Category: Hear From the President

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

At this time of year, we celebrate the great sacrifice of Jesus Christ, by which our sins are forgiven and our eternal future is assured. It was the greatest act of love we can imagine—although we can’t fully grasp the depth of that love.

As Paul wrote to the Romans, “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:7-8).

What the Lord God did in Jesus goes far beyond any human standards of love and sacrifice. That is why we find it so hard to accept, without any reservations, the richness of God’s grace. We read that our sins are forgiven, but we feel the need to add an “if.” We understand that God’s love for us is unconditional, and yet we still think there is a “but.” Unconditional love and forgiveness seem too good to be true.

People in Old Testament times didn’t have this problem. The Temple animal sacrifices left no doubt that the removal of sin was a bloody and messy business. But even then, some were able to glimpse that there was more to the forgiveness of sin than slaughtering an animal. David, when confronted with his multi-faceted sin with Bathsheba, pleaded,

Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.
(Psalm 51:9-11)

David realized that his outrageous behavior had damaged his relationship with God. He wanted desperately to make it right. However, a visit to the Temple with a sin offering was not enough.

You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
(Psalm 51:16-17, NIV margin)

David was ahead of his time in glimpsing God’s grace, realizing there was nothing he could do except admit his guilt and ask for forgiveness. As we know, he was forgiven and later, in happier times, he could sing confidently:

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
(Psalm 103:11-12)

The world of David’s day was much less technologically advanced than ours. Most people thought of the heavens as a vast inverted bowl in which the sun, moon and stars moved. In Psalm 103, David used that view of the cosmos as an analogy for the vastness of God’s forgiveness and mercy, which separates our sins from us by an unimaginable distance. That sense of vastness is sometimes blunted in our modern age. I often fly long distances “through the heavens” from east to west and back again. Thus, David’s analogy might seem less impressive. But it shouldn’t. Just last week we were reminded of how vast the cosmos truly is. In 1977, an unmanned spacecraft named Voyager 1 was launched from Cape Kennedy. Its mission was to travel along a trajectory that would take it through our solar system, sending back photographs as it traveled.

Voyager 1 has fulfilled its mission brilliantly. After traveling for 18 months, it sent back stunning pictures of Jupiter. Three years into its mission it gave us the first close-up pictures of the ringed planet Saturn. Now, over 35 years later, Voyager 1 has traveled farther “from east to west” than any other man-made object. It is now over 11 billion miles from earth. Its signals, traveling at the speed of light, take about 18 hours to reach us. It is heading out of our solar system at about 38,000 miles an hour. Last week, scientists were speculating that either it has, or soon will, move beyond the influence of the sun. Its power plant may be able to send us signals for a few more years. But then Voyager will be on its own, hurtling through interstellar space until it comes under the influence of another star in about—wait for it—40,000 years!

The journey of Voyager 1 puts David’s analogy of “east from west’” and “above the heavens” into perspective, doesn’t it? Although the spacecraft has traveled through only a tiny fraction of our cosmos, the distance, even with our modern scientific understanding, is beyond our ability to grasp. Perhaps if David was writing Psalm 103 today, he might put it this way:

For as far as interstellar space reaches away from earth,
so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as Voyager has traveled from east to west,
so far has he removed from us our transgressions.

God’s commitment to remove from his memory the guilt and stain of our sins is still greater than anything we humans can imagine. That’s how great God’s love for us is. And always will be. Let’s be thankful for that.

Your brother in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

PS: With this issue, we have posted Scripture, God’s Gift, the first article in a six-part series entitled Guidelines for Interpreting Scripture by Gary Deddo (the article also is linked under the Church Development heading at upper left). We will be publishing the other articles in the series, one every-other week, over the next three months. I think you will find these articles extremely helpful.

Embracing Incarnational Trinitarian Theology means reviewing and, if necessary, changing many of our ideas, including our approach to Holy Scripture. Gary has spent his career studying and teaching the Bible—bringing to the task a deep love and respect for Scripture as well as his world-class scholarship. As I read the articles, I found myself thinking, “In a few sentences Gary has said what it’s taken me years to learn.” Though we can’t all be professional theologians, this series will help us become “a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the word of truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). I hope you enjoy the series. Please let me know what you think of it.

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Over the next few days, we will be celebrating the death and resurrection of Jesus. These are pivotal celebrations because all that we believe and hope for hinge on the events commemorated by Good Friday and Easter Sunday.

Some sincere people put great emphasis on getting the details surrounding these events correct. Much has been written about the exact year, or precise date, or precise chronology of Jesus’ arrest, trial, death and resurrection. Though most accept that Jesus was crucified on a Friday, others insist that it was a Wednesday or a Thursday. Some argue over whether Jesus was in the tomb for three days and three nights or just parts of those days. Some believe we should not celebrate the orthodox Christian days at all, insisting that the Old Testament observances are the only correct way to remember Jesus’ sacrifice.

I once thought these details were important and spent far too much time trying to resolve them. I now see that it was time wasted. I don’t mean to suggest that the details are insignificant. The events of Jesus’ last week were carefully orchestrated by God so that prophecies of the Messiah could be fulfilled. However, if we try to establish an exact chronology, some of these questions cannot be resolved definitively, because there is some ambiguity in the scriptural record. However, even if the precise details had been recorded with the attention to chronological detail that we expect today, they really do not matter. What is important is what happened, not when.

