From Sabbath School Picnics to Community Cookouts

Crooked Creek Baptist Church has been doing picnics well for more than a century, and so it is no wonder that our picnics continue to be so popular with present members, former members, invited guests, and anyone else who joins us. Based on the clothing worn, the photo above was probably taken sometime between 1890-1910. We've been here for a long time, and we've constantly reinvented ourselves. But from what we can figure out from really old written and even photographic accounts, we've always been welcoming, and we've always done food well. We're open to change in lots of areas, but we also preserve our traditions when they've stood the test of time.

We hope you'll join us at our next such event. We have a community cookout planned for February 28th, 2018, starting at 11:30am. It won't look anything like the photo above...but you should definitely click it and take a closer look!

Sunday School Discussion Starters on Immigration

On Sunday May 30th, Rev. John Amick will be leading Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class. The topic will be immigration, and to provide a starting point for discussion, Rev. Amick has provided links to relevant documents which may provide a starting point for conversation on this topic.

Letter Addressing Immigration and Immigration Reform (American Baptist Churches USA)

Immigration 2009 (National Association of Evangelicals)

A Bipartisan Call for Immigration Reform (Evangelicals for Social Action)

Immigration Reform (Church World Service)

Immigration Reform Agenda (America's Voice)

Christians For Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Articles on Immigration at Ethics Daily (Baptist Center for Ethics)

The Blue Parakeet

Dr. McGrath's class will be reading Scot McKnight's book The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible together.

We'll be reading chapter 1 for next time.

Copies of the book have been purchased on behalf of several people who asked for them, but if you weren't among them, it isn't too late to join in!

New Sunday School Series

Beginning next Sunday, May 31st, Pastor Tom Bartley will be offering a new Sunday school class, which will continue for much of the summer, on "Being Baptist". Regular attendees of Dr. McGrath's class are encouraged to attend Rev. Bartley's class, and Dr. McGrath's own class will cease meeting for the duration of this new class in order to facilitate attendance.

Introduction to Islam

To facilitate our discussion of how Christians might/should view other religions, we realized that many need or would benefit from an introduction to some other major religious traditions. Today we began with Islam, and just barely scratched the surface.

We will continue next time, and those who will be attending and who have specific questions and/or topics of interest they would like to be covered/addressed are encouraged to let Dr. McGrath know ahead of time. One easy way to do so is simply to leave a comment here!

Christianity and Other Religions (continued)

Today in Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class we continued to discuss how we as Christians might, and should, view other religious traditions. To facilitate this, Dr. McGrath and Rev. Bartley will provide an overview about some major world religions in next week's class.

Dr. McGrath began today's class by presenting some Biblical reasons for Christians to expect to find they can learn from other religions. He began with John 1, which emphasizes that the Word "enlightens every human being coming into the world". That itself should lead us to expect that God is revealed not only in Jesus, or in the Bible, but elsewhere. More than that, the concept of the Word (Logos) is itself an example of something from another religious tradition (Stoic pantheism) that Jews and then Christians found they could utilize in expressing their own faith. Also mentioned was the fact that, when the Bible was translated into Chinese, the translators rendered John 1:1 as "In the beginning was the Way (Tao)".

Acts 17 is another key text in thinking about this subject. There we see Paul disagreeing with Greek idol-worship, but we also find him depicted in terms echoing the story of Socrates. In Acts 17:28 two Greek sources are quoted: "'For in him we live and move and have our being'. As some of your own poets have said, 'We are his offspring.'"

Epimenides' poem Cretica is quoted twice in the New Testament. In the poem, Minos addresses Zeus thus:

They fashioned a tomb for thee, O holy and high one—
The Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies!
But thou art not dead: thou livest and abidest forever,
For in thee we live and move and have our being.

The other text quoted in Acts 17 is "We are his offspring" from the Cilician poet Aratus (c. 315-240 BC) in his "Hymn to Zeus". And so clearly the author of Acts did not think that what was said about Zeus could not be applied to God as understood by Christians.

We also touched on Romans 2 and the parable of the sheep and the goats, both of which suggest that it may be more important what we do than the doctrines that we hold. Paul's choice of Abraham as an example of saving faith points in this direction too, since Abraham probably didn't assent to anything in the Nicene Creed beyond "We believe in one God".

