movies, tv, etc, we can learn about our culture and speak in its metaphors, but yes, this is dangerous as well, as it opens the possibility that the world will transform us more than we’ll transform it.

The reality is that we’ve seen God work both ways through his salvation history.  We see in Scripture examples of his people flourishing under persecution (think of Joseph, Daniel, Moses and the Exodus).  We see examples of God building his people through external structures (think of the nation of Israel).  We need to be ready to adapt to whatever means God is using in the moment.  One is not necessarily better than the other.

Christians use many terms for the Lord’s Supper- communion, Lord’s Supper, mass, last meal, etc.  Eucharist is one we’ve probably heard but it sounds so churchy and foreign.  Where does it come from?

It’s actually a term that connects Jesus’ institution of the Lord’s Supper to it’s roots in Passover. Eucharist means “blessed” and this word was given to the meal because of the prayers always said in association with Lord’s Supper.  These prayers began with the phrase, “blessed. . .” and enumerated the blessings we receive from the Lord in this meal.  These prayers were based closely on the prayers said by the Jewish people at meals and especially when they partook of the Passover meal, prayers based on the injunction to give thanks in Deut. 8:10.

There are obviously many associations between our Lord’s Supper and the Passover meal- we think most often of the bread and wine, and the connection between Jesus to the Passover lamb.  But when you think of the prayers said at the Lord’s Supper, it’s a reminder of a different element, the necessity of giving thanks when we take this meal.  How often do you really take time to give thanks as you take this incredible meal into your body?

Another element of connection we rarely think deeply about is the Words of Institution.  They pass by so quickly, but why do we speak them?  Because God has attached a promise to them and because they tell us what is happening. In the Passover meal, the father famously asks his family, “Why is this night different than any other?”  When you hear the Words of Institution they are telling you why this meal is different than any other.

So the next time you receive the supper, remember also the necessity for Eucharist, prayer and thanks.  Remember also that the Words of Institution are telling you why this meal is different than any other.

Well, I’m not going to answer all the questions of the so-called “worship wars” in this blog, but as you reflect on not just the arguments, but also what you find uplifting in worship, I hope that a little taste of the chapter relating Christian worship to its Jewish roots  is helpful to you.

In this chapter, the author notes that it is relatively easy to see that Christian worship was deeply related to Jewish practices, but how close that relationship was is much harder to determine.  It’s also hard to know how widespread the relationship was.  The reality is that our sources concerning the early church’s worship are not numerous and what we have does not go into great depth.  Why?  Well, it was such a normal thing to do, it rarely became important to write in detail about it.

We do see a couple of interesting developments though.  First, Christians adopt and adapt Jewish worship practices.  In Jesus’ time it was typical for Jews to have daily prayer (generally three times, either at home or the Temple).  They gathered to read the Scriptures together on a weekly basis in the synagogue. And they gathered annually for the Passover and some other big festivals at the Temple.  It’s interesting to note that Christians kind of pull all these experiences together into a weekly celebration.  They may have started out meeting daily, but quickly the pattern becomes a weekly worship, not on the Sabbath, but on the first day, a celebration and remembrance of the resurrection.  In that experience they had communal prayers, regular readings from Scripture, and the Lord’s Supper (which of course it tied to the Last Supper, Jesus’ Passover meal).

Second, while we don’t know exactly what Christians worship looked like word for word, we see both common patterns and flexibility, related some to Jewish worship.  They continued to pray, including the Shema in all likelihood, and some early church fathers exhort leaders to pray written prayers, but they often call on pastors to pray in the moment as well.  They continue to follow a set of readings, often following a similar pattern to that used in the synagogue, but they also add the epistles as they become more widely spread and begin to have special readings for significant days in the life of the church.  The Lord’s Supper is highly valued, but even the liturgy around that changes some, and it’s timing as well, moving from a separate evening service as part of a meal, to the morning worship and apart from other eating.

