Objections

Here's what they tell me. "The Scriptures have been questioned on (the subject at hand) throughout Church history" and "They've been wrong about women and slavery since the beginning, so why wouldn't they be wrong about (this subject)?"

The question I keep coming back to is, "If Jesus claimed He would send the Holy Spirit who would lead His disciples into all truth, how is it that He failed to do so?" No one is answering.

So, the first objection is a question of consensus. "Since everyone throughout history hasn't agreed, the Scriptures aren't clear." No, no one actually says that, but this is the basic position. And this is a mindless position to take. Given that the world will hate you (John 15:18) and the Gospel is foolishness to those who don't believe (1 Cor 1:18) and Jesus Himself taught so as to give "the secrets of the kingdom of God" to His disciples while the rest would see and not see and hear and not understand (Luke 8:10), it would be a certainty that there would be dispute over Scripture. Consensus isn't the answer.

As for the second objection, is it true? Is it true that the Church has always been wrong about women? Is it true that the Church has always defended slavery? Now, remember, I'm not asking if it's true that anyone has ever been wrong about these subjects. I'm asking if it is true that the Church has always been wrong on these. I'm asking what the thread has been. Has the Church -- those who are genuine Christians -- always held an oppressive view of women? Has the Church always endorsed the slavery of the 18th and 19th centuries? Are those accusations accurate?

Actually, no, they're not. These objections are typical, coming from a blind view that seems to think, "If it has been recently, it has always been." Further, it imposes modern standards on biblical texts. For instance, you will hear about "women's equality" and how it hasn't existed in the Church for thousands of years. In truth, when Paul wrote, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Gal 3:28), he was indicating equality. It was not however, the modern version. Modern "equality" means "equivalence". It requires basically that everything be the same. "Same" is not "equal". The idea of "equality" in human terms is "equal worth" because isn't it absolutely clear that no two people are "equal" in the sense of "the same"? "Equality" today requires that women be allowed to perform everything that men perform (and, apparently, not vice versa), but this isn't required to come to the position of equal worth. So Peter says husbands are to show honor to their wives as "heirs with you of the grace of life" (1 Peter 3:7). Equal worth. But by applying a modern version on top of the question, it makes a false dichotomy. No, the Bible doesn't call for "equality" in the sense of "everyone is the same". Nor should it.

Worse, there is a continuing position here that modern values and measurements ought to be applied to Scripture. If God's Word does not line up, God's Word is faulty. Of course, this is pure nonsense. If it is indeed God's Word, then we need to do the reverse. We need to see what God's Word says and then evaluate modern values and measurements against that. So if God's Word demanded unequal treatment or slavery or the death penalty for adultery (a favorite objection of so many), then we must favor it as well. We don't get to decide what's right over what God says is right. That is the ultimate arrogance.

No one is answering for me the question about how the Holy Spirit seems to have failed (assuming their objections are valid). Thus, my contention is that He didn't. I hold that the Holy Spirit has come and that He has led His people into all truth. As such, I would argue that, from Jesus onward, there has been ... the truth. Sometimes that truth has been mainstream and sometimes it hasn't. Sometimes it was bright and clear and sometimes less visible. But it has always been present in the Church. Now, of course, I need to emphasize that what I mean by "the Church" is not Christendom -- the visible Church -- but the Body of Christ. I refer to those who are genuine Christians, the "wheat" among tares. Depending, then, on the "purity of the field", so to speak, the truth would be more or less visible, but it was always present in "the wheat". So when I can trace a clear path from Jesus to today of a constant position on a topic, I see this topic as a serious matter to hang onto. Isn't it interesting that things like the definition of marriage and the sinfulness of homosexual behavior are things that were constants throughout Church history but in question today? I mean, I can certainly see why we might wonder about areas where there have been debates among God's people, but these are not those areas.

The question, then, is really much more basic than the morality of homosexual activities or even marriage. The question is about the reliability of Scripture and the efficacy of the Holy Spirit to lead His own into the truth. Either we have a Bible we can read and trust or we don't. Either the Holy Spirit has led His own into the truth or He hasn't. If the modern objectors are correct, then the Bible is not clear and the Spirit hasn't succeeded until the day they showed up and all of that is now in question. I'll have to stand on this issue until someone tells me how it is that, given the lack of clarity of Scripture and 2,000 years of the failure of the Church to get these issues right, the Holy Spirit did not fail. I'll wait right over here.