A Ramble about "I"

I have recently been rereading The Gospel of Buddha. Those who have been reading my Rambles for some time will know that I have a great deal of respect for the Buddha and his teachings while maintaining a somewhat respectful distance where he diverges from what Jesus taught. This time around as I was reading, it struck me that the foundation of the Buddha's teaching hit upon something very similar and equally foundational in what Jesus taught and the writings of St. Paul.

The Buddha received enlightenment when he realized that self, the atman (or soul, or psyche), was an illusion, and did not in reality exist. The human being is a combination of physical parts, memories, experiences, sensations, consciousness, etc. with no one element of that combination comprising an individual self or soul. The belief in the existence of a self independent of those parts (the “I”, the doer of one's actions and the thinker of one's thoughts) was a delusion which led to desires, attachments, and aversions which led to actions produced by those desires, attachments, and aversions, which led to the consequences of those actions, which ultimately led to suffering.

The Buddha came from a Hindu culture and worldview which accepted the transmigration of the atman, or reincarnation, as a fact of life. The Buddha came to the conclusion that because of this reincarnation, the suffering driven by the attachment to the existence of one's “self” became a cycle which was continuously repeated without end. Reincarnation was then a cycle of suffering. The goal of salvation in this understanding was to break the cycle of reincarnation. He came to understand that when you remove the illusion of an individual “I”, it removes the foundation upon which those attachments, aversions, desires, and ultimately suffering are all based thus removing the foundation for the cycle of reincarnation which continues the suffering. This cessation of suffering he called Nirvana, an uncreated and indestructible state of being. The destruction of the illusion of self was the path which led to Nirvana.

The problem with the Buddha's understanding is his own assertion that, because there is no atman, there is no transmigration of the atman, thus no reincarnation. He then maintains that what reincarnates is one's own karma (one's actions and the consequences of those actions), and one's mind. The atman cannot because the atman doesn't in reality exist. However, the conclusion of this logic must be that, once the combination of elements which comes together to form the person ceases to continue in combination, that person, as such, ceases to be. Death claims him or her permanently, though the consequences of his actions, words, and thoughts continue to play out long after he is gone.

The Church has always taught that human beings have a fatal flaw which is variously called “original sin” and a “sin nature.” I have previously called it a “disorder” and a “malfunction” of the psyche. The Church has also always taught that all human beings will be resurrected from the dead (not reincarnated) to face judgment by Christ at the end of days. This fatal flaw means that, regardless of how you explain it, all human beings will be condemned unless they are rescued from it. (See my previous Rambles concerning “Spiritual Autism” for a further discussion of this fatal flaw.)

If we understand our fatal flaw, or at least a part of it, as being this delusion of “I”, then we need salvation from the suffering caused by that fatal flaw. We need salvation from the fatal flaw itself; salvation from the suffering caused by the consequences of our fatal flaw; and salvation from death and the judgment against us which follows as an ultimate consequence of our fatal flaw.

Neither Jesus nor St. Paul go so far as to say the atman or “psyche” does not exist, or that there is no “doer of deeds” or “thinker of thoughts” as the Buddha maintains. They say that the psyche must be executed, made dead, and replaced with God in the person of Jesus Christ as the “doer of deeds” and “thinker of thoughts.” It is this death and exchange which effects the transformation of deification, by God's uncreated energy through faith in Jesus Christ working through lovingkindness.

“The person who has more affection for father or mother than for Me is not worthy of Me, and the person who has more affection for son or daughter than for Me is not worthy of Me; and the person who doesn't take his cross and follow behind Me isn't worthy of Me. The person who finds his psyche will destroy it, and the person having destroyed his psyche for My sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:37-39)

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, 'If someone wishes to come behind Me, let him deny himself and pick up his cross and follow Me. Because whoever might wish to save his psyche will destroy it; yet whoever might destroy his psyche for my sake will find it.'” (Matthew 16:24-25)

“And He said to him, some person was making a big dinner, and he called many and sent his slave at the hour of the dinner to say to those having been called, 'Come, because it has already been prepared.' And all of them, one by one, started to excuse themselves. The first said to him, 'I bought a field and I have a necessity to leave and see it; I ask you, have me excused.' And another said, 'I bought five yoke of oxen andI am going to examine them; I ask you, have me excused.' And another said, 'I married a woman and because of this I am not able to come.' And the slave appearing reported to his owner these things. Then, being angry, the house-master said to his slave, 'Go out quickly into the wide roads and alleys of the city and lead in the destitute, crippled, blind, and lame here. And the slave said, 'Lord, what you ordered has happened, and there is still space.' And the owner said to the slave, 'Go out into the roads and fences and compel people to enter, so that my house will be full. Because I tell you that n one of those men who had been called will taste my dinner.'” (Luke 14:16-24)

Look at who the owner of the slave invited to the feast when those who were first invited refused to come. Those who were first invited excused themselves because of their attachments to possessions or relationships and placing those things as more important to the calling to the dinner. The man who made the dinner then drew in people whom he believed had no such attachments. Immediately after this parable, Jesus becomes far more explicit:

“If someone comes to me and doesn't hate his own father and mother and woman and children and brothers and sisters still even also his own psyche, he is not capable of being my disciple. The one who doesn't carry his own cross and come behind me isn't capable of being my disciple. … So then every person of you who doesn't renounce all the things of his own existence is not capable of being my disciple.” (Luke 14:26-27, 33)

“I was co-crucified with Christ; and 'I' no longer live, yet Christ lives within me; and what I now live within the meat, I live by the faith which is the Son of God's who loved me and surrendered Himself over me.” (Galatians 2:20)

“And may it absolutely not happen for me to brag except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world was crucified to me and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)