If, about 2000 years ago, Jesus the Son of God incarnate, was executed and then later resurrected, the destiny of every human being has been changed forever. If he was not, then, as Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, “Our preaching is useless and so is your faith” (1 Corinthians 15:14). In that letter, Paul reminded his readers that if indeed Jesus had been resurrected from the dead, “Then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory’” (v. 54). Here Paul was quoting from Isaiah 25:8:

He will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears
from all faces;
he will remove his people’s disgrace
from all the earth.
The Lord has spoken.

That was probably a popular scripture. It is poetic and concise. Had Hallmark been in operation then, they probably would have put the saying on bereavement cards. Paul was showing the Corinthians that it was no mere pious platitude. Because of Jesus, what Isaiah prophesied became reality. Death had in fact been swallowed up in victory and thus Paul could write confidently: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:55).

Death—any death—does have a sting. If a particular death does not affect us personally, it might only be a small sting and the pain doesn’t last long. Tragedies like the shooting at the elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut leave us all hurting for some time. The pain of the death of a loved one goes even deeper.

Our Christian worldview gives us comfort in knowing that there is more to life than what we experience in our mortal bodies. Jesus taught that there is an afterlife and promised that he would go and prepare a place for us. Knowing that death is not the end for our loved ones moderates the terrible pain of loss, so that we need not “sorrow as those who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13, NLV). However, it does not take away the entire ache. We still suffer the loss of not having their companionship and presence with us while we are still alive and they are dead.

This is why death is the enemy, and even though Jesus has conquered this enemy, we still feel some of its sting when a loved one dies or when we see innocent children murdered. Though we shed tears over death, we are reassured in Psalm 56:8 that God is aware of them all: “You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle” (ESV); “…list my tears on your scroll—are they not in your record?” (NIV). Whatever the translation, the point is clear: God knows our pain and suffering down to the details and has promised to eventually remove them forever.

I have been pondering the phrase that John wrote in Revelation 21:4: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” Like Paul, John was reminding us of the reality of the promise in Isaiah 25:8. Consider how important that promise is. If God did not wipe away all tears from our eyes, there would be ongoing cause for weeping.

Most certainly, we’d weep over our past sins, the wasted opportunities while we were upon the earth, as well as our acts of unkindness toward others. We would weep much about the old order of things. But God says there will be no more death and the old order has passed away. In the fullness of God’s kingdom, every cause of grief will be removed. In our glorified life, there will be no more death to part loving hearts. There will be no more sorrow of any kind. There will be no more crying for any reason. There will be no more pain of any sort. Instead, there will be fullness of life—a sharing in God’s own kind of eternal light and love.

This is why Jesus allowed himself to be tortured and executed, only to be resurrected shortly thereafter. What he did for us he did freely and with confidence in his heavenly Father. And so we read of him: “Who for the joy set before him, endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2).

The precise chronology of Holy Week is not the important issue (were it important, surely God would have made it clearer). What is important is what Jesus did to fulfill the specific prophecies of the Messiah, like those given by Isaiah. Jesus changed the very nature of death and opened a pathway to our future hope when all things are made new (Revelation 21:5).

That is what Jesus did and that is what we should focus on. Let us remind our congregations of these things as we commemorate the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Your brother in Christ,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Thomas Edison once said, “There is no expedient to which a man will not go to avoid the labor of thinking.” My grandfather would have agreed.

Conversations with my grandfather were always entertaining. Although he did not go to college, he was quite smart—he could read and write in seven languages. As a journeyman tool and die maker he often worked with college graduates. Grandpa was astonished that though some of them were graduate engineers who studied calculus, they were unable to set up the tool and die machinery on which they worked. He would say that their years in college made them “educated idiots.”

Some of my relatives worried that Grandpa was dissuading me from going to college. They warned me that he was “old school.” Actually, he encouraged me to pursue higher education, but he did not want me to become an educated idiot.

I did go to college, eventually earning a doctorate. Rather than learning to use machine tools, I learned to use the most valuable tool of all—Holy Scripture. I’m not saying I have it all figured out, but I learned that there are right and wrong ways to read the Bible. Some of this I learned through academic training—so I am not denying the value of that. However, the most important lessons about reading the Bible have come through experience.

I learned that one of the wrong ways to read the Bible is what I call the Robert’s Rules approach. Robert’s Rules as you may know, is the recognized authority governing the conduct of meetings and assemblies according to parliamentary procedure. It covers just about every contingency, allowing a meeting to be conducted with order and fairness. Some people look at the Bible like that. They see it as God’s Rule Book, and believe all the problems of humanity stem from not following those rules.

Of course, the Bible does contain rules. There are commands to wash one another’s feet, to remain isolated for a month after childbirth, to not wear jewelry, to trim one’s beard in only a certain way, and many more. Of course, you can’t keep all these rules even if you can remember them. How many of us greet everyone with a “holy kiss”? How many of us build parapets on our roofs?

All of us are selective about which rules we obey and which we ignore. At some level, we realize that certain rules are more important and applicable across all time and for all people than others. But some who worry about this try to specify exactly what is required so as to avoid violating any of the rules. The problem with that approach is that it leads to losing touch with the heart and character of God, thus failing to see God’s overriding purpose to be in close, loving relationship with his people. That legalistic approach leads to think that a relationship with God can be reduced to a list of rules. Reading the Bible from that perspective is a sure-fire way to miss the point.

