The struggle for sound doctrine
Dorothy Sayers was a masterful mystery novelist during the first half of the twentieth century and was counted as an equal among such famous authors as Agatha Christie, G. K. Chesterton, and Baroness Emma Orczy. But her greatest love and calling was as a theologian and Christian apologist. She was friends with several of the greatest Christian writers of the era including C. S. Lewis, Charles Williams, and J. R. R. Tolkien. In one of her essays titled “Creed or Chaos?” she wrote of the importance of the Christian doctrine.
It is worse than useless for Christians to talk about the importance of Christian morality unless they are prepared to take their stand upon the fundamentals of Christian theology. It is a lie to say that dogma does not matter; it matters enormously. It is fatal to let people suppose that Christianity is only a mode of feeling; it is vitally necessary to insist that it is first and foremost a rational explanation of the universe. It is hopeless to offset Christianity as a vaguely idealistic aspiration of a simple consoling kind; it is, on the contrary, a hard, tough, exacting, and complex doctrine, steeped in a drastic and uncompromising realism. And it is fatal to imagine that everybody knows quite well what Christianity is and needs only a little encouragement to practice it.[1]
The enormous importance of doctrine (dogma, creed, belief, principles, teachings) can be seen throughout the 2000 year history of the Christian church. In God’s master plan, the first revelation was given to the Old Testament Hebrews and pointed to the coming Messiah. Jesus came as the final revelation of God. “In many and various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets; but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, whom He appointed the heir of all things, through whom he created the world.” [Hebrews 1:1-2. RSV] But the Hebrews rejected the promised Messiah. Thus, the Gospel was sent to the Gentiles. But the Christian faith of the New Testament traces its ancestry to the Hebrew religion because Christ was the fulfillment of the promises of the Old Testament.[2]
The defense of the truth and integrity of God’s revelation and the faith that flows from it is a central theme throughout church history. The last books of the New Testament were written in the first century following the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that signaled the beginning of the Christian diaspora. Even during those early days of the church, its doctrinal foundations were under constant attack. In the last half of the second century, two heresies know as Gnosticism and Montanism arose and threatened the foundations of the faith. Certain gnostic sects had infiltrated the church and spread its two central perversions. Gnostics believed in a dual world of good and evil and the existence of a secret code of truth transmitted only by word of mouth or by obscure secret writings. Gnosticism was a spiritual parasite that attempted to debase the truth of Christian creedal beliefs and separate it from its historical roots.[3] One of its heresies taught that Christ never dwelt on the earth in human form.[4] Among other heresies, Montanism denied that the Comforter promised by Christ in the upper room the evening before his crucifixion did not come at Pentecost but was now at hand.[5]
During its first three hundred years of existence, the church not only grew spiritually and numerically, it grew organizationally out of necessity. From its beginning church councils have been held to deal with problems within the church, almost all of which arose from doctrinal issues. Recall the earlier discussion of Paul’s journey from Antioch to Jerusalem that resulted in the first council ever held by the church. Known as the Council of the Apostles in Jerusalem, it dealt with resistance of some in the church to the extension of Christianity to the Gentiles.
The challenges from the heresies of Gnosticism and Montanism in the last half of the second century led the church to the Apostles’ Creed and clarified the heart Christian doctrine for everyone in the church. From this struggle came the canon (list) of books that comprised the New Testament.[6] In compiling the New Testament, church leaders were not picking and choosing from among the best of those early writings they wished to include. There were many Christian writings at that time which competed with the writings that were consistently recognized as the absolute authoritative and inspired word of God. As new heresies attempted to infiltrate the doctrines of the church, it was necessary to identify and consolidate the canon (list) of authentic and inspired works of the New Testament writers. By doing so, the New Testament canon was separated those from writings that were merely historical by nature but not divinely inspired accounts of Christ, the apostles, and the early church. They also discarded those writings that contained heresies hostile to the truth of the inspired word of God.
Even as the canon of the New Testament emerged as a result of the controversies surrounding various heresies, many leaders of the church still did not have a deep knowledge of the Bible. A hundred years after Christ, even the writings of the Apostolic Fathers who were said to have been personally taught by the Apostles did not reflect an in-depth understanding of the profound truths of the Bible. As a result, there was an on-going misunderstanding of many fundamental articles of faith which led to questions and controversies.[7] One issue that beset the church for three hundred years was the question of Christ’s divinity. Arius stood against Athanasius, both presbyters in the church of Alexandria. Arius preached that Christ was not fully God but is the first and highest of created beings. Wishing to settle the dispute, Emperor Constantine called a council in 325 to meet at the small town of Nicaea forty-five miles from Constantinople. The council pronounced the views of Arius as heresy and resulted in the very first written creed of the church. Known as the Nicene Creed, it affirmed the deity of Jesus. Other early councils clarified and conformed significant questions as to the meaning of certain fundamental biblical truths: the Holy Spirit is God (Council of Constantinople 381), human beings are totally depraved (Council of Ephesus 431), and Christ is both man and God (Council of Chalcedon 451).[8]
Loss of separation of church and state
For three hundred years the church fathers had maintained separation between the affairs of the church and secular rulers and governments in whatever countries to which they had been dispersed. Their only desire was to worship Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. For the Romans and the ancients, the concept of separation of church and state was both incomprehensible and an irritant for religion had always been linked to the city and state. The Romans were not anti-religious and dedicated the Pantheon in Rome to all gods. The Roman rulers were not averse to Christians worshiping Jesus. The problem arose because they worshiped only Jesus as God and his Father the infinite, personal God. This was viewed as treason because it was a particularly significant threat to the unity of the state. Also, Christians believed their God established the absolute universal standard by which to judge not only one’s personal morals but the actions of the state as well. In the Roman Empire, any group that presumed to question its actions or judge its authority could not be tolerated and were treated as enemies of the state.[9]
Because of this, the church received little to no sympathy from those rulers and as a consequence the church suffered severe persecution. Even though the persecuted church was bathed in the blood of its martyrs who had carried the Gospel throughout the Roman Empire, the church grew spiritually and numerically. But something remarkable was about to happen that would forever change the history of the church.
