Author: W. Keith Brenton

Can You Have It Both Ways with Authority and the Old Testament?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 8 Comments

Virtually without exception so far in my study of instrumental praise and a cappella worship, of law and liberty in hermeneutic, those who defend the vocal-only and legal-only viewpoint will cite Old Testament scripture as examples of their “Prohibitive Law of Silence” which must be carried over into the New Testament church.

Yet some, almost in the very same breath, will discount commands to worship with instruments that are given by God in the Old Testament (yet never specifically rescinded in the New) because the OT law which authorized instrumental music has been replaced by the gospel of Christ (which they agree is silent on the matter of instrumental or a cappella-only praise).

So, does the Old Testament have authority or not?

At least a few will ask:

If we can use instrumental music in worship because David did, can we:
1. Offer animal sacrifices? (Psalm 20:3; Psalm 66:13-15)
2. Dance before the Lord (2 Samuel 6:14)
3. Keep the sabbath? (Exodus 20:8)
4. Have many wives? (2 Samuel 5:13)

May I attempt to answer out of my admittedly meager knowledge of scripture and God’s nature …
1. No. Well, you could, but it’d be pointless. And there’d be no temple at which to do it. (Hebrews 10:3-10).
2. Maybe. Never specifically rescinded or revoked in the New Testament. Why do you ask? Do you not like dancing? Or just not feel like dancing when you suddenly, more fully perceive the grace and providence and love of God?
3. Maybe. Never specifically rescinded or revoked in the New Testament. (But see Mark 2:23-28.) Is the Son of Man no longer Lord of the Sabbath? Would it be a bad thing to keep the Sabbath and rest as God rested on the seventh day, the day before our work for him begins again on Sunday?
4. No. (Ephesians 5:31; Mark 10:5-9).

And, when confronted with the presence of harps in the highly-symbolic Revelation to John, a few will ask questions like these:

1. Why should we believe that these are literal harps in a highly symbolic book like Revelation? (Revelation 5:8; 14:1-2; 15:1-3)
2. If the golden bowls full of incense are a symbol for the prayers of the saints, why wouldn’t the harps be a symbol for the praise of the saints? (Revelation 5:8)
3. If the harps in heaven authorize instrumental music in worship here on earth, do the golden bowls full of incense authorize the burning of incense in worship here on earth? If not why not? (Revelation 5:8)
4. Did John hear a harp or a voice? (Rev. 14:1-2, ASV)
5. Since all the victorious had harps, shouldn’t every Christian play a harp in worship today? If not why not? (15:1-3)
6. If harps are authorized by these passages, why do most churches use nearly everything but harps?
7. If these passages authorize instrumental music in worship here on earth, why didn’t the early church have instrumental music?
8. Even if there really are harps in heaven, does this prove that God wants instrumental music in worship here on earth (cf. Matthew 22:30; Hebrews 4:14 & 8:4; Revelation 7:16-17.)

Again, if I may be forgiven a pauper’s intellect with regard to scripture and the will of God:
1. Why should you not believe that these are literal harps in a highly prophetic book like Revelation?
2. Well, possibly the harp each held is a symbol for the prayers of the saints, as well as the bowls of incense they all held. Isn’t the word for “harp” plural there? Making it pretty hard to play more than one and hold more than one bowls or vials and sing, which they did in the next verse. But at least the four living creatures or beasts had six wings each, which may have helped. I don’t know about the elders. Are you saying that all Christians are symbolized by these beasts and elders? Where do you get that?
3. You really are hung up on that “authorize” stuff, aren’t you? You see, I never insisted that this scripture authorized the use of instruments on earth. I would merely point out that God chose these symbols to describe worship with instruments to Him in heaven, and commanded them in the Old Testament and never revoked the command in the New. Do you have something against incense? If a church chose to burn incense as described here in an attempt to help its members picture the wonder of heaven and its glorious worship, would that be a sin?
4. In the American Standard Version you specify, John hears “a voice as of the voice of harpers.” In the KJV, it is “the voice of harpers harping with their harps.” In the NIV, he hears a “sound … like that of harpists playing their harps,” which is virtually the same wording as the New KJV, Young’s Literal, and the NASV. Happy? Can we nitpick something else irrelevant but different now?
5. If we are all commanded to have harps by this example, then shouldn’t we sing only the song of Moses and the Lamb, since it is the only song authorized? Does anyone have the sheet music to that one? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?
6. Why do most churches use everything but harps in their instrumental praise? Man, have you priced one of those hummers? And they’re huge and heavy these days, too! It’s hard to find little ones you can carry in one hand while balancing a bowl in the other. Let alone getting more than one for each member, just to be in compliance with Revelation 5:8 as you suggest! Of course, some of those churches might also be going back to Psalm 150 for their authorization, and coming as close as they can. Or maybe they’re not sold on the notion that everything they do in worship must be specifically, letter-for-letter authorized because they don’t find that to be a guiding principle of the New Covenant. Maybe they find it ridiculous that God would accept a harp but reject a guitar because He didn’t prophetically authorize it in scripture. I don’t know, really. You’d have to ask them.
7. Ah, that assumes that the early church didn’t have instrumental praise. Ever, one would suppose from the way you pose the question. Even when the church early on in Acts met daily in the temple, where instrumental worship was commanded by God (2 Chronicles 29:5). Can you show me where in scripture it says that the church didn’t celebrate with instrumental praise? (No, I’m not talking about quoting a bevy of scholars and historians who agree with you and confidently assert it; I mean proof. – Would you accept the word of scholars and historians I could quote who disagree? No? You can’t say it is a fact if there isn’t proof.) Can you do that? Or otherwise prove this negative?
8. Even if there really are harps in heaven, does this prove that God wants instrumental music in worship here on earth, you ask? I dunno. If there were not harps in heaven, would it prove that He doesn’t? What did Jesus pray in Matthew 6:10? Or does it make more sense to conclude that since God doesn’t specify a preference in scripture after the arrival of His Son on earth, that we shouldn’t, either?

