Church History: The Secret of Success

Why bother to study Church history? For the same reason we study World History and American History and human history in general – to know where and whom we came from and to learn from their successes and failures. The early centuries of Christianity were exceedingly fruitful. We need to discover again their “secrets” to success.
The most obvious secret is their deep conviction that the gospel was true. That man was condemned and had no hope of rescuing themselves. That Jesus, the Son of God came from heaven to earth as a baby, grew to a man who lived a perfect sinless life and died, taking the sins of all mankind with Him to the grave. That He rose again, appeared to hundreds of people, and ascended to the right hand of God in heaven. Those who believe the gospel to the marrow of their bones will declare it. They can’t help it – it just bubbles forth like lava from a volcano.
Another insight we gain from church history is the practical expression of love among Christians. They took to heart Jesus’ command to “Love one another as I have loved you” (Jn 13:34). It was a different kind of love – a selfless, generous, genuine love that stood out in the world. Tertullian said that the pagans remarked, “See how these Christians love one another.” Christians who were filled with the love of Christ expressed that love in practical ways within the church and without.
And strangely, persecution watered the soil of many souls. Huge crowds gathered to watch Christians meet their death in the colosseums of Rome, drawn by the thrill of blood and gore. But the courage, faith, and Joyful disposition of the martyrs pierced their own hearts so that many of the onlookers came away as believers in Jesus Christ.
Now look at the witness of the church today. Are we still convinced that the gospel is true? Are we living out the command of Jesus to love one another? And what of persecution? Here in the U.S., it is largely a minor matter, but in other places in the world, it is life and death. In either case, how we respond to persecution can speak louder than anything we say. And we dare not leave out the presence of the Holy Spirit who is the power behind it all. Are you filled with the Spirit, Beloved? Then be bold, be loving, and be brave. The lost world is watching. Be a witness to someone today.

Doctrines of the Faith: The Spirit and the Unbeliever

We’ve considered the work of the Holy Spirit in creation and in the believer, but how does the Holy Spirit work with the unbeliever? The Spirit has one chief responsibility regarding the unregenerate person: conviction. Jesus said, “When [the Spirit of God] comes, He will convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:8-9). The word “convict” means to refute something or someone with a suggestion of shame. And that is the heart of the matter. Shame has become the enemy. But sin is shameful. The Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin by calling it what it is: something to be ashamed of.

Perhaps now you see the problem. Our culture has made sin something to be proud of, something to celebrate, and something to hold up as the highest goal for humanity. Those who are caught up in sinful lifestyles are told there is nothing to be ashamed of. Any message from the church that even hints at the shame of sin is shot down. Honestly, I would expect that from a world that is under the devil’s control (1 Jn 5:19).

Unfortunately, the church is falling right in step. Many churches are doing away with the conviction of sin. There is no shame. And that is to humanity’s detriment. Paul explained it like this: “Where there is no law there is no transgression” (Rom 4:15). When the church refuses to preach and teach the truth about sin, the world reasons that there is no such thing. Thus, they feel no shame for their actions. Shame is not a weapon, it is an arrow that points sinners to the cross.

One other way the Holy Spirit convicts of sin is through Christians. No, not bashing people over the head with the Bible or pointing self-righteous fingers in their faces. Christians convict unbelievers of sin by living holy lives. The truth is, a faithful Christian doesn’t have to say a word to bring about the Spirit’s conviction. The contrast between light and dark is obvious. Paul said, “God did not call us to be impure, but to live holy lives” (1 Thess 4:7). Lives that stand out. Why do you think the world hates true believers? Why do you think satan is working so hard to make the church look like the world?

The question is, are you and I helping the Spirit’s cause or hurting it? Beloved, what does your life say?

Grace

Joy asks a thousand questions a day – that’s how she learns and so I try to be patient with the never-ending stream of “Why?” and “What?” and “How?” Yesterday she saw some honeybees in the ligustrum bush and started asking about what they were doing which became how do bees make honey. So after her bath, we surfed YouTube for videos about bees.  She loves to learn new things and I love to help her explore the world around her.

But sometimes she asks questions with a different motivation. We have rules in our house that have been in place all her life. They haven’t changed just because she isn’t here all the time anymore. She knows the rules well, but sometimes she will ask the question hoping to catch me off-guard and give her a different answer. I may be old and slow, but I’m no dummy. The rules are the rules.

God gave the Israelites the law – the commandments and regulations that must be strictly observed to maintain a relationship with Him. He is holy and righteous and His people must live holy and righteous lives. The law was given to instruct them in His ways and ensure their standing before Him. But the people failed to keep the law – “Everyone did as he saw fit” (Jud 21:25). Which meant they did not obey God’s law. Man was and is still sinful. Sin demands death. The Israelites relied on animals to die in their place, but that was not enough.

