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Now to real. All right, so I gave you the Antiquity. So the whole point of Antiquity is why? So that we can bring out the apostolic faith, right? And so we're seeing that as the Antiquity went on, it's complicated, you know? And so as we start reading these writings, I want to put that in your mind as we go. But now at the end of the day, it's really easy to just kind of say, you know what? I'm starting over. It's me and my thought and my mind and my Bible and my understanding of Greek and my resources.
I'm going to start this thing over again. And people have done that over and over and over to tens of thousands and through history. And there's something lacking in it. And this is where the quote that I gave you, and this is deep and fluffy, but there's more to it than just these guys fighting. There's more alive than all their terrible doctrines and their mess. And somehow the Church of Jesus Christ lives through all these. And there's a sense of ownership that I think is important.
I'll show you what I mean by that. So apostolic quadrilateral scripture, Christocentric Antiquity, and now real. All right, so real. Doctrine and practice should endeavor to be rooted not only in theory, but in the living witness of faithful communities across time. I try to ask myself when I read some of these, where would I go to church in 350? Where would I go to church in 1215? You know, I don't trust myself enough to go, well, I would just be me and I would, you know, and I'd start my own movement, right?
I've seen enough of my own mistakes and owned my own mistakes to realize I can't do that. So there's something real. And so what I think that this thing helps you, and I want to put this in you as you study this. We spend our life in, this is a lagoon. And here's a lagoon. And it's all warm and cozy, you know, and all that kind of thing. And but suddenly when you get a hold of the whole church, it's like you can look up and see like, whoa.
And there's a tendency to lose your lagoon in the, in the, the, the whoa, the epiphany. But what we need to be able to do is to embrace our communities, but appreciate we're part of this bigger giant thing called the church. And you own that. You know, and it helps us to be honest. This guy, J. Froude or Froude, it often seems to me like history was like a child's box of letters with which we can spell any word we please.
We have only to pick out such letter as we want, arrange them as we like, and say nothing about those who do not serve our purpose. You see so many people, and this used to be a lot more common in the 80s. It's harder to do now with, especially with AI, it can help us do that. Is everybody had like their version that their church goes all the way back down to the apostles, you know? We're the seventh-day keepers of the, I don't know, whatever it is.
And they've got this and say, I see this guy said that and that and that. And they didn't even read any of the other people. And everybody has these stories about how they're the one true church. And it's deadly. As a matter of fact, I never forget this one guy, early day, we're living in Dallas and the day or so, we had an inner city church and there was this group called the Travelers. I don't know if you remember the Travelers coming through. I'll tell you about them later. Interesting guys.
And they were guys who would drive around on bicycles and eat out trash cans and stuff like that. And they were staying at our church building. I remember this one guy, he was coming out of that and he said, he said, Dean, I felt that sectarian passion so passionately, so that I felt the fires of heaven, fires of hell underneath me. And you just get into the sectarianism that's deadly. And you'll see the early church talking a lot about sectarianism. And this helps us have the humility not to go there.
Matthew, the scriptures promise us that the church would continue. Matthew 16:18, and I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Matthew 28, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. Ephesians 3:21, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever.
And Hebrews 12:28, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful and so worship God acceptably with reverence and all. I like those passages. Here's my take. You can take it or leave it, but here's my take. When I read the early church, when I read the scriptures, I do not see one particular conference, denomination. I see congregation. So here's my saying. I like sayings. Yes, you'll see. I believe the church is congregational yet Catholic, small c, autonomous yet accountable.
So what I mean by this, when I read the New Testament, people say, well, you know, who was the right church? And you know, you got to be able to point through it. Well, look at even in the New Testament, the difference between Paul's Galatia and Jerusalem were pretty big. I mean, they were pretty big. So we didn't have the one, you know, everything agree exactly the same church there. You go into the early church, no, you've got different expressions.
And it wasn't until later, around the time of Constantine or starting maybe the round of 250, where you're trying to force people into this massive conference that all these wars start to come out. I believe the Holy Spirit meets with us congregationally, but at the same time, we should be Catholic. We should be part of the bigger. Don't be the one true church in your local church. You should be autonomous, but accountable. And you'll see that in the early church. And I think you'll see that.
So anyway, I'll come back to that. But so as I receive the whole church, what this helps me to do, to being real, he's part of my mistake. I'm not just separating myself from the church. I'm Catholic with a small c. And so you try to explain to a Muslim guy that, no, no, no, that wasn't us. That was our group is different than that. And like, yeah, shut up. You were the Crusades. You were Constantine. You were all that. So in a humility, say, yeah, that we did that and that was really bad.
