This is the conclusion to the “secondary matters” posts. After you first see how clear and often things are presented in scripture, and then look at how the church over the years has understood something to be clear in scripture, you should then move on to the present. This is the THIRD and final step. I apologize for it being so long.

How has the Christian community within your denomination understood an issue? How have those outside your denomination or particular history (Baptistic, Reformed, Ana-Baptistic/Mennonite, etc…) or cultural background (Eastern, African-American, etc…) understood the scriptures to be speaking to certain matters? How have you personally, in your experiences, in your personal time of study, in your reflections understood the scriptures to be speaking to the issue?

The degree to which you find greater agreement among the steps should affect your certainty. The greater the agreement, the greater the certainty. And vice versa.

As you interact with your personal experiences, denominational understanding, those outside your theological/cultural camp you will find some universally held beliefs. Things like the Apostle’s Creed. If people want to argue about Jesus’ real resurrection from the dead, or whether or not He’s essentially the same as Allah, or Shiva the Destroyer (Hinduism), then you ought to “contend for the faith.”

Then there are issues which I believe the scriptures clearly teach regarding God’s ultimate sovereignty and baptism, which I hold to a high (not highest) degree of certainty. So I’m going to pastor or join a church with those things in mind. However if there is no such church with those standards in my area (speaking as if I weren’t a pastor), I will look for one that aligns itself with my highest degree of certainty: Apostles Creed. There are many folks who don’t think I should have had Connar baptized. And they would probably re-baptize them if they could. However, I still learn from folks like John Piper (Reformed Baptist), Mark Driscoll (Reformed non-denominatonal “baptistic”) and Don Miller (not Reformed at all).

For folks like these, I can enter into a dialog with them. But neither will probably convince the other, and that’s fine. No big deal. Scripture just isn’t as clear as we would like to think on these issues. Even though that pains me to say!

And even within denominations there are areas which need to be revisited and thought through today. So that they are as scriptural as possible. For instance, in my denomination, the role of women. Should they be deacons? I personally think so, but I’m submitting myself to the larger body. However, that doesn’t mean that this will always be the case, nor should it always be the case. There is debate and dialog going on. And it is being done with these steps in mind, with people smarter than myself (Tim Keller leading the pro-side). So the stance could change someday.

Finally, there are individual convictions and interpretations of scripture which need to have all three steps in mind. Something that may seem so clear to you could perhaps be due to your past, the way your family did things, the way your church did things, your friends, your enemies, your political party, your socio-economic standing, your exposure or lack thereof to good training, etc..We all need to recognize that we have certain biases which we bring to the scriptures. Some helpful. Some quite harmful. That’s why it is SO important to limit these biases with the help of the church over the years and the wider Christian community today. For these issues, dialog is fine. Personal conviction in these areas is fine. But trying to force these on others, judgment, harassment, isolation, arrogance that YOU hold the key interpretation and application is not Christianity. It’s more gnostic (secret knowledge God gives to an enlightened few) than anything.

We need to keep in mind that even the Reformers who broke away from the Catholic church looked to those before them for their interpretations of scripture. Augustine believed in salvation by grace through faith before Luther, Calvin, Zwingli. And John Huss, said it a 100 years before all of them. And while not perfect examples of fellowship, they all interacted with their contemporaries, in addition to their personal studies. Unfortunately some of their convictions did sourly affect and limit their fellowship as things with lesser clarity were held with higher certainty (view of Lord’s Supper). So the next time you think you’ve discovered an interpretation and application that no one, or only a few have discovered in 2000 years, think again. You’re most likely wrong. In the slight chance you’re not, keep it personal and gracious when you dialog with others.

Tampa Bay Rays mania may start to dwindle very soon. With only 20 games left in the regular season, they are only up one and half games against the evil Red Sox. Most people are just hoping for a Wild Card shot. That seems more likely since they haven’t scored A run in two games. But at least we’ll be there for one game to root for the home team. One game, but four tickets though.

First, let me give you and “Ocho Cinco” update. Apparently since so many of the number 85 Chad Johnson jerseys have been sent to stores, the NFL is NOT letting “Ocho Cinco” run free. He will have to remain Chad Johnson on the field. Unless he decides to purchase all of the 85 Chad Johnson jerseys currently in stores. Life is hard, eh?