In late October 312, the Roman Emperor Constantine believed he had received divine help from the God of the Christians during a battle that made him the supreme ruler of all of the western part of the Roman Empire. Subsequently Constantine professed Christianity, and in 313 issued an edict in the city of Milan which put a stop to the persecutions and made Christianity and equal of other religions before the law throughout his empire. The Christian church that began with a tiny band of severely persecuted followers of Jesus Christ in the small and hated nation of Israel had astonishingly conquered the heathen world within a span of three hundred years.[10]
Christianity’s legalization in 313 had for a season ended much of the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. Christianity became the professed religion of the Emperor and was now seen as the avenue to material, military, political, and social success. Thousands joined the church, but many were Christians in name only as the narrow gate was made wide which allowed a flood of corruptions to flow into the church.[11] By 381, Christianity was officially deemed to be the state religion of the empire.[12]
Not only did the church suffer much corruption from within, it quickly learned that Constantine and his successors would extract a most severe price for their newfound liberty. Separation of the church from the Roman state soon disappeared as the state demanded a say in church affairs. In 353-356, Hosius, bishop of Cordoba, Spain, reprimanded one of Constantine’s three sons (Emperor Constantius II) for meddling in church affairs by attempting to get Western bishops to oppose Athanasius of Alexandria for supporting those who rejected the Arian heresy (which denied the divinity of Jesus). Hosius invoked Christ’s words in Matthew 22:21, “…Then sayeth he unto them, Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s and unto God the things that are God’s.” [emphasis added] Hosius then warned the Emperor, “Intrude not yourself into ecclesiastical affairs…God has put into your hands the [secular] kingdom; to us [bishops] He has entrusted the affairs of His church.”[13]
This does not mean Christians are to abandon the civil arena. To the contrary, Christians have a dual role as both followers of Christ and citizens in the civil sphere. One of the roles of the church is to speak truth into society and government and call attention to those areas where civil authority fails in performing its duties. But the church must not usurp the role and duties of government such as laying its hand to the sword. In spite of early resistance, the church eventually succumbed to the non-biblical intertwining of the ecclesiastical with the civil realm.
Because of the compromise of certain doctrinal beliefs, incorporation of worldly thinking and practices, and unbiblical alliances between the church and state, great damage has been done to the cause of Christ and consequently many dark chapters were written in the church’s history.
Sola scriptura – the Bible only. Yes, but…
Throughout this series much will be written of the importance of the scriptures as the wellspring of all truth. But the church’s devotion to the Bible does not mean we begin with a blank slate in each generation. In their haste to cast off the wisdom and experiences of generations of our Christian forefathers, evangelicals have mischaracterized the meaning of sola scriptura which led to a measure of anti-intellectualism and spiritual shallowness. The church must not reject its rich history and knowledge gained over the centuries which are invaluable to understanding of scriptures. The successes and failures of the church through the centuries serve as priceless lessons that both illuminate and elaborate upon the Bible’s teachings. The teachings and writings of the great minds of the Christian past such as Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, and Calvin give much insight into a right understanding of the scriptures.[14] Given the benefit of hindsight, we know they got some things wrong, but without a doubt they were profoundly right on many things.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] Dorothy Sayers, “Creed or Chaos?” Letters to a Diminished Church, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, 2004), p. 49.
[2] B. K. Kuiper, The Church in History, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1951, 1964), pp. 3-4.
[3] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1976), p. 49.
[4] Kuiper, p. 17.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Ibid., p. 18.
[7] Ibid., p. 15.
[8] Ibid., pp. 30-31, 33.
[9] Francis A. Schaeffer, How Should We Then Live? (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 1976), p. 24.
[10] Kuiper, pp. 24-25.
[11] Ibid., p. 27.
[12] Schaeffer, p. 26.
[13]Alvin J. Schmidt, How Christianity Changed the World, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2004), pp. 265-266.
[14] Nancy Pearcey, Total Truth, (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2004, 2005), pp. 280-281.
