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theology
Have you ever heard Christians talking about predestination and wanted to object that they were only telling half of the story? Ever read that God chooses to save some people and not others and wanted to point the person to some verses they hadn’t considered? Do you find that people’s explanation of election doesn’t do justice to how you understand God’s working in the Bible? Let’s consider some of those verses together.
Have you ever thought about why you believed in Jesus when so many others don’t? Were you smarter? More spiritual? Were you just born in the right family or did you just meet the right friend? Was it luck, or was it something deeper at work? If you believe in Jesus, consider how the Bible says that took place.
Have you ever found yourself in an argument that never seemed to go anywhere? People dig in their heels and end up repeating themselves as they try to convince each other that they’re right. Often when that happens, we need to step back and look at the problem from a different angle. I think that’s the case with the question of whether God chooses to save certain people and not others.
Most people feel that God is angry and judgmental in the Old Testament but full of love and forgiveness in the New Testament. And they struggle to read the Old Testament as a result. But Jesus constantly quoted from it and Paul said that “all Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). Are we reading the Old Testament the way they did? I think that there are at least three things that can help us reconcile the depictions of God in the Old and New Testaments.
Over time, it’s easy for historical figures to be seen as caricatures. We’re not so concerned with the details of their lives so much as what we think they stood for. As a result, we can treat them as mascots for our cause, rather than hearing them on their own terms. That seems to have happened with Jesus in a number of different ways. Some people believe in Jesus, the moral teacher. Others esteem Jesus as a prophet. Some see Jesus as a champion of social justice. And still others see Him as an ally for conservative politics. What Jesus do you believe in? And more importantly, who do the Scriptures reveal Him to be?
We create sayings to remind ourselves about things we recognize as important:
“Keep the main thing, the main thing”
“First things first”
“Don’t sweat the small stuff”
Each of these slogans helps us remember the importance of prioritizing our priorities. And they highlight the reality that often other things distract us from what we believe should be central.
The church is not immune to this. I’ve seen Christians become obsessed with ‘biblical’ diets, numerology, church growth, the end times, particular forms of worship, home-schooling, social justice, speaking in tongues, and not speaking in tongues. In each case, a secondary issue became an all-consuming issue. In some cases, a good thing became a bad thing because it replaced the best thing. At times, I despaired that Christians seemed to get excited about almost anything other than the gospel!
Today, there is a trend to make the gospel a priority. But like all trends, this one will likely pass. When it does, we will still have God’s appointed means for keeping the gospel front and centre in our lives: The Lord’s Supper. Let me explain three ways that the Lord’s Supper can help us remember to keep our focus on the gospel.
Over time, things that initially shock us don’t anymore. I think something similar happens with the strangeness of baptism. It’s weird, right? If I asked you about your first day at work or your first time at a photography class and you said that they gathered everybody around to see all the new people dunked in a pool or a lake before they got started, I’d be pretty surprised. That would seem like a really strange company or club to me! So why have churches been doing that for the last 2,000 years? Let me give four reasons.
Last time, we considered the practice of infant baptism. And we said that since baptism in the New Testament is an expression of a believer’s faith in Jesus and a powerful reminder of vital truths about what happened when they trusted Him, it’s inappropriate and misleading to baptize someone who hasn’t yet put their faith in Jesus for salvation. But the question remains about what to do when a person does come to believe. Should a person who was baptized as an infant be baptized again when they understand and respond to the gospel?
Baptism is one of the few areas where churches still disagree—especially when it comes to infants. But the differences are smaller than many think. Here’s a simple explanation of where churches agree and why they sometimes baptize differently.
Some people live in denial about death. They just don’t want to think about it. Others have decided that it’s impossible to know and so they’re just going to wait until it happens. Those who care about what the Bible teaches, look to the Scriptures but can often be confused. This week, a person asked me to reconcile the verses that speak of death as “sleep” with those that describe other things going on after death. What really happens when die? And did Jesus teach that we just go to sleep?