And it gives us a humility. Still, I'm congregational. My church never did that. You know, but nevertheless, it's part of our story. And the way the world sees it, that's the way it is. And there's something about that. This guy, I love this. It's a big quote, but it's really a good one. John Fea, historian. And as we study history, let this statement sink in. It's good.
He said, Christian historians will do their best to meet the people in their past as Jesus encountered the people he met during his earthly ministry. They must relinquish power and avoid the temptation to use the powerless, those in the past who are at the mercy of us, the interpreters, to serve our selfish ends, whether they be religious, political, or cultural. The exercise of this hermeneutic of love means that we will read historical texts for the purpose of learning how to love people who are not like us.
Perhaps even people who, if we were living in the same time, may have been our enemies. They may have killed us, as Anabaptists for sure. It forces us to love others, even a 19th-century slave owner or Hitler, when they say to be unlovable. Failure to respect the people in the past is ultimately a failure of love. It is a failure to recognize the common bond that we share with humanity. Here's a big point. I've seen it and I've done it myself. I confess it. I do it all the time, but I don't want to do it.
When we speak of people we disagree with, let's try to give them the argument and explain it in a way that they would appreciate. If we're not Calvinists, fine, but man, you got to understand Calvin has some really good stuff and really good points. When we study Augustine, I mean, I think he made terrible mistakes, but we have to love Augustus and Augustine and use and speak of him and understand him in a way.
So being real, being part of Christianity and not just a sectarian thing of our own, I think is very important because I believe the Holy Spirit works with all this mess, calls humanity all the way up to today. And so Constantine, what were you thinking? No, church, what were you thinking? But it's my mistakes. You see what I mean? I don't just have to separate my. I don't have to deal with that. Yeah, because if I'm honest with it, I can see Constantine in myself.
I can see my own wanting to put myself, my own naked statue of myself, which would be terrible. But so more than coffee table revivals, is your fellowship a church or a debate? A lot of times we get like, I'm going to have my points. I'm going to win this argument, win this argument, win this argument. I'm going to have all my arguments all wrapped up together. The truth is in the everyday life, we make mistakes. Our churches do dumb stuff. I do dumb stuff.
And we're trying in the stuff of earth that God gives us, anointed by the Holy Spirit the best we can to walk through these things. But it has to have more than just ideas and doctrines and creeds and statements. There's a, it's that back to that statement that the common man is not ignorant, but it's a different kind of intelligence. It's wrapped up.
And so our communities, and many times you are coming from places that maybe you're frustrated by your expressions of what you've had, understand that there's something to just being in a congregation that's real that you work out this stuff in. And not just having all these ideas. You see what I mean? And then when you get that, you have this kind of moment a little bit.
Like, wow, I can embrace these writings and these people and the church, but yet still be congregational, still have my church, still have my community, but learn through this and go through the waters of how we make it through this life and have a fellowship that's real and expresses itself. This guy puts it a big zinger, Sam Wineburg, another historian. He says, for the narcissist sees the world, both the past and the present in his own image.
Mature historical understanding teaches us to do the opposite, to go beyond our own image, to go beyond our brief life and to go beyond the fleeting moment in history, human history, into which we have been born. History educates, which in Latin actually means leads outward in the deepest sense. Of the subjects in the secular curriculum, it is the best at teaching those virtues once reserved for theology, humility in the face of our limited ability to know and all in the face of the expanse of history.
So seeing, always seeing ourselves as the winner of each of these theological debates as we go through times. It's like watching Cowboy and Indians movies, you know, we used to when we were kids, which is probably very racist. And, you know, and always seeing yourself or reading the Old Testament and always seeing yourself as the Israel who didn't apostatize. You know what I mean? We have a tendency. It's probably more healthy if we embrace the mistakes and the successes in our church.
Here's what I love this cartoon. I saw it once. Maybe I've seen this. So the guy's teaching church history. I don't want, this is what I don't want to do. So he's teaching church history and he's got this tree and we're going through all these splits. And he goes, so this is where our movement came along and finally got the Bible right, right there. And this guy says, Jesus is so lucky to have us. This is the way we typically do this. I typically do this. And so we got to fight this way of thinking.
And as we walk through church history, be there with them and understand both their successes and their mistakes. So at the end of this reel, then why study from an Anabaptist perspective? Why? Good question. So the primary reasons why I think what I hope to show you is that what you asked earlier, Caleb, is what is the true dogma? What really matters? And I personally think it's a very simple faith, a very simple faith. It's supposed to be known as a child.