“Be mindful of this within you which is also in Christ Jesus, who, existing in the shape of God, didn't conclude being equal to God a prize to hold onto, but emptied Himself taking the shape of a slave; having come to be in the image of human beings; and being found in the outward appearance as a human being He humbled Himself having become obedient to the point of death, and the death of a cross at that.” (Philippians 2:5-8)

“Or are you ignorant that, as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus, we were baptized into His death? We were therefore entombed together with Him through the baptism into death, so that just as Christ was awakened from the dead through the glory of the Father so also we should walk by means of a newness of life. Because if we have become grown together by an image of His death, but also will we be of the resurrection; knowing this that our old human being was crucified together with Him, so that the body of the fatal flaw would be nullified, for us to no longer be slaves to the fatal flaw; because the one who died has been acquitted from the fatal flaw. And if we died together with Christ, we believe that we will also live together with Him, knowing that Christ being awakened from the dead is no longer mortal, death no longer has ownership of Him. Because what died, died to the fatal flaw once for all; and what lives, lives to God. Thus also you: factor yourselves to be dead indeed to the fatal flaw yet living to God in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 6:1-11)

(all translations mine)

St. Paul, in no uncertain terms, maintains that those who have received baptism into Jesus Christ have been joined to the death of Jesus Christ. Those who have been baptized into Jesus Christ have therefore died and the fatal flaw no longer maintains ownership over them. They receive a release from the fatal flaw through baptism because those who have died are thus acquitted from it. The psyche is thus removed from the equation through being joined to the death of Jesus Christ in baptism.

“Therefore then, brothers, we are debtors not to the meat to live according to the meat, because if you live according to the meat, you intend to die; yet if by the Spirit you make the practices of the body dead, you will live. Because as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” (Romans 8:12-14)

When the psyche has been removed from the equation through death, all that remains is the meat (being the body), and the Spirit (being the indwelling Holy Spirit). We then may choose to continue in the delusion of “I” through the obedience to the meat, or we may choose to continue in the truth of this death through obedience to the Spirit, thus ensuring our transformation and deification. This is the basis of St. Paul's theology of practice throughout his letters in the New Testament and is for him, and thus for us, a foundational teaching.

“If you died together with Christ from the elements of the world, why as living by means of the world are you submitting to rules and regulations? Don't cling to nor taste nor touch (all of which concern things which break down by consumption) according to the commands and teachings of human beings. … If then you were awakened together with Christ, seek the upwards things, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God; be mindful of the upwards things, not the things upon the ground. Because you died and your life has been hidden with Christ in God; when Christ your life is made visible, then you will also be made visible together with Him in glory.” (Colossians 2:20-21, 3:1-4)

Whether the individual self begins as real or not is irrelevant. The belief in a “self” is a real and serious impediment to discipleship and salvation. In Christ Jesus we believe that the self has died and is therefore no longer a factor, and we are to keep this as a factor in how we process our thoughts, words, actions and interactions with everything and everyone else. Self is the biggest impediment or obstacle to the process of one's salvation. In order for salvation to progress it must be removed from the equation. Either way, we must believe that it has been removed as a factor—belief implying the actions expressing that belief. As baptized Christians, we must believe in the death of our selves with Christ. Without moving past this, we can't really move forward towards the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. If we don't believe (producing the actions which mark that belief) we died with Him, we become lost in our own disorder or error, and our progress towards deification is stunted at best.

A Doctrinal Statement of the Ancient, Pre-Nicene Church

This is a snippet of some of my studies lately, a doctrinal statement of sorts for the Ancient Church. I intend to eventually expand it with quotations from the Church Fathers. With all the theological bickering in the Church today, most denominations and churches don't realize what that pre-Nicene Church actually taught and believed, and, more disturbingly, many don't care being so wrapped up in their own modern interpretations. Many might be amazed at how much the Ancient Church really taught and understood regarding the Trinity, the Deity of Christ and the Holy Spirit, and more.

For this study, I have been using A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, edited by David W. Bercot. This is a topical index of the Ante-Nicene Fathers compiled by Philip Schaff in the late nineteenth century, which itself is a compilation of all the legitimate existing writings of the Ancient Church from the first to the fourth centuries.

What I will not be doing right now, if ever, is trying to prove these doctrines from Holy Scripture, although they certainly could be. I will not be doing this for two reasons. First, every denomination looks to Holy Scripture to prove their various teachings even when one denomination's teaching conflicts with another. Often, they are following a tradition of Scriptural interpretation, either Reformation, Catholic, Orthodox or otherwise without even knowing where the interpretation really comes from. My stated objective is to look as these subjects through the lenses of the ancient interpretation, one which is almost two thousand years old, and not one which has sprung up within the last few hundred years. Second, and related to this, while the Ancient Christians used the Holy Scriptures, they did not understand or practice the Reformation teaching of “Sola Scriptura” (Scripture Only), the recognized canon of Scripture not having yet been set by Church Councils. They relied just as much on the sacred tradition of Apostolic teaching passed down verbally as much as written, which itself included which books were considered to be Holy Scripture and which were not. I will also not delve into which translation of Holy Scripture they used as most of them spoke the language in which the New Testament was written as a birth tongue, and they used whatever translation of the Old Testament Scriptures was available in their language. Most of the time, this was either the Greek Septuagint or a translation into Syriac or Aramaic, Hebrew having been a dead language for many centuries.

I don't think that the importance of understanding what they understood as the Apostolic Faith can be overstated or exaggerated. Their writings record a Church which was devoted to Jesus Christ, demonstrated power daily in miracles and testimonies of faith, and brought the Gospel to the entire known world all while maintaining a unity of faith which lasted for hundreds if not a thousand years. Many today, ironically, would call their doctrines heretical, maybe even dangerous. Maybe that's why there's such a difference in their Church and in the Church of today.

