UNDERSTANDING OUR FAITH

The NICENE CREED

A series of 9 study sessions for Individuals and Groups with notes for

Leaders

By

R E Darby BA (Theology) (Rhodes) Chartered MCIPD

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For the Holy Trinity Clapham Home Study Pilot Group who supported my efforts & without whom I would never have done this.

Pauline BledmanPeter CarpenterElizabeth Gibson

John LambNicky Long

Susan ShellyJill Threfall

Eustace Wiltshire & of course the most important person in my life, my love, my wife, Lucy

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Foreword By Rt. Rev. Tom Butler Bishop of Southwark

Understanding our Faith The Nicene Creed

The Nicene Creed is one of the most important statements of the Christian Faith. It outlines the basic theological principles that underpin the call to discipleship and through its regular recitation it reminds us that we are called to serve God who is the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

In this series of Study Sessions, Robin Darby offers an important contribution to how it can be used to assist both groups and individuals in better understanding their faith. The format is very simple even though it covers profound theological truths. The Chapters are each based on different elements of the Nicene Creed and by drawing on each of the sections different areas of Christian life and belief are opened up for wider discussion.

Beginning with ‘I believe’ he leads the reader and those who will study in groups into exploring all the elements of Christian theology. Each of the chapters begins with a different part of the creed, in this way the content allows for a full exploration of the whole.

The chapters introduce questions of life and faith. Opening up the depth of the meaning of the universe of which God is both creator and redeemer. The themes that are explored include reflection on contemporary science and how in seeking to better understand the link to theology and faith that God is revealed in new ways.

In opening up the Nicene Creed in this way Robin Darby is able to show that even though it was written in the 4 th Century it remains a contemporary statement of belief. It enlivens our faith by reminding us that God is at the heart of all that we believe and that in Jesus he reveals himself. In the Holy Spirit we are led into new truths and this being the case we are brought back to the certainties of the creed.

In commending this Study Guide, I hope that all who make use of its chapters will be grow into a deeper understanding of what it means to be a Christian.

The Churches history over a period of 2,000 years is one of the Nicene Creed being used to teach and affirm faith. In the 21st Century is remains a key statement that we can draw on in seeking to both defend what we believe and better understand our calling to be disciples.

In this Study Guide, tools are offered for reflection, study that can lead to a deeper faith. It is a source book that opens up questions that will assist Christians to better understand what it is they commit themselves to Sunday by Sunday when they recite the Nicene Creed.

Rt Revd Tom ButlerBishop of Southwark

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CONTENTS

Introductionpage 3

Chapter 1 We Believe page 6

Chapter 2 in God, The Father Almighty page 20

Chapter 3 Creator, - Seen & Unseen page 31

Chapter 4 One LORD, Jesus Christ page 47

Chapter 5 For us & our salvation – in accordance page 59With the Scriptures

Chapter 6 Ascended into Heaven – Kingdom shall page 70Have no end

Chapter 7 In the Holy Spirit page 80

Chapter 8 One Holy, Catholic & Apostolic Church page 92

Chapter 9 One Baptism – Life of the world to come page 104

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THE NICENE CREED

INTRODUCTION

Purpose

During the planning stages of this course I had reason to discuss the project with a member of the clergy at my local church. As soon as I mentioned the Nicene Creed he said, “Aha, you want to discuss St. Athanasius?” He was somewhat taken aback when I replied that I wished to discuss St. Anselm rather than the saint who contributed so much to the Creed, for while the subject of this course is the statement of our Faith as set forth in the Nicene Creed, the purpose of this course is the deepening of Faith through gaining a better understanding of our Faith.

When a structure is erected by builders the first thing that is done on site is to lay a foundation to support the structure and give it the strength to withstand all that the elements can throw at it. The New Testament teaches us, as Christians, that our Faith in Jesus Christ is the foundation upon which we are to build every aspect of our lives. It makes sense then to ensure that we have the strongest possible foundation to our Faith in Christ and this entails an understanding of our Faith which, at the same time strengthens and deepens our Faith. Living as we do in a time when we have to devote effort to our personal development at work by constantly learning new skills in order to progress it is easy to overlook the development of Faith.

Target Groups

Many of the most rewarding experiences of my professional life as a Training & Development specialist have not come from seeing executives within an organisation develop new skills but rather from the changes in the lives of people that were convinced that they had no hope of ever succeeding in any kind of employment. Once they started putting effort into learning either work or life skills the realisation that there was a future for them literally changed their lives and capacity for learning and understanding new ideas grew exponentially. If such development is possible with socially excluded inner city youths & adults it is certainly possible in other fields. So, when I was told that the level of this course was more suited to theological students, I developed a series of talks that facilitated the understanding of the topics within the course and used this format with a pilot group consisting of a fairly typical church Bible Study group. The unsolicited feedback by the group on the completion of the course was entirely positive and all reported that they had found the course beneficial.

The capacity of people to learn is, and always has been, astounding. The example of some Galilean fisherman and others who lived about 2000 years ago springs to mind.

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Their learning of and understanding of Faith helped to change the world forever. Mind you, they had the Master Teacher.

The Course

The Notes

At the beginning of each section there is a set of notes on the subject for that session. These notes are a fairly intense condensed form of the salient theology underlying the relevant part of the Creed. Working with the Pilot Group it was found that the majority of members felt that if they received the notes well in advance (about a week) of the lecture / discussion they were able to examine and reflect upon all the information in the notes. The lectures / discussions thus became the reinforcement of learning to the notes as well as broadening the notes. It also provided the Pilot Group with an opportunity to seek clarification on certain issues and develop their own ideas.

It should be noted that certain members of the Pilot Group chose not to receive the notes before the lecture / discussion as their preferred style of learning was to use the notes as reinforcement to the learning in lectures / discussions on each subject. It is felt that each member involved in this course should be allowed adopt their preferred style and no hard and fast ruling be laid down for the running of the course thereby allowing Group members “ownership” of the course.

Lectures / Discussions

Following the notes on each session is a section on how I successfully delivered the course to a specific group. In the delivery of the course to other groups other materials and / or examples will be more appropriate. The composition and abilities of the group should determine the delivery of the learning. My materials are included purely as a guideline. Those delivering the course must however ensure that in their delivery all the relevant points are covered.

As the Pilot Group met in a private home I used a flipchart for my illustrations as this was deemed more appropriate than other forms of media. I have included all my flipcharts for each session together with participative introductions, where possible, to each subject.

Each lecture / discussion closely follows the notes on each subject but they are not a verbatim repeat of the notes. As the Pilot Group was an established group I was able to relate certain points to individuals and check their understanding or gain their professional expertise. I was also able to invite members to contribute from their experience of certain circumstances. This led to a degree of interaction between the presenter and other group members.

Each session lasted approximately 45 minutes and the Pilot Group met on a monthly basis. Due to the amount to be assimilated the minimum time between sessions should be at least 2 weeks though a longer break between sessions is preferable.

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The Pilot Group

The Pilot Group for whom this course was run consisted of people from a wide range of backgrounds with education ranging from post graduate qualifications to basic education. The age of the Group was middle to late age. Predominately female, the group is an established Home Study group within the church that has been together for a number of years and there are strong bonds of friendship within the Group. Delivery of the course was carried out by myself as a member of, but not the leader, of the Pilot Group.

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THE NICENE CREED

Session 1 “WE BELIEVE”

Introduction

One of the characteristics of our modern 21st century, secular society is our loose usage of words, giving them meanings that at times detract from a deeper understanding. Two of these such words are “belief” & “faith”. Today we say for example, “I believe that Cairo is the capital of Egypt.” What we are really implying is that although we have never been to or seen Egypt, let alone Cairo, we are fairly sure based upon our own research and reading & what we have been told that it is the capital of Egypt. We also use the word believe to indicate a degree of uncertainty when we say we believe something to be correct, or right, or that someone is being truthful.

The same is true of our use of the word faith. In our current secular use of the word faith we tend to use it to indicate that we believe in something, or more usually someone or idea even though common sense, or the perceived wisdom of others makes our belief illogical or irrational. If in the future we are proved right we often respond with a “told you so” to the person who challenged our way of thinking. In reality we have remembered the challenge to our way of thinking and have been actively, consciously or subconsciously, seeking out facts that tend to support our beliefs or undermine the standpoint of those who challenged our belief.

When the emperor Constantine asked of the 300 or so bishops who attended the Council of Nicea he was not just asking for a brief oversight of Christianity, he was asking them to put into words the very core of their religion. So, at the start of each ‘section’ of the Creed, you will find the words “We believe”.

Belief

Belief is very hard to define. Psychologists tell us that a person’s beliefs are at the very centre of who they are. Counsellors, in trying to change a client’s behaviour or actions, claim that changing a person’s beliefs is the most difficult task of all. Yet a person’s beliefs can change. Sometimes the change is so dramatic, so far reaching that they become a new person like Saul on the road to Damascus becoming Paul the disciple. Sometimes the change is not always for the good. One has only to look at the Holocaust or the actions of some members of the present day Israeli army shooting children to understand the change that can be brought about for evil. That such people can commit such deeds is an indication of how much pressure has been placed upon them. We call it brain washing though soul erosion would, I think, be a better term for the beliefs & values they started to acquire at their mothers’ knees as a child have been radically altered and rather than being cleaned as implied in washing part of the very soul maybe scoured away.

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Beliefs and values are interconnected but perhaps the best way to describe belief is that used by Prof. J A B Holland in his lectures at Rhodes University. In these he likened a person to an onion. At the very innermost place in a person is their soul, the heart of the onion. The next layer is a person’s beliefs closely followed by the core values they have based upon their beliefs, in other words what is right & what is wrong, what is good & what is evil. The following layer is that of experienced truth. In this layer we find what we may term lesser beliefs, things like fire burns, the difference between black & white. Subsequent layers are built up over these layers at the centre of a person’s being, growing outwards and including layers such as morals, how they see themselves & how to interact with others. A huge complex onion with soul & belief at its heart. It is a fascinating analogy that I feel goes a long way to understanding belief.

Most human beings have an inbuilt desire for order and dependability. We crave familiar routines and surroundings. We want in our lives is certainty not chaos. This applies to our beliefs as well as our daily lives. We need to have our beliefs confirmed, strengthened & therefore dependable and to this end we seek confirmation of the beliefs we hold. By doing this we obtain a degree of certainty & dependability close to the core of our being, a real comfort zone. Sometimes we find that we are unable to get certainty in our beliefs and in some cases we even find that it becomes necessary to alter or modify our beliefs despite this occasionally causing trauma. A prime example of this was the ending of the apartheid regime in South Africa in the 1990’s. The Truth & Reconciliation Commission led so ably by Archbishop Tutu prevented a great deal of individual and group trauma as individuals and groups had to radically alter their belief structures about race.

The key to either changing or strengthening our beliefs is of course understanding. Understanding in turn implies learning and development both in our innermost selves and as a result in our relationships. On example of this development is experimental science where a belief about something is tested and either proved or disproved. The problem with our innermost beliefs is that unlike scientific beliefs there is no experiment to prove our beliefs. Instead there is something we call FAITH and it to this topic we must now turn our attention.

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FAITH

Belief & Faith

If little has been written about belief then the same is not true of faith. Faith has been examined by many over the years & there are many great works on the subject. For our study purposes I would define Faith as those beliefs relating to God we hold closest to our innermost selves.

Faith then is a set of beliefs that is both personal and shapes our lives. There are for me some similarities between faith and belief. As our beliefs lend structure to our daily lives our faith should also give our daily living a structure, for there is no point in having faith unless it is to be used all the time and not just in times of trouble.

Like beliefs faith can change. Our faith, Christianity, was firstly carried into the world by those who had met Christ and were of the Jewish faith. Eventually the pantheon of gods in ancient Europe was replaced by Christianity, a massive change of faith by a number of people. From there Christianity has spread across the world changing & superseding many faiths in the process.

Just as we seek confirmation of our beliefs we also tend to seek confirmation of our faith. With hindsight we can see how our faith in Christ has assisted us through a crisis in our lives, or indeed in the lives of those around us or the world at large. But there is a danger in over claiming confirmation of our faith to explain concepts as we shall see in our examination of God as Creator.

There is however one unique difference between plain beliefs and beliefs & faith. Unlike static beliefs faith can grow and deepen. Unlike the entrenchment of our beliefs when we take a stand our faith is a living thing that thrives on being questioned. Indeed one could go so far as to say that unless one questions one faith there is no growth. This questioning of our faith is not to destroy it but to understand our faith and by understanding to deepen our faith.

Along with understanding comes learning. The more we learn about our faith and come to understand it the deeper it becomes as it grows. Faith must grow; if it becomes a static feature locked away somewhere close to our soul it can shrivel and die. If faith is something accorded recognition at just baptism, marriage & funerals so much is lost out upon that one is forced to ask if it is truly faith. Faith is not about hatch, match and despatch but about every aspect of our daily lives as Christians.

So how do we learn about, understand & grow in our faith? There are many ways of answering this but I would like to offer up my understanding for consideration.

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UNDERSTANDING, FAITH & LEARNING

In considering the interrelationship between our faith, understanding & learning I have drawn on two models. The first of these models was drawn up by St. Anselm in the Middle Ages and is still valid today. The second model, a modern secular concept, comes from Trainer Training and focuses on the Learning Cycle concept put forward by Kolb, Rubin, McIntyre et al (1974).

In his writings St. Anselm puts forward the idea that one has to have faith in Christ in order to understand the whole of the Christian message and by understanding one gets more faith then more understanding leading to yet more faith. The idea can be described as upward steps. The first step is having faith in Christ. Having taken this first step one then takes another step – understanding – on to the next step of faith & so on.

It is felt that this approach has much to recommend it. When a person first develops faith in Christ, be it from their parents, from experiences or from a conversion such a person must gain an understanding of their faith otherwise their faith will remain immobile, brittle and shallow, easily breaking under the pressure of daily living. By taking the step of understanding a person allows their faith to grow and also develops new insights and different aspects of their faith.

A person who has newly acquired faith in Christ, or is on the very first step if you like, faces the possibility that in their understanding of Christ they will not get the full meaning & message of Christ and will end up cherry picking only those aspects that have immediate appeal without devoting effort to learning & understanding the full message. That is why the church & fellowship are so important. They help Christians to grow. If we once again turn to the conversion of St. Paul we can see how important his blindness was. During this period, after having gained faith, he came to understand through the Christians at Damascus.

To sum up then, St. Anselm describes our faith in Christ leading to understanding leading to more faith & understanding, in a continuous journey joining us to God through Christ. We have also seen that understanding is something that just ‘happens’. In obtaining an understanding of our faith we have to give active thought to our beliefs, moving them ever closer, for us, to certainty. This we do through Testing / confirming them against Scripture and through discussion with other Christians.

All in all faith, learning & understanding are closely related and it is to this relationship we now turn our attention as we look at the secular Learning Cycle. The cycle is read clockwise starting at 12 o’clock the heading Concrete Experience.

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The Learning Cycle

(Kolb, Rubin, McIntyre et al)

CONCRETE EXPERIENCE

(Planned or unplanned)

REFLECTIVE OBSERVATION

(Actively thinking about theExperience, its basic issues,

and their significance)

ACTIVE EXPERIMENTATION

(Trying out the learning in other, similar situations: creativity, decision - making and problem solving.)

ABSTRACT CONCEPTUALISATION

(Generalising from reflections, analysing, in order to develop a body of ideas to apply

to similar problems or situations thus leading to more successful behaviour in those situations)

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Using examples is perhaps the best way to understand this model. Let us begin by using something we all know, fire burns. A child touches a flame and feels pain due to the heat. This is the Concrete Experience.

Actively reflecting on the experience the child comes to realise that putting one’s hand into a flame is unpleasant as it causes pain. A link is established between touching a flame and being burned.

At the Abstract Conceptualising stage the child goes on to realise (one hopes!) that touching hot objects can cause pain. Rather than just flames the child is coming to grips with the concept that excessive heat can cause pain.

Having learned that excessive heat can cause pain the child then incorporates this idea into daily living, avoiding getting burned. This then is the final stage, Active Experimentation. The child will go close to a source of heat for warmth but not touch it having learned through experimentation just how close is comfortable.

Let us now use a more familiar example of how the learning cycle can work. Let us look at using a computer.

At the Concrete Experience stage one may have lessons, read a book on computing or go through an interactive programme in order to learn say both Word and email programmes.

At the Actively Reflecting stage a person thinks about how the programmes work, which commands are used and the achievement of a desired result. This is done by following the steps learned during the concrete experience.

By the Abstract Conceptualisation stage our learner is considering sending emails of the articles they have written to their friends using email. Two different programmes have come together to form an idea.

This idea is then used experimentally in sending an attachment on an email to another party, it could be attaching one’s CV to a letter of application or, having used Word to produce a joke to then try to send this to all addresses in one’s emailing list.

Try using the Learning Cycle to explain something you have learned and you should find that in most cases it provides a fairly good fit. All in all it is a very useful tool in understanding the process of learning.

Perhaps it could be adapted to fit the process of Faith? In the next section we will examine how we develop our faith and see if this could be explained in a similar cycle.

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The Process of Faith

All faith begins with the belief in and acceptance of Christ as Lord. (Those of different religions may hold different beliefs but for Christians our faith starts here.) This is the first step in the linkage between God and man. As we will see in our examination of Jesus Christ later in the Creed, it is the bridging of the huge gap between fallen man & Holy God, by God, that is the central pivot of all things, for all time and space. So, for a Christian, the first step in the Cycle of Faith is Realisation, the realisation and acceptance of Christ.

Realisation

All too often there is what we can call a ‘Yeah, so what?’ attitude by people who purport to have realised & accepted Christ into their lives carrying on as if nothing had changed. Just like a seed eaten by a bird they will not be able to contribute to the harvest of God’s kingdom for they have almost taken the first step to being a Christian, but their faith will not grow. As we saw in the section on Belief it is as if they failed to seek a confirmation of their belief and in so doing isolated and weakened that belief so that when challenged the belief was given up. Stony ground springs to mind to describe this weakness.

For Christians our Faith must grow and not be something that is static. The growth of Faith is not through our intellectual arguments or learning but a realisation that Christ is present in our lives at all times and in all places. Unlike the Concrete Experience of the Learning Cycle our Realisation of Faith may come at a discrete point in time through an activity like attending worship, reading the Bible, within a Church group, or praying or just meditating on the day’s events. Our Realisation of Faith may not even happen in the same time frame as an event in our lives that triggered the realisation. It is often long after a traumatic event in our lives that we come to realise that Christ was there with us at the time, guiding us through and giving us help even though we thought at the time we were on our own battling against a problem or incident.

Our realisations can come to us in unexpected ways like talking to and listening to others who are not necessarily of the same persuasion as us, like a colleague at work or, indeed, the stranger we met whilst shopping. Make no mistake: God speaks to us in our daily lives. It is for us to listen, recognise His presence and grow in our faith.

Reflection

Unlike the Learning Cycle’s terminology of Reflective observation that focuses purely on the aftermath of the learning event in our reflection upon our realisations we have to take a far wider view for what has happened can effect all aspects of our lives. There are no hard and fast rules that can be cast in stone for each and everyone of us can and do realise Christ’s presence in different times and in different ways.

There are, however, a number of questions that must be answered by us individually as we meditate on our realisation of Christ’s presence. First among them is to question whether the realisation is true. By this I mean that are we really realising

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Christ’s presence or are we, perhaps in all sincerity, projecting our wishes into the situation? The latter is very easy to do and is very attractive to us as Christians as we seek to grow in our faith and as we are talking about faith rather than certainty we have to be very sure indeed. Bearing in mind the revelation of Christ in the Scriptures, we have to ask whether our realisation is out of character with the true Christ revealed there. If it is it is certainly not a true realisation, that is, we are trying to read too much into a situation. Scripture is in these reflections the supreme arbiter and guide for us.

If we think that we have realised God’s presence in our lives but are not quite sure it makes sense to ask Him. Prayer is not just for physical needs it is an ever present help in our faith and who better to turn to for guidance than God Himself?

If our realisation has stood the tests of Scripture & Prayer we then should move on the next step in our reflection, what the realisation means for us. The first point that must be addressed is whether the realisation is a challenge to the faith structure we already have in place. Does the realisation complement the faith we already have or does it challenge our beliefs in any way? If there is a challenge how is this to be resolved? Does one ignore the realisation or does one re examine one’s faith to see if it is not only on track but also deep enough? Or perhaps the new realisation will reinforce our faith, giving us that strength to retain our faith through everything and anything that happens, safe in the certainty faith, which is by far stronger than knowledge, that Christ cares for us.

Reinforcing

Having reflected upon and ‘tested’ our realisation of faith we now come to a process of reinforcing our new insights. Remember that in the section on belief we saw that people seek to have their beliefs backed up by similar views and beliefs? Well the same is true of us in our faith. As St. Anselm put it understanding leads to more faith – if we are bothered to do anything about it. Just as a learner in the Learning Cycle has to go through the process of Abstract Conceptualisation we as Christians have to use our new insights that have been reflected upon to seek out other areas of faith & apply our understanding gained through realisation to these areas.

