Thanks for the thoughts. The joy of blogging is that it captures thoughts in raw form.

First off, simply because I’m reading a book by someone doesn’t mean much. I read a lot of books from all sorts of perspectives. (Though I have read many emergent authors books/articles and find most to be completely orthodox in their views… they just don’t like to get nailed down to labels. Sharing coffee with some of these guys reveals much more of their heart than merely reading a book/article.)

But reading a lot shouldn’t make anyone nervous since it merely means I’m well read.

That said, I do agree that the interpretation of Scripture morphs incredibly over time. Look at the intepretation of baptism for example.

In the early church the NT sees baptism happening soon after conversion. It happens by immersion for the most part, it’s done publically, etc.

But within 100 years the church stopped doing it this way. Cultural pressures “forced” the church to make baptism more exclusive. You had to complete a 1 year (roughly) period of proving yourself to be serious about your conversion. Then, only after you had proven yourself… they would baptize you, almost always in private. Far different from only 1-2 generations before? What happened? Were they apostate? Not IMO, culture changed that.

Fast-forward into the 5th century and you see that it went from something that adults did and only when they were really serious to something that nearly EVERYONE did because kids being born were pre-supposed to make a later confession (or confirmation) of a decision for Christ. What happened? Were they apostate? Not really, just culture applied Jesus’ teaching differently. From my perspective it’s bothersome… but it’s easy for me to judge.

On and on the morphing a interpretation goes. It “gets better” in each person eyes as one person rebels against the previous generations ineffectiveness. And time marches on.

The concept of infant baptism continued into the early reformation unquestioned. Zwingli and his students started to wonder if the original form of NT adult baptism was “better” than the tradition of infant baptism. So… Zwingli morphed our understanding of baptism back towards the original. But I would argue that doing baptism in church is much different than say doing it in public. I hold that view, I’m OK with the method… but it’s a method and methods change and morph to meet contemporary needs.

The interesting thing we see happening these days is that there are groups of Christians who are absolutely convinced that they’ve nailed it. They have a doctrine “nailed” and anyone who questions it is somehow unorthodox. (Such as people questioning John Piper’s view on baptism, etc etc etc.)

Go back 70 years and you see it clearly displayed. The “fundamentalists” warned the church that these new “modern evangelicals” would destroy the church with their modernism. I’ve got a great tract in my office preaching against the ills of modernism.

Well, modernism won out in loads of churches. Sure, there are people who label themselves fundamentalist but they are now the minority… not wrong, but clearly the minority numerically. (Just as the fundamentalist morphed or came out of a response to mainline denominations embrace of higher criticism, liberalism, etc)

Modernism didn’t destroy churches. God is still sovereign, He still reigns, the church expanded and didn’t crumble.

Now, some say we are experiencing another shift or morphing of how people are interpreting Scripture. The old guard (Modernists, including me) wrestle with this new fangled way of doing things.

They say a communities understanding and interpretation… in concert and maybe even in fulfillment of historical views on Scripture… is of higher value than what modernist have written over the last 70 years.

We see very good colleges, seminaries, and bible schools de-emphasizing systematic theology in favor of a more “narrative based” biblical theology. On and on and on.

So I suppose my use of 2 Peter 1 was a bit raw out of my devotions this morning… maybe even a poorly thought out arguement… but I also don’t want to lose site of the main idea of the post.

What are areas of syncretism in my life that are clearly non-biblical. What am I adding from my culture into my expression of my relationship with Jesus that isn’t pleasing to the Father? That is what I am searching for.

There is always room for disagreement in the body of Christ. I’ve got no problem with that. Where we may differ seems to be that I don’t think that we ever stop growing and interpreting.

I look at something like Hodge’s systheo or Berkhoff’s or the other 2-3 that I’ve had to read and go “cool, just not my thing.” It’s not that I don’t understand it or think he’s wrong. I just don’t connect to God by dissection. Systematising God has it’s usefulness but it by very nature is limited to what God has revealed to us.

I guess we will disagree on the use of terms like “compromise” and “standing for the truth.”

Rather than using us as an example of churches that compromise… why not apply Matthew 18 instead? If you have something to say about us… have you said it to us first? Likewise if we have offended you, how can we respond to you biblically if we aren’t aware of it?

You aren’t monopolizing anything.

And you certainly have a right to say what you like. But I would hope that you’d feel free to come to us and address us face to face out of respect for one another.

It’s one thing to say “I think we’ve got a great church and this is why.” It’s another thing to say “We’re better than that church because we don’t do this, that, or the other.” Just not mentioning the name of the place you are referring to is like saying “I broke the spirit of the law… just not the letter of it.”

Seriously… if you’ve got something against us, we’d love to sit down for a cup of coffee and get on the same page.

Of course that goes back to the original post doesn’t it?

Who defines those boundaries? Who defines lines we mustn’t cross? Are the things that I teach or you teach truly “straight from the Bible” or are they someones interpretation that we buy into? Even the translators themselves put their culture into their translations. It’s not like we crack open the Bible on Sunday AM and just read a book. Close it and say a prayer… no. All the rest is some form of interpretation of a man.

I hope you see we not talking about things that are clearly taught in Scritpure. When we’re talking methods we’re talking about grey areas which are not clearly taught in Scripture.

So if a boundary is say music… who defines what lines to cross? Church culture… but who’s church culture? When we say using media to convey truths… when we say using small groups instead of another method. When we say sitting down in church instead of standing or pews instead of chairs… on and on and on. These are methods of communication. I’ve never met a pastor who said “I’m not teaching the bible.” We all do our best to communicate God’s Word to people. The question is “how to best communicate God’s Word to people.”

All of these are not clearly black and white issues in the Bible. Some will say “they didn’t use electric guitar in the NT so we should not either” but at the same time we don’t meet in people’s homes. We allow men and women to sit together, on and on and on the American church bears little resemblence to an Acts 2 church.

So as communicators of God’s Word to His people… are we more responsible to an interpretors interpretation or on what God is communicating or illuminating to us through His Word? (Of course, you are going to jump on that because it is relativistic. Bear in mind the idea of absolute truth is not an entirely biblical construction but a construction and result of absolute modernism)

There are standards of course. There are always standards of interpretation. Anyone who has studied hermeneutics knows the rules and I won’t rehash that. Interesting stuff but time to go home.

Simply put. They change the words of the original to meet current needs. In NT Christianity the original stays the same and how we apply that to our daily lives tends to adjust a bit over time. (See baptismal example)