And although I love geeking out on all these different things we're going to talk about and understand them, and they do bring death to me, being followers of Jesus and receiving Christ by faith and living that out in a world is the fundamental things. But when you leave the teachings of Jesus, then I get it. It never ends for me. And so, but here's a point this guy writes, and I have this letter in your drive, and I think this is right towards the end, and we'll try to get onto our writing.
This is guy Kevin Vanhoozer. He's a Calvinist professor of a seminary, and he wrote a letter, which I put in your drive under extra materials there, this letter to budding theologians. And he has a really good point. And it's hard to get sometimes, but his point is profound if you catch it. He talks about a letter of some new theologian like yourselves who came to his seminary and said, yeah, I'm just a free range guy. I don't want to be a Presbyterian. I don't want to be a Baptist.
I want to just be me and all this. And he goes, okay, I get it. I get it. He's a Presbyterian, I think. He says this. He says, finally, with whom should we do our theology? So we're going to be studying theology, classic theology. Whom do you do that for? And he says, in the old days, most of my students identify with a particular confessional tradition, Presbyterian, Reform, you know, in his setting. This is no longer the case.
We often hear the millennials are more interested in spirituality than organized religion. Hence the decline in denominationalism. I know you expressed interest in being a free range theologian. That's my term, I know, but it's better than your lone ranger, which I fear comes closer to the way that church historians often describe heretics. Recall what I said above about the importance of reading scripture in communion with the saints. And then he goes on.
I understand your consternation about being forced to act like a consumer and deciding which particular communion to join. But consider, just as there was no contradiction between belonging to one of the 12 tribes and belonging to Israel, so there was no necessary contradiction between being local or even confessional. He means that by accepting the Presbyterian confession of faith and whatever, and Catholic, Catholic with a small c. Jesus says, in my Father's house, there are many dwelling places.
There is much to be gained by inhabiting a particular theological tradition, a dwelling place, but confinement to a single room, or as some translators have it, a mansion, can be suffocating. The important point is that whichever room you occupy, you should aspire to build up the whole house, preserving the integrity of its witnesses, orienting its worship, and increasing its wisdom. So he's saying that the faith is meant to be walked out in community, real, living, not just a theology, not an argument.
Our church is not just an argument. It's real. And because it's real, it's got to work out with real people and real things. And you got to understand that you can't be dogmatic about, you know, everything. But yet owning something also owns the mistakes. People sometimes think, well, Dean, you just think that the Anabaptists are all perfect. I said, no, it's just the opposite. It's our 500 years of mistakes is the reason why we should own it.
I've seen so many times as in my radical movements I've tried to be a part of is, you know, it's that starting all over again. If you'd have looked at what the mistakes they made, then you just repeated the whole thing over again. Okay? So walking in the mistakes and understanding it is actually healthy. That doesn't mean we're stuck in the past. By all means, no. But owning the mistakes, owning a tradition, owning it has arguments, owning my heritage, and now building up the whole mansions.
Don't be sectarian with it. By all means, don't. My guiding verse, Dean Taylor's guiding verse is this. John, Mark 9:50. The context is the apostles are coming up to Jesus and they say, Jesus, these guys are exorcising demons out of people and they're not with us. So you need to stop them. So imagine that now, what's going on there? So the apostles are thinking it's better to be demon-possessed than not do it their way. Okay? So people were getting exorcised from their demons without doing it their way.
And Jesus says, what are you talking about? He was not against me. It's for me. And he goes into description at the very end of the chapter nine. He says the statement, and I'll put the statement over the whole study of church history and our theology. Have salt in yourself and have peace with one another. It's a brilliant statement because if he would have just said, hey, have peace with everybody. It's kind of like modern evangelical fish, kind of American pop kind of thing, you know, right? Everything's okay.
Just have peace with one another, guys. That's not what he said. If he'd only said, men, have salt within yourself. No compromise. You know, we could have amended him, but he says have salt within yourself, but have peace with one another. So we should be fully convinced about our, the way I read this, we should be fully convinced, be literally salty about the things that you believe in and you stand for. But at the end of the day, have peace with one another. See that, you know, have some humility here.
I've heard the term have epistemological humility. Have an understanding that people come about this in a different way. But don't be wishy-washy. Have salt within yourself, but peace with one another. And that's how I want us to read that. And that's why I think it's so important that our theology is real, working out, and that we read through history, real, loving our enemies, understanding, oh guys, did you, oh, you were real, and understanding and not just seeing ourselves. Because the empire has started.