So can Christians learn from other religions? Yes, we already have, and there is no reason in principle why Christians today ought to take a more negative view of other religious traditions than the New Testament authors themselves.

Dr. McGrath shared an example of something from another religious tradition that he found positively challenging, namely the famous prayer of the Sufi mystic Rabi'a:

O my Lord, if I worship you from fear of hell, burn me in hell. If I worship you from hope of Paradise, bar me from its gates. But if I worship you for yourself alone, grant me then the beauty of your Face.

He also mentioned the experience of meeting a Muslim autorickshaw driver in India who spoke of how much he loves Jesus. Whatever one's views on this subject, cases like this need to be part of the discussion, since they raise the question whether it is our knowledge and beliefs about Jesus, or our love for him and obedience to his teaching, that is most important.

As was already mentioned, next time there will be presentations about some of the major world religions.

Sunday School: Genesis 1:1-2:3

Today in Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class we started a series on the creation stories. Before trying to ask how the natural sciences might cause us to reflect in new and different ways about God and our place in the universe, it is usually helpful for Christians to look first at the creation stories, and consider what they do and do not tell us. Today our focus was on the story of creation in 7 days found in Genesis 1:1-2:3. Many of the subjects we touched on are ones Dr. McGrath regularly covers in his course on the Bible, such as the similarities and differences between Genesis 1 and the Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish being a key to understanding the text.

A key point Dr. McGrath made is that no one (even if they call themselves literalists) takes the dome literally. To single out evolutionary biology as though it were more at odds with Christian faith than other realms of scientific explanation is likewise unjustified. Also mentioned was the fact that the text of Genesis 1 depicts God commanding the earth to bring forth life, rather than creating in some more direct manner.

The question of authorship came up briefly. Next time we'll discuss whether there is more than one creation story in these early chapters of Genesis.

Different Views of Jesus

Today in Dr. McGrath's Sunday School class, we moved beyond our discussion of the varied portraits of Jesus found in the Gospels to begin to answer the question posed in Mark's Gospel, "Who do you say that I am?" Dr. McGrath's own personal answer was to focus on Jesus as crucified Messiah. Historians may debate (as illustrated by the book by Tom Wright and Marcus Borg mentioned in class, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions) how Jesus viewed himself and how various Christian understandings of Jesus developed. But one thing seems clear. Christianity continued, while other messianic movements disappeared after the individual who was their focus was killed, because instead of concluding that Jesus was not the Messiah because he had been crucified, instead they reinterpreted what was meant by Messiah, leaving us with the challenge of following a path that does not lead to our own personal gain. It is the power of that message that has changed countless lives, and it does not ultimately depend on historical reconstruction in detail of all that Jesus said and did.

Other subjects came up which will be the focus of our discussion next time. It is common in a Christian context to speak about Jesus as "God". But what does that mean? When Jesus behaves humanly, is that "just his humanity at work" at that moment? Did God accept human limitations in the incarnation (the term for that being kenotic Christology)? Was Jesus striding the earth getting the answer to every question right?

That last question led to an interesting side debate about whether Superman could get a haircut.

Evolution Weekend 2009

Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class will touch on the topic of evolution in February 2009, in conjunction with Evolution Weekend. More information will be posted as the time gets closer.

New Sunday School Topic: The Person of Jesus

After considering a number of other possible topics, we've decided to make the next topic for Dr. McGrath's Sunday School class "Who Is Jesus?" It seems a particularly appropriate topic for the season leading up to Christmas.

This topic will begin on November 30th. We'll begin with the information in the New Testament, but it will be useful to read the Nicene and Chalcedonian creeds in order to have a sense of how historic Christian orthodoxy was defined.


The Nicene Creed

We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through Him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
He came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
He became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake He was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
He suffered death and was buried.
On the third day He rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and His kingdom will have no end.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father.*
With the Father and the Son He is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. AMEN.


