Hi, I'm David Bercot, and tonight we're going to be talking about what we could learn from the early Christians but don't. First, we'll discuss what we could learn, and then we'll talk about why most Christians don't learn anything from the early church. But perhaps I should begin by explaining what I mean by the term "early Christians." When I use that term, I'm referring to the Christians who lived from the time of Christ up to the Council of Nicaea in AD 325.
Now, you may be wondering how we can learn from the early Christians. I mean, after all, they died over 1,700 years ago. We can't talk with them. Well, thanks to God's providence, we have their writings, volumes and volumes of them. So we have a fairly complete picture of how they lived, how they worshiped, and how they understood the New Testament. So what can we learn from them?
Well, to begin with, since they lived so close to the time of the apostles, their writings are our best aid to help us understand the Scriptures the same way the New Testament Christians understood them. In fact, some of the early Christian writers actually knew the apostles and had been personally discipled by them. But you may ask, why do we need an aid at all? Can't we just go by the Bible alone? Well, of course we can.
I'm going to be sharing with you six things we can learn from the early Christians, and none of these things involve adding anything to your Bible. In fact, it's just the opposite. The early Christian writings can help us realize what humans have already added to the Bible so you can let the Bible itself speak. So let's suppose that you read the early Christian writings to get more insight on the Scriptures. What exactly will you learn from them?
Well, first, you'll quickly discover that the information in commentaries and Bible dictionaries is often inaccurate. Even worse, it's often made up. The early Christians typically knew nothing about the things these reference works claim about them. In my book, Will the Theologians Please Sit Down, I detail the inaccurate information that commentaries contain about 1 Corinthians 11, for example, which talks about the head covering.
Most commentaries today will tell you that the only women in Corinth who went out in public without a veil or head covering were prostitutes. But the early Christians don't know anything about that. In fact, they make it clear that plenty of women in the ancient world went in public without veils or head coverings. The prostitute claim is something made up by commentators. They have no source for their information.
In fact, as near as I've been able to tell, that story began with Adam Clarke, the 19th-century commentator, so it's not even very old at all. Before reading the early Christians, I assumed that commentators had writings contemporaneous with the New Testament or at least written in that time period. I thought that that's where they were getting their information.
After all, they act as though they have inside knowledge on what was going on in New Testament congregations and what was going on in the ancient world of that time. But the truth of the matter is that the only Christian sources we have are the writings of the so-called Ante-Nicene Fathers. And after I read the entire set of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, it was clear to me that these writings are not the source of the information contained in today's commentaries.
In other words, those commentaries have no primary source. Well, what do I mean by a primary source? Well, a primary source is the original piece of evidence. For example, if you wanted to find out how the early Christians dressed, the primary source would be their own writings. Something written in the 19th century would not be a primary source because the writer would not have been around during the days of the early Christians.
A primary source would be contemporaneous with the early Christians, so you would have to go to their writings, or another primary source about how they dressed would be the pictures they painted in the catacombs. So what I learned from having read the early Christian writings is to never settle for anything less than information that comes from primary sources. And the information contained in Bible encyclopedias, Bible dictionaries, and Bible commentaries rarely is based on primary sources.
But please don't misunderstand me. I own Bible dictionaries and Bible encyclopedias, and I refer to them from time to time. Occasionally, I'll even look at a commentary. But if the writers in those works can't cite a source for their assertions, then I look at it very skeptically. That's because if you have a primary source for your information, you're normally going to cite it.
If you can say, "Now, Tertullian says this," or "Josephus says this," or "Ignatius, who was a disciple of the apostle John, says this," you're going to bring that out. The second thing you will notice from reading the early Christian writings is that back then, Christians took the New Testament commandments very literally and very seriously. If Jesus said to love your enemies, then they loved their enemies. If he said, "Don't swear at all," then the early Christians didn't swear at all.
If the Bible says not to eat blood or things sacrificed to idols, then they didn't eat blood or things sacrificed to idols. If the Bible says for a woman to cover her head when praying or prophesying, then the early Christian women covered their heads when praying or prophesying.
If the Bible says for the women to adorn themselves in modest apparel with propriety and moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, then Christian women back then adorned themselves with modest apparel and not with braided hair, gold, pearls, or costly clothing. If the Scriptures say to greet one another with a holy kiss, then they greeted one another with a holy kiss. If the Bible says not to take your brother to court, they didn't take their brother to court. And so on and so on.