Another wrong way to read the Bible is what I call the Nostradamus approach. It presumes that the Bible’s purpose is to give us detailed prophecies of how world events will unfold in the next few years (it’s always “the next few years,” no matter when you live). You take the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other, and try to interpret the “signs of the times” from the news of the day. This too leads to missing the point, which is that the purpose of prophecy is to point to Jesus Christ and his work of reconciling all humanity, in every age, to God. The point of prophecy is to help us hope and trust in God, knowing that all of history is in his hands.

Another wrong way to read the Bible is what I call the Rubik’s Cube approach. It sees the Bible as a giant puzzle to be decoded. Just as a Rubik’s Cube has several color cubes that must be twisted and turned until they go together properly, some mistakenly think the Bible should be contorted into systematic topics, such as a divinely approved diet, the only correct “sacred calendar,” or a universal dress code. Some actually take this to the extreme of looking for coded messages buried within the Bible’s text.

Of course, the worst way to read the Bible is to combine these wrong approaches. I need not elaborate—many reading this have personal experience with viewing Holy Scripture through this terribly distorted lens.

God’s story—our story

So how do we correctly read and use the Bible? The key, I believe, is viewing Scripture as an encounter with God in history. We have to understand that the Bible uses many literary devices and genres, with multiple layers and mini-stories that yield a single Grand Story telling us who God is and the relationship he desires with us.

Some of this can be learned academically, and we should value sound scholarship. However, it is not just a case of knowing ancient languages, or being able to ponder and argue profound philosophy. Do that and you run the risk of becoming one of my grandfather’s educated idiots.

What I have come to learn from experience is that to really understand the Bible, I must become a part of the story—seeing God’s story as my story and finding my place in it. The Bible is not just a collection of stories and prophecies from another age. It is about our relationship with God—here and now. It isn’t just a story to read, but a story that we live.

Gary Deddo is preparing a series of articles on how to study and read the Bible from this perspective. We will begin to publish the series here in GCI Weekly Update, beginning after Easter. I think you will find it eye-opening and inspiring.

With love in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

March 14 is Albert Einstein’s birthday. He was born 134 years ago. Einstein has always been a fascinating personality to me. More than a hundred years ago, he wrote a paper describing a radical insight into the nature of light, which turned the conventional physics of that day on its head and led to the development of Quantum Theory. What may be less recognized is the potential impact that Einstein’s ideas had on theology.

Disciplines like physics and chemistry are called “hard sciences.” Not because they are difficult, but because those physical phenomena respond to the scientific method, yielding testable predictions through controlled experiments that can produce accurate and quantifiable data. Disciplines like sociology, political science and theology are less exact, more difficult to quantify and don’t easily yield predictable results outside the experimental environment. So they are sometimes called “soft sciences.”

Einstein showed that hard sciences are not so hard after all. He realized that what were considered established ideas about the nature of matter were too simplistic. Light, for example, behaved in some unfathomable way, as both a wave and a particle. This apparent paradox defied a simple scientific explanation. Einstein said, “What I see in nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility.” The idea of light acting as both a wave and a particle is still a difficult concept to grasp. It is an idea that would seem to belong to a soft science, not physics.

As scientists probe ever further into the realms of the very large and the incomprehensibly small, they have found even more extraordinary paradoxes. Stephen Hawking, a brilliant contemporary theoretical physicist has written, “Quantum physics is a new model of reality that gives us a picture of the universe. It is a picture in which many concepts fundamental to our intuitive understanding of reality no longer have meaning” (The Grand Design). According to physicist Lisa Randall in Knocking on Heaven’s Door: How Physics and Scientific Thinking Illuminate the Universe and the Modern World:

We are poised on the edge of discovery. The biggest and most exciting experiments in particle physics and cosmology are under way and many of the world’s most talented physicists and astronomers are focused on their implications. What scientists find within the next decade could provide clues that will ultimately change our view of the fundamental makeup of matter or even of space itself—and just might provide a more comprehensive picture of the nature of reality.

I find this a fascinating topic to explore. In some ways, it has helped me in my journey to appreciate the triune nature of God. When I see that paradoxes exist in nature, it is not so difficult for me to accept that the nature of the Creator of light would also seem, to my limited human understanding, also somewhat paradoxical.

Albert Einstein was not a “believer” in the traditional sense. Though he considered himself an agnostic, he was a firm critic of atheism. He would have deplored the strident voices of some scientists today who angrily insist that God does not exist. He wrote, “In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views.”

Although Einstein did not believe in a personal God, he never missed chapel service at Princeton when prayers were being offered for Jews trapped in the concentration camps. He maintained, “even though the realms of religion and science in themselves are clearly marked off from each other,” there are “strong reciprocal relationships and dependencies as aspirations for truth derive from the religious sphere.” He once explained that “science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

Einstein died in 1955. It is not only the hard sciences that owe him a debt of gratitude. When asked how he came to his great new discovery, he said: “I stood before the universe and listened.” He showed that being scientific does not mean making everything understandable with absolute certainty. He demonstrated that great new advances in knowledge come only when we let a reality, far greater than our previous understanding would allow, determine how we are to know it and in humility let it tell us its nature.

