The last few days I have been asking myself these questions:

• “What if the spiritual decline in America over the last several decades has very little to do with church structure and people’s preferances?
• What if all of the worship wars and culture wars that we have experienced in the church are merely symptoms of a much larger problem?
• What if the real issue is the fact that most Christians have very little to no commitment to studying scripture?

The more I think about this and reflect on my own experience the more I am convinced this is the problem. In spite of the fact that most Christians have heard hundreds and thousands of sermons, most never go deeper than someone else is willing to take them.

Without a real commitment to scripture how can a follower of Jesus ever really get to know Him? How can a follower ever learn to really follow Him? They can’t.

Any thoughts? I would love to discuss this.

1. britt Says:
   January 2nd, 2009 at 2:44 pm

   Good questions. I apologize in advance for a long answer.

   I think the simple answer is that it is all more connected than we realize.

   Some things aren’t worth arguing about, while others are SCRIPTURALLY laid out and principally important to people like Paul and others.

   So on the one hand, yes, we need to get back to reading the scripture, but did the personal reading of scripture unify the Church during the latest fundamentalist period … or did even the Solo Scriptura of Martin Luther’s time result in a unified Protestant faith? On the contrary, there were divisions almost as soon as people were given the ability to read scripture for themselves.

   Some church practice discussions are worthless, while others are very important to the fundamental understanding of the New Covenant, which is why Paul so adamantly fought against some things infecting the Body (worldly philosophy, pagan practices, sexual immorality, external religion, etc.).

   For an example, the first time David tried to take the Ark back to Jerusalem, Uzzah died because he touched it. David was angry until he went back, looked at the scripture, and found the correct way to carry the Ark instead of based on how the Philistines did it. He could have kept killing well-meaning servants all the way to Jerusalem. Some modern Church leaders do just that.

   Another example, Jesus speaks to one of the fellowships in Revelation and says, “you hate the Nicolaitans … so do I.” Wait, Jesus hates these guys? What did they do? Nicolaitan means power over the people, a priest-clergy type of professional class over what we would today call the laity. But God hates it. If God hates it, doesn’t that make it pretty important to discuss and stand against? I would say so.

   It goes both ways. The problem with reading scripture is when we read it under the wrong paradigm. For instance, reading Paul’s letters to Timothy as if Timothy is related to what we would call the modern pastor, thinking that those letters somehow justifies or supports that position. (Some people call these letters the Pastoral Epistles … no pastor was ever addressed in a letter by Paul) Nothing is further from the truth. Timothy was an apostle, working as Paul worked and in conjunction with Paul to set up a plurality of elders and then LEAVE. (interesting note … that fellowship didn’t have much of a leadership structure before Timothy did this … it takes time for elders in the Church to develop … the fellowship was successfully leader-less for months or years)

   So correct Church structures work together with proper understanding of scripture. They are interconnected and work together.

   Some people might have a problem with the idea that we need to see the correct model before understanding scripture, but didn’t Jesus teach this way? He didn’t give his disciples scripture to read but an example to emulate. Then he promised that the Spirit would lead them into all truth as they taught others to do the things he said.

   Seeing the correct paradigm and listening intently to the Holy Spirit is essential to correctly understanding the Bible. Too many Christians read the Bible with an incorrect example as the standard and twist the scripture to fit those examples (this is religious as well as worldly, very similar to the issues Paul defended against).

   Again, sorry this is a long answer, but something I think about often.

   Peace.