If it was commanded by our Lord, then they obeyed it. I don't mean that they obeyed it perfectly, but they certainly didn't abrogate any of the commandments or say that they weren't meant to be followed. Now, there should be nothing surprising about that. It's what we should expect to find.
However, over the centuries, Christians started ignoring or nullifying so many New Testament commandments that I myself found it a bit surprising to learn that the early Christians were obeying many commandments that I had been taught we don't need to obey. It was a rude awakening for me. But I'm so glad I was jolted out of my complacency when I was relatively young and could still turn my life around.
Now, this second point that they took the commandments seriously and literally is very closely tied to the first point I mentioned, which was the fact that commentaries make up a lot of things. And quite often, commentaries do that in order to abrogate a specific commandment in the New Testament that isn't popular today. This is certainly what they've done with regard to the biblical teaching on the head covering. It's what they've done with Jesus's teachings on divorce.
Some have done that even with the New Testament teachings on homosexuality. So up to this point, we've talked about two of the things we can learn from the early Christian writings. One, that Bible dictionaries and commentaries are often inaccurate and false. And two, that originally Christians took the New Testament commandments very seriously and very literally. The third thing their writings can do for you is to open your eyes to your own preconceptions. That is, if you read them with an open mind.
Before I first read the early Christian writings back in 1985, I would have said that I go by just the Bible alone. But when I began reading their writings, I quickly realized that their beliefs were quite different from my own in many areas. Well, naturally, I assumed that they were the ones who were off base, not me. But when I went back and reread the New Testament, I realized that everything they believed is right there in the New Testament.
In fact, invariably, what they believed is the most natural, literal reading of the New Testament. So the issue wasn't that I went by the Bible and they didn't. No, they went by the Bible as well. So this was puzzling. If I was going just by what the Bible teaches and they were going by just what the Bible teaches, how come we didn't both believe the same thing? When I did some honest self-examination, I realized that the problem was my preconceptions.
Like most Christians, I hadn't come to my belief system by reading the Bible alone. No, from the time I was a young boy, I had been indoctrinated by others. Even after I left the sect I had grown up with, I was still heavily influenced by commentaries, pastors, sermons, study Bibles, Sunday school curriculum, and other Christian literature. I had not come to my beliefs just from reading the Bible alone.
Every time I picked up the Bible to read it, all of these preconceptions that had been inculcated in me drowned out the literal words of Scripture. You know, it's amazing how much our preconceptions affect us in every sphere of life. A couple of years ago, I had surgery done on my knee to repair some cartilage. It was arthroscopic surgery done at an outpatient clinic. It was all a pretty easy, simple procedure that didn't take very long. Well, a year later, my wife needed some routine surgery.
She and I met with her doctor, and the doctor said the surgery would be done in about two weeks at the same-day services division of the local hospital. Well, because my own surgery was at an outpatient clinic, I immediately took the expression "same-day services" to mean outpatient building. So during those entire two weeks, as we made preparations for the surgery, I had it fixed in my mind that the surgery would be at the hospital's outpatient clinic.
Even though my wife mentioned same-day services dozens of times, and even though the written instructions given said to go to the same-day services wing of the hospital, I still had it fixed in my mind that the surgery would be at the hospital's outpatient clinic. So on the morning of the scheduled surgery, I drove my wife, Deborah, into town using the directions on the handout given us. Following those directions, I suddenly found myself in the hospital's main parking lot.
"Well, there's some mistake here," I said to my wife. "We're supposed to be going to the outpatient clinic." "No," she replied, "we're supposed to go to the same-day services." She then pointed to the large letters above the door of the wing of the hospital we were at. They read "same-day services." "You mean the surgery is going to be in the hospital?" I asked in disbelief.
"Not at a separate clinic?" "Yes, of course," she replied, "at the hospital." "But I'm sure the doctor said it would be at an outpatient clinic," I argued, still not convinced. "No, the doctor said it would be at the same-day services section of the hospital," my wife answered. "No one has ever said anything about an outpatient clinic." Well, shaking my head in disbelief, I led my wife into the hospital, and she got checked in.
And once she was taken in for surgery, I pondered how I got so mixed up about the whole thing. I eventually realized it was my own preconceptions. When I had first heard the phrase "same-day services," I had equated it with the term "outpatient services." Thereafter, I was blinded by everything else that was said because of my own preconceptions. Well, when it comes to understanding Scripture, that's the situation we're all in.