In this way, Einstein surely opened the door for some to recognize the legitimacy of the so-called “soft science” of theology; for in theology we stand before a Reality that far exceeds our understanding. But when we listen in humility at the place where God has personally made himself known, we can indeed have real, if not absolutely comprehensive, knowledge of God. And that place is a person, Jesus Christ.

Christian theology is not unscientific and science does not and cannot rule out a reality greater than ourselves—greater than our universe. Doing so would be, well, unscientific. As Einstein wrote:

Everyone who is seriously interested in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the universe—a spirit vastly superior to man, and one in the face of which our modest powers must feel humble.

With love in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I encourage you to read the Mozambique prayer update linked at left, which updates us on the situation faced by our members in Northern Mozambique. Their homes have been flooded and their crops destroyed. They were already some of the poorest people in the world. I am thankful that we are able to help them come through this crisis through prayer and financial assistance.

The situation in Mozambique reminds me of how much we take for granted. In the developed world, we don’t really need to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” Our supermarkets have great variety from which to choose. It is the same with water. Millions of people in the poorer parts of the world must pray, “Give us this day our daily water”—and then walk several miles to get it. We, on the other hand, are spoiled for choice. In the Western world, bottled water is a multi-billion dollar business. My local supermarket offers at least 12 varieties, each promising to be superior to the others. Some people argue that none of them is actually better than plain old tap water, which is one hundred times less expensive. Maybe that’s true. I don’t know.

Though I am not an expert on water, Jesus was. He not only turned water into wine, he walked on it. And in the beginning, he created it. You will remember the account in John’s Gospel, where Jesus met the Samaritan woman who was drawing water from a well. He told her he could supply her with a never-ending supply of what he called “living water.” This water was so superior that whoever drank it would never be thirsty again.

Clean drinking water was scarce in Jesus’ day, so the woman naturally asked him how she could get this exceptional water. The phrase “living water” usually meant moving, flowing water. The woman knew there was no flowing water nearby. The only water available locally was in that well. Jesus was using a play on words. He explained, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14). This was a great metaphor since water is essential to life. Just as the physical body needs water to continue living so does the spirit.

When we become physically thirsty, water satisfies us. However, we are not just physical creatures. We are made in God’s image and we have a spiritual appetite, whether we recognize it or not. We can become hungry and thirsty spiritually for a restored and right relationship with God. Jesus explained that he was the source of the “spiritual water” that can quench the thirst of the spirit. By drinking the living water one can live and never thirst again.

The woman was astonished, not only by his extraordinary offer. In fact, she may not have fully understood it at the time. What astonished her was that Jesus spoke to her in the first place. She was a gentile, a woman and had a somewhat dubious reputation. She was used to being shunned by her own people. A Jewish man should have gone to great lengths to avoid her. Nevertheless, Jesus accepted her and offered hope and encouragement.

This story teaches us that Jesus offers his forgiveness to everyone. No matter how many sins one has committed, Jesus offers new life—and he offers it to all humanity. By reaching out to an outcast Samaritan woman, Jesus showed that his kingdom is for everyone from every nation, every tribe and every culture.

Our denomination is greatly blessed to be truly “international”—not just in word but in fact. I am humbled that the Holy Spirit sees us as a “safe place” to bring people looking for grace and truth. We did not go seeking several thousand members in Mozambique. They were looking for a “well” to satisfy their thirst for truly knowing and worshiping God. Right now, their need is physical as well as spiritual and so we will continue to do what we can to help them. However, let’s not forget our own backyard. Physical food and drink is not the critical need for most Western nations. But they are spiritually undernourished and in desperate need of wholesome spiritual food and clean living water.

When Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well, he opened up a whole new perspective to his ministry. His disciples were shocked to find him talking to “that kind of woman” (John 4:27). But they eventually came to understand that Jesus had a ministry to all the world—not to just a select few.

We are privileged to participate in that ministry today. Think about it next time you see the array of rather expensive “superior” bottled waters on your supermarket shelf. Remember, the best water of all is free. You just have to know where it comes from.

Your brother in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

As our understanding of who God is (our theology) developed, we began using the term “Incarnational Trinitarian Theology” to identify and summarize our understanding. However, use of that term (and others like it) might cause some problems. First, it might confuse some who are not trained in theology. Second, it might be used by some who do not understand it well. Third, it might be overused and thus become cliché. Last, it might become a denominational label that could lead some to misunderstand what we actually believe and teach.

Along with this letter, we’ve included an article from Gary Deddo titled, “Answering questions about our theology” (click on the link in the column at left). I urge you to read it carefully. As Gary notes, it is helpful to think of Incarnational Trinitarian Theology as describing how we believe rather than merely what we believe. Of course, all orthodox Christians accept the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation. But for us, they are more than two doctrines on a list of many—they are the heart of our faith and worship.

Why is that not so for all Christians? Partly because these truths are deep mysteries beyond our fallen human imaginations. Also, these doctrines at times are poorly taught or not taught at all. Thus it is easy to drift away from this defining core and begin to emphasize secondary (even tertiary) issues. When that happens, everything becomes distorted.