It’s clear that the worship follows patterns and some things remain the same.  They value what came before, but they know the resurrection has changed everything, and so worship changes some as well.  Hopefully this gives some direction to all of us as we enter our own worship today.

I remember doing canon balls in pools and there was an incredible feeling associated with it.  Yeah, the descent and splash was fun, but there was something else.  There was that feeling you had as you sank deep into the water and then started going back up.  You pushed and pushed, going farther, still not able to breath because you were under water.  You could feel the pressure around you.  And then you burst forth out of the water.  And you take a deep breath of life giving air again.  Woo- you made it.  There was an exhilaration in that whole experience as well.

This idea of bursting forth into life out of the water is something I find helpful as we’re talking about baptism, including its connection to Judaism.  Most people think of baptism as an exclusively and distinctively Christian rite, but the reality it also is tied to Judaism.  Devout Jews would immerse themselves before entering the Temple.  Even after the fall of the Temple many ritual washings were continued.  This placed the connection between washing and ritual and ethical cleanness into the background.  Even more importantly, the Jews developed the rite of proselyte baptism for converts to Judaism.  Since pagans were considered unclean due to their association with idols and other elements, they were asked to undergo a ritual washing.  Elements of it included fasting, prayer, instruction, exorcism, new clothing, and of course washing in water.

It’s interesting to note that all of these elements listed above are also included in early Christian baptismal rites.  Why?  Because they were carrying forward much of this into their baptismal rite since there were also theological connections.  After all Jewish proselyte baptism was said to be about conversion into a new life. You were putting off the uncleanness of idols and dying to all your old sins.  It was not just a rite, it was inviting a living God into your new reality.

Early Christians recognize that this was still true of baptism.  What they did was extend that meaning to see its fulfillment in Christ.  Baptism was as Romans 6:1-11 says an actual connection to Christ’s death and resurrection.  It truly is a new life, not just symbolically, but in reality.  It is an experience in which the Holy Spirit truly enters the person.

That’s powerful stuff.  And it involves death as well as life.  That’s what makes me think of the canonball image.  When you sink deep into the water and you can’t breathe, there’s that feeling of almost-death around you, but when you burst forth and take in air, you feel life renewed.  In baptism, Christians understand that we die to our old lives, its sins and associations, and we welcome that.  We need to go through that touch of death so we can emerge into a new life.  A breath of air, the breath of the Holy Spirit, and a new type of life going forward.

As you think about baptism today, live in your baptism as Luther tells us to do.  We die daily to the Old Adam, to sins and brokenness, and we rise each day in new life and new opportunities.

That I think is a simpler way of summarizing a statement from the book.  In case you’re curious what I’m summarizing, here’s a representative statement. “It is as if he [Tertullian] were striving to express the basic intuition that the offensiveness of the christological dogma is precisely what makes it ring true.”

The discussion in this chapter is about the formation of the Nicene Creed in the early history of the Church.  There’s been a lot of discussion about how the christology (the statements about the nature of Jesus) got hammered out.  The common thinking for a long time was that the statements in the Nicene Creed about Jesus’ nature were from the Greco-Roman way of thinking.   After all, much of the Nicene Creed follows the Apostles Creed, focusing on Jesus’ work, but then you have all those statement at the beginning. . .

“begotten from the Father before all ages, light from light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one substance withthe Father”

And to most people that sounded like Greco-Roman philosophy talk.  Well it may sound philosophical, but here’s the problem (and also leads us to the too good to be made up stuff)Greco-Roman philosophy doesn’t like these statements.  Sure they might like statements that sound like this, but they don’t like the actual concepts.  The Greco-Roman philosphers would have been offended by the idea of God coming to earth.  They were offended by Trinititarian unity.  They were especially offended by the incarnation- the idea that God would take on change, that he would take on physical being and flesh.  After all, most of their philosophers spent their time bashing the physical world and trying to figure out how you escape it, so no, this did not come from the philosophers.

