Church Voices

From Josh:

Yes, drinking wine is required. He said “Do this in remembrance of me,” not “substitute something else for the wine if you like, and do that in remembrance of me.” Drinking wine, eating bread, and getting wet are three things commanded by God. Or can we go about substituting cheese sticks for the bread and baptizing with sand now?

The Restoration Movement has in its history phrases like “where the Bible speaks I speak, and where the Bible is silent I am silent” and has at its basis for existence a unifying principle of trying to make the current church look like the early church. So why has our un-denomination insisted on strict adherence to the example of the early church when it comes to baptism (immersion anyone?) but has felt free to substitute grape juice for wine when it comes to the elements of communion? And, this just gets even weirder, our un-denomination has also insisted on practicing communion every week because it seems that’s what the early church did. So why do we see an exception made when it comes to the use of wine?

Well the easy answer is that in the culture of the middle 1800s (the era when the Restoration Movement got rolling) alcohol was a no-no. And so in an area where the early church clearly had a practice of using an alcoholic drink we decided to substitute grape juice, despite our uniting principle of doing what the early church did.

A lot of Restorationists have accused members of European denominations of placing tradition on the same level as scripture, but we’ve done the exact same thing in this case. I’m not suggesting that our founding, guiding principle is wrong, but I am suggesting that there are cases where we rely on tradition in leiu of, and sometimes instead of scripture. Something about a splinter, a log and eyes is coming to mind right about now.

Note:
For those of you just itching to type up a big rejoinder about how it was unfermented wine and the feast of unleavened bread and you even want to break out your Greek lexicon just save it. Because if you’re right somehow people were getting all loopy on grape juice and Paul had to let ‘em know that’s not real cool in the 11th chapter of 1st Corinthians (and notice he didn’t tell them to start using grape juice, he said stop with the drunkeness). It was alcoholic and if you’re going to use scripture as a source of authority then you need to deal with it sincerely.

I’ve stayed out of the Iraq War conversation in regards to scripture pretty well. But now I’ve just about had enough.

If you’re going to talk about what the Biblical position is on the Iraq War the only proper thing to be talking about is the role government has been given by God. You can find this in Romans 13:1ff, as well as 1 Peter 2:13-15 as well as a (very) few other places. Unless you’re pulling from these scriptures, shut up. Cause you’re wrong.

Peter Bogert has a great point.

There’s quite a bit of scripture out there, and its all good for you. Here are some categories of scripture that are often ignored by Christians and a few reasons why they can be beneficial. I’ll probably expound on each of these categories in longer posts later, but for now here are general categories, coupled with which books fall into each category and an extremely non-comprehensive list of reasons of why each is beneficial to read.

The Law
-Leviticus and Deuteronomy
-Displays the character of the law giver.
-Shows the relationship between God and His people.

Wisdom
-Job, Ecclesiastes, and Proverbs.
-How to act so life will go easily for you.

The Prophets
-Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.
-Where the Law hits real life. The prophets came along after the Law had been given and interacted with God and His people on a daily basis. This is where theory meets reality.

History
-Genesis, Exodus, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1st and 2nd Samuel, 1st and 2nd Kings, 1st and 2nd Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, and Acts.
-Tells the story of God’s interaction with His people.

Few things cause my blood to boil. Even though I admit to posses a stereotypical �red-headed temper,� for the most part, I�m able to keep it under control. But some things just push my buttons: The excess amount of cellophane used to package compact discs. Carl Lindner�s refusing to spend the money that I�ve invested in his companies [everyday stops at UDF and my banking with Provident] on some pitching for the Reds. Tim LaHaye novels.

But of all things annoying, there is one that rules them all. It wasn�t until the past few years that I really noticed how much I was bothered by these, but my disdain now runs at an all-time high. One of the greatest abuses the church has ever committed . . .
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