The question at hand is a complex one. Salvation is among the vaguest theological term in use, and one of the most popularly misunderstood, to my mind. This misunderstanding, it seems to me, stems from the fact that folks of different traditions mean very different things by this term "salvation." In my tradition, salvation has typically used to express the idea of justification, which happens by faith alone. In a more catholic vein, salvation expresses the idea of sanctification, which is the process by which a person is made holy. I will not even bring into the discussion the concepts of Glorification and Deification, as they are clearly outside of our reach "on this side of Glory." It seems to me that both of these concepts, justification and sanctification, have bearing on the discussion at hand.
Obviously, justification is at work in an individual's life, quite apart from the church, when the individual comes to faith in Christ. Of course, the individual has most likely inherited that faith from, or at least was introduced to that faith in the context of a church tradition. Justification, however, happens in the individual as a result of their personal (not private) decision to turn to God. However, this raises a few important questions: What has the individual been saved from? and What has the individual been saved for?
What has the individual been saved from? Well, in short, sin. Sin is what separates a person from God, and so by turning to God in faith, one somehow begins to cross the bridge over the chasm of sin and separation, and return to God. Sin also, I believe, separates us from each other. And this leads us to the question of what we are saved for, in economic -that is to say this-worldly- terms.
One can model this disparity caused by sin by invisioning dots (individuals) arrayed around a center point (God). Sin causes those dots to travel extreme distances away from the center point. And you may notice that as those dots travel outward in straight lines, the dots themselves grow farther apart. And since they are doomed to travel on straight tracks, the only way to get back into contact with each other is for them all to travel back inward to God. Likewise, as they draw closer together, they are naturally drawing closer to God.
This process of drawing closer together and closer to God I will call sanctification. This is what we are created for, this closeness to God and this closeness to each other. And so I think my answer is that in order to most fully realize our salvation in this life, on "this side of Glory", we must live in community. We must have church. We must draw closer together and closer to God.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Bethany poses an interesting question and one I have thought and prayed about myself. I also like the Augustine quote “He that does not have the Church as His mother cannot have God as his father”. But I have a deep seated problem with this kind of mentality. The Church is not our mother and the idea of hierarchy not only scares but terrifies me. To say that it is only within the local church that we can experience the fullness of salvation is dangerous. It seems to me to place the keys of heaven into the hands of flawed persons who for the most part I see damaging this world rather than saving it. Hopefully I can make my points a little more coherent or maybe it will just be rambling but here we go.
First the Church is not the mother to Christians we and the rest of the world are the bride of the Son. Who by the Holy Spirit was made flesh and has paid the dowry of for mankind to be ever joined in union with the Godhead. By calling the Church our mother or giving it the keys to fulfill salvation we lose the humbleness that is supposed to come with being the bride to the beloved. Inevitably we will create standards and view membership of the local congregation as membership in the kingdom. Salvation can be experienced in fullness anywhere because the Kingdom of Heaven is breaking through more and more with each passing moment. To put such an emphasis on the local congregations in formal sense is to cling a dying form of ecclesiology that for the most part is self serving and out dated. I believe that we are on the brink of a massive change in the church where we leave our cloisters of brick buildings and store fronts and return to society. Salvation is to be experienced in the gutters of life in the day to day.
Second this idea disturbs me because salvation is found and comes from naught but the cross on Calvary. It has already happened and is done; no building, gathering, or magical experiences necessary. We have already been saved the fullness of that is found in submission to the reality of that truth. I wish it was more complicated there would be lots of money to be made off of herding people into churches so that they can experience the cross and how it has saved us all. To claim that church or local congregation holds the keys to salvation or in the very least the fullness of salvation creates a power structure that is likely to be riddle with both abuse and monetary gains. We like to think that we would not send out Tetzel to sell indulgences but the truth is people suck and church people a lot of times suck harder. The Church is good because it allows us to meet together and worship our God, I love the church but it is Christ who bore my sin not the church.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
November's Prompt
Bethany offered this as our prompt for November. I apologize for not posing it before I had my 6 AM brainstorm, but I hope that I can amend the posting order for ease of access.--- JC
"The fullness of salvation in Christ cannot be experienced apart from a church--not just the Church Universal, across time and space--but a local congregation of other believers. Do you agree with this argument? What role (if any) does a local church, specific denomination, or particular religious tradition have in the life of an individual Christian?"