I. God

The Ancient Church taught that God was not born or made. He is without beginning and without end, immortal and incorruptible. He cannot be seen or comprehended. He is incapable of being divided, and He is the only one with no equal. He is infinite, completely omnipotent, completely omnipresent, and completely omniscient and is incapable of being measured or contained. He is above space and time. No one is capable of fully knowing Him but Himself. He is neither male, nor female, though He is always referred to with masculine words. He is fundamentally good, and cannot cease from being or doing good. He is dispassionate, not subject to human passions. He is not subject to change. He has no need for any name other than the designation of “God” or “Deity.” He created everything that exists, and by His power everything created continues to exist and subsist.

II. Jesus Christ

From the earliest time, Jesus Christ was referred to as no other than “our God” and “the Lord of all the world.” He was recognized in the Ancient Church, in every century of the Ancient Church prior to the Great Councils, as no other than God, Creator of the world, incarnated into human flesh. Prior to the Creation of anything, and prior to the incarnation, He was begotten, not created, from the Father. They taught that He was one with the Father in substance, being eternal and uncreated, while remaining distinct from the Father.

The Ancient Church taught that Jesus Christ was descended from King David. His mother, Mary, was a virgin. He is referred to as the Son of God because He was conceived by God in the womb of a virgin with no human father. He lived for thirty three years and then was crucified under Pontius Pilate. He died and descended into Hades where he preached the Gospel to those who had died. On the third day from His death, he resurrected from the dead. Afterwards, He ascended into heaven where He sits at the Father's right hand. They taught that He would return to resurrect all the dead and sit in judgment over all those living at His return, and all those who had died.

They taught that Jesus Christ was both truly God, and truly human (necessitating all bodily functions, needs, and frailties), containing the two natures within Himself. They also taught that He was sinless in His humanity.

III. The Holy Spirit

The Ancient Church taught that the Holy Spirit was also God of the same substance as the Father and the Son. They taught that the Holy Spirit proceeded from the Father through the Son (as opposed to proceeding from the Father and the Son). The Holy Spirit is imparted to the Christian immediately proceeding baptism through the laying on of hands by a presbyter or bishop, after which He resides within the Christian. Salvation is impossible without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

IV. Salvation

The Early Church taught that Salvation was through Christ alone. They taught that no one could enter into the Kingdom of God other than through believing in Jesus Christ, repenting of their sins, being baptized, and observing the commandments of Christ. No one is able to save himself by his own works. Salvation comes only through faith in Christ as demonstrated through one's obedience to Christ. Those who are not living as Christ taught were not to be considered Christians regardless of their profession of faith. It wasn't those who profess Christ, but those who obey Him, who would be saved. It was also understood universally that only those who persisted in their faith as evidenced by their obedience until the end of their lives would be saved. Willfully turning away from faith in Christ would cause a person to be lost. Those who would disown Christ would be themselves disowned by the Father. The idea that a person could be saved in such a way as to never be lost was considered false teaching. “No one is a Christian but he who perseveres to the end.” (Tertullian, 198 AD)

Those who continue in faith as evidenced by their obedience to Christ until the end of their lives would be, at the resurrection of the dead, made one with God (though not in His substance), deified immortal by His Grace into the same immortal, incorruptible body as Jesus Christ. This is the stated goal and end of Salvation. “Our Lord Jesus Christ, through His transcendent love, became what we are, so that He might bring us to be even what He Himself is.” (Irenaeus, 180 AD) and “God became man, so that man might be made God.” (Athanasius, 325 AD)

V. After Death

Following an ancient Greek understanding of the afterlife, the Ancient Church taught that once a person died, their soul went to Hades (also referred to as Abraham's Bosom), the realm of the dead, where the righteous dead were kept in paradise, separate from the unrighteous dead who were kept in torment. They taught that once a person had died, there would be no further chance for repentance or confession. Souls would not transmigrate from one body to be reborn into another, but would be kept and held until the resurrection, when everyone would raise from the dead to be judged by Christ. Those judged righteous will be deified. Those judged unrighteous would be condemned to eternal suffering in Gehenna. Afterwards, there will be no more death, and no need for Hades.

VI. End Times

The Ancient Church taught that there would be a great tribulation, and a great cataclysm over the whole world, and that there would be an anti-Christ that rose up and persecuted the Church. After this, Jesus Christ would return to transfigure those living and raise the dead immortal and judge them. Then He will reign in Jerusalem for a thousand years. After this, the present heaven and earth will be destroyed and a new heaven and a new earth will be created.

VII. Spiritual Gifts

The Spiritual Gifts were evident, frequent, and common within the Church of the first three centuries. They were so common in point of fact that Christian apologists would use the knowledge of them to prove the validity of Christianity to pagans who were well aware of the miracles performed by Christians. This was regarded as the point of the Spiritual Gifts. Different Spiritual Gifts were manifested to different Christians. Some had the gift of prophecy and foreknowledge. Some had the gift of healing. Some had the gift of demonstrations of power. And yes, some had the gift of speaking the Gospel in languages they couldn't have otherwise known. Aside from this are recorded gifts of teaching, counseling, understanding, and others. Exorcisms were well documented, and were mostly performed by the laity of the Church as a volunteer service. Healings were mostly performed on unbelievers as a witness of the truth of the Gospel, and more often than not, members of the Church were not themselves expected to be healed from diseases and infirmities which plagued everyone, although prayers were offered when one became ill.

The writers of the Church also record that the displays of the Spiritual Gifts became more and more infrequent by the middle of the third century, although not unknown. After this point, they are generally only displayed in history by those Christians considered to be particularly Saintly and those remembered as Saints. One quotation reads “For if it happens that there are no longer any unbelievers, all the power of signs will afterward be unnecessary.”