We have the Roman Empire and we have the baby born in the manger. And these two empires have continued on to this day. And one of my favorite statements of the Bible, he hardly answered any other question, but when Pilate started saying, are you a king? It's like everything changed. Who told you that? Did somebody else tell you that or did you get that on your own? Because you said rightly that I am a king for this cause I was born. And so this empire is the empire we're a part of, the empire of Christ.
And I think it's still going. So as we look through history, it's real. If an argument has lasted 500 years, it's probably not stupid. And we're going to explain. But now we're going to get to our quote. And this is the point that I judge, or not judge, but I even hold Vincent of Lérins accountable to his own statement, profound. Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken that we hold the faith which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all.
And that's what these statements mean here. All right, so let's look at that. Tradition is the living faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. So our scar, scripture, Christocentric, antiquity, and real. And we're going to read it in this way. Scripture, the Bible is received as a sole infallible source of authority for Christian faith and practice. Christocentric, scripture is interpreted through the person and teaching of Jesus Christ.
Antiquity, doctrine and practice should be supported whenever possible by the testimony of the early church and real. Doctrine and practice should endeavor to be rooted not only in theory, but in the living witness of faithful communities across time. All right, so let's in our few more minutes finally get to what it's going to look like for us to look at a document. Pull up from your thing, your St. Vincent of Lérins. Any question while we're pulling that up or any thoughts or, yeah, that kind of thing.
Don't forget to put your class participation test. Take that at the end of the class today and all that. And be sure to ask questions. Wait a minute. I have a question. Yes, ma'am. Well, I guess more of a thought is I read this in the pre-reading and it's very like similar to scripture. Maybe you're going to get into that, but it's not, is it actual Bible verses or is it like, maybe I'm getting it confused with something else. Some of the things I noticed were like almost like quoting scripture, but.
Okay, but not quite. Yeah, it looks different. From Vincent, you mean? Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, you're going to get that for sure. It reminds me of an old joke. I remember this Baptist pastor moved in next to his Episcopalian pastor. And as they were talking about it, his Episcopalian there had, you know, they have their book of common prayer and they're very big on their common prayer book. It's very big to them. And the Baptist pastor, he gave him the Bible.
And so he, after a few, you know, months, he asked him, he said, yeah, how'd you, what'd you think of it? He said, it was great. I had a lot of quotes from the book of common prayer. So, you know, he was so used to the book of common prayer that he saw these scriptures as quotes from them. Anyway, you're supposed to laugh there. Anyway, so that, that is, yeah, you're seeing also a different version of the scripture. So he would have been reading, you know, from a Latin Vulgate potentially and that kind of a thing.
But it's good to bring it out. So you're doing great to discern that. So, all right, so let's get into him. All right, this is our first document. So this is just a touch, the rest of the few minutes that we have of what it's going to look like to study. So here's the point, just like you were doing there. We want to get into theology as theology was being created. So when we get to Clement of Rome on Thursday, we're going to talk about election first off, predestination.
And we're going to be talking about the first word that comes out of his mouth in his epistle to Rome is about the elect. But this is 1,300 years before Calvin and Luther were born. Okay, so it's like, it's very ancient stuff. And it's before these had silos and everything. So the point that I love about Vincent of Lérins is his, is some of his warnings that he had. So just real quick, I'll do a summary of him. So I don't want to waste too much time so we can get to the text.
Born around the early 400s, this is after the Council of Ephesus, which was already getting pretty bad about using militaries to use their dogmas. And he was a military soldier. We don't know how, of course, I'd love to know the story. He stopped being a soldier and became a monk on this island and became a priest and a theologian. This island didn't look like that in the 400s, but this is the monastery today. And even then, it was a place where people came and studied.
And we believe that, you know, it was a bastion of people, you know, following. And he had this book and he's seen all the different Christians thinking and everything. And people think that one of the things that he is writing against is just some of the heresies of his day. And we think that maybe he's writing against Augustine, Augustine the Great. So he became a monk and he, and he then finally he wrote this book, which he called himself just the Pilgrim.
And this book just means like the memorandum is what the word translates from Greek, from Latin. And so he's writing against Nestorianism. That was kind of his era. And we'll get to that later. And Semipelagianism, Pelagius was who Augustine's big opponent was. And then Augustine. But people think that he is the hidden elephant in the room of the whole paper is the published works of Augustine, which were coming around in his time, which were basically arguing that God creates people to damn them.