Regardless of what church we belong to, we didn't arrive at our belief systems in a vacuum. No, we've all been instructed or indoctrinated in "what the Bible really means." As a result, we can read the exact words of Scripture, yet those words never penetrate our mind. It's like me and my preconception about same-day services. Once my mind had decided that same-day services meant outpatient services, thereafter that's all my mind ever heard or read.
Well, happily, there were no consequences to my preconceptions about same-day services. It didn't make us late to the hospital or anything. But there can be eternal consequences to our preconceptions about what the Bible says. If we're blinded to the clear teachings and commandments of Scripture, the consequences can be very severe. So one of the biggest benefits I received from reading the early Christian writings was that they opened my eyes to my own preconceptions.
That's because in almost every case, what the early Christians believed about any subject is the same thing anyone would believe about that subject if they did the following: one, started with a blank slate without any preconceptions; and two, collected together every New Testament passage dealing with that subject; and three, took all those verses literally. And because that's the case, I eventually had to admit that where my beliefs differed from theirs on most topics, it was because of my own preconceptions.
I had been blinded to the clear language of Scripture because of all of the instruction and indoctrination I had received over the years. But after reading the early Christian writings, I could hardly believe how many clear passages of Scripture there were that I had ignored or explained away all my life. And so I'm convinced that the greatest thing the early Christian writings have done for me is to open my eyes to all this. Their writings enabled me to realize that I was not listening to the Scriptures alone.
Every time I read a passage of Scripture, all of my preconceptions drowned out the actual language of the Bible, as I said earlier. And those writings can do the same thing for you. You know, one of the main criticisms I've received over the years is that I supposedly teach that we can't go by just the Bible alone. We need the early Christian writings as well. They say that I teach that we have to add something to Scripture. But just the opposite is true.
The early Christian writings don't make me feel like I can't go by the Bible alone. Rather, they've helped me to see that I can go by the literal reading of the Scriptures. I don't need commentaries and study Bibles to make sure I'm understanding the Bible correctly. And I don't need any of the doctrinal systems that theologians have come up with. What the Bible says is exactly what it means. In fact, let's look at the three things I've mentioned so far that we can learn from the early Christians.
One, that the information in commentaries and Bible dictionaries is often inaccurate and false. Now, is that adding something to Scripture? No, it's just the opposite. It's saying we don't need these supplemental human works. It's the commentaries that add and take away from the Scriptures. All right, the second point we've talked about is that originally Christians took the New Testament commandments very seriously and very literally. Again, does that add anything to Scripture? No, it's just the opposite again.
It's a lesson to us that we shouldn't listen to commentaries, preachers, and Christian books that say we don't have to obey what the New Testament clearly says. And third, we've talked about the fact that the early Christian writings can open our eyes to our own preconceptions. Once again, does that add anything to Scripture? No, it helps us to see what we have added to Scripture and what we've taken away from Scripture.
It helps clear the blinders off our eyes so we can listen to the Scriptures to hear what they're actually saying. And this leads to the fourth thing that we can learn from the early Christians. That is, they teach us that we must take the totality of what the New Testament says on any subject. Now, that may seem like a rather obvious point, but the truth is that's not how most churches approach the Bible.
Now, they may think that they take the totality of Scripture for their belief systems, but in reality, they don't. Instead, what most churches do is to mine the Scriptures for proof texts. That is, they take a verse here and another verse over there, and they patch together a belief system that leaves out a lot of what the New Testament says. In fact, typically, such doctrinal systems leave out a lot of what Jesus himself taught. They leave out all the verses of the Bible that don't fit into their system.
Or if they can't ignore these other verses, they explain them away. Well, the early Christian writings opened my eyes to all of that. They opened my eyes to the fact that my belief system was built upon a patchwork of proof texts taken from scattered portions of the New Testament. And I could see that this was no way to find truth. In fact, it was as a result of reading the early Christian writings that I first realized that the original Scriptures didn't have chapters and verses.
The chapter and verse divisions are man-made additions to Scripture. They were made around the time of the Reformation. Now, to be sure, they are very handy. They make it easy to reference and cite Scriptures. And they make it easy when you're preaching to have the whole congregation look up a Scripture passage with you.
I mean, without chapters and verses, you'd have to say, "Let's now turn to the Gospel of Matthew." And if you flip about a third of the way through the book, you'll find a passage that says, "A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master." Now, that would be pretty awkward, and probably the result would be we would just read the Scriptures and not ask people to follow along. So the addition of chapters and verses has certainly been helpful in many ways.
