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Theology is Important

Leave a Comment / Blog, Home Bulletin, My Blog / Christopher Peppler

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Theology is important! “But I am a practical person, so why do I need all that book-learning stuff?”

Theology is important for you. “No way. I follow the Spirit, so why do I need to know all that doctrine?”

“Theology is the domain of seminaries and we all know that seminaries are spiritual cemeteries.”

I have written on this before, but it is worth stating again – what we believe largely determines how we live. Sometimes we speak and act irrationally or out of anger or hurt, but mostly what we say and do flows from our embedded values, priorities, and life principles. These arise from what we believe about who we are, what we are doing on this planet, and where we go when we die, and these, and more, are the subjects of theology. However, I need to define ‘theology’ before progressing further.

What is Theology?

I really dislike the stock definition of theology as the study of God. God is multidimensional and we are limited to three dimensions of space and one of time. God is all-knowing, all-wise, and all-powerful and we are pathetically limited in all of these aspects. How then can we study God?! It is like an aphid claiming to be able to study an angel. I don’t even like the idea that theology is talking about God. No, it is far more than just that, and of much greater value than talk and conjecture.

A biblical understanding of the nature of theology derives from two Greek words, Theos and Logos. Theos translates as ‘God’ and Logos translates as ‘divine reason’, which can also mean ‘reason as the controlling principle of the universe’, and even ‘reason as manifested by speech’. However, the biblical revelation goes deeper because in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, the author writes that the Lord Jesus Christ is The Logos.

‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning … The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.’

On all three occasions ‘the Word’ is a translation of the Greek ‘logos’. So, authentic Christian theology is based on the revelation of Jesus Christ as God. Theology is rooted in divine revelation rather than intellectual discovery yet it deploys philosophy and reason as aids to comprehending God’s revelation to us. Theology is the body of Jesus-centred divine revelation.

How we Develop our Theology

Seminaries articulate theology and act as its custodians over the generations. Some of us study at such establishments’, others read theology books, while still others do neither. Yet all of us have a theology. We may have imbibed it from our parents or teachers, or perhaps we have built it directly from the pages of scripture, but all Christians have a theologically informed worldview of one form or another.

This theology, whether we call it that or not, plays a huge role in how we live. It informs our business ethics, our personal morality, and our value system, and it moulds our measures of meaning and worth. Theology is, therefore, important to all of us.

Church Theology

The role and importance of theology is more obvious within the context of the church than it is in our personal lives. Local churches and denominations invariably have a well-established theology, which becomes obvious through its preaching, teaching, and leadership ministries. They often crystalize their theology in statements of faith or position papers and teachings on key doctrines. Problems arise when churches place their traditions and historical positions above the revelation of scripture. Problems also occur when church practices arise from poor doctrine and faulty theology. However, those accountable for defective theology seldom acknowledge that their understanding is deficient. For instance, those who promote infant ‘baptism’ usually claim that their practice flows from the legitimate idea that baptism is a church-age continuation of the Old Testament rite of circumcision. However, Jesus modelled adult baptism by immersion and Paul expanded on this idea. So, infant baptism/Christening does not arise from a Jesus-centred understanding of scripture and is therefore defective. All churches have a theology but not all parts of their theology are necessarily ‘correct’. Now, this obviously begs the question of what constitutes good/correct theology.

The Fundamental Criterion of Good Theology

For at least the last thirty-five years I have preached, taught, and written on this subject. My personal conviction is that the biblical revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ is the fundamental criterion of good theology. In a nutshell, my reasoning is:

The Bible is the trustworthy written record of God’s revelation to humanity.
Jesus Christ is the full manifestation of the Godhead in bodily form.
Therefore, the biblical revelation of what Jesus said, did, and revealed of the nature and character of the Godhead is the criterion of sound theology.

The foundation of this process of deduction is obviously the presupposition that the Bible is the trustworthy record of God’s revelation to humanity. A critic might claim that my Christocentric (Jesus-centred) basis for sound theology is simply an assumption. This is true. Almost all logical arguments are founded on an assumption of some kind. However, my base assumption is neither arbitrary nor unsubstantiated. I have devoted a huge amount of time and research to satisfying myself that the bible, as we have it today, is trustworthy and reliable. I do not claim that it is ‘inerrant’ as my more fundamental brothers claim it to be because it does not make this claim for itself. Yet, despite the involvement of human beings in its authorship, editing, and preservation, I find it to be consistently trustworthy.

