The globalization of the church in the first 300 years
of existence is an amazing story of God's perfect plan. In the perfect time of history God incarnate stepped
out of eternity into history so as to be our salvation. It is in the
historical moment of a world dominated by the Roman Empire that God
chooses to step in to make himself known. The increased awareness of
God, through Jesus is God's purpose of a restored relationship with
his creation. It brings people to a place of humble hearts seeking to
know God.
Jesus
is more than a historical figure. Bradley Holt states: “They saw Jesus as
the Promised One, not only as Messiah (anointed king) but as
suffering servant, crucified for all, and as Lord, raised from the
dead."
Jesus is the central key to all the other views in God's revelation.
It is in this view that the theologians and great leaders of the
spiritual formation within these early years heard the Holy Spirit
and sought after God and knowing God more. These wonderful
“God-fearers” stretched out a foundational desire for God that
remains a call to all Christ-followers today.
The
gifts of the spirit were discovered in the joy of knowing God. Paul
address these gifts as opportunities to demonstrate God's love. The
Corinthian church was using the gifts to lord it over others within
the group. Holt summarizes Paul's teaching with; “Paul suggests
love not as an alternative gift to others but as a 'more excellent
way' in which the gifts are to be evaluated and exercised.” It is in this love that all things are made complete.
A good modern example is the worship wars of the
1990's. The style of worship was never the true issue. What became
the issue was opinions of people in what they thought was formation
to pleasing God verses true spiritual formation in knowing God. The
underlining lack of love that so dominated change in music
established war lines that divided God-fearers and established a very
difficult time on God's kingdom. The issue may have had a small part
in the style. The bigger issue was in change from what was important
to the ones fighting the battle against knowing God through grace and
truth.
An illustration that occurred often in these worship
wars were the tactics that were used to remove the organ. The “why”
was proclaimed that we need to bring new people into the church and
the old organ style is a turn off. That very well may have been true,
but the lack of love for the people that had so diligently worked and
rehearsed demonstrated rejection of the individuals that invested
their life efforts. They retorted by starting a retaliation we now
label as worship wars. The same was true of the move from projectors
to screens. We had worked hard to raise money that was dedicated to
purchase new hymnals to add new songs so as to bring in new people.
The way we accomplished the purchase of the hymnals was to dedicate
the hymnals to the memory of a specific person. It wasn't very long
before screens were introduced and the hymnals in memory of “mr.
perfect elder” were headed to a box in the storage room. The people
that remember “mr. perfect elders” cried out, “we can't do
that” and again a lack of love was demonstrated by both sides.
Preaching styles, church directories, music, Sunday
schools, Vacation Bible Schools, and missionary technique all change.
Change is a constant in the church. God has established the church to
be a living organism within the world he created. It is interesting
to learn in these early years of the church change also existed. It
is important to learn that these early believers struggled with
discernment and change the same as we do. The revealing survival for
the change is the Holy Spirit given ability to love. All
Christ-followers are able to embrace love as a gift given to every
believer.
Those
within the early years that embraced the love also discovered how the
life of the the believer is to train for the purpose of preparation
for a great goal of spiritual formation. Holt describes these
practices as, “characterized by self-denial for the sake of the
true self.”
There is no doubt that the writer of Hebrews greatly influenced this
thought of running the race by keeping our eyes focused on Jesus the
author and perfecter of our faith. The early believers established
successful Christian living through out the ages by, “saying no to
a good thing for the sake of saying yes to a better one.”
Any great athlete or artist would agree with this assessment of their
craft. The denial of desire or the easy route is enhanced by the
willingness to strive for the greater desire that is achieved by the
choice of the harder route.
The
word to describe this training as preparation for a contest is,
“asceticism.” The moral, ethical, and proactive choice to live as Jesus lived is to
train for the a great goal laid for us in being transformed into the
likeness of Jesus. The means by which a person is transformed is
diverse and there are several techniques available. From the early
years of the church to the modern church, these practices and
disciplines brought a change and growth to the lives the
Christ-followers by the mean of transformation to a closer walk with
God. This dedication to training and development of denying the lower
good for a better good grants “self-confidence while enabling
people to serve others.”
The
challenge for the modern believer is that the church today is living
in mediocrity. We are complacent in our faith and are not striving as
we once did in the area of denying the lower good for the greater
good. The church is willing to compromise in order to gain great
numbers for attendance and for evangelism, but the result is large
number so of people that are spiritually Luke warm. It is the call of
God that we embrace these disciplines again and strive for the
greater good in knowing God more in every moment. It is then that he
will bring about a great transformation within the hearts of those
who believe.
Let us run the race marked out for us with a dedication to the Truth and to Grace! - You know I love ya, Don
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