March 2005 - Gospel Union - A blog about Christian faith and unity

Shout Hallelujah!

Thursday, 31 March 2005 by Editor

I had the song “Shout Hallelujah” (sung beautifully by the a cappella Zoe Group) running through my mind yesterday evening, and for good reason. Another sweet niece of mine (Jamie) was baptized into Christ last night! God is so good, and real faith in Him is so infectious. I’m absolutely confident her gift for conversation

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Tsunamis and the God of the gap

Wednesday, 30 March 2005 by Editor

After yesterday’s earthquake off the coast of Indonesia, I read an article quoting a scientist who stated that there was a 100% chance of a tsunami in the region: “My personal view is that a tsunami has a 100 percent chance of happening,” US Geological Survey earthquake expert Kerry Sieh told journalists in Los Angeles.

current events science skeptics

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A toothless watchdog

Tuesday, 29 March 2005 by Editor

If creeds are so useful for the truth they may contain, but are not authoritative for our salvation, then we might as well call Moby Dick by Herman Melville a creed. Scripture is quoted in the novel, so it contains some inerrant truth, right? People view creeds as watchdogs to protect a group from heresy,

creeds heresy tests of fellowship

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Sweet Fellowship

Monday, 28 March 2005 by Editor

My first exposure to the singing group Acappella was their album “Sweet Fellowship” about 15 years ago or more. The title track is a great song, and very encouraging. I thought I’d post the words to it here, since the subject of fellowship features prominently around here: Fellowshipping with one another as we’re walking in

fellowship music

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Attributing good motives

Friday, 25 March 2005 by Editor

It’s my experience that one of the most kind and useful things we can do to facilitate edifying relationships with other believers is to assume they have good motives. When I don’t recognize that a fellow Christian is sincere in what I perceive to be his error, it is far too easy to dismiss him

judging motives relationships

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Christian coalitions of the willing

Wednesday, 23 March 2005 by Editor

I think President Bush’s use of “coalitions of the willing” as a replacement for rigid treaties and lines of demarcation between allies and enemies makes an interesting application to our Christian cooperation with each other. This is particularly true in the sense that modern believers in Christ have factionalized themselves with their own rigid and

church divisions fellowship opinions

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Terri Schiavo and our web of laws

Tuesday, 22 March 2005 by Editor

It’s interesting to think about the Terri Schiavo case as it relates to a law of ordinances vs. a law of love. It seems that it is impossible to create a set of legal regulations that would deal justly with every contingency in life. The husband has legal standing, as well he should: Genesis 2:24

euthenasia lawkeeping

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Bickering, bloodsport of siblings

Thursday, 17 March 2005 by Editor

I just saw a copy of the LA Times laying around and noticed a headline on the Home section: Bickering, bloodsport of siblings by Robin Greene Hagey. As a parent it caught my eye. As a Christian, the parallels were obvious. The caption under the headline reads: “You should worry if your kids aren’t squabbling,

division family unity

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Diversity and homogeneity

Thursday, 17 March 2005 by Editor

Joe over at EO posted an interesting article today entitled Micromotives and Macrobehavior: How Diversity Leads to Homogeneity. He is writing about how even the extreme diversity of thought represented in the blogosphere tends to coalesce along standard political or religious lines. (I like Joe’s quote from Montaigne: “There were never in the world two

dissent opinion uniformity unity

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Tolerating error

Tuesday, 15 March 2005 by Editor

In recognizing the brotherhood of all who have put on Christ, one sincere concern of some good friends has been that I may be tolerating error–that I may come to accept the errors of denominationalism or the deeply divided “religious world.” Rest assured, I’m not. I still remain just a Christian, not a hyphenated or

error heresy tolerance

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Barton Stone - "I blush for my fellows who hold up the Bible as the bond of union, yet make their opinions of it a test of fellowship; who plead for union of all Christians, yet refuse to fellowship with such as dissent from their notions. Vain men! Their zeal is not according to knowledge, nor is their spirit that of Christ. Such antisectarian-sectarians are doing more mischief to the cause and advancement of truth, the unity of Christians, and the salvation of the world, than all the skeptics in the world. In fact, they create skeptics."

Alexander Campbell - "We will not hearken to those questions which gender strife, nor discuss them at all. If a person says such is his private opinion, let him have it as his private opinion; but lay no stress upon it; and if it be a wrong private opinion, it will die a natural death much sooner than if you attempt to kill it."

Alexander Campbell - "But men cannot give up their opinions, and therefore, they can never unite, says one. We do not ask them to give up their opinions--we ask them only not to impose them upon others. Let them hold their opinions, but let them hold them as private property. The faith is public property; opinions are, and always have been private property. Men have foolishly attempted to make the deductions of some great minds the common measure of all Christians. Hence the deductions of a Luther, and a Calvin, and a Wesley, have been the rule and measure of all who coalesce under the names of these leaders. It is cruel to excommunicate a man because of the imbecility of his intellect."

Alexander Campbell - "Dear sir, this plan of making our own nest, and fluttering over our own brood; of building our own tent, and of confining all goodness and grace to our noble selves and the "elect few" who are like us, is the quintessence of sublimated pharisaism. The old Pharisees were but babes in comparison to the modern: and the longer I live, and the more I reflect upon God and man--heaven and earth--the Bible and the world--the Redeemer and his church--the more I am assured that all sectarianism is the offspring of hell; and that all differences about words, and names, and opinions, hatched in Egypt, or Rome, or Edinburgh, are like the frolics of drunken men; and that where there is a new creature, or a society of them, with all their imperfections and frailties, and errors in sentiment, in views, and opinions, they ought to receive one another, and the strong to support the weak, and not to please themselves. To lock ourselves up in the bandbox of our own little circle; to associate with a few units, tens, or hundreds, as the pure church, as the elect, is real Protestant monkery, it is evangelical pharisaism."

Alexander Campbell - "I have tried the pharisaic plan, and the monastic. I was once so straight, that, like the Indian's tree, I leaned a little the other way. And however much I may be slandered now as seeking "popularity" or a popular course, I have to rejoice that to my own satisfaction, as well as to others, I proved that truth, and not popularity, was my object; for I was once so strict a Separatist that I would neither pray nor sing praises with any one who was not as perfect as I supposed myself. In this most unpopular course I persisted until I discovered the mistake, and saw that on the principle embraced in my conduct, there never could be a congregation or church upon the earth."

Alexander Campbell - "I have no idea of adding to the catalogue of new sects. I labor to see sectarianism abolished and all Christians of every name united upon the one foundation upon which the apostolic church was founded."