Therefore, if a church or denomination bases and validates its theology Christocentrically (from a Jesus perspective) then that theology will be good theology. The same must apply to individuals. However, I do have a few caveats to add.

Qualifications

It is possible for someone to base their theology on a biblical understanding of who Jesus is and what he said and did and revealed of the Godhead, yet still produce poor doctrine and theology. This can happen by:

Basing theology only on what the scriptures reveal of Jesus Christ. Some would call this red-letter theology and it arises when there is a failure to realise that Jesus is both the subject of scripture, but also its interpreter. For biblical theology to be adequately developed it must take into account all of the biblical revelation and not just the Gospels, Acts and selective verses from the book of Revelation. But, and it is a big but, all of scripture needs to be looked at through the lens of what Jesus said, did, and revealed of the nature and purpose of the Godhead. This is what I understand as genuine Jesus-centred interpretation.
Not basing theology on the texts and passages of the bible within their fuller context. Verse-picking bedevils many Christians! Verses that are lifted out of their historical, linguistic, and literary context do not constitute a basis for sound interpretation.

An Example

Just in case the two principles I have articulated above are too general, let me give an example of what I mean. I have written before about the Mathew 24 ‘signs of the end of the age’, passage before, but it will also serve well here.

Many people are wondering if we are currently living in the final days of planet Earth as we know it, and so what Jesus said about it is a hot current issue.

Matthew 24 contains some statements that may confuse or scare some. For instance, Jesus said in Matthew 24 verses 15 and 16, “So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes desolation’, spoken through the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand) then let those who are in Judea flee fo the mountains’”. I wonder how many doomsday-preppers have taken this as a reason to head for the hills and live in armed and fearful isolation? The assumption for them would be that the whole of chapter 24 is about the end of time. Because there is no longer a temple (holy place) in Jerusalem, then they figure that the reference must be to parts of today’s church which they perceive as an abomination in so many ways. The world is evidencing much of what Jesus speaks of in the chapter, and they see the traditional church as ‘desolate’, so it must be time to run and hide. The problem is that the disciples asked Jesus two questions, one about when the Jerusalem temple would be destroyed and the other about the end of time and the second coming. In verses 15 to 22 Jesus describes the conditions that would occur in AD 70 when the temple would be destroyed by the Roman army. This passage does not refer to our current conditions. There are clues in the text itself that this is the case. For instance, ‘let the reader understand’ must surely refer to the original readers and not the hundreds of generations between then and now. If you would like to read further on this passage of Matthew then click HERE.

If, as I believe is the case, what we say and do is greatly influenced by our theology, then a good way of changing our lives for the better is to re-examine our theology.

What do I believe concerning the centrality of Jesus Christ? What do I believe concerning the trustworthiness of the bible? What do I believe concerning my dependence on the Holy Spirit?

Having determined what I currently believe concerning these three fundamental theological foundations, my next step should be to relate issues of faith and life to what Jesus revealed within its proper context. Do my current life principles, values, and purposes correlate with a Jesus-centred theology? From this base, I can determine what needs to change in the way I live my Christian life. This will be hard work requiring regular reality checks, but I know of no other way to intentionally adjust our theology and the lifestyle that flows from this.

Another way to perform a reality check is to change our approach to responding to issues that arise in our lives. If someone asks what your position is on homosexuality, abortion, war, radical liberalism, or whatever, you can check your habitual response and reprocess the matter differently. Instead of responding with “Well, I think…”, or, “The Bible says…”, you can find some time to run the issue through the filters that I have proposed.

If you still hold that theology is not important, then I would be very happy to interact with you and hear what you have to say. The easiest way is to comment on this post at the foot of the page, or you could send me an e-mail.

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What religion says about Jesus

1 Comment / Blog, Home Bulletin, My Blog / Christopher Peppler

I have found that a good way to determine the integrity and truth of religious, sectarian, or cultic teachings is to first determine what they say about Jesus.

The teachers of many religious systems claim that they worship the same God as the God of the Bible, and that their system of belief is just another way of approaching Him. Now, according to the Bible, Jesus is ‘the image of the invisible God…the exact representation of His being… for in Christ all the fullness of the deity lives in bodily form’ (Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:3; Colossians 2:9). The Lord Jesus is therefore the primary yardstick by which we should measure the validity of all spiritual truth claims. What a belief system teaches concerning His deity, uniqueness, and Lordship is an excellent indication of whether or not their god is our God, and their way of salvation the biblical way of salvation. So, let us have a quick look at what five major religious systems have to say about Jesus.