This part of the Faith Cycle must not seen to be just the process of the participant’s active thought albeit thinking does play a large part. Reinforcement can come from a wide spectrum of sources that can include Worship, Prayer, and Bible Study whether in groups or individually, Picking up on something said in a sermon that triggers a reinforcement or just talking to fellow Christians. The reinforcement need not be within a church setting - it could come from a secular source like something someone says, or does, or an event reported in the news media. The point is that our faith in Christ is reinforced, not the path of the reinforcement that God chooses to help us strengthen and deepen our faith.

So far we have looked at our responses to the God given opportunities for growing in our faith through the realisation that Christ is with us, reflecting on how this realisation of Christ’s presence adds to our faith and seeking reinforcing,

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complementary realisations of Christ’s presence. Now we have to examine the resulting change the growth of faith brings to our lives.

Resuscitation

Change: It is hard to change. In Human Resources some people have devoted their entire careers to changing the way organisations operate and if changing the structure of an inanimate object like an organisation is difficult changing an entire person, a living, thinking being is infinitely more taxing. Yet change does happen all the time. With hindsight it is easy to see how we have changed as we have grown older, how our tastes in music, food and literature have altered as we have gained maturity. This change comes about through our natural growth as human beings. If we are honest with ourselves we will find that our views and opinions on various subjects have also changed as our innermost core values and beliefs have been modified by experience. Yet despite sometimes drastic changes to our belief structure we find that our faith in Christ as Saviour & Lord still exists, perhaps not as strongly as we would like but it is still there, embedded deep within us, right up close to our soul.

Our faith may be weak but if we go through the process of the Faith Cycle we find that our faith becomes stronger through growth. The realisation of Christ’s presence in our lives and the way our reflecting upon this coupled with our seeking reinforcement develops our faith and, not surprisingly does cause change. From deep within us our faith radiates out, affecting every aspect of our lives from the way we treat others to the way we choose to spend some of our leisure time in contemplation of our relationship to God, in worship and prayer.

Our growth in faith is not something that happens once and once only. It is a continuous process which can be likened to breathing, with all the connotations of the Holy Spirit (pneuma) implied therein. It is part of the Christian life, hence the use of the heading Resuscitation rather than Rebirth. The slogan “A born again Christian” implies that when Christians accepted Christ into their lives His salvation may not work. It is far better to think of all of us, both new and old Christians, as growing in our faith and through this process rather than a traumatic (constant?) rebirth changing our lives. Faith that exists needs to be built upon not reinvented. When Christ spoke of a person needing to born again to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven He was, as I see it, speaking to those who were of other beliefs not people who were already Christians. Yet the analogy of birth does have a bearing on our Christian growth. It is as necessary for a new born infant to breathe at birth and for the rest of its life as it is for a Christian to grow in their faith. More so in fact, as the life of a Christian is not limited to their span of existence on this world.

Growth causes change causes what? The quick answer to this question is opportunities for evangelism. By having faith in Christ and by our constant growth in our faith we, through our Christian lives and our interaction with others, create opportunities to draw other people to Christ by example and openness. People come to Christ not through being beaten over the head with the Scriptures but by people like, well, us. We not only help them to come to Christ but assist their Journey through the Faith Cycle. It also causes us to see Christ working in us & through us to gather others into His Kingdom. This is of course Realisation…

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The FAITH CYCLE

REALISATION

(Realising the presence of Christ in our daily livesNoticing Christ’s influence & work)

REFLECTION

(What does this mean to me?Understanding, Testing, Accepting)

RESUSITATION

(Changing from the soul Outwards to a more Christian life)

REINFORCEMENT

(Actively seeking other examples, Researching, being open.

Gaining new insights,Building a confident faith structure)

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The SPRING of FAITH

If we combine the ideas of St. Anselm’s progressive Faith – Understanding – Faith and the idea of a cycle of Faith we get a mental picture of something joins two points in a spiral shape, in other words it looks like a spring.

Consider a spring. It is a spiral shaped piece of material holding a piece of metal that can move to an anchored piece of metal in a larger mass. It also serves to cushion any impact between the objects at each end of the spring. A spring can be twisted, hammered or otherwise abused but it will still retain its flexibility & perform its task provided it is not destroyed by overstretching it beyond its tolerance, the only way of destroying a spring other than cutting it.

Now consider the relationship between God & man where we see God as the large mass firmly anchored to one end of the spring and man as the part capable of movement at the other end of the spring. If God had not allowed man the freewill of having a relationship with Him through faith but instead had use what we could call a solid bar of compulsion to love Him not only would man’s love be obedience rather than love but any deviation from the bar would cause the brittle bar to break under the pressure of life & the presence of evil.

The more ‘turns there are in a spring the stronger it becomes, so too the deeper the faith obtained by continuous use of the Faith Cycle the closer one becomes to God. This closeness also provides protection against the lateral pressures of life that seek to push man off course.

Just as a spring can be broken by overstretching it we can break the spring of faith by moving so far away that we can no longer relate to Him or He to us. This must be taken as a possibility for in Christ God is continuously reaching out to man, striving to establish the bond of faith even though our actions may have weakened or even broken the link. This is called salvation.

The view of faith as a spring also allows us to see how one can turn away from God but return before the limit of the spring’s tension is reached, like a prodigal son still having a vestige of faith in his father returning to his home after a long absence.

Just as a spring lends strength from the larger stable mass at one end to the moving, lighter mass at the other end and allows it to function we too are dependant upon God for our existence as we will see in the next section of our study of the Creed IN GOD THE FATHER.

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DELIVERY

MATERIALS to be Prepared before Session

Spring

In addition to the illustrative materials shown below a spring is needed for this session. The spring should be fairly substantive (I used the spring from a multi poise desk lamp that had expired) as the Group can be invited to try and force the spring out of shape. [The point of using a spring is that it can only be destroyed by overstretching.]

Flipcharts

For this session 4 illustrations are needed.

Figure 1 St Anselm; Developing Faith

More Faith

Understanding

Faith

Understanding

Figure 2 The Onion of Faith

SOUL

FAITH

Beliefs

Core Values

Experienced Truth

Morals

Self Image

Relationships

N B Dotted Line between FAITH & Beliefs – FAITH CAN GROW

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Figure 3 The Learning Cycle Reproduced from Notes page 5

Figure 4 The Faith Cycle Reproduced from Notes page 10

Figure 5 Our Relationship with GOD

For this illustration take a piece of paper with ME written on it & attach it to one end of the spring. At the centre of the illustration write the word GOD and place the other end of the spring over this, keeping it in place with a finger. Show that however far we may stray from God the strength that is our Faith always pulls us back to Him & thus the stronger our Faith the closer to God we come. It is us, not God, who can destroy the relationship by overstretching (and weakening) our faith.

INTRODUCING the Session

Start the session by asking Group members the location of their souls in their bodies. Most will indicate their hearts or heads as the core of their beings. (I know of and have encountered some cultures that will indicate their genitals but the majority of people will either indicate their chests or heads). Once they have done this they were asked why they made their choice and all answered that this was their centre of their being, their core. Picking up on the idea of a personal core one can then move on to the Emperor Constantine’s command that Christians state the core beliefs of their Faith.

The SESSION

The session followed the notes very closely, with confirmation of understanding and clarification being offered at each stage by the person delivering the session.

If the person delivering the session is not able to remember all the points to be covered the following aide can be used.1 The soul is seen as the very core of each person. The Faith or non faith beliefs

of a person affect who & what they are.

2 Belief seeking certainty confirmation or rejection strengthens or alters belief.

3 Faith def on page 2 grow, underpin all actions understand, learning.

4 The Learning cycle – how we learn

5 The Faith Cycle – how we develop our Faith.

6 St Anselm Faith – understanding more Faith – more understandingGROWTH

7 The more we understand our faith and go through the Faith Cycle the stronger our faith becomes. This is like a Spring, combining Faith Cycle & St Anselm. Analogy of the strength of a spring - Strength binding us to God. More we explore Faith Cycle & deepen our understanding stronger the spring of faith becomes.

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8 Emphasise that we have faith / believe in God, not that God. It is a Living Faith in a Living God.

9 General discussion then prayer on the lines of thanking God for being able to put our faith in Him.

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THE NICENE CREED

Session 2 “in GOD the Father Almighty”

GODIntroduction

One of the first things we get to know about someone we meet is their name. Names are important to us as they allow our minds to file all we know about someone under their name. It is no accident that almost every document we possess from baptism certificates through passports (& ID cards?) to death certificates starts off with, or has our name prominently, on the document. In war a prisoner is obliged only to disclose their Name, rank & number under the Geneva Conventions.

Even though names are so important to us the three major monotheistic religions of the world, Judaism, Christianity & Islam,1 do not have a name for God. At first this may seem a bit odd to us today in the “enlightened” 21st century but the reasons for us not knowing God by name are as valid today as they were God spoke to Moses on Mount Horeb also called Sinai.

Blaming the gods

When we have a hard day in modern times we seek an outlet for our frustrations in some form of activity that lets us dissipate our pent up feelings. Coming home from work we can spend time at the gym, do some gardening or unwind relaxing until the tensions have passed. We could also kick the proverbial cat to relieve our frustrations. In ancient times there was another method of relieving the tension and, as I am more familiar with the Greek pantheon, I am using Greek gods to illustrate the process.

If you had a bad hair day you could come home & get to feel better by hurling a statue of Aphrodite, the goddess or beauty across the room. Sunburned? Dump Apollo the sun god on the floor. Bad news? Don’t polish the statue of Mercury, the messenger of the gods, for a month. The Ancient Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, etc had gods you could blame (and punish) for every occasion even if the problem was of your own making. Now whilst this was very handy in being able to a certain extent to duck responsibility it also implied that a statue someone had made directly affected all of your life and by inflicting a form of punishment on the statue you had you could influence the appropriate god. With a multiplicity of gods you could go even further than just blaming &“punishing”.

1The word “Allah” in Arabic is equivalent to God and the 99 Names of Allah in the Koran are in fact attributes of Allah such as “Allah the Most Merciful”, “Allah the All Knowing” etc.

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Manipulating the gods

Most ancient people had one special god to which they gave their special allegiance2. It could be called allegiance of a kind for the Ancients had what we would call today a “get out clause”. If things did not go well for you when you supported a particular god you could always change gods. Just a small fee to the appropriate temple and you were free to manipulate the gods as you wished. For example take a young girl who worships Aphrodite then gets acne. Time to switch to Athena, goddess of wisdom? You bet! Get dad to pay a few drachmas to the priests and all is well. What is really happening is that an either / or ultimatum is given to Aphrodite to cure the acne. All this can be done because you know the name of the god and, therefore, you have the power over the god.

Moses at the Burning Bush

In Exodus chapter 3 we find Moses meeting God for the first time. Bearing in mind that Moses had been brought up in the royal court of Pharaoh and definitely knew of the Egyptian pantheon of gods. As Rt. Rev. Dr. G. Ashby pointed out in his Old Testament lectures at Rhodes University whether we accept the “early” date for the Exodus of the Jews from Egypt (circa 1400 B C) or the “late” date (circa 1200 B C) Moses, as a member of the court, would have known of Amenhotep the 4 th changing his name to Akhaten and establishing a state religion with queen Nefertiti. Why then when he met God at the burning bush did he emphasise that he had a speech impediment then ask God His name? Was Moses trying to establish the power the Ancient Egyptians had over their gods over this, for him, “new” God? Perhaps, but God forestalls any attempt by man to have power over Him. The existential “I AM” (Hebrew Yahweh) is the only answer Moses gets.

So sacred is the name of God to the Jews that it becomes the unpronounceable YHWH, the sacred tetragramaton and from this point on God is known as YHWH. There are other ways of referring to God in the Old Testament. Adonai – Jehovah, meaning “the Lord our Sovereign” occurs a number of times as does El “God” and El – Shaddai “God Almighty” but the most constant reference to God is YHWH which occurs 6823 times in the Old Testament. All of these ways of referring to God have one thing in common, we do not even know if He has a name. The first 2 of the 10 commandments reinforce the message. God is in charge & we can not manipulate Him.3

FATHER

2 This was especially the case with Egyptian Pharaohs. Their very names proclaimed their relationship to their gods. Ramses means man of Ra, Amenhotep means Amen/Amon is pleased, Akhaten means son of Aten.3 Given that Islam, like Judaism & Christianity, does not have a name for God it must surely follow that Allah is telling the followers of the prophet Mohammed that they can not manipulate Allah.Rather than appealing to abstracts like humanity when dealing with Islamic suicide bombers could not our Church Leaders be appealing to the Imams, Mullahs & Ayatollahs in a non confrontational way to repudiate these beliefs on the grounds of Theology in that the so called martyrdom can be seen as a deliberate attempt to manipulate Allah into letting the bombers into Paradise. Is this not the great Shaiteen of which the Koran speaks?

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Introduction

So far we have seen that all the three major monotheistic religions share in the certainty that man can not manipulate God. If we just had the picture of God from what we have covered so far He would be a frightening God, demanding our allegiance through fear. But this is not the whole picture of God in the Old Testament. Time and time again we find the prophets likening God’s sorrow at the breaking of the Covenant by man made between God & His people, Israel, to that of a husband whose wife is playing away from home as we would call it nowadays. With the sorrow there is always the promise of forgiveness if the Covenant is renewed. This is hardly the action of a God who rules by fear. Love, and divine love above our understanding, is the message conveyed here. We see God wanting and facilitating, a relationship with us.

God the Bridge Maker

When considering God as Father there are 2 main approaches to the subject. One is to say that the role of any father is the production of children and leave the Father’s function as that of Creator and the other approach is to liken human fatherhood to that of God, whilst at the same time acknowledging that human fatherhood is but a pale copy of God’s Fatherhood. Both of these approaches have merit but they both have drawbacks. In confining God the Father to Creator both of creation and Christ, we are in danger of losing much and in trying to see God the Father as a “super dad” it is possible that we read into God some of the faults of man that could give us a distorted view.

If we accept that God is both Creator and is not to be manipulated by man we see that there is a gulf between God & man. God is greater than all man has known, all man knows and all man will ever know. In this context using words like infinity and universe are inadequate to describe the chasm between God & man. If the distance between God and man were not already beyond description man’s sin increases the gap even further. Yet, and it is the biggest yet ever, we call God our Father when we say the Lord’s Prayer.

Sin is the very opposite of God and God can not look upon sin. In order that man should truly love God and not be forced to love Him man has been given free will by God and, man being flawed, imperfect man, has chosen sin all too often rather than God, thereby widening the gap. It is as if man were at one corner of a sheet of paper and God at the diagonally opposite corner. Convention tells us that to join the two a straight line is needed as this is the shortest distance between the two points. Whilst this is true of a geometric problem it does not bring man closer to God. The gap still remains. Remember too that man is powerless of himself to close the gap. There is only one solution to the problem of the gap between God & man and that is for God to move closer to man offering a bridge to Himself for man to take. It is as if God folded the paper so that man in one corner now has God right next to him, as close as it is possible. Bridging the gap is the great work of God the Father for it not only eliminates the gulf of sin between man and God but it also ends the gulf of existence

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between God & man. With our sin wiped out by God man now has the opportunity of joining with God in life everlasting.

One and only one comparison may be made between earthly fathers and God the Father. Both are prepared to pay the ultimate sacrifice for their child’s survival, giving their own lives for their children.

Christ, the bridge

As we shall see when we come to the nature of Christ He is both man and God and in His life, death & resurrection He redeems all mankind from sin. In the Sistine chapel Michelangelo likens the Father in the act of creating man to a dynamic figure giving life to the supine form of man. In the fresco the fingers of God & man are adjacent but not touching. If we were to use the same analogy to describe the recreation, for it is a recreation4, of man by Christ we would have to show God not sweeping by in majesty but stopping, stooping down to the same level as man and raising man to his feet.

But there is more to it than God, in Christ, just raising man to his feet. Christ not only sacrifices Himself to remove man’s sin, He also promises to be with us always, a very, very close identification with man. Through this redemption of and identification with man a new relationship between God the Father and man is made possible. It is as if Christ has made us His brother & sisters and by His kinship with all mankind Christ has lifted fallen man to a height hither to unobtainable through creation in that as the kin of Christ those who believe in Him are drawn by Him into a new relationship with the Father. We are the Children of God in a new & special way, able to call God our Father. So great, so powerful is this bridging of the gap between God and man that eternal life through Christ may be seen as almost a by product of the process.

Our Father

If there is just one thing that comes from our study of God the Father it is His love for us. In His refusal to come to us and be part of fallen man on our terms through avoiding our manipulation of Him by the withholding of His name in the Old Testament to the recreation of man through the unconditional sacrifice of His son, Christ, we can see a God whose love is beyond our understanding. That we may call Him our Father through Christ is a freely gifted relationship beyond belief and price.

ALMIGHTY

4 The idea of the recreation of man is Biblical. In St. John’s gospel he starts of by describing Christ as the Word, (Greek Logos) thereby referring inter alia to the story of the creation in Geneses where the Word of God (God said) is the very act of creation.

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Introduction

If history has taught us anything it is that in the hands of man power is a corrupting influence for there is always the temptation to use power for self rather than for the good of all. Not matter how good the intentions of those who wield power there always comes a “wouldn’t it be nice if …” moment & man, being an imperfect, fallen being all too often succumbs to the temptation. As nobody is perfect democracy is perhaps the best answer we have to curb the heady influence of the tiny portion of power wielded by man.

The Father on the other hand has literally limitless power and, as He has no sin & is wise far beyond our comprehension, His use of His power has amazed, frustrated and baffled mankind since man became aware of the existence of God. God’s use of His power has also fascinated man in that we tend to look for and find evidence of god’s power in various situations.

The Medieval outlook

According to medieval man God was a very busy Being. If a cow fell into a well and survived to be rescued it was considered by some to be a miracle. If someone recovered swiftly from an illness it was considered a miracle. If one liege lord defeated a neighbouring liege lord in battle no matter how strong the forces were it was claimed by some to be miraculous.

More often than not the claim that a given incident was a miracle was made by a member of the clergy. Often with little education the clergy were not only striving to inspire faith in their flocks they were also, perhaps sub consciously, trying to maintain the lucrative income from “religious” artefacts that had miraculously survived from the time of Christ. Among the most common of these were fragments of the “True Cross” and saints bones. Despite being pieces of timber and parts of dogs’ skeletons these relics did serve a purpose in bolstering peoples’ faith in difficult times and though we with our modern insights can smile at them we also claim that God uses his power on numerous occasions.

The Modern Position

In our modern sophisticated world we too reckon that God is very busy using His power. Ask anyone who has had to make a claim on their insurance if you require confirmation of this fact. Did lightning strike your house? That was an act of God. Did a boulder fall from a hill & damage your car as you drove past? Act of God. Did an earth tremor or flood water damage the structure of your home? They too are Acts of God.

Although these acts of God are nowadays mainly used in the technicalities of the insurance industry they are the most common usage we have. Now while we can claim that our knowledge has moved on somewhat from medieval times there are two points raised by these “Acts of God” that are worth noting. Firstly they are used in

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most cases to give a label to the unforeseen and secondly they tend to be a catch all for misfortune. That modern man can “blame”, God even in a technical sense, for the misfortunate unforeseen events that occur in life is surely an indictment not of God but of modern man. If medieval man was naive in attributing good fortune to God as a miracle then modern man is blasphemous in attributing misfortune to God’s use of His almighty power for it creates a capricious, uncaring god who is definitely not Our Father.

Good, Evil & the Power of God

If you are looking to this for the answer to the question of why God allows evil or bad things to happen in the world you will be disappointed as I do not have an answer. Really & truly only God can give us the full answer to the question of why evil is in our world and, as a Christian, I will have to wait until I die and through salvation in Christ get the chance to ask God. Until then I will have to make do with a partial answer that may not be the full answer or correct in all parts but one I have found it useful5.

One of the reasons God had for creating man was that man should love God. This love could be “programmed in” during the act of creation so that man had no option but to love God or man could choose to love God, his Creator and therefore God allowed man freewill to choose between good & evil, loving or rejecting God.

If we take this viewpoint we have to differentiate between man made events and natural events, in other words those which are a result of us living on this planet and being human and those that are a direct result of our choice of evil rather than good. In the former category we would find events like the Boxing Day tsunami. The tsunami itself was neither good nor evil; it was part of the normal movement of the tectonic plates of the earth’s crust. The huge death toll was evil, evil due to man. Rich countries have well developed early warning devices to ensure that lives are saved by evacuation in the event of a tsunami yet the technology & equipment was not made freely available to poorer regions. What happened to “Love your neighbour”? Worse still it took this disaster for the richer countries of the world to even consider a fund for the rapid relief to help those in need. The triumph of evil is seen in that to date the technology has not been installed nor the fund been set up. Evil is also present in the deeds of man after the tsunami. Geologists have warned that the earthquake which caused the tsunami release pressure on less than a third of the fault at the junction of the tectonic plates. A far greater disaster will come yet no one seems to be worried about the lives of their fellow man and, if they are not yet Christian, potential brothers & sisters in Christ.