"The fullness of salvation in Christ cannot be experienced apart from a church--not just the Church Universal, across time and space--but a local congregation of other believers. Do you agree with this argument? What role (if any) does a local church, specific denomination, or particular religious tradition have in the life of an individual Christian?"
The Scandal of Exclusivity, the Scandal of Schism
"There is no salvation outside the Church."-- Catholic dogma
Warning: Opinions stated herein are subject to change upon further review and reflect the author's most current ideas concerning pluralism and what defines a church.
I like the Catholic statement taken out of its context. Certainly Rome used the phrase as a means to excommunicate the Protestants and "send" them to hell. Yet stripped of that cultural and historical meaning (which I hardly ever advocate, especially when Scripture is concerned), the statement contains a glimmer of something true, even if only a half-truth. Christ calls us to community, and one will be hard-pressed to find grounds for a solitary faith in the Bible.
Perhaps this is the Baptistness in me, but I would claim that Christ calls us to membership in a church that fosters the spiritually transforming aspects of the Gospel (read: regenerate Church membership). The error of Catholicism (and many other established [read: state supported] churches) is that such membership must be voluntary; the error of Calvanism is that such membership is indeed voluntary rather than an act of God. Any other form of membership in a church prevents it from being truly regenerate as the membership is legislated either by God or by the state. Christ bids all who are weary and heavy-laden to come and receive his rest; he does not compel them through sovereign might. It is for these reasons that I am a Baptist, and I believe that the freedom permitted to the individual is most in harmony with the Gospel.
More substantial than the kind of membership is the nature of the body into which a person is to be a member. Christians have struggled with what defines a church for the vast majority of Christian history, beginning with Paul's conflict with the strict Pharisaical Christians over Gentile converts, to the Reformation, and recently to the Southern Baptist Church chaos that continues to flare up now and again. All conflicts have been over what doctrines are enough to make one a Christian and allow him or her to have fellowship with other Christians (aka be a part of the church).
How many creeds do we have that say, in essence, "This theology, and nothing else."? Does that exclude people who have had an authentic experience with Christ yet do not affirm a specific creed from the salvation present in the Church? Does it not mean that these "heathens" are not competent to answer for their own souls? Our church membership criteria, vary as it does from tradition to tradition, sound the claim of Christ in John 14:6 loud and clear and indeed add much to Jesus' words. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through him and by acceptance of whatever set of doctrines a denomination has.
Again, a half-truth. The other half of that truth is to be found in John 10. Jesus claims that there are sheep (read: people) who are not "of this flock." Typically when I have read this I read "Jew-Gentile struggle." Yet is this not also a question of pluralism? Can Christianity, which begins as a Jew-only movement, expand to the Gentiles with their Greek understanding of the universe? Tertullian says, "No!" The Pharisaical Christians say, "No!" Paul, Luke, Peter, and John's Jesus say, "Yes!"
Returning to my Baptistness for a moment, I reiterate that I believe that Baptist doctrine allows for the most authentic expression of the Gospel in a Christian setting. It allows for the freedom of the individual while reinforcing the importance of community. The question of universalism versus exclusivity in a Christian setting is a question of denominations. That same question in a pluralistic setting is a question of belief systems. The harmony between universalism and exclusivity in a pluralistic setting must be the same harmony between Baptist freedom/ responsibility and the Gospel. It must respect the individual and his/her encounter with God and yet call him/her into the fellowship of the Church. Any theology or philosophy that seeks to do away with one side of the tension will find itself doing away with one side of the Gospel as well.
Thus we have this contention: doctrines qualifying church membership versus God's universalism. How do they mix together to form something that works for all people at all times? I don't know. My best guess at the moment is that all faith traditions (Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.) contain elements of the Gospel and that there are "invisible" Christians who live Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, etc. lives and find their "church" in a mosque, temple, etc. Yet at the end of the day it is Christ who calls them home, and they respond having heard the Shepherd's voice before. They are not of the Christian or Jewish flock, but Jesus brings them anyway.