Islam

In terms of Islamic teaching, Jesus is only a messenger of Allah (and a prophet). Muslims deny that Jesus is both God and man and they also deny that he was crucified. However, they affirm that He was born of a virgin and that He was sinless. Islam has a high view of Jesus, but denies His divinity.

Hinduism

Although there are numerous sects within Hinduism, most of them hold to certain core teachings. For instance, Brahman is the name they apply to what they believe is the divine essence of all that exists. Brahman is impersonal, eternal, and beyond all human comprehension. There are many hundreds of gods and goddesses within Hinduism generally believed to be manifestations of the divine essence (Brahman). An Avatar is the name given to an appearance on earth of one of these deities and some strains of Hinduism claim that Jesus was an Avatar. However, most hold that he was simply an enlightened teacher (a master or guru).

Buddhism

Perhaps the best way to understand Buddhism is as a philosophy of how to live a happy life. Although it does include a concept of reincarnation, each new appearance of life on earth does not represent a specific spiritual entity or being. Because Buddhism predates Christianity by some six hundred years, its basic teachings take no account of Jesus. If they have any view of Jesus at all it would be as an enlightened teacher.

Mormonism

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints claims to be ‘the church of Jesus Christ’ but the big question is, ‘is this Jesus the same of the biblical Jesus of Nazareth or is he the Jesus of the latter day saints?’ Their Jesus was birthed in a pre-earthly existence (on another ‘planet’) by a flesh and bone divine man and his wife. He was the first of many sons and Satan was his younger brother. This alone evidences that the Jesus of Mormonism is not the Jesus revealed in the Bible.

Jehovah’s Witnesses

According to Jehovah’s Witness’ theology, God is a single person, not a Trinity. He does not know all things and he is not everywhere. He first created Michael the Archangel through whom He created all “other things,” including the universe. When the time came for a messiah to redeem humanity Michael the Archangel became a human in the form of Jesus. Jesus was created and was therefore not ‘god’ and he is not part of any supposed trinity. The Jehovah’s Witness doctrine of salvation sets out three requirements for salvation – a proper knowledge of god and Jesus, obedience to god’s law, and membership of and loyalty to the one true church (theirs). This neither the Jesus of the Bible nor the way of salvation it reveals.

It is reasonably clear from all of this that the Mormon or Jehovah’s Witness Jesus is not the Jesus revealed in and through the Bible. Nor is the Jesus acknowledged by Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism the Jesus of the Bible. The Jesus of these religions cannot save anyone in and of himself and cannot be worshipped as God.

Here are links to the source documents of the five religions I have listed, for those of you interested in verifying this information or studying further:
Islam: The Quran
Hinduism: The Vedas
Buddhism: The Dhammapada and others
Mormonism: The Book of Mormon
Jehovah’s Witnesses: New World translation of Holy Scriptures
The Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry (CARM) has a lot of information on these and other religious systems.

PS: Listen to my forthcoming TruthTalk and the Q&A that follows it if you want to know what I think of Roman Catholicism’s take on Jesus and His saving work.

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The liberal ‘gevaar’

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In many evangelical circles, and certainly amongst most fundamentalists, the world ‘liberal’ carries with it a definite emotional and theological charge.

Liberals are seen as threatening the Faith and undermining true Christian theology. Liberals have a nefarious agenda; they are wolves in sheep’s clothing, and so on. Liberal theologians, on the other hand, are concerned at what they observe as a lack of love and compassion for the human condition among fundamentalists. They also take exception to what they perceive as the naïve and uncritical spiritualisation of evangelicals. Some, like bishop Spong for instance, even contend that unless they save Christianity from unscientific supernaturalism it will become first irrelevant and then extinct.

So what is theological liberalism? I would describe liberals as people who hold the following theological beliefs: Concerning the Bible, they generally believe that the scriptures are no more inspired than other important literary works. As a result, they subject the Bible to rigorous ‘higher’ criticism and discount much of its historic reliability and factual accuracy. Concerning salvation, they understand regeneration as a reprogramming of the individual mind and the transformation of the structures of society. Liberal theology is both humanistic and anti-supernatural. On the positive side, this results in a focus on compassion for people and consideration for the human habitat. On the negative side, it strips Christianity and the Bible of everything that cannot be logically explained. Angels have never been scientifically evaluated therefore they cannot exist. A miracle is merely the mythological name given to a natural process we do not yet fully understand. Rebirth is actually just a way of describing the process of intellectual and moral transformation. The virgin birth is superfluous… and so on. I need to note though that there is a continuum from old fashioned liberalism on the one end, through neo-liberalism, evangelical orthodoxy, to fundamentalism on the other end. Some fundamentalists regard the average evangelical as somewhat liberal, and many liberals see little difference between evangelicals and fundamentalists.