This was seen clearly in the way Jewish religious leaders resisted Jesus. Those leaders looked to Scripture as a source of truth, but disagreed about its details. Nevertheless, they were united against Jesus. And so Jesus told them, “You have your heads in your Bibles constantly because you think you’ll find eternal life there. But you miss the forest for the trees. These Scriptures are all about me! And here I am, standing right before you, and you aren’t willing to receive from me the life you say you want” (John 5:39-40, The Message). Note how Jesus placed himself at the center as the living key to interpreting Scripture. He himself was the source of their life. If they would accept and understand that, they would put their petty disagreements in perspective and come together in acknowledging him as Messiah. Instead, they saw him as a heretic and plotted to kill him.

As Christians today, we can make the same mistake. Even if we accept Jesus as Lord and Savior, we can sideline the fundamental truths that define who he is. The result is the fragmenting of Christianity into competing “schools” of thought with their own doctrinal distinctives. This leads to a “my Christianity is better than yours” mentality. Though the distinctives may be accurate, they emphasize peripheral matters. The result is that the reality of who God is and what he has done for us in his Son is diminished, if not lost. Division within the Body of Christ results.

That is why we need to avoid using labels in ways that imply that we are setting ourselves apart as having a Christianity that is superior in comparison to others. The reason we use a label at all is to remind ourselves (and others, if they are interested) of the focus of our renewal—the reality of what is revealed in Jesus Christ according to Scripture.

Also, in using a label, we must avoid implying that we are slavishly beholden to some systematic theology or to certain theologians—even those identified as Incarnational or Trinitarian. There are approximately 50 systematic theologies extant today. However, there is no single concrete, uniform, particular school of thought called “Trinitarian Theology.”

For example, Barth, the Torrance brothers and Thomas Oden drew on many other theologians throughout the ages and on the writings of the early church councils. Rather than seeking to establish a new theology, they were seeking to serve Jesus Christ and to build up his church through their teaching and research. Yes, they might be described as “Incarnational Trinitarian Theologians” because they saw that these particular elements of Christian faith were being neglected or even forgotten. They discerned that the church needed to get back on the central path of Christian faith.

When we use the term, “Incarnational Trinitarian Theology,” we are referring to the fact that Jesus is the lens through which we read and interpret the Bible and how we have come to know God. Consequently, any other doctrinal points should flow from and fit with the Trinitarian nature of God. Our role in the administration of our denomination is to pass on the best formulations of Christian theology that we can find—especially on the major issues. We are blessed to incorporate the ideas of the great theologians of Christian history and we can learn from those alive today. But we do not do so slavishly and biblical revelation always has the controlling authority.

So, when we say that we believe and teach Incarnational Trinitarian Theology, we are describing how we understand and believe Scripture based upon Jesus as the centerpiece of God’s plan for humanity. It is perhaps more like your computer’s operating system rather than one of many programs you load into it. Individual doctrines are like the software applications, which must be able to interface with the operating system if they are to work properly. But it’s the operating system that orders, organizes, prioritizes and produces all other useful results.

The focus of our renewal as a denomination has been the very theological issues that have been central to historical, orthodox Christianity. We are not the only branch of the church that neglected or even misunderstood the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation. We hope that we might benefit other parts of the Body of Christ with what we have learned. It is in this spirit that we offer our Speaking of Life and You’re Included videos. If you have not viewed them, I urge you to do so. They will help us all keep the Center in the center, feed our continuing renewal in the Spirit, and enable us to join with all Christians down through the ages in giving witness to the glory of our triune God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Yours in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I enjoy reading a book or watching a movie in which a good story unfolds. I especially enjoy it when I know how the story ends, yet still I am compelled to read or watch to the end to see how it unfolds. The old American television series Columbo, starring the late Peter Falk, is a great example.

Each episode of Columbo revolved around the perpetrator of the crime, whose identity is already known to the audience. He would eventually be caught and exposed. The intrigue was generated by seeing how Columbo would go about solving the crime. The series was not so much a traditional “whodunit?” as a “how to catch them.” The gospel of God’s grace is rather like that. Jesus has completed the work of saving us, although not all understand that. There is great joy when the proverbial “light bulb” turns on and someone does get it!

Not long ago, I received a letter from an 87-year-old gentleman describing how he had hated me for leading so many changes in our fellowship. But now he understands and so he apologized. No apology was needed—he made my day and I am still enjoying his letter.

Christians often say that the gospel is good news, but then add a great big “IF.” I’m sure they are sincere, but this addition turns the gospel into a proposition or a possibility of what could be true if certain works are first performed. For them, the gospel is good news, but only for those who qualify. For everyone else, it is not good news at all.

The wonderful truth is that the actual gospel is not a contract, which tells us what God will do “IF” we first do our part. Rather, it is the announcement concerning what God has already done—what he has already established in and through his Son, Jesus Christ. It is vital to understand the difference.

The actual gospel speaks of the fact of our forgiveness in Jesus and gives us something real to believe in. The gospel with an “IF” appended speaks of the possibility of our forgiveness, but then proclaims that we must also believe in something else, such as our faith, or our repentance or our performance, before that possibility becomes reality. One is the truth of God’s grace; the other is legalism.

This legalism projects a false reality that Jesus’ forgiveness does not exist unless you first measure up. However, no one can measure up to the perfection of God. Even when we become believers, we still have our times of failing to do what is right. And the blessing of the grace of God is that we are forgiven in Jesus Christ. He stands in for us as our great high priest and takes our weak and imperfect repentance and faith and then by the Holy Spirit shares with us his perfect faith and repentance on our behalf. And God gets all the glory.

