Quote:
Originally Posted by OBW
You are quite right to note that there is a deficiency in the cases mentioned. But is it not that they are each in some way clearly out of alignment with the clear words of Christ. I suspect that we don't even need to get into the writings of Paul or others outside of what is recorded in the gospels to find the error in each of these.
My point is not that "reality" is not a true or valid thing, but that to the extent that it might be seen as pointing to the error in something, it should also be found that there is scripture that agrees with that position. In other words, I'm not sure that we should accept some view of "reality" if it does not seem to be consistent with scripture.
In Lee's case, there are places where he dismissed scripture because he found it to not be up to his version of "reality," most often in terms of "God's NT economy." I do not see this as a valid use or "reality." If we reverse Lee's lexicon, isn't "reality" equal to truth? "Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth." What is truth/reality? The word of God. How then does reality diminish the word of God?
|
As usual, I probably wasn't clear enough about my point on "not being fully in the reality"... I wasn't so much thinking of pointing to error, as I was looking at the idea of our christian journey containing a progressive continuum of experiences. And the initial experiences shown (Apollos teaching the baptism of John as a great example) are not so much erroneous as they are merely the early steps in someone's journey.
So to look at the "immutable" word of God for a guide on what to do/say/be as we follow Christ is perhaps to miss the crucial point that the template experiences we are evaluating ourselves against are themselves only partly into the full reality of the risen Christ.
I am basing my evaluation of the Acts and the Epistles of the Bible, illuminating the "early church" experience, on one verse, which is nestled in a section (John 14 - 17) going repeatedly into the idea of a progressive spiritual journey awaiting the disciples. That verse is John 16:13, where the coming Spirit of truth/reality is promised by Jesus as a guide, leading them into all the truth/reality. This to me bespeaks a process, not an "all at once" experience.
So I evaluate the subsequent teachings/writings/acts of the faithful not for error, but rather as being only partly in the reality. It is a progressive experience. A child may occasionally err, but often simply is doing the best it can with limited experience & understanding. That way scripture remains consistent, as does the testimony of the disciples, but we allow it to grow, and ourselves along with it.
Lee's example with James is not what I want to do: he seems to be saying here is an anomaly within the progressive revelation. Here is a regression back to the law, and works. This is an unkind take: James was on a journey like the rest of us. To dismiss his life and work as merely deficient is to dismiss the reality/truth, which as you point out is the word of God.
I have earlier given the example of Jude, whom I for years regarded as "even more deficient" than James. A reactionary, with nothing positive to show us. Then one day as I was considering something else I remembered the word in Jude verse 6, about angels not keeping their appointed place, and my eyes were opened. I saw not only angels, but every spiritual entity (us believers included) being in peril in this regard.
Jude, and James, and Apollos, and Paul, and all the rest, had spiritual journeys every bit as "real" as yours and mine. But I now evaluate them in the light of an expanding and deepening and purifying progression of our personal and collective experience of "reality", as exemplified in Jesus. Unless the scripture clearly points out "error" in the written record, I don't call it that so much as "only partly into the reality".