Man, on the other hand, is quite capable of evil, direct acts. We have seen more than enough evil acts, man against man, to dwell on this aspect of good & evil. It is sad to note that it took a humorist to say “Always do right. This will gratify some people & astonish the rest”6.

In some situations we ask why God did not intervene and stop the pain or suffering. Take the example of a fit, healthy young man due to be capped as scrum half for

5 From lectures by Rev Professor J. A. B. Holland DD, PhD, DSc, Rhodes University 1971 – 1973. 6 Mark Twain

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English rugby. In an accident he lost both his legs and his suffering caused some to claim God was cruel. As a man Sir Douglas Bader, the legless fighter pilot, proved an inspiration to generations. Sometimes, just sometimes, we do not fathom God’s plans. As Christians we are sometimes guilty of expecting God to abandon His plans and do our bidding.

Sometimes God answers our prayers in unexpected ways. Some years ago a young boy was in hospital just after the 5th operation, a muscle transplant, on his left leg due to a condition brought on by meningitis. He was crying with pain. One of his visitors was a Jewish lady, a friend of the family, who had become an agnostic. On seeing the child’s pain she cried out that if there were a God He would not allow such suffering. On hearing this boy said that if it helped her faith he would no longer cry. He never cried in pain from his leg again & learned to control his pain. The lady’s faith was rekindled & she went on to become the secretary of the local synagogue. The boy recovered well. Years later whilst doing his national service he was wounded in a raid behind enemy lines but by controlling his pain & using evasion tactics he escaped to rejoin his unit.

Understanding how God uses His power

Given the huge difference between man & God it is really not that surprising that we do not and can never always understand how He uses His power. As Christians and the Children of the Father through Christ we have to accept that our Heavenly Father loves us and cares for us. We may not get what we want in the way we want it every time we ask God in prayer.

This is really not surprising considering God’s past actions. God took a symbol of despair, humiliation and death by torture and transmogrified the Cross into a symbol of new life eternal, hope and salvation for all mankind. He answered the Jews’ prayers for a Messiah but gave a Messiah not only to save & redeem the Jews but all humans. This was not what the Jewish zealots had been asking in their prayers. They wanted a military / political leader who would overthrow the yoke of Rome. God gave them and all mankind a leader who, rather than overthrowing the yoke of Rome, overthrew the far greater yoke of sin. Rather than seeking to understand God’s use of His power we should take time out for a while and just marvel and worship Him for His love and the way He uses His power on our behalf.

As the writer of Revelations put it, “Now unto the King Immortal. Invisible, the only Wise God be honour and glory for ever & ever. Amen.”

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DELIVERY

Preparation of MATERIALS

Section 1 GOD

For this session the first flipchart or other media is left blank for the “name game” introduction.

Figure 1

The Name of GOD

The Ancient Egyptian Tradition

Ramses = Ra’s manAkhaten =Brother of / Son of Aten

Old Testament Names of GOD

No images – cannot manipulate.

We do not know the Name of God so no power over HimAnd we can not “blame” God for our wrongdoings.Y’HW’H Sacred name of God - unpronounceable 6823 times in OTAdonai-Jehovah = the Lord our Sovereign El = GodEl- Shaddai = God Almighty

Our Name for GOD

FATHER

Figure 2

In extreme top left corner of page write “sinful man” & extreme bottom right write ”GOD”.

Figure 3

Bridging the Gap

Summary

God wants a loving relationship with man. For true love to exist there must be the choice not to love. This is

freewill. By not choosing to love God man chose sin. This caused a gap to open between God & man. Man is unable to

bridge the gap. Man does not have the power; only God does.

Figure 3 (Contd.)

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CHRIST the Bridge

1 Only God can bridge the gap between Him & sinful man.

2 God still wants loving relationship with His creation, man so sends His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, the Logos, (Word) to “recreate” man by His sacrifice on the Cross for all the sins of man.

3 Christ not only removed sin by his sacrifice on the Cross but by His Resurrection claims kinship with man. As Christians we can claim kinship with Christ for we are God’s new creation.

Figure 4

“Our Father”

Unlike an earthly father God can not be manipulated.

So great a love He gave His only Son for us. – New relationship as His children. – Free of sin and with His promise through Christ of eternal life.

Our response? Follow Christ & worship.

The SESSION

As an introduction to this session the group is introduced to the “name game”. The Christian names of each member of the group are written on the extreme right flipchart. Each person is then invited to select a positive characteristic beginning with the same letter as their Christian name. For example you could have, Athletic Alan, Brave Betty, Caring Cathy etc. [O K mine was Reliant Robin – a bit of humour is helpful.].

Once again the session follows the notes closely. The main points to note stem from the premise we can not control God but He can & does care for us as evidenced by the sacrifice of Christ.

1 In ancient times it was possible to blame the gods for our mistakes as their names & functions were known. Some extreme, humorous examples may be used here. (Bacchus for a hangover?)

2 The Name of God

From the introduction get the group to think about how important a name is to people, the way it sums up all we know about them in the “filing system” of memory. Moving on from this ask the group to consider how they came to be assembled here today. They were invited by N as N knows

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their names. In other words N persuaded them to attend partly by knowing their name and issuing a personal invitation.

If you want someone to do something it helps no end if you know their name.

Now the thing about deities is that they have power to do things in their followers’ lives – manipulating the gods of ancient times. – Puts man in charge – man has the power.

Moses at Sinai

God withholds His name from Moses. In effect He is saying that He has the power and Man can not manipulate God. Later God gives Moses the 10 Commandments, the first 2 of which preclude any attempt at man manipulating God. God is in charge, God rules.

3 Sin & the Gap between Man & God

This indicates the huge gap between tiny mortal mankind and the Almighty Creator and Ruler of all that is. Yet God wants a loving relationship with Man, His creation.

For true love to exist there has to be the choice of not loving.

If God wants Man to love Him Man has to have the choice not to love Him.

With freewill Man chose not to love God, i. e. sin. God can not look upon sin, and hence an even greater gulf opened up between God & Man.

Despite the sinfulness of Man God enters into a Covenant with His chosen people at Sinai. God is still showing His love for Man. Being sinful Man the Covenant is repeatedly broken by man &, in reading the prophets of the Old Testament, there is always the image of a sorrowing God, almost begging His people to repent and once again enter into a loving relationship with Him.

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4 Christ the Bridge

Man has not the power (or the will) to bridge the gap between Man & God. Only God can do so. To heal the gap the sins of man have to be expunged. Christ, Son of God sacrifices His earthly life for man. As if the blood of Christ wipes out our sins, covers us from God’s wrath.

Sharing in the blood of Christ we now have a kinship with Him & as the children of God we can inherit eternal life. Loving relationship restored through Christ. Like a recreation of Man giving us the opportunity to choose to be as we were meant to be in a loving relationship with God, so close that we can now call Him Our Father.

5 Almighty

This section may begin with a brief look at they way we have interpreted the power of God in our everyday lives over the years. How it has changed from the common place in Medieval times to the modern position with its negativity.

Good, Evil & the Power of God

Begin by offering the explanation of free will in the notes. (This can be described in terms of dance. God wants us to rumba with 4 beats but we prefer the added beat of the cha cha.) Examine the examples in notes & invite comment on them. From this remind the group that Man, not God, chose sin rather than maintaining a loving relationship with God and it many cases it is up to us to decide whether the outcome of an event results in good or evil. You may care to contrast recent “natural disasters” in “first world” countries with “natural disasters” in a “third world” country. The outcome in one is “good” because few lives were lost due to planning & resources whilst in the other there was a significant death toll.

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The NICENE CREED

Session 3 CREATOR ---------------seen & unseen

Introduction

As science has progressed and man has discovered more of the universe in which he exists a controversy has grown over creation. Fuelled by belief, and sincere belief at that, by some Christians & growing discoveries by science parties have polarised and drawn up often intractable battle lines over the issues about creation. The point of view in this article is neither an attempt to undermine faith nor to rubbish science. It is to put forward the opinion of the author as both a Christian and as a person with interests in palaeontology and cosmology. The question of creation may be seen in two parts, the origin of the universe and the origin of life. For convenience these topics will be dealt with separately though they are closely bound.

The positions for the conflict were drawn up with the publication of Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin in 1859. The discoveries of Newton and other scientists being dredged up & incorporated into the debate. The calculation some 200 years earlier by Bishop, later Archbishop (of Armagh), Usher that the world began on October the 4th 4004 B C at about 9 A M was also brought into the debate.

As the whole debate revolves around the Book of Genesis let us take a closer look at this, the first book of the Old Testament.

By the Rivers of Babylon

From 604 B C to 539 B C the people of Israel were held in exile by the Babylonians, being allowed to return and rebuild Jerusalem in 537 B C when the Persians defeated the Babylonians. During the years of exile attempts were made to assimilate the Hebrews.

Babylon famously had two thousand and ten gods, the greatest number of any civilisation in the Ancient World, and in addition to all these gods there were a number of heroes and demi-gods. In being assimilated into Babylonian culture captive peoples were required to convert to the Babylonian pantheon. One of the most important of the demi-gods was a legendary king of Uruk called Gilgamesh. The myth of Gilgamesh includes both the story of creation and the flood in addition to the equivalent of a fall of man7. In the form of an epic poem the legend was written in

7The legend of Gilgamesh first appears in Sumerian writings about 2000 BC. The Babylonian version, written in the Akkadian language which is related to Hebrew, is on 9 clay tablets & was found at Nineveh. As the translator, Shin-eqi-anninni, is the oldest story with a known author. Partially

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a language close to Hebrew thereby encouraging the exiled Hebrews to become assimilated into Babylonian culture including worship of their gods.

To counter the threat of losing their religion and identity as a nation there arose from the exiles the writer of Genesis. Just who the author of Genesis was we do not know. Written in the Hebrew of the period of exile the writer refutes the claims of the Babylonians that their pantheon was responsible for these mighty acts and points the people of Israel back to their true God as their Creator, explaining the fall of man and the great flood in terms of their God. It then goes on to give a history of the Hebrews prior to the Exodus.

Due to the style & grammar of the language used in Genesis, the circumstances responsible for it being written and the dates of the Exile it is feasible to claim that Genesis is not chronologically the first Book of the Old Testament but one of the last to be written. The writer is addressing a specific problem facing the Hebrews at a specific place in Babylon at a specific time in history when the Gilgamesh myth posed a threat in that it could divert their attention from the one, true God.

The specificity of the creation story in Genesis makes it wrong for us, centuries later, to expect that it should talk of post Einsteinium physics, non – linear mathematics and advanced palaeontology. If it had done these things it would have been totally useless in its prime objective of turning the exiles of Israel from assimilation to God – the writer would have been dismissed as mentally defective in Babylon over 2000 years ago. Genesis is God the Master Communicator speaking to His people in terms that they would understand. That it was effective may be measured in terms not of science but that few, if any, can name let alone worship the 2010 gods of Babylon whilst Judaism & Christianity continue.

CREATION of the UNIVERSE

The Classical View

Up to the Renaissance the creation story in Genesis formed the basis for creation. God had made the world from nothing (Latin: Creatio ex nihilio) and had set the other celestial bodies, Sun, Moon, planets, stars etc. around the earth. This geocentric view was that of the church which through Medieval Times had been the custodian of learning including Ptolemy’s concepts of the solar system. This also fitted neatly with the view that man was more important than the rest of creation in the eyes of God. That the observed trajectories of the planets across the sky had them reversing their positions from time to time the continuing on their way across the night sky was irrelevant. God had made it so and that was that!

With the Renaissance came the science of observation and the recording of data. Science demanded that the theory fitted observed data or the theory had to be

damaged by the Persians during their invasion of Babylon the tablets were kept at the Nineveh Museum in Iraq. It is not known if they survived the invasion of Iraq and the subsequent looting of antiquities.

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modified or discarded. The position of the church demanded that observed data be modified or discarded to fit the theory. Conflict was therefore inevitable. It came to a head with the discoveries of the Renaissance astronomers who shaped our knowledge of the heavens we have today.

Observation and Gravity

With the fall of the Moorish empire in Spain Europe once again had access to not only the knowledge of the Ancient World but also the considerable body of science that had been built up in the Islamic World. In the hundred or so years between the middle of the 17th and 18th centuries the astronomical branch of science made huge progress with the work of the first true astronomer / scientists like Tycho Brahe, Nicolaus Copernicus, Galileo Galilei and Johannes Kepler who is credited with producing the first heliocentric model of the solar system. The later work of Sir Issac Newton (1642 – 1727) on gravity provided the explanation of how the solar system functioned as a stand alone entity.

This expansion of science was almost concurrent with the Reformation of the church. It must be remembered that these men did not set out to oppose the church. On the contrary they were, for the most part, devout Christians. In order to accommodate this new learning the position of the church changed. Over the years it became accepted that the solar system was heliocentric rather than geocentric and thus it was still possible to hold on to the standpoint that God had created the world and the heavens out of nothing.

With the science of Newton in an impregnable position astronomers came to realise that the sun was in fact a star (and a minor one at that). As astronomy progressed over the years astronomers also began to realise that stars and galaxies were moving apart from one another and there was simply not enough mass in the universe for it to remain as stable as it is. A number of theories were put forward to explain this phenomenon, two of which had implications for theology. The first of these theories put forward was that single Hydrogen atoms were constantly being spontaneously created at random thereby constantly adding to the mass of the universe. Eager to maintain the position of God as the Creator some theologians argued that if the constant appearance of Hydrogen atoms was taking place then it was God’s continuing creation. Not surprisingly this position became known as Continuous Creation (Latin: Creatio Continuatio).

The second theory put forward was one that argued that there was a huge amount of so called Dark Matter in the universe which, not emitting light, could not be seen through conventional telescopes. At first this was thought to be all interstellar dust but with the advent of radio telescopes super dense objects like black holes, quasars and neutron stars were found that accounted for a significant proportion of the dark

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matter8. Creatio continuatio was therefore abandoned as was the supremacy of Newton’s laws with the advent of Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

Bangs, the Big Bang, E = MC 2 and all that

Just as the Doppler Effect appears to change the tone of a train whistle as it comes towards you and again as it moves away from you astronomers realised that the spectrum of light from distant objects change. If galaxies were moving towards earth they would appear in the blue end of the spectrum and if they were moving further away they would appear at the red end of the spectrum. It soon became apparent that galaxies in the universe are indeed moving away from each other in what is termed the redshift. Further discoveries showed that the more distant, widely separated, galaxies are moving at a different pace than others, like our Milky Way, which are relatively close together.

All in all the way the galaxies are moving away from each other suggested to some astronomers that they were being hurled away from a central point just like the debris from an explosion. This, of course, was impossible. The unbelievable force needed to hurl all the matter in the entire universe away from a central point was simply too huge to be possible, furthermore to do it with such force that Newton’s laws of gravity had no discernable effect was unthinkable. That was until Albert Einstein. With Einstein it all changed.

Einstein’s Theory, or more correctly his theory of General Relativity, states that Energy (E) released in the “splitting” of an atom is equal to the Mass (M) of the atom multiplied by the square of the Speed of Light9. If we now divide both sides of the equation by the square of the speed of light we find that Mass = Energy divided by the Speed of Light Squared. Mass can be converted into Energy in a huge explosion, like that of an atom bomb. Put all the mass in the universe together in one reaction and you get a really Big Bang, big enough to fling galaxies across the universe.

“The Big Bang” that started the creation of the universe is no longer just a theory; it has become widely accepted as a fact by science. This is very distant to Genesis where the universe comes into existence through God’s creative act and it is so very, very tempting to claim that it was God Who set off the explosion in the first place. As no one yet knows how the big bang originated (we know only about after the big bang) the attributing to God of the triggering of the explosion id fraught with danger. Science progresses all the time and one day, perhaps not for many aeons, we will gain some knowledge of pre big bang events. Bearing in mind the gulf between man, a created species on an insignificant planet, in a vast galaxy, somewhere in the universe, and God the Father, Almighty, is it not a bit presumptuous of us to claim that we know what He is thinking let alone doing? That man first used Einstein’s theory to 8 The discovery in April 2006 that sub atomic particles called neutrinos do have a mass has further reduced the estimated mass of Dark Matter.9 The speed of light is not the absolute maximum speed possible. It has long been known, much to the delight of Star Trek fans, that sub atomic particles like the tachyon can and do travel faster than light. In 2004 the Hubble Telescope Deep Space Imaging Spectrograph picked a gamma ray burst GRB980425, thought to come from the supernova 1998bw, which exceeded the speed of light by several factors.

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build atomic weapons of mass destruction rather than to explore creation is a sad comment on man and it is even sadder that Einstein did not live to see his theory applied to the creation of the universe. More recent science makes man even smaller, 13 times smaller.

Post Einsteinium Cosmology

The latest ideas about the nature of the universe which include the science of the Big Bang have their roots in both Chaos Theory and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle which in turn deal with quantum mechanics branch of physics. Put as simply as possible Chaos Theory evolved from the unpredictability of weather patterns and the ways in which small events or deviations from the expected cause unforeseen changes in the eventual outcome due to the links between seemingly separate events. Thus the example (an erroneous one, a better one would be how the imperfections on a snooker table change the expected movement of the cue ball) of the flapping of a butterfly’s wing can cause storms a distance away. The key concepts we need to remember from Chaos Theory are the inter connections between even the smallest events and the final outcome of an action10.

When Dr Werner Heisenberg first observed the movement of sub atomic particles through a gamma microscope he is reported to have exclaimed “God must have been mad when He created these!” for instead of the relatively steady state of the sub atomic particles he expected to see they were vigorously moving about in what appeared to be a completely random fashion. Heisenberg became fascinated with the predicted momentum of sub atomic particles and devoted much research into the field of quantum mechanics. He soon realised that predicting the position of a particle at any point in time was impossible due to the uncertainty involved and in 1927 he published first an essay then an article on the subject titled The Principle of Uncertainty. The key points we need to note here are the uncertainty of particles at a given point and their rapid movement or vibration.

Spurred on by the “renaissance” of science following Einstein in the early part of the 20th century scientists have been seeking an explanation of the interaction between stellar objects be they galaxies, stars or planets. As a result String Theory has evolved. String Theory sees the inter connection of all matter by minute, invisible, vibrating strings. While the concept of the theory had merit the mathematics needed to underpin the theory did not balance so the cosmologists involved postulated that there are another 12 universes in addition to our own. Not only does this allow the concept of string theory to work it is also within the boundaries of Einstein’s theory. As the parallel universes are forever beyond our reach the theory will never be observationally proved but it can & may be mathematically proved.

If this is the case it is safe to bet that someone in the church will take up the idea with a ‘told you so’ attitude probably claiming that heaven is the 4th universe on the left, just past the universe of hell.

10 This is not only true of science. See also Aesop’s fable about the lion and, of course, Christian teaching.

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The Place of God

If there is a reoccurring theme in our brief examination of the beginnings of the cosmos it is that theologians & well intentioned people within the church have repeatedly latched on to certain, appealing aspects of science and have tried to use certain points to “prove” the existence or the act of creation by God. With the exponential increase in man’s knowledge of the cosmos each of these positions has been abandoned as God is seemingly forced out of the picture. Note that this does not mean that God is diminished in any way. It simply means that we got it wrong by trying to say that at some point, a point for which at that time there is no scientific evidence, “God did this.”

The questions we should be asking at this point is not that we can obtain empirical proof that God did so and so but rather that our arrogance in thinking that we can know exactly how God in His infinite wisdom created all that is, both seen & unseen. It is far better to accept that science is uncovering part of the process of creation but that it will not and can not ever uncover the act of creation for this was done by a Being so much greater than us that we only get glimpses into His handiwork. This position allows both Faith to respect Science and, hopefully Science to respect Faith.

There is, of course, another position one can hold over the creation of the cosmos. It is the position held by many fundamentalists within the Christian Faith. This position is to deny that science has the right to exist by maintaining that the Genesis version of creation is the only true version. Not only does this sustain a view of God that is very small it also takes us back over 2000 years to where we began the discussion in the first place.

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CREATION of LIFE

Introduction

In this section we are going to look at the origins of life on Earth and attempt to relate this to God the Creator in the Creed. Of necessity we will be entering areas dealing with some intensive science but as they also involve the creation of life and thus the Creed we will be exploring them.

The Classical View

Unlike the classical view of the universe that survived until the Renaissance the classical view of the origins of life on Earth remained virtually unchallenged until the early 19th century. Once again the Genesis explanation of life on Earth was widely accepted with observed data, fossils, being discarded to fit the theory held by the church. Fossils were written off as the bones of animals that were drowned in the Great Flood which Noah survived. This view even accounted for fossils found on mountains. That some very large animals, such as dinosaurs, coexisted with men at some period was either glossed over or written off by some as the remains of long dead dragons, whales and other “sea monsters” or elephants.