Sadly, some reject this, objecting that it means that you can just sit back and do nothing. But that is not where a correct understanding of grace leads you. Presuming upon God’s grace is not receiving God’s grace. It is not responding to grace as grace. Grace is not an impersonal abstract fact or principle, like gravity. Grace is not an exception to the rule of law. It is God’s offer of a restored, reconciled relationship of fellowship and communion with him in faith, hope and love. Grace, then, calls for a particular response. The apostle Paul tells us that God has reconciled the cosmos to himself. He then goes on to implore us to be reconciled, to live in line with the reality of that reconciliation (see 2 Corinthians 5:18, 20)—to wake up and smell the coffee! Such an ordered or disciplined response is not the enemy of grace but how we receive and benefit from it, or rather, benefit from our restored relationship to God through Jesus Christ!

In Colossians 1:29 (NIV, 1984), Paul explained how he proclaimed Christ: “To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.” The gospel of grace in Jesus Christ energizes and moves us just as it did Paul. It brings about “the obedience of faith,” which was the aim and goal of his entire ministry (see Romans 1:5; 16:26 RSV).

Accepting God’s grace is not a license for laziness. We should remind ourselves every day what Christ has done and is doing for us. Our motivation is the fact that he has accepted us, not the fear that he might reject us. Paul tells us: “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age” (Titus 2:11-12 NIV, 1984).

Before I began to really understand grace, I regarded the Bible largely as a rule-book that God gave to tell us what to do and not do. In doing so, I missed the point of many of the narratives in the Bible. I saw God as detaching and not attaching, disconnecting and not connecting with us. Do the right thing and you belonged to his “in” crowd. Disobey and you were “out.” The more I focused on obeying the law, the more I also seemed to miss God’s purpose to develop a loving relationship with each of his children. My view became one of seeing God as ruling people out, breaking them with “rods of iron.” Thankfully, I did not totally lose sight of God’s mercy, but I really did see him as a cosmic sheriff and myself as his deputy!

I know that many of you grew up believing as I did. Our experience was not as unusual as we may have thought. As I have gotten to know Christians in other denominations, I find that this is typical, even among many who have been Christians for many years. That is why we need to understand and be reminded daily that it is his grace—not law—that disciplines us. God has caught us, like Columbo caught those criminals. He is the author and the finisher of our faith. It is the best “whodunit” and “how did he catch ‘em” story of all.

With love in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Artists typically depict prayer as going upward from us to God. They might show a person kneeling in a beam of light, or looking up with hands outstretched to heaven. In the illustration below, the artist depicts another dimension of prayer—its roots and soil. It reminds me of Paul’s words to the church at Ephesus to be “rooted and grounded in love” (Ephesians 3:17—KJV throughout).

Although I see most of you only once a year or less, I feel close to you all. That closeness is not about email, but a relationship of unity in the Holy Spirit that is grounded in prayer. I pray frequently for our elders and their families as I do for all our members and their families. I do this not as a duty or mere discipline, but because I want to maintain my relationship with all of you even if we are not able to be together as often as I would like.

I learned this idea of prayer relationships from my reading of the apostle Paul’s writings. Long before Facebook and Skype, Paul maintained a strong network of personal relationships across the Mediterranean world. He prayed that God’s blessings would rest upon the churches that he planted and served. These were not just general “catch-all” prayers. He was often quite specific. To the Thessalonians he wrote: “Night and day praying exceedingly that we…might perfect that which is lacking in your faith…. To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness” (1 Thessalonians 3:10, 13). To the Romans: “Without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers” (Romans 1:9). To the Philippians: “Always in every prayer of mine for you all making request with joy” (Philippians 1:4). And to the Colossians: [We] do not cease to pray for you… I would that ye knew what great conflict I have for you (Colossians 1:9; 2:1).

Day and night Paul prayed for God to intervene and that the Holy Spirit might guide and direct these Christians. As earnestly as he believed in the power of his intercession for them, he believed in the blessing that their prayers would bring upon him: “Now I beseech you…that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me” (Romans 15:30). “[God] will yet deliver us; ye also helping together by prayer for us” (2 Corinthians 1:10-11). “Praying…for me…that I may open my mouth boldly” (Ephesians 6:18-19). “This shall turn to my salvation through your prayer” (Philippians 1:19).

Paul understood that a pastor-congregant relationship is a heavenly one—developed and maintained through prayer, by the Spirit. It is the same today, no matter where the congregation may be. Because we are participants in God’s life through Christ’s vicarious life for us, our prayers are ultimately rooted and grounded in the intercessory voice of Jesus as our Faithful High Priest (Hebrews 2:17; 7:25).

In Atonement: the Person and Work of Christ, T. F. Torrance wrote this: “Prayer is the link between world history and the intercession of Christ in heaven. So far as the church in history and on earth is concerned, therefore, the great connecting link between world history and the heavenly session of Christ is to be found in prayer and intercession.”

Paul’s prayers focused on all kinds of relationships—not only between Christians, but also between church and state. Remember Paul’s words to Timothy: “I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:1-4).

Do you see why I like the illustration shown above? Rather than presenting prayer as something vague and ephemeral, it brings it right down to earth. When we pray, we are joining in the work of the kingdom of God, supporting each other and those we serve in a vast “underground” network of prayer relationships that are rooted and grounded in love.

