Let’s do church

I found Martin Pakula's article very insightful. The relationship between Jew and Gentile is a topic that is fundamental to the concerns of the New Testament, and it is important for all Christians to grapple with the topic as we seek to understand and serve God our saviour. Martin's article helpfully drew my attention to the parallel between gender and Jewishness in Galatians 3:28. Jews and Gentiles are “equal but different”—equal in terms of our salvation in Christ and our common justification through faith in Christ, but different in our relationship to God's particular promises to and special concern for the historical nation of Israel.

Malcolm Jones' letter, unfortunately, does not engage properly with the points that Martin raised. Malcolm seems to be just repeating the issues that Martin has already dealt with in his article. The Bible verses that Malcolm cites are not conclusive. Galatians 3:29 teaches that all Christians share in God's blessing and sonship and Spirit; it does not negate Paul's teaching elsewhere about other (albeit lesser) Jewish privileges (e.g. Rom 3:1-2, 9:4-5). Romans 3:22 and 10:12 teach the universal need for human beings to be justified by faith, not the absolute equivalence of all human beings in every respect. There are strong contextual arguments that Galatians 6:16 and Philippians 3:3 (and perhaps even 1 Peter 2:10) are speaking directly about Jews, not Gentiles. Ephesians 2:12ff does not say that Gentiles are granted citizenship in Israel; it says that exclusion from Israel is no longer a barrier to our common inclusion in the ‘One Man’, Jesus Christ. And even after Acts 1:8 has been fulfilled, Paul still shows a special evangelistic concern for Jews (e.g. Acts 28, Romans 9-11).

There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ. This is primary. But that does not make every person exactly the same in all respects. Using the universal call of the gospel to erase all distinctions between Jews and Gentiles is just as wrong as using it to erase all distinctions between men and women.

Lionel Windsor of Wollongong, NSW, AUS (06/05/2008)

My article ‘Who is a Jew?’ (Briefing #354) was necessarily brief. Nonetheless, it reads like a reply to Malcolm Jones' letter rather than vice versa. I am left wondering whether Malcolm understood the article. Since the article was brief I omitted many verses in the Bible that bear on the topic. I am well aware of the verses however and the arguments on this topic that arise around their interpretation. Donald Robinson's work on each of these verses was published this year in Donald Robinson: Selected works. Detailed arguments can be found there that refute the common misinterpretations of these verses given in Malcolm's letter.

Malcolm quoted Galatians 3:29 which says that all Gentile Christians are children of Abraham. I agree: that is what Galatians says. It is a far cry however to move from Gentile Christians being children of Abraham to saying that Jews and Gentiles are the same and distinctions are abolished. That would be an illogical conclusion that goes against what many other verses from Paul say. Gentile Christians are children of Abraham, but are not Jews or the new Israel. Abraham was to be the father of many nations (Gen 17:5, Rom 4:17), which include the Jews (Rom 4:12) and the Gentiles (Rom 4:11). I don't know anyone who would disagree with the point made by Malcolm from this verse: that Gentiles are children of Abraham. However it does not back up the conclusion of his letter at all: that there is no present day distinction between Jews and Gentiles.

Galatians 6:16 is the next verse Malcolm quoted which speaks of the “Israel of God”. Many commentators believe that this refers to Gentile Christians. If they are correct (and they may be), then this would probably be the only use of the word “Israel” in the New Testament that can refer to Gentiles. However, Steven Voorwinde from the Reformed Theological College in Geelong has recently examined this verse and shown conclusively (I believe) that it refers to Jewish Christians and that “Israel” in the New Testament always refers to Jewish people, not Gentiles. (His work can be obtained from the Reformed College).

I could go on and refute each verse cited one by one. I refer interested readers to the work of Donald Robinson mentioned above which does this. “We are the circumcision” in Philippians 3:3 refers to Paul and his co-workers who are true Jews, as opposed to the Judaizers who are false Jews. It does not include Gentile Christians. Ephesians 2:12 speaks of Gentiles being excluded from citizenship in Israel but now in Christ becoming one new man in him. This is an important passage that highlights what Jew and Gentile have in common in Christ. It cannot be used then to undo others verses in Paul that highlight the differences. There are things we Jews and Gentiles have in common: a shared salvation and inheritance in Christ. We have the same status before God. This is also true of all male and female Christians. However, there are still distinctions between male and female Christians, as there are between Jewish and Gentile Christians. That was the whole point of my article. The 1 Peter 2:10 verse has, in modern times, been thought to refer to Gentile Christians. The traditional view is that 1 Peter is written to Jewish Christians (Peter is the apostle to the Jews). If it is written to Gentile Christians, then it is true that it would be taking Old Testament descriptors of the people of Israel and applying them to Gentile Christians. That does not make Gentile Christians Jews, but that, as Ephesians 2 emphasizes, they now share the inheritance of the Jews in Christ.

Malcolm looks at Romans 1:16 and Acts to argue that the gospel first went to the Jews, then to the Gentiles, but that this is an activity describing what happened historically in the first century only and no longer applies today. Acts continues to show Paul taking the gospel first to the Jew right to the end of the Book of Acts, and there is no reason to assume the verse applies only to the original readers and not to us. I argued in my article that reading Romans 1:16 in the light of Romans 11 leads to the conclusion that the gospel is still first to the Jew. I would be happy for readers to look at most modern day commentaries on Romans to see that this is indeed the case. This would indeed lead to primacy of Jewish mission and a burden on the church. It is exactly what I and others are arguing for from the New Testament.