And so we don't know. He doesn't explicitly say that anywhere. And people who defend him sometimes say, no way and all that. But that's the scholarly thing. It's interesting. He writes this canon that we have a faith that was believed always from everywhere and at all times. And it's interesting. Catholic theologians are a little more honest about talking about the development of doctrine.
And even in Vatican II, Ratzinger, who became Pope Benedict, says, okay, we're finally definitely moving away from Vincent of Lérins. We can no longer say this because we're changing stuff. Other ones today in the Roman Catholics would say that we have to change things. But let's get into it. And this will be kind of a starter, a teaser of how we're going to start doing this. So this is where we really get some good conversation into these theological points. And let's get it.
So if you have one, bring up your document and then let's discuss it. So. Just to clarify, he would have been, like you were talking earlier about there was Greek and Latin. Ah. Ooh, that's a good question. Yes, he would have been Latin. Yes, he would have been Latin living on, I didn't show an island. It's right off the island of France. So it would have been definitely on the western side of that.
And then right during his time period, Nestorius, who was branded a heretic in the Council of Ephesus in the late 300s, early 400s. And he didn't like that they were calling Mary the mother of God, Theotokos. And so the theological points between Cyril and him are going back and forth. They end up bringing in armies. It's just terrible. But anyway, it would have been the time period of this and everything that's going on. A lot of theological. So I gave one, you'll see one of the chapters I have there.
You could read this chapter just for fun. And he goes into this crazy just description of the details of the Trinity, breaking it down. It's a good exercise. So anyway, but yeah, he would have been a monk there living off an island, which would have been now in what would have become later the Roman Catholic Church. Yeah. So, but has this great statement. So let's look at this. Chapter two. How do I do this? Or do I have, what do I have? Do I have chapter? Yeah, chapter three. No, no, chapter two. I skipped one.
So the big statement, as we see, he's come here and he says, I'm looking at, and he's like, this is a teaching monastery. And he's like, how do I help these young monks, you know, study to understand what the ancient faith is? Very much like this. And so he writes this to try to explain it. And he wants to explain that it's really important to find the deposit that is given to us. It's kind of why I like this so much. It's very much what I'm trying to do in his emphasis that he puts on this.
And so the whole guiding verse is, O Timothy, guard what was committed to your trust, avoiding the profane and idle babblings and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. First Timothy 6:20. But then this statement, let's pick it up. Chapter two. So this is the general rule for distinguishing the truth of the Catholic faith from the falsehood of heretical pravity. I like these words.
I have often inquired earnestly and attentively of very many eminent for sanctity and learning how and by what sure and so to speak universal rule I might be able to distinguish the truth of the Catholic faith from the falsehood of heretical pravity. And I have always in almost every instance received an answer to this effect. And he goes on. So then he makes his statement and let's look at chapters or paragraph six there. Oh, of course he goes on. Oh, let me go. I'm sorry. Let's go back to what he.
So people just say, well, let's just look at what's in the Bible. He says in chapter five there, but there are some perhaps will say, since the canon of scripture is complete and sufficient of itself for everything and more sufficient, what need is there to join with the authority of its church interpretation, of the church's interpretation for this reason?
Because owing to the depth of Holy Scripture, all do not accept it one and the same sense, but one understands his words in one way, another, another, so that it seems to be capable of many interpretations. And we can see this certainly in our day. And then I have, and I added to each of these, tried to give a word that would bring it to our day. He says, for Novatian expands in one way, Sabellius, which is sort of oneness people, another, Donatus, which are very separatists, another, Arius, Jehovah's Witnesses.
And he goes on to these different ones all interpret the scripture in different ways. And we see this. You have your Mormon missionaries coming to your house. You see Muslims coming to your house. You see Jehovah's Witnesses certainly coming to your house. You have different little sectarian sect groups that are starting every day coming in with their thoughts of it. And everyone thinks they have an understanding of their little formula of why their church is the church. So he's making this statement.
He says this then. Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken that we hold that faith, which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all. And that's his famous statement. So just as we look at, so as we read through the apostolic, you know, the apostolic fathers, the first, you know, century, you're going to see a faith that's practiced by them.
But the other claims, what he's saying that's coming on to the church, and I would argue even in his time, it's already way past, but that comes on to the church is not something we see in that. What you're going to read when we read the Didache tomorrow is a very simple faith. So if a dogma that is later required that the church says, oh, you have to believe that, or you're not a Christian and I just might kill you, is not something that was always in all places. Does that make sense?
