Basic Christianity
Week One
Introduction
People today believe all kinds of things. It seems, in fact, that America
is a virtual "belief cafeteria" with faiths of every kind to
select from. The statistics show that while the majority of us identify
ourselves as "Christian," most people do not believe some of
the most basic and essential biblical truths. Many of us are really confused
about spiritual things.
Maybe we believe pretty much what the Bible teaches but don't really
understand our faith. This makes our faith shaky and unsatisfying. How
can we apply our faith to our lives if we don't have a deep grasp of what
it is? It would be like trying to build a bridge without a solid knowledge
of physics. No one in their right mind would chance crossing such a bridge.
It's odd that people take such great pains with their careers and other
interests, but so little with the things that matter most. And this brings
us to the next point.
- Importance of doctrine. Truth matters. Just as there are consequences
to errors in engineering or science, so too there are consequences to
being wrong in the realm of spiritual truth. That's why Jesus said,
"you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free"
(John 8:32). And we note too, the Apostle Paul's warning, "See
to it that no one take you captive through philosophy or empty deception"
(Colossians 2:8). Here are three key reasons why doctrine is vital:
- Everyone needs answers to the "big" questions of life.
What happens to me when I die? Where did I come from? Is there a
God? How can I know God?
- Eternal issues are at stake. If the Bible is right, then the
faith commitments a person makes in this life will determine
their eternal destiny. Certainly, such ultimate and weighty
concerns demand careful thinking through.
- The kind of life we live is also affected by what we believe.
Jesus taught, "I came that they might have life, and have it
abundantly" (John 10:10). As we discover God's design for our
lives, and begin to live it out, we will find God's transforming
hand in our lives. The more we know about God, the more we will
be able to recognize his work in the world and in our lives.
- We have a built-in need for our lives to be vitally connected
to reality. We may pity the person whose life is in service to a
lie--the Nazi or the Hare Krishna. We may admire their dedication,
but realize that it is being wasted on falsehood. On the other hand,
when our lives are poured into true and deeply meaningful things,
it has a profoundly satisfying result: The best of our abilities
and personalities are brought out. Life has a real direction and
purpose.
The role of doctrine is to clarify these issues. Doctrine lays out what
we could call the Christian world view. By world view, I mean the
essential truths of the Bible and how they answer the key questions of
life.
- How we arrive at doctrine. Doctrine systematizes what
the Bible teaches. The Bible was written over a several hundred year
period by many authors in very different cultural settings. Yet the
important issues are consistently and clearly expressed. What the biblical
authors say about who God is, what it means to be human, how to be in
right relationship to God, and other key truths are stated repeatedly
throughout the scripture. Doctrine means taking these selections from
all over scripture and organizing them into subjects. This class is
an introduction to Bible doctrine.
Who Am I? The Christian View of Human Nature
Then God said, 'Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness'
. . .And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created
him; male and female He created them (Genesis 1:26,27).
This is a very different starting point for human nature than what we
are taught to think. When we think about human origins, we tend to think
about evolution. The basic idea is that the human species is the product
of a long process of biological change, based on the "survival of
the fittest." According to evolutionary theory, there is no purpose
for human life. We are here by evolutionary chance. We can not say that
there is anything essentially unique or valuable about the human species
in general, or about each one of us in particular. Nature is indifferent
to our search for meaning, because nature itself serves no ultimate purpose.
The dignity of man
What is man, that You take thought of him? And the son of man, that
You care for him? Yet You have made him a little lower than God, and crowned
him with glory and majesty! Psalm 8:4,5.
In contrast, the Bible places great value in human life. We are uniquely
"the image of God." We are both physical and spiritual. There
is something very special about each of us, according to the Bible.
What does it mean to be in the "image of God?"
- Gen. 1:27. Benevolent rulership. Adam is entrusted with a stewardship
of nature. Other species adapt to the environment. Man is to care for
it. Just as God rules creation, he has entrusted to man the responsibility
to care for the environment.
- Gen. 2:15. Creative accomplishment. Adam is to cultivate the
ground. He is to make things useful for human purposes. As God is creative,
so is man.
- Art, literature, music; these are aspects of human uniqueness.
- Gen. 2:16,17. Free Will. Humans are not biologically determined
automatons. We are free to make choices that guide our lives.
- Genuine freedom entails the possibility of making significant
moral choices. Only humans are responsible for their actions.
We do not blame animals for what they do. We acknowledge that it
comes naturally to them. But for man, freedom means both the extraordinary
opportunity to chart our own course and the liability of being held
accountable for these choices.
- Gen. 2:18. Social. The ability to experience love relationships
is essential to personhood. When we really think about what motivates
us, and what brings out the best in us, it is tied to our social nature.
- The greatest examples of human virtue are people who gave all
they had to serve others.
- A vital life quest is for people to love. Certainly this is true
in the romantic sense--finding a mate to enjoy a life of love together.
Think about all of the songs, art, music you know. Isn't it primarily
about this quest? God's design is for lasting, stable love relationships.