On the other hand, this man-made division of chapters and verses leads us to think that we can cherry-pick a verse from here and another verse from over there. Without the division of chapters and verses, a person is forced to read the entire context of a passage. Each sentence is connected to another sentence. Now, I'm not advocating that we all get rid of our present Bibles and try to find Bible translations without chapters and verses. I don't even know if there are any such translations around.
No, but what I'm saying is that we need to mentally approach the Scriptures as though those man-made chapter and verse designations weren't there. We need to recognize that those are man-made, and so we must take the totality of what the New Testament says on any subject. And that leads us to the fifth thing we can learn from the early Christians, which is that our whole approach to the New Testament is wrong. Now, that's a rather bold statement, isn't it? So let me explain.
To begin with, churches today focus on theology. The early Christians focused on discipleship, living the Christian life. Most, but not all, of the church divisions we've had since the Reformation have been over theological doctrines. Now, there were two major church divisions before the Council of Nicaea, before the year 325, and that was the schisms of the Novatianists and the Donatists. And they both were over church discipline and lifestyle issues, not over theology.
Now, let's look at some of the reasons why churches focus so much today on theology. One is that Christians today don't want to live by the New Testament commandments. By focusing on theology, churches find it easier to shove the commandments into the background. Another reason why modern churches focus so much on theology is that essentially they believe that we are saved by theology. I realize they say we're saved by faith alone, but that faith has to fall within the perimeters of their theology.
Certainly, most evangelical churches teach that obedience plays no role at all in our salvation. So obedience to Jesus's commandments is a side issue. But there's a third reason why churches today focus so much on theology. And that's because they emphasize the epistles over the teachings of Jesus.
We've all heard of the expression, "The Romans Road to salvation." So when evangelical churches today make converts, they immediately indoctrinate those converts with the idea that Romans is the chief book of the New Testament. In fact, Martin Luther specifically taught that it was so. One of my friends is a former Baptist preacher. He pastored a Baptist church that was very Calvinistic. And he told me that what he was taught in seminary is that, "We don't go to the Gospels for theology.
We go to the epistles for theology." Now, I don't know if most seminaries would make that exact statement, but it is what they do in practice, whether or not they acknowledge it. As a result, in most evangelical churches today, Jesus's teachings are treated as though they are almost irrelevant. Now, the early Christians would have viewed this as one of the greatest blasphemies. "You don't place Jesus's teachings at the center of Christianity?" they would have asked.
"The Sermon on the Mount is just some nice thoughts for today? Or are you saying Jesus's teachings applied to a different dispensation than the Gospel age?" They would have been in disbelief. "What heresy!" they would have said. "What blasphemy!" Also, "What stupidity!" I mean, Jesus told us that a disciple is not above his teacher. So it's only common sense that we start with the teacher.
Then, once we have obtained a solid grasp on what Jesus taught, the teacher, and only then do we go to the teachings of the apostles. And we interpret what the apostles said in their epistles in light of the Gospel already laid down by Jesus. Now, I have to admit that I got sucked into that whole system myself, thinking that the most important thing is to get all of our theological doctrines right.
And even after I saw that the early Christians emphasized lifestyle over doctrine, it was hard for me to let go of what had become ingrained in me. What helped me to finally let go is when I realized that Jesus himself talked so little about theology. If you collect together all of Jesus's words, the red letter words that appear in many Bibles, you'll find that only a very small percentage of them have to do with theology.
Nearly all of his teachings were about how God wants us to live, how he wants us to treat our fellow man. And if a person starts his study of the New Testament by beginning with the teachings of Jesus and the life of Jesus described in the four Gospels, he isn't likely to walk away thinking that what Jesus cares about most are our theological opinions. But you see, churches today do everything topsy-turvy.
They start with the epistles, the disciples, and then they interpret those epistles in such a way as to make a person think that the main focus of Paul and the other apostles was theology, when in fact it wasn't. And only then do they go to the teacher, the master, Jesus himself. And since then Jesus's teachings don't fit the way those churches have interpreted Paul, well, they decide that Jesus's teachings don't apply to Christians. They're either for a future age or for a past age.
And since they push Jesus's teachings into the background, most churches completely miss the significance of the Kingdom of God. If churches began their understanding of Christianity with the teachings of Jesus, if they focused on Jesus's words, they couldn't possibly miss the significance of the Kingdom. That's because it was the very theme of Jesus's preaching. He talked about the Kingdom more than he talked about any other subject.
