The Growing HOLY ARMY of GOD.

As a protestant I was lead to believe in a Gnostic and Greek myth, that all God was concerned with was my "soul" and "spirit" and that my fate, were I to be faithful to Christ, was to live in some "floaty spiritual realm" of Spirit, far removed from the struggle of those left behind. I was also taught that those faithful who have reposed before us exist on a plane unable to see our struggles here. I didn't understand the total complexity of the Church Triumphant and the Church Militant as the one Body, where each person attached to that Body has concern and is willing to fight for the good of the rest.

After reciting the heroic Saints of old, the writer of Hebrews (which some think was Paul and others think was James, and some think was Jesus' other brother, Judas "Jude") he states the following:

1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,
2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.
Hebrews 12:1-4 (King James Version)

Now so many have done just that, "resisted unto blood" and stand in eternal strength GREATER than the angels.

As a Protestant, I was lead to read that passage above as meaning merely that these people's lives as recorded in scripture are a witness to us, in an evangelical sense, merely examples and not also observers (witnesses) of our own struggles. The space between that realm and this realm was made to be very great, impossible for any communication to pass between. But then what is the meaning of:
7 For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself.
8 For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.
9 For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.
Romans 14:6-9 (King James Version)

People write much about the increase of evil in the world, as I do, following the mandate to be "wise as a serpent" encouraging other to also be "wise as a serpent" so they are not prey to evil, foolishly, are not destroyed by blindness. But just as evil has increased so has the power of the Good, produced by the amassing cloud of God's Triumphant Army, which operate both in heaven and earth. God may do as he wills, we know this from the nature of BEING, but he has chosen that this army be built for the final battle, which has been ongoing for two thousand years and will culminate in that Great Day. This army operates both in heaven and in earth, both on the spiritual and material realm. "Whatsoever things you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven." This has to have real meaning. "Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as in heaven." No this mighty army is not resting in some mindless nirvana, but it is working still as they have been unalterably joined with the Father, who works for our good still.

But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.
John 5:17 (King James Version)

And his mighty army that is growing day by day also works with him. These warriors have become powerful beings who will judge the angels. They have concern for US. Why should we set ourselves apart from them? Should we not instead invoke their help, for surely evil is increased in the land, and so may the wonder-working power of the Good, as we join with those warriors who are eternally bound with the Father's Will, that none should be lost.

The stories number in the millions of the intervention of the Saints into the lives of mortal men, too great a witness to be ignored. Too powerful an aid in our own struggles to be rejected.

Teaching "Just From the Bible"

One of the great blessings of becoming Orthodox Catholic was the consolidation of scripture, where, in Orthodox understanding, all of it "fits" and has context.   Nothing but the Gospels are "amplified" and by "amplified" I mean contain the information, the story upon which all other scriptures are viewed.  In Orthodox Catholicism, all scripture is genuinely interpreted IN Christ, not in a personally held understanding of what "the Light of Christ" is, or what a particular or passage or section of scripture says.  Nor is the Church's interpretation subject to that personal understanding, the ego filter, which colors scripture.  Rather, all is understood, all of the Tradition, which includes Scripture, in the Light of Christ held by the Whole (Catholic -of the Whole) Church from the very beginning. 

I suddenly was relieved of the burden of defending my interpretation of scripture on every issue, all those things a thinking Protestant needs hold an opinion. I speak of the myriad huge, mild, and subtle difference of Protestant scriptural interpretation, creating 44,000 denominations of Protestants in the world, and millions more non-churched Protestants all holding their "personal interpretation" of scripture. In this sea of confusion, it was like battling waves that could sink you, and suddenly finding rock solid ground, and being able to say, "The Church Teaches."  Because she indeed does.  No matter what scripture, the church teaches; no matter what the competing dogma, the church teaches. She always has and her light has not been extinguished.   ON this subject a friend wrote the following.
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My Protestant Coworker Has Been Learning From a Bible Teacher
 
One of my coworkers, whom I'll call Terry, goes to an Evangelical Protestant "non-denominational" church.

He had a conversion a few years back and does not yet understand much about the differences between different Protestant denominations, much less what Catholicism teaches.
 
He found out that I was Catholic, and we began to discuss some of the important issues surrounding which Church, if any, is the true one.
 
Terry told me that his family member gave him and his wife a set of DVDs of a Protestant pastor's sermons, and that they had been watching them.
 
"He teaches straight from the Bible," Terry said. "And when he says something that is his own opinion, he tells you. He says 'this is my own belief here,' or 'this is directly from Scripture.'"

So I pointed out to Terry that even the things this pastor is saying are directly from Scripture are actually only his opinions as well. Terry didn't understand, but I soon demonstrated it to him.
 