Anyhow, I learned one valuable thing on Friday night. Enterprise, the company which boasts the slogan “We’ll pick you up,” doesn’t. At least not airport Enterprises. On the way to Rock the Universe (Christian concert night at Universal Studios), the church bus broke down. About 15 miles from the Universal Studios exit.

The kids made the most of the time by cross-stitching, paper meche, and making balloon animals, so that was fine. The caravanning cars following us took their kids and then came back an hour and a half later for the rest of the kids.

Myself, and the bus driver + wife waited for them to return and take us to the Airport Enterprise (only one open at that time) to rent 3 mini-vans. Because if you are stranded on I-4, they will not pick you up. Busch league. Totally.

We finally got to Universal Studios at 11:45 pm, just in time to meet the kids at the check point at midnight. I can now say that I’ve been to Universal Studios, and not be lying. Although I was joking about the paper meche and the like, our kids had a great attitude and one of them led a few games. You know, the kind of games you’d play if a bunch of your peers were broken down on the side of the interstate.

I really can’t complain. The Apostle Paul was shipwrecked. And he didn’t have Enterprise, or a coast guard for that matter. He probably just had a board to float on. I was in my bed at 3:30 am and can blog about this with a smile. A long night, but God safely, and fairly cost-efficiently, delivered us to our homes.

The NFL season finally started last night. Although this been an easy transition with the success of the Tampa Bay Rays. And with the first week of the season, we shall see something of a “first.”

Do you want another example of why it is important to make major decisions in life IN COMMUNITY and NOT by yourself? I would consider changing one’s last name to be fairly large.

That’s what Bengal’s receiver Chad Johnson has done. He officially changed his last name in a Broward County courthouse last week from Johnson to OchoCinco. His number is “85” and instead of going with the exact translation to Spanish “ochenta y cinco,” he opted for a looser translation. Crazy.

Now the NFL has agreed to officially recognize this name by allowing the Bengals to put “Ocho Cinco” (though it is technically one word for legal documents) on his jersey. I think he got fined for having it on his jersey last year at the beginning of the game before his QB ripped it off.

This stunt may last a season. I doubt he will retire as Chad OchoCinco. More likely he’ll be Chad “Ocho Cinco” Johnson. Probably very few folks out there will be inspired to officially change their name to “G-Money” “Scottish Nightmare” or “Dushka” (all of which I’ve gone by at different times in my life.) But regardless, it shows the need for others to speak wisdom into our lives regarding important decisions. Sometimes such decisions may not be as easy to reverse, and have more serious consequences that only others may be able to see.

I want to continue the question: “how do I know if something is a secondary matter?” But I want to expand it to cover a wider arena, “Which things should garner higher levels of certainty?”

The first step is to see how clear it is, how often it occurs, or how central it is to the scriptures. But that does raise the question: what makes something clear? I mean, when A-Rod hit a home run and it was viewed on instant replay last night (first time in MLB history by the way), I thought there was clear visual evidence to overturn it. So did the announcers. But the umpire didn’t. But what if 100 umpires looked at the replay? And 95 out of 100 believed it was a home run? Well, I would hold to my “foul ball stance” far more loosely. I might even be convinced that I were wrong.

Since God has given wisdom to the church, we ought to look at how saints who’ve gone before us have interpreted and applied the scriptures. How has it been interpreted in the early church? How has it been interpreted and applied over the years?

Let’s take a look at something relevant: the role of women in the church. Should they hold office as deacon? Should they be preachers? Preach on occasion? Do anything an un-ordained man can do in worship?

In order to decide on where to stand, and how strongly to stand on this issue, I need to look at how God has instructed His Church over the last 2000 years. Did the early church have deaconnesses? What was their stance on woman preaching? Did Augustine have anything to say on the matter? How about Luther? How about Calvin? How about the Westminster Confession of Faith? How about in the last 100 years?

Obviously the last 100 years has seen some diversity of opinion on this matter. We’ll visit that at a later time, provided you come back to read in a day or two.

But this exercise ought to help us know what’s primary as well. Churches which believe that the bible is the authority (step 1), also hold to the way the Church (step 2) has from early on interpreted that which is primary. The Apostle’s Creed, which is still recited in many churches today, is what we hold with the highest certainty.