The rest of the chapter shows in many ways how Jewish the thinking of the Christians was in terms of the nature of Jesus.  It points to Old Testament Scripture that supports it.  But the reality is that while this is all true, most of the Jews didn’t much like the Christian thinking either.

In a sense that’s what makes this so great.  What Christians were saying about Jesus was the kind of stuff that no one would just make up.  And in a amazing way, that lends to its credibility.  You don’t make up stuff that you want others to believe when you know they will oppose it on a fundamental level.

This is true of what we know about Jesus’ being, and it’s true of so many of our beliefs.  What we have to say about salvation- that God came not just to earth to take on human form, but that he also came to die for us.  That he rose again. That we will rise again some day with bodies.  That this is all based on grace, not works.  So many of our beliefs don’t make sense to others.  And yet, as you bring it to people, partly because it’s stuff you can’t just make up, and partly because it just rings true as you experience it, what we have can connect with people in a way different than any other faith proclamation.

So we speak it loud and clear.  Because you just can’t make this stuff up.

The Jews asked- “If Jesus was the Messiah, why hasn’t the Messianic age come?”  In essence, they’re saying, the kingdom restored means everything is better. No more oppression, disease, famine, poverty, etc.  All that stuff is supposed to go away and it hasn’t!  Jesus can’t be the Messiah.

In a similar way, many nonChristians (throughout history, but especially today) challenge us with the idea, “If God is good, why isn’t the world better?”.  There’ s a similar vein to it all.  If the Messiah had come, if God is around, why wouldn’t he make things better than they are?  Why is there still evil?

So how did the the Church respond then? What are we to say now?Sometimes people were tempted to respond to the Jews that Jesus came to bring a spiritual kingdom.  That they could not expect to see a kingdom here on this earth, but even though we still hear that today, that was not the normal tact.  Oftentimes, they began with the way Jesus responded to the question in Matt. 11:2-6

You can see that Jesus says the Messianic kingdom has come.  And is has come physically.  He’s healed.  He’s cared for the poor and oppressed.  And these things that have come are a taste of the full kingdom.  There are stages to the coming they responded.  Jesus’ ministry is a stage.  His death on the cross is a stage (connecting to Is. 53 and other Scriptures).  His resurrection and ascension were a stage.  And when he returns again that will be the final coming when the kingdom will be seen in full.

To some degree we have a similar response to the question we’re asked.  Yes God is good and there is evil, but we’ve only now begun to taste God’s goodness.  His goodness is seen in places all around us.  His goodness is seen in the cross and resurrection.  His goodness is seen through the Church and her actions as his body on earth.  His goodness will be seen most fully when he returns again and remakes all, putting away suffering and brokenness forever.  Is there still more?

Yes, there’s more to the answer.  Some of the answer is shrouded still in mystery.  Why didn’t he establish the whole messianic kingdom in one coming?  Why did he ever allow evil to enter in the first place?  We don’t know, but we trust in the God who did come and who was willing to suffer for us.

So on to task number one.  If you’re familiar with PBS/History Channel documentaries on the Bible and early church, DaVinci Code, and some of the modern takes on this issue you might think that there was a massive conspiracy by a few men in a smoke-filled room that determined what was in the Bible and what was out.  All kinds of stuff was tossed out just because it didn’t fit their narrow power-hungry goals.  Not true.  Again, I don’t have the space to tell the story, but roughly you have two stages in the development of the Bible.  First, the formation of the Old Testament canon.  Very early on (pre-AD) the Jewish people recognized that there was a special prophetic era in their history, roughly from the time of Moses to Nehemiah.  During this time God inspired prophets to write to his people and after that period things were different.  With this in mind, Scripture meant books written during this period by prophetic voices that were in agreement with the Torah and prophets.  The vast majority of OT was undebated.  A few books in the OT were debated (e.g. Ecclesiastes, Esther, Song of Songs) but generally seen as genuine.  Some of the Apocrypha was debated, but most acknowledged that these books were not written in that era or by the prophets (these books tended to be revered by the people, but the scholars were skeptical early on)

