Tag: Church

Legalism is killing the church

Legalism – and the legalists that preach it – are like cancer in the church. Until we remove the infection, it will continue to drain our strength and corrupt our good works.

There are legalists in all strands of the church. They serve only to weaken us and leave the body ineffective. We decry the decline of church numbers and the apparent disintegration of morality in the world around us. It is not some outside force that is to blame but the legalists that we have allowed into the body.

Legalists that trade the purity of Christ’s teachings of love and grace for a return to a doctrine of impossible laws. Laws like, “agree with me or you will go to hell”. Laws that place the teachings of the legalists beyond reproach and above question. Laws that condemn anything that differs from the culture the legalists wants to create.

Legalism can never be a form of true Christianity

However, they dress it up, however righteous the legalists claim to be – and they so frequently do – and however cleverly they defend their teachings with Bible quotes, what they preach should never be called Christianity. It has the trappings of the faith but has sold its soul for power and pride (2 Timothy 3:1-7).

Christianity means being like Christ. Christianity means following all of His teachings. Teachings like, “love your enemies” (Luke 6:27-36). Teachings that say truly loving God and a complete love of your neighbour fulfil all the law and the prophets (Matthew 22:37-40). Teachings that show that true Christians and fake Christians are separated only by the good they do for those most in need (Matthew 25:31-46).

The legalists pay lip service to the doctrine of grace (Ephesians 2:8-10) but see no disunity with placing ever greater burdens for salvation on the individual. The legalists boast in their self-appointed status as “God’s elect” due to their keeping of laws they have made for themselves. As the prophet, Isaiah says – they honour God with their lips but their hearts are far off (Isaiah 29:13).

Legalism neglects mercy

Puffed up with pride, the legalists neglect mercy because they look with disdain upon any that fail to achieve their impossible standards. There is no grace for the humble sinner, no love to cover a multitude of sins – there is only condemnation and with it hate dressed up as righteousness.

Jesus warned of such people, calling them false prophets. Outwardly they look like sheep but inwardly they are hungry wolves (Matthew 7:15-20). Often they will dazzle you with their fierce passion for “the truth” and rise to leadership roles. Rather than protect the sheep, these shepherds will savage and abuse them. In place of pastoral care, there will be only guilt, condemnation, and a heavy burden.

The legalists do not strengthen the weak. They do not heal the sick. They never bring back the strays but condemn them for straying. They rule over the church with cruelty and verbal violence. Jeremiah spoke out against such shepherds in the harshest of terms (Jeremiah 23:1-2). So too did Ezekiel (Ezekiel 34:1-4).

It was perhaps these legalists – the false prophets we were warned about – that, from the third century until the present day, have led the church into institutionalised racism in the name of the faith. A lingering Christian anti-semitism that has tarnished the church and has yet to be rooted out and purged from our ranks.

Legalism is the enemy of grace

It is tempting to see the legalists and their law-heavy teachings as simply a misapplied passion for the Gospel. This is not the case. Legalism is a poison that corrupts and defiles the church. Even a little spoils the whole body (Galatians 5:7-9).

The fruits of legalism are heaviness, divisions, elitism, pride, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, heresies, envy, and many other things that stand in opposition to the nature of Christ and the work of grace (Galatians 5:16-26). In place of love comes harsh rebuke. In place of peace comes conflict. In place of humility comes boasting dressed as righteousness.

It is not true that legalists are simply overly enthusiastic Christians. The Bible calls them servants of Satan (2 Corinthians 11:14-15). There can be no place for legalism in our churches.

A call to repentance

Repentance worked in Holiness and humble compassion are what we need. It is in that spirit we must root out all forms of legalism. First within ourselves and then within the church. We must recognise that legalism is a grave sin that brings certain death both to the credibility of our witness and to the body of Christ – the church.

If we desire to see a change in this world. If we are to see the day when righteousness is the rule and not the exception. If we desire what some are happy to call revival then we must humble ourselves in repentance (2 Chronicles 7:14). This must not be a lip-service repentance, for a faith without resultant works is dead (James 2:14-26), there must be true change.

