Sometimes the hubris is insufferable. You want to grab the person by the shoulders, shake them a bit, and ask, “Do you hear yourself? Do you hear what you’re saying? Do you understand the ramifications of insisting that people who were martyred for the sake of Christ will not enter the Kingdom because you deemed it so based on your personal prejudices? Do you get that in declaring that someone will be barred entry into heaven based on some arbitrary rule you determined, or some performative ceremony you insist upon is appropriating the authority of God and putting yourself in His place as judge?”
We’re no better than the people who think biological men can
get pregnant sometimes. We cling to things that are demonstrably false and will
not be moved from our position, no matter how many times we are proven wrong.
If Paul was a demonic plant, then Peter must have been too,
yes, the selfsame Peter of whom Jesus said that upon this rock He would build
His church. How so? Peter cosigned and vouched for Paul, calling him a brother.
If he were a deceiver, then, by Peter calling Paul a brother in Christ, he,
too, must have been deceived.
2 Peter 3:14-16, “Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these
things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless;
and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation – as also our
beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you,
as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are
some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to
their own destruction as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.”
Not only did Peter call Paul a brother, but he also called
him beloved! Well, there you have it, Peter’s off the list now, too. There go
another two books of the New Testament. Eventually, all we’ll have left of the
canon of scripture is the book of Enoch and Genesis 6. Yes, I know, the book of
Enoch is not contained within the canon of Scripture, but that too was a
conspiracy, don’t you know. They left the best, most essential part out on
purpose, they did!
The God who is sovereign over all creation missed that one!
The God who knows the end from the beginning and is supreme in purpose, will,
and design got this one wrong. If He were smart about it, He would have
scrapped everything Paul wrote and replaced it with the book of Tobit, the book
of Judith, the book of Enoch, the book of Mary, the gospel according to
Nicodemus, and just for some added spice, the Protevangelion.
Full disclosure, yes, I’ve read the Apocrypha, the writings
of the early church fathers, such as Origen, Polycarp, Augustine, Irenaeus, and
Ignatius, as well as later writings by men such as Gurnall, Luther, Knox, Pink,
Spurgeon, Bunyan, Ryle, Watson, Flavel, Tozer, Ravenhill, and a score you’ve
likely never heard of, but they were never meant as a replacement or substitute
for Scripture, nor are they on equal footing with it.
Since the Son of God was the only perfect man to ever walk
the earth, in every case, there are things I agree with wholeheartedly and
things I don’t agree with, things I understand, and, as Peter says, things that
are hard to understand, but I filter them through the prism of Scripture and
not personal prejudice. To some extent, we can’t help but be influenced by
upbringing, personal experience, and worldview, but we cannot allow those
things to dictate in such a fashion as to discount the Word of God in favor of
them.
I don’t like kale. It’s a personal preference. My wife loves
kale, and that too is a personal preference. The Bible does not make any
determination on the consumption of kale; therefore, neither my dislike of kale
nor her enjoyment of it is wrong or sinful. Sin is sin because the Bible deems
it sin, and what the Bible deems sin is sin, no matter how many faux shepherds
try to say otherwise.
If Aunt Trudy all of a sudden decides meat is murder, and no
flesh shall evermore pass her lips, that’s her prerogative. It does not make it
a doctrine. It does not make it a divine edict. It does not make her more
righteous for not eating meat, just as it does not make me a sinner if I enjoy
a steak on the rare occasion I can afford it. If, however, Aunt Trudy
determines that her not eating meat means no one else should, and if they do,
they’re headed for the lake of fire, Aunt Trudy is playing God, and one day she
will answer for her missives.
Rather than being diligent to be found by Him in peace,
without spot and blameless, we’re spending our days and nights trying to prove
how smart we are at the expense of Scripture itself. Sometimes it’s okay to sit
in the corner and eat a slice of humble pie. Sometimes it’s okay to be silent
and not offer a hot take on how you feel about what the Bible says. Sometimes,
it is perfectly reasonable and even highly recommended that we don’t create new
doctrine out of whole cloth in the hope that others see us as luminaries and
wise men among fools.
Granted, it’s easier to stargaze and ruminate about Nibiru
than it is to submit to the process of sanctification, molding, pruning, and
refining, but Nibiru doesn’t save; Jesus does. We’re watering the potted plants
while the house burns. We’re rearranging the deck chairs as the ship is
sinking. We’re running out of time, but in our arrogance, we presume that God
will see it our way, so what does it matter what tomorrow brings? We won’t be
here to see it anyway, so back to the talk of black holes and dwarf planets we
go. Who wants to hear about all that righteousness and holiness unto the Lord
stuff anyway? That won’t get you much traction nowadays, and traction is what
it’s all about.
Zophar’s reaction to being challenged was to take offense. I’m certain that not only will some take offense at the preceding pages, but they will also be sure to let me know loudly and repeatedly. Such is life; the more things change, the more they stay the same, and that goes double for human nature.
With love in Christ,
Michael Boldea, Jr.
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