In regards to the New Testament the process was similar.  What belonged in the New Testament?  Those things from a special era- the words of Jesus Christ and those who were followers/eyewitnesses of Christ (authority was also extended to those who wrote down those words from his apostles like Mark and Luke).  Again, there would be debate about some books (e.g. Revelation, Hebrews), but they were generally accepted and seen to be in accordance with the rest while other writings were seen as clearly not belonging.  The Gospel of Thomaas, Judas, Mary, etc may have claimed apostolic source but they were analyzed quite well by the early church fathers and found to be wanting on two grounds- they would “pop up” in one location and weren’t known early on in the church’s history and they taught at variance with the well-established apostolic writings.  The Fathers were not naive in such debates, but actually had well-researched arguments in these regards and took challenges quite seriously (one bishop who penned a supposed narrative of Paul’s journeys that was orthodox in terms of teaching was actually kicked out of his post for this offense)

That’s the quick history and if you’d like more, you might check out this video Bible study series by the Men’s Network of Lutheran Hour Ministries.

So what does this mean for us?  What does it mean to have The Scriptures?

What it means is that when we go to the Bible, we can trust that the words we have come from our Lord.  Can you imagine opening up the Bible, looking for guidance, and then thinking, “oh, but this might really just be the opinion of the author”.  I’m not saying we don’t have to contextualize things or understand how God works through authors, but in having the formation process we see above, we have an incredible gift.  When you read the Bible, you can trust that these are truly words from God that he inspired men to set down so that we could receive guidance from them for all of time.  So we are not overstating it when we say that the Bible is “God’s Word”.  It is words he spoke to prophets, it is words he literally spoke, it is words he spoke through men and women that actually walked with him on earth.  Wow.  That is a gift, one I think we sometimes take for granted as we’re so used to opening up the Bible as a book that has just always been around.  The reality is God did something great in forming this “book” for us today.

Whether you’re talking to another Christian about a different view of Scripture or a doctrinal issue or with a non Christian, do you ever feel like things take a negative turn that you regret?  The tone gets harsh.  People leave the dialogue upset not just over the difference in views, but also at each other.

I was reading a chapter in the book, Shadow of the Temple, and it was discussing the ongoing debate between the Jews and Christians over big issues like Jesus as the Messiah, OT laws, etc, and it was interesting that for a long period of time, the discussion was vehement, but there was a united character in it.  By the second century something started to change.  The Christian church became more and more dominated by Gentile believers.  And as they criticized the Jews, it became something from the outside.  They started to use texts from the OT which referred to God’s people as stiff necked, hard of heart, etc, but rather than doing so as fellow Jews, and as ones who were warning their brothers to repent, it became more of a self-righteous action.  It became more about enjoying the criticism and the downfall of this rival.  As you’ve seen in debates before, they wanted to win the argument in some ways more than they wanted to win the brother.

The text suggests part of this might have been an inferiority complex. After all, the Jews has the status of religio licita and the rights that came with it- the Christians were a little defensive and might have taken that out on the Jews.  Also, Judaism had a long textual tradition with a deep exegetical past.  The Christians were trying to catch up in some senses and may have felt threatened in these debates as they argued what many viewed as “new” doctrines and interpretations of Scripture.

It’s sad that this tension moved the two parties towards name-calling and anger and that’s something we need to avoid in our own dialogues, debates, and discussions.  So how do we do that?

By reclaiming the earlier tradition in the church’s dialogue.  It’s not that we don’t ever criticize those with different opinions, but examine your motives- are you doing it to win or are you doing it to aid the brother/sister?  And just as importantly, are you choosing your words/nonverbals in a way they can sense that?

That’s a question that has always been asked in the church.  When is a person in the faith and when has  a person walked out of it.  That applies to what a person does as well as believes, but when we deal with the ideas of orthodoxy (teaching correctly) and heresy it focuses on belief and knowledge.