The fact that this view of the creation of life on Earth had no challenge for such a long period contributed to the ferocity with which it was (and in some cases still is) defended. The Genesis version of creation had become intertwined with the Faith of those involved and any proposed change was seen as an all out attack on Christianity itself which had to be defended at all costs, even if this meant open intellectual warfare with science. The ‘Sarajevo’ incident that triggered the battle was caused by a man who studied for the ordained ministry at Cambridge University. Charles Darwin, as well as being a Christian11, was also a naturalist and it was his interest in nature that led him to be aboard H M S Beagle on her historic voyage. Among the books Darwin took with him were the 3 volumes written between 1830 & 1833 called Principles of Geology. They were written by Charles Lyell.

Origin of the Species11 Darwin claimed that he was an agnostic after the death of his Eldest daughter, Annie, in 1851. He still was involved with the local church on the pastoral side.

The Principles of Geology described the laying down of different layers in rock, each corresponding to a period in the distant past. Darwin used this in his Origin of the Species by Natural Selection, to give his work its full title, showing that life evolved in different forms, the form most suited to its environment by adapting to the environment being the most likely survivor12. In addition to drawing on the specialised adaptations of species to the Galapagos environment Darwin also pointed out that prehistoric life had evolved. He also examined the factors that made man the dominant species attributing the supremacy of man to the evolution of the human brain, concluding that random chance was responsible for the species produced and that evolved into the life forms we know today.

In scientific terms the Origin of the Species was so overwhelming in its evidence in support of its arguments that it was incontrovertible and was rapidly recognised as such by the scientific community. For them evolution was a fact. In the wider world the irresistible force of evolution hit the immovable rock of the Genesis position held by the church and the vibrations of the collision still resonate today, 150 years later.

Origin of the Species also opened the door to the understanding of the fossil record of life on Earth and hence the creation of life. The research into this area is still going on today and a broad consensus has been reached about the time scale involved. For the sake of simplicity the 3 main ‘ages’ have been used rather than the periods like the Jurassic etc.

The Ages of Life on Earth

Palaeozoic Era 545 – 240 million years ago Ancient Life Forms

Mesozoic Era 240 – 65 million years ago Age of Reptiles / Dinosaurs

Cenazoic Era 65 million years ago – present Age of Mammals

12 The term “Survival of the Fittest” only came out in the 1869 edition of Origin of the Species and is attributed to Herbert Spencer.

Another common mistake is to think that Darwin claimed man was descended from apes. This idea was put forward as an insult to Darwin’s work by a fundamentalist during a widely reported debate. Even today science does not claim that man is descended from apes.

Whilst we share over 90% of our DNA with Chimpanzees this is due to both man & apes sharing a “recent” common ancestor probably 5 million years ago & almost certainly in Africa, possibly the recently discovered Egyptopithecus.

In addition to man other hominoid creatures evolved but were not well adapted as Homo Sapiens ancestors to survive. Perhaps the most famous among these is Australopithecus Africanus; the so called “Missing Link” nicknamed Lucy, discovered by Prof. Raymond Dart in 1924 at Taungs in S Africa.

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From this table it can be seen that life on Earth is reckoned to have begun about half a billion years ago and it is to this period we must turn our attention. But before we do so let us examine the fossil record & see what it may say about God’s creation.

The Fossil Record & “God of the Gaps”

A number of conditions are needed for the remains of a dead animal to become a fossil and as these conditions are rarely met there are really very few fossils in the record of life on Earth. Those that we do have show us the broad sweep of evolution over the years like the development of the head & brain from primitive creatures to man but they are not a full, exact record.

Add to this the fact that a number of fairly similar creatures are at a given time adapting to given conditions through evolution and you can see that it is easy to mistake one fossil as the forebear of another, completely different type of animal. At the same time widely different animals alive today may have at some time shared a common ancestor. A prime example of this is the hyrax or rock rabbit (dassie) of Africa, a tiny animal, and the elephant. Both have a recent13 common ancestor.

When a new fossil is discovered attempts are made to determine where the specimen fits into the record of a particular species and, as more fossils are uncovered, a picture is gradually built up of the evolution of a species. As there are gaps, sometimes very large gaps, in the record and the human desire for dramatics some new finds are hailed as “missing links” by the public not understanding that either side of each “missing link” there are other “missing links”.

Given that there are these gaps and that people within the church wish to maintain a role for God in creation rather than random evolution it was very tempting for some theologians in the early 20th century to claim that God somehow “changed” one type of animal into another. Apart from keeping God very busy this theory had a distinct vulnerability. When a fossil that went some way to bridging the gap between two fossils was uncovered it had the effect of squeezing God out of the picture, making Him as disappearing God of the Gaps.

So much for the fossil record. We now turn our attention to the earliest forms of life on Earth to see what they can contribute to our knowledge of creation and what they can tell us of God’s mighty act of creating everything.

13 Recent in this case is about 10,000,000 years ago.

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Early life, DNA & RNA

DNA

When Watson, Crick & Wilson won the Nobel Prize in 1962 for describing the structure of DNA science was at last able to postulate specific theories as to how life originated on Earth as DNA forms the so called “building blocks” of life. They also opened the way for discoveries about how the double helix of genes we call DNA sequences over 2000+ enzymes within a single cell to activate. Roughly speaking the DNA tells the material in a single cell to grow, divide and change into a tiny part of say an ear. The function of DNA is therefore as part of the highly complex system that is life on Earth, giving well over 100,000 instructions to other parts of one cell.

One of the first questions to be asked by science was “Where does DNA come from?” Even in the simplest single living cell the complex pattern of DNA is in a highly complex double helix with each gene in its own position. It has been suggested that the first DNA on Earth came from naturally occurring amino acids and cellulose that in some way reacted with each other to form DNA in the first living cell. Just how the reaction happened or what caused it to happen is unclear. The whole process is, of course, driven by random chance.

There is however another problem with this neat theory. In the most simple cell we know if the genes that make up the strands of DNA in that cell were to randomly rearrange themselves purely by chance every minute it would take somewhere between 40 and 100 BILLION years for the correct pattern for DNA to be made. BUT, and it is a very big but, Earth is about 3 billion years old and the first signs of life on Earth appeared roughly half a billion years ago. For DNA to have found the correct sequence more or less as the surface of the Earth cooled enough for life to survive all within 2.5 billion years is either fantastically lucky or something else was at work.

RNA

There are some living organism that have no DNA whatsoever in their make up. In some very simple forms of life14 rather than DNA being present in a cell there is RNA. Broadly speaking RNA is a single strand of genes that triggers enzymes to work within the cell’s lifetime, thereby performing the same role as DNA in more complex forms of life. The tiny fragments of genes in RNA are not big enough to form a double helix structure like DNA.

It has been postulated that this more simple form of life was the first on Earth and, as there is no possibility of such creatures leaving a fossil record, they pre dated DNA. It is conceivable that such creatures over a lengthy period evolved into others making use of DNA. Ignoring the problem of the chances of genes randomly evolving into DNA over a long period by chance we are still left with the question of where RNA originated.

14 These forms of life are called prions. The most famous prion is the one which causes Mad Cow disease in cattle & new variant CJD in humans.

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Some eminent scientists have put forward the theory that life forms based on RNA came to Earth on comets or meteors from space in the distant past. This idea is not as radical as it first appears due to the existence of extremophiles. It has long been known that some forms of bacteria exist in extremely inhospitable conditions like those in the water of the Old Faithful geyser. In the 1990’s simple organisms were found at extreme depths & pressures in the oceans living off the sulphur ejected in columns extremely hot water (over 400 degrees Centigrade) rising from volcanic vents. The remains of prehistoric vents dating back over 550 million years are present in rock in the Kalahari region and also in Mapumalanga province of S. Africa so life arriving on a body from space could have survived much earlier than previously thought possible. That the meteor or comet landed in just the right place at just the right time and the surviving RNA creatures evolved into using DNA is once again pure chance.

Take a Chance on ME

In our examination of creation we have time and time again attributed our present existence on Earth today to random chance. These chances include:-

The 1 in the huge figure that allows for the Earth to be where it is in the universe after the Big Bang

The 1 in another massive figure that allows for life to be carried to and survive on Earth some half a billion years ago at a time when conditions on Earth were such that survival was possible.

The correct order of DNA within a cell taking place within 2.5 billion years when chance only predicts a minimum of 30 billion years for this to happen.

The chance that evolution through the survival of the species most able to adapt to the changing conditions on Earth resulted in human beings, bearing in mind the high rate of extinction. Of the 500 billion species that have inhabited the Earth only 1%, 50 million, are alive today.

In each of the cases cited above the odds are stacked against the outcome that has occurred. The random chance in each case is a huge number. Yet for us to be here now each of the 4 conditions stated above has to be fully met. This means that the figure of the chance for each condition must be multiplied by all the other conditions.

The resulting chance is a figure so huge, so massive, that it is difficult to conceive. It has been argued by others that so large a figure is proof positive that something more than random chance is involved in creation & that something is God. This position is currently popular among some circles but I feel that it is incorrect to infer God is at work from a massive number.

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Rather than saying that the huge figure is proof of God’s work in Creation it would be better to claim that the figure allows room for Christians to believe in God’s Creation on a more rational basis. All too often in the past our faith has been forced out of a position by scientific discovery that has made a position untenable. It is about time that we stopped trying to “prove” God by Creation. Our God is immensely greater than just His Creation and if we try to “prove “ God by creation we end up with a god who is by many factors too small to be Our Father, Almighty, Creator of Heaven & Earth, of all that is seen & unseen. Can one describe or even infer the nature and person of a baker from the loaf of bread that we may see, especially when we are a crumb in a very big loaf? Our task is not to “prove” but to marvel, give thanks and worship, believing in our God.

Postscript Space; the Final Frontier

Our examination of God as Creator has taken us to and maybe beyond time & space and we have ended up in a position of grounds for a more logical belief. There still remains the question of other life forms in other parts of our universe. Will we find life on other distant planets? Probably, but those life forms are more than likely not to be as advanced us. Will we ever encounter life forms more technologically advanced than we are? Possibly, this may happen at some stage. The late astronomer Carl Sagan was once asked what we could give a more technologically advanced life form than man in return for their technology. He replied “The complete works of J S Bach, but that would be boasting.”

Much as I have enjoyed Sagan’s programmes on TV and his books that remark has always remained a disappointment to me. As Christians we should reply if we are ever asked a similar question “Pity, for all mankind has barely begun to evolve. After this life we, through belief in Christ, evolve into a life eternal”.

As H F Lyte so ably put it:-

Angels help us to adore Him,Ye behold him face to face,

Sun & Moon bow down before Him,Dwellers all in time & space

Praise my Soul the King of Heaven!

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DELIVERY

Preparation of MATERIALS

As part of the introduction of this session I showed the Pilot Group 2 fossils from my collection, a small Devonian nautiloid & the upper tooth of a late Jurassic shark. If no fossils are to hand pictures of any fossils or perhaps even dinosaur skeletons, taken from the web, could suffice.

Figure 1

CREATION: a BATTLEFIELD?

CHURCH SCIENCECREATION

GENESIS OBSERVATION

GOD of the GAPS EVOLUTION

? CHANCE

Figure 2The Book of Genesis

The SituationConquered by Babylon. In Exile. Assimilation 604 – 539 BC

GILGAMESH

Creation

Fall

Flood

GENESIS

Creation

Fall

Flood

Egypt

GOD

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Figure 3COSMOLOGY

CLASSIC VIEW

Creation from nothing – Ex Nihilio

Geocentric

RENAISSANCE VIEW

Observation

Heliocentric

Gravity

1750 – 1900

Mass Continuous Creation – Creatio Continuo Gravity

EINSTEIN

E = MC2 : M = E / C2

Big BangSTRING THEORY

Interconnection – Vibration – Knock on effect

Figure 4EVOLUTION

Lyell

Darwin(Illustrations)

Head of a shark

Head of a frog

Head of a lizard

Head of a dog

Human headDNA Double Helix

RNA Single strand

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Figure 5The CHANCES

Of Earth existing & being habitable

1 in 5 quintillion 1 / 5 X 10 30

Of Life Starting

1 in 4 billion 1 / 4 X 10 12

Of DNA being in the correct sequence

1 in 20 billion 1 / 20 X 10 12

Of Evolving to present Life Forms

1 in 5 billion 1 / 5 X 10 12 TOTAL: 1 in 2000 followed by 66 zero’s

The SESSION

After the group have examined the fossils or the photographs / illustrations ask them if they think Genesis contradicts the evidence they have just seen. A lively discussion is likely to follow with some adopting a creationist standpoint whilst others back empirical science. Allow about 5 minutes for the discussion.

Ask the group what they think the purpose of the Book of Genesis was suggesting that it may not be to tell us how the world began but was written for another purpose. Move on the fact that the language used in Genesis suggests that it was among, if not the last, book of the Old Testament to be written. Tie in the time line to the exile in Babylon.

Explain how the Babylonians attempted to assimilate captive nations by converting them to their beliefs in a large pantheon of gods with the legend of Gilgamesh which explained creation, the flood & also the fall of man from the gods’ favour. Compare the legend with Genesis & point out that Genesis was written to counter the myth. In this it was successful; we still have the O T but not the gods of Babylon. Far from being a failure about creation Genesis is the successful communication by God to His chosen people in their hour of need. Point out that in order to “justify” the Book of Genesis some in the church, instead of taking the opportunity to develop their understanding (& faith), have rejected the logic of science and lost the wonder of God’s communication to His people at their time of need. The resultant intellectual laziness has resulted in a conflict with science that has consumed the valuable resources of the church.

The next topic in the session is the movement towards the modern day positions where there is seen to be a “war” between science & religion over creation. The history of how present day positions were adopted is explained in the notes and, using the flipcharts this should be explained to the group, pointing out that there has been a tendency by the church to nit pick science in order to show God’s “involvement”.

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This has led to problems. Prime examples of this are the “God of the Gaps” in evolution, the temptation to say that God made the Big Bang &, of course, to adopt a purely creationist position denying science in its entirety.

Continue the session with the latest ideas on chance being the reason for our existence here today. The resultant figure when all the elements are taken into consideration is so large it is mind blowing. Already some are saying this is evidence of God’s guiding hand in creation. This could in the future lead to conflict with science if and when the chances are proved to be correct. The result of this would be to see, once again, the idea that God has anything to with us being forced out by discoveries. Rather than to say the size of chance proves the existence of God it is better to say that it may indicate the power of the Almighty who is so far above human comprehension.

The session ends with speculation of future findings by science, considering the vastness of God’s creation & string theory’s implications of parallel universes. All, all is God’s handiwork. We believe this and that He loved us so much as to redeem us by the sacrifice of His Son demands our joy, love, worship & praise.

THE NICENE CREED

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Session 4 “One Lord JESUS Christ”

Introduction

What makes Christianity so different from the other great religions of the world? Why is Jesus Christ different from other religious leaders like Mohammed, Buddha or Confucius? The answer to both these questions is to be found in the Nicene Creed and it goes right to heart of our faith today some 1700 years later as well as being responsible for the heart of the Nicene Creed.

Unique Christianity

Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and just about any other religion you care to name have 2 main “themes” for want of a better word. They are:-

1. Mankind has fallen from a state of Grace and

2. Mankind can be restored to a state of Grace.

All the major religions share a belief that man is separated from god. Within the Judaic – Christian view the fall of man is attributed to man, using free will, choosing sin rather than God and thus man is no longer fit to enjoy the company of God and is expelled from the Garden of Eden.

It is man’s restoration to a state of grace that is the major difference between religions. In Buddhism one may return to a state of grace through self enlightenment. In Islam man returns to a state of grace only if the teachings of the Koran are followed to the letter. Even in Judaism man returns to a state of grace by following the law and keeping the Covenant of the Old Testament.

All these approaches share one thing in common. The actions of man bridge the gap between God & man. Christianity is different. In Christianity it is God, not man, who restores man to a state of grace. This mighty act of salvation is carried out by God in the Life, Death & Resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ. This is the uniqueness of our faith; salvation is God’s free gift. We do not have do anything other than have faith in Christ. The lives we live as Christians are a result of & a response to our faith, not an attempt by us to get into heaven through “good deeds”.

Christianity claims that man can not by his own efforts be saved. Salvation is God’s business, not man’s. God’s free gift of salvation, the very heart of Christianity, was nearly lost. How it was saved explains why there is so much about the nature of Christ in the Creed.

Arius, the man behind the Arian Heresy

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When Christianity first came into contact with the Roman world it came into contact with a society that had Greek thinking, philosophy and reasoning as its intellectual base. The power houses of Greek thinking were the universities and pre - eminent among the universities of the Byzantine World was the university at Alexandria in Egypt. Alexandria University was Oxbridge and Harvard rolled into one. It is not surprising then that the two most prominent antagonists over the Nature of Christ both came from Alexandria.

Much has been written about the motives of Arius (256 -336) the chief representative of a school of thought that gave rise to a heresy that bears his name. Arius was a leading Presbyter in the Bauclavis district of Alexandria, which included the university, who had both power & influence at the time of the Council of Nicea. Some scholars have claimed that he sought power & influence; others claim that he was the fulfilment of the Gnostic heresies and yet others claim that he wanted to allow man to have a part in salvation other than just believing in Christ. Whatever the motives of Arius his teachings caused perhaps the greatest controversy the Church has ever faced. During the Council of Nicea the Bishop of Alexandria, Alexander was the chief opponent of Arius. Bishop Alexander was to die 5 months after the Council of Nicea. It seemed everything was working out well for Arius and his followers.

Teachings of the Arian Heresy The Arian heresy had one main point which was summarised in a book (the Thalia, by Arius). They claimed that God the Father was a distant God like the God of the Old Testament and that Christ was a being created by the Father & therefore less than the Father. The Arians were quite happy to accord Christ honour & glory as the Saviour & Redeemer of mankind but being a created being he was not quite up to the standard of the Father. At best he was a sort of super prophet. It would have made the Father a very unattractive figure to Christians. The Father, very distant from man retains this distance by placing a created being as an intermediary between Him & us, a sort of tier of holy management between the boss and menials. This meant that the Arians could claim that God’s mighty work of saving man was perhaps not efficacious in itself; it needed man to follow all the teachings of the (Arian) church to gain salvation. Belief in Christ alone was not enough. Man could bridge the gap between man & God.

By teaching that Christ was somehow inferior to God the Father the Arians also challenged the idea of the Trinity of God the Father, Son & Holy Spirit. If the Son was somehow inferior to the Father the Holy Spirit could have been seen as something inferior to Christ as He promised to send the Holy Spirit to be among us. Using the analogy of the Father as a distant chairperson of the board & Christ as a managing director the Holy Spirit would be a line manager, firmly lower in the hierarchy. The Arians never got round to this point but it is a logical progression from their beliefs as Archbishop Rowan Williams points out in his works on the subject15.

Enter Athanasius

15 On Christian Theology. Williams R. (Oxford Press 2000)

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Athanasius, later St. Athanasius, was born in Alexandria in about 295 A D. We do not know much of his early life other than he was interested in the Church, had an ecclesiastical education and accompanied Bishop Alexander to the Council of Nicea as the Bishop’s Secretary & Theological Adviser and it was in this position he was responsible for leading the debate against Arius on behalf of the frail bishop Alexander and the orthodox position. (With the death of bishop Alexander 5 months after the end of the Council of Nicea Athanasius was ordained as bishop of Alexandria at the age of 20). Writers have described Athanasius as a brilliant theologian, well versed in intellectual arguments, who had not only a sardonic sense of humour but also genuinely cared for people. Some writers claim that Athanasius also ran a mafia like rent a mob that were called on the streets to demonstrate against the Arian faction. (The Arians also had their own street supporters for the debate was closely followed by the entire populous. A modern analogy would be the equivalent of football hooligans, albeit intellectual hooligans if there is such a thing).

Although Athanasius is remembered for the Council of Nicea the stand he took there did not end the Arian Heresy then & there. Although the heresy had been dealt a severe blow by the Creed it continued with fluctuating but declining fortunes for centuries after the Council. For the rest of his life Athanasius battled against Arianism, often being forced into exile when the heirs of Constantine favoured the heresy over the orthodox position. It is to his credit that he returned time after time and left us the legacy of a Faith that gives us not only an understanding of God’s free gift of the salvation of mankind but also the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. He wrote a number of discourses on combating the Arian Heresy that are as relevant in understanding our faith today as they were 1700 years ago. In addition to combating the Arian Heresy Athanasius was among the first in 367 A D to identify and produce a list of the 27 books of the New Testament. This list was later used by Damus the Bishop of Rome to draw up our present New Testament. We owe a great debt to St. Athanasius.