Sorry; I hope that doesn’t sound disrespectful, but you’ve got to at least recognize that I find us (as a fellowship of believers) teetering on the very edge of absurdity in even bringing up some of these arguments and questions about something as serious (and yet ecstatic and heart-clutching and mind-riveting) as our worship together. Some would say we done fell off long ago.

That’s why, along with my confessedly manifest ignorance, I am not going to go ahead with a discussion of psallo, and psalleto or any number of other words which would have us throwing quotes from disagreeing linguists at each other. A good, solid knowledge of Biblical languages can often be helpful in determining the meaning of words. But arguments over words don’t prove anything. Words change in meaning over time; pretty much everyone accepts that. And some meanings remain intact with their original words for-nearly-ever. Which is it for these words? You don’t know and I don’t know. I find the guiding principle here is 2 Timothy 2:23.

So I return to my original question: With regard to the authority of scripture as God’s binding word and authority forever, can you have it both ways with the Old Testament? It is, but it isn’t? And who determines where it is and where it isn’t?

Or is there something consistent about God’s nature as revealed in all of scripture that transcends our concepts of old and new, justice and mercy, “precept and promise, law and love combining ’til night shall vanish in eternal day?”

Is He unclear about any of it that we absolutely need to know?

Does He leave crucial parts of it out?

Does He require us to assume and presume and build intricate structures of syllogism and deduction and proof and principle and law where He has not spoken?

Or does He ask us to believe a simple, perfect, incarnate Truth … and then cherish our praise and gratitude to Him for that Truth, however imperfect our worship may be?

Lessons from History

/ W. Keith Brenton / 5 Comments

Go back in time with me, a little over a century and a half, when the Restoration Movement was still aborning and unrest was brewing in the United States of America regarding the ownership of human beings as slaves.

That’s when the disagreement over instruments of music used in worship began in earnest. Before that, you can find very little in the way of history or commentary about it, beyond a meager number of disgruntled writers who did not like it and variously composed a few lofty poetic metaphors or pithy comments about it, but did not count the matter worthy to number among 95 theses nailed to a door. (The Greek Orthodox Church has long practiced a cappella-only worship for many of the same reasons cited by those in the Restoration Movement who require it – but rarely makes an issue of it when parishes in America adopt instruments.)

The issue pretty much came to a head at Midway, Kentucky in the early 1860s when a melodeon (small organ-like instrument) was brought into a church building to aid in the singing. If he did not have the consensus of the other elders, then one of them and his slave engaged in the acts of breaking and entering the building, stealing the instrument, and chopping it to bits with an axe. When it was replaced, they were satisfied simply to break in and steal the second one and store it in that elder’s barn.

Those who dislike instrumental praise are apt to cite a related incident at a Christian college in Texas in 1894, where their point of view protested more civilly and democratically – but still disrupted worship and caused an awkward confrontation as an organ was about to play – long after both sides should have come to the table of discussion and ironed it out.

There is plenty of blame and plenty of unChristian behavior to be assigned to both points of view over the issue and over the years.