VIII. Creeds

Ignatius of Antioch (105 AD):

...Jesus Christ, who was descended from David, and was also of Mary; who was truly born and did eat and drink. He was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate. He was truly crucified and died—in the sight of beings in heaven, on earth, and under the earth. He was also truly raised from the dead, His Father raising Him to life—in the same manner as His Father will also raise us up, we who believe in Him by Christ Jesus.

Irenaeus (180 AD):

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them. And in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation. And in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord. And we believe in His manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father to gather all things into one, and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race—in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, God, Savior, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth, and that , and that every tongue should confess” Him. And we believe that He will execute just judgment towards all, so that He may send spiritual evils and the angels who transgressed and became apostates—together with the ungodly, and unrighteous, and wicked, and profane among men—into everlasting fire. And we believe that He will, in the exercise of his grace, confer immortality on the righteous, the holy, those who have kept His commandments, and those who have persevered in His love—some from the beginning and others from the time of their repentence. We believe He will surround them with everlasting glory.

Tertullian (213 AD):

The Church acknowledges on Lord God, the Creator of the universe, and Christ Jesus born of the virgin Mary—the Son of God the Creator; and in the resurrection of the flesh. The church unites the Law and the Prophets into one volume, with the writings of evangelists and apostles, from whom she drinks in her faith. This she seals with the water of baptism, arrays with the Holy Spirit, feeds with the Eucharist, and cheers with martyrdom. Against such a discipline thus maintained, she admits no deniers.

We … believe that there is only one God, but under the following dispensation or “economy”, as it is called: that this one only God also has a Son, His Word, who proceeded from Himself, by whom all things were made, and without whom nothing was made. We believe Him to have been sent by the Father into the virgin, and to have been born of her—being both man and God, the son of man and the Son of God, and to have been called by the name of Jesus Christ. He suffered, died, and was buried, according to the Scriptures. And after He had been raised again by the Father and taken back to heaven, He has been sitting at the right hand of the Father. We believe that He will come to judge the living and the dead. And He sent also from heaven from the Father, according to His own promise, the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, the sanctifier of the faith of those who believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

IX. Holy Scripture

Old Testament Scriptures, canonical and deuterocanonical, which were accepted and used:

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1&2 Samuel (1&2 Kings), 1&2 Kings (3&4Kings), 1&2 Chronicles, Ezra, 2 Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther (including additions), Tobit, Judith, 1, 2, & 3 Maccabees, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Wisdom of Solomon, Wisdom of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Baruch, Ezekiel, Daniel (Including Bel and the Dragon, Susanna, and The Song of the Three Jews), The Twelve Minor Prophets, Martyrdom of Isaiah, Book of Enoch, Assumption of Moses

Attestations to various books by name or citation: Peter, Jude, Barnabas, The Didache, Polycarp, Hippolytus, Cyprian, Methodius, Clement of Alexandria,Tertullian, Origen, Melito, Lactantius, Apostolic Constitutions.

The Ancient Church accepted and argued that the reasons why the deuterocanonical books and several “pseudepigraphical” were excluded from the Jewish canon at Jamnia in 90 AD were 1) the Early Church was constantly using them to prove that Jesus was the Christ, and 2) the Jewish leaders hid from the knowledge of the people, as much as possible, any passages which contained any scandal against the elders, rulers, and judges.

New Testament Scriptures, Canonical and Deuterocanonical, which were accepted and used:

Canonical:

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts of the Apostles, Romans, 1&2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1&2 Thessalonians, 1&2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, James, 1&2 Peter, 1,2, &3 John, Jude, Revelation (Apocalypse)

Deuterocanonical:

Shepherd of Hermas, Barnabas, 1&2 Clement

Attestations: Peter, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Muratorian Fragment, Tertullian, Origen, Victorinus, Methodius, Apostolic Constitutions

In nearly every case, the Old Testament used by the Church was the Greek Septuagint, and nearly every quotation in their writings is taken from the Greek Septuagint. The Ancient Church believed that the Scriptures were completely divinely inspired, and this belief in their inspiration by nature encompassed the Greek Septuagint so much that at times they defended the Greek readings as superior to the Hebrew texts. This belief in divine inspiration extended primarily to the Old Testament Scriptures, and then secondarily to the New Testament Scriptures, in particular the Gospels, and the Pauline Epistles.

They believed that there were no contradictions or absurdities in Holy Scripture, and that the Gospel and Apostolic Tradition could be defended from Holy Scripture. They interpreted the Holy Scriptures in the light of the Apostolic Tradition and the teachings of Christ. The idea of drawing doctrine from only Scripture however, ignoring the Apostolic Tradition was unknown among them.

X. Sacraments

The Ancient Church practiced at least four Sacraments as such: Baptism, Holy Eucharist, Anointing with Oil, and Laying on of Hands. These Sacraments were not displayed publicly to everyone, but only to those within the Church who had themselves received baptism. Sacraments celebrated by clergy who were themselves unworthy, outside of the apostolic teaching, or in sin were not considered valid.

Baptism: Baptism was not performed on a candidate until they had been instructed in the faith, and they had demonstrated their sincere conversion to the satisfaction of the church. Baptism was practiced with as much water as was available although full immersion was preferred. It was done in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit after the person made vows to the Lord and had renounced the devil. Baptism was universally understood to be for the remission of sins, and that all previous sins which had been committed would be washed away.

