I fear many Christians have the notion that we are saved by grace, but we are trained for righteousness by legalism. This is a serious mistake for Christians and it misses one of the most wonderful truths of scripture. In Titus Chapter 2 Paul tells us the grace of God trains us for Godly living. Look with me at these verses.
“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”
Titus 2:22-14
Let me point out for you several ways that God uses His grace to train us to live Godly lives.
First, We Are Trained In The Gratitude of Grace.
We do not develop self control and godliness so we will be saved. We obey God out of gratitude that He has already saved us. This gratitude brings great devotion. “Look what He has done for me!” It also produces humility in us that is foundational to a changed life. And focusing on His grace frees us defensiveness about our sin. Our sins were paid for on the cross.
We Are Trained In The Hope of Grace.
We are like a bride being adorned for our bridegroom. We love Him. And we are preparing our hearts to be ushered into His presence. We desire God's grace to be worked into our lives more and more because we are looking forward to seeing Jesus face-to-face.
We Are Trained In The Transformation of Grace.
When we begin to follow Christ God brings about a radical change in our desires. But we still have habits of mind and behavior that must be changed on a deep level. Because the penalty for them has been paid we have freedom to deal with the root motivations of our pride, greed, lust, or whatever sin we would avoid dealing with if we were still being defensive. And God is planting more and more of His thinking and His holiness into our lives. The more we read His word, and live in fellowship with Him, the more like Him we become.
We Are Trained In The Fellowship of Grace.
God's Grace has appeared so that He might make us a people who are zealous for good works. We cannot do this, or be this, alone. We stand together. As we are united with Him by God's grace, we are united with others in the family. We love one another and encourage one another every day while it is still called today. (Hebrews 3:13)
http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/
http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/
http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/
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Tuesday, June 12, 2018
Sunday, June 10, 2018
CALLING MYSELF A FUNDAMENTALIST
Years ago I wrote an article for a state denominational paper beginning with the statement, “I was going to title this article, 'I Call Myself A Fundamentalist.’ But I didn't want to spend the next six months explaining to my friends that I don't own an assault rifle or any plastic explosives.” Even then few pastors in my denomination would call themselves Fundamentalists, although I didn't know one who would reject the basic tenets of the faith. I tried to be careful not to call myself a fundamentalist in places where I was not able to explain what I meant. But I didn't want to give up the term. My reasoning was two fold. First, I did not want to give up the word Fundamentalist to people who whose hearts did not reflect the fruit of the Spirit or the fundamental attitudes of Jesus and the New Testament. And I wanted to resist giving up our language to the barbarians.
My Oxford English Reference Dictionary released in 1996 only has the word as an addendum to “FUNDAMENTALISM,” which they define as, “Strict maintenance of the basic teachings of a religion.” I read a book written earlier that simi-seriously defined a Fundamentalist as a conservative Christian who is angry. Who could read 1 Corinthians 13 and call themselves fundamentalists by that definition? I recently heard someone raise a question about Ephesians 4:31. It reads
“Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice.”
He asked, “Does this mean to put these other things away from you with malice toward them?”
Incidentally, that is not a possible interpretation this verse. In the original language the reading is, put these other things away “together with all malice.” Malice is not the attitude of putting the other things out of our lives, but one, and possibly the worst, of the things of which we are to rid ourselves. However you read this verse, its words, the entirety of Ephesians 4, and everything the New Testament says about our attitudes, completely exclude an angry and divisive expression of the Christian faith.
I first started calling myself a fundamentalist while I was still in seminary. In a Biblical Backgrounds class the teacher presented several lists of hermeneutic principles. Hermeneutics are the underlying principles that determine how you interpret Scripture. One of them was labeled a Fundamentalist Hermeneutic. And as far as I could tell everyone in the class including the teacher agreed with those principles. But the teacher said, “You can hold these without being a Fundamentalist.” I asked, “How?”, and he said “Just because you decide you're not.” I need to say that professor was a great teacher. Even though I'm not giving his name, I don't want to say anything bad about him. But, that didn't make a whole ton of sense to me.