So in weighing the issue on its own merits and demerits, may I ask that we consider these questions together:

Is Christian worship with or without instruments a scriptural matter, which one side or the other or both can definitively resolve by pointing to scripture and saying, “This what God says about it, and this is inarguably all He says about it”?

Or is it a disputable matter, about which God expresses no preference in scripture?

If it is, at its essence, a disputable matter – and people have been disputing it within the Restoration Movement for 150+ years and in Christendom at least to some extent for centuries before it – what does scripture say about handling disputable matters?

Can both points of view practice what they believe without calling it God’s law, enforcing it upon others and judging them as wanting in the balances if they disagree and practice differently?

Did Christ live, teach, bless, die and live again in order to bring more law, unspoken law – or freedom from law?

Does the ongoing disagreement over Christian worship with or without instruments unite or divide people in the body of Christ?

Does God stand to gain from men insisting on either side of the disagreement as the law for all and perpetuating it?

Does Satan stand to gain from it?

The Law of Expedients

/ W. Keith Brenton / 3 Comments

Worship is one of those “both-and” areas of our lives together as Christians. It cannot be an “either-or” because God has filled His family with extraordinary diversity so that we can keep each other in balance. Worship together is a matter of what God wants FOR us as well as what He wants FROM us. (See A Comprehensive Hermeneutic and Part 2 for some thoughts on this.)

If it were only a matter of praising Him, there would be no need for us to do it together. It would be clearly laid out in rules to follow, and it would not matter whether it came from our hearts or not; it would simply be a matter of rote obedience.

If it were only a matter of worshiping together, we could do whatever we wanted to that was edifying to ourselves/each other as long as it didn’t directly violate scripture, but it would not necessarily have God as its intentional focus and in the end, it would not be worship. Fellowship, maybe, or at worst self-indulgence. But not worship.

The problem comes when one point of view sees itself as the only one that matters and the other as unnecessary, dangerous, and/or unscriptural.

If scripture were a radio station, there would be folks who would insist that its format is all-law, all-the-time. And that’s all they can hear in it. They are plenty vocal about what is “wrong” with the other point of view, so for the sake of balance, I’d just like to chat about the problems that arise when a “law-only” point of view is observed.

This hermeneutic, or way of looking at scripture, can sometimes be very useful in determining what God says to do or not do, and what He wants FROM us. It is not as useful when determining what God wants FOR us. There are still problems when you use it only with logic and not without love and a discernment for God’s entire nature of justice and mercy. That leads to logical absurdities like The Law of Silence.

Because there are problems with it, a set of amendments has to be legislated onto it in order to interpret it and help it seem less absurd and more logical.

Since the Law of Silence* dictates that anything God has not commanded is forbidden, and any proposed action or practice must be commanded by God, exceptions have to be made for the things we are already doing which are not directly commanded, exemplified, or even inferred of necessity from scripture.

That’s where the “Law of Expedients” comes in.

Its adherents often explain it is drawn from the KJV scriptures I Corinthians 6:12, where it summarizes what Corinth was considering the “permissibility” or “lawfulness” of fornication, idolatry, adultery, cross-dressing/male prostitution, homosexuality, theft, greed, drunkenness, slander, and extortion and in 10:23, where it focuses more on just idolatry, sexual sin, and eating/participating in food sacrificed to idols – and still eating the bread and drinking the cup at the Lord’s table. In both cases, it says:

All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. / All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any.

Now, I ask you, can you demonstrate that any of those things are truly items about which God is silent – or was silent about at that time – either in scripture or through His servants?

Nevertheless, its adherents can confidently state that “Expedients help fulfill the instruction, but additions change the instruction.” And in case you can’t logic it out for yourself, they will sometimes supply a handy-dandy chart so that you’ll know which things are expedients and which things are additions to scripture. (Although the chart itself is not listed among the additions to scripture, so it logically must be an expedient.) Here’s a reproduction of one of them; I’d credit it, but I have modified it slightly for clarity and I’m not certain the specific author would want to be associated with my revised – but standard – version:

Bible Examples Expedients Additions
Lawful and Authorized Unlawful and Unauthorized
Noah’s Ark – Gen. 6:13-22 Tools to cut, join, and to spread pitch; gopher wood Larger size, additional windows, additional woods
Tabernacle – Ex. 25:9,40; 26:30; Ex. 39:32,42,43 Tools to work silver, gold, and wood in making the tabernacle and its furniture Making ark of covenant out of both acacia and pine wood
Lord’s Supper Bread and Fruit of the Vine; Trays and Cups Roast Lamb
Baptize, Be Baptized Baptistery, pool, river, lake, sea, or bathtub Sprinkling and pouring are different actions
Singing- Eph. 5:19; Col. 3:16; Heb. 13:15 Songbook, pitch pipe, tuning fork Piano,
Organ – Different kind of music, Different means of praise

If there is any way that a chart or set of definitions of “Expedients” like this can be qualified as a teaching of God through scripture rather than an interpretation or tradition of man, please let know how.