Then Jesus came on the scene. He said that He came to “fulfill” the law and the Prophets – but not to abolish them (Matt 5:17-20). What did He mean? The purpose and demands of the law had not changed. What changed was how one approached God. Under the law, all the rituals and rules – God’s “house rules” – must be followed to a T. But Jesus came “full of grace” (John 1:14). He lived the perfect life that man could not live. And He died to fulfill “every jot and tittle” of the law. Jesus – God in flesh – shed His divine blood to meet the demands of the law. All who receive Jesus’ work are under grace.

That means if you are a believer, you can breathe a sigh of relief because Jesus did all the hard work for you. And He sent His Holy Spirit to live in you and help you live out your holy standing. The rules haven’t changed, but how we obey them has. Beloved, you cannot; but Jesus did. Now you can live in grace.

Church History: Fathers of the Faith

My desire in this church history study is to teach you how the Holy Spirit moved over human history to build Christ’s Body and introduce you to the people He used along the way.

When the church began its westward movement it took deep root in Rome and then slowly moved toward France. One of the most prolific ancient Fathers, Bishop Irenaeus, ministered in Lyons and left a wealth of Christian writings. Irenaeus was firmly orthodox. He lived in a time (the second century) when false interpretations of Jesus were rampant. Not only did he defend the biblical Jesus and fight for authentic Christianity, but Irenaeus was instrumental in establishing the canon of scripture we know as the New Testament.
Canonicity means the collection of sacred writings which were accepted by the church as authoritative and true. Irenaeus argued for specific requirements in determining which writings would be included in the Christian manifesto: agreement with direct apostolic teaching, prophetic revelation, and early creedal statements. He eschewed fantasy and mythology, relying instead on eyewitness accounts of Jesus’ works and the works of His followers in the first century.
Irenaeus was a “third-generation” Christian. He was a disciple of Polycarp who was a disciple of John. He sat at the feet of the man who sat at the feet of the man who sat at the feet of the Lord Jesus. He endured fierce persecution in Lyons, taking the office of bishop after his predecessor’s death due to abuse. He was held in highest esteem by the churches of that era and lived up to his name as a peacemaker in an era of great doctrinal turmoil while still defending the orthodox Christian teaching against Gnostic heresies. Irenaeus argued that salvation had nothing to do with intellect or secret knowledge but was solely rooted in the work of Jesus.
By the end of the third century, the church had moved into Spain and Britain, then headed south into North Africa where Christianity was well-received and fruitful. North African churches were the first Latin-speaking churches in the world. Just west of Egypt was the town of Cyrene. The man who was drafted to carry Jesus’ cross was Simon of Cyrene (see Mark 15:21). It is almost certain that Simon became a believer and returned home to share the gospel. Simon’s son, Rufus was highlighted in Paul’s list of fellow Christians in Romans 16. By the end of the third century, the vast Roman empire was replete with gospel proclaimers.
What does that mean for you and me in the twenty-first-century church? Just that the seeds of the gospel were planted some two thousand years ago and they are still growing and still producing fruit for the Kingdom of God. When you and I tell the old, old story, Beloved, we are standing on the fields where Irenaeus and others went before.

Doctrines of the Faith: The Spirit in You

he Holy Spirit is one of the least-known persons of the Holy Trinity. He is not as “visible” in the Scriptures, but He is all over the scenes and people of the Bible. We know He works continually to advance the Kingdom of God in the world. But how does He work in the believer? Here is a very small sampling.

The Spirit enables us to know the truth about God.  1 John 5:6 says, “It is the Spirit who bears witness because the Spirit is truth.”  The Spirit is the conduit of Truth. He imparts truth and opens our hearts and minds to receive it.

The Spirit enables us to serve God. Paul said,  “There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit.  There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord works all of them in all men” (1 Cor 12:4-6). The good works we do for God are initiated by the Spirit, empowered by the Spirit, and brought to completion by the Spirit. 

The Spirit is the evidence that we belong to Christ.  John declared, “This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.  If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God.” (1 John 4:2, 15). The Spirit also produces fruit in our lives which is further evidence that we belong to Christ.  “Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Gal 5:22-23).  These fruits reflect the character of God and are only possible when we are surrendered to Christ and filled with His Spirit.

The Spirit is our Teacher:  “The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” (John 14:26). He instructs us as we study the Scriptures and helps us put into practice what we’ve learned.

The Spirit is our “prayer partner.” He prays for us when we cannot pray for ourselves: “The Spirit helps us in our weakness.  We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express,” (Rom 8:26). I have depended on the Spirit so many times when I couldn’t find the words to express my heart.

