Exclusive Christianity: There is Not Other Gospel

Wow. What a harsh title. Isn't it just typical of some egotistical Christian to think he is the only one who is right. How absurd and closed minded the Church must be to have such a narrow view. With all the wisdom, all the great thinkers, all the various people on earth and differing views which constitute a celebratory diversity for so many modern thinkers... how can we be so backwards to think we're the only people right on the face of this grand planet?

In our study of Galatians this week, we took a closer look at Paul's outrageous claims in chapter 1:6-8. "I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel... But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned!"

Eternally Condemned? What was the crime worthy of such a judgment? To turn from the Gospel, perverting it from it's original truth. This leaves one of two options: either Paul was inescapably close-minded and unloving, warranting the complete dismissal of this and all his writings, or there must be something crucially important to the Gospel. So crucial, in fact, that to pollute the message with any falsehoods is a capital crime, worthy of death. Which is it?

While we may be under the impression that diversity of thought is good, that perpetual evolution of truth is the ultimate reality, and that any and all claims to exclusive truth must be folly--the reality is that these sentiments are not consistent with a Biblical outlook. Any perversion--modification, addition, revision, or outright restatement--of the Gospel will ultimately fail in one or both of the following ways:

1. Failure to acknowledge the gravity of our sinful nature, which ultimately leads to idolatry of Man.
2. Failure to recognize God’s complete character as He has revealed Himself, which leads to idolatry of a created god.

At the core of the issue is God, not man. The charge that Paul, and evangelical Christians today, are in fact intolerant and closed-minded will attempt to center the debate around man. The exclusivity of the Gospel has become an issue of Man's creativity and the assumption that it is our right to determine truth for ourselves. Inasmuch as this is the case, we are already idolaters.

The simple fact is that the Gospel is about God, not man. God desires that all men worship Him, and yet this cannot come about by spreading false testimony about Him--a false Gospel that is, as Paul said, really no Gospel at all.

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Apostolic Authority

As we start digging into our study of Galatians this Sunday, the first topic that comes up is one that many would find odd to study from Scripture. Paul, the author of the letter, enters into a lengthy discourse about his own position of authority. In so doing, he describes his independence of the authority of Peter, James, and John--the ones who are called pillars. His claims seem brash, boastful, and downright arrogant. And, in fact, they would be just that if it weren't for one simple fact: he's right!

Apostolic authority is a subject often assumed, but rarely discussed in Bible studies. Why do we care so much what a renegade Jew who traveled Eastern Europe wrote on the matter of Christianity. What gives him the right to dictate for us the doctrines, teaching, and even the very Gospel which cannot be contradicted by any man, nor even an angel from heaven (Gal. 1:8)?

Paul builds his defense first drawing upon the source of his knowledge. Paul was clear in Galatians 1:11-12 that he received this gospel from no man, but from Christ himself. I asked a class, what would have been different if Saul had believed upon hearing Steven's sermon in Acts 7? The answer: he would not have met the qualifications as an Apostle. But when God was pleased to reveal His Son to Paul (1:15), then he received Christ by special revelation from the resurrected Christ.

What Paul so adamantly defends, no other teacher, pastor, missionary, or theologian in the church today can assert. Paul's authority is apostolic. As one who received the gospel direct from Christ, and learned direct from Christ, his office in the church is uniquely authoritative. There were 12 others with the same station in the early church. Some of whom wrote instruction to the early church, along with Paul, that we still have today. And, because of the authority we know to be true in Apostles, this collection of Apostolic writing is counted infallible, as the words of the prophets who came before.

No other Christian thinker, teacher, theologian, clergy, or otherwise has written anything which the evangelical community would consider God-breathed scripture. As we study Paul's authority in the first two chapters of Galatians, then, we study the basis for Biblical authority. This is the reason that we can debate Luther, but not Paul... or that we can dispute Augustine's writings, but not Peter's... or this very blog, for instance, but not the writings of James, John, and the other New Testament writers.

So, knowing the authority with which Paul's words come, how then should we hold these teachings in our own lives? I rarely get more animated in an argument than when someone opposes the clear teaching of scripture. I tolerate direct disagreement from my students gladly, but nothing angers me more deeply than when they refuse to yield to the authoritative, Apostolic writing of Paul, Peter, James, John, or any of those reputed to be pillars.

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The Discipline of Dying

Over the past year (or maybe even longer) I've been working on writing here and there when I have the spare time. The end goal: a new book on the Sovereignty of God. I'm excited to announce that it's nearly complete, but that's not really the point of my post today. Today, I share an excerpt fresh off the press.

For about 3 months now, there has been a chapter left hanging. Incomplete. Wrapped in an enigma I not only failed to solve (which is never my aim) but I could not even begin to explore it. The chapter was on Moral Imperative, and the question: in view of God's absolute sovereignty, why even try?

Finally, it hit me (I think, at least. I'll let the comments on this post be the judge as to whether it makes the final cut). The reality is that we do not try. We die. But, lest that seem a mere platitude of escapism, do not forget that when we die we do. There is no trying in God's law, there is only doing. Be perfect. Be holy.

I wish that believers everywhere would find far less comfort in the limited success of their efforts to obey. Instead, when faced daily with the realities of our iniquity, we ought to learn the discipline of dying to self—self-motivation, self-sufficiency, self-reliance—and living in Christ's power. We ought to "carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body" (2 Corinthians 4:10).

When we believe the lie that we, as Christian people, are somehow empowered now to live perfect lives, the reality of our present life lived in a dead carcass not yet regenerated will ultimately lead to disparity and defeat. We are, even after confessing Christ and receiving the Spirit, defeated by the moral imperatives of Scripture. And here, once again, in our present weakness we find strength only in God's power—His absolute sovereignty to work in and through us.

We know the folly of believing that one can earn salvation without the atonement of the cross. We are helpless but for His mercy. How much more foolish, then, after one's acceptance of Christ's atonement to go on in the Christian life pursuing moral imperative by our own will? How blinded have we become to take the same imperative which once drove us to our knees at the foot of the cross and later attempt its perfection within ourselves. No, the truth of the Gospel is that we must continually return to the cross, "to proclaim the Lord's death until he comes" (1 Corinthians 11:26) so as to confess with the Apostle Paul that "I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me" (1 Corinthians 15:10).

The Spirit's work in sanctification is not unlike His work in justification. Whereas we find righteousness through the imperatives of Scripture only when we die by the Law and receive Christ's imputed righteousness, so too does the Spirit sanctify us by the same imperatives which continually teach us to depend on Him for life. A deep thirst for Scripture is instilled in God's elect as a provision of God with the chief purpose that we find there not instruction for how to now succeed as Christians, but a perpetual conviction that we must "die every day" (1 Corinthians 15:31).

That is the discipline of dying. Scripture drives us to our knees begging for God's mercy more than once in the Christian life. Life by the Spirit begins in utter dependence on God and therein it must also continue.

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