So if churches focused on Jesus's teachings, then the Kingdom would be the main topic you would hear preached from church pulpits Sunday after Sunday instead of personal salvation. Now, to be sure, personal salvation is a very important part of the Kingdom, but it is only part of it. It's not the center of it. But before we go any further, let's briefly review what we've covered so far. We've discussed five things we can learn from the early Christians.
One, that the information in commentaries and Bible dictionaries is often inaccurate and false. Two, that originally Christians took the New Testament commandments very seriously and very literally. Three, we learned that the early Christian writings can open our eyes to our own preconceptions that are blinding us to the actual words of Scripture. Four, we can learn from them that we must take the totality of what the New Testament says on any given subject instead of pulling proof texts from here and there.
And fifth, we can learn from them that the whole approach of modern churches to the New Testament is wrong. They emphasize theology over discipleship. They lift Paul's writings above Jesus's teachings. And they totally miss the Kingdom, the theme of Jesus's preaching. Now, have any of these five things involved adding something to Scripture? No, not in the least. All five are about getting rid of man-made additions and reading the Scriptures in their natural sense and in their natural order.
The sixth thing that we can learn from the early Christians is a better understanding of the New Testament Greek. When I read the early Christian writings for the first time, I immediately noticed that in many New Testament passages, they were obviously understanding the Greek differently than the way our English translations render those passages.
Now, this surprised me because I had always assumed that our Bible translators have consulted the writings of the early Christians to know how they understood the New Testament Greek. After all, what better place could you go to in order to see how Christians were understanding the New Testament Greek in ancient times? Not only did these men live in the same era as the apostles, they were people whose native language was Koine Greek. They not only wrote it, they spoke it, and they thought in it.
They were obviously much better equipped to understand first-century Koine Greek than someone living 2,000 years later. Think about it for a moment. How can anyone today know what a Greek word or phrase meant to Christians living in the first century? You see, it's not sufficient to know what those Greek words mean today. The Greek language has gone through 2,000 years of changes since the New Testament was written. And it's not sufficient to understand the Greek in Plato's writings, for example.
He lived over 300 years before the New Testament was written. And he wrote in classical Greek, not in the everyday Koine Greek that the New Testament was written in. I mean, what a word means in one age isn't necessarily what that word means in a different age. Let me give you some illustrations in English to help you understand the problem. The English word keen today means sharp, like the edge of a knife, or it can mean intelligent.
But when I was a boy, in the everyday language of the time, keen also meant cool or neat, as in, "Hey, that's cool." Now, someone who wasn't around in the 1950s probably wouldn't know that keen ever had that meaning because it lost that sense of meaning, I don't know, probably by 1960 or sometime in there. Now, suppose someone today is reading the following sentence that was, in our illustration, written back in the 1950s.
The sentence says, "Hey, that new pocket knife you have is keen." Well, the modern reader in the 21st century would probably think that the speaker was saying that the pocket knife had a sharp blade. But what the speaker was actually saying was that the knife was cool. It was great. You see, it's not enough to be a linguist when you're translating New Testament Greek. You also have to be a historian, or you're not going to catch all the special meanings and idioms that were around in the New Testament era.
I'll give you another example from the English language. I'm going to ask you to interpret this sentence. "A mouse sat on Sally's desk next to her coffee cup." Now, if that sentence were written today, it would probably mean that a computer pointing device was on her desk next to her coffee cup. But it could mean that a small rodent was on her desk. There's two possibilities. But if the sentence was written in 1960, there would be only one possibility. It's talking about a small rodent.
Now, none of us know how long people will be using a computer mouse. But if the Lord tarries, perhaps 50 years from now, we'll be using some other kind of device that's totally different. And more than likely, the word mouse will eventually only have one meaning again, and that will be a small rodent. But suppose someone 2,000 years from now is trying to translate 21st-century English into another language. Suppose that person comes upon the sentence that I just read to you.
Well, unless the translator also knew a lot about the history of the 21st century, he or she would probably have no idea that the word mouse had this other second meaning during a certain span of years from, say, 1980 to 2060. So can you see where the early Christian writings can be such a huge help when it comes to Greek? Since they lived in basically the same era as the apostles, their knowledge of Koine Greek was obviously better than the knowledge that academians have today.
As a result, we can learn a lot from them about New Testament Greek. I should say we could learn it because it seems to me that most Bible translators don't. I get the impression they've never read the early Christian writings. I want to give you a few examples of things I've learned about New Testament Greek from reading the early Christian writings. Now, some of these things are just interesting tidbits with no great significance, but others have a great deal of significance.