Holy Eucharist: The Holy Eucharist was celebrated with bread and wine. On Sundays, the church would gather and read from the Scriptures. The Presbyter would instruct the people, and then the Church would pray. Then the Eucharist would be celebrated. The celebrant would first give thanks to God, then would pray over the bread and wine, which would then change the elements into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. The wine was mixed with water, and both had to be present symbolizing both divine and human natures of Christ, as well as reminding of the blood and water which flowed from Christ's side. The Ancient Church was explicit in their belief in the real presence of Christ in the consecrated bread and wine and explicitly condemned the denial of the real presence of Christ as false teaching. Only the baptized could partake of it, and only the Bishop or Presbyter could consecrate it. It is spoken of repeatedly and in every century prior to the Great Councils as both a memorial of Christ's sacrifice and as itself a sacrifice and is equated with Christ's sacrifice on the cross. It was expected that confession of one's sins to God either privately or in public confession and absolution by a presbyter would precede the reception of the Eucharist.

Anointing with Oil: Either immediately preceding or following baptism, the person being baptized was anointed with oil.

Laying on of Hands: After Baptism, the Bishop of the church would lay hands on the person in order to impart the Holy Spirit to him. It was understood that a person being born “of water and the Spirit” meant being baptized with water, and then given the Holy Spirit through the laying on of hands. It was generally agreed on that without the laying on of hands, a person wouldn't receive the Holy Spirit.

Aside from this was practiced Confession of one's sins, which was generally made to another Christian, in particular a member of the clergy. Absolution of one's sins was granted only by the Bishop or Presbyter either in private or at public confession.

XI. Church Government

In the Ancient Church, they recognized at least two orders of ordination: Bishop and Deacon, with the order of Presbyter emerging as separate from the Bishop towards the middle to end of the second century. In the late first and early second century the terms Bishop and Presbyter were used interchangeably. Bishops were consecrated initially by Apostles, and those succeeding them had to be consecrated by Bishops who could prove their own ordination succession from the Apostles. Bishops, Presbyters, and Deacons were expected to not have been married more than once, but were otherwise free to be married or celibate as they were led.

Bishops, or the Presbyters chosen to represent them, had to be present for all Sacraments. Only Bishops could ordain Deacons, Presbyters, or other Bishops.

Deacons were ministers of visitation, preaching, and they assisted the Bishop and Presbyters.

Bishops who had obtained their position by means of money were held as invalid. No Bishop had the authority to add to or take away from the Apostolic Faith and those found to be doing so were held as invalid. The Sacraments held by a Bishop or Presbyter who was known to be sacrilegious or in sin were held to be invalid. All such clergy could be, and were expected to be removed by their congregations.

XII. Christian Living

The Ancient Church expected that all those professing to be Christians were to live according to the commandments of Christ as He taught in the Gospels. All those not living according to His commandments were not considered Christians. To be more specific by way of example, they practiced extreme non-resistance to violence committed against them, refused to attend the theater or coliseum shows, they stayed out of politics and refused to enter public office. Their women tended to be without cosmetics, or jewelry, or perfumes. They embraced martyrdom. As much as possible they tried to live at peace with everyone. They were opposed to capital punishment. They were explicitly opposed to both abortion and infanticide. Many lived celibate, although they certainly didn't require it of anyone. They didn't hold sins against anyone, but forgave them. They were known by their love for one another, and they were expected to live simply, humbly, and with sincerity, abandoning luxuries and the trappings of wealth. Homosexual practice was forbidden among them, and those practicing homosexuality were not considered Christians, regardless of their profession of faith.

A Ramble About Faith Alone

It is a strange thing that, given my own journey of faith, I should come to this conclusion on my own and apart from the Evangelical Protestant training in which I was initially formed; that, ultimately, and according to several Fathers of the Church, faith alone in Jesus Christ is necessary for one's salvation.

This isn't to say faith without action, because faith is action and action is faith. To be judged by one's actions is the same thing as being judged by one's faith because action is the outward expression of what one truly believes and has faith in.

It is faith in Jesus Christ which makes the transforming Energies of God active within us and around us. It is faith in Jesus Christ which makes the Sacraments effective. It is faith in Jesus Christ and God's ability and willingness to save us through His death, burial, and resurrection which makes that Saving Grace active. Though, our outward actions must reflect our inward faith to this end. No one should delude himself on this account, if your actions do not reflect the faith you profess to have then your profession is a self-deception and you do not believe what you say you do. Grace will only become active in the presence of genuine faith in Jesus Christ. Just as Jesus said, you will know a tree by its fruit. A good tree will not produce rotten fruit, neither a rotten tree good fruit. The Energies of God respond in proportion to the presence of faith.

Thus we will also, at the resurrection, be judged by both our faith and our actions because our actions demonstrate what we truly believe, and we will be judged on whether we truly believed in Jesus Christ. So it can be said truly that we are saved by faith alone, and our actions bear witness to that faith. Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Do you refrain from judgment? Do you love you enemies? Do you forgive so you will be forgiven? Do you pick up your cross and crucify your self? Do you believe Him when He told us to do these things, or is it lip-service only?

We, as human beings, none of us can tell what another person truly believes except through his actions. Only God can truly know a person's inner heart and intentions. There are times when we don't know ourselves, but must step back and observe our thoughts and actions to determine where our faith truly lies.

We are transformed into the image of Christ by Grace through faith alone, because it is only by faith Grace is made active. A person not visibly undergoing this change, however slowly or however small or great the change may be, doesn't have faith in Jesus Christ at all. But the person whose faith is but small, this person's faith must be fanned and fed, stretched, exercised, and encouraged carefully so that it grows. Any amount of faith in Jesus Christ is or can be saving faith regardless of most false teachings around which it may be wrapped. We must be careful not to extinguish this faith as we ourselves may be the cause of rendering Grace inert within that person, and this is a terrifying prospect for us, because we must answer to our Lord for it; the One who said it was better for a large millstone to be tied around our necks and be thrown into the sea than for this to happen.