Summary of the Positions at Nicea

The Arians claimed that Christ was the Son of God but in being a son was a created entity and therefore less than the Father. This position undermined the message of salvation, opened the way for other teachings and destroyed the idea of the Trinity. Well prepared the Arians produced what is perhaps the first sound bight in history to sum up their position, ’’ (Greek: There was a time when he was not.) Pronounced Hain potty otty uke (as in Luke) hain the asymmetrical nature of this Greek phrase was widely used by the Arians to promulgate their position and to summarise their arguments. It was both powerful and catchy enough to be set to music. (It was!)

The Orthodox faction did not yet have the wording to defeat the Arians, how they obtained the correct wording is the reason for the lines in the Creed from Eternally begotten to of one substance with the Father.

Formation of The Creed

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The first 7 lines of the Creed were generally accepted by all parties without quibble. All sides agreed on the belief in God the Father Almighty Creator and in Jesus Christ, our one Lord. The Arians were quite happy with this; it was the nature of Christ which was the problem for them.

When we come to the line “the only Son of God” we can almost hear, through the echoes of history, the Arian faction chanting ‘There was a time when he was not.’ Using the analogy of human children & their fathers the Arians pointed out that Christ could well be the Son of God and be created by the Father, thus being less than the Father who created Him. The Battle for the Trinity & Salvation was joined.

Scripture

The first reply by the orthodox faction to the challenge of the Arians was to seek out passages of Scripture that supported Christ not being a created entity but part of the Christian Trinitarian Godhead. The problem with Scripture, especially when it is taken out of context is that it is open to a plethora of interpretations. (As an extreme spurious example we could say that Moses was a Democrat. According to part of verse 4 in Genesis Chapter 3 he asks why Bush is not being consumed by fire.) The Arians had done their homework for the Council of Nicea and for every passage of Scripture that the Orthodox faction put forward to silence them they had a different interpretation that supported their viewpoint. Result: Stalemate

“Eternally Begotten of the Father”

This was the next line of attack by the Orthodox faction. What they meant by this was that Christ had been the Son of God before all time and therefore was not a creature made by God but that He was, is & will always be God’s Son. Once again the Arians had a different way of interpreting this statement. They argued that even if eternity was before time began it was still possible for the Father to have existed alone before begetting His Son. Given that this possibility existed they were quite entitled to hold their belief that “There was a time when He was not.” And, therefore, Christ was a created being less than the Father, thank you very much. Result: Arians succeed.

“God from God”

The Orthodox faction’s next attempt to settle the argument was to say that Christ is God; He is from God and is therefore divine. The Arians took their usual position, if Christ is God from God He is only a part of God and therefore could be less than the whole, the Father. Furthermore if God split part of Himself off He was creating a creature, albeit a new creature the like of which had not been seen before, and as previously stated any creation is by definition less than the Father. The Orthodox faction now had to state more precisely the intended meaning of God from God in a way that left no room for misinterpretation by the Arians. Result: Arian win, but some hope for the Orthodox faction.

“Light from Light”

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Noting that the Arian refutation of the argument about God from God contained if and could the Orthodox faction attempted to capitalise on this possible opening up of the Arian heresy to attack. They wanted to underline the point that Christ is God, an equal with the Father. At the same time they wanted to retain that Christ was begotten by the Father so they described the relationship between the Father and the Son in terms of one light giving life to another.In terms of Greek thinking fire & hence light was one of the four elements and it was thought that in lighting one candle or lamp from another the pure light (&flame) was transferred from one to the other without any loss of characteristics. Essentially the second flame & light was the same as the original. In other words the Father & the Son are both divine. Ever ready to seize on a point that would allow them to retain their position the Arians were quick to point out that the light that transferred another light to a different location existed before the second light. Once again the refrain of “There was a time when he was not.” was used. Christ could therefore be seen as a creation of the Father & less than the Father. Result: Arian win.

“true God from true God”

At this point one can almost hear the frustration in the efforts of the Orthodox faction. “No, no, it is not about one light existing before another light. It is about Christ being true God from the true God of the Father.” This was intended to mean that both Christ & the Father were both God and Christ was not a mere creation by the Father. It was also an attempt to forestall the argument that although Christ was from God there was a possibility of a ‘contamination’ creeping in from somewhere else thus making Christ not on the same level as the Father. Against this the Arians argued that Christ could even be true God from true God but this still allowed room for them to take it as Christ being created by the Father and, being created, He was a lesser being than the Father. Result: Arians escape.

It had become clear by now that an unequivocal statement of Christ’s Deity and His relationship to the Father was needed. It would have to rule out any possibility that the Father had created Christ whilst maintaining that Christ was an integral part of the Trinity.

“Begotten, not created, of one substance with the Father”

The key to the success of the Orthodox faction was the reinvention of the Greek word Homoousis or of the same substance. Attributed to Athanasius the word Homoousis had been used to describe coins struck from a single bar of metal. The coins were identical in composition to the metal from which they were struck. The problem with

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this was that being struck off a bar the coins were most definitely created. This, the Orthodox faction had to avoid at all costs.What Athanasius proposed was to give the word homoousis a new meaning in line with its previously accepted meaning, the idea being to show that although separate and from a source the coin is made of exactly the same material as the bar from which it is struck. The closest modern equivalent would be to say that Christ had the same genetic structure as the Father and contained all the genes of the Father. [Remember that the full understanding of genes first became clear to us, modern man with all our science, in the 1960’s and you can begin to understand some of the intellect of St. Athanasius. Here he was virtually describing the concepts of genetic science in the year 325 AD.]

This argument would allow the Arians no room for reply on those grounds but there was still the phrases “There was a time when He was not” to be refuted. This was done with a lack of any subtly in the line of the Creed “Begotten not created.” This rejected outright any claim by the Arians that Christ was an entity made by the Father and hence less than the Father. Begotten implies, correctly, that Christ is the Son of God and as children bear a resemblance to their parents through the sharing of common genetic material it also implies that Christ was not of a different, corrupted ‘material’ to the Father thereby reinforcing the homoousis concept.

Taken together the 2 lines from the Creed “Begotten not created, of one substance with the Father” effectively refuted the Arian position. They not only stopped Christ from being regarded as a lesser being than a remote Father and hence opening the way for an alteration of the doctrine of salvation they also firmly established Christ as a member of the Holy Trinity. Christ was coexistent with the Father. Result: Orthodox victory

“Through Him all things were made”

With the refutation of the Arian position accomplished with homoousis Athanasius had to ensure that there was no outlet for the Arians to seek to revive their arguments. If we examine the Arian position we can say that they saw Christ as a creation of the Father whose sole function was to save mankind, almost a spare wheel for a fallen creation. That this position is a massive underutilisation of resources by a cynical, distant, unfeeling god is not the point. The point could still be made that Christ was for one purpose and if this argument were to be developed by the Arians it could reignite their heresy.

The words “through Him all things were made” are as familiar to us as they were to all gathered at Nicea. They are the second part of verse 3, chapter 1 of the Gospel of St. John, a portion of that wonderful writing in verses 1 to 5 & verse 14 that describes Jesus as “the Word”. Writing in common, koine, Greek the actual expression that St. John uses is (logos) which literally translated means word but like all words in any language, but especially Greek philosophy, it has a wealth of meanings and connotations. Many learned volumes have been written about logos in both the context of Scripture and the theology of the Creed so we will only highlight a few main points in passing.

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1. At the time when St. John wrote his Gospel both Jew and Gentile were familiar with the idea that when God or any god spoke it was a dynamic act that held immense power, literally the power of God or the god himself. The logos of God is in fact God Himself. St. John further clarifies his meaning by saying that the Word is God and dwells with God. By reference to St. John the Creed is reinforcing the idea that instead of being a lesser being than the Father Christ, (the logos), is in truth the very dynamic of the Father, with the power of the Father.

2. By embracing the portion of verse 3 of the Gospel of St. John the intention of the Creed is to underline the pre existence of Christ as a part of the Trinity and not as a created being forming part of creation. By citing that all things were made through Christ there is also definite reference to the opening verse of St. John’s Gospel “In the beginning was the Logos”, further highlighting the divinity of Christ as God. St. John was in no doubt; he deliberately refers back to the beginning of the book of Genesis where God creates through His word (logos). This would not be lost on any Jewish reader of the time.

3. Tying Christ to creation as the Logos of God the Creed, like the Gospel of St. John, gives us a far deeper understanding of God’s love. Christ has a stake in us as He, the Logos, was involved in our creation. So too does the self same Logos take flesh to save us. This is not the action of an Arian superhero that suddenly appears from nowhere to save mankind.

4. Another meaning of logos is that of logic. Athanasius was a very logical debater and it is my understanding of this reference to the Logos of Christ that he was trying to say that the Arians in calling Christ a creation were being illogical, decidedly so if we tie their position to the Logos of St. John, for they would reduce salvation to the whim of a distant father figure who for no good reason created a being to save mankind.

Conclusion?

As we have seen the debate over the nature of Christ at the Council of Nicea took centre stage, starting and ending with arguments from Scripture. Although

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Athanasius and the Orthodox faction had won the day, ripping the intellectual basis of Arianism apart the matter did not end then and there.

Fifteen bishops did not sign the Creed and a larger number noted that they signed with certain reservations. Those who did not sign and those with reservations provided Arianism with an extended life which strengthened or waned according to the disposition of the Byzantine Emperor16 who happened to be in power at the time. Constantine agreed with the Creed but many of his successors did not so there was musical chairs of exiles for a number of years (Athanasius himself was exiled on a number of occasions). The Arians also moved out of the Byzantine Empire and gained converts among the “barbarian” tribes of the Germanic plain. One of the Arian recruited chieftains, Theodosius, a Goth, eventually became Emperor and instigated a persecution of the Orthodox Clergy. With the passage of time the Creed became widely accepted both in Byzantium and Rome, eventually resulting in the elimination of Arianism.

From the Council of Nicea until the 7th century various heresies based on Arianism came and went, unable to survive long due to the crushing intellectual defeat Athanasius and the Orthodox Church inflicted on the Arians at Nicea. It is said that one cannot kill an idea but the Creed, especially that portion on the Nature of Christ, doomed Arianism to a lingering death.

Such was the threat to the Trinity and the doctrine of Salvation posed by Arianism that every time a major theological (as opposed to doctrinal) debate arisen in the Church one side has inevitably tried to label the other as Arian. This has continued into modern times with attempts to discredit sects like the Jehovah’s Witnesses by having the charge of Arianism laid against them with, one might add very convoluted arguments.

Postscript

It is interesting that Islam in the Koran uses the same type of arguments, namely Christ was created (by Allah), as the Arian heresy some 300 years before17 to try and disprove the Deity of Christ. Given that Mohamed started his mission in Asia Minor circa 610 A D it is not beyond speculation that he was influenced by Arian teachings.

DELIVERY

Preparation of MATERIALS

Figure 1Our UNIQUE FAITH

16 One Emperor, Julian, returned to paganism and persecuted both factions. He is known to history as Julian the Apostate. 17 See Imran III, 59 & Nisa IV, 157

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Man has Fallen

Man can be restored

IF or BY

GOD THROUGH CHRIST

Figure 2The Arian Heresy

“Christ is Less than the Father

‘’ (There was a time when He was not )ATTACKS

Trinity Salvation

Athanasius

295 – 373 ADStarted at Nicea as Secretary & Adviser to BishopBecame Bishop

Figure 3

CONSTANTINE PROMOTIONS

PRESENTS

TheBIG FIGHT

AtNICEA

ATHANASIUS Vs ARIUS

For

THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY!

Figure 4

MEANING WHAT???

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Round 1

SCRIPTURE

Round 2

ETERNALLY BEGOTTEN

Round 3

GOD FROM GOD

Round 4

LIGHT FROM LIGHT

Round 5

TRUE GOD

Round 6

BEGOTTEN of ONE SUBSTANCE

CREATION THROUGH

The SESSION

Introduction

In order to focus the group’s attention on the subject of this session begin by asking them by what means Christians, as opposed to other religions, hope to get to heaven. The answer “by Faith in Christ” should be readily forthcoming from the group. Use the reply to point out that it is God through Christ who has opened the way for our redemption. Nothing we can do by ourselves with our own power can save us; - it is Christ’s life, death and resurrection that opened the gates of Heaven for mankind.

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Background

Although Rome was the power in the Ancient World it was Greek learning & philosophy that was the intellectual base of the Roman Empire. The common language was Koine (Common) Greek. It was Greek intellectual ideas & methods that were debated in cities. Even the Gospels were first written in Greek. When Christianity moved into the Roman World it met this culture head on & it was inevitable that each & every aspect of the message of the Gospel would be debated and counter arguments brought against Christianity. In the long run this would strengthen Christianity but in the short term it was a major battle for the fledgling church. Perhaps the greatest battle of all was fought against the Arians….

The Arian Heresy

Arius, the leader of the Arians, questioned what “the Son of God” meant. In human terms a son implies that there is a time in the life of a human father when he has no son. This idea was applied to Christ in that it was speculated, then claimed, that Christ, as the Son of the Father, must be a creation of the Father. This meant that the Arians saw Christ as a created creature that was less than the Father & if this were so Christ’s authority could be challenged and Arian teachings advanced as having equal authority.

The Arian sect was large, having many followers in the city of Alexandria & they had a brilliant sound bight, “there was a time when He (Christ) was not. In Greek this is sounds like hain potty otty ook hain. The Arians were organised & up for a fight. It was into this explosive mix that Emperor Constantine dropped a lighted match by asking Christians to state their beliefs. The Church had to define Christ in such a way as to once & for all refute the Arians. The result was the Council of Nicea or, the big fight at Nicea……. The prize; the future of Christianity.

Formation of the Creed

The formation of the Creed is exactly analogous with a boxing match. Each side was trying to land a defined verbal blow that would leave no room for their opponent to continue. Both sides had agreed to the wording of the Creed up until now but the core issue of Christ’s divinity was now at stake.

Enter Athanasius

Before moving on to give a round by round account of the formation of the Creed the “boxers” are announced together with their history. (As I can ‘do’ an Irish accent I had the commentator speaking to Barry McGuigan getting the pedigree of the opponents before the match. [Barry also provided inter round comments as to why the Church’s blows did not land until “of one substance”.])

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Each of the attempts to define the oneness of the Father & Son are seen as punches thrown at the Arians and their counter arguments and interpretations are seen as counter punches .This is delivered by the “commentator” with Barry summing up why the church failed after each attempt. For example, in round 2 the “commentator” describes how the church tried to block the heresy by describing Christ as the “Eternally begotten” Son of God. Barry then points out that begetting implies a time when he was not & the Arians used this to escape a knock out. Lively paced this delivery can bring a sense of urgency to the session along with an idea of effort.

The fight ends in round 6 with the Arians suffering a technical knock out but succumbing much later, they are fatally weakened by the Creed.

The session ends with the follow up of the concept of Christ as the Word (Logos) of God at Creation.

THE NICENE CREED

Session 5 “FOR US & OUR SALVATION ……THE THIRD DAY HE ROSE AGAIN IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE SCRIPTURES”

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Introduction

Within this section of the Creed there are a number of points that merit our attention. As Christians we are all well aware of the birth, life, death & resurrection of Jesus and how this was foretold in the Old Testament. It is therefore intended that rather than treating this section as an extended Bible Study we will examine each of the main themes of the Need for Salvation, the Incarnation, Christ’s sacrifice and the Resurrection. In doing this we will try to establish the theological principals behind each sub section.

Our Need of Salvation

Over the years I have heard many people try to blame God for man’s sinful state. In most cases they argue that as God is Almighty He should not have allowed sin into the world in the first place. Ignoring for the moment the attempt to blame God let us ask why man had, still has, and will have the opportunity to sin.

Man was not created to exist alone. In both the Old and the New Testament we find that God wants to enter into a relationship with His creation man, a relationship of love. As He is Almighty God could have made us with a compulsion to love Him. If this was the case there would be no sin as we would be all loving God and worshiping Him without let or question. Although this seems very idyllic one is forced to ask if man’s relationship would be based on true love for man would have no option to love God. For man to freely love God we are looking at an entirely different ball game. In order for true love to exist there has to be the choice either to love or not to love. This is true of all relationships. For true love to be given it must be chosen, compelled love is just that; a compulsion. For a relationship with God true love is needed. God therefore gave man His trust in giving man the option not to love God. We call this free will.

With the gift of freewill man chose not to love God. Man, not God therefore caused sin to enter the world as man broke God’s trust in Him and chose not to love God as He intended we should. Instead of the One, True, Loving God man chose his own gods, whether they were constructed effigies, gain, power or just plain self centeredness. So instead of a loving relationship with God man stood alone having chosen sin and, with the loving, stabilizing relationship with God shattered, the relationships between all mankind also unravelled for man by himself is not as strong as he thinks himself to be; without a spiritual base in God’s love for his soul man loses his soul.

God’s love for us is something that cannot be just switched off. Despite our sin He still cares for us asking time & time again through the prophets that we repent and re-enter a loving relationship with Him.

“God’s Problem”

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God created man with freewill in order to enter into a loving relationship with man but man chose that which is not God but the opposite – sin. The relationship between God & man was, if it were a document, torn up, shredded, burned to ashes and the ashes scattered. In the Scriptures we read that God cannot tolerate sin: He always condemns sin and cannot “look upon the face of sin”.

Yet despite the betrayal by man, God still loves His creation and wants a relationship with man. This love is so strong that it stays His hand from wiping man, and perhaps all creation, away and starting from scratch again. In the Genesis story of the Flood we see God almost, but not quite, wiping the slate clean by destroying His creation. In the Flood story we find that man, not learning a lesson, continues in a sinful state after the great flood. God then chooses the Hebrews as His “special relationship” people through whom He can establish a loving relationship with the whole world. Yet at the very moment God is entering into the Covenant with Moses as the representative of the Hebrews on Sinai the rest of the Hebrews are building a golden calf to worship. So much for man changing the sin that has become our nature. Still God persists. He leads the Hebrews into the Promised Land of Israel. The Hebrews respond promptly. They worship Baal, Ahstarte and any other local deity that comes to hand.

I have the feeling that these constant betrayals hurt rather than anger God for He does not lash out or abandon His Chosen People. Rather than leaving them to wither away God sends His prophets to call on them to return His love. Due to inherent sin man ignores God. Our constant, loving God, like any parent with a wayward child, imposes not punishment but chastisement on the Hebrews by what I call the “ites & the ians”18. So endemic is sin that even God’s chosen People do not respond. Sin has become what it always was, part of man’s nature. It is almost as if sin were in all mankind’s genes. From a loving relationship with God mankind has fallen to what a computer programmer would call a sin default system – sin, not loving God, is what we do first and best.

By sinning, man had imposed a huge gulf between himself and God, a gulf which God had on numerous occasions encouraged man to narrow by turning away from sin and re – entering a loving relationship with Him. Loving man so much He could not bring Himself to destroy and re – create man there was only one option left. Man by himself had neither the inclination or the power to bridge the gap of sin.

God’s “Solution” the Incarnation

As man had neither the power or the inclination to bridge the gap between himself and God, God did the unthinkable – He, our Great God, sent His only begotten Son to man as a man to redeem all mankind. In his gospel St. John describes this act of love

18 Canaanites, Midionites, Hittites, Phoenicians, Egyptians, Assyrians and Babylonians.

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as “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us”19. The Greek word St. John uses for flesh is (pronounced sarks as sparks). Although meaning flesh the Greek word had connotations of corruption not only in terms of human flesh but also in terms of human nature. (It is thought to be the origin of our word sex.) By using this Greek word flesh – there are other words he could have used – St. John is telling us that Christ did not appear to become human in some weird form similar to Jupiter in his mythical (and lustful) forays on Earth but truly human. is the word used to describe not just flesh but fallen flesh, a hint of Christ’s purpose, namely the sacrifice of Himself to redeem man.

Many commentators’ only remarks on the virgin birth of Christ tend to centre on the concept that a virgin birth in ancient mythology indicated that the person so born would rise to high office. For some the object of their attention is Mary and in some cases her near deification. I think that the main point we are missing here is that God has not come in all His glory & power to redeem man in a dazzling display, rather He comes to take on fallen human in the most intimate of ways, being born into the world that awaits its salvation. Once again God allows us the opportunity to truly love Him by sending His greatest gift, His Son as a child in the form of our fallen flesh. We all know, or should know the Gospel accounts of Christ’s betrayal, trial, death & resurrection but let us take a look at these events as a sacrifice in terms of the Old Testament laws and see what, if anything, we can learn.

Hebrew Sacrifice – The Crucifixion

In Leviticus20 we find the 5 main types of sacrifice used by the Israelites. We will concentrate on two of these: the Olah or burnt offering and the zevakh shelamim, the full peace offering. Whereas the rest of the Ancient World made sacrifices, including human sacrifices in some instances, in order to “please or appease the gods” the people of Israel sacrificed for a very different reason. The Hebrew word for sacrifice is korban which in turn is based on the three – letter root quf – resh – bet which means “to draw near” (to God). At the time of the Kingdom of Israel sacrifice was a method of bridging the gap between God and man.