I'll start with one that is merely a point of interest. This is a passage in John 4:10-14. This is talking about Jesus and the Samaritan woman, and it says, "Jesus answered and said to her, 'If you knew the gift of God and who it is who says to you, 'Give me a drink,' you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.' The woman said to him, 'Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?' Jesus answered and said to her, 'Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.'" When you hear the expression living water, what do you think it means?
Well, I had always assumed it meant life-giving water or supernatural water or something like that. But notice the Samaritan woman's response in verses 11 and 12. She said, "Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob?" Let me ask you, does her reply in any way indicate that the phrase living water was an unusual phrase to her? No, her reply indicates it was a common expression.
She doesn't ask Jesus, "What on earth is living water?" Nor does she respond by asking, "How can water be living?" No, she merely asks him where he's going to get that living water. Now, all of that escaped me before I read the early Christian writings. But one day I was reading a very early writing known as the Didache. It may have been written as early as the year 70 AD. And as I was reading, I suddenly noticed something interesting. I'll read the passage to you. It says, "Baptize in this manner.
When you have gone over these things, baptize in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit in living water. If you do not have living water, baptize in other water." Did anything in that passage catch your attention? It's the expression living water, isn't it? From the context, what did living water mean at that time? It obviously meant running water, didn't it? In fact, that's how some translations of the Didache render it. So Jesus was telling the Samaritan woman that he had running water.
That's why her response is so normal and mundane. She thinks he's talking about a spring of water that's gushing out somewhere. "So where are you going to get this running water?" she asks him. "You don't even have a bucket to scoop it up." Then Jesus explains that he's not talking about ordinary water, but about something supernatural. Anyway, that's just an interesting tidbit. But the next example I want to give you does have some doctrinal significance.
This passage is 2 Corinthians 3:5-6, which reads, "Our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit," and Spirit with a capital S. "For the letter kills, but the Spirit capital S gives life." Now, as I indicated when I was reading, in my Bible, which is the New King James Version, the word Spirit is capitalized in both places in that verse. I assume it is in your translation as well.
Well, based on such a translation, the sense of the verse seems to be that God's laws kill, but the Holy Spirit gives life. And this fits what Protestant theologians teach, which is that in the new covenant, Christians aren't under any laws. We simply look to the Holy Spirit to give us life. But the early Christians didn't understand that verse to be saying that at all.
They were understanding the verse to say that in the new covenant, we are not under the letter of the Mosaic law, but we are under the Spirit of that law. "For the letter of the Mosaic law kills, but the Spirit of the Mosaic law gives everlasting life." To put it another way, Jesus told us that the whole law and prophets hang on the two great commandments: to love God and to love our fellow man. That's the Spirit of the law.
Christians aren't under the letter of the Mosaic law, all of the minute commandments, but we are under the Spirit of it to love our fellow man, to love God, to exercise justice and mercy. Now, you may be wondering how people can come up with such differing understandings of the same verse, of the same Greek words. The reason is that the early New Testament manuscripts are written in all uppercase or capital letters.
So a person translating the Greek has to decide which words should be capitalized in English and which words shouldn't be. The manuscript itself doesn't indicate where to capitalize and where not to capitalize. So the first translation, the one I read to you of 2 Corinthians 3, it's not grammatically incorrect, but it is an interpretation of that particular passage. And it's an interpretation that is different from the way the early Christians understood it.
Now, I would say at a minimum, the translators should have added a margin note there explaining that this verse could be translated two different ways. That would at least make those of us who don't read Greek aware of that fact. But there's more to it than that. You see, we have an expression in English concerning the letter of the law versus the Spirit of the law. For example, a person rushing to the hospital might be pulled over for speeding.
But the driver would probably tell the police officer, "Well, maybe I broke the letter of the law, but not the Spirit of it. I had an emergency here." We're all familiar with that expression, right? Interestingly, you see, they had the same expression in ancient Greek. I'm guessing, in fact, that's where the expression probably originated was in ancient Greek.
So it's only natural that the early Christians understood Paul to be talking about the letter of the law versus the Spirit of it, since that was a common expression. Let me go to another example that has doctrinal significance. But this next example is only apparent to persons using the NIV or the English Standard Version or other recent translations based on the Nestle Aland critical text. The verse is John 1:18.