And so I think it's a profound statement, even if it means that he himself is in trouble to keep it. It's a profound statement. And that's what it means to be real, to be Catholic with a small c. And it helps us to be humble. A lot of times what you'll see in, and they'll say, how do you believe on predestination? Or how do you believe on the millenniums? Or the mode of baptism? Or what's your thought on the atonement? Is it penal substitutionary atonement? Or is it this kind of atonement? Or is this idea?
And there's very many silos that the church has brought in to be divisions into the church that are huge. I mean, like wars started over it, huge, that you're not going to see in the early church. So one of the reasons why I'm based upon that statement is why I want you to read the apostolic fathers this semester and get what was always, everywhere, and by all. And so you'll know then that when something comes up, that it's not there or something. So anyway, thoughts on that. So let's go to chapter three then here.
Feel free to, this is our practice for hitting the text. What is to be done if one or more dissent from the rest? What then will the Catholic Christian do if a small portion of the church have cut itself off from the communion of the universal faith? What surely, but prefer the soundness of the whole body to the unsoundness of the pestilent and corrupt member? What if some novel contagion seek to infect not merely an insignificant portion of the church, but the whole?
Then it will be the care to cleave to antiquity, which at this day cannot possible, cannot possibly be seduced by any fraud of novelty. Oh yes, it can. So his point then is, so in heresy, you'll see as we go through the church, and you'll see this even in your own churches. It's one thing to have opinions. It's another thing to say, you know what? I've got my opinion and all of you guys are wrong. And that's what ends up happening. The word heresy, it means a divider, a sectarian divider.
The word means that you've got your own little group, that you're the one that's right. And we so easily do this. And I'll give you an example. Back in the day, oh, we used to have these really big leadership seminars. Maybe y'all are old enough to remember that, some of you guys back from Lancaster. And they were huge. And people would come from everywhere. And I had a friend of mine, and he was going to a Holdeman Mennonite.
And if y'all know the Holdeman Mennonites, what's one funny thing about the Holdeman Mennonites? They're one of the one true churches, okay? And so they're also the only one who keeps Menno's funny incarnation, by the way. But they're one true church thing. And he was a doctor. He was getting out of the Air Force. The only thing he found around him was a Holdeman Mennonite. He said, so what do you think, Dean? I said, I mean, I like them. They're great. I mean, it was a good church.
I just hate that one true church doctrine, you know? Now, I'll never forget what he said. He said, well, Dean, you know, there's churches that have a doctrine that they're the one true church, but they don't really act like it. But then there's churches that have a doctrine that they're not the one true church, but they sure do act like it. I said, okay, ouch. So that kind of pride, we so easily fall into, you know? And this kind of sectarianism, you're going to see hit hard in the early church.
And the sectarianism starts to gain ground. And then when you can start adding swords to this and military power and stuff, it gets really nasty. It gets really nasty. And so he's saying here, we need to not do this. And you're going to see this echoed through the early church a lot, the sin of sectarianism. My whole biggest problem with the Orthodox and the Catholics these days is that they're not Catholic. They're incredibly sectarian. You get an Orthodox apologist online.
He goes, oh, I'd leave all the sectarian Protestantism and come to the one true church. And I'm like, I don't see Protestants these days going around, you know, doing, I don't know. I mean, we have our differences, but it's not like that kind of sectarianism is not there. And so it's very destructive and it's very, it's deceiving. Another one, I was, I got to not tell too many stories, but I was speaking at a church in Buffalo Valley. This was, oh, Laps Church, what's his name? Paul Laps. Paul Laps.
I was up there and I was giving my testimony on non-resistance. And there were these guys in the church and they had plain coats on them. They had no beards, but they had plain coats on. So I just figured they're like beachy, you know, or something like that. And I gave my testimony on non-resistance. And afterwards, I went over to them and said, oh, is this kind of what you grew up with, you know, being beachy and all that? And they said, beachy, what's that?
I said, oh, I just saw, I assumed you guys were just unmarried beachy guys. He said, oh, we're Wesleyan. But yeah, we grew up with non-resistance like this. I went, really? You're Wesleyan and you wear plain coats and you're non-resistant? He goes, yeah, that's us. And I was like, oh, I got to hear more about this. So we're going through the meal, you know, or coming. And one of the guys there at the church had left their church. So he was going along with me, grinning, you know. And we're going through the meal.