Immediately before the act of sacrifice the presiding priest would place a hand on the head of animal to be sacrificed. This was done to transfer the sin from the supplicant to the sacrificial animal. The subsequent death of the animal would atone for the sins of the person. Three of the four Gospels, unusually not just the synoptic Gospels21, all mention the Roman soldiers placing a crown of thorns on Christ’s head. This of course was a mockery but it also ties in, to a certain extent, with the priest placing a hand on the sacrificial beast to transfer sin; - in this case the sins of all mankind for the Roman soldiers were the “priests” of the material world [In one sense they can be

19 John : 1, 1420 Leviticus1: 1 – 5 :2621 Matthew 27: 29; Mark 15: 17; John 19:2

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said to be carrying out the orders of their god the Emperor.], and also representatives of fallen humanity, the sinner, albeit unrepentant.

The other aspect of Hebrew sacrifice that merits our attention is the way in which animals were sacrificed. Animals that were sacrificed had their throats cut in order that their blood could be shed for the person making the sacrifice. It was believed that the blood so spilt would turn aside God’s wrath from the sinner. As Prof J. A. B. Holland points out in his thesis on logos & pneuma22 it is almost as if the blood masked the sin from God, allowing God to look upon sinful man.

The Olah Sacrifice

The Hebrew meaning of Olah is “that which goes up”. (To God in the case of sacrifice). There were specific requirement for the animal to be sacrificed. It had to be a male animal without blemish. Depending on the wealth of the person making the sacrifice it could be a bull, a sheep, a goat or a pair of birds. The olah was therefore costly. The purpose of the olah was to demonstrate one’s belief in God and submission to God’s commandments: the Covenant. In the olah the whole offering, apart from the hide, was given up to God by burning and blood was shed for redemption and sprinkled around the altar.

Jesus knew the olah. At the Last Supper He makes specific reference to the olah sacrifice of Himself23 in establishing a new covenant with God, by the shedding of His blood for the redemption of mankind and by the offering up of His whole earthly body, the only unblemished .

Yet there is more to the Last Supper than just the olah sacrifice for the redemption of mankind. There is an element of a peace offering between God and man and it is the sacrifice of the full peace offering, the zevakh shelamim, we must now examine.

The Zevakh Shelamim sacrifice

The zevakh shelamim sacrifice is known as “the full peace offering” and was intended not only to restore peace between God and man but also between those members of the Old Testament Covenant who were participating in the sacrifice. In this sacrifice an animal of either sex and not necessarily unblemished was sacrificed. Part of the offering, usually the fat, was burnt on the altar as an offering to God. Certain cuts of the meat, I suspect the choice cuts, were reserved for the participating priests and the remainder was shared as a common meal between all those participating in the sacrifice. This was done as a visible sign of kinship within the Covenant.

Consider then the Last Supper. Jesus shares the bread and wine which He likens to His own body and blood, shed to make peace between God and man, with His disciples, the first in the New Covenant between God and man.

22 Pneuma & Logos in the N T; Doctrinal Thesis of Prof J A B Holland DD, PhD, D. Sc. Edinburgh University23 Matthew 26: 26 – 30, Mark 14: 22 – 25, Luke 22 1 – 19,

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The zevakh shelamim was a time of rejoicing in a shared meal with fellow Israelites within the temple of God. Holy Communion too is a time of celebration. We are not only remembering with pain the high cost of our redemption we are celebrating our salvation through the sacrifice of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God who for our salvation became flesh and was sacrificed for our redemption.

Another form of sacrifice that has some bearing on our service of Holy Communion is the minkhah. This was a cereal offering of unleavened flour in the form of cakes or wafers. Part of the offering was burnt on the altar and the rest given to the priests. This sacrifice is of interest only in that it unleavened bread was also used in the Passover meal and from this origin is used in churches today. The 2 remaining types of sacrifice by the ancient Israelites dealt with unintentional and deliberate sin and our outside our present consideration24.

On the Third Day

In the context of ancient Hebrew sacrifices the animal killed to restore the covenant died, was burned to a cinder or consumed and that was that, over and done until the next time. Of course there would be a next time for mankind was and is addicted to sin. Man had become sinful almost as a default setting so the cycle of sacrifice was destined to repeated for by sacrificing under the Hebraic laws did not necessarily include repentance – though this was originally the intention – and the re-establishment of a loving relationship with God.

Now the cycle of sacrifice, destined to be repeated under Hebraic law, had been broken once and for all by the sacrifice of God’s only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. This was a once and for all time sacrifice to restore a loving relationship between man and God. In this sacrifice Christ took man’s sinful, fallen flesh - the very nature of man - and restored it to its pristine form as it had been when man was first created. By becoming Human and dying for us Christ wiped out our sins. God could once again enter a loving relationship with all men, provided that they accepted the sacrifice made by His only begotten Son. Of course man would sin again. It is in our nature so to do but through Christ these sins are wiped out provided we believe and repent by trying to enter into and maintain a loving relationship with God.

Our sins have been separated from us not by some divine trickery but at great cost in the ending of the earthly life of God’s Son upon a cross. The cost of this unblemished flesh could not have been higher. The blood spilled at this sacrifice was both uniquely the blood of God and man. The incident of St. Thomas not believing the physical resurrection of Christ25 is not only to encourage those who have not seen the physical Jesus to believe, it is also to demonstrate that human flesh, , is once 24 The offering for unintentional contravention of the 10 commandments or the religious laws of the Torah was the sacrifice of an animal, usually a goat. In remote communities it was not always possible to attend the temple for this type of sacrifice so, at regular intervals the local priest would place all the sins of the community on the goat which would then be driven out into the wilderness to die either by malnutrition, dehydration or as prey. It has been suggested that this sacrifice, the chatat, is the origin of the word scapegoat.25 John 20: 24 – 29.

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again made whole in the sight of God, opening the way for the restoration of a loving relationship between man & his Creator.

Loving God

Throughout this section we have talked about both God’s great love for us and the need for our response to this love by entering a loving relationship with Him through Christ. We well know God’s love for us but what about our love for God in our relationship with Him? What is expected of us?

In the Synoptic Gospels26 Jesus is asked which of the commandments is the greatest and His reply sums up what our relationship to God should be and the relationship we should have with one another. He said that we should love the Lord our God with all our soul, all our strength and all our mind. There are a number of points we have to note about this commandment.

The love required by God is Unconditional.

The love required by God is Active

The love required by God needs Effort.

The love required by God Shapes our relationships.

Unconditional

The first thing we have to note about Christ’s commandment about loving God is that there are no ifs, buts or maybes. Loving God it not the thing we do just when everything is working out for us. It is something we should be doing all the time, irrespective of our condition. Now that is something that is very hard to do, there are times in our lives when, for a host of reasons, we may feel that God has not made life easy for us but, and it is the biggest but of all, we have to remember God’s sacrifice of His only begotten Son for us and a new perspective governs our thoughts demanding our unconditional love.

Active

Our love of God is to be an active love. It is not something that we reserve for an hour, or sometimes longer, on a Sunday morning at church then conveniently abandon for the rest of the week as we go about our daily business. Our love of God should govern every aspect of our lives, every day. This is not always possible in the world in which we live today but as Christians our relationship with God should be such that it does influence our every action or thought as a goal if not as a fact.

Effort

26 Matt 22: 35 – 40, Mark 12: 28 -34, Luke 10: 25 – 28.

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Jesus made it very plain that our love of God requires effort. It is not something we can get by on like saying “Good morning God” to start the day instead of the usual “Good God, morning”. Loving God in the way Jesus tells us we should requires us to engage all our faculties. From making a particular time for us to spend focusing on God in our daily lives to thinking about what God is saying to us to say nothing of resisting the very real temptation to let this part of our life slip by takes a considerable effort. It also takes an effort to realise when we have fallen short of loving God with all our soul, mind and strength and asking His forgiveness for our shortcomings.

Shaping Relationships

Have you ever wondered why Jesus put the two commandments He gave us in the order that he did? Let us consider this order. If we have God at the centre of our lives we are exercising our free will to love God. This does not make us holy or even special; it makes us only what God intended us to be when He created us. This recreation of man has been gained at a cost, namely the sacrifice of Jesus Christ who died that all man may have eternal life. Through this great act of God everyone in the world is potentially a brother or sister in Christ, able to love God of their own free will. So, from our love of God, there must be a reflected love for all our fellow mankind irrespective of who they are or what they do to us. Low self esteem is not an excuse for not fully loving others as Jesus demanded.

DELIVERY

Preparation of MATERIALS

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Figure 1

LOVE, SIN & FREEWILL

TRUE love implies CHOICE

Man CHOSE not to Love GOD – SIN

=======================

GOD’S PROBLEM

Destroy & Recreate?

Chastise His Chosen People?

Educate?

Figure 2

CLOSING the GAP of SIN

FALLEN FLESH

INCARNATION

IMPLICATIONS

Figure 3

HEBREW SACRIFICE

The korban To Draw Near (To God)

CHARACTERISTICS

Transfer of Sin

Sin hidden by blood of offering

The olah That which goes up (Burnt Offering)

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CHARACTERISTICS Submission to Covenant

Unblemished Animal

Costly

Blood sprinkled for Redemption

The zevakh shelamim Full Peace Offering Shared Meal

Figure 4

The SACRIFICE CYCLE

SIN

SACRIFICESACRIFICE

*

SIN

* Insert Cross when explaining how Christ’s death & resurrection broke this cycle forever.

RESURRECTION

New

Figure 5

AGAPE: Our Response: Loving God

1 Unconditional

2 Effort

3 Active

4 Shapes our lives & relationships.

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The SESSION

Start the session by asking each member of the group which is their favourite colour and, if they know, why that colour is their favourite. Point out that they chose a colour “because it pleased them” or they “like it.” When we do this we are making an active choice, exercising our free will. From this remind the group about what we have learned about choice being necessary for true love and that man has made a choice about a loving relationship with God.

[You may care to use the analogy of dances. God wants us in a loving relations being a rumba with 4 beats, us wanting more being a cha cha with 5 beats & the Arian heresy being a waltz with 3 beats as one member of the Trinity missing.]

God’s Problem

God loves man, His creation, but man has chosen sin, the opposite of God. God can therefore no longer have a relationship with fallen man. In the O T God uses all the options in figure 2 but His chosen people stubbornly turn to sin. It is as if sin is part of man now, part of human flesh.

God’s Solution: the Incarnation

In this section the concept of fallen human flesh,, (sarks) is introduced as is the idea of God in Christ taking upon Himself all that is human in order to redeem mankind. It is also important to explain to the group that in sending Christ to us for our salvation God is once again giving mankind the opportunity to enter into a loving relationship with Him, not through forcing us – we still have the freewill not take up the offer of salvation – but by showing us the depths of His divine love. A love that is prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice.

Hebrew Sacrifice &the Crucifixion

Using the notes describe the 3 main types of Hebrew sacrifice & point out that there was a repetitive cycle of sinning followed by sacrifice then sinning. Sacrifice had become a ritual & repentance had become less important than the deed. Point out how the Hebrew sacrifice was reinterpreted by Christ both in the Last Supper & also in the events of His trial and crucifixion.

On the Third Day

Emphasise the once & for all time nature of redemption through Christ with sin being wiped away. The Cross breaks the cycle of sacrifice, (Insert cross into figure 4). The huge cost of separating us from our sin is considered. Coming back to the

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Resurrection it is the body (sarks) of Christ that has risen from the grave, the self same sarks of human form that the Word became when He became flesh & dwelt among us. Sarks is now restored in the sight of God to what it was intended to be when He created us. This demands a response from us in recognition of the magnitude of God’s gift: a recognition shown by loving God.

Loving God

This section is quite straightforward and closely followed the notes starting on page 62. At the end of the session members of the group were asked to pause & reflect on their response to the Sacrifice of Christ.

THE NICENE CREED

Session 6 “ASCENDED INTO HEAVEN….HIS KINGDOM SHALL HAVE NO END”

Introduction

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So far we have been examining the earthly nature, person and life of Christ. We now move on to look at the role of the resurrected Christ in His return to heaven. This study is therefore in 4 discreet sections, the Ascension of Christ, the position of Christ in heaven, the Judgement and the Kingdom.

The Ascension of Christ

In the Old Testament authors who mention ascending into heaven do so mainly in stories of dreams27 or narratives28. The references to ascension in the Old Testament do however have one thing in common, they all make clear that ascension is a Divine act done through God’s power and cannot be accomplished by mere humanity. Not that man has never tried – the pharaohs threw the resources and wealth of an entire empire into ascending into heaven in an afterlife, not with much success though they did generate some interesting tombs.

For those who witnessed Christ’s ascension into heaven it was a very real, historical, factual incident, uncloaked by a whirlwind or dreams. This is emphasised by the author of Acts in his narrative of the Ascension.29 It is Jesus in the flesh, albeit redeemed, resurrected flesh, that ascends to heaven. We can now see that Christ’s work on earth has come full circle. He became flesh, (remember our thoughts on fallen human flesh), redeemed it on the Cross and now that redeemed flesh, through His sacrifice is able to enter into heaven. It is much like a final rescue expedition mounted after all other attempts have failed that finds and rescues survivors of a crash in a jungle who are falling prey to carnivores. After breaking through to the survivors the rescuer gives them sustenance, defeats the carnivores then lead the way back through the dangerous jungle to the destination for which the survivors were originally bound. Christ has broken through into the human world; rescued mankind from sin and in the ascension leads man to the place where we were intended to go in God’s plan for us, heaven. As St. Paul puts it, Christ is the first fruits of the final resurrection for all at the end of time.30 The Ascension can thus be interpreted as a pathfinder event for all mankind, directly linked to Christ’s earthly work on the Cross and His heavenly ministry.Atonement & Ascension

Bearing in mind that the author of Hebrews had a detailed knowledge of Hebraic rituals and tradition and was addressing others who were familiar with this tradition it is interesting to see how the author takes up the idea of sacrifice and links this to the Ascension. [At this point a quick revision of the full peace offering sacrifice, the Zevakh Shelamim, as discussed in the preceding chapter would be useful.]

For the writer of Hebrews the Ascension bridges the gap between the earthly work of Christ culminating with the Cross and Christ’s heavenly work as a Priest / King, seated at the right hand of the Father.31 This also signifies that no further act of sacrifice is necessary for the redemption of all mankind for it can not add to the 27 Jacob’s ladder Gen 28: 12. 28 Angel of the Lord ascending as Manoah & wife look on Judges: 13: 20, Elijah in whirlwind 2 Kings 2: 11 -12.29 Acts 1: 1 - 1130 1 Col.15: 20 -28, 1 Thes 4: 13 - 1831 Hebrews 8: 1

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sacrifice Christ made upon the Cross.32 The writer of Hebrews sees the Ascension as a necessary part of the ritual of sacrifice, where the ascended, exalted Christ, in the role of High Priest, sprinkles the blood of the sacrifice before the altar of God in the Most Holy Place thereby completing the sacrifice. Thus the ascension becomes an essential part of atonement allowing the historical Jesus who is now Priest / King to finish in heaven the sacrificial work necessary for our redemption, alluding to Melchizedek the priest / king who blessed Abraham.33

Ascension & Power

There is something about breaking the law of gravity that inspires awe in mankind. Consider the crowds that gather to watch, hear and feel the launch of space vehicles from Cape Kennedy. While some have come hoping to see a disaster the vast majority have come to be awed as the shackles of gravity are cast off and the spacecraft ascends into the heavens, with a lot of noise, the shaking of the ground, plumes of smoke and a column of fire. All the sights and sounds of a launch are the result of the unleashing of power. Putting even the lightest payload beyond the clasp of gravity takes enormous power and it is this power that is so fascinating to the onlookers at Cape Kennedy.

The author of Acts, like all the writers in the New Testament, is constrained by lack of space in their writings and the need to fit their testaments on to one scroll. In describing the Ascension of Christ to heaven in a cloud the author of Acts describes the apostles observing this with “an intense gaze”34. The word used to describe their gaze is antenizen, a word that implies awe. Even after Christ had disappeared from their vision the apostles were still looking up at the sky and in verse 11 are rebuked for this by men in white. In modern parlance the reaction of the apostles would be best described as totally gob smacked by the power of Christ.

[Today we are able to venture beyond the bounds of gravity by harnessing the power of chemical reactions in spacecraft and we have not found God in the sky. Those who claim that not seeing God in space is proof that God does not exist are missing the point. At the time of Christ’s Ascension those who witnessed His ascension believed that heaven was in the sky as it were and God was communicating with them in terms that they understood even if this meant the breaking of the law of gravity, awesome to us even today but to the apostles 2000 years ago it must have been a sight beyond description.]

In Acts we are told that the Ascension took place very close to Jerusalem,35 the centre of power for the Roman occupation of the Holy Land. Jerusalem it must be remembered, had also been the centre of power for the kingdom of Israel and, as such, was seen as the place where the new messiah would proclaim the start of the restoration of the kingdom of Israel. By choosing a point very close to centre of power in the minds of the Jewish people for His ascension Christ is reaffirms, in a very decisive way, His power and sovereignty.

32 Hebrews 10: 11 - 1433 Hebrews 6: 16 - 2034 Acts 1: 10 35 Acts 1: 12

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Another aspect of the Ascension narrative in Acts we should focus upon is that of sovereignty. In Acts 1: verse 6 the disciples ask the risen Jesus the old chestnut question of when He is going to become the popularist messiah of Jewish belief and overthrow the Roman yoke. Christ’s reply is interesting in two aspects. Firstly it shows His power over the apostles as He instructs and commissions them to do His bidding and secondly in that He claims sovereignty over not just Israel but the whole world. It should also be noted that the power of Christ continues after the Ascension. Much like NCOs follow an officer’s briefing to troops with the command to “get on with it” angels tell the disciples to “get on with it” (albeit in more dulcet tones than any a NCO would use) and carry out Christ’s commands. It is not only orders that the disciples received from Christ just prior to the Ascension. There is also the promise of empowerment to come with the coming of the Holy Spirit that will enable the disciples to carry out Christ’s instructions.

Ascension and Love

Although the Ascension focuses mainly on atonement and power it should not be forgotten that it is also an act of love. The Ascension was not done so that Christ could return to heaven and revel in the glory that was His prior to becoming flesh. He went to rule over all not as a despot but as an intercessor, a loving God Who cares for us. Of His Ascension Jesus said on many occasions that He was going to prepare a place for us. The departure of Christ from the physical to the heavenly realm also made way for the coming of the Holy Spirit, to guide, comfort and sustain us.

References to the Ascension in the New Testament describe the Ascension as being on “our behalf”. In John 16: 7 we see Jesus saying that the Holy Spirit will be sent for “our good.” In Hebrews 6: 20 & 9: 24 the Ascension is directly connected to the atoning work of Christ for our good. Rather than the Ascension being seen as an act of aggrandisement or reward, even though Christ’s exaltation is deserved, it was done on our behalf and is connected directly to both the incarnation of Christ36 and the crucifixion37 and can be seen it the context of the immense love our God has for us.

“Seated At the Right Hand of the Father”

At first sight the idea of someone seated is that of a person at rest, perhaps a couch potato, or, if active at all, engaged in that catchall we call administrative work for that is our understanding of being seated today. This modern interpretation of Christ being seated at the right hand of the Father gives a totally false impression of the ascended Christ, so before we go any further we should put all ideas of a feet up, relaxing Christ out of our minds.

At the time when the New Testament was written being seated at the right hand of a ruler was common conception that they would have readily understood in a far different way to us some 2000 years later. In the Ancient World in general and the Near East in particular heads of state were often titular in nature. Very often the real

36 2 Cor 8: 937 Rom 5: 6 - 8

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power within a kingdom lay with the person who performed what we can best describe as the executive function. This individual held immense power derived from the favour of the ruler and advised the ruler on both plans and policies in addition to the execution of such plans & policies. The executive, if we can call him38 that, held the power of life or death over all the ruler’s subjects and could overrule the court system in granting amnesty for crimes. At the royal palace the executive was seated on the right hand of the ruler to indicate his exalted position as others stood or prostrated themselves before the ruler and to advise the ruler in an unobtrusive way. In battle the executive rode beside the ruler as the last line of defence and as a lance carrier, providing the ruler with weapons.

Given this understanding of being seated at the right hand of a ruler we can gain a more satisfactory idea of the position of Christ in heaven.

Christ as the Father’s Executive

For me the best way of understanding the position of Christ as God the Father’s executive is to be found in the opening verses of St. John’s Gospel where he refers to Christ as the (word) of God, through Whom all things were made and Who became incarnate in human flesh for the work of our salvation. St. John ties Christ into the very act of creation and for me firmly establishes Christ as the executor of the Father’s will, especially in the mighty acts of creation & redemption. This also shows that far from a subservient being in the ‘employ’ of the Father Christ is God with the Father.

When we pray for others and ourselves we address our prayers to God the Father, making our requests in the name of Christ. Once again we are not claiming that the Father and Christ are different with one less than the other. What we are doing is acknowledging that it is through the saving work of Christ we are able to approach the Father as favoured applicants.39

Another function of the person sitting on the right hand of the ruler was that of judge and this is the subject of our next section.