Otherwise, it would seem to me to be extra-scriptural, unscriptural, and something which God did not command to be done in order to worship or serve Him acceptably.

We speak of God as a Father, as He wants us to speak and think of Him. Would He consider us good parents if we punished our children cruelly for doing something harmless, something “extra” to express their love for us – because we had not specifically commanded them to do so? Or because they did not fully understand our instructions and asked for clarification, but we refused to reveal that truth to them even though we had promised to do so?

He has promised. He will provide. All we have to do is ask (Luke 11:33; John 16:5-15).

Why do we fail to ask?

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. – Proverbs 3:5

*I have a problem with the “Law of Silence” creed, if you haven’t already guessed. Since it is minimalist by definition, then taking it to its logical conclusion provides a reason – or an excuse – for doing as little as possible to worship or serve God and being satisfied that it is scripturally “enough” because that’s all God commands and more would be wrong. To me, that flies in the face of The Parable of the Talents, where Jesus speaks of reward for creativity and risk-taking in serving God.

An Illustrative Story

/ W. Keith Brenton / 10 Comments

You look out of your home’s front window, and see a tow truck lurching away from your driveway with your car on its hook.

A couple of police officers watch nearby at their squad car, one shaking his head sadly as he fills out the paperwork.

You dash to the door and out to your lawn, shouting and hollering to get the tow truck to stop and demanding what under heaven above is going on.

The other police officer restrains you by grabbing your arm firmly, but addressing you courteously, “You’re in violation. You car was parked in your driveway, and that is not allowed under the new state constitution.”

“What?” you foam at the mouth. “What are you blatheirng about?”

“The new constitution contains no statutes, amendments or pending legislation permitting you to park your car in your driveway.”

“Well, there blazing-well were such laws under the old constitution!” you protest.

“They have been nullified when the old constitution was revoked. Now, the legislature has made it clear that they will enact laws relevant to your situation as soon as they go into their next session.”

“When is that?” you ask.

“They haven’t set a date.”

“Well, what in the world caused you to suddenly enforce this new lack of law on me and my car?”

“Your neighbors complained. They didn’t like your car.”

“What?”

“Now, if you’ll be so good as to spread-eagle on the police car, please.”

“I beg your daft-headed pardon?!?!?!?”

“You’re under arrest. There are no laws in place which make it legal for you to protest the impoundment of your personal property which has been lawfully removed from your premises. You may remain silent. Anything you say may be used against you in a court of law. You may consult an attorney, but it will do you no good because the law is clear and unimpeachable and unappealable and the sentence is automatic and the penalty is death.”

“DEATH?”

No, you’re not in the “Twilight Zone.”

You’re in the “Law of Silence Zone,” a.k.a. the “Prohibitive Silence Zone,” where God makes anything that He has not specifically and verbally authorized a crime and sin punishable by eternal death – especially when the “anything” in question has to do with gathered worship that praises and honors His name from your heart.

It is a doctrine of the hermeneutic which views the Bible as either completely or primarily a book of laws by which we are expected to perfectly live or die, and God does not help those who do not understand because they did not use the logic and brain cells that excel every other gift He gave mankind – even grace, even forgiveness, even Jesus Christ Himself.

It proceeds from the creed “We speak where the Bible speaks and are silent where the Bible is silent,” which is logically drawn from 1 Peter 4:11a:

“If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God.”

Since the passage says nothing about silence, logically, the interpreter must speak as the very oracles of God and add it.

It also proceeds logically from the tragic story of the sin of Nadab and Abihu in Leviticus 10:1-2:

“Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu took their censers, put fire in them and added incense; and they offered unauthorized fire before the LORD, contrary to his command. So fire came out from the presence of the LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD.”

