Mastering the Faith

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Teaching it old school...Today, my son got his report card from our online school. Most of us are used to an “A-F” grading system, but this school used “M” for mastery as their highest grade. Included in the idea of mastery is that he fully understood the topics at hand and worked at them until perfect (or very close). A student couldn’t move on to the next course until he mastered the previous one.

We completed the basic requirements plus a little bit more, so my son got straight M’s. Sounds like a hum, I guess—”Mmmmm….” A happy sound, for sure.

Can you imagine what our Christian education in our churches would look like if we taught the Christian faith to mastery?

Actually, I can. And I don’t understand why we don’t teach the principles of the faith that way.

I graduated from Wheaton College in 1992 with a degree in Christian Education. My profs were some of the smartest and most innovative guys to tackle that subject who ever walked the face of the planet, but we never talked about teaching the faith to mastery.

I believe part of the problem comes from an unwritten rule in too many of our churches that we can’t make people hew to a certain standard against their wills. Nor do we want to make distinctions between successful disciples and unsuccessful ones. In some ways, Christian education in American churches resembles a politically-correct version of Little League, where—despite how many runs one team scores—every game is played to a tie and everyone wins.

But that’s a lie. Unfortunately, we believe it to the core of our educational processes in the American Church and its damning all of us to a lowest common denominator belief. Any off-handed perusal of any of the Barna Group’s stats on discipleship and belief in this country should show us how corroded simple knowledge of the Faith has become.

It didn’t used to be that way, though. A couple hundred years ago, even the rankest sinner in a church could give you an acceptable outline of the tenets of Christianity. Most people could recite a basic systematic theology, even if they weren’t regular attenders.

Contrast this with today. I once offered to teach a basic theology course (though I was told I couldn’t use the word theology in the course title—too off-putting, too high and mighty) at a large, fast-growing church I attended. The class was one of about a half-dozen offered on Wednesday night.

Though new converts comprised a healthy portion of the church, only five people attended my class. The vast, vast majority went to the associate pastor’s teaching on how to maximize the power of the Holy Spirit in one’s life. Me, I started off with more elementary teachings like “Who is God? What is He like?”

So we tramped through ten weeks of courses about the basic tenets of Christianity, and though all the students came up to me after class and told me how much they appreciated learning the basics and my gentle way of teaching them, I finished that course with one student left. The others had drifted into the “Walking in the Power of the Holy Spirit” class.

As the last class ended, I remarked to my lone remaining student that I’d not seen her in church before. That’s when she told me she didn’t even attend this church. She went to another church nearby. She’d visited once, saw the class offered, and thought it a good idea.

Great for her, but I’ll tell you, I was beating my breast when she walked out of the classroom.

I look back at that class and I see the microcosm of the problem. We’ve got nothing in place to teach to mastery. We encourage people to jump into topics they can’t handle because we “sexy” up those teachings. It’s the age old story of handing someone a Bible and them saying, “Cool. When are we going to study Revelation? All that Armageddon stuff rocks!”

Is it any wonder that people aren’t growing in our churches? How can they when there’s no comprehensive, cradle-to-grave educational strategy? (What church anymore even has a Christian Education Director?) We can’t begin to talk about mastery because we can’t get the basics into people in a coherent fashion.

In many churches, the bulk of educating adults falls on small groups. I’ve written on this before, but small groups are a terrible way to educate adults. They can be fantastic for relationship building, group worship, and group prayer, but they’re lousy for actually instilling the principles of Christ’s teachings. Most small group leaders themselves can’t articulate a systematic theology, so how can they teach one? This leaves the most educated teachers in the churches, the pastors, out of the educational equation because they’re typically teaching “Gospel-lite” in the Sunday messages so as not to put off the “Seekers.” That’s totally backward.