Judgement

Whether we like it or not there is a judgement to come for all of us. It is in both the New Testament and our statement of belief, The Nicene Creed. Now the idea of being judged is not very nice, it causes unease, taking us out of our comfort zone in our religion. It is therefore very tempting to ignore it in our studies and only address it in church when the minister is feeling a bit liverish and mentions it in passing during a sermon. All this does not however alter the fact that judgement is in the New Testament and we have to deal with it, like it or not.

One of the functions of the person who sat at the right hand of ancient rulers was to dispense justice to all who came before him. Seated at the right hand of the Father it is Christ who will judge all who are brought before Him at the end of time. From our

38 In most cases the position was held by a male, usually the eldest son, a male relative, or a eunuch; queens and the harem held little actual power.39 Not that we will always get our prayers answered in the way we expect.

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Scriptures we know that some will be saved and others will not. Those who will be saved are those who believe in Christ, in other words, Christians. Now we examined belief in our first session and we concluded that belief is not just a vague agreement with a set of core values with which we find ourselves more or less in agreement but rather something that is at the centre of our very existence our soul.

Belief & Judgement

In our first session we saw how that belief is at the very centre of us, right within our souls and we argued that our Christian behaviour is due to this belief rather than finding Christian behaviour being something which our value structure finds attractive enough for us to use. Our Christian behaviours are dictated by the love Christ has for us and thus we are able to place (love) at the centre of our dealings with our fellows. That we will help someone in need is not due to the person being in need and contributions to charity being the flavour of the month in fashionable circles; it is due to the love of Christ which compels us to love and care for all for they are now or can be potential brothers and sisters in Christ. Those who do not have belief in Christ at their centre but who follow Christian ethics may be in for a rude awakening for Jesus said that not everyone who professes to be Christian will be saved.40 In the parable of the vine and the withered branches that were destroyed Jesus again said that we have to dwell in Him,41 in other words have Christ as the very centre of our existence in our soul.

Despite all our efforts to maintain belief in Christ as the centre of our existence there are times when we are going to fail for we are after all only human. Yet such is the love of God the door is always open for our return as Jesus described in the parable of the prodigal son.42

There is also a judgement to come for those who, secure in the power of their own evil*, reject Christ and like an insidious weed sowed by an enemy among the growing crops of wheat attack the belief in Christ Christians hold at the core of their being. Their harvest ensures that they will be harvested.43

And His kingdom shall have no end

Although the Gospels have over 80 references to both the Kingdom of God and Christ’s kingdom the position of and the wording about the Kingdom of Christ within the Nicene Creed makes it very plain that those who drew up the Creed had a specific concept of the kingdom of Christ. We will therefore be concentrating on the narrow idea of the kingdom of Christ in the Creed rather than the far larger concept of the kingdom of God about which so many authors have produced excellent references.

40 Matt 7: 21 - 2941 John 15: 5, 642 Luke 15: 11 - 3243 Matt 13: 19 – 52* See appendix

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We will also be tying in the ideas of the kingdom of Christ contained in the Creed to the positions already taken in foregoing subjects.

Stating as it does that His kingdom shall have no end the Creed is in effect saying that Christ is to rule over all who have been saved by faith during the final judgement. By saying that Christ’s kingdom is future orientated the Creed is not implying that Christ does not rule over anything at present. In the Section on Christ being seated in glory on the right hand of the Father we noted that He was the executive ruler of all. We have also seen that creation was through the (Word) which we identified as Christ. This leaves us with a problem. How come our Almighty God does not have sovereignty over all He created?

Once again we can see that in order for mankind to truly love Him our creator allowed us the choice of not loving Him. By exercising his freewill man chose not to be in a loving relationship with God and, just as moving to another country allows one to change nationality, man left the kingdom and migrated to a place where evil could set up an embassy as it were. We opted out when all but evil was within Christ’s kingdom and, to allow us the option of returning to the kingdom, Christ came to us, removed our sin at the cost of His life and invited us back into His kingdom with the visa of Christ within our souls.

As Christians with Christ at the very centre of our souls our prime allegiance is to Him and although we are in this world we are only visiting tourists from our true home with Christ in His kingdom. But unlike tourists who stay a short while then leave with little trace of their passing other than a fading entry on some hotel’s guest book we, as Christians, are seeking to change where we stay; we maybe tourists but we are also agents provocateur to bring that part of God’s creation which remains outside into the kingdom of Christ so that the will of the Father can be done on earth as it is in heaven. This we do compelled by the love of Christ within us giving us a love for our fellows and our manifesto for change is the Good News of the New Testament.

The kingdom of Christ is then the place where those who are saved will live with Christ and it will also be here as Christians bring all those who are outside the kingdom into the suzerainty of Christ, causing heaven to be upon earth.

Appendix: Weeds among the Wheat

Evil can take many forms as it infiltrates the soul of men that should be the preserve of Christ, often replacing Christ as men choose evil. It has manifested itself as the belief that certain people are sub human as in the Holocaust, Apartheid in S Africa, Bosnia, Dafur, the Congo and in the training of some of the forces in Iraq who now take photographs of dead enemies as trophies to be examined at leisure with their comrades, some of which have been published on the web. Trophies of people as earlier hunters had pictorial trophies of hunting animals!

Evil can also grow up like a weed in the very wheat of the church. During the recent conflict between the state of Israel & Hezbollah that devastated so much of Lebanon

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some people who hoped for an escalation of the conflict into all out global nuclear war. To this end they actively lobbied decision makers to refrain from making an early call for peace thereby prolonging the conflict and suffering of the people of Lebanon.

The suffering mankind would undergo during and in the aftermath of an all out nuclear war would be immense. To most Christians nuclear war and indeed most forms of warfare on any scale, are abhorrent as inflicting pain and suffering on one’s fellow man is the antithesis of the love we have for others due to our compulsion to love caused Christ being at the centre of our world outlook. It is sad that many of those who hoped for all out nuclear war prayed for such an outcome as they consider themselves Christians, attempting to justify their actions on an incorrect interpretation of a small passage of Scripture without the love of Christ within them that reflects out to all. There is something very wrong here and those involved would do well to read Mark 9: 42 – 50.

DELIVERY

Preparation of MATERIALS

Figure 1

ASCENDED

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Completing the Rescue

Figure 1 consists of a drawing of a “jungle” with 3 paths leading towards the centre where there is a circle labelled “SURVIVORS”. Two of the paths, labelled LAW & PROPHETS do not reach SURVIVORS but turn back after short meanders through the “jungle”. The third path through the “jungle”, labelled “CHRIST”, leads straight to “SURVIVORS” and a line on this path indicates that there is a retracing of steps to the starting point. A pair of reptilian eyes representing an evil threat is drawn close to the survivors.

Figure 2

THE ASCENSION POWER & LOVE

CHRIST has POWER over

Nature

The Disciples

Heaven--------------------------------------------------------------------

ASCENSION shows LOVE in

Preparing a place for us

The sending of the Holy Spirit

Figure 3At the RIGHT HAND of the FATHER

Ancient Rule: The C. E. O.

Legal Power

Administrative Power_________________________________________

Ruling in Heaven

The Logos

Priest / KingFigure 4

This illustration is the same as FIGURE 2 On page 15 – The onion of Faith

Figure 5

CHRIST’S KINGDOM

That Was

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Is Now

& is yet to come

The SESSION

Ascension

The session began by bringing up the conversation of old films, mainly the early “Tarzan” films where a plane crashes in the jungle and rescue efforts are all in vain until Tarzan arrives, defeats the menace – either animal or human - & leads the survivors to safety, except of course the bit players who fall prey to the menace by not following Tarzan.

Draw out the analogy of Christ breaking through the jungle of sin to rescue crashed mankind who can not of their own, escape the jungle of sin & death therein. Having completed His work on the Cross and in the form of redeemed human flesh He now leads mankind to the safety of heaven, a pathfinder for all.

Atonement & Ascension

Remind the group of the Zevakh Shelamim sacrifice & the sprinkling of blood of the sacrifice before the high altar. The writer of Hebrews takes up this idea & views the Ascension as bridging the gap between the earthly work of Christ peaking in the Cross and the heavenly work of Christ at the right hand of the Father.

Ascension & Power

A physical event, much to the surprise of the disciples – an angel tells them to get on with the mission Christ has placed upon them for He claims the world, not just Israel. There is also the promise of empowerment through the Holy Spirit.

Ascension & Love

The Ascension is also an act of love. It is the completion of Christ’s mission as in Hebrews. Ascension can also be seen as demonstration that eternal life is now ours through Christ. Also the coming of the Holy Spirit for our good & on our behalf. All demonstrate the immense love our God has for us.

Seated at the Right Hand of God the Father

Once it is felt that the group have grasped the fundamentals of the Ascension move on to this section by briefly explaining how the real power, including judicial power, in

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ancient times often lay in the person appointed to be the ruler’s executive. It is an exalted position.

Christ as the Father’s Executive

Explain how when an ancient ruler spoke it was a deed of power; his word was law. From this move on to Christ as the Word (Logos) of God. Tie in St. John’s Gospel & creation in Genesis – establishes Christ as Father’s executor – He is One with the Father in the Trinity.

Prayer & favoured supplicants through “kinship” with Christ.

Judgement

It is there whether we like it or not.

Belief & Judgement

It is due to our belief that we behave as Christians – it is not enough to behave like a Christian for salvation. It is from our belief in Christ that we have love the (agape) for others that governs our ethical behaviour & judgement in our lives. Referring to the Onion of Faith emphasise our Christocentricity.

Those who do not believe but trust in their own power will be judged & condemned. We, as Christians, are not perfect, we fall prey to temptation as we are human. Parable of the prodigal son. Love of God is so great that the door is always open.

His Kingdom shall have no end.

Take up & expand upon the themes in the notes; the Kingdom was, is now & shall be. Also our duty to seek the coming of the Kingdom.

THE NICENE CREED

Session 7: The HOLY SPIRIT

Introduction

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From one of my hobbies I have learned that the species Homo Sapiens is a tactile species. Whenever someone wants to “look” at one of my scale models they will always want to reach out, hold it and touch it, much to the detriment of small, delicate parts to say nothing of natural oils from finger tips smearing the most carefully applied paint finishes. As a result I now always caution friends that looking does not mean touching. The need to touch something we have seen in order to fully understand it is a characteristic that is not solely the preserve of adults. Babies are constantly reaching out to grasp objects that they see; it is an integral part of the learning process, the learning process of a very tactile species.

Whilst many people are able to have a mental image of God the Father 44 and Jesus Christ45 I have found that few, if any, have any kind of mental image of the Holy Spirit. This is probably due to the fact that we are a vision and touch orientated species whilst the Holy Spirit is both invisible and non corporeal46. It is not surprising therefore to find that the church fathers who drew up the Creed describe the Holy Spirit in terms of function rather than in terms of characteristics.

Due to the fact that there are many theological works on the Holy Spirit we are going to concentrate our studies solely on the references to the Holy Spirit within the Creed.

“We believe in”

As we have seen all the major sections of the Creed begin by saying in what we believe. Of all the sections the section on the Holy Spirit is perhaps the one that forces us to look most closely at belief for the Holy Spirit is neither discernable by any of our five physical senses, nor mentioned in historical texts like Jesus47.

Despite being beyond our sensory perception the Holy Spirit is very real to us in our lives as Christians and hence we are able to believe in the Holy Spirit. In the first of our sessions we examined Belief and the Cycle of Faith. In the latter we noted those moments of sudden insight or those longer periods when an understanding came to us that deepened our faith and assisted us to formulate a coherent belief structure in line with our Christianity. Now these breakthroughs do not just happen by mere co-incidence. If they did statistics dictate that there would be very few Christians. They occur due to a “something” actively working to bring about the breakthrough of God into our lives. As Christians we recognise this “something” as the Holy Spirit of God bringing about, deepening and sustaining our Faith. As St. Anselm put it, with faith comes understanding and with understanding comes more faith. We can therefore see the Holy Spirit activates and sustains faith.48

Sometimes, as Christians who have received our faith by the Holy Spirit, we are more aware of the presence of the Holy Spirit than at others. It is when we sense the presence of God in our lives that we sense the Holy Spirit. It can be at times of crisis, or at times of quiet contemplation, or even as we worship God in church that we know 44 Usually based on Michelangelo’s Sistine chapel 45 From renaissance paintings such as the Last Supper by Da Vinci46 In both Matt 3: 17 & John 1: 32 there is reference to the Holy Spirit descending upon Jesus like a dove after His baptism by John the Baptist. These references are couched in allegorical terms. 47 The writings of the Jewish historian Josephus as well as Tacitus & Pliny the Younger48 As promised by Christ at His ascension; John 6: 63

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we are not alone but that God is right there with us. Some may call it superstition, some may say we can not believe in something we can not detect with our active senses, as Christians we say, “We believe in the Holy Spirit”.

“The Giver of Life”. At the time the Creed was formulated the Holy Spirit was not specifically seen as the Giver of Spiritual life, though that is an interpretation we can and should make, but rather the Giver of physical life.

Furthermore as the Holy Spirit is both intangible and invisible the people who formulated the Creed drew on the earliest references to the Holy Spirit in both the Old and New Testaments and compared the Holy Spirit to the breath of life. The Holy Spirit is called ruach in Hebrew texts which means wind and in the Greek of the New Testament the Holy Spirit is called (pneuma)49 which again is translated as wind or breath.

Ancient traditions of breath

With our current medical knowledge it is no surprise that resuscitation is the first subject in First Aid courses with Airways and Breathing being the prime subjects. The Ancient World also knew the importance of breath to human life. Long before the establishment of the kingdom of Israel the Ancient Egyptians developed rituals at the death of a pharaoh. On a pharaoh’s death the orifices of his body were blocked to preserve the breath of life within him until the ceremony of the opening of the mouth immediately prior to the actual entombment. There is some evidence to suggest that pre – Inca civilisations in the Americas had similar rituals. As recently as the 19 th

century the Matabele and Zulu tribes in Southern Africa believed that the bloating of corpses was due to the dead person’s spirit, as breath, seeking to move on. They therefore disembowelled slain warriors to assist the departure of the spirit.

In the Judaic – Christian tradition the idea of breath being the source of life was common. The writer of Genesis describes how God breathed life into Adam through his nostrils50. In the Gospels there are numerous references to Jesus breathing upon the people He healed, thereby signifying new life placed in them: the newness of life that is there for all His followers. Small wonder then that the Holy Spirit as wind / breath is seen as the Giver of Life.

the Energiser

Breathing and movement are interconnected. It may sound very obvious but people who are alive breathe and, in the very act of breathing, their chests move as they take each new breath.

49 Root of our words like pneumatic and pneumonia50 Genesis 2: 7

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The Church Fathers who formulated the Creed may not have detailed knowledge of how oxygen is bound to haemoglobin and used by the body to power both thought and movement but they must have understood that breathing air (or “wind” if you like) gave us the energy to live. It could well be that by calling the Holy Spirit pneuma they were indicating that they believed that the Holy Spirit also energised those who believe in Christ.

During Spring when trees put forth new leaves they tend to be more active on days when there is a breeze as this speeds up osmosis by evaporation. Although no large scale empirical study has been carried out there is some evidence to suggest that young school children, whose senses are keener than adults, tend to be more active on days when there is a wind than on days that are calm51 so it is possible that we are more active when the wind blows. In other words the blowing of the wind can energise us.

The greatest example of people becoming energised is to be found in the Book of Acts at Pentecost52 when the Holy Spirit came upon the first Christians and enabled them to communicate the Good News to all mankind. Consider too the plight of those who were energised at Pentecost. Their Leader had recently gone away from them in the Ascension, they had to replace a traitor in their midst, Judas, they were in fear of persecution from the same authorities that had put their Leader to death, not long before. In short they were perhaps the most unlikely revolutionary bunch the world has ever seen. Yet they burst out from hiding at Pentecost and irrevocably changed the world without force of arms. Such is the power of God when we become energised by the Holy Spirit.

We, as Christians, have Christ at the centre of our being, in our innermost soul, and hence we have a value system that is markedly different from non Christians. The love Christ has for us flows out into the world as we try to obey Jesus’ commandment to love others as ourselves. This love ( is part of that which makes us unique. As St Paul puts it that beautiful passage in 1 Corinthians Chapter 13, “I may have faith enough to move mountains; but if I have no love, I am nothing.”53 To love as Christians takes effort; to love those who are our enemies and seek to oppress us takes even greater effort, an effort very, very few could make. Yet in the history of Christianity there are many who have made and continue to make the effort to love their neighbours day in and day out not because they are “good people”, for they are undoubtedly that, but because they are Christian. As Christians they and we too, draw on the energising power of the Holy Spirit that enables us to live as Christians. In a very real sense the Holy Spirit is the Giver of Life, Christian Life to all who believe in Jesus Christ.

In 1 Corinthians54 St Paul writes of the gifts of the Spirit and gives examples of some of the gifts. They include spreading the Faith, teaching, healing, prophecy, counselling and speaking in tongues. If one reads this chapter in 1 Corinthians then

51 Prof J A B Holland: Lectures at Rhodes University 1971 - 197352 Acts 2: 1 - 4153 1 Cor 13: 254 1 Corinthians 12: 1 - 31

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once again reads the second chapter of Acts once cannot help but notice that the gifts of which St Paul speaks are exactly those which delivered the impact of Pentecost when the very earliest church burst forth upon the world. The Holy Spirit gave Life to the church.

We should not however think of this giving of life by the Holy Spirit to the church as something that is historical. There are those Christians now, today, that strive to increase the Faith both in mission abroad and in local communities that have lost touch with God. There are those Christians now, today, who teach others about Christ, not only in Sunday School but also in adult life by example. There are those Christians now, today, who have the gift of healing, not only those who are in the medical profession but those who pray for the sick, visit them and comfort them and those who are able to lay on hands. There are those Christians now, today, who are given the insight to see where a course of action will lead and call upon decision makers to return to God. There are those Christians now, today who give valuable counsel to and guide newcomers to Christ. There are those Christians now, today, whose intensity of worship is an inspiration to others. The Life Giver to the Church, the Holy Spirit is now, today, still giving life as at Pentecost.

The Holy Spirit can be seen as the Giver of Life on a number of levels:-

On the physical level in the classic belief that the first breath of life a person takes comes from God.

On an individual spiritual level, energising and enabling Christian life of the individual.

On a global level, empowering and giving life to the Church both as a whole and its constituent parts.

“Lord: Who proceeds from the Father & the Son……glorified”

The Nicene Creed was formulated at a time when a significant portion of the population of the Byzantine – Roman Empire still followed pagan beliefs and, as we have seen, had a strong tradition of philosophical debate. As Christians we understand that the Holy Spirit was sent to us at Pentecost, after the ascension of Christ, but a pagan could argue that the Holy Spirit was a “new” god whose power came only after Christ ascended. Alternatively they could argue that by being sent the Holy Spirit was subservient to both the Father and Christ and, therefore, not God.

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In defining the Holy Spirit within the Creed those at Nicea had to steer a course that avoided both the Scylla of the Holy Spirit being less than the Father & the Son and the Charybdis of the Holy Spirit being completely separated from the Father and the Son as a “new” god. The first title used of the Holy Spirit in the Creed is that of Lord.

At the time the Creed was formulated a lord was someone, often a relative, of a ruler who, on behalf of the ruler, lead the subjects of the ruler’s kingdom in both war and peace giving both protection and employment. The lord to whom people gave their allegiance protected those in his charge from physical attacks by enemies and, by distributing grain, from famine when times were hard. By strengthening our faith in Christ – and hence the core values we hold as Christians – the Holy Spirit protects us from evil, giving us the whole armour of God55. As the lord provided for those on his land who gave him their allegiance the Holy Spirit may be seen as giving us food. Food provides us with energy, allows us to grow and maintain our health. In the last section we saw how the power of the Holy Spirit provides us with energy and in the Cycle of Faith we noted how our faith is strengthened as we receive, test, understand and use the insights into our faith which are given to us by the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is indeed our Lord, providing us with both protection and nourishment.

But the lord also provided his people with employment, both in the fields producing food, and in the army protecting and expanding the lord’s domain. To understand the Holy Spirit in terms of these aspects of a lord’s function we need look no further than the gifts of the Holy Spirit we examined earlier. It is very tempting to differentiate between the gifts of the Spirit dividing them into those which sustain people already within the Church and those that help the Church to grow and gain more followers of Christ but all the gifts of the Spirit are for both functions. In other words we, in giving our allegiance to the Holy Spirit, the Son and the Father, take upon ourselves the work a lord provided for his subjects, producing sustenance for our fellows and actively working to increase the Kingdom of God here upon earth. This working for the Lord is not just the preserve of some of Christ’s followers it is the work of all of us for we all pray for the coming of the Kingdom every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer.