- No man is an island. We are social beings by nature. In fact,
the family, which is the basic social unit is where we learn to
communicate, where we adopt our values, and the survival skills
that will take us through life.
- Gen. 2:19,20. Intellectual. We have a built in need to understand
the world around us. We want to learn, not merely for the sake of survival,
but simply to understand.
- We see the intense curiosity of children as evidence of this.
- Gen. 1:28, 2:24. Sexual. Sex is not a sin, nor is it the cause
of all evils. Sex expresses the joining of two people in the most intimate
way. It both preserves personal diversity and distills unity. In this
respect, sex reflects God's intimate unity in the trinity.
- Gen. 2:25. Open. As the creation narrative ends, man is in
harmony with God and with each other. Adam and Eve are not ashamed of
who they are. Their identities are secure and they can be completely
vulnerable.
So this is how God designed humans "in his image" to be. Yet,
we know from our own experience that it's not that way now. There is another
side to human nature.
Human depravity
The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick.
Who can understand it? Jeremiah 17:9.
And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, 'From any tree of the
garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall
surely die' Genesis 2:16,17.
Most people believe the biblical view about human dignity. We recognize
something of value about human beings that we don't see in anything else.
Yet, everyone recognizes that there are problems with man. Secular people
typically believe that people are basically good. If every one were properly
educated and had their basic needs met, there would be no problems in
the world. Problems people have is a result of what is done to them, not
something that originates within them. Sometimes this view is called "humanism."
On the other hand, the Bible teaches that there is something fundamentally
wrong within us. People are not "basically good," and our core
problem is not something that has been done to us by others. We are inherently
valuable, but not inherently good. The essential flaw in
our nature results from what the Bible calls "the fall." While
human beings maintain the dignity of sharing in the image of God, the
image is distorted, corrupted.
- Genesis 3:1-6.
- God placed the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden
as a tangible opportunity to exercise freedom to reject God. The
tree is the opportunity to say no to God. But it is not because
God is uptight that he told Adam And Eve not to eat, but because
he knows what is good for us. Autonomous, self-directed will
has catastrophic consequences.
- C.S. Lewis' illustration of each ship in the fleet doing their
own navigation.
- Consequences of the fall.
- Gen. 3:7. Psychological alienation. Adam and Eve were
no longer comfortable or secure with themselves. They could
not be vulnerable before each other.
- Gen. 3:8,9. Theological alienation. No longer confident
in their standing before God. They recognized the barrier of
sin that they erected by their disobedience. No longer will
they have direct access to God.
- Universal human awareness that man and God are alienated.
That's what all religions of the world are based on. They
may see God differently, and even view the human dilemma
differently from the Bible, but they all acknowledge the
fundamental rift between man and God.
- Colossians 2:14. The Certificate of Debt.
- Gen. 3:12. Social alienation. Unity between Adam and
Eve was shattered. Rather than seeing his mate as a compliment
to himself, Adam blamed her for his choice. Perhaps this is
the most significant outward sign of the fall. War, divorce,
breakdown of community and family attest to the distorted and
corrupt social nature of man.
- Quote Alan Bloom, Closing of the American Mind, p. 118,
124. See also study cited in Chicago Tribune, "Kids
pay toll of broken home, study says."
- Most people's lives revolve around the desires of self.
"Looking out for #1" is really what its all about.
- Human sexuality has been transformed from a celebration
of unity to self-seeking pleasure and exploitation.
- Gen. 17,18. Ecological alienation. Previously cultivation
was easy, now it is with great toil that the crop would be harvested.
- Man's stewardship of the environment is distorted. The
current ecological crisis gives sharp testimony to how irresponsible
we are with nature.
- Gen. 3:19. Death. Ultimately, the fall means death
to all people.
- Death is not natural. We were not created to die. Paul
refers to death as "the enemy" in I Corinthians
15. In John 11, Jesus wept at the tomb of his friend Lazarus.
So the greatness of man is corrupted by the fall. We maintain the image
of God, but in all of the areas of human dignity, a pervasive element
of distortion remains.
Under God's Judgment
For the wages of sin is death. . .Romans 6:23
Clearly, we can not think of a less popular idea. Most people no longer
believe in a "judging God." This is true for basically two reasons.
First, we don't think that sin is quite that serious. Second, we don't
think the idea of a loving God is consistent with God judging. So lets
delve into this more fully.
- Sliding scales. Most of the time when we think about moral
evil--the kind worthy of God's judgment--people like Hitler come to
mind. No one would claim the self-righteous position of sinlessness.
But the thinking is that most of us are not too bad. Most of
the time we're honest, hard working people. We don't hurt other people
and would never think about doing the really terrible things Hitler
and others have done. So we tend to see two different kinds of "sinners."
The real serious ones, deserving of hell, and the rest of us.