While I am 100 % convinced that I was honoring God in baptizing Connar, many other sincere believers would not take such action. The Church has not been uniform on this issue. Thus I hold the truth presented in the Apostle’s Creed with higher certainty than I do on baptism, role of women in church, etc…

Randy preached on Romans 14 on Sunday. Edifying and challenging, as the Word should always be to us. The passage challenges those who differ on secondary matters (specifically dietary concerns and when to have church) to come together in love. They must not abandon fellowship and need to learn to respect each others’ convictions. Provided people are eating or not eating “by faith,” in Christ, they’re cool. That’s the bottom line. Both can be serving Christ if they do what they do in faith.

Well the question now is, “What is a secondary matter?'” Certainly there have been those who have divided over Jesus’ resurrection and a belief that God’s Word is in fact, God’s Word. But there also have been denominations formed because of an anti-alcohol stance (can you just see John Knox rolling over in his grave!) and pre-millenial end times views. Not good. So how do we figure out what is worth fighting over and what is worth putting up with?

I’ll be doing a series now on how to know what’s really important (contending for the faith-Jude 1:3) and what we should be able to disagree on but do so in love (Romans 14).

There are three main areas to look at. We’ll visit the first one now. Our standard: the Bible.
There are some things in the bible which are very clear. Jesus is fully God (not just a dude). In order to deny that, one would need to add words to the bible (as Jehovah’s Witnesses do) or ignore certain parts of it. Other things include His bodily resurrection from the dead, our sinful humanity, our need to gather and worship Him, etc..

Now there are some things which are not as clear. Are there a number of clear passages which tell us exactly how to vote, that tattoos are evil, head scarves are needed for women, exactly how to school your child, how Sunday worship should look, etc…? No.

Those things which find greater clarity and space in scripture we should contend for. We should hold them with higher levels of certainty. Those things which find less clarity should move us toward more charity. St. Augustine (not the city) once said something similar. Of course, not in English.

This is the first step. Some things may be clear to me and not to you, and vice versa. So there is a second step we need to take. In time. Probably a day.

I’ve been a little bit farther into The Shack lately. I’ll be posting a review myself when I finish reading it. For the time being, if you’re interested, here are few reviews to get you thinking: Christianity Today, ByFaith online.

I just want to take a minute to address some (at least it would seem to me are) underlying presuppositions held by the author.

1.) Apparent Presupposition 1: Either God has stopped communicating to His people or He is still speaking outside and without connection to His Word . But God has given us everything we need to know about Him and how to live through His Word. This is what some have called the “sufficiency of scripture.” God’s Word is so full of great stuff that it is plenty enough to sustain us, teach us about Him, and direct us with general principles for how to live in our particular cultural setting.

Does God speak with us today like He did with Moses on Mt. Sinai? No. But we don’t need Him to. We’re actually in a better spot now, since we have all of His Word before us. We have the Holy Spirit who speaks to and directs our hearts through His Word. As we read the Word or hear it preached, the Spirit challenges and encourages us.

We may then feel the Spirit challenging us to quit engaging in a sinful practice. We may feel the Spirit reminding us to be faithful in giving, or encouraging us to stop trying to please God and instead rest in Him. We might be moved to full time ministry, away from it, to a relationship or away from a detrimental one, to forgive, to go to college, etc…God’s Spirit enables and empowers us to apply general principles to our specific situations.

Now on to how He does it….

2.) “God’s voice had been reduced to paper, and even that paper had to be moderated and deciphered by the proper authorities and intellects.” Apparent Presupposition 2: you can interpret God’s word alone. You don’t need help.

We need help in interpreting this Word. Watch out for someone who interprets something a certain way that no one has before him for 2000 years. He or she is certainly wrong! We need to interact with the larger Christian community, Church History, and our present church/denomination to understand how to apply it today. This will reduce our subjectivity and biases, which we all have.

Just because we need brothers and sisters in the faith to help us, does not mean that God doesn’t use them to speak to us today. In other words, you shouldn’t go away to a shack as your EXCLUSIVE means of figuring things out. You should go away to a shack to spend time with God and His word and in prayer. However this can’t be the ONLY means, or else you will go awry.