But, I have given you this entire rambling dissertation, because I'm giving up the title, fundamentalist. As much as I hate it, I have to admit that our language has been hijacked. The word no longer means what it should mean to people. It is a little more complicated than that. I recently reread Bodie Thoene’s Zion Chronicles. These are historical novels about the foundation of Israel in the years immediately after millions of Jews were shipped, often in the name of Christianity, to death camps. The refugees of that Holocaust we're trying desperately to reestablish the Jewish state in the face of local and world opposition. I think it may have been in the Gates of Zion, the first book in the series, that a Hebrew archaeologist was explaining to an American friend how he had come to be convinced through the Old Testament Scriptures that Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of the Messiah. He said “I believe in Him, but I will never call myself a Christian.” I have never understood what this character said as well as I do now.
Steve Brown, the radio preacher on the Key Life broadcast used to say that Jesus was a Pharisee. He was alluding to Acts 23:8 and other passages that indicate that the Pharisees unlike the Sadducees believed in the Spirit, and angels, and the resurrection. Jesus believed in all of these. But Jesus never called himself a Pharisee.
I have recently been exposed to people in several circles in more than one state, who are not only angry, but arrogant, brash, rude, domineering, hateful, and hurtful, all in the name of Scripture. And while I am unhappy about it, I cannot continue to call myself by the term fundamentalist.
However lest everything I write sound so gloomy, I need to add that I do have a solution to my dilemma. From now on I'm going to call myself a Christian. I may even use the term Christ-follower.
http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/
http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/
http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/
http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/
Website
http://daveswatch.com/
YouTube
https://goo.gl/PyzUz7
My Oxford English Reference Dictionary released in 1996 only has the word as an addendum to “FUNDAMENTALISM,” which they define as, “Strict maintenance of the basic teachings of a religion.” I read a book written earlier that simi-seriously defined a Fundamentalist as a conservative Christian who is angry. Who could read 1 Corinthians 13 and call themselves fundamentalists by that definition? I recently heard someone raise a question about Ephesians 4:31. It reads
“Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice.”
He asked, “Does this mean to put these other things away from you with malice toward them?”
Incidentally, that is not a possible interpretation this verse. In the original language the reading is, put these other things away “together with all malice.” Malice is not the attitude of putting the other things out of our lives, but one, and possibly the worst, of the things of which we are to rid ourselves. However you read this verse, its words, the entirety of Ephesians 4, and everything the New Testament says about our attitudes, completely exclude an angry and divisive expression of the Christian faith.
I first started calling myself a fundamentalist while I was still in seminary. In a Biblical Backgrounds class the teacher presented several lists of hermeneutic principles. Hermeneutics are the underlying principles that determine how you interpret Scripture. One of them was labeled a Fundamentalist Hermeneutic. And as far as I could tell everyone in the class including the teacher agreed with those principles. But the teacher said, “You can hold these without being a Fundamentalist.” I asked, “How?”, and he said “Just because you decide you're not.” I need to say that professor was a great teacher. Even though I'm not giving his name, I don't want to say anything bad about him. But, that didn't make a whole ton of sense to me.
But, I have given you this entire rambling dissertation, because I'm giving up the title, fundamentalist. As much as I hate it, I have to admit that our language has been hijacked. The word no longer means what it should mean to people. It is a little more complicated than that. I recently reread Bodie Thoene’s Zion Chronicles. These are historical novels about the foundation of Israel in the years immediately after millions of Jews were shipped, often in the name of Christianity, to death camps. The refugees of that Holocaust we're trying desperately to reestablish the Jewish state in the face of local and world opposition. I think it may have been in the Gates of Zion, the first book in the series, that a Hebrew archaeologist was explaining to an American friend how he had come to be convinced through the Old Testament Scriptures that Jesus fulfilled the prophecies of the Messiah. He said “I believe in Him, but I will never call myself a Christian.” I have never understood what this character said as well as I do now.
Steve Brown, the radio preacher on the Key Life broadcast used to say that Jesus was a Pharisee. He was alluding to Acts 23:8 and other passages that indicate that the Pharisees unlike the Sadducees believed in the Spirit, and angels, and the resurrection. Jesus believed in all of these. But Jesus never called himself a Pharisee.
I have recently been exposed to people in several circles in more than one state, who are not only angry, but arrogant, brash, rude, domineering, hateful, and hurtful, all in the name of Scripture. And while I am unhappy about it, I cannot continue to call myself by the term fundamentalist.
However lest everything I write sound so gloomy, I need to add that I do have a solution to my dilemma. From now on I'm going to call myself a Christian. I may even use the term Christ-follower.
http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/
http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/
http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/
http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/
Website
http://daveswatch.com/
YouTube
https://goo.gl/PyzUz7
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