Before we can begin to teach the tenets of Christianity in our churches, we need to rectify this lack and put a comprehensive educational strategy in place. We need to

  • Identify gifted teachers in our churches.
  • Ensure those teachers know the Faith enough to teach it. (Pastors, this is your primary audience for teaching, your identified teachers within the congregation.)
  • Create a cradle-to-grave educational strategy that teaches an age-appropriate overview of Christianity’s principles “from milk to meat.”
  • Weekly teach that strategy so that all ages within the church receive the same basic teaching. This allows parents to know what their children learned because they received the same age-appropriate teaching.
  • Teach to mastery. People don’t move onto the next class unless they can show mastery of the material. This method may mean that primary teaching occurs in classes rather than from the sermon messages, but it ensures people get the basics before they move on. And yes, people will need to prove they know and practice the material.
  • Stress that everyone in the church must participate in the classes as part of his or her membership/affiliation with the church. No one opts out if they wish to receive the benefits of the church Body as a whole. This expectation must be hammered home till it sinks into every person who crosses the threshold of the church building.

Let’s also understand that mere academics and head knowledge aren’t going to cut it. People must be able to combine knowledge with praxis if they’re to prove themselves able disciples.

One of the most intriguing trends in seminaries is the idea that academics cannot trump servanthood. I believe this is a sea change concept that bodes well for the Church in the future. Honestly, what good is a pastor or bishop who may be able to parse every Greek verb known, but who can’t (or won’t) wash the feet of the folks he’s called to serve? So the pastoral intern can tell you the finer points of distinction between infralapsarianism and supralapsarianism, but doesn’t that all go out the window if he has a basic contempt for those who don’t?

Some seminaries now require that their students participate in programs geared to evaluating a student’ s ability to serve humbly. Group living practices that serve as testing communities emphasize this new desire to turn out men and women who not only know the material, but live it day in and day out. Kudos for those seminaries who get it! They understand that mastery means developing servants, not academicians.

The final cog in the mastery machine may prove the most difficult to implement, but we must.

No true mastery of the faith exists apart from committed community. Examples of how to live like Christ absolutely require that we be intimately involved in each other’s lives. For growing in Christ must mean that we see each other growing, that we meet together more than one or two days a week, that we see learning as surrounding ourselves with those who get it and live it. It means those with the most finely honed minds and spirits find ways to break the Church out of the hellish culture we’ve wrapped ourselves in, the culture that separates us rather than binds us together. That means rethinking how we work, play, and live in a way that makes community a priority. There can be no shortcuts around community if we wish to achieve mastery.

Jesus is our Master. If we are to be like Him, shouldn’t we be methodically growing into His fullness? How will we if we don’t teach to mastery?

Testimony Tuesday at Cerulean Sanctum

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On a hill far away...The Godblogosphere’s Powers That Be elected today “Testimony Tuesday,” so I thought I better fall in line lest I be numbered among the transgressors. As someone of whom it was once said, “He’s got the worst testimony I’ve ever heard,” don’t expect a whole lot. For the curious, that notorious testimony can be found here.

I think knowing another’s testimony binds us together. One day, I hope to hear the testimony of every member of my church. I’d be blessed if you posted your own testimony in the comments here.†  We preach the Gospel to others by telling our own stories of coming to Christ. Those stories build our faith.

The best testimony I think any Christian can give is to go to the grave in such a way that others say, “That one finished the race sprinting.” Over the last few years, I’ve come to believe that how we act out the faith is the best testimony we can give. May it be that every person we encounter in our daily journey can point to us and say, “Because of the way they live, we can see Jesus.”

Talk is good. Actions are better.

Live out the Gospel today in a way that radiates Jesus to everyone you meet.

Have a blessed day!

†  If you don’t know how to write a testimony, someone’s actually gone to the great length to post an outline for doing so. By their standard, I guess mine once again doesn’t measure up!

Dissing Discernment

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Fork aheadThree weeks ago in church, one of our elders quoted T.D. Jakes.

My head nearly exploded.