Which proves that violating the law of silence is more serious that violating God’s explicit command, which Aaron does a few verses later in 12-20 and God lets him live. It is not relevant that God may have specifically instructed them not to add to nor subtract from the dedication but that it wasn’t recorded in scripture, or that Aaron’s sons may have been drinking overmuch and prompted the instruction from God in 8-11, because verse 1 specifically says “they offered strange fire before the LORD, which He commanded them not” and that does not mean “which He commanded them not to” but “which He did not command them to” and it is rendered incorrectly by the spawn-of-Satan New International Version “contrary to His command” because the adherents of this creed are speaking as the very oracles of God and they say so.

The “law of silence” doctrine also proceeds logically from Hebrews 7:12-14:

“For when there is a change of the priesthood, there must also be a change of the law. He of whom these things are said belonged to a different tribe, and no one from that tribe has ever served at the altar. For it is clear that our Lord descended from Judah, and in regard to that tribe Moses said nothing about priests.”

It is the principle of silence that makes the writer’s argument (that Jesus was a priest after the order of Melchizedek) reasonable (because Moses said nothing about priests coming from any other tribe than Levi). So there must be a law of silence today – even though the passage refers to a principle of silence only within the old law – because the adherents of this creed will tell you that when Jesus says in Matthew 5:17: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them” that Jesus means that He has come to bring a new law, a law of silence, a law where reason prevails over passion – even the passion of a cross – because they are speaking as the very oracles of God and by gum, they say so.

So you’d better agree with them and toe the hard line, because if you don’t some of them may write you up in their books, blogs, Web sites and periodicals or take out $11-12,000 full-page ads in the statewide newspaper and tell everyone in the world just where they’re right and just where you’re wrong and why you don’t belong at a faithful church and let you logically deduce why you’re going to hell as a result.

And they don’t like the way you’ve parked your car in your driveway, either.

I Can’t Do It

/ W. Keith Brenton / 2 Comments

If you skip over this link to Doug Schaefer’s post Did Jesus Come to Teach Us How to Live?, you will miss a profound insight into an aspect of Jesus’ nature and character we often miss, an insight clearly and humbly expressed.

That said, I believe Jesus did come to teach us how to live – among many other things for which He came – to be Himself a perfect example of self-sacrifice so that we would not be willing to settle for less.

And, realizing that we cannot live up to it, to be willing to accept His perfection, given to us through grace as a gift beyond any other price.

Do We Expect Too Much of the Holy Spirit?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 1 Comment

When we rely pretty much solely on opening our church buildings to the public at large and inviting them in with a sign out front or – at a very progressive church – with a newspaper advertisement or a (gasp!) flyer or a radio or TV spot …

When we tacitly invite those yet unreached by the love of Christ to sit in our church buildings and listen to our lessons and sing our songs with us and pray our prayers with us and innately comprehend our secret biblical language and all of its insider terminology …

When we kinda expect them to clean up themselves and their clothing and their lives before setting foot on our holy premises and mingling in our holy fellowship …

Are we expecting too much of the Holy Spirit?

True, He is promised to guide Jesus’ followers into all truth; to convict the world of guilt in regard to sin and righteousness and judgment.

But …

It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things. ~ I Peter 1:12

Are we expecting Him to go out and do all the work for us – but without us?

Where Do You Draw The Line?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 15 Comments

If you’re persuaded that instrumental praise (or mixed singing-and-instrumental praise) is not acceptable to God under the new covenant through Christ, at what points do you determine the praise to be unacceptable?

If the song/worship leader uses a pitch pipe or tuning fork before it begins?

If the song/worship leader taps a foot audibly during singing, does that constitute the use of a percussion instrument?

If an electronic recording of an a cappella performance is used at some point during worship to teach a song while the congregation sings with it?

If a recording of an a cappella performance is used without the congregation singing along?

If a child’s toy falls off a pew and a bell on it rings during a song?

If the child keeps time with the bell?

If the child is so filled with joy that he/she begins clapping in rhythm to the song?

If an adult is so filled with joy that he/she begins clapping in rhythm to the song?

If a musical ringtone begins to play on a cell phone that someone forgot to turn off during worship?

If the song/worship leader happens to fall into rhythm with the sound of an off-balance ceiling fan thrum-thrum-thrumming away above?

If a worshiper has had throat cancer, has no voicebox, and uses a an electronic voice synthesizer to sing, like the one that theoretical scientist Stephen Hawking is famed for using? Even if it “sang” in a monotone, like a Gregorian chant? Is a Gregorian chant unacceptable because it does not aspire to four-part harmony or tuneful gymnastics? If a voice synthesizer is acceptable, what about a talking guitar (like Peter Frampton’s TalkBox) that could add tune to the lyric just like a voicebox?

If a song/worship leader uses a megaphone as an instrument of amplification?