This may mean taking a winnowing fork to long cherish doctrines. Your church may shrink as the legalists depart for easier prey elsewhere. It might be painful to give up the righteousness that is as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). It may also mean selling or giving up the signs of wealth within your church (Luke 12:32-34) in order to care for those in need. But when the legalism is gone, and only then, will the Holy Spirit be free to usher in true Christianity.

It is time for our churches to call on the Name of the Lord and be saved.

Christian cybermisogyny and hate speech has to end

fire

There is a trend that the church simply cannot afford to ignore – cybermisogyny and harassment of women “in the name of Christ”. I wish I was joking.

I’ve talked before about what I call “Trolls For Christ” – the worst kind of ill-informed Pharisee determined to spill hate in defence of the church. Just recently I penned an open letter to a church leader engaged in cybermisogyny dressed up as a book review.

This “defending the church” argument in support of cybermisogyny (because it targets women far more than men) is wrong on two grounds – a minor point but the church does not need us to defend it (that’s taken care of, read the Bible) but more importantly – because hate speech should have no part in Christian living. Not ever.

Jesus talked about being meek, turning the other cheek, forgiving sins, and healing people. Somehow we have made it all about defending our rights. Did we forget that he said over and over that when someone tries to trample your rights – help them to do it? If they sue you for your coat, give them also your shirt. If someone compels you to go a mile, go two miles. That is literally where the expression “to go the extra mile” comes from.

How bad is cybermisogyny?

The Guardian reports that women writers are facing unprecedented levels of harassment, rape threats, and abuse.

In 2014 there was an organised campaign of harassment that became known as GamerGate. The harassment campaign targeted several women in the video game industry; notably game developers Zoë Quinn, Brianna Wu, and media critic Anita Sarkeesian.

Account upon account of the online harassment of women continues to pile up.

WMC report that this can include defamation and accusations of blasphemy. Defamation, in this case, can include coordinated attempts where a person, or, sometimes, organized groups deliberately flood Google, social media and review sites with negative and defamatory information.

As for the blasphemy charges…

Women face online threats globally, but they run a unique risk in conservative religious countries, where, in blasphemy is against the law and where honor killings are a serious threat. Accusing someone of blasphemy can become, itself, an act of violence.

A 2013 report from the organisation Working to Halt Abuse Online showed that 72.5% of those who reported being abused on the internet were female. That, right there, is cybermisogyny.

This all culminated in a campaign under the hashtag #MeToo. How did the church respond?

What is the church doing about cybermisogyny?

Is the church speaking up those that have no voice like the scriptures say (Proverbs 31:8)? Do we weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15-18)? Do we, as God’s law command, protect the fatherless and the widow (Deuteronomy 10:17-19)?

No. No, we do not.

We don’t do this because the church is too busy joining in with the cybermisogyny. We cannot condemn the sin because we are the sin.

Australian Christian news website, Eternity News, shared an article dedicated to ordinary women revealing sexual harassment by Christians.

#MeToo: Christian women share stories of assault at the hands of Christian men

And we wonder why the church is not seen as relevant any more?

Disagreeing with you is not a sin, church

I hate to have to be the one pointing this out because I thought we were past these basics but disagreeing with someone while being a woman is not a sin; harassing a person you disagree with is a sin, though.

Treating women like something you can own is a sin.

This cybermisogyny, protecting cybermisogyny, and failing to speak out against cybermisogyny from Christians are all sins too.

It is not okay to call women all kinds of names, to suggest their character, their faith, or their life is anything less than it is just because the way they interpret the Bible or chose to live their lives, differs from the way you do.

Jesus said, in John 13:35, that it would be our love for each other that would show we are his disciples. This behaviour shows that we are not His disciples. Maybe few of us ever were.

The church needs to repent, and fast

The moment #MeToo started to break headlines, church groups the world over should have joined with the oppressed and cried out for justice. We did not and that is to our shame.

Our churches must, most urgently, change how we address sexual violence. So far we have done too poor a job of even recognising that it exists. We have failed to be salt and light. I think we all know all that salt which is no longer salty is good for?

I don’t pretend to have a plan for how we can change but Eugene Hung has some strong suggestions.