So, salvation is truly, ultimately, by Grace through faith alone. We can do nothing, no good works to earn it, and yet obedience to Jesus Christ is an absolute necessity as evidence of our faith in Him.

A Ramble About Doubt

On our journey to research for the Mission which we envision, I have often struggled with doubt. No matter how many times the Lord provides for us, and no matter how magnificent a way, doubts continuously creep back into my mind as I look at the ridiculous poverty of our circumstances and the magnitude of the task in front of us.

I had something of an insight the other day as I was spending time in prayer. We were staying the night parked in a church parking lot in Iowa and I had gone to use an outdoor electrical outlet to charge my laptop and tablet. While they were charging I spent some time in prayer.

My insight was this, when doubts creep into my mind, they're not doubts about what God can do, they're doubts about what I can do. How I can accomplish something. God can do anything He wants. Me? Not so much. But this is why doubt hampers faith, because it turns our faith away from God and what He can do and it turns it towards ourselves and what we can do. And when we see what we can, or in this case can't do, we then become afraid. Doubt hampers our faith in God, because it redirects that faith towards ourselves, positively or negatively.

The impact of this on prayer, and the transformation and powers of Grace can't be underestimated. For Grace to become active, it absolutely requires faith in Jesus Christ. For prayers to bear fruit, they absolutely require faith in Jesus Christ that He will do them. But doubt throws our faith back onto ourselves and off of Him thus rendering Grace inert proportionately.

As human beings we will always have faith in something; either ourselves, other people, idols, or Jesus Christ. But the uncreated Energies of God will only be made active in the presence of faith in Jesus Christ. He will only respond to faith in Himself, and not in anything else. When faith is redirected away from Himself and onto the abilities of something or someone else, He chooses not to respond so as not to add to our delusions. Just as a psychologist doesn't want to contribute to a patient's psychosis or insanity, but draw them out of it, so also God doesn't want to add to our self-deception by responding to faith in ourselves or in idols. That wouldn't be healthy for us or bring us any closer to union with Himself. But He does respond to faith in Him however small the faith might be, and as we see and experience His responses to our faith, then, ideally, our faith in Him begins to increase and our faith in other people or things begins to decrease.

To this end, there are some times when He has to forcibly separate us from our faith in other things or people in order to increase our faith in Him. And so we lose jobs, friends, family, ideas, philosophies, theological structures, and anything else we are trusting in besides Him. The disillusionment of these losses can be painful and severe, but it is always done therapeutically like a surgeon removing a gangrenous limb because He knows if it's not removed we will not become healthy, and will likely become worse. In the process of discipleship and learning to follow Jesus Christ by Grace through faith, we must unlearn all the ways we have previously studied as to how to live because He shows us that they are not only unreliable, but they are as tangible as smoke. He is the only permanent, trustworthy reality.

In the Scriptures, Jesus gave His disciples the authority to cast out demons when He sent them out to preach, and they reported back that demons did indeed obey them and leave. But there was this one that was causing epileptic fits in a boy that they couldn't cast out, and after Jesus did cast it out they asked Him why. He responded that it was because of their lack of faith. The disciples knew for a fact that Jesus had the authority to cast out demons, and when He told them He was giving them that authority they believed Him, having seen everything else that He did. This faith in Him is what activated the Grace around them to order the demons around. But when it came to this particular boy, his condition seemed so severe they began to doubt, and misdirect their faith onto their own abilities or lack thereof. This is why Jesus again calls them “oligopistoi,” or “little-faiths,” which seems to be the name He gives them every time they begin to doubt and are unable to do anything, like when Peter stepped out on the boat to walk to Jesus on the water and then began to doubt because he started looking at the storm and the water instead of Jesus. Jesus calls him, “oligopistos.”

Doubt, misdirected faith, cripples faith in Jesus Christ, and as a result it also cripples the activity of Grace, and it can cripple answers to prayer as well. Part of God's transforming work in our lives is to remove the sources and objects of that misdirected faith so that we will actually have faith in Him alone.

A Syllabus for Discipleship

Generally speaking, a syllabus is a list of books and course materials that are needed for a class. When we become disciples of Jesus Christ, we are to study what He taught and become His students. There are certain books and methods which I believe are more helpful for this goal than others. To this end, this also involves studying what His disciples taught, and what the great "Jedi Masters" of Christianity taught and practiced.

Many of these books are available in electronic format for free, although some aren't. All should be required reading in any course on discipleship as far as I'm concerned:

The Holy Bible

The letters and writings of Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp, Justin Martyr and other Early Church Fathers

The Philokalia

The Confessions of St. Augustine

The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis

The Cloud of Unknowing

The Didache

The Release of the Spirit, and other works by the late Coptic Pope Shenouda III

The Orthodox Way by Kallistos Ware

The Paradise of the Desert Fathers

The Sayings of the Desert Fathers

The Autobiography of St. Ignatius of Loyola

The Life and Legend of St. Francis of Assissi

Many of these works can be found in the first volume of the Ante-Nicene Fathers. The rest can be found through a careful search online or at gutenberg.org and archive.org. Some are available as Kindle books for free through Amazon.com.

Any serious discipleship must begin first with the study of what Jesus actually taught and committing this to memory and practice. To this end I recommend starting with the Gospel of Matthew, getting a spiral bound notebook and pen and begin copying down everything Jesus says in the text. This is easier to do with a red letter edition of the Scriptures, but any good translation will do. There are a number of reasons for writing down, but the main one is simply to take notes on what Jesus actually said and to think about it and incorporate it more carefully.

When Jesus gave the command to disciple the nations, He explicitly said to teach them everything whatever He had commanded. Not to teach them things about Him, but what He Himself taught. So this needs to be the first and most important foundation laid down in our discipleship; what Jesus Himself taught.