If a song/worship leader uses a microphone as an instrument of amplification?

If a praise team uses microphones as instruments of amplification while the congregation is singing?

If a praise team uses microphones as instruments of amplification while the congregation is not singing?

If any of these occurrences took place in a surrounding that was not a church building?

If any of these occurrences took place in a church building, but not on a Sunday?

If any of these occurrences took place in a church building, but not on a Sunday or a Wednesday night (or other period of gathered worship normally observed by the church in question)?

If any of these occurrences made someone feel a little uncomfortable?

If any of these made someone feel very uncomfortable?

If any of these prompted someone to stop worshiping?

If any of these triggered someone walking out of the assembly?

If any of these possibilities made someone feel that their elders should meet and legislate unanimous policy on all of them – and any others that could be thought of – before public gathered worship was permitted to take place again?

What if you’re not in a worship assembly, and you’re listening to a worship song on the radio or your CD player or the P.A. system at Hobby Lobby that is accompanied by instruments?

If you’re not worshiping but being entertained by it, is that permissible?

If you start singing along with it but are just being enertained by it?

If you start singing along with it but begin to mean it and stop being entertained by it and start worshiping along with it?

If you continue to be entertained by it and also worship with it?

If you sing along with it and don’t mean it as worship but God hears it and is entertained by it, does that become sin?

Is it okay if it’s not Sunday (although Hobby Lobby would be closed, so it would have to be a radio or your CD player)?

If any of these possibilities made someone feel that their elders should meet and legislate unanimous policy on all of them – and any others that could be thought of – before fellowship with you could continue to be extended?

I ask the questions because I have heard it said (and have read it written) that the simple answer to the question of worshiping with an instrument is essentially “just don’t do it, and you know that you’re safe.”

I don’t find it simple at all.

In fact, I find that if you’re inclined to make rules where no rules have been made, you invariably end up having to make more rules to clarify the rules that you made where no rules were in place before. That’s how Congress and the legislatures stay in business – not to mention all kinds of courts, judges and attorneys.

But do we really need all those rules if God didn’t explicitly go into them Himself, through His Word? (He didn’t seem to have any reservations about being too detailed in the old covenant. And He seems to have nothing against instrumental praise there, nor in heaven as metaphorically described in the Revelation to John. So why would anyone want to call “unclean” what God has called “clean”?)

Wouldn’t Jesus’ favorite top two rules pretty much suffice in worship as well as in the rest of our lives? You, know:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.
Love your neighbor as yourself ~ Mark 12:30-31

That, I think, is where He would draw the line.

Truth is, I don’t find it “safe” at all to make rules God hasn’t made and then bind them on other folks and judge them when you deem there’s been an infraction and then condemn them. Isn’t that what Jesus lit into the Pharisees about doing, time and time again? Didn’t He say things like “For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2) and “Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven” (Luke 6:37 and “Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?” (Luke 12:57)

Was He ever recorded as saying “Why don’t you judge what is right for others?”

As nearly as I can tell, there is nothing wrong with having a harmless, uplifting tradition and observing it and enjoying it and even sharing the joy of it with God. Things like holidays come to mind. Or carving a good roast turkey. Or dining vegetarian. You don’t have to impose them on everyone else. And if one tradition makes others edgy, you don’t have to make it a part of your worship together. In fact, if it is a matter of conscience with them, you shouldn’t. Observe that tradition between yourself and God privately. If you’re aware of others observing a tradition that makes you edgy, don’t let it cause you to stumble – especially to stumble into being judgmental of them.

That’s where Paul draws the line of love.

It’s enough to say that a cappella praise can be beautiful and pure and that it is a cherished tradition in your religious heritage; to observe it and thrill to it and worship God with it. To go beyond that is to go beyond what God says in His Word; into the realm where teachings become rules taught by men. (If you are seeking condemnation for instrumental praise, that’s where you have to go – because you can’t find it in scripture.)

In addition, going beyond scripture in this direction limits the concept of worship only to what is done in the assembly of the saints. What we practice in our lives, outside of our gathered worship, affects our worship to God. In fact, what we obediently do every day can also be worship. (Romans 12:1) Worship through day-to-day obedience is the very context (in Matthew 15) of Jesus’ quotation of Isaiah 29:13: the Corban tradition set aside God’s instruction to care for parents, and it nullified both the word of God and their worship:

“They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.”

Tradition can be good – and blessed by God – but not when it supercedes His Word.

And I can’t help but believe that’s where the Spirit of God draws the line, too.