  1. Ministers and their churches need to address sexual violence on a regular basis.
  2. Ministers and churches must not neglect biblical passages that describe sexual violence.
  3. Churches need to bring more women into upper levels of leadership and decision-making authority.
  4. Church leaders must refuse to be party to conspiracies of silence.

We need to change and we need to change fast.

It is time to remove pharisaical influence from our doctrine

We talk about “my church”, “my pastor”, and “my ministry”. These things are not yours.

Our church is our family. Our church is where we are pastored (nurtured) and where we minister to (nurture) each other. 

The difference is between a place where you take for yourself and a place where you care for others. One is a club for Bible geeks and the other is the Kingdom of Heaven.

This pharisaical toxin in our thinking is inherited from the trace amounts of pharisee presence in our church culture and wider doctrinal teachings. Pharisaical influence is like leaven (yeast) of Galatians 5:9 – any is too much. The church is suffering from a yeast infection.

I suggest that it is time to remove pharisaical influence and rethink the way we think about “church”.

A vision of the Church of tomorrow

I would like to set out seven principles that I think it would be healthy for all Christians to adopt using language that is free from the colouring of doctrinal debates.

Before I get to those principles I would like to paint a picture for you.

Imagine a body of believers that operates, despite differences of tradition, in perfect unity. A bride ready for the bridegroom, if you will. Revelation 19:7 made real. Imagine glory going only to the Father. Imagine a time when the pretences of perfection give way to humility. Imagine the Christian body with room for everyone.

You are now starting to consider the Church of tomorrow. Keep doing that.

Travellers along the path of The Way of Yeshua

Sometime before I hit upon the idea of using axioms as stepping stones to build a systematic and self-consistent framework for evaluating doctrine, I wrote an essay. This essay carried the title, “Travellers along the path of The Way of Yeshua“. In it, I dreamed of a better tomorrow.

I had found that the “normal” language of doctrine and creed often colour our thinking. Rather than help us explore our faith, I suspected (and still do) our words do more to obstruct discussion. Which is why my introduction said this:

I have long dreamed of a return to the foundations Christianity as expressed in the book of Acts and demonstrated in the letters of the new testament in general. However, tradition and history have tarnished the name of Christianity and we have imbued much of its language with meaning unique to our own doctrines and traditions. Therefore, I have attempted to write down this vision of the Church of tomorrow with little of the language of the past so that our current understanding does not colour or distort what I feel The Father is trying to show us. I have looked to our roots, as best I understand them, to provide for this. So if this seems familiar, that is probably because it is.

I could have probably done with a few more commas. Feel free to imagine them.

When I write about the path of The Way of Yeshua, what I am doing is both imagining a better Church (the Church of tomorrow) and attempting to express what unites us without any distracting language. I will almost certainly fail. If in failing, I spark a discussion that leads to the Church of tomorrow, I will have been a success.

Making the vision known

The essay opened by quoting Habakkuk 2:2-3. While I got as far as the writing down the vision, I failed at the making it known part. This post, and the ones I hope will follow it, aim to correct this failing.

These principles might be summed up as: we do not know everything and we should not pretend that we do.

7 Principles for the Church of tomorrow

In my essay “Travellers along the path of The Way of Yeshua“, I set out seven guiding principles. If you have ever wondered where I am coming from when I write, these principles are it. In many ways, they are the foundations of the axiomatic (using axioms) approach I have started to apply.

These are not just fine ideas but express the very core of how I read the Bible. These are the principles that guide my study.

  1. Agnosis – Man is ignorant and all that we think we know is faulty due to our own limitations.
  2. Incompleteness – We realise that our transformation is incomplete.
  3. Retirement – We must be ready, as we mature, to put away less mature doctrines and ideas.
  4. Knowing only Yeshua
  5. Scriptural mystery – While the scriptures are God-breathed, we lack the spiritual wisdom to fully understand them.
  6. Faith – We trust The Father to guide us and place our faith in Him.
  7. Love – Above all else, in all things, we act from love.

Over the next few months, I will try to unpack these principles. I hope that you will explore them with me.

What are your hopes for the Church of tomorrow?