From there, go to Mark, Luke, and John, and do the same thing. After you have a good grounding in understanding and practice of what Jesus taught you should be ready to go to what His Apostles said about what He taught in their letters, making up the bulk of the rest of the New Testament.

At the same time as you are copying down what Jesus said, I recommend beginning to read through The Cloud of Unknowing. This little book was originally written in Middle English, so find a good Modern English translation, but it remains one of the best books on prayer you can find.

When you are done with letters of the Apostles, go on to the letters of the Early Church Fathers. I recommend beginning with Clement of Rome, and then going on to Ignatius of Antioch, following the order of the Ante-Nicene fathers. This should give you a good grounding in how the second and third generations of the Church understood the teaching which was passed to them from the Apostles, who themselves were taught by Christ.

When you are done with The Cloud of Unknowing, start on the Philokalia. This is a long collection of spiritual writings compiled over a period of about a thousand years. Your best bet is to start at the beginning. They are largely written by Orthodox monks who lived as either solitaries or in small communities, so you may not be able to relate to them right away, but their writings contain a lot of practical wisdom on practice, prayer, and ultimately internal spiritual warfare. These men were grounded and experienced combatants in the spiritual realities which every follower of Jesus Christ must face, and about which the unbelieving world has no clue. St. Peter of Damaskos' writings in volume three in particular are a good condensation of all the learning before him and I refer back often to him.

When you are finished with Justin Martyrs writings go on to the Didache, then the Confessions of St. Augustine. From there continue on through the works listed in no particular order. It will take you a while. Where The Orthodox Way is concerned, use this as a guide if you are not already familiar with Christian doctrine and dogma of any faith tradition.

As you begin this course of discipleship, maintain regular prayer times each day following what you learn in the course textbooks. Don't neglect this. The process of salvation is by grace through faith. You must stay connected to and focused on Jesus Christ. There is no other way. Discipleship is about learning to do, not just filling your head with information. If you just want to be full of knowledge stop right now. None of this will help you and is possibly harmful to you.

No one can make you follow Jesus Christ. No one can make you become a disciple. It is a choice you must make on your own, and it is a choice you must keep making by faith. This little list of books and set of instructions isn't the only way to go about it, but it is one way and, in my opinion, a good way especially if you don't have a good spiritual guide or pastor to whom you can turn. It would be best to find a church or parish with mature Christians who can guide you, but this is not always possible in this day and age. So I offer this Syllabus to help all those who for whatever reason must begin this journey without a community to support them.

A Ramble About "Irresistible Grace"

Contrary to John Calvin, the uncreated energies of God are not irresistible. They surround us and fill us constantly because all life depends on His existence, but they are not irresistible. If His energies were irresistible, there should be no one in danger of being forever lost to eternal suffering. His energies must be cooperated with in the same way that a patient must cooperate with his course of treatment if he wants to get well. If a patient refuses to do what the physician prescribes, it isn't the physician's fault if the patient gets worse and worse. The first rule a physician follows is that if you can do any good for the patient, at least do no harm. Forcing a patient to submit to treatment is dangerous and can have the exact opposite effect you are looking for. It can cause harm to the patient. God knows this better than any human physician. And few if any physicians would treat a patient against their own wishes regardless.

It is said that we cannot respond or cooperate with God unless God first initiates it. We cannot have faith unless God first initiates this as well. And if God first initiates this, is this not irresistible Grace? And yet I would counter that it is perfectly possible for a person to spurn God's advances towards him or her. Even those who are joined to Him through baptism into Jesus Christ do this on a daily basis, to our shame. God doesn't play games with those He doesn't wish to be destroyed, and He doesn't wish any of us to be destroyed with our own eternal suffering. Grace requires cooperation on our part.

We trust in something. We have faith in something even if it is not in Jesus Christ. Many people put their faith in their own abilities, or in the abilities of others. More often then not we have faith in our delusions of material security. Faith itself, the ability to believe something as true and act on it, is not a product of Grace, but is something we do by nature one way or the other. We have to do this in order to remain sane. We instinctively have faith that when we go to bed, we will wake up the next day. We instinctively have faith that the sun will set tonight, and rise tomorrow. We instinctively have faith that when we sit in a chair, it will hold our weight, even if we have never seen that chair before. We base this faith on previous experiences with these phenomena from the time we are born. This goes down to the foundations of our psyche where we must have faith that certain things are true in order for the psyche to function properly and make sense and order of the world. Otherwise, it goes insane if there is nothing it can have faith in as being true as opposed to false.

We must direct this faith towards Jesus Christ in order for His energies to become active within us. This doesn't preclude Him arranging circumstances outside of us to induce faith in Him within us in order to activate Grace. It doesn't take much faith in Him to activate Grace, it only takes faith itself. As Jesus said, even faith the size of a mustard seed can rip a mountain from its foundations and throw it into the sea. Once Grace has been made active, it then moves within to induce more faith to continue the cycle of cooperation to initiate the salvific transformation. As long as Grace is active within the person in any way, it will continue to draw the person towards deification, union with God in His energies (though not His essence). But if the person refuses to cooperate with that Grace, it will result in his shifting the focus of his faith towards something else other than Jesus Christ. This will render Grace more and more inert proportionately drawing the person away from deification and towards eternal suffering.

I say again though, that we must direct this faith towards Jesus Christ Himself, and not towards a particular teaching, or system of theology, or any other person, but Jesus Christ Himself. There are a great many people that put their faith heavily in their denomination's system of theology or dogmatic teachings, and there are also a great many people that put their faith heavily in their church leaders. They do this, and yet Grace often seems stunted among them. Why? Because they trust more in these things than they actually do in Jesus Christ. Perhaps this has been the problem with the Church for centuries. It isn't that the truth, the Gospel, hasn't been there, it's that the people within the churches have put their trust in their leaders, theological systems, and dogmatic teachings, and not in Jesus Himself. Deifying Grace is only made active when we put our faith in Jesus Christ, and it is made active in proportion to this faith.

