Unruly people or the Holy Spirit, your church is not big enough for both.

I Thessalonians 5:12-22

We have often treated this passage as a string of individual behaviors that Paul has listed as a sort of good deeds to do list. This is misguided and misses the power of this passage. Having addressed mistaken eschatology and the busy bodies that were its carriers, Paul calls for some practical Church leadership to address the conflict and set those individuals to right that would cause conflict. Never doubt that correcting misguided people has the potential to cause them to turn the misguided into clergy killers.

Paul begins by commanding support for those who are leading the church.  He makes the point in v. 12 that these leaders are to give instruction.  This word is more than simply teaching.  It is about setting in order the muddled thinking of certain people.  When this is done the muddle-headed individual may become unruly. Paul says they are to be admonished.  This word means, “to keep military order”.  The point of Paul’s using a word with a military origin is that this is no matter of want-to or cooperation, but rather order and submission to authority.  Verse 14 is a study in the problem of the American church in the early 21^st century.  When faced with the unruly, church leaders are often weak and fainthearted.  The weak are severely tempted to give in to secure peace at any price with those who are being unruly.  The fainthearted (the word literally means “little soul”) lack the conviction to stand firm by their principles.  We often misunderstand the role of patience when dealing with church discipline problems.  Patience is not endlessly putting up with the non-sense of the unruly or dysfunctional person, it is rather, sticking to doing what is right regardless of what is involved.  Patience is holding faithfully to the right course of action and enduring the grief that comes from doing the right thing.  But Paul also warns against an over reaction in which evil is done to the unruly or disruptive person. 

Dealing with this kind of dysfunction is not easy, but if we are faithful in the hardship we can remain positive at our core.  The advice and behavior described in vs. 16-18 will keep the leaders from despair in the difficult times.  As long as a leader has some sense of hope for the future and mission of the church he can have remarkable durability.  That sense of hope is enhanced and encouraged by rejoicing, praying and giving thanks.  Ministers do not usually leave the church and the ministry because they have lost faith in God, Scripture or the Kingdom.  They do so for good reason; they have lost hope in the local congregations. 

They have had dysfunctional crazies in the church attack them and the leadership that is called to guard the flock decides it is easier to get a new preacher than deal with the unruly member.  So, the preacher becomes discouraged and leaves.  But the preacher is not the only one.  The grammar of verse 19 is very clear, translated literally Paul says, “Stop quenching the Spirit.”  Allowing the unruly to be disrespectful of the leaders and to misbehave without accountability causes the Spirit to withdraw from the life and ministry of the church.  If you talk to a minister that has been through an ugly church fight he can very likely tell you of sensing the distinct absence of the Holy Spirit at some point.  If a church does this enough times eventually it will die.  By the way, have you noticed how many churches are closing across our nation?

In verse 20 Paul wisely strikes a balance.  During a church conflict people will sometimes or often say, “I believe the Lord is leading us to….”  Paul warned not to reject such statements out of hand.  The Lord may in fact be leading.  Rather than believe everyone who says the Lord gave him or her direction or, equally bad, missing the genuine guidance of the Spirit, Paul commands that we “examine everything”.  The word is taken from testing metal to see if it is precious or common. One way of putting it is, “Is this advice golden or is it just cheap tin?”   Paul advises to hang on to the good.  He used the word for beautiful or comely and rejected in dynamic terms the evil (the root word from which we get the word porn).  The bad advice of the unruly is as bad for the church as is pornography. 

In the church you can have the unruly person, the clergy killer, or you can have the Holy Spirit, but you can never have both. 

What God wants is more than big churches.

Colossians 1:8-14

While still new to Christianity the Colossians were impressive with their faith, love for community, and fruit bearing. But even with all of this Paul prays for still more for them. He asked God to grant them to be filled with three things. First, knowledge of God’s will; this is the deep and real knowledge rather than a superficial kind of knowing about. Paul wants them to have a profound knowing of what God is all about. Second, he asked that they be filled with all Spiritual wisdom; this is really about the “how” of accomplishing the will of God. Third, he asked for understanding, to have the perception of what is happening in the dynamic or fluidity of life. Life is not a constant.  Like whitewater rafting each new moment requires new insight.  Rather than dull academic research the Christian life is a lively awareness of what God wants done, how it needs to be done, and a sensitivity or understanding to the Holy Spirit in the process of the doing. We call this a Spirit-led or filled life.   The Spirit-led life is neither the ecstatic experience in the worship gathering nor the foggy-eyed mystic in a desert cave hearing voices.  It is knowing the will of God in life, how it applies and partnering with the Holy Spirit as it comes about. 

