Going to Church in Hippie-Town

Not too long ago, my wife and I had our hearts set on going back to our home county. We couldn't find a church or anyone we really related to here. For me, the biggest deal was church. I was tired of not being able to be part of the fellowship of believers. We both were. It's not like we didn't try; we'd been to multiple churches in the area, all of which had something that turned us away, and had sort of given up. Not only that, but we had also been clinging to our old church back home, our hearts fully set on getting out of this hippie-town as soon as possible. We just couldn't find the right combination of sound theology and community we needed.

Then we found the church we're currently attending, Hope Community Church.

Now, we had tried this church before. We knew they were theologically sound. But we had had a hard time connecting the first time around, which I think was primarily because we were expecting others to start the connecting with very little effort on our parts. So we left on our inevitably-doomed journey to find a good church.

I think on this journey we looked up every church in the county on the internet (which is a ludicrous amount). Each website annoyed me; either they were just wrong on some crucial doctrinal issue or they were unclear on everything (or both). They also saddened me, reminding me of the poor state of the visible church with all these groups of people learning from false teachers. We only attended three churches in total because they were the few that actually looked good on the internet (we'd found maybe one or two others that seemed okay, I think), but each one was a let down in some way. Either the preacher was just weird, the sermons were pithy and shallow, or they were impossible to understand. We also couldn't find a church with people in our stage of life.

All of that wound up with us coming back to Hope Community. I had become so skeptical of every church in Olympia that I figured they probably weren't really all that great theologically, or that the preaching may be sub-par (to be fair, I had only heard the pastor preach once before; during most of our first time, the youth pastor had taken over during the head pastor's sabbatical. He was great, but I didn't know anything about the head pastor).

Guess what? We haven't left.

Not only was the preaching theologically sound, but it was clear and easy to understand; we'd been to a church where the Bible was extolled, but the pastor was nigh incomprehensible. The music was worshipful and meaningful; we'd attended a church for a while where the music, while rich with theologically deep lyrics, was more akin to a concert, complete with live auto-tune (which wasn't our reason for leaving, but that still rubs me the wrong way for multiple reasons). The sermon was rich and God-centered; we'd been to a church where we got a twenty minute self-help sermon.

We've also gotten far more connected with people. Originally we knew exactly two people, the couple who introduced is to this church, who are great and wonderful people whom we are very blessed to know. But now we know more people, we participate in events, we're excited to go to church every Sunday. We even met a couple in our same stage of life; recently married, same age, one's in school, no kids. They have a house though, but we're only slightly jealous of that.

You wanna know the result? We aren't so sad about living in hippie-town anymore. In fact, we actually like it here. Imagine that, huh? Actually liking where God has put you? We're also not in such a rush to go back. If that's where God takes us, so be it. But, we'd be happy to stay here for a while.

The Leaven of the Pharisees

I've been reading Mark lately, and I've been generally kind of fascinated by Mark 8:14-21. I won't quote the whole passage, but just the first two verses:

Now they had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. And [Jesus] cautioned them, saying, "Watch out; beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod."

What follows is basically one of many times when the disciples just didn't get it. I always think this is kind of sad, but I guess I don't always get it either. Matthew 16:12¹ reveals that the disciples did understand after Jesus' lecture about their hard hearts. What He was saying is to avoid the teachings of the Pharisees and Herod.

Now, the teaching of Herod makes sense. The Herodians² were a very worldly bunch. The Herod mentioned in Mark 6, Herod Antipas, was the son of Herod the Great. Herod II was Herod the Great's son by another woman. Herodias was his granddaughter through a different son. Herod II married Herodias, but they divorced and Herod Antipas married her. Confused yet? Yeah, it was such a tangled web of incest and sin that no wonder that Jesus would want his disciples to avoid it. Herod the Great was also the Herod who ordered the slaughtering of all the young males of a city to kill Jesus. He had also ordered the slaughter of many other people, including family members. I think you get the point now: "Do not be conformed to this world" (Romans 12:2).

The interesting thing to me is the leaven of the Pharisees. Now, to us this is obvious; the Pharisees are the religious bad guys, the false teachers, the oppressive rulers, the Empire (if you will). I wonder if we often think of avoiding the teachings of the Pharisees to mean, "Don't be a judgmental legalist"? Because, while that's definitely part of it, that's not the whole meaning.

Back then, the Pharisees were considered the best of the best. They obeyed the rules, they could quote Scripture easily...they were the religious teachers and scholars of their day. A Jew of those times would probably want to aspire to that level of goodness. But according to Jesus, they were sons of Satan (John 8:44) who needed to be avoided. They had left "the commandment of God and [held] to the tradition of men" (Mark 7:8). They generally sucked so much that they have nearly an entire chapter of the Bible dedicated to how much they sucked (Matthew 23). They were wolves, false teachers leading people away from the true God.

See, the reason this warning speaks to me so much is that times haven't changed all that much. In fact, I'd argue that times are worse due to the speed at which information travels these days. And the church (at least, the visible church³) is literally infested with these false teachers who have absolutely no problem spreading their Satanic influence around the world for millions of unsuspecting people to learn from.