It’s like a tripod. You may have personal experience as a “pod,” interaction with the church at large and in history as a “pod,” and your home church/denomination as a “pod.” If you take one of the “pods” away, you’re left with a “di-pod.” And who’s every heard of a “di-pod?” It certainly wouldn’t stand if there were such a thing.

I went out fishing with a few buddies today in the kayaks. Fishing was slow, while the wind was anything but. I had just caught two fish in two casts (combined total 9 inches) and then saw my least favorite person on the water (besides jet ski-ers, who are in their own terrible category): the marine patrol.

I said to one of my buddies, “He’s going to ruin my day.” And I was right. He asked to see our lifejackets, fishing license, and whistle or other “personal noise making device.”

I repeated back to him, “I have no personal noise making device, and one of the two kayaks has a life jacket in them.” My other kayak, in use by a friend from church, was the winner. Not having a life jacket is now a 90 dollar fine. Just went up last weekend. Lovely.

He also issued us warnings for not having a whistle/personal noise making device. To make matters worse, I actually didn’t have my fishing license with me either. It was in the car, in my wallet. So I got a 70 dollar fine, which will be taken away when I go to the clerk of the court and show him I do in fact have a license. Crazy. I felt a pang of conscience and checked just to make sure I wasn’t assuming my lifejacket was there. Fortunately it was in the front compartment. Now I won’t have that on my conscience!

The morals of the day:

1.) Get a stinkin whistle, another life jacket and put your fishing license with your fishing lures. What good does it do you in your wallet if you leave that in the car?

2.) People in positions of authority like to be respected. Marine patrols have a clause that allows them to give a “non-refundable” 70 dollar ticket for folks who don’t have their licenses with them. Apparently it is up the marine patrol’s discretion. Glad I was decently respectful. Now I’m only out a trip to courthouse and 5 bucks or so. And half the other fine.

Someone made my day a few days ago when he said, “Geoff, I’ve been bringing the bible to work and trying to read some on my breaks. How do you do choose what to read?”

Hearing that was better than catching 10 oversize snook in a day on lures. It really was. By the way, don’t comment that I look like a dork in the picture with my top button buttoned. I already know I do. But safety first.

But this phone call was especially welcome on a week which I started reading a book called The Shack. This is a book I don’t recommend, but am reading it because so many people are. As far as a story goes, I’ve enjoyed it like the Da Vinci code. But here’s an excerpt that exposes an underlying presupposition which I can’t support:

“In seminary he had been taught that God had completely stopped any overt communication with moderns, preferring to have them only listen to and follow sacred Scripture, properly interpreted, of course. God’s voice had been reduced to paper, and even that paper had to be moderated and deciphered by the proper authorities and intellects. It seemed that direct communication with God was something exclusively for the ancients and uncivilized, while educated Westerners’ access to God was mediated and controlled by the intelligentsia. Nobody wanted God in a box, just in a book…..”

Ultimately, the point is that God’s Word is not sufficient for us today. We need some sort of direct personal encounter that is not limited to God’s Word. What those look like I don’t know (can they go against His written Word, should they even be tested against the written word?); I just started reading. Does God still speak through his written Word today? If so, how? How intelligent do I have to be read and understand the bible? Is it bad to have people help me interpret the bible? I’ll be visiting these questions in future posts.

We had Connar baptized two weeks ago and it was quite a blessing. Its good to take time to reflect, which I’ve done little of. Most people don’t contemplate or reflect; we just do. Anyhow, here are a few brief reflections I had “time for!”

1.) God the Great Hound dog
A number of family members came to Hope that Sunday. I was blown away by the mere fact that some of these folks weren’t in a church at all only a few years ago. And now some of them not only go, but are getting connected. God had been faithful to His covenant promises to be a God to believers and their children. They were all baptized. We actually had 4 generations of Hendersons there that day. Pretty cool. One by one, He chased after such folks like the Hound of Heaven. And Henderson, by one translation book, means “Lover of Hounds.” Seriously, that’s what I heard.

2.) A Sinner’s Prayer?
I’m praying for Connar to never know a day where he doesn’t know Jesus as His Lord and Savior. If he does have some sort of time or day experience, that’s fine. But since there is actually no official “sinner’s prayer” in the bible, I’m not going to tell Him he needs to pray one. Instead I’m always going to point Him to repent and trust and follow Jesus from day one.