Once again, the “no difference” between Jew and Gentile of Romans 3:22 and 10:12 speaks about no difference in salvation before God. Jew and Gentile are alike saved by the death of Jesus (justified by faith). However Paul speaks at length about the differences between Jew and Gentile in Romans: 3:1-2, 9:1-5, 11:1-5, 11, 17-18, 24, 25-26, 28-29, 15:8-12, 25-27. This is a key point. Reading verses that emphasize similarities between Jews and Gentiles, and using them to obliterate the distinctions between them is seen by Paul to be a Gentile ‘arrogance’: In Romans 11:13, 18, 20. Paul is calling on any Gentile Christians who think this way to repent of their arrogance.

We must be more careful in how we read the Bible. That was a key point in my article. Ignorance of logic and the Bible, of course, does not make one anti-Semitic. However, even then, we must take care. Most anti-Semites deny anti-Semitism. I am aware that the teaching in my article produces a strong response in some people (like Malcolm). Why? Perhaps the article can be misread and seem to be saying that Gentile Christians are unimportant or less important than Jewish Christians. It is not saying that. However, if Gentile Christians thought that they were far superior to Jewish Christians, then such arrogance would be confronted by the article. That arrogance could be something akin to Gentile nationalistic pride (which of course occurs on the Jewish side too), or it could be a distaste for Jewish people. The latter is anti-Semitism.

Malcolm says that it is not helpful to make the national Jewish identity an issue. That is precisely what the article argues against. The New Testament makes it an issue.

Malcolm then gets a bit naughty, I believe, in arguing from one logical point to a completely different conclusion. He argues that Jews are saved through the gospel and that the Old Testament promises are fulfilled in Christ. I agree. In fact, my ministry in the past and present highlights these very points. I am at pains to point out that the Old Testament is fulfilled in Christ. I am at pains to point out to the Jews that they can only be saved in Jesus. However, these facts do not then equate with Malcolm's conclusions. He has a very strong replacement theology which says that the church has replaced Israel and the Jews are no more. My article showed from the New Testament why this is an unbiblical view. Jesus fulfils the Old Testament. Jews are saved through Jesus. They continue to be Jews. God's promises to non-Christian Jews in the Old Testament still stand (Rom 11:29). The gospel has not erased these distinctions. One cannot argue from one thing (fulfillment of the Old Testament in Jesus) to conclude another (no distinctions between Jews and Gentiles).

It is very sad to see modern Christians perpetuating this identity theft upon Jewish people. The New Testament does not back up their position.

Martin Pakula of Lilydale, VIC, AUS (06/05/2008)

An important issue that I am looking forward to reading about in more detail is that of the Christian community (the church) and how it relates to the physical community (the neighbourhood). Until the industrial revolution, it seems to me, these two were much more closely linked. The people you ‘churched’ with were your physical neighbours. This may not always have been a positive thing. In some English parish churches, the building and seating may well have reflected the social hierarchy of the community in a way that was not in keeping with James 2. Many Christian communities seem to have also forgotten Jesus' message in Luke 10 that our neighbour is not always the person who thinks, acts or dresses the same way that we do.

The dislocation of church and neighbourhood was one of the reasons William Booth founded the Salvation Army. He recognized that the Church needed to go out to the community because the church was no longer physically or spiritually at the centre of the new, mobile population groupings that formed around the factory or mine. The desire of the emerging church to be relevant to the culture around them is nothing new. Neither is the use of technology to facilitate the connection between church and culture.

In our mobile societies, the people who form our gospel community are much less likely to belong to those who form our daily neighbourhood. There is a positive side to this. We are compelled to see our daily life as a mission field, distinct from, but supported by our Christian community. (I note Steve Timmis' description of this group as a dis-community.) In my situation I definitely see my daily life, at home, at work, and in between, as relevant to God's gospel mission. Because I work for a Christian organization working with young people, I am blessed to have people around me who exhort and encourage me in that mission daily, as well as admonish and correct me when my life is not matching the message. My colleagues fulfill much of the role of the church or gospel community in a real and immediate way that my church community may not. On the other hand, I would not be wanting to travel to my place of work for my weekly church gathering—although some people do. By meeting with a different group for church, I am reminded that there are many other daily mission fields to which the gospel message is relevant and in which the Lord Jesus Christ is to be proclaimed. I am reminded that the gospel community contains a diverse group of people centred on Christ. I am able to focus on things other than those that take my attention the rest of the week. As Philip Yancey puts it, there are many different shapes to take the rough edges off me and be used by the Holy Spirit to polish me so that I might reflect Jesus.

Different Christian groups address this here and there nature of our society in different ways. It is no afterthought that the so-called mega churches place a high emphasis on Bible study or home groups or shepherd groups. The Logos church is one example where the members would buy houses in the same street to promote a connection between their spiritual and physical community. The use of the internet and sites such as Facebook and MySpace to link gospel communities who are physically separated is another means being explored. The trend for pastors to live away from their church property—sometimes in a different suburb—underlines the difference between the Christian community and the physical community.

The relationship between the Christian community and the physical community is important because it addresses the barriers that can contribute to the exclusion of the gospel from the daily life of society, and the exclusion of society from the eternal life of the gospel of Jesus.

Philip Cooney of Wentworth Falls, NSW, AUS (26/05/2008)