It was a question that raged early on for the church.  What’s interesting is how the debates change and how they stay the same.  During the early history of the church one of the biggest questions centered around the “gnostic beliefs”.  There’s a ton written about this, but essentially this group taught that the God of the Old Testament was not the supreme God, but instead a lesser god.  Not only that, he was evil and stupid.  Why?  Because spirit is good and matter is bad.  This lesser god had been part of a fall and had created matter and the physical and thus entrapped souls and spirit inside it.  What was left to believers then was to find the secret knowledge (that’s what gnosis means) so that one could escape the body and return to true spirit.

It’s interesting that they accepted some of the Genesis account but reinterpreted it.  They rejected most of the rest of the Old Testament.  They accepted Jesus, but heavily edited his sayings and said most of the narrative, especially the cross and anything he said about resurrection were wrong.

So were they Christian or not?  Well, to most of us this sound crazy enough that they’re clearly out.  To reject God the Father.  To reject Jesus’ death and resurrection.  To reject our own resurrection.  And the vast majority of believers clearly rejected the gnostics as well.  Despite what you might read occasionally by scholars today (some of the Davinci code fans), there was never much popular support for these beliefs and generally it was something that would get a charismatic leader every once in a while and then fade again.

So that’s all closed up now right?

But think about it.  Do we still deal with some of these issues?  We do.  Think how often people kind of disparage the physical world.  Think how often people emphasize the Christian elements of soul and spirit and forget about God’s care for the world around us.  Think about how often people are so focused on our souls going to heaven hey forget about the resurrection that is the focus of the Bible.  Think about how similar these teaching sound to other faiths, like Hinduism and Buddhism and how easily people become convinced that our faiths “are all really the same”.

Is heresy a dead issue?  Not really. There are many variations and others we must deal with today, but it’s interesting to see that even gnosticism, 1800 years old or older, is still in a sense going strong.

Pray that God would help us continue to examine how the faith is taught so that we can stand up for truth and do so in a positive way.

Sometimes things actually feel hostile.  Well, the next chapter of Skarsaune’s book deals with Christian outreach into pagan audiences.  For the earliest part of the Church’s history, most of the outreach focused around Jewish peoples and converts to Judaism.  What they found in these groups was not always a welcoming crowd, but one that identified with them on a core issue- there is one God and idols and other gods are not only false, but evil.

This is not to say that they didn’t work in pagan crowds too (Paul’s preaching in Athens in Acts 17 is a famous example), but a lot of their missionary endeavors focused on audiences that would agree with them on this fundamental point.  Their apologetics were shaped by that fact- they wanted to convince people that Jesus was the Messiah.  Idols weren’t an issue.  Other gods were a defeated enemy in that crowd.

But what happened when they began branching out more and more?

Well, they started to realize they didn’t fit in.  They didn’t belong.  And there can be hostility.  You’re reaching out to people that not only don’t acknowledge Jesus, but who worship something in a heartfelt or historic way that you are calling evil.  How do you do that?

Well, what Skarsaune discovers is part of their work was apologetic that was similar to the tactics used by Jews with pagans from previous centuries.  They used philosophy and story to speak to people and convince them that there couldn’t be tons of little gods out there, but there must be one big God.  Creation testified to it. Logic testified to it.

What is interesting is that one of the other main pieces that helped in their apologetic and evangelism to the pagans was the stories and testimonies of the martyrs.  One of the stories referenced is that of the martyrs of Lyons, specifically, Blandina.  The faith of these people, to die, to remain committed to virtues and the faith despite the costs, changed the hearts of many.  This was something new.  And a later apologist, Tertullian, would state famously, “The blood of Christians is a seed.”

What does that say to us?  As we continue to reach out in a world that moves further and further away from real understanding of God and toward a chasing after “gods”, how do we speak for the faith in this context?  I think the most important piece this reminds us of, is that there is a need for sacrifice associated with our faith.  I pray we don’t have to go to the extent of Blandina, but there is a call for us to live lives that make people wonder about what’s going on inside of us, to notice something different.