The Chalcedonian Definition

So, following the saintly fathers, we all with one voice teach the confession of one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ: the same perfect in divinity and perfect in humanity, the same truly God and truly man, of a rational soul and a body; consubstantial with the Father as regards his divinity, and the same consubstantial with us as regards his humanity; like us in all respects except for sin; begotten before the ages from the Father as regards his divinity, and in the last days the same for us and for our salvation from Mary, the virgin God-bearer as regards his humanity; one and the same Christ, Son, Lord, only-begotten, acknowledged in two natures which undergo no confusion, no change, no division, no separation; at no point was the difference between the natures taken away through the union, but rather the property of both natures is preserved and comes together into a single person and a single subsistent being; he is not parted or divided into two persons, but is one and the same only-begotten Son, God, Word, Lord Jesus Christ, just as the prophets taught from the beginning about him, and as the Lord Jesus Christ himself instructed us, and as the creed of the fathers handed it down to us.

Church and State

Today in Dr. McGrath's class we finished our introductory topic on the Bible in the "When Christians Disagree" series. We looked at the example of circumcision, which in Genesis 17 is quite plainly said to be a permanent and absolute condition of membership in the covenant people, even for those not actually descended from Abraham. We then turned to Acts 15 and looked at how the church (or at least part of the church) decided that it was going to do something different than what a plain reading of Genesis 17 would require. Reading Acts and Paul's letters as Scripture, it can be hard for Christians to put themselves in the situation of the time in which they were written, when these texts were not yet Scripture, and were making the case for something that seemed to many to represent a departure from Scripture.

In Acts 15, as also in Galatians, the argument seems to allow experience to trump Scripture. God had shown acceptance of Gentiles by pouring out the Holy Spirit on them while uncircumcised. If God had accepted them in this way, who are we to impose other requirements upon them? To get a sense of how this argument seemed to many Jewish Christians in the first century, one may usefully compare the topic of homosexuality, in connection with which many today might make a similar argument...

As we turn to various topics on which Christians disagree, there are other factors beside the Bible that we'll need to consider, such as reason, tradition, and experience. The Bible can of course be thought of in different ways: as a source of writings which are authoritative on Christian doctrine and practice, or as a source or writings which allow us to see examples of how the earliest Church worked through issues, themselves making use of Scripture, reason, tradition and experience.

The biggest news is perhaps that we have chosen our next major topic: "Church and State". It was on our list and seems particularly timely (we'll probably finish with the topic in early November). We will begin next week. We did not have a chance to discuss what we'd read to prepare, but I'd suggest that, in addition to the Ten Commandments and some of the places where Paul and Revelation mention those in authority, we should also read the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution, since that is a key component in the distinctive form that debates on this topic take in an American context. Here it is:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Fulfillment of Prophecy

In Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class today, we discussed what Matthew's Gospel means by "fulfillment of prophecy". A number of passages are quoted and said to be fulfilled in the first couple of chapters of Matthew's Gospel. Yet if we read the texts which are quoted in their original context, we'll see that they are not predictions about a future Messiah. In fact, a common theme seems to be that they relate to key events in the life of the people of Israel - the Exodus and the Exile, for instance. In Matthew chapter 4, we see another great instance of this sort of typology, as the story of the temptation in the wilderness takes on more meaning as we understand it to be intentionally echoing the story of Israel in the wilderness, presenting Jesus in comparison and contrast with that story.

We also paid a quick visit to the Book of Jonah, and considered the fact that Jonah's prediction that Nineveh would fall within 40 days did not come true. This shouldn't lead us to conclude that Jonah was a false prophet, but rather that prophecy in ancient Israel was not about the inevitability of things that were predicted, but precisely about averting disasters that the nation was heading towards. This is important, since some who understand prophecy as about predictions that inevitably come true may not grasp the Bible's teaching about second chances, repentance, and new beginnings (a key theme in today's sermon).

Next time, we'll look at an instance when it seems that the early church discerned that something that appeared to be God's commandment for all time was no longer applicable! If you want a head start, take a look at Genesis 17:9-14; Acts 15; Galatians 5:6 and 1 Corinthians 7:19. (Scot McKnight's latest book, The Blue Parakeet, has an interesting section on this topic, if you want to dig deeper still). Hope you can make it!