The Holy Spirit is vital for the Christian.  In fact, if you do not have the Spirit you are not a Christian (Rom 8:9). Beloved, you can’t do this Christian life without Him. Thankfully you will never have to.

Yes, Jesus Loves Me

I was blessed to attend a Bible study group this week for the first time. As a teacher, it is a rare treat to have someone pour into me for a change. The worship was uplifting, the fellowship was sweet, and the message was timely: the Love of God. The speaker took us through several of the attributes of God’s love and she ended by leading us all through “Jesus Loves Me.” Yes, that is a sweet little song we teach to our children, but let me assure you, it is equally applicable to adults. There is something specials about singing that song with a group of seasoned ladies who have leaned on God’s love through the highs and lows of life.
But something interesting happened. Did you know that there are more verses to that song than we teach our babies? Do you know the words to all those verses? I don’t and neither did most of the ladies there. So we Googled the song. We all knew the first verse – no problem. And we all referred to our phones for the second verse – still good. And then we came to the third verse and we were not all on the same version. Suddenly most of us dropped out and let the leader sing a solo.
What happened? We looked to the world for the words. We trusted the internet to fill in the holes in our song. The lesson was clear to me. Trust no one else but God for truth. Sure it was just a verse in a simple, little song, and the words we pulled up were not blasphemous – they were just not the right words. But words – or rather The Word – matters. Paul urged Timothy to stay in the Scriptures that are the very breath of God (2 Tim 3:14-17). Peter confirmed that the Scriptures are given to man by the Holy Spirit – they are trustworthy and true. They are always the right words.
You may be tired of me beating the Berean drum, but it cannot be stressed enough – always, always, always take everything you hear and everything you read and lay it alongside the Bible and see if it is true (Acts 17:11). Do not take anyone’s word for truth if it does not agree with the living Word of the living God. Too much is at stake to be misled, even by one little, seemingly insignificant word.
Beloved, be a student of the Scriptures. Get to know God’s Word for yourself so that you do not fall for the wrong verse in the song. Because Jesus does love you, and you need to know it.

When You are Hard-Pressed

I ran across a powerful statement a few days ago that set me on a search mission in the Scriptures. Oswald Chambers said, “The burden that God places on us squeezes the grapes in our lives and produces the wine.” The Spirit brought Paul’s words to mind: “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed” (2 Cor 4:8-9). In the Greek “hard-pressed” is both pressing grapes to produce the juice and pressing a person with trouble, suffering, and affliction. No wonder the Spirit directed me here.
I studied the rest of the words and found some interesting things. Paul said we will also be perplexed – which means to be uncertain about what to do in a situation. Anybody? Persecuted means to be harassed and troubled. Yep. That comes from people, from our own minds, and from satan. To be struck down means to be thrown face-down to the ground. (A perfect position for prayer.) All of these Paul said will be a reality in the life of the believer. They have all been a reality in mine this past year.
But here is what we will not endure: we will not be crushed – the Greek means to be crushed in spirit. Satan can press us, but, praise Jesus, he cannot touch our spirits. We will not be in despair – utterly hopeless. We will not be forsaken – left behind in a helpless state. We will not be destroyed – this refers to losing our eternal salvation.
Maybe this has been a pressing season for you – it sure has been for me. What do we do when we feel like the grapes at the bottom of the barrel? Paul said, “. . . we do not lose heart” (2 Cor 4:1, 16), but “fix our eyes” on eternity (v. 18). Because these pressing seasons – these “light and momentary troubles” (v. 17 – God’s words, not mine) are all about glory and eternal life.
Beloved, hard seasons are guaranteed. You and I will be pressed and perplexed, maybe even persecuted and thrown down to the ground. But God will not let us be crushed or left in despair or destroyed. He will use every difficulty to prepare us for eternity. The question then is, will we trust Him? Will we bring forth wine or whine?