Your brother in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Black History Month reminds us of the important people and events of the African Diaspora. It is celebrated annually in the US and Canada in February and in the UK in October. Carter G. Woodson and The Association for the Study of Negro Life and History announced the second week of February to be Negro History Week. In 1970, this was expanded to Black History Month and President Gerald Ford formally acknowledged it in 1976.

 

During Black History Month in the US, we acknowledge the contribution that African-Americans have made to our nation. They have held some of the highest offices in our government (including president) and have made their mark in the sports world. Thousands of less recognizable African-Americans have and are making significant contributions to our national life in academia, science and the arts (see the P.S. below).

Black History Month also reminds us of the tragic record of misunderstanding, prejudice and cruelty that has been a part of our history. Thankfully, things have improved. However, I shudder when I think that only a generation or so ago much of this country was still mired in outright segregation and blatant prejudice.

Of course, this is not just an issue in the US—and here it is not just a white and black issue and not just a matter of race. The genocide in Rwanda at the end of the last century was a clash of two tribes of the same race. The deadly Bosnian conflict was between peoples who share a common language, much common history and possibly ancient ancestry. The cruelties of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia were perpetrated mainly by Europeans on Europeans. Imperialist Japan and Communist China committed atrocities against fellow Asians. In the long and sordid history of racial/nationalistic conflict, no people can plead “not guilty” to prejudice and discrimination.

Sadly, these atrocities are often committed in the name of God. It is sobering to remember that those who do these things have often used the Bible to justify their actions. Surely, this is one of the greatest perversions of Scripture. Regrettably, such teaching continues and still affects the way some think about others and even about themselves. I have friends who grew up with segregation who tell me that the scars take a long time to heal. And I wonder if, perhaps, the greatest damage is done by those who, considering themselves superior, look down on fellow human beings.

There is nothing in the Scriptures to indicate that any people are inferior or are excluded from God’s saving grace on the basis of ethnic origin or skin color. God is “not wanting anyone to perish” (2 Peter 3:9). The book of Revelation explicitly expresses great joy that heavenly worship involves those “from every tribe and language and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9; 7:9; 13:7; 14:6). Jesus paid the same price for everyone. No race, nation, tribe or people group are outside the embrace of his love. As the old song goes, “red and yellow, black and white, all are precious in his sight.”

The Bible is clear that God created humanity in his image, with one common ancestor. There is, in actuality, only one race—the human race. Within this human race, by God’s design, there is great diversity in culture, language, skin color and other physical characteristics. It is interesting that the Human Genome project has discovered that every human being on the planet is 99.9% genetically identical. There is only one-tenth of one percent of DNA that differentiates us from one another, no matter our race.

Furthermore, Jesus has done everything to forgive and redeem us all. When the angels appeared to the shepherds to announce the birth of Jesus, they said it was good news for all peoples (Luke 2:10). Jesus taught that he would “draw all people” to himself (John 12:32) and from east and west, north and south (Luke 13:29). The apostle Paul declared that Jesus was the new Adam, the new head of all humanity (Romans 5:14; 1Corinthians 15:45) and that, in Christ, there is one new humanity (Ephesians 2:15). We celebrate this truth and there is no one who should be appreciated any less than another.

When Carter Woodson created Black History Week, he hoped that racial prejudice would eventually be eliminated when black history became fundamental to American history. We have made progress, but we are not quite there yet. There are still many tragic examples of hatred and oppression in the world today. So we still need Black History Month. It reminds us of where we have been and where we need yet to go. The more we learn about the accomplishments of our brothers and sisters, the more we learn to appreciate the variety God has given his children.

GCI is multi-racial, multi-ethnic and multi-national. We may be a small denomination, but we are a rich tapestry of many peoples from many different backgrounds and nationalities, working together with the same purpose. Let’s thank God for that.

Your brother in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach

P.S. Can you name the notable African-Americans pictured here? See the answers below.

Upper left corner: George Washington Carver was an American scientist, botanist, educator and inventor. Carver’s reputation is based on his research into and promotion of alternative crops to cotton such as peanuts, soybeans and sweet potatoes, which also aided nutrition for farm families. He wanted poor farmers to grow alternative crops both as a source of their own food and as a source of other products to improve their quality of life. The most popular of his 44 practical bulletins for farmers contained 105 food recipes using peanuts. He also developed and promoted about 100 products made from peanuts that were useful for the house and farm including cosmetics, dyes, paints, plastics, gasoline and nitroglycerin.

Upper right corner: Finishing his master’s degree, Lonnie G. Johnson joined the Air Force and was assigned to the Strategic Air Command, where he helped develop the stealth bomber program. His other assignments included working as a systems engineer for the Galileo mission to Jupiter and the Cassini mission to Saturn. Johnson also created the Super Soaker squirt gun, which became one of the most popular toys in the world.

Lower left corner: Author of more than 30 books, economist, social theorist and political philosopher Dr. Thomas Sowell served on the faculties of several universities, including Cornell and the University of California, Los Angeles. Also, he worked for think tanks such as the Urban Institute. Since 1980 he has worked at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.