In the NIV, the New International Version, this verse reads, "No one has ever seen God, but God, the one and only who is at the Father's side, has made him known." The English Standard Version reads, "No one has ever seen God, the only God who is at the Father's side, he has made him known." Now, just on the face of them, those translations don't make any sense. "No one has seen God, but the only God has made him known." What is that supposed to mean? How has he made God known if he is the only God?
But what the Greek actually says is, "No one has seen God, the only begotten God has made him known." The Greek word that the NIV translates as the one and only is monogenes, which means only begotten. Mono means only, and genes means begotten. Now, the early Christians found nothing odd about the expression only begotten God. They frequently refer to the Father as the unbegotten God and to Jesus as the only begotten God because he was begotten from the Father.
Translators shouldn't find the expression strange because it's the very language of the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed says that Jesus is the only begotten Son of the Father and that he is God from God, true God from true God. So he is the only begotten God. If you've listened to my CD on what the early Christians believed about the Trinity or what they believed about the Father and the Son, you're familiar with the original understanding of the Trinity and how Augustine confused nature and person.
As a result of Augustine, Western Christians have had a confused understanding of the relationship of the Father and the Son. The fact that modern translators translate this verse in such an odd manner shows that they don't have a correct understanding of the historical teaching of the Trinity or of the Nicene Creed. If they did, they'd have no problem translating it just the way it reads, the only begotten God.
I have found no instance anywhere in the early Christian writings where monogenes, only begotten, has the meaning one and only or only. It means just what it says, only begotten. Incidentally, the textus receptus, the Greek text the King James and the New King James were translated from, reads only begotten Son in John 1:18 instead of only begotten God. So which one is the correct reading, only begotten Son or only begotten God? Well, the answer is nobody knows.
I've seen it quoted both ways by Christian writers before the year 200. So the different rendering was made very early in Christian history, and either one is theologically correct. I want to give you one more example of something we can learn about New Testament Greek from the early Christians. Now, usually what we can learn from them is from something they said, but we can also learn from things they didn't say. And the Greek word agape is a perfect example of that.
Like most of you, I grew up being taught that agape, which is one of the Greek words for love, has a special meaning that differentiates itself from other Greek words for love, such as eros or philia. I was taught that agape love is the highest form of love, that it's a principal love, that it means seeking the highest good of another person. I was taught that only a person who has been born again and who has the indwelling of the Holy Spirit can have agape love.
For example, let me read to you one reference source what it says about agape. It says, "Agape represents an attitude of love that is non-selfish. It has a selfless interest with its focus on primary giving to others. Agape can be described as unconditional, positive regard, a personal state of mind that spurs us into helpful, needful action in personal simplicity, humility, compassion, and equanimity.
Agape is the higher form, manifestation of God's true love for all of us, which we all still do need to personally have, promote, and cultivate by letting God have full control of our lives. The Greek word agape is mostly foreign to classical Greek because its origin is from God.
The first disciples of Jesus Christ were incapable of agape love until after Pentecost, for agape love comes from the Holy Spirit alone." And I'm sure there were many times in my own life that I gave sermons and Sunday school lessons saying things very similar to the passage I just read to you. So you can imagine my surprise when I read the early Christian writings and noticed that they don't seem to know anything special about the Greek word agape.
They use the word a lot, but they never indicate that it carries a meaning unfamiliar to pagans. So that made me start digging. I searched through the New Testament to see the various ways the word agape is used there. And I found, of course, that it's used when talking about God's love for us. It's used in 1 Corinthians 13, the famous chapter about love. But I also found that agape is used in various passages throughout the New Testament that talk about an entirely different kind of love.
Let me give you some examples. In each of the passages I'm about to read to you, the word love is used, and in each instance, the Bible writer used the verb form of the word agape. Luke 6:32 says, "Even sinners love those who love them." That's agape. So they have love, even sinners. Luke 11:43, Jesus said, "Woe to you, Pharisees, for you love the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces." Guess what Greek word is there? Love, for love. It's agape.
John 3:19, "The light has come into the world, and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil." And the word there is agape again. So you can have agape love for darkness, for evil. John 12:43, where Jesus says, "They loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." That too is agape. Even more surprising is 2 Timothy 4:10, where Paul says, "Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world." That's agape love that Demas had for this present world when he forsook Paul.
2 Peter 2:15, talking about wicked people who had infiltrated the church, he says, "They have forsaken the right way and gone astray, following the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness." That was agape love. Finally, 1 John 2:15, "Do not love the world or the things in the world." And again, the word there is agape. Well, all I can say is so much for our learned Greek experts.