Sunday Morning in a Garden

/ W. Keith Brenton / 13 Comments

It is in a garden that mankind first meets God and chooses sin, and it is in a garden outside an empty tomb that mankind meets God re-infleshed and has the opportunity to choose perfection.

If you read the gospel accounts of the discovery of the empty tomb and you get caught up in trying to determine how many women or men or angels were there and when and where, you miss the simple fact which is not, in any way, related differently among the four individual writers:

Jesus of Nazareth, beaten and crucified and run through with a spear, is not only no longer in the tomb, but He is no longer dead!

It is the single most astounding fact in the history of mankind.

Other people have died and have been raised from the dead by God’s agents in the flesh, and scripture is not shy about relating those accounts.

But this is the first time God has directly intervened and raised a man from the dead; restored life to three-days-lifeless flesh and bone; breathed breath and spirit back into His lungs and set Him on His feet and sent Him walking on the earth never to die again.

Can it mean anything but that the man is God’s own Son?

I believe that. I would believe it even if I were convinced that the accounts in the gospels contradicted each other on every other fact they relate about the event.

They don’t.

They each tell it differently.

There was a time when I felt like I had to know all the right answers in order to believe. It wasn’t that long ago. Now I’m persuaded that I’m probably never going to know all the right answers, any more than Job did. He didn’t know them before he spoke with God. He didn’t know them after. But at no point did he stop believing.

So, in the interest of those who (as I originally described myself as the author of this blog years ago) “question reality and won’t settle for an evasive answer,” may I offer my personal harmony of the four-fold gospel witnesses in this instance?

On the first day of the week, while it was still dark, there was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.

Very early in the morning just after sunrise, the women – Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Joanna and Salome – took the spices they had bought and prepared and went to the tomb so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. They asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?” They found the stone – which was very large – rolled away from the tomb already.

While they were wondering about this, and entering the tomb, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. One looked like a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed because they saw him but they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. “Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. Why do you look for the living among the dead? He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’ Now I have told you.”

Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. At first, they said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid. Then they remembered His words. So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell His disciples – to Simon Peter and the other disciple John (the one Jesus loved) and the rest of the apostles. Mary Magdalene came running and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” And they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense.

Peter and John, however, got up and ran to the tomb, the women following not too far behind them. Bending over, Peter saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the burial cloth that had been around Jesus’ head. The cloth was folded up by itself, separate from the linen. Finally John, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. And they went away back to their homes, wondering to themselves what had happened, because they still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.

Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had driven seven demons, stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and again saw the two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

“Woman,” he said, “why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher).

Suddenly Jesus met them all. “Greetings,” he said. They also came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. – But do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me before I go.”

Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told those who had been with Him and who were mourning and weeping that He had said these things to her.

While the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. When the chief priests had met with the elders and devised a plan, they gave the soldiers a large sum of money, telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came during the night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ If this report gets to the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” So the soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has been widely circulated among the Jews to this very day.

I haven’t added much beyond an “also” or an “and” or a “but” or a “because” to this narrative, and those only for clarity. The rest you’ll find in the histories of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. All I did was try to put them in the right order. What I wanted to point out was that John saw and believed … even though he and Peter still did not understand. John himself wrote those words (20:8-9) – an admission of his own growing faith, unsupported by knowing all of the right answers. He just believed.

He believed in the most preposterous, unthinkable, ridiculous, impossible truth ever: that God raised His Son Jesus from the dead.

Because He did, all of the other puzzles pieces of life were beginning to fall into place, and all of life’s questions were beginning to be answered.

Why God allows evil – so that good can stand in contrast and be freely chosen. Why God lets man sin – so that He can fill the guilty emptiness it causes with forgiveness. Why God allows suffering and death – so that He can end it once and for all.

Through this One. This Son. This life. This death.

This resurrection.

I still can’t understand it.

I just believe.

Did Jesus Seek the Old Paths?

/ W. Keith Brenton / 14 Comments

The old paths said, “Why don’t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with ‘unclean’ hands?”

Jesus said, “Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are but rules taught by men.’ You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men.” – Mark 7:4-8

The old paths said, “We are not stoning you for any of these [miracles], but for blasphemy, because you, a mere man, claim to be God.”

Jesus said, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I have said you are gods’? If he called them ‘gods,’ to whom the word of God came—and the Scripture cannot be broken— what about the one whom the Father set apart as his very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’? Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does. But if I do it, even though you do not believe me, believe the miracles, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me, and I in the Father.” – John 10:22-39

The old paths said, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful (picking some heads of grain and eating them) on the Sabbath.”