As an evangelical, I have very real problems with most that goes under the heading of theological liberalism. I accept that the Bible has a human aspect to it, but I do not accept that it is anything other than divinely inspired and authoritative. If, as many liberals contend, most of the New Testament is simply a record of the philosophy of Paul of Tarsus, then it provides only limited help in the 21^st century and no certainty for an eternal future. If the Gospels record the embellished mythology of overzealous first century Christ-followers, then perhaps Jesus did not do what they say He did and His teaching is no more definitive than that of any other wise man of His day. If man is essentially good, then sin is just a religious word for social dysfunction. If right and wrong, morality and immorality are genetically or culturally determined, then homosexuality is just a matter of personal preference or predisposition, and abortion on demand a societal convenience.

If science stands above scripture as the yardstick of truth, then tomorrow’s truth will not be the same as today’s truth and both will be uncertain.

If God is an archaic name for cosmic group consciousness, then the possibility of a personal relationship with him, her, or it is an absurd idea. If Jesus was just a radical Jewish teacher and activist then I am without a saviour and my only hope for the future is my own effort, the success of my particular race or society, and a lot of luck. If this is what the Christian Faith truly is then it isn’t worth saving.

I see no point to a liberal Faith of the kind I have described. However, a note of sober caution is in order. Liberalism is not the only aberration within the greater body of the Church. In my opinion, extreme fundamentalism, on the other side of the continuum, with its harsh separatism and exclusive definitions of biblical inerrancy, creationism and so on, is an ill-conceived over-reaction to liberalism. In its own way it does just as much damage to the credibility and vitality of the Christian Faith. Naive and slavish literalism denigrates the rational aspect of biblical faith; fixation on non-fundamental doctrines fragments the church; separatist pride and lovelessness opens the chasm between church and world even wider than it already is.

Another caution is that we should recognise the liberalism in our own views and practices. When we focus on societal change as the Faith priority, then we are comfortably in line with the liberal agenda. When we practice our Faith as an essentially private matter, largely unconfined by the demands and restraints of church life and doctrine, then we are being distinctly liberal. When we respond accommodatingly to unbiblical societal norms with the mantra, ‘different strokes for different folks’, then we are surely liberals at heart. So perhaps, rather than being as concerned as we often appear to be with only the liberalism we identify in the institutions of the church, we ought also to examine the insidious incursion of it into our own lives and thinking.

I can’t speak for you, but I actually don’t want religion of any type, liberal or other; I want a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ as revealed in the Bible and as illuminated by the Holy Spirit … so help me Father God.

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The Great Creation Debate

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Over the last several years there has been quite a lot of Christian media coverage given to the evolution versus divine creation debate. The subject is not a new one, but of late the Young Earth Creationist camp has been making its views known fairly clearly and dogmatically and this has sparked responses from Christians who hold other views on creation.

I am not a trained scientist and so I am not competent to comment significantly on the scientific aspects of the debate. I also do not claim to be a theological ‘expert’ on the subject. Despite both of these limitations I do feel able to make some cautionary comments on the subject. Job 38:4 records God’s challenge when He asks Job, “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?” I believe this applies equally to both scientists and theologians. Human beings were not present when God created the heavens and the earth. Scientists were not present at the creation to observe and analyse. They develop their hypotheses from the geological record and logical assumptions. Theologians were not there either and we develop our doctrines from a logical understanding of the scriptures. So an essential requirement in the evolution/creation debate, on both sides, is humility.

A second preliminary consideration concerns who the parties are in the debate. On the one hand Christians are engaged with atheist or agnostic sceptics like Richard Dawkins, but it seems to me that the more heated debate is occurring between Christians. Evangelicals are taking issue with Liberals, but bible-believing Christians are also fighting with other bible-believing evangelicals. I say ‘fighting’ because some of the debate is beyond robust.

The main ‘camps’ in the Christian debate over evolution and creation are the Young Earth Creationism camp, The Progressive Creationism camp, the Intelligent Design camp, and the Theistic Evolution camp. Bruce Waltke has written a paper on ‘Barriers to accepting the possibility of creation by means of an evolutionary process’ which you can read here and as an appendix he attaches the findings of four surveys administered to Pentecostal seminary faculties between 2004 and 2009. The last of these surveys revealed that only 23% of the respondents were Young Earth Creationists and 19% were evolutionary creationists. So we need to note that neither of these positions enjoys majority support even among Pentecostals.