He told me the pastor's name, and I googled him. Turns out the pastor is a mid-Acts hyper-dispensationalist Protestant.
 
A Hyper-What?

It does not particularly matter what small niche within a niche within Protestantism that this pastor follows. In this case though, I was familiar with this sub-sub-strain within Protestantism from a guy I interacted with a year or so ago who was a late-Acts (or Acts 28) hyper-dispensationalist.
 
Every statement that this pastor made--even those he claimed were straight from the Bible--were his own interpretation of the Bible through a particular lens or tradition.
 
In this case, the tradition is a hyper-dispensationalist one that was invented about one hundred years ago by some other Protestants.

My friend Terry was confused. So I explained briefly to him that he is listening and believing a man who has no more authority than any other Protestant who picks up a Bible and says "this verse means X."

And in this case, he was following a man whose beliefs are such a tiny minority within Protestantism that even his fellow Protestants had created websites devoted to debunking his teachings.
 
Terry didn't know how to respond. But I didn't press him on it. A seed is planted. A seed that will make him think critically about what this pastor is saying before blindly believing in it.
 
Most Protestants Are Like Terry
 
Most Protestants are not apologetics experts. They are not Bible experts.
 
They are instead like Terry.

They know what they have been taught from some particular set of Protestant pastors and friends. They think that it is just "plain Bible teaching," not even realizing that thousands of Protestant denominations differ on those "plain teachings."

You don't have to refute everything they wrongly believe. You just have to gently and kindly point out the questions they need to ask themselves: "How do I know what Jesus and the Apostles really taught?"

God bless,
Devin
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2701 Quanah Dr.
Round Rock TX 78681
USA

Lesson Seventeen: Forensic Justification

or the Calvinist's core heresy.

A well-meaning woman offered me this paragraph and it is a good springboard to teach something crucial.
K.D.:
"My righteousness is Jesus Christ himself, not whether I've sinned in a particular way 11 years ago or 5 minutes ago. When God looks at the believer, yes a fallen man or sinner, if you will, He sees Christ. When we look at another man we will ALWAYS see another fallen man, like ourselves. Think this through carefully and take heart!"

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Can't let this Calvinism stand without challenge. You have just described exactly 1/3th of the healing/salvation story told in the Bible, held in the New Testament and consistently taught by the Church for 21 hundred years. What you have described is Christ's finished work of salvation on our behalf. What you have NOT described, in fact, skewed is our present working out of our salvation "in Him" and finally that finished and complete work IN US, where we will fulfill the prophecy, "I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people."


Salvation is spoken of in the New Testament in both Chronos and Kairos times (earthly and heavenly) and in three tenses in the Greek that closely relate to but are not identical to, past tense, present tense and future tense in English. In Greek, it is a little more complicated because there are those tenses that indicate a "past action that is still happening" not just a past action that is completed. Also, "a present action that is happening and will continue to happen." And that action that will happen in the future. Jesus and the Apostles in the New Testament, as did all the early Church fathers talk about Healing/Salvation in these different tenses. Something that happened in the past and is complete; Something that happened in the past and is still happening; Something that is happening in the present; Something that is happening in the present and will continue to happen; and something that will happen and become complete in the future.


So where you adequately describe Christ's completed work in the past and its present effect from HIS (God's perspective) you have not described our answer to it, and the Holy Spirit's work with us and in us in the present, nor the completed work "in that great day."


God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is NOT blind to us as you indicate, but rather examines us and reveals new layers of sin to us, for which we MUST repent, progressively as we GROW and go from simple Repentance/Conversion (which you describe) to Enlightenment/Maturity (translated "perfection" in the KJV) and finally to Sanctification/Theosis/Deification, actually becoming a part of God Himself, that is in hypostatic union with Him, sharing with him the common Divine Human Nature of Jesus Christ. BTW when I say that you "skew" the one-third of the story of salvation and salvation history in your little theological presumption, what you present is actually a heresy called, "forensic justification" a core heretical teaching of the "reformed" movement. Forensic Justification claims that our Justification happens "outside of us" "independent of us" and that our own sinfulness cannot change that "forensic justification." Such is not the teaching of Jesus and the Apostles, or the teaching of ANY teacher of the Church, only the confused teaching of heretics.


Even Saint Peter's healing the lame man by the "Gate Beautiful" was not a completed thing, but required something of the man. He did not say to him as it is translated into English for convenience sake, "stand up and walk", the literal meaning is "stand up and begin to walk about, and continue to walk about for the duration." And this is an excellent picture of the "work of salvation." IT is not a legal game, but an organic process.


God is NOT blind to us as you indicate, but rather a healing presence to us, able to guide us, teach us, give us the lessons we need, to both "persevere" and "become completed" in HIM.