But lest we think this is about developing a big overarching strategy for a great ministry or mega church we have to take the next phrase of the text.  The Spirit-led life or as Paul calls it “walk” and its purpose are described here. In our lives we “walk in a manner worthy”.  This is not about church growth strategy, but about individual lives that live up to the name and please Him in all respects. It is producing fruit in the good works He has for us and it increases in knowledge.  This fruitfulness and knowledge is a by-product of living to and in Him.  Instead of really great staff developing a plan for ministry that will cause the church to grow, perhaps we need to focus on living every moment led by the Spirit and teaching other believers to do the same. 

Paul turns his attention to good works and knowledge.  Too often we have focused solely on the later that is on knowledge. The purpose of knowledge, wisdom, and understanding is ethical not just academic, how to live (to do good works) not just knowing about life. I am amazed that we seem to think it is acceptable for a believer to attend Sunday school their whole life and never graduate and never enter the work force.  When we have good works and knowledge together, we are strengthened by God's power in two key areas. Here Paul is both in step and in stark contrast to much of contemporary Christianity.  While Paul would advocate for good works and knowledge, like much of contemporary Christianity, he has a decidedly different objective.   We think of work and knowledge as the pathway to growth or advancement.  For Paul it is the pathway to steadfastness and patience.

There is clearly nothing wrong with growing a great church, but these two virtues or strengths stand opposed to cowardice or despondency on the one hand and revenge on the other-temptations that are ever present in a life of discipleship and ministry.  These virtues enable us to live joyfully the life that is difficult. 

The verse break between versus 11 and 12 is unfortunate. The acts and rituals of thanks to God are profoundly linked to the life of joy. There is a mixture of steadfastness, patience, joy, and thanks that gives us the ability, by the Holy Spirit, to live faithfully even in difficult circumstances.  This has happened because we have deliverance from the authority of darkness and have been moved into this Kingdom of his son Jesus. The powers of Darkness have been broken and we live in the light because of the forgiveness that Christ accomplished.

Christianity as an invasive species.

Col. 1:1-8

Paul begins with his typical greeting of “Grace” and “Peace”. The first is essential to the second, without grace there is never the possibility of peace.  But we should also note that the double greeting has both a Greek and Hebrew component.  Even in saying, “Hello,” Paul is moving toward unity.  This issue of unity will be developed later on in this letter.

Three elements that Paul refers to in the passage need to be developed in the life of every disciple.  There can be no point at which we stop growing in these three areas.  First, is “Faith in Christ” that is more than knowledge and theology.  I can never have a strong faith if I live in ignorance.  Nor can I assume I have it all figured out.  I must avoid learning in order to reinforce my opinions and pet ideals.  Rather we learn to constantly challenge our personal convictions and make sure they are Biblical convictions.  Knowledge is not the same as faith, but it is the foundation of faith.  Faith is the active trust and living in the sphere of Christ.  It is the challenges of obedience in the daily-we live in Christ.  Second, is the “love of the saints”.  Love is not practiced at a distance.  Love for the saints requires an ongoing, involved and intimate relationship.  It is much more than membership in a church, even with weekly attendance, though for many that would be an improvement.  Nor is it friendship and a common affection.  Agape love is always costly.  If the relationship is not based in the faith, ongoing, intimate and in some way costly, it is not love.  I should not try to find this in others; but rather, ought to find and develop it in myself.  Third, “fruit bearing” is the final descriptive.  The life of faith that is not bearing fruit is dead, that was the point of Jesus cursing the fig tree.  What is the fruit that Paul refers to in verse 6?  This is clearly critical!  It is the fruit of both the change in the life of the believer and the expansion of the community of faith.  Christianity is the ultimate, invasive species.  Everywhere it is supplanting and rooting out the native species of the world, the flesh, and the devil, it is replacing these with its new life.