I recently read comments by a scientist who described himself as a Christian Theistic Evolutionist claiming that a prominent Young Earth Creationist was implying that those Christians who do not agree with his views do not therefore believe in a real Adam or an actual fall. He then points out that as a Theistic Evolutionist he does believe in a real Adam and Eve, a Garden of Eden, a real Fall, and in the authority of the Bible. So we all need to be careful how we classify and characterise other sincere Christians.

I believe that, instead of fighting each other over the ‘how’ of creation, Christian scholars with a particular interest in this area of study should engage each other in a non-confrontational way on some of the underlying issues in the debate. For instance, we need to discuss what the various views say or imply concerning the character of God, the trustworthiness of the scriptures, and key doctrines such as sin and salvation. As an example, the idea that God created the earth some 6,000 years ago with the appearance of great age says something about God’s integrity and transparency. Disbelief in an actual Adam and original sin seriously affects the evangelical understanding of salvation in and through the last Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45), the Lord Jesus Christ, and so on. These, and other serious doctrinal and faith issues, should be resolved through considerate and careful debate. I for one would certainly appreciate more of this kind of exchange and less polemic dogmatism in Christian magazines and journals.

My appeal to both scholars and editors is to air the underlying faith issues in the debate rather than the endless ideas on how God might have created, or when He created.

As a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ I am far more interested in, and impacted by, what the creation issue has to say about God’s character, the trustworthiness of the Bible, and the key doctrines of the evangelical faith.

So my appeal is that we make the subject of creation a great debate rather than a great ‘barney’.

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Jesus Deficit Disorder: The Evidence

Leave a Comment / Blog, Home Bulletin, My Blog, Podcast, TruthTalks / Christopher Peppler

Ever since I have known him Len Sweet has boldly declared that the church is suffering from a ‘Jesus deficit disorder’

I met up with him again a few weeks ago and asked him if this was still the case. His response was, “It’s even worse now than it was two decades ago”. Is his view correct? Well, those of you who regularly read my posts know that I agree with Len 100%, that the church appears to have lost its focus on The Lord Jesus. But is there hard evidence to back up these claims? Yes… and here is one example.

Ligonier Ministries have recently released their latest survey, ‘The state of theology’ in the United States of America. Ligonier is part of the teaching ministry of Dr R.C.Sproul, a well-known Calvinist theologian. Some of the statements posed to the 3,000 Christians polled are phrased from a Calvinist perspective, but most are not and therefore give a good idea of general Christian thinking rather than just ‘reformed’ thinking.

Here are some of the statements that relate to the Lord Jesus Christ, along with the responses:

Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God… 67% agreed or were not sure.
So, two-thirds of evangelical Christians in the USA believe that Jesus was and is a created being like some sort of super angel! The great historic creeds state the exact opposite. For instance, the Nicene Creed states that ‘we believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.’ Of course, the Creeds are merely statements of biblical truth written in order to combat error, truths such as Hebrews 1:2-4; ‘in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs’. There are several other scriptures I could quote but the point is made.

So, here’s the thing, the majority (67%) of American Christians believe that Jesus is less than God despite the biblical evidence to the contrary. The response to the next statement confirms this terrible heresy.

Jesus is truly God and has a divine nature, and Jesus is truly man and has a human nature… 37% disagreed or were unsure! Over a third of those polled either believe that Jesus does not have a divine nature, or that He doesn’t have a human nature. Yet in Colossians 1:19 Paul boldly asserts that ‘God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him’. The very salvation that Jesus came to earth to procure for us depends on both His divinity and His humanity. So it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise to see the responses to the next statement.
Jesus Christ’s death on the cross is the only sacrifice that could remove the penalty of my sin… 38% disagreed. Yet John the Apostle wrote that Jesus ‘is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2). And Paul wrote, ‘for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood (Romans 3:23-25).
Only those who trust in Jesus Christ alone as their Saviour receive God’s free gift of eternal salvation… 44% disagreed! O my, O my… I don’t need to comment further.

So has the American evangelical church lost its focus on Jesus? Is it suffering from a Jesus Deficit Disorder?

The evidence confirms this deadly malaise in the Body of Christ.

And don’t be too quick to think that this is just an American phenomenon because the anecdotal evidence from around the world points to the same conclusion.

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