The Word(s) of God

In Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class today, there was an interesting discussion of some of the ways that Christians at times refer to the Bible, such as "the Word of God" and "the words of God". A good example of the difference between those two expressions can be seen in the Book of Job. In the book, there are many words attributed to Job's friends. Yet at the end of the book, God is depicted as saying he wasn't pleased with what Job's friends said about him. So, when one considers the book as a whole, are the words of Job's friends the "words of God"? Or is the "Word of God" one encounters in and through the Book of Job something that requires that one read the whole story?

We also talked about textual criticism (i.e. the fact that we do not have the original manuscripts of the Biblical writings, and the need for scholars to make their best judgment about the most likely original form, at the very least the earliest form), and touched on many other topics.

Biblical Literalism

I've posted a clip on YouTube that recaps a key point that came up in our Sunday school class this past weekend, namely that no one simply "believes the whole Bible" and "takes it all literally".

Divergent Birth?

Apologies for the pun in the title, but it seemed the best way to sum up the theme of today's installment in Dr. McGrath's Sunday school class. After a brief introduction of how historical study works, we compared the geographical movements and time frames in the infancy narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke.

In Matthew, unless one knew otherwise before reading the text, one would assume that the hometown of Jesus' family was Bethlehem, the first geographical setting mentioned. It is hinted that Jesus may be up to 2 years old, since Herod, after inquiring when the star appeared, gave orders for all males two years old and under to be killed. At the very least, Jesus does not seem to have been a newborn. The family is found in a house.

They flee to Egypt, and particularly striking is what happens after that. After Herod's death, they want to return to Judea, and only head for Nazareth in Galilee because they are afraid of Archelaus, Herod's son who ruled over Judea after his death. Going home for Joseph in this Gospel thus meant returning to Bethlehem.

In Luke, the impression given is very different. The family lives in Nazareth, and only go up to Bethlehem for the census. If we ask how long they stayed there, we have a firm basis to draw a conclusion about that. They go up to Jerusalem to take care of Mary's purification, as specified in Leviticus 12. They were thus in Bethlehem for little more than a month after Jesus was born. We're told that once they completed everything required by the Law, after making a very public appearance in the capital of Judea (which it would be hard to imagine them doing in Matthew's Gospel) they return to Nazareth.

The impression given and the historical details seem irreconcilable to someone approaching the text asking historical questions (even without bringing in outside considerations about the census under Quirinius). But while this may raise problems for those arguing to inerrancy as popularly understood, such situations can be good news for historians, since they suggest that the two authors did not collude with one another. It certainly makes clear that the later church did not conspire to assemble a canon that spoke with a single unified voice, reflecting the aims of Constantine or some other authority.

A discussion ensued of how one might make sense of these aspects of the Biblical writings. Next week we'll look at some of the theological content of the stories, including themes and motifs such as the genealogies and the fulfillment of Scripture in Matthew.

Outside the Canon

Another subject that came up yesterday in Dr. McGrath's Sunday School class is the character of those writings that existed in the early Christian centuries but did not become part of the canon of Scripture. Possibly the best site to learn more about those other writings (some of which were excluded because they were deemed "heretical", but this is clearly not the case for all of them) is Early Christian Writings. I recommend it for anyone interested in exploring this particular subject further.

When Christians Disagree: Introduction

In beginning a study series on "when Christians disagree", we ought to mention why some seem to find it so surprising that Christians do in fact disagree. For some, the reason this seems surprising is the impression they have been given that Christianity is (and/or ought to be) a single, monolithic entity that has a clearly defined and uniform set of beliefs and practices. For others, the reason might be the assumption that, at the very least, those Christians who agree on the Bible's authority ought to agree.

But in fact, the Bible is one of the reasons for Christians disagreeing, for a number of reasons. First, Christians do not all agree about what the Bible is. For some, it is "inerrant", and in popular speech that may be taken to mean that everything in the Bible is not only without error, but precise in detail. However, a look at a statement about Biblical inerrancy made by conservative scholars and theologians, such as the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, makes clear that for those who study the Bible in detail and in depth, the concept of inerrancy needs to be carefully nuanced if it is to reflect what we find in Scripture. And of course, if one defines inerrancy without regard for what we find in the Bible, then that definition is being imposed on the Bible and thus has authority over the Bible. And since those who argue for Biblical inerrancy usually do so because they regard it as the ultimate authority, the result is a contradiction.