- But let's think about what this view really means. Some sinners
are worthy of God's judgment, but others aren't. Where do we draw
the line? How much sin is too much sin? In the final account, doesn't
it make a mockery of God's moral character. The fact is that we
are all in the same situation: "All have sinned and fallen
short of the glory of God" (Rom. 3:23).
- Illustration of swimmers going from LA to Hawaii
- What really are God's moral requirements? (James 2:10). Part of
many people's confusion about moral guilt comes from appealing to
current social standards of ethics, rather than biblical ones.
- Matthew 22:36-40. Now it is clear that we simply don't
live up to this standard. The person who thinks that they are
"basically good" don't define goodness the way Jesus
does. They think they are good because they don't do certain
obvious evils. But as for the motivations of the heart, and
a life of sacrificial love on behalf of others, it is sheer
foolishness and self-delusion to think that we are righteous
on these terms.
- A loving God won't judge. How could a loving God send anyone
to hell? This is something I've struggled with quite a bit. I wonder
about those who didn't get a clear, relevant presentation of the gospel
like I did. And I think about the fact that eternal punishment is an
awfully big sentence for what most people do. So what do we do about
this?
- Those who haven't heard the gospel?
- Some are innocent because they lack the ability to grasp their
moral state. See 2 Samuel 12:23.
- Romans 1:18-23; 2:14-1618; Luke 18:9ff. Natural revelation
gives everyone reasonable and intuitive awareness of the human
condition.
- We are responsible for responding in faith to what God has
revealed to us (Gen. 15:6). Abraham did not know the full plan
of God. He only knew that God was calling him, and that he should
act in obedience.
- So why evangelize? Because what intuition a person has gets
lost and distorted in false religion.
- Eternal punishment for finite sins. How is the punishment
fitting the crime here?
- 1 Tim. 2:3,4. God's desire is that all be saved.
- Heb. 9:27. We are given a finite amount of time to make a
decision of permanent consequence.
- What would be the appropriate sentence? The point is not a
fixed number of years for a particular offense. Rather, the
issue is whether or not we will humble ourselves to receive
forgiveness. Jesus said, "He who is not for me is against
me" (Mt. 12:30). War time analogy fits in here. The issue
is not the number of sins, but where we have our allegiance.
We have a limited time to decide.
- What if God does not judge? In what sense does this preserve
his basic goodness? Think about it just a minute. If God does not
intend to hold anyone responsible for their lives, then God is ultimately
responsible. Further, what would eternity with an unrepentant Hitler
be like? Could this be heaven? What is the difference between heaven
and hell at this point?
So human beings are in a very bad situation. As Isaiah illustrates, "all
of us like sheep have gone astray" (Isaiah 53:6). An absolute moral
being must impose consequences on human sin. To overlook our cruelty is
not loving. But God has a solution.
God's Solution
But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth His Son. . .Galatians
4:4
God is omniscient. That means he knows everything--including the future.
Even before he created us, he knew what was going to happen. So he decided
on a plan to deal with man's rebellion. We see his plan unfolding through
the pages of scripture. In fact, that's really what the Bible is: the
revelation of God's plan for fallen humanity.
- In the Old Testament:
- Genesis 3:15. Seed of woman
- Genesis 3:22. Expelled from the garden, so that they would not
eat from the tree of life and remain forever in a fallen state.
- Genesis 12:3. God will bless the world through Abraham
- Sacrificial system: A picture of what God will do through Christ
- Lev. 17:11. Substitutionary Atonement: Death of an innocent
on behalf of the guilty
- Lev. 16:1-3. Day of Atonement
- Isaiah 53. The suffering servant predicted
Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did
not come to abolish, but to fulfill Matthew 5:17.
Often, people think that the essence of Jesus' teaching was moral: Sermon
on the Mount, for example. In reality, the overwhelming emphasis of Jesus'
teaching was about his death and resurrection.
- Jesus' teaching about his death (Mk. 8:31; 9:31; 10:32-34)
- John 1:29; Hebrews 10:12. Christ is the fulfillment of sacrificial
system.
- Because Christ is eternal and sinless, he could substitute for
all men.
Saving Faith
But to as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become
children of God, even to those who believe in His name. John 1:12.
Salvation is offered by God as a gift. That's what grace means--not
something you say before dinner. But he will not force us to take his
offer. We must exercise faith. But what does this mean?
- Faith means agreeing with God about our need for forgiveness
and the adequacy of his provision in Christ.
- This means acknowledging that we in no way earn God's acceptance.
See Ephesians 2:8,9.
- Faith means making a conscious decision to trust Christ's death
on our behalf.
This is what it means to be right with God. We simply humble ourselves
to receive what we could never earn. God wants us to be confident in our
standing before him. Once the issue of forgiveness is out of the way,
we are restored to permanent fellowship with God (Ephesians 1:13,14).
Receiving new life in Jesus Christ is where it all begins. In the third
week we will discuss in detail how God works in our lives as believers.
Contact
Jim with a comment or a question
Return to Basic Christianity Syllabus
Return to Adult Education course list
Return to Equipping Division
Return to Xenos
|