Lower right corner: Zora Neale Hurston was a novelist, playwright, folklorist and anthropologist. She was born in 1891 in the tiny town of Notasulga, Alabama and raised in Eatonville, Florida. While earning her bachelor’s degree at Barnard College in New York, she studied under pioneering anthropologist Franz Boaz, whose work inspired her to collect the African-American folklore that would inform her most famous literary works, such as Their Eyes Were Watching God, Mules and Men, Jonah’s Gourd Vine and Tell My Horse.

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Some claim that Trinitarian theology teaches universalism, the belief that everyone will be saved, regardless of whether they are good or bad, repentant or unrepentant, accepting or rejecting of Jesus, and that, consequently, there is no such thing as hell. I have two problems with this claim, which is a “straw man” argument (a logical fallacy). First, accepting Trinitarian theology does not necessitate belief in universalism. Noted Swiss theologian Karl Barth did not teach universalism. Neither did theologians Thomas F. Torrance and James B. Torrance. In GCI, we teach Trinitarian theology, but not universalism. Our website clearly states our position:

Universalism is a biblically unsound doctrine, which says that in the end all souls, whether human, angelic or demonic, will be saved by God’s grace. Some Universalists argue that repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ are irrelevant. Universalists typically deny the doctrine of the Trinity, and many Universalists are Unitarians. Contrary to universalism, the Bible teaches that there is salvation only in Jesus Christ (Acts 4:12). In Jesus Christ, who is God’s elect for our sakes, all humanity is elect, but that does not necessarily mean that all humans will ultimately accept God’s free gift. God desires that all come to repentance, and he has created and redeemed humanity for true fellowship with him, but true fellowship can never constitute a forced relationship. We believe that in Christ, God makes gracious and just provision for all, even for those who at death appear not to have yet believed the gospel, but all who remain hostile to God remain unsaved by their own choice.

Careful students of the Bible recognize that though we need not rule out the possibility that everyone will in the end repent and receive God’s gift of salvation, the scriptures are not conclusive. Therefore we are not dogmatic about this issue.

My second problem is this: Why should the possibility that all would be saved arouse hostility and accusations of “heresy”?

The creeds of the early church were not dogmatic on the nature of hell. The biblical metaphors are of flames, outer darkness and weeping and gnashing of teeth. They are meant to convey what it is like for a person to be lost forever in a self-enclosed “world,” with their own selfish heart and desires, adamantly rejecting the source of all love, goodness and truth. If taken literally, these metaphors are conflicting. But metaphors are not intended to be taken literally—they illustrate various aspects of the topic. What we gain from them is that hell, whatever it is, is not where we want to be. To have an ardent desire that all humanity be saved and that no one suffer in hell, does not necessarily make a person a heretic. What Christian would not want every person who ever lived to repent, receive forgiveness and experience reconciliation with God?

The idea of all humanity, transformed by the Spirit of Christ and in heaven together, surely is to be desired. That is, in fact, exactly what God desires. He wants all people to come to repentance and not suffer the consequences of rejecting his gracious provision for them. God wants this because he loves the world (cosmos), just as we read in John 3:16. God tells us to love our enemies, just as Jesus loved and served even his betrayer Judas Iscariot at the Last Supper (John 13:1, 26) and on the Cross (Luke 23:34).

However, the Bible does not guarantee that all will necessarily accept God’s love—it warns that there very well may be people who will refuse God’s forgiveness, rejecting the redemption and the adoption he has for them. Still, it is difficult to believe that anyone would make such a choice. And it is even more difficult to imagine that any would persist in rebellion against having a loving relationship with God. As C.S. Lewis described in The Great Divorce, “I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked on the inside.”

Universalism should not be confused with the universal or cosmic scope of the effectiveness of Christ’s saving work. In Jesus Christ, who is God’s elect for our sakes, all humanity is elect.

That does not mean we can say for certain that all humans will ultimately accept God’s gift. But surely we can hope that they do. According to the apostle Peter, God does not want “anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). Furthermore, God has done everything possible to save us from the terrible and horrific situation that is hell.

Yet, in the end, God will not violate the deliberate and persistent choice of those who willfully and deliberately reject his love and turn away from him. In fact, for God to absolutely override their minds, wills and hearts he would have to undo their humanity—he would have to uncreate them. Of course, were he to do that, there would be no human being there to freely receive God’s costly gift of grace, which is life in Jesus Christ. God has created and redeemed humanity for true fellowship—a relationship with him that cannot be forced.

The Bible does not blur the difference between believer and unbeliever, and neither should we. When we say that all people are forgiven, saved and reconciled in Christ, we mean that while we all belong to Christ, not all are in communion with him. While God has reconciled all to himself, not all are yet trusting and living in that reconciliation. Therefore the apostle Paul says, “that God was in Christ, reconciling the world (cosmos) to himself…” So, “be reconciled to God” (2 Corinthians 5:19, 20, NASB). And that is why ours is a ministry, not of condemnation, but of the announcement of Christ’s finished work of reconciliation.

Our focus is to bear witness to the biblical revelation and orthodox teaching concerning God’s own character, mind, heart, purpose and attitude towards all people, manifested in Jesus Christ. We preach the universal or cosmic Lordship of Jesus Christ and so hope in the cosmic reconciliation of all those created according to his image. Since the Bible tells us that it is God’s desire for all to come to him in repentance to receive his gracious and costly forgiveness, that is our desire as well.

With love, in Christ’s service,

Joseph Tkach