We jump into our first session of Ask Anything April with a good number of questions. Let’s get started.

Ask Anything April – Session 1

presented 3 April 2019

AUDIO

Presentation Notes

Resources – General Questions – Session 1

GENERAL QUESTIONS

Introduce Theological Triage

  • A useful concept for answering several of the questions related to denominations!
  • Google “Theological Triage” to find the article
  • https://albertmohler.com/2005/07/12/a-call-for-theological-triage-and-christian-maturity/
  • Inspired by the triage process in a hospital – gunshot wounds take priority over broken bones take priority over scraped knees
  • We must defend God’s truth at every point – but priorities and approach vary based on how critical that truth is to orthodox faith
  • First-level Issues
    • Most central and essential to the Christian faith
    • Disagreement on these mean you aren’t a Christian!
    • This is where cults fall away from Christianity
    • Here too is the biggest divide between Protestants and Catholics
    • Full deity and humanity of Jesus Christ – this was the subject of earliest debate and attacks in and on the church, settled in the early centuries of the church
    • The Trinity – likewise settled in the early centuries of the church, a necessity to understand the respective roles and work of God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit
    • Justification by faith alone – this is  the Gospel! Anything less or more turns salvation into a human works-righteousness, which is NOT good news at all!
    • The authority of Scripture – there has to be trust in the Bible as God’s Word otherwise we have no means of dividing truth from error other than subjective personal opinion and experience, and that can’t ever result in holding a line about any doctrine or belief. Jesus held Scripture up as authoritative, as did the church until the Enlightenment human-centric thinking began to chip away at it
  • Second-Level Issues
    • Important issues about which believing Christians can disagree and still acknowledge that the other party is a Christian
    • But the disagreements create significant boundaries that prevent doing church together on a regular basis.
    • This is where denominations form and even similar churches divide
    • Baptism is a great example – infant or believer’s baptism, sprinkling or immersing
    • Significance of the Lord’s Supper – is it symbolic only, or is there some mystical presence of Christ in the supper, sacrament vs. ordinance
    • Perseverance of the Saints – will true believers persevere in the faith until the end or can you lose your salvation?
    • “Christians across a vast denominational range can stand together on the first-order doctrines and recognize each other as authentic Christians, while understanding that the existence of second-order disagreements prevents the closeness of fellowship we would otherwise enjoy. A church either will recognize infant baptism, or it will  not. That choice immediately creates a second-order conflict with those who take the other position by conviction.” – Al Mohler
  • Third-Level Issues
    • Doctrines over which Christians may disagree and remain in close fellowship, even with local congregations
      • Which doesn’t mean we always do – but I strongly encourage and try to maintain a relatively large tent for third-level issues!
    • Eschatology is a great example here – as we’ll test out in coming weeks
    • “Christians who affirm the bodily, historical, and victorious return of the Lord Jesus Christ may differ over timetable and sequence without rupturing the fellowship of the church. Christians may find themselves in disagreement over any number of issues related to the interpretation of difficult texts or the understanding of matters of common disagreement. Nevertheless, standing together on issues of  more urgent importance, believers are able to accept one another without compromise when third-order issues are in question.” – Al Mohler
  • Reflections on Triage
    • “A structure of theological triage does not imply that Christians may take any biblical truth with less than full seriousness. We are charged to embrace and to teach the comprehensive truthfulness of the Christian faith as revealed in the Holy Scriptures. There are no insignificant doctrines revealed in the Bible, but there is an essential foundation of truth that undergirds the entire system of biblical truth. This structure of theological triage may also help to explain how confusion can often occur in the midst of doctrinal debate. If the relative urgency of these truths is not taken into account, the debate can quickly become unhelpful.” – Al Mohler
    • However, there can be disagreement on which level things fall into!
      • As you move toward the more liberal end of the spectrum, first-level issues tend to be viewed as third-level, or there is denial of the existence of any first-level issues.
      • As you move toward the more conservative or fundamentalist end of the spectrum, third-level issues tend to get promoted to second or even first-level, e.g. eschatology becomes a divider that prevents church fellowship.
      • Calvinism vs. Arminianism – is that third or second?

SPECIFIC QUESTIONS

Denominations: There are so many denominations of the church: Pentecostal, Methodist, Presbyterian, All Saints, etc. Do we have the same core values? Do these other churches believe in Jesus and His crucifixion and resurrection?

  • There are a couple of levels of the answer – there’s official doctrine of the churches and denominations, then there’s what’s actually believed/taught in the churches.
  • Officially, pretty much all of Western non-Catholic denominations ascribe to the same “First-Level” beliefs – Jesus Christ if fully man and fully God, the eternal Son of God, salvation is by faith in Christ alone, Jesus was physically alive, suffered, died, and was physically resurrected and will return again, that Jesus, along with God the Father, and the Holy Spirit are the three parts of the Trinity, 3 persons, 1 God, that the Bible is the Word of God, etc.
  • This represents what I’ll call historical, orthodox Christianity as expressed centuries ago by the Councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon. Officially the Nicene Creed, frequently summarized through the Apostles Creed.
  • Practically, many “mainline” denominations (Episcopalians but not American Anglicans; Presbyterians, but not PCA; United Methodists, though not all; Lutherans, but not Missouri Synod) have long since drifted away from these beliefs in their formal teaching of pastors, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the people in the churches have
  • Within most of those denominations are churches and individuals who’ve held onto historical, orthodox Christianity. Then there are your evangelical denominations – like Southern Baptists, many Pentecostals, plus your non-denominational Bible churches which hold to this. Independent fundamentalist churches hold these, but have a tendency to legalistically add to these, promoting third-level issues to second or first-level.

What are the main differences in Baptist churches from others?

  • Number 1 – Believer’s baptism by immersion. Not infant baptism, not sprinkling. This is commonly held with non-denominational churches, but not too many other denominations.
  • After that, Baptists come in all different flavors, some very liberal, some extremely conservative, some Calvinistic, some Arminian, and there are variations within that.
  • Most Baptists hold distinctively to:
    • Autonomy of the local church – why we don’t have bishops, etc.
    • A fierce love of religious liberty
    • Historically a congregational model of church polity, though that’s diminishing
    • Southern Baptists will  hold AT LEAST two points of Calvinism: total depravity and perseverance of the saints
    • A high view of Scripture

Catholics & Catholicism: Catholics believe in confessing to a priest, or “blessing” themselves by doing a cross outline gesture over themselves. Are they saved if they believe in Jesus’ death and resurrection? Even though they pray to saints and such? Even though they confess to a priest? P.S. my friend is Catholic and is unsure of what she believes vs. what Christians believe.

  • Let’s go back and consider the one and only way we get saved
  • Walk through Ephesians 2: 1-10
  • Romans 10: 8-13