I said, I got to hear about this. A Wesleyan, non-resistant, plain coat wear in church? I want to know about this. I mean, you know, I named my kid John Wesley, you know. I like the fervor of the Wesleyans. So he's coming around and we're sitting down. I said, okay, so tell me one, you know, essence of your church. Tell me about it. He goes, well, we're non-denominational. And I said, oh, oh, well, so are we. And the guy who left, he goes, he means it differently than you. And I said, oh really?
How does he mean it? They are the church. And I went, oh no. So would that have been a break off of like a Bible holiness? It would have been a Church of God of Christ, Church of God Holiness Anderson. Yeah. Because I'm like all the... You'll see the gospel trumpet. Yeah. No, this would be, it's kind of, it's kind of like Midwest. They would have literally, we are the one true church, you know, rebaptize everybody that joins them and all that kind of a thing.
So, but the point is like, yeah, that's not fixing sectarianism by thinking you're the one true church. And we can so easily do this. So I like his point that he's trying to make us. And he's also his claim for antiquity. You can see why I liked him so much and why I had this be your first writing to read. He then says, okay, what if you even differ to that?
And he claims, and he said, but what if in antiquity itself there be found error in part of two or three men, or at any rate of a city or even of a province, then it will be care by all means to prefer the decrees if such there be of an ancient general council or to the rashness of an ignorant few. He says, you know, there should be just a few. We should start looking at, again, by all.
Let's try to get, you know, not what one tangent, but let's, as we look at this, even in the early church, try to get a feel of kind of what they're all saying. What's the emphasis of all of them? Is what he's saying. Oh, that's back to chapter two. I had those out of the way. So, Catholic by university. And this rule we shall observe if we follow. So again, I'll read it again.
Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken that we hold the faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all. For that is truly and in the strictest sense Catholic, which as the name itself, which means universal in Latin, it just means universal, which as the name itself and the reason of the thing declare comprehends all universality. This rule we shall observe if we follow universality, antiquity, and consent.
We shall follow universality if we confess that one faith to be true, which the whole church throughout the whole world confesses. Antiquity, if we in no wise depart from those interpretations which it is manifest were notoriously held by our holy ancestors and fathers. Consent in like manner if in antiquity itself we adhere to the consistent definitions and determinations of all, or at least of almost all the priests and doctors. And then chapter six.
So the other thing, and then I'll be done with it, but I do encourage you to read it. He brings up an interesting people about what if those really, really, really smart guys in the early church that ended up going off. It's a great discussion. So he talks about two things he adds to it. He says, can we ever change? And he says, yes, we change, but we still look like the original organism. So we don't morph into something completely different. Every generation must change.
Your generation must be different than my generation. You have to, you have to, the challenges that you have are challenges for your generation. They were different than mine. I have to relinquish that. I have to let you do that. But it should look like the democracy of the dead, that the voice of the antiquity still cries out in your generation as well when you're making your decisions.
But he brings out then, well, what do you do with those guys that were in church history that were just, whoa, incredibly genius, had incredible influences, but went off? And he brings up a couple of them, Origen and Tertullian. And it's interesting to watch how he talks about it. He says, the error of Origen and the great trial of the church.
We said above that in the church, God, of church of God, the teacher's error in the people's trial, a trial by so much the greater in proportion to the greater learning of the error-erring teacher. This we showed first by the authority of scripture and then by the instance of church history. Or persons who having at one time had a reputation of being sound in the faith, eventually either fell away to some sect already in existence or else founded a heresy of their own.
An important fact truly, useful to be learned and necessary to be remembered and to be illustrated and enforced again and again. By example upon example in order that all true Catholics may understand that it behooves them with the church to receive teachers, not with teachers to desert the faith of the church. In other words, you've still got to discern them to the truth. Now, this quote is great.
My belief that among many instances of this sort of trial, which might proceed, there is not one to be compared to that with Origen. And we'll get to Origen, I think next semester. Or yeah, I think it's next semester. We'll get to Origen. And he is brilliant. In whom there were many things so excellent, so unique, so admirable that antecedently anyone would readily deem that implicit faith was to be placed all his assertations.
For if the conversation and manner of life carry authority, great was his industry, great his modesty, his patience, his endurance. If his dissent or his erudition, what more noble than his birth of a house rendered illustrious by martyrdom? What shall I say of his eloquence, the style of which was so charming? He went on and on. So soft, so sweet that honey rather than words seemed to flow from his mouth.
What subjects were there, however difficult, which he did not render clear and perspicuous by the force of his reasoning? What undertaking, however hard to accomplish, which he did not make to appear most easy? But perhaps his assertations rested simply on ingeniously woven argumentation? On the contrary, no teacher ever used more proofs drawn from the scriptures. From his school came forth doctors, priests, confessors, martyrs without number.
