It's Not True Until We Understand It

This was the unofficial motto in the church I once belonged to. Their Imperial Leaders were SO intellectual. They were to be revered and never challenged. Awful, how many churches are based on the idea that truth comes from preachers, not the Bible. Preachers are important, but they should be examined regularly in the manner of the Bereans, with their beliefs and teachings compared to the Word, nothing else.

This does require that the congregation is knowledgeable about the Bible though. I understand and sympathize with those who prefer the man they hire to do the study. This leaves them free to watch ball games and other more important stuff.

I was in a class that ran into some passages that implied that God, not man, was in charge! Obviously this could not be. They asked their pastor-teacher, "How do we handle this doctrine of predestination?" It sounded like a home owner asking for help from a pest control expert.

The preacher shrugged and then lamented that although his church (Presbyterian) was based on this doctrine, he objected that it made us all into robots and violated the most sacred of all doctrines, Free Will.

Now I happen to believe in free will. God's that is.

This contrived problem is the result of the Reign of the Intellectuals, those awe inspiring ivory tower dwellers that we are lucky enough to share the planet with. This disease of fake intellectualism is, unfortunately, communicable. Whole congregations have caught it. In fact, whole denominations.

It is treatable though. Very simply, see what the Bible says, even use a concordance. Instead of the sterile, and ignorant attempts at reasoning, trust in the Word. It's that simple.

As though creation from nothing could be understood. The eternal existence of God, substitutionary atonement, existence itself--do we understand them? Yet, for the most part, they go unchallenged.

Why is Predestination such a problem? Could it be that it makes God, not man sovereign? A crude, ignorant, dispensationalist,like me, who often uses a Scofield Bible to study from is considered an enemy of truth, perhaps a hopeless one.

I had no idea what I was getting into, when I joined this church. I became the victim of what the Bible calls "party spirit". At the time, I did not know that interpretation of the Scripture had caused a schism in this church. Those leaving and forming their own church, were called, oddly enough, "Bible Presbyterians".