No, Grace isn't irresistible. If it were, we should all be mature, complete Saints with transfigured bodies right now. That we are not is testimony to this fact.

A Ramble About Faith in Prayer

I wrote down several passages today that caught my attention. I've been reading through different books of the New Testament over the last few months in the Greek text. (As to why I've been doing this, the truth is that it's been long in coming. I started learning Greek when I was fifteen, and now, twenty three years later, I'm at a point where English translations begin to really bug me and I find myself crossing out the words in italics in my English Bible which I know really shouldn't be there. I then asked myself “the” question, “why, if I know the original well enough am I still bothering with a middleman's work, however scholarly and well done?” So, I quit making excuses and just took the plunge. Besides this, it makes my reading slow down enough to where I can actually take the time to think and meditate on what I read devotionally.) The latest book I've been reading through has been Matthew, although the truth is that I cheated a little. I started in Matthew five, rather than Matthew one, because I really wanted to jump to the meat of what Jesus taught.

The thing that caught my eye this time, and that I've been pondering now for some time is Jesus' insistence that if we have even the smallest size of faith we can order mountains, trees, and shrubbery to do the most unnatural things, and they will obey. The reason why it struck me this time is that I realized today that Matthew records Jesus as saying it more than once in his gospel. For some reason, I kept thinking the only repetitions of this were in between Gospels, and were of the same event. They are not. I have thought, more and more over the years, that anything the Gospel writers took pains to record more than once was an important enough part of His teaching that He said it regularly. In Matthew, the two occurrences which stuck out to me are:

He said to them, “Because of your unbelief. For most certainly I tell you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.” (Matthew 17:20, WEB)

Jesus answered them, “Most certainly I tell you, if you have faith, and don’t doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but even if you told this mountain, ‘Be taken up and cast into the sea,’ it would be done. All things, whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.” (Matthew 21-21-22, WEB)

I then started looking up other similar passages in John's writings, and also in James, that had stuck out to me:

“You didn’t choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain; that whatever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you.” (John 15:16, WEB)

“Most certainly I tell you, whatever you may ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.” (John 16:23b, WEB)

“But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach; and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed. For let that man not think that he will receive anything from the Lord He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.” (James 1:5-8, WEB)

“This is the boldness which we have toward him, that, if we ask anything according to his will, he listens to us. And if we know that he listens to us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions which we have asked of him.” (1 John 5:14-15, WEB)

I have been trying to understand these passages more, especially in reference to my own prayers and my own faith, or lack thereof. Jesus and His immediate disciples were insistent on this point and so it should not be taken lightly, and neither should the power it represents be. At the same time, I and many others know from experience that God does not always give us what we ask for when we ask for it. I believe that there are many reasons for this. More often than not, it's because what we ask for isn't in our best interests as He sees it. The closer we draw to Him, the better able we are to sense this in our requests through Grace and the Holy Spirit. But because of this, there always exists the element of doubt, even if it is just, “I am asking for this, but what if God doesn't think it's the best thing for me?”

In my previous Ramble I explored the nature of Sacrament and the relationship of God's uncreated energies to faith in Jesus Christ. In the same way, according to these passages, our requests in prayer, according to Jesus, are directly related to our faith in Him and belief that He will do as we ask. According to the Apostle John, there is the added stipulation that it be asked according to His will. And according to James the Elder, there can be no doubting that God will grant what is asked, otherwise the person asking shouldn't expect anything to happen because he really doesn't expect anything to happen to begin with.

So, as I have been meditating on this, it comes back to what I was saying previously. The transforming, uncreated energies of God are made active in direct proportion to our faith in Christ, as is also the movement of God for which we ask through prayer. To round this out, I will add that the charismata are likely made active and empowered in direct proportion to our faith in Christ as well.

So then, how do we approach this? Faith isn't faith unless it produces action. As I have said many times, you will always act on what you truly believe. Whether or not that's what you say you believe remains to be seen by what you do. So we must approach prayer in the same way we must approach every other aspect of our transforming relationship with God through Jesus Christ, by Grace through this kind of genuine faith. The faith which precedes the actions of faith.

This is why St. Peter began to sink beneath the waves when he took his eyes off of Jesus. He started believing something else besides the fact that through Jesus he could walk on the stormy water. I think this is also the problem in my own life. I began to look at the storms raging around me, and began to believe more that they would sink me, rather than believing that Jesus would hold me up regardless of the storms. Like St. Peter, I cried out “Lord, save me!” And like St. Peter, Jesus gently rebuked me, grabbing my hand and calling me, “little-faith.” While at the same time letting me know that He was still there and wasn't going to let me sink. We still haven't made it back to the boat yet, to carry the analogy further, but we're on the way.

In the ancient church, there are records of healings, exorcisms, and astounding miracles for centuries after Jesus ascended. Many of them were performed through the clergy, but many of them were also demonstrated through the laity as well and were commonplace among the church for centuries, because of their faith. At one time, exorcisms were the routine office of the laity, not the priests or bishops, and could be performed on the fly without preparation. This was the level of faith and discipleship which the church maintained at one time. It is striking that they ceased to be commonplace in proportion to the enculturation of the Christian faith among the people. When it became trendy and popular to be “Christian”, the true signs of a disciple were relegated to those “special Saints.”

I am reminded of a key line from the movie Prince of Egypt, “Believe, and you will see God's wonders.” The main reason why we don't see them so commonplace among us now, I think should be obvious. Jesus pretty much spelled it out.