Others prefer to speak of "infallibility", which usually means that the Bible is trustworthy in everything it affirms about God and salvation, without necessarily being accurate in all details of botany or mathematics or science.

Still other Christians view the Bible as errant and fallible, the work of human beings who wrote out of the depths of their experience of God, but who were nonetheless not made to write perfectly. Some would go further and emphasize that Christianity is about following Jesus, not the Bible, and that claiming inerrancy as an attribute for anything other than God is idolatry.

Even when Christians agree about what the Bible is, they do not automatically understand it and interpret it in the same way. It may turn out that this is because the Bible does not always give a single definitive answer about a particular subject, and we must resist the temptation to choose some teachings and use them to dismiss others because "they can't possibly mean that because the Bible says this", since one could always start with the other set of passages and argue the reverse.

Even Protestants agree that experience, reason, and tradition also have a place in Christians' thinking about matters of doctrine and practice. And while it might seem ideal to emphasize that the Bible has primacy of place, in practice none of us reads the Bible before having been influenced by parents and teachers and our own personal experience.

Christian who emphasize the Bible's authority also do not as a result always spend time making use of scholarly resources such as commentaries that would help them understand the text.

Christians of the modern era, whether Liberal or Conservative, tended to emphasize that there is a single absolute truth, whether it was to be found by reason, experience or revelation. In the postmodern era, some deny that there is in fact an absolute truth. In response, the idea of "critical realism" has been developed, which means being committed to the notion that there is a real world, that there is such a thing as truth, while also humbly acknowledging that what I believe may not correspond to that truth, and certainly there is a strong chance it will not correspond perfectly and precisely.

In addition to the differences that result from our interaction with the Bible, new issues that arise also lead to differences. We see this happening in the early church as it wrestled with the issue of the status of Gentiles in this Jewish Messianic movement. Today, we are in a similar situation, unable to simply look up a passage in "2 Newton" and read the verse that tells how Christians should view stem cell research. Most Christians agree that one should identify principles which can then be applied to the new issue. But even if we agree on the relevant principle, we may not agree on its application.

Disagreements among Christians thus seem inevitable, and in my opinion (you are free to disagree!) this is a normal and ideally should be a positive thing. If church is not simply a place for the spiritually mature, but also a place for those who are new to the faith to be nurtured, then we should expect there to be different viewpoint, and members who are at different stages in their Christian experience. As a community of fallible human beings, when we read in Galatians of Paul rebuking Peter, it should lead us to reflect that if one of the closest disciples to Jesus, who was an eyewitness to his public ministry, and was according to Acts 2 filled with the Holy Spirit, if he (who some identify as the first Pope!) could be wrong, then how much more so can we? And if he wasn't wrong, then Paul, one of the authors of Scripture, was presumably wrong to think that he was! Either way, the characters in and authors of Scripture left a lot of examples that should lead us to humility. It might be ironic were we to repeat their words, confident that we are never in error in doing so.

The Bible encourages us to have a childlike faith. Often it is claimed that this is a faith that accepts whatever it is told without questioning. Clearly those who understand it that way have forgotten what it was like to be children, and have no children of their own. Children question everything, and are often painfully honest about the emperor not having clothes on, while adults play along in a facade of mutual self-deception. Hopefully in discussing subjects that Christians disagree about, we can have this naive honesty. Hopefully as well we can separate people from the opinions they hold, and emphasize that our disagreements need not automatically lead to conflict on a personal level.

As this series progresses, there is no illusion that we will all come to agree. But hopefully we will better understand why we disagree, and if we continue to do so, will do so for better reasons, having critically examined the issues, the evidence and the arguments on various sides. Since the Bible will have a key place in all topics, we had best turn our attention next time to the different views Christians have of the Bible, of what it is and of how it is to be interpreted and applied. We hope you can join us!

Dr. McGrath's Sunday School Class Starting New Series

Dr. McGrath's class (formed from the combination of the earlier classes/small groups Friends.com and BASICS) will begin a new series a week from today, on Sunday August 10th. The subject will be "When Christians Disagree: Dealing with and delighting in our differences".

The first class in this series will introduce the general theme and solicit ideas for topics to be covered on subsequent Sundays. The first major topic will be different views of the Bible that Christians have.

Today's class will finish off the series on John's Gospel.