If they had only read the early Christian writings, they would have known that agape in itself has no special meaning. It simply means love, and it can be a good love or a bad love. In fact, after checking the New Testament usages of agape, I went to the Greek Septuagint. This was the first translation made of the Old Testament, the Hebrew scriptures into Greek. And it was the Old Testament that the early Christians used. And I discovered that agape is used all throughout the Greek Old Testament.
Even in the Song of Solomon, in those mushy verses about romantic love, the Greek word used there is agape. Once again, let's review the things we can learn from the early Christians. One, that the information in commentaries and Bible dictionaries is often inaccurate and false. Two, that originally Christians took the New Testament commandments very seriously and very literally. Three, the early Christian writings can open our eyes to our own preconceptions.
Maybe we're not letting the Bible really speak to us because we've approached it with a mind that's closed, that thinks it already knows what the scriptures are saying. Four, we can learn from them that we must take the totality of what the New Testament teaches on any subject instead of just pulling proof texts here and there. Number five, we can learn from them that the whole approach of modern churches to the New Testament is wrong. Modern churches emphasize theology over discipleship.
They lift Paul's writings above Jesus's teachings, and they totally miss the kingdom, the very theme of what Jesus preached about. And finally, we can come to a much more accurate understanding of New Testament Greek by looking at how they understood this Greek. This was their native tongue. They not only wrote in Koine Greek, but they thought in it. Now, none of these things that I've listed have anything to do with adding to scripture or taking away from it.
What they do is help us to obtain a better grasp of what the New Testament is actually teaching. And that's a blessing. So we come to the question then, why doesn't the whole church enjoy these blessings? Why is it that we don't learn from the early Christians? Well, perhaps I can best answer that question by giving you an illustration. I used to practice title law, and in the course of that, I sometimes discovered that people were living on land to which they didn't have good title.
Now, let's suppose that you're building a new house on a tract of land you inherited from your grandparents. You assumed your grandparents had good title to it. You've poured the foundation and done the initial framing, but then one day I come by and say, "Listen, I hate to tell you this, but as a friend, I think I should let you know that you don't have title to this tract of land. You're building your house on someone else's land.
I know you've already invested quite a bit of money in the work you've done, but I thought you'd rather know now before you put any more money into your house." I then show you the evidence for what I'm saying. Now, you could respond to this in one of several ways. Some people would just get angry at me and say, "Why don't you mind your own business? What do you think you are bringing me this news? Get off my land." And then they would just go on building. Some people would just go into denial.
"Oh, you can't go by the records at the courthouse. The clerks who worked there in the olden days didn't know what they were doing. They're silly to give any credence to their records." And they would just go on building. But some people would thank me. They would say, "I hate to hear I've been building on land I don't even own, but I'm sure glad to find out now instead of after I had finished building the house." Well, it works the same way with the early Christian writings.
What they reveal will almost certainly go against some of your preconceptions. The light they shed on the New Testament might mean you need to make some changes in your life. That's what they did for me. Or maybe the light from their writings will show you that you need to change some of your theological beliefs. That's also what happened to me. But in light of this, some people just get mad at me. "Why are you bringing this up?
You shouldn't be writing about the early Christians." In fact, from the responses I sometimes get, I get the impression that some people think I wrote the early Christian writings myself. Other people just go into denial. They don't want to have to make any changes in their life or in their theology. If they're wrong, they don't want to know about it. So they just brush it off by saying things like, "Well, you can't go by the early Christians.
They started falling into heresy as soon as the apostles died." I always find that claim interesting. Mere human teachers like Martin Luther, John Calvin, and John Wesley, they've all started churches that still teach the same theology centuries later. In fact, the people who claim the church went in error as soon as the apostles died. Nearly always belonged to a church themselves that has held to the same theological doctrines for a century or more.
But somehow the apostles who were handpicked by Jesus, who were inspired teachers, we're supposed to believe that they were unable to plant a church that held to the same theology for even 15 or 20 years after they died. Well, the choice is up to you. You can just get mad at me, or you can go into denial and imagine that the faith was lost as soon as the apostles died. Or you can choose to learn from them and be blessed by the things you learn.
You'll find that the early Christian writings are of enormous help in aiding you to get out of the New Testament something comparable to what the first-century Christians got out of it. I can tell you what my response was once my eyes were opened to a clearer understanding of the New Testament. I said to myself, "Well, this is a rude awakening, but I'm certainly glad to get this rude awakening now when I can still turn my life around rather than getting it on Judgment Day."