This isn't really a post meant to give advice, it's more just a warning. Be discerning whenever you hear anyone claiming to preach the Gospel. I don't care if that man is your pastor or a man you hear on the radio or on TV; if he's not teaching the genuine, biblical Gospel, he is a wolf to flee from, no better than the Pharisees.

Footnotes

¹ In this particular verse, Jesus talks about the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees, but it's the same general idea: avoid the teachings of false teachers.

² "Herod" was a name used by multiple kings of the Herodian Dynasty, not just one person.

³ The "visible church" is basically all the people who attend church regularly. The "invisible church," however, is all those people of the world who are genuinely saved. The reason for this distinction is because only God, who looks into the heart, knows everyone in the world who is truly saved, whereas we, who only look outwardly, don't. We can, however, have pretty good guesses.

For God Loved the World

Source: gospelrenewal.com

So a while back I came across the Holman Christian Standard Bible website. I don't remember if it was intentional or not, but I decided I was curious about it. I had heard good things from the Bible dictionary that Holman had made (obviously). It talked about accuracy a lot, and if you look on their website, you'll find that that's one of their big selling points.

On that note, I found their treatment of John 3:16 to be not only interesting, but very enlightening. For comparison, let's look at John 3:16 from various other popular translations:

• NIV: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
• ESV: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
• KJV: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoevere believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
• NASB: For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

All of those are perfectly good translations. However, as the HCSB's blog post on John 3:16 says, "[I]f you think the verse intends to communicate how much God loves the world, you have missed the meaning of the original Greek text." With that in mind, let's look at the HCSB's translation:

For God loved the world in this way: He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

Rather than (seemingly) talk about how much God loves the world, this translation shows God's love as an action. It says, "This is what God did to love the world."

I know some people may think that the HCSB is ruining the beauty of this verse, or interpreting it wrong. They aren't. I looked up the Greek (with the help of study tools of course, since I don't know Greek) and found that, in fact, that is the meaning of the original text!

And it doesn't make this verse any less beautiful: it makes it more so. Think about it: God's love isn't just some obscure, impossible-to-define emotion. It's the clear action of Him sending His Son to die for us and save us. That's consistent with the ever famous "love chapter" of the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, which shows love as an action, not a feeling.

Wouldn't you rather God's love save you, rather than just feel for you?

P.S.: I was going to write about how I approve of the HCSB, but I think I prefer that ending better.

God Told Me

So what's a common phrase you hear in evangelical Christianity today? If the title of the blog post hasn't already told you what I'm talking about, I'll just tell you: God told me. That's a very common thing to hear in (and out of) most churches these days. Now, rather than do my normal thing and throw my opinions in your face, I'm going to try to get people thinking about what it really means when we say such things.

Where Does The Authority Come From?

When we read the Bible, I wonder: do we think of what we're reading? Is it just another book? No, what we're reading is the very Word of God, given to us to save us, to instruct us, sanctify us, and guide us. God Himself inspired the writers of Scripture to, well, write Scripture! As a result, what we have is a perfectly infallible, authoritative Word that has the final say on everything because, well, it's from God, Who is perfectly infallible and authoritative.

Now, the Reformers knew this. That was one of the big reasons they separated from the Catholic Church; the Catholic Church said that the church (meaning specifically the clergy and the Pope) had equal authority to the Bible (hint: they don't, and neither do we). The Reformers understood that absolutely nothing has more authority than the Bible. Why is that? Because it comes from God!

So when we say God told me this, aren't we, in fact, saying that whatever we say God told us has just as much authority as the Bible itself?

Well...

There's a common argument against that statement that, frankly, I don't understand. The words and visions given to the church now aren't as authoritative as the Bible.

Really? Because last I checked, if a Word comes from the absolutely authoritative God, shouldn't it be perfectly and absolutely authoritative? And if it's not, wouldn't that mean that it's not from God? Or are we saying that God has less authority than He used to?

What About Acts?

I know someone might say that since we have recorded evidence in the Bible that God spoke directly to people, He obviously does that. And I'd fully agree with you that we have that conclusive evidence. But the problem with that argument is that all those times you're talking about are recorded in the Bible. What I mean by that is that those words from God were later added to the Scripture. So if the words spoken to the church now are, in fact, from God, shouldn't we perhaps be writing them down? Why isn't the Bible much longer? Why does it stop almost two thousand years ago if God is still giving direct, extra-Biblical instruction to the church? Shouldn't those instructions be recorded for the whole church to hear?

These are honest questions, because I know I have friends and family who believe these things and I honestly don't understand.

An Afterword

Please note that when I'm saying all this, I'm not arguing against or doubting things such as God's providence. I absolutely believe God still works in the world and makes some things that He wants us to do clear when the Bible doesn't say explicitly, Adam, move to Olympia. I know it was God's will for us to move here because we moved here. If it wasn't God's will, or part of His plan, we wouldn't be here right now.

