He Is Risen!

There is always joy in my heart on Easter when I am with family and one of us will smile and say; "He is risen!", to which the other will always say; "He is risen indeed!" The joy is there because at one time I did not know the Father, or the Son, and I thought that the only thing that would remain of me after death would be memories, or what I had built or accomplished. But now I have an inner witness that the resurrection of Jesus was the first fruits for my eternal life with Him. Someday in the future, whether I am dead or alive, my body will rise up to meet the Lord in the air, and that glorified body will combine with my soul and spirit body and spend eternity with God. I can see that each of my children also share the same inner witness, the same relationship with the Redeemer, that causes us to smile when we reply; "He is risen indeed!" Together we celebrate, not our theology, but a living experience, through both good and rough times, of our love and trust and hope in Him. This joy increases as time goes on, and as I witness the faith life of my wife and children.

I have a larger family of faith as well. We may have differences in language, tradition and theology, but because our spirits are reborn we are all part of the same body, brothers and sisters in Christ. When Jesus asked His disciples in Matthew 16 to tell Him what people were saying about Him, they responded that some thought He was Elijah, or another one of the great prophets. "But who do you say that I am?", to which Simon responded; "You are the Christ, the son of the living God". Jesus tells Simon that this was not something that he figured out for himself, but rather it was revealed to him by the Father in heaven. Jesus calls Simon by a different name, Peter, which translated means, a little stone. "You are Peter (a little stone), and upon this rock (Simon's acknowledgement, revealed to him by God, that Jesus was the Redeemer and Son of the living God) I will build my church". The Church is compared in scripture to both a building and to a living organism. It is comprised of all, living and dead, who share with Peter a reborn spirit, made possible because of each person's declaration in faith that Jesus is God, and the He is Redeemer. This became possible for Peter and for us because of the death and resurrection of Jesus. Neither the enemy or death (the gates of Hades) will be able to overcome us, and authority has been given to us (the keys of the kingdom of heaven) to bind the enemy and to set free the captive.

Although all spirit reborn people belong to the same body, and are part of the same spiritual building called the Church, there are and have been since the time of the apostles many divisions that keep us from sharing the joy of salvation with one another. In the book of Acts, Paul takes Peter, who God used first to bring the faith to the Gentiles, to task for not associating with Gentile believers. And Paul again had to urge the leadership of the early Church, at a council presided over by James, not Peter, to accept new non-Jewish believers into the faith community, without putting on them the burden of Jewish traditions and laws. After Pentecost, Jerusalem was the primary center of the Christian faith. But as time went on, Jerusalem was destroyed, and major centers developed in many places, including Syria, Northern Africa, Asia Minor and Rome. Each center had it's own character, they developed different traditions, and doctrine and liturgy were not imposed by any central authority. At around 165 AD, there develooped several major areas of disagreement on specific theological points, so each center made lists to trace their spiritual lineage, and by inference, the correctness of their theology.

The church centered in Rome eventually took this one step further, claiming primacy over the entire Church. Roman bishops traced their roots back to Peter (who may or may not have acutally been in Rome) and Paul. And they taught that Peter was given authority by Christ to rule His Church on earth, as were each of his successors. Suffice it to say, although you can find a list of popes going back from Benedict to Peter, Peter had the scriptural office of apostle, not bishop, all the early bishops of Rome were given the title "pope" posthumously, and bishops of Rome did not exercise authority over other centers of Christianity for hundreds of years. Even in the first example scholars cite, a letter written about 190 AD to the Roman bishop Victor, from a bishop of Alexandra, asking advice on a serious matter. Other bishoops were consulted as well, and Victor's advice was not taken. Politics, economics, and brute force consolidated Roman power, and made dominate Roman theology and tradition.

Jackie and I were baptized, raised, and educated as Catholics, and we know many Catholics of deep faith who have reborn spirits, and who share the same joy of the risen Savior as we do. Jackie never wavered in the faith she had since childhood, but grew closer in her relationshiop to Jesus after being baptized in the Holy Spirit during the time we were dating in college. In high school I became an agnostic, and was atheistic throughout four years at a Catholic college. After asking Jesus into my heart and being filled with the Holy Spirit several months after marrying Jackie and graduating from college, we still worshipped in the Catholic church for 10 more years. As our children grew, and as scripture became clearer, we became more uncomfortable with the teachings and the traditions of Catholicism that seemed to us to clearly run counter to how we understand scripture. And eventually God gave us the freedom to leave. The most difficult part for us after leaving was that our parents felt in a sense that we were rejecting a part of them. We were not just leaving a religion, but a culture as well.

In future posts I may be talking about some of the traditions and theology that gained acceptance early on, both in Rome and in the other centers of Christianity, which I believe stifle the free and powerful moving of the Holy Spirit, and which have created barriers to a personal relationship with the King of Glory. My intent is not to condem a faith tradition, but to explain to the best of my ability the truth as I understand it. The logic found in Catholic doctrine is consistent throughout. If A and B are true, then C must follow. But if A or B are wrong, it does not follow that those who teach or believe such doctrine are evil people. Nor does believing that A + B = C negate the possibility of a real relationship with the Lord, even if we use different terms and worship in different ways. Truth must be declared, but the author of truth is a loving God who gave His life in love for all who will honestly seek Him.