You see, T.D. Jakes is a cult leader. He’s not a Christian—at least by the standards of orthodoxy. As a leader in a Oneness Pentecostal church group, he denies the classical understanding of the Trinity. (See update below.) Yet Jakes shows up on numerous “approved” lists of Evangelicals that circulate on the Web and in print media. Just the other day, our YMCA (an organization championed by historic Christian evangelist Dwight Moody) held a book sale to raise money. One table included Christian materials. I suspect a quarter of the books had Jakes’s doughy, smiling face on the cover.

A few days later in one of our small groups, someone mentioned a book by another Oneness Pentecostal without understanding the theology. He’d never heard of them or their beliefs.

In my younger days, cults crawled out of the woodwork. Mo Berg, Victor Paul Weirwille, Herbert Armstrong—we knew these guys and knew to stay far away from their pernicious brands of deviancy. I used to spend hours reading up on Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Mormons just so I could show them the truth.

Now you’ve got Mormon books showing up in Christian bookstores and Mitt Romney giving the commencement address at Pat Robertson’s Regent University.

Times were that the marks of a cult stood out like a sore thumb. Three doctrinal denials will usually reveal a cult:

  1. Denial of the Trinity
  2. Denial of the efficacy of Christ’s blood to cleanse from all sins
  3. Denial of the sufficiency of faith in Christ alone for salvation

Apply those three to any religious organization or leader and they’ll snare cultists with an efficiency close to 100 percent.

In most cases, you don’t have to go any further than looking for a group’s flawed view on the Trinity to unmask it as a cult. Nothing marks the uniqueness of orthodox Christianity than the belief that God exists in three full, unique persons in one essence. We believe the unity of the Godhead in essence, the Godhead’s diversity in persons. And we’ve believed that fundamental understanding of the nature of God since the founding of the Church by Christ Himself.

How fundamental? As I see it, every doctrine we hold dear in the Church must begin with the nature of God Himself. If we fumble that, everything that proceeds from it takes on a warped perspective. For instance, the very love of God cannot be properly understood from a Oneness perspective, for the love the members of the Trinity possess for each other expresses itself in God’s love for us and our love for each other. Our concept of what love means can only be fully understood if we acknowledge that God is Trinitarian in nature.

In fact, I can’t see how anyone can possible read the Bible and not see the Trinity on every page. Consider even Deuteronomy 6:4—Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one—the word “one” there is not the word for a single person (yahid), but a unified personna (ehad). We see the same word ehad in reference to husband and wife being one (ehad) flesh. How appropriate that the ecstatic love the Triune God experiences within His persons reflects in the joining of husband and wife, while also mirroring the unification of Christ and the Church in the imagery of Bridegroom and Bride. I’m also one who believes that Man is a tripartite being (body, soul, spirit) in the same way that God is triune, further reflecting the idea that we are made in the image of God.

Just inches away on my library shelf sits James White’s The Forgotten Trinity. Check it out. For more on the error of Oneness (historically known in several minor variants as Sebellianism, Patripassionism, or Modalism), check out Theopedia.

I spoke with the elder Sunday morning about his reference. He wasn’t familiar with Oneness Pentecostals, their beliefs, or the fact that T.D. Jakes is a non-Trinitarian. He expressed surprise about Jakes and he staunchly defended Trinitarianism. While I wasn’t happy about the Jakes quote, I absolutely understood the elder made the comment without knowing the truth about Jakes.

This brings us to the meat of this post.

So why do we diss discernment? The elder made a telling statement as we talked, “There are so many variants of Pentecostalism, it’s hard to know exactly what each believes.” That’s a legitimate comment on Pentecostalism—and Christianity in general. So much fracturing and splintering over a couple millennia have left us all a bit strung out. When the Lord speaks to the seven Churches in Asia in Revelation, it’s hard to miss the different flavors of practice and belief already evident.

I’ve made the Church my study, but I still can’t tell you what the Ukrainian Orthodox believe differently from the Russian Orthodox. Or Regular Baptists from Bible Baptists. I could give you generalities, but generalities won’t cut it when trying to discern truth from error.