And when we think of words or passages from the Bible, is it because God brought them to mind? Absolutely, I have no doubt about that. And when we look on the earth as see God's glory, we can know God is communicating to us His glory through His creation.

But when we say God told us something directly, aren't there serious ramifications? And what do we do with that?

Put On Compassionate Hearts

Colossians 3:12-13 gives more practical advice on becoming more like Christ. “Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.” We can see here even more about our relationships with other people because how we interact with other people is extremely important in our Christian walk. It’s part of our testimony to the world about the life-changing Gospel and the hope it brings.

These verses once again give us our reason for why we need to do this, and at the risk of sounding repetitive, I’ll say it again: we are to do this because we have been saved, not so that we will be saved. This verse tells us that we are to “put on” these things because we are “God’s chosen ones” and “holy and beloved.” Anyone who’s been reading my blog for a while already knows my whole predestination spiel, so I won’t go on about that here. I’ll simply say that “God’s chosen ones” simply means Christians; it means real, true Christians who are “holy and beloved” by God. Just think of that! This passage talks about being nice and forgiving to people. “But they did this to me!” we say. Well, guess what? We sinned greatly against a God who is perfect and doesn’t deserve to be disrespected, hated, and disobeyed like we do. We are evil by nature (Matt 7:11; Luke 11:13). God is good by nature. And He has forgiven us undeserving Christians for every sin we have committed, are committing, and will commit. We sin constantly. People sin against us sometimes, and it’s not nearly as bad. So why can’t we forgive and be kind to others who don’t deserve it when we really think about the fact that we have done nothing to earn the perfect love and forgiveness of God?

With that little intro in mind, let’s dive in. “Compassionate hearts.” I think this is pretty self-explanatory, especially with the other components in the text. I’ll give two Biblical examples here, the first from Matthew 9:36-38: “When [Jesus] saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

Jesus saw all these people, helpless to save themselves and undeserving of salvation, and felt deep compassion for them. They couldn’t save themselves, only He could do that. So he tells His disciples to pray for them to be saved even though they’ve done nothing to earn it. He’s saying, “There are so many people who need salvation, but so few people to tell them about the Gospel. So pray for people to be saved so we can send them out to bring more people to salvation.” Jesus knew He wouldn’t be on earth forever, and his disciples were few. In order for the Gospel to spread, they needed more people so that it could grow and be passed to the next generation and the next and the next. We can assume the disciples did pray, whether it was now or later, because the Gospel has survived for 2,000 years and has spread to virtually all corners of the world! Jesus asked for prayer for the masses because He loved them and wanted them to be saved, knowing full well they couldn’t do it themselves.

Another passage showing Jesus’ compassion playing out is Mark 8:1-10. I won’t quote the whole passage, but this is the story of Jesus feeding the four thousand men (not counting their wives and children, so the actual number is probably much larger). He has compassion on the people who have been following Him and listening to His teaching for three days without eating any food. He knew they couldn’t make it back to their homes because they are all very hungry and would “faint on the way.” He didn’t want that to happen, not after they’d traveled so far to listen to Him. So he tells His disciples to get the bread and fish and He feeds them all. He loved these people and just gave them food because they were hungry. How great is that? It’s such a simple thing to do coming from the compassionate heart of Jesus.

There’s a very important thing to emphasize here: Colossians 3:12-13 says specifically to have “compassionate hearts,” which I take to mean as this: we should not simply just be compassionate because it’s what we’re supposed to do (though it is), but we should earnestly desire to be compassionate because we want to. Our hearts should long for it. We’ve already talked about sin coming from the heart and manifesting in our actions. That’s the old self, the unsaved self. The new self has genuine, honest compassion in his or her heart manifesting in real, loving action. Jesus, in the passages we just looked at, wasn’t simply compassionate because He was supposed to be. He was compassionate because it was His nature to be, because He really loved these people who needed Him. The verses could have all just said “He saw this so he did this.” No, they go into what He felt. “I have compassion on the crowd” (Mark 8:2). “He had compassion for them” (Matt. 9:36). He loved these people! He wanted to fill their spiritual and physical needs and still wants that today. As His people, shouldn’t we desire the same? Doesn’t God work His plans through His people? So, rather than just begrudgingly and dutifully being nice or something, we should be genuinely compassionate because it’s in our nature to be, because God is compassionate and has made us compassionate. And remember Jesus’ ultimate act of compassion when He died on the cross to pay for our sins. Nothing we can do can measure up to that.

Somehow I expected to cover the entirety of verses 12-13 in one post, but I guess considering my previous posts, it’s not surprising that this is so long already. What's great about this is that I'm learning so much more than I expected through writing this series, and hopefully you're learning too! So next time we’ll talk about kindness. I think I’ll close this out with a great verse from Luke as a reminder to be compassionate:

Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:36)

Read the rest of this series:

1. Introduction
2. Appearing with Christ in Glory
3. Put Off Sexual Sin
4. Put Off Sins of Anger
5. Obscene Talk
6. As Fits the Occasion
7. Christ is All, and In All (Part 1)
8. Christ is All, and In All (Part 2)
9. Put On Compassionate Hearts