Then one can express how much he was admired by all, how great his renown, how wide his influence. Who was there whose religion was at all above the common standard that did not hasten to him from the ends of the earth? What Christian? I love this. What Christian did not reverence him almost as a prophet? What philosopher as a master? How great was the veneration with which he was regarded?
For who in the world would lightly desert a man of so great genius, so great learning, so great influence, and who would not rather adopt that saying, this would make a good coffee cup, that he would rather be wrong with Origen than right with others? What shall I say more?
The result was that very many were led astray from the integrity of the faith, not by any human excellencies of this great man, this so great doctor, this so great prophet, but as the events shown by the two perilous trials which he proved to be.
Hence it came to pass that this Origen, such and so great as he was, wantingly abusing the grace of God, rashly following the bent of his own genius, and placing overmuch confidence in himself, making light account of the ancient simplicity of the Christian religion, pursuing that he knew more than all the worlds beside, despising the traditions of the church and the determinations of the ancients, and interpreting certain passages of scriptures in a novel way, deserved for himself the warning given to the church
of God, as applicable in his case as in that of others.
If there arise a prophet in the midst of you, you shall not hearken to his words, for he is not a prophet, because the Lord your God does not make trial of you whether you love him or not. So the point here is that he's saying that these people in their own genius and going on and on and on got away from the simplicity of the faith. I like that. And it's good for us to kind of see that as we read through these people, is that everywhere, always, and by all. And as we see people like Origen, he gets weird.
He starts getting to some strange stuff about the Trinity, strange stuff of separating and the atonement, but still brilliant stuff. And we'll read Origen, and he has some brilliant stuff. And he brings the same thing about Tertullian. Tertullian, later in his life, believed to guide into that Montanist heresy, which was the belief that the Holy Spirit was giving new revelation on ascetic lifestyle and that kind of a thing.
He says, every sentence of his was a book, and every, he goes on and on, like he did about Origen, and all that kind of thing. So I don't know. I have you to read this, to put this as sort of like a burning statement for us as we read, and I'll close with a statement. Moreover, in the Catholic Church itself, and I should put that in a small c, all possible care must be taken that we hold the faith which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all. And so there it is.
So okay, so that is our introduction to the Apostolic Quadrilateral, and just a sample. Tomorrow, I'll give you a little bit, and then I believe we're getting into the Didache. So I have an audio version of the Didache. We will go through the entirety of the Didache here. So be ready to grab into, and we're going to start talking about theological subjects. We're going to talk about communion. We're going to talk about modes of baptism.
We're going to talk about congregationalism versus being in a synod or something. And we're going to talk about some of those things, and it's all right there in the Didache. But if you're going to get a little ahead, if you're just really behind already, do Clement of Rome. Clement of Rome is a little bit longer. We'll do that on Thursday. And I do have an audio version in your thing. You can listen to it at two times speed. It'll read just like, it'll sound like an Epistle of Paul.
And he was, and it's very much, and we're going to get into Clement of Rome. And I want you to engage in it, into the theological points that are brought up in Clement of Rome. And then on Friday, I'm just going to kind of give you the beginning and the end, the start of the Roman Empire through Julius Caesar and Augustus. So you have kind of an understanding of how that affects us through our history. So that's it.
Thank you very much, and looking forward to tomorrow to digging into our first real text study, the Didache. Any questions or anything? Yep. Yes, sir. Sounds like the statement is sort of like we were talking about the doctor thing. This is sort of shape. This is where it. Yeah. This comes out of it, exactly. Like what you're going to get to Clement of Rome, and you know, you say, well, how does the Rome, didn't the Roman Catholics ever read Constantine?
Yeah, but you're going to see that they take a statement there, and everyone has their points. You're going to see Calvinists look at the election passages, and we're going to say, is that really what Clement of Rome is saying? And the Didache and these different ones, and you're going to see people have their, everybody, nobody, no group likes to move too far from the Apostolic Fathers. Everybody likes to claim them. You're a little nervous if you've left the Apostolic Fathers.
You know, Origen, one thing, but boy, the first hundred years, if you can't even get in there, then, you know, so anyway, but yes, this is, this is kind of hoping to help us keep what's important. Yeah. Yeah. Good question. All right. So don't forget to practice your click on class participation and test, and then do that, and then we'll go for it. So yeah. Thank you very much. We are excited to partner with you on your journey of learning, faith, and service.
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