The church must never become or be allowed to be stupid (weak in faith), disconnected (without Agape love) and deadbeat (failing to work with the Holy Spirit in personal and kingdom growth).  We must never look at Paul’s guidance as if he were speaking to another.  We must hear him speaking to us. 

We lament the removal of Bible reading in school. But we have removed the Bible from worship.

I recently attended a worship service that was almost entirely devoid of Scripture.  During the service someone read a few verses of Scripture.  During the sermon the speaker read a single verse of Scripture and referred in passing to two others.  In a twenty-five minute sermon less than 30 seconds were devoted to reading Scripture and perhaps two or three minutes were dedicated to exposition of that verse.  The balance of the sermon was a saccharine talk that was not sweet on the tongue, but mildly nauseating to the belly. 

It is absolutely impossible for a Christian or the church to have a maturing walk with the Lord while at the same time being highly ignorant of the Word of God.  I recall a conversation with a young man who grew up in a church, went to weekly Sunday School classes and attended worship with his parents but was stunned to find that sex outside of marriage was wrong, as in, “the Bible says don’t.”  According to research reported by Christianity Today, almost 80% of Evangelical Christians agree with the statement that Jesus is the first and greatest created being.[1]  How is this possible?  This has happened because the vast majority of the emphasis of the church in American for the last couple of decades has been on personal fulfillment and growing larger congregations.  Not that long ago, if you went to a Christian bookstore it was dominated by commentaries, theologies, and Biblical study tools.   Those Christian bookstores that are left today are little more than Christian self-help, Christian entertainment, and Christian paraphernalia shops. 

Even in my own blog I have seen it.  The blogs that I reported or commented on church-growth related issues were read and shared most frequently.  Those that were most directly related to discipleship were read less often.  I believe that in most churches and for most church leaders we would rather grow large churches than make disciples.  It seems easier, there is more support material, and it has the potential to be more financially and ego rewarding.

It is my opinion that the only way forward for the church in our time is the way back, a return to the study of Scripture.  To that end each week I will be mailing Bible studies that are designed to call us to discipleship by looking at scripture and finding application.  Please do not read the post until you have read the passage on which it is based.  Use these for devotional purposes, share them in your network as you see fit, forward them to a friend. I do not care how you use them as long as people are returning to the Bible.  My only request is that if you use them link your use to www.beyondharan.blogspot.com. 

So, let’s look into Scripture-today is an intentionally short devotion.

Psalm 67 (read Text)

If you don’t know the proper use for something you will end up abusing it, misusing it and ultimately losing it.  It is difficult to imagine a case where this is not true.  We often ask God for blessings in our lives without knowing the purpose of those blessings.  As a result many of those blessings are abused, misused and ultimately lost.  This Psalm explains the purpose of blessings in our lives.  The first two lines in verse 1 are the quintessential Hebrew blessing.  But the purpose for blessing is given in verse 2, namely that God’s way and salvation can be known worldwide.  We are blessed to bless others not to acquire luxury, pleasure, and ease for ourselves.  This Psalm is an evangelistic Psalm and directs that our blessings are for a testimony and witness to the world.  It is natural that under the new covenant of the Cross and in the community of evangelism and faith of the church that we would see the support of missionary and benevolent efforts as the proper use of our blessings. 

As we receive any blessing if we try to keep it only for ourselves and try to use it only to gain more or to be used to gain selfish pleasure we cut ourselves off from the purpose of blessing and eventually from the source of blessing.  In contrast to this selfish attitude we see in verses 5-6 that in the investment in blessing others there develops a repeating cycle of blessings, so that the earth yields its produce.  Stewardship, the Godly use of God-given resources, extends not just to our money, but also our environment indeed to the whole of creation.  This Psalm concludes with verse 7’s summation; God’s blessing came to us so all the earth may fear the one, true God.

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[1] https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2018/october/what-do-christians-believe-ligonier-state-theology-heresy.html