What is a church? I will not try to define it. Rather, I will say that I meet Jesus in the faces of the people I fellowship with in that place every Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday. Hopefully that statement is open enough to let us all experience salvation inside the Church while preserving its Christian identity.
Warning: Opinions stated herein are subject to change upon further review and reflect the author's most current ideas concerning pluralism and what defines a church.
I like the Catholic statement taken out of its context. Certainly Rome used the phrase as a means to excommunicate the Protestants and "send" them to hell. Yet stripped of that cultural and historical meaning (which I hardly ever advocate, especially when Scripture is concerned), the statement contains a glimmer of something true, even if only a half-truth. Christ calls us to community, and one will be hard-pressed to find grounds for a solitary faith in the Bible.
Perhaps this is the Baptistness in me, but I would claim that Christ calls us to membership in a church that fosters the spiritually transforming aspects of the Gospel (read: regenerate Church membership). The error of Catholicism (and many other established [read: state supported] churches) is that such membership must be voluntary; the error of Calvanism is that such membership is indeed voluntary rather than an act of God. Any other form of membership in a church prevents it from being truly regenerate as the membership is legislated either by God or by the state. Christ bids all who are weary and heavy-laden to come and receive his rest; he does not compel them through sovereign might. It is for these reasons that I am a Baptist, and I believe that the freedom permitted to the individual is most in harmony with the Gospel.
More substantial than the kind of membership is the nature of the body into which a person is to be a member. Christians have struggled with what defines a church for the vast majority of Christian history, beginning with Paul's conflict with the strict Pharisaical Christians over Gentile converts, to the Reformation, and recently to the Southern Baptist Church chaos that continues to flare up now and again. All conflicts have been over what doctrines are enough to make one a Christian and allow him or her to have fellowship with other Christians (aka be a part of the church).
How many creeds do we have that say, in essence, "This theology, and nothing else."? Does that exclude people who have had an authentic experience with Christ yet do not affirm a specific creed from the salvation present in the Church? Does it not mean that these "heathens" are not competent to answer for their own souls? Our church membership criteria, vary as it does from tradition to tradition, sound the claim of Christ in John 14:6 loud and clear and indeed add much to Jesus' words. He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through him and by acceptance of whatever set of doctrines a denomination has.
Again, a half-truth. The other half of that truth is to be found in John 10. Jesus claims that there are sheep (read: people) who are not "of this flock." Typically when I have read this I read "Jew-Gentile struggle." Yet is this not also a question of pluralism? Can Christianity, which begins as a Jew-only movement, expand to the Gentiles with their Greek understanding of the universe? Tertullian says, "No!" The Pharisaical Christians say, "No!" Paul, Luke, Peter, and John's Jesus say, "Yes!"
Returning to my Baptistness for a moment, I reiterate that I believe that Baptist doctrine allows for the most authentic expression of the Gospel in a Christian setting. It allows for the freedom of the individual while reinforcing the importance of community. The question of universalism versus exclusivity in a Christian setting is a question of denominations. That same question in a pluralistic setting is a question of belief systems. The harmony between universalism and exclusivity in a pluralistic setting must be the same harmony between Baptist freedom/ responsibility and the Gospel. It must respect the individual and his/her encounter with God and yet call him/her into the fellowship of the Church. Any theology or philosophy that seeks to do away with one side of the tension will find itself doing away with one side of the Gospel as well.
Thus we have this contention: doctrines qualifying church membership versus God's universalism. How do they mix together to form something that works for all people at all times? I don't know. My best guess at the moment is that all faith traditions (Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc.) contain elements of the Gospel and that there are "invisible" Christians who live Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, etc. lives and find their "church" in a mosque, temple, etc. Yet at the end of the day it is Christ who calls them home, and they respond having heard the Shepherd's voice before. They are not of the Christian or Jewish flock, but Jesus brings them anyway.
What is a church? I will not try to define it. Rather, I will say that I meet Jesus in the faces of the people I fellowship with in that place every Wednesday, Thursday, and Sunday. Hopefully that statement is open enough to let us all experience salvation inside the Church while preserving its Christian identity.
Monday, November 1, 2010
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