Jesus said, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests. Or haven’t you read in the Law that on the Sabbath the priests in the temple desecrate the day and yet are innocent? I tell you that one greater than the temple is here. If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent. For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” – Matthew 12:1-8 … “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” – Mark 2:27

The old paths said, “How is it that John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees are fasting, but yours are not?”

Jesus said, “How can the guests of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? They cannot, so long as they have him with them. But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast. No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins.”

The old paths said, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

Jesus said, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?” – Luke 13:10-16

The old paths said, “It is the Sabbath; the law forbids you to carry your mat.”

Jesus said, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working.” – John 5:1-18

The old paths said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.”

Jesus said, “For judgment I have come into this world, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.” – John 9

Luke recounts that Jesus chose not to wash before a dinner hosted by a Pharisee – and his apparently unspoken surprise prompted the Lord to call down six woes upon the proponents of the old paths.

The old paths quoted a lot of seemingly-related scripture and applied it to a given situation in order to attack and demean and refute and destroy what they had decided God didn’t mean. Jesus spoke what God gave Him to say; He spoke scripture, to bring good news to the poor and set the captive free and bring sight to the blind.

The old paths were about law enforcement and self-righteousness and prosecution and persecution. Jesus was the Way, the Truth and the Life.

The old paths were what were originally new paths that God’s people – in defiance that Jeremiah prophesied in that oft-quoted passage – blazed by their “I will not”s. Frustrated by their captivity in Assyria and Baybylon, and their inability to follow God’s law because of their separation from His temple and His presence, they logically interpreted their own supplementary law – and it was intentionally far stricter – far more difficult to comply with – than what God had, in generalities, decreed.

It was commentary, not commandment.

It was tradition, not testament.

It was legalism, not law.

It was nit-picking, not soul-shaping.

It was human logic, not divine love.

It was their word, not God’s word.

And after four hundred and ninety years, the tassel on their garments had become the noose around their necks.

All because they were blind to the fact that the law was underwritten by love, because God is love; that God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him; that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ; that “God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, ‘Abba, Father.’ “

Do those who call us to seek the old paths today see those truths in God’s word? That He is law and love; justice and mercy; severity and kindness? The old paths they call us to follow – are they the paths of scripture only? Or the teachings of men who – not miraculously but logically – came to a perfect understanding of all scripture as law, somewhere between fifty and two hundred years ago and whose teachings must be accepted and followed and unquestioningly obeyed lest hellacious damnation befall the infidel?

Did Jesus seek those old paths? Should we?

New Look at New Wineskins

/ W. Keith Brenton / 7 Comments

Bigger. Brighter. Different type face. Hopefully a little easier to navigate and search, with a three-way search engine option that lets you select the New Wineskins site, the ZOE Group site, or just the ZOE Life Store. (Though you’ll still get “E-Commerce” results at the bottom of the first two searches.)

Those were my goals in the redesign of the sites, and I would appreciate your feedback, suggestions, bug sightings and complaints.

Greg Taylor, now Senior Editor, leads off the “R is for Revolution” edition with a chapter from his upcoming book, One Church from Leafwood Press. If reading New Wineskins makes you grumble about the old wine and the old paths being better, this article will send you running for the southern comfort of your old wineskin.

In it, he dares to suggest that there might actually be believing, saved Christians outside the confines of the Churches of Christ.

He asserts that our fellowship may not be as involved in activities to lead others closer to Christ as we should be.

And he concludes,

We’re called to unity with all Christians everywhere who call Christ Lord. When Jesus prayed his unity prayer, he didn’t parse every doctrine and neither will I here. We live the Christ-life and follow the rule of the Holy Spirit to keep that everlasting covenant God the Father has kept since creation. Christ and Paul and our own more recent forefathers such as Thomas Campbell call us to produce fruit and look for fruit of the Spirit in the lives of fellow disciples. Will Churches of Christ, Christian Churches/Churches of Christ, and Disciples of Christ join this new restoration?

The comments attached to the article are beginning to accumulate like the ones posted to Editor Emeritus Mike Cope’s blog.

And there are even more challenging articles to come in this edition.

Look, you don’t have to agree with everything that’s published in New Wineskins. (In fact, I don’t. And my new title with it is Managing Editor.) But if it prods you to re-examine what you believe and what you practice in your walk of faith (as well as what you don’t practice but perhaps should), then your time and mine and Greg’s and Mike’s and a lot of other folks’ has not been wasted.