The sheer mass of Christian (and pseudo-Christian) thought multiplied over thousands of belief statements is daunting. No wonder so many Christians appear baffled. Still, we can’t excuse our lack of diligence.

In the charismatic and pentecostal ranks, you tend to see a lot of cult of personality issues. Folks get sidetracked by big name preachers and ministries. Prophets, apostles, deacons, elders, pastors—stick a title on someone (usually self-affixed by the Christian celebrity in question) and you’ll find people who immediately succumb to slavish devotion. Obviously, the chance for delusion runs high. Sadly, once a leader proves to have feet of clay, the defrauded simply move onto another hero. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Folks outside charismatic and pentecostal circles will, of course, laugh and mock any follower of Benny Hinn or Jack Van Impe, but those mockers aren’t immune to deception. My experience shows that rather than falling prey to dynamic individuals, the noncharismatics/Pentecostals fall for an even more insidious lie: power structures and systems. They get sucked into thinking governments, organizations (Christian or not), and even church hierarchies are the means by which the world revolves. The faithful tack a veneer of godliness over the top of power structures, but the core’s still ungodly. These folks end up perpetrating great injustices against the poor, disenfranchised, powerless, and even each other, as a result.

Don’t laugh at someone else, because I can promise that all of us have drunk (or are still drinking) from some soul-corroding teat. Even the best of us get off-track or stumble in little ways. Let’s all be humble here.

I talk about discernment quite a bit on Cerulean Sanctum. On the whole, I think it’s the greatest lack in the Church today. I think five reasons drive this:

  1. We’re too busy – Busy people nod their heads and unthinkingly accept whatever comes their way. That’s a recipe for disaster. While the sheer number of lies out there overwhelms the average person, God still holds us accountable for truth.
  2. We’re too apathetic – “Does discernment matter? Why should I care?” Paul warns that many have shipwrecked their faith by lack of discernment. Rank pragmatism within many Christian hearts pushes discernment into the background because its raison d’être doesn’t immediately leap out. We don’t understand that God’s people perish for lack of knowledge and that this knowledge is beneficial for own its sake—because God said we need to know it.
  3. We think we’ve arrived – We’re saved now, so what? But eternal security isn’t license for spiritual sloth. Too many Christians think they’re in, but then fail to work out their salvation with fear and trembling. That fear and trembling includes godly discernment.
  4. We’re naïvely optimistic – Jesus didn’t tempt God by taking a leap off the top of the Temple. The same Enemy that tempted the Lord tempts us. He’s a master at deceiving us into thinking we’re immune from the mess our neighbors made of their lives. It never dawns on us that we could go down in flames, too. So when the Enemy tells us to jump off, we do. That’s pride, and it’s from the pit of hell.
  5. We’re not drilled on discernment – People quote 1 John 1:4 (Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world), but it’s always for some other person in some other church at some other time. Our church leaders should have that 1 John 1:4 filter up at all times and show us how to keep it up as well.

As for me, I side with Jesus here:

Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many believed in his name when they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself knew what was in man.
—John 2:23-25

In this day and age, it’s foolish for any Christian to go blindly out into the world. Jesus had His filter on at all times. He knew the evil that lurked in the hearts of men, so He did not trust them.

That’s wisdom for us, folks. Begin at skepticism. Never assume someone is telling you the truth, no matter how trusted that teacher/leader/pastor/friend might be. Let God alone be true and every man a liar (Romans 3:4). The Scriptures are our source. The Holy Spirit is our interpreter. Run everything you hear past those two. Any human is capable of error, even this writer. Don’t take everything I say as gospel truth. Prove it against the Word of God. Correct me if I need it. I expect nothing less.

Thanks to all who contributed. I’ll unpack some of your comments from Friday’s post tomorrow.

 (Update: I made an error in currently assigning Jakes to the United Pentecostal Church. He was once affiliated with that Oneness church, was ordained a bishop in another Oneness denomination, and currently is a high-ranking leader within another Oneness church group. I regret the error.)