Doctrines of the Faith: The Spirit in You

As we continue to look at Church Doctrine and consider the Third member of the Trinity, we find this gem from Paul: “The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God…no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God…we have received the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand…” (1 Cor 2:10, 11, 12). Put simply, because the Holy Spirit is God, He knows how God thinks. He “hears” God’s thoughts. Because the Holy Spirit indwells believers, He reveals those thoughts to us – Jesus said “He speaks what He hears” (see John 16:13-14). And when He speaks to our spirits we are convicted, commanded, comforted, challenged, encouraged, directed, and inspired. (Which, by the way, is how Peter explained the transmission of the Scriptures: “Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but man spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Pet 1:20-21).)
What are we to do with the Spirit’s messages? Obey. Paul called it being “controlled by the Spirit,” “living according to the Spirit,” and being “led by the Spirit.” How does work? We “set [our] minds on what the Spirit desires.” We “set our minds on things above, not on earthly things (Col 3:2). When the Spirit says one thing and the world says another, we choose to meditate on and obey what the Spirit has said. The world tells us that God has no authority over us. Paul said that we are “obligated” to submit to God’s Word and His Spirit. And if we don’t? Paul said we are not God’s children. God’s children are Spirit-fed, Spirit-led, Spirit-filled people. (See Romans 8:1-17)
There is another aspect of the Holy Spirit in us that I want you to grasp. Paul said in this same passage that “the Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children” (v. 16). Why is that important? Because the enemy and the world will try to tell you the opposite. Satan will hound you that God has rejected you because of your sin, that He could never love you. The Spirit says you are God’s child and God loves His children.
Give heed to the Spirit; believe and obey Him, Beloved. He is the very Life of God in you.

Doctrines of the Faith: Who is the Holy Spirit?

The greatest life pursuit of man is to know God. But that is not natural to our human, sinful natures. The desire to know God comes from God. He orchestrates it and provides the Teacher: the Holy Spirit. To have the Holy Spirit we must know Jesus Christ (Rom 8:9-11). Here you have the Holy Trinity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, uniquely three in one. It is one of the great mysteries of the faith, pondered by men for thousands of years. No one has been able to fully explain this Holy Oneness. I choose to take the Trinity on faith. In this part of our Doctrines study, we will focus on the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is a person – not an “it,” and He is equal in power, sovereignty, divinity, and all other attributes of God the Father and God the Son. We tend to think of the Holy Spirit as a New Testament entity, but the Bible tells us that He was an active participant in the Creation. Genesis 1:2 says “Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters” (emphasis added). The Holy Spirit was the power that generated all creation into being.
The Holy Spirit was visible in the Old Testament imparting power, strength, and wisdom to those God used to accomplish His sovereign purposes. However, the Spirit’s activity within man was only for the task, leaving the person when God’s work was fulfilled. One example is found in 1 Samuel 10 when “The Spirit of God came upon Saul in power” and he prophesied. Later, the Spirit departed from Saul when David was chosen by God to succeed him on the throne of Israel(1 Sam 16:14).
After Jesus’ resurrection and ascension, the Holy Spirit fell on the believers at Pentecost (Acts 2:1-12), giving them the ability to proclaim “the wonders of God” in previously unfamiliar human languages. He was the driving force behind the birth of the new church. The Holy Spirit now dwells within all who place their faith and trust in Jesus Christ, not coming and going as before, but literally “taking up residence” in the heart of the believer. He is our assurance that we belong to Christ (Rom 8:9).
We will look deeper into the Scriptures concerning the Holy Spirit in the next couple of weeks. For today ask yourself, Beloved, do I know God through His Holy Spirit?

More Than Words on a Page

The Bible is the Word of God for all His people in every generation and culture. The world has changed over the years, but human nature has not. We are all, at the core, sinners. Our methods may be different, but the bent to sin is not. For example, lust has been with humankind since the garden. Eve went after what would bring her pleasure. Lust is that same desire for pleasure. Men may access it through technology today, but the root is the same. Sin still runs through our human DNA. Our means of achieving it may be “modernized” but at the basest levels, we are essentially all the same.
One of the most important Bible study tools I learned is to glean the principle of the biblical text because, like our bent for sin, the principle is timeless. It always addresses the root of our human nature. That is why I will always teach context, context, context. One verse plucked out of its context can be – and often is – completely misconstrued. We need to discover the who, what, where, when, why, and how of the text.
Once you get through to the principle you are ready for the application. What does the principle demand of you? A step of obedience? A word to speak? An attitude that needs adjusting? A life change? This is where you decide who has authority over your life – you or God? The Spirit encourages me to put myself into the text to help me understand what God requires of me. I had a deep issue with my dad and the Lord had me put myself in 2 Corinthians 2:7-8: “Now, Dorcas, forgive and comfort your dad . . . and reaffirm your love for him.” It was a clear word that changed twenty years of estrangement.
This also reminds me of what He has done for me. That is where I want to take you today, Beloved.
I encourage you to take this personalized rendering of Isaiah 53:4-6 to heart:
“Surely He took up my infirmities and carried my sorrows,
yet I considered Him stricken by God, smitten by Him and afflicted.
But He was pierced for my transgressions,
He was crushed for my iniquities;
The punishment that brought me peace was upon Him,
and by His wounds, I am healed.
Like a sheep, I have gone astray, I have turned to my own way,
and the Lord has laid on Him all my iniquity.”
The Bible is not an antiquated book of rules and fairy tales. It is the living Word of the living God for you. Take up and read, Beloved.