Month: October 2006

Church Size

Church size does not happen by accident. Rather, size is determined by structure. It is possible to stratify a list of churches according to size based on a description of their structure, both logistical and liturgical. Certain kinds of structure simply cannot support a church larger than a certain size. On the other hand, other kinds of structure scale very rapidly and are limited only by the population density of the region adn the efficient use of facilities.

This is important because it requires some intentionality in regards to church size when you choose the structure of your church. You may have other reasons for choosing a certain kind of structure, but when that structure inevitably results in a certain size congregation, you cannot claim ignorance.

I could describe for you the structures of churches of various sizes, but instead I want to ask if a church should deliberately choose to be small.

Does God want little churches?

Almost Thou Persuadest Me to Become a Pedobaptist

Or: A Few Thoughts on Infant Baptism

Disclaimer: I am not, nor have I ever been a practitioner of infant baptism. I have never baptized anybody. I was raised in the rural parts of Southwest Oklahoma, first among Southern Baptist churches, and finally among non-denominational charismatic churches. To my knowledge, there are no pedobaptists of any stripe in Southwest Oklahoma. Quite frankly, the very idea of infant baptism gives me the heebie-jeebies.
Nevertheless:

  1. Infant baptism is the practice of the ancient church.

    There are no denominations that trace their origins to before the Protestant Reformation, either “Orthodox” or “Catholic,” and which also practice credal baptism.

  2. If infant baptism was an early innovation that differed from the practice of the apostles, it occurred so early and so quietly that there is no record of it whatsoever in church history.

    If differences between between credal and infant baptism have caused such difficulties in our time, surely they would have caused a stir in an era that was willing to commit murder over a difference of one word in the doctrine of the Trinity. Yet there is no record of such a fight.

  3. If infant baptism is unscriptural, so also are the use musical instruments and art of any kind in worship.

    The modern practice of credal baptism stems from a radical application of Zwingli’s “regluative principle,” which says that only those practices which are specifically prescribed by scripture may be allowed in the church. It is on the basis of this principle that Zwingli banned art and music from his church’s worship. The Anabaptists were those who insisted Zwingli had not gone far enough, and wished to also ban infant baptism on the basis that it wasn’t clearly prescribed by scripture. Since there is marginally more support in scripture for infant baptism than for art and music, those who use these things in worship should not argue that infant baptism isn’t mentioned in scripture. Else, those who argue against infant baptism should also argue against art and music.

  4. Credal baptism attempts to do the work of God by removing all the tares from the field before the harvest.

    The effect, and usually the intent, of credal baptism is to ensure that the church is composed entirely of believers whose salvation is assured. Yet Jesus compared the church to a field in which an enemy had sowed tares in with the wheat. Credal baptism, then, is an effort to “weed out” the tares. This is a futile effort (there are always tares), and potentially harmful: Jesus himself said that removing the tares before the harvest could destroy some of the wheat.

  5. Baby dedications are either infant baptism in disguise, or an unscriptural sacrament

    Among churches which practice believer’s baptism, a new practice has arisen, which has all the effects of a sacrament: A newborn infant is taken before the church and blessed by the elders. Sometimes the child is annointed with oil; always they are prayed for. Often the congregation is invoked to support the child’s Christian development. The only discernable difference between this practice and that of infant baptism is the presence of water.

    If baby dedication is a form of baptism, then these churches are guilty of performing two baptisms, and possibly creating a church within the church. If it is not a form of baptism, then they have created a new sacrament to replace infant baptism, and which has no support in scripture.

As I said in the title, these things *almost* persuade me to become a pedobaptist. There are other arguments in support of credo-baptism that are persuasive for me – particularly the fact that Jesus based his baptism on John’s, which was clearly performed on those who were themselves repenting, and also Paul’s comments on Christians and circumcision.

Nevertheless, the strongest motivating factor for me is tradition: baptism upon confession is the system that I grew up with and which I have known my whole life. I can’t imagine offending all my friends and family over this issue. But this is a pitiful appeal on an issue where the opposition has a **much** stronger tradition.

If tradition is my strongest point, then there is little doubt that if I had lived in Luther’s time, I would have been a pedobaptist.

God’s choices

It is to no end of my amusement to think that God could have made me into a billionaire. I have a good mind and a diverse set of interests: I think I would have made a great billionaire. Think of the good that I could have done as a very wealthy, committed, evangelical Christian! But God in his wisdom has seen fit to bend me into the shape of a preacher and a teacher of the Gospel. This amuses me to no end. For while I would have made an easy match for a businessman of any number of shades, making me into a preacher has taken some quite violent twisting to get me into shape. I suspect it will continue to require a bit of work on God’s part to force me into this role.

As I said, this affords me no end of amusement. I don’t particularly mind the lack of wealth on my part, but I can already see that, by certain standards, I am quite possibly going to be a very pitiful preacher. Was God so short of willing hands, that he felt obliged to choose me? I doubt it. I was hardly a willing hand myself. Yet something in God’s character determined he would rather me be a preacher than anything else, perhaps like the poor Gipetto, who determined he would rather make a talking marionette than a talking coo-coo clock from his talking block of wood, even though by many standards, a marionette is a silly thing for a poor carpenter to make.

Nevertheless, even though the wood was ungainly for the task, a preacher is what he decided to make of me, because it pleased him. Perhaps it even amused him. And so it amuses me. And this, I think, points to the sovereignty of God: for no amount of badgering could change his mind. And though there are any number of things for which I might have been better suited, I am surely becoming that which he has determined I should be.

Revelation – Or Isn’t It?

As I recover from my ill-advised attempt at in-school employment, I’m sprinting through a book for class called Living the Story by R. Paul Stevens & Michael Green. It’s not bad as devotionally oriented books go (though I wouldn’t have picked it out for myself – I’ve gone over a lot of their points before), and it actually very interesting insights, particularly on the Wisdom books of the bible.

But I wanted to pull out something on Revelation that I seem to be coming across a lot lately: it’s this description of the Revelation of John as being a product of John’s imagination.

I’m not really sure what to make of it. The idea seems to stem from the fact that Revelation falls clearly within the apocolyptic genre that was popular in the classical age, a genre that is particularly inaccessible to modern readers. So to make it easier to understand, we play up the fact that this kind of literature was particularly accessible in the era in which it was written, and that these kinds of images were common to the age. Fine so far. But then we start talking about sanctified imagination, and things start to get a bit blurry. Continue reading “Revelation – Or Isn’t It?”