In the Creed the Holy Spirit is said to come from the Father and the Son and with them is worshipped and glorified. This statement firmly places the Holy Spirit within the Trinity. The statement that follows about the Holy Spirit having spoken through the prophets discounts any notion we may entertain that the Holy Spirit was “only activated” after Pentecost. Those who formulated the Creed are saying that the Holy Spirit Is not a new phenomena but part of the Trinity which we worship and in our own way with the company of all heaven glorify.

Far from being “new” the Holy Spirit is like the Father and the Son, present at the beginning of time. Some 500 to 600 years before the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost the writer of the Book of Genesis places the Holy Spirit as being present at the very act of creation.56 As we have noted before the Father and the Son were

55 Ephesians 6: 10 - 2456 Genesis 1: 2 makes reference to a “mighty wind” (ruach), which sweeps over the abyss prior to the mighty act of creation. Some of the early texts do not use the word wind but instead use the Spirit of God. In either translation the meaning is not one of passivity but one of action and from this we can

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present and active in our creation and have displayed a nurturing love to us ever since that far transcends our earthly concepts of love. If we say that Holy Spirit was also present at the moment of creation and displays the same love for us then we have to accept that the Holy Spirit is part of the Holy Trinity for there is nothing in, above or beyond creation that come anywhere near to our God’s love for us.

“Who has spoken through the prophets”

Before we even think of looking at the Holy Spirit speaking through the prophets of both the Old Testament and the New Testaments there is one issue we have to address. It is what is a prophet?

In our modern understanding of prophecy we reckon someone to be a prophet if they make a prediction that comes true. The more spectacular the prediction the more it is noticed. Our modern, limited understanding of the role of the prophet tends to centre on this function, a function that owes more to the Oracle at Delphi than it does to Scripture. The role of the prophet as seen in Scripture was far wider than to merely predict the future although prediction was a part of the role of a prophet directed by the Holy Spirit.

The Prophet in the Old Testament

To understand the role of the prophet in the Old Testament we must remember that the relationship between God and the people of Israel as well as the relationship between the chosen people was defined in the context of the Covenant in general and the Ten Commandments in particular. The purpose of prophets was to ensure that these relationships were maintained and if broken, were restored. This the prophets did by identifying how the Covenant was broken, the likely outcome of the consequences of the breach of the Covenant and what was needed to restore the Covenant.

The Book of Amos provides an excellent example of the role of the prophet. In chapters 1 & 2 the numerous breaches of the Covenant are detailed. In chapter 3 we learn of God’s sorrow over the breaking of the relationship despite the love God has shown to the people of Israel. In chapters 4 to 8 we see the dire consequences of how the continued breaking of the Covenant without repentance and restoring the broken relationships will result in destruction. In chapter 9 we read how a remnant of the people of Israel will survive the coming disaster caused by the breaking of the Covenant and, on the restoration of the Covenant, will enjoy God’s favour.

To a greater or lesser extent the prophets in the Old Testament followed the same pattern:-

A statement that the Covenant between God and Israel or between members of the Covenant had been broken by the sinful actions of man and.

link the Holy Spirit directly to creation.

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A lament that this had happened which contained a reminder of all God had done for the people of Israel.

A warning of the results that will follow the breaking of the Covenant. It was this which gave rise to the idea that prophets predicted the future.

A call for repentance and a return to the Covenant with God.

The Message of the Holy Spirit

In examining the message the Holy Spirit is giving man through the prophets we have stated that this was done in terms of the Old Testament Covenant. Primarily defining the relationship between God and the people of Israel the Covenant also defined the relationships between members of the Covenant. The prophet Amos uses some choice expressions in condemning the breakdown of the Covenant between people, going so far as to describe some of the women of Israel as cows.57

Even from this truncated summary it is clear that the main thrust of the prophets’ message is not to reveal the future to people58 but to call for a return to the Covenant with God which would avoid God’s wrath against sin. Now there is something that should be very, very familiar about that message. We saw the same message in our look at eternal life in the Creed and again in the sub section on judgement only this time there was not the Covenant with just Israel but the New Covenant of Christ for all humanity. It is the same message that the disciples preach after receiving the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.59 In speaking through the prophets the Holy Spirit is speaking of mankind’s redemption from sin, the restoration of a loving relationship with God and, through this, the ability to love others.

Pointing to Christ

As Christians we believe that the coming of Christ to give eternal life to all through His life, death on the Cross, His resurrection and ascension into heaven is the pivotal point in all history. It is the point where God entered into our physical existence for our salvation; the point from where everything that went before or has happened since, or will happen changed. Nothing can compare to the Word becoming flesh and dying on our behalf to release us from sin and give us eternal life.

If we accept that the central message given to us throughout the ages by the Holy Spirit is one of our salvation, redemption and the restoration of a loving relationship with God it would be extremely surprising, to say the very least, if the Holy Spirit did not mention an event of such importance as the coming of Christ when communicating to us through the prophets. When the Holy Spirit spoke through the prophets of the Old Testament the coming of Christ was not only mentioned but 57 Amos 4: 158 Those who seek to learn the future are rebuked both in the Old Testament and the New. When Saul makes use of the witch of Endor he is rebuked in no uncertain terms(1 Samuel 28: 1 – 20) and when the disciples ask the risen Jesus when He will establish the sovereignty of Israel He rebukes them (Acts 1: 6 – 8)59 Acts 2: 1 - 41

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specifically detailed with prophets like Micah foretelling where Christ would be born.60 Widely acknowledged as the greatest of the Old Testament prophets Isaiah contains numerous references to Christ, specific mention being made of the foundation of the New Covenant61 and the New Covenant in Christ being for all nations62.

The thrust in the Old Testament prophets’ references to Christ is not about foretelling the future; it is all about the salvation of mankind and the New Covenant in Christ. At the beginning of Jesus’ ministry on Earth this message becomes highly detailed, more urgent with all four Gospels recording the now imminent message of the Holy Spirit of salvation through John the Baptist. It is the culmination of the Word of which the Holy Spirit has spoken through the prophets. It is the become flesh.

DELIVERY

MATERIALS to be Prepared before Session

Figure 1

A Blank Sheet

Figure 2

The Holy Spirit

REALFunction Activates & Sustains FAITH

[Illustration of light bulb shining]

Reproduction of figure 4 The Cycle of Faith Section 1 page 10.

60 Micah 5: 261 Isaiah 28: 1662 Isaiah 42: 6-7, 49: 6, 52: 7, 61: 1-2.

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Figure 3

Giver of Life

Breathing / PNEUMA

Ancient Beliefs

Judaic – Christian Tradition

EnergisesPlants (& Children?)

PENTECOST

Gifts of the Holy Spirit

Agape effort & Pneuma

St. PaulThe Giver of Life

On Physical level

On Spiritual level

On Global level

Figure 4

LORD

Liege Lord

Sustenance

Employment

Genesis & Holy Spirit: Not “new”

Who has Spoken through the Prophets

The Role of the Prophet in the O T

Not foretelling future

Preserving the Covenant Relationship

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With God

With others within the Covenant

“Formula” Used

1 Covenant broken

2 Lament

3 Warning of consequences

4 Call to repent & return

Figure 5

Message of the Holt Spirit

Return to the CovenantAvoid God’s wrath against Sin

Pentecost

New Covenant in Christ avoiding God’s wrath against sin

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Pointing to Christ

Foretelling of New Covenant – Christ

O T prophets

More & more specific: Micah, Isaiah – Urgency

John the Baptist

He is HERE!The SESSION

Introduce the session by asking the group to describe what winds looks like; not the effects of wind but wind itself. When there are no answers forthcoming draw an analogy between wind & the Holy Spirit concentrating on the non corporeal characteristic of the Holy Spirit.

We believe in

As we describe wind by the physical results it generates we tend to define the Holy Spirit by its function in our lives, that of activating & sustaining faith. Use the Faith Cycle here.

The Giver of Life

Breath

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Before covering the ancient traditions of breath explain how all living creatures on earth’s surface, including plant life, breathe taking in oxygen for releasing energy. Begin with the ancient traditions of breath then the Judaic – Christian idea of God giving life through breath. The tie in with Genesis wind – Spirit of God.

Pneuma the Energiser

The main points to cover in this section are:-Breathing & movement“Wind” gives us the energy to liveMore wind more activeThe energising at PentecostGiven the energy to love – hard work agape

Gifts of the Holy Spirit

Read 1 Corinthians 12: 1 – 30 then use page 4 and the summary there after.

Lord

Formulation of the Creed; Holy Spirit that powerfully burst forth at Pentecost is not “new” or “separate” god. First title used is Lord.

Liege lord gave protection – whole armour of God, protecting us from evil. Provides food – nourishment to keep going as a Christian in times of difficulty. Provides employment – in harvesting newcomers into the Kingdom, nurturing.

Who has spoken through the Prophets

Prophecy & Prediction

Ensure that distinction is made between the idea that prophecy is all about foretelling the future and the main function of the Old Testament prophets. The purpose of the prophets was to ensure that twin relationships between God & His chosen people and their relationships with each other were maintained in the Covenant.

Role of the Prophet

Identification of a break in the Covenant. Lament (by God) that this has occurred despite all He has done for Israel. Warning of the results of the breaking of the Covenant. A call to repentance & a return to the Covenant with God.

Message of the Holy Spirit

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Main aim in prophets was not to reveal future but to call to a return to the Covenant thereby avoiding God’s wrath against sin. Familiar Message? The message of both the Gospels &Pentecost.

Pointing to Christ

As the central message of the Holy Spirit is that of our salvation being possible it is not surprising that there are specific references to the coming of Christ in the Old Testament (Micah, Isaiah), the means of our salvation. Try to communicate the growing sense of urgency that is contained within these references as we near the birth of Christ. Then John the Baptist & Christ is with us.

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THE NICENE CREED

Chapter 8: “We Believe in One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic CHURCH”

Introduction

Before we go any further let us try and agree upon what the Church is and is not. Dictionaries define a church as “a place of worship.” True, it is that, by why then did those who wrote the Creed use the same formula for the Church “We believe in” as they had done for the Holy Trinity? If they had seen the Church as just a building and not a living entity they would have stated their belief that there was One Holy Catholic Church. For them to have used such a formula the Church must have been seen as having life.

Reading the Creed in the original Greek or a Latin translation for that matter, there is a bit of a shock when one comes to the section on the Church. In each of the major sections that begin with the formula “We believe in” the object of belief the Father, Christ and the Holy Spirit is a masculine noun. Suddenly for the Church there is a feminine noun, (translated as ecclesia – from the word for an assembly). Why is the feminine form used here? Could the concept of the Church having what is seen as a feminine role as opposed to the masculinity of the Holy Trinity shed light on our understanding of the Church?

Let us put the two ideas of a living entity and female together. Consider the reproductive purpose of the human female. It is within her body that life first begins when sperm and egg meet. It is in the female that this foetus grows and is nurtured by the mother’s body. In the fullness of time the developed child leaves the mother’s body and is born.

Now consider the purpose of the Church. The Church exists to bring new life 63 to mankind in Christ, instilling in all the love of God and, from this, a love of their fellow man in their souls. It is within the Church that an individual’s faith grows and is developed. When an individual’s faith is sufficiently developed and strong enough to cope with the “outside” world they are able to go out and through the work of the Holy Spirit within them bring others to Christ.

This concept of the Church as the “mother” of Christians provides a very useful framework to consider the role of the Church which we will use in this section as we consider the Church in the Nicene Creed.

The “Mother” Church63 John 3: 1 – 8

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Conception

To follow Christ one has to make a commitment, a life changing commitment that not only involves one’s soul but ultimately a commitment that changes the whole of one’s values and outlook on life. The point at which this commitment is made can be seen as the point of conception for a “new” person is made, a person who is a Christian.

For some the commitment takes place over a number of years, a gradual awakening to Christ. In the majority of cases this type of conception takes place within a church’s Sunday school where the young person comes to Christ. For older people the moment of Christian conception comes not so much as a gradual awakening as a moment of realisation. Although this does not always happen in a church – there is a famous case of it happening on the road to Damascus – it is in the church that the majority of these conceptions take place. Even in the case of the conversion of St. Paul it should be noted that he was cared for in a church environment immediately after his conversion. Very few conceptions of new Christians take place without the church and those that do occur are not always sustainable.

Development

When new life is created within the mammalian womb the foetus is dependant upon the mother for the nutrition necessary for growth and eventual birth into the world. Without the continuous sustenance provided by the mother the developing baby will die within the womb or be born with defects.

When faith in Christ is created within the womb of the church the new Christian is dependent upon the church for the understanding to develop their faith in order that they make take their faith into the world. Without the understanding of faith provided by the church the new Christian may well leave the church never to return or enter into life outside the church without the strength in their faith to withstand the myriad temptations of life.

Note that it is the understanding of faith that is needed, not so much the whats as the whys, for faith in Christ is simple and must remain so. All too often a new Christian is perhaps given a short course in understanding their faith when they join the church then apart from perhaps the occasional Bible Study course they are left to find sustenance as best they can by themselves. Many do not survive. With understanding comes knowledge and with knowledge comes the deepening of faith and understanding – precisely the sustenance needed by Christians in today’s world - the arguments of St. Anselm hold good even today. The church has to ensure that Christians understand their faith, are able to be fortified by their faith and able to elucidate their faith in the world for it is into the world that we, as Christians, are born.

BirthThe birth of a Christian is to go out into the world and proclaim the Gospel in thought, word and deed so that all may come into the Kingdom of God. It is Mission with a capital m, the purpose of the church.“One”

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Having established that Jesus Christ was not inferior to the Father as the Arian heresy had claimed, the writers of the Creed led by St Athanasius did not want the Arians to leave the Council of Nicea and build a rival version of the church which ignored the Deity of Christ. In an attempt to circumvent the growth of the now theologically weakened Arians the Church in the Creed was called the one (true) Church. The ploy was not successful. The Arian church continued expansion for centuries after Nicea but with its discredited theological base succumbed to the inevitable and eventually died out.

Since its use to try and deny the legitimacy of the Arian church the word one in the Creed has, over the intervening centuries, been used to promote what we may call a physical church unity. Whilst this may be desirable in some circumstances we should not lose sight of the spiritual unity among all Christians that has existed since the Word became flesh and gave up His life for all mankind.

We are one. All churches have the same function: to conceive Christian Life in people, to nurture and develop faith within those who have accepted Christ and to send them forth into the world as Christians with a mature faith. All churches work towards the one goal of the establishment of Christ’s Kingdom here on Earth. We are one.

We are one. In our worship in Eucharist or Communion – what we call it is not that important – we acknowledge that we all share in body and blood of our One Lord, Jesus Christ. This is the one and only sacrifice necessary for the salvation all mankind. At this point in our worship we need to give thought to our common faith. We need to be aware of those around us in church. Expanding our vision we need to be aware of our fellow Christians partaking of the Body & Blood of Christ in other churches in our local area. Expanding our vision still further we can see all our fellow Christians in our country and beyond that the entire world, all of us joined in Christ and the task of the Church as a whole. We are one.

We are one. Being one in Christ does not mean that there are never disagreements among us. Just as earthly families have their differences and arguments we too have our differences. Sometimes these differences can become heated at other times they are no more than interesting debates. The real danger for us as the Children of God is that we become too involved in our differences and lose sight of the commission Christ placed upon us, as individuals and as His Church, to spread the Gospel. It is alright to describe oneself as an evangelical or a liberal or a liberal evangelical or evangelical liberal or however we wish to be known. The names and theological standpoints we assume are not that important despite the gravity we wish to give them.

What IS important is the task of the church and, indeed, all Christians: the expansion of the Kingdom of God here on Earth. Any perceived difference between ourselves that diverts the physical, mental and spiritual resources that we should be using doing the work of Christ to our own differences is not only wrong it is downright evil for it robs that which is for God. We must stay one in the task Christ has placed upon us.

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“Holy”

Only God is Holy. This is made plain in the many references in both the Old and the New Testaments. The Creed describes the Church as holy, giving us pause to examine this statement to understand what is meant by calling the Church holy.

When a church is newly built it is consecrated. Many think that the verb to consecrate means to make holy. In this they are wrong for only God is holy; nothing we do, no matter how good our intentions or how much we try, can make anything holy. To be truthful we have a penchant for making things unholy rather than holy. To consecrate means to set aside for the service of God and it is in understanding the service of God we can understand how the Church comes to be holy.

The most obvious way in which the Church serves God is that it serves as a place where people can meet and be connected to God. When Moses first met God at the burning bush on Mt. Sinai he was told to take off his sandals for he stood on holy ground.64 The patch of ground on the side of a volcanic mountain was not holy because Moses was there; it was Holy because God was there. It is the presence of God that makes places holy. This is further borne out when the Ark of the Covenant is placed in the temple of Jerusalem.65 The presence of God was so strong here that the spot on which the ark rested was known as the Holy of Holies and was screened off from the rest of the temple by a curtain or veil. Only the chief priest could enter the holy of holies but once a year at the feast of atonement (Yom Kippur) and then only after extensive cleansing rituals. [It should be noted that the chief priest did not meet God for no one can look upon the face of God and live: he merely entered into the presence of God].

In the New Testament all three synoptic Gospels report that at the moment Christ died upon the Cross the curtain screening off the Holy of Holies in the temple was torn. 66

The sacrifice of Christ for the sins of all mankind means that all are now able to enter into the presence of God without fear of His wrath. As a consequence people are now able to enter into the presence of and connect to God in church. In that sense the Church is Holy. But worshiping God alone does not make a place holy.

If connecting to God in worship & prayer was the only criteria for causing a place to be holy there would be many places that are holy such as the family home where prayers, praise and thanks are given to God first thing in the morning and last thing at night. While these daily activities may be the mark of a Christian household they do not make the house holy.

In carrying out God’s bidding to establish the kingdom of Heaven on Earth through Jesus Christ the Church obtains holiness for it is blessed by God in its work of bringing people to Christ, nurturing their new faith and developing that faith so that in time those new Christians may witness to Christ in mission. This and the presence of God in a very real sense makes the Church Holy reflecting God’s Holiness.“Catholic”

64 Exodus 3: 565 1 Kings 866 Matt 27: 51, Mark 15: 38, Luke 23: 45

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In the context of the Creed the word catholic does not refer to a specific church but to all churches for it means inclusive. (At the time of the formulation of the Nicene Creed the Roman Catholic church had not yet attained the eminence it was to gain in later Medieval times; the churches in the Eastern part of the Byzantine Empire were taking the lead at this stage of history). The concept of inclusiveness was not something that the Church Fathers at Nicea added to the Creed for harmony. It is firmly rooted in Scripture.

In both the Gospels of Matthew and Mark we read of Jesus’ encounter with the Canaanite woman in what is today the Lebanon who had a daughter “possessed by an evil spirit”.67 The Canaanites had been subdued by the Hebrews many centuries before and were seen by Jews as an underclass so it not surprising that Jesus refers to her in the vernacular as a dog – prejudice was alive & well in Israel even then. What is shocking is that Jesus, a Jew, listens to and then accedes to her request for healing. It is the first indication in the Gospels of both Matthew and Mark that through Christ salvation is for all mankind, gentile, Jew or atheist not just the people of the old Covenant. Later in both these Gospels, on numerous occasions, Jesus Himself states that His sacrifice is for all mankind. The Church is inclusive.

Not that the question of inclusiveness ended there. Far from it. In the early chapters of the Book of Acts68 we see that the matter was hotly debated in the early church. The question of whether those new to Christ had first to become Jews before becoming Christians was only resolved when a hungry St. Peter, pondering this issue outside Caesarea fell asleep and had the vision of all the animals of the world being what Jews would not call kosher. Immediately after this vision Cornelius, one of the Roman oppressors is baptised into the church. A modern day comparison would be an Israeli soldier being invited into and made a member of a radical mosque. The Church is inclusive.

Sometimes we tend to forget the magnitude of God’s love for all of us and we become judgemental about the inclusiveness that is required of us as Christians. In his letter to the Romans St. Paul likens all Christians to one big family in Christ with the love of Christ so vast that there is no measure of its height or depth69. If we accept this we must also accept the implication that Christ’s love is for all Christians and is therefore inclusive. The Church is inclusive.

If we need further confirmation of the need of the Church to be inclusive of all we need look no further than the words of Jesus as recorded by St Matthew & St Mark in describing the rich man and the eye of the needle70. Both accounts note that when asked how it was possible for the most unlikely to enter into the kingdom of God Jesus replied, “For men this is impossible; but for God, everything is possible”. One has the sneaking suspicion that when one gets to Heaven one may be surprised at who is also there; such is the Love of God and the Magnitude of Christ’s sacrifice upon the Cross. The Church is inclusive.“Apostolic”

67 Matt 15: 21 – 28, Mark 7: 24 - 3068 Acts 10: 9 - 1669 Romans 8: 26 - 3970 Matt 19: 16 – 26, Mark 10: 17 - 31

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The Creed describes the Church as being apostolic and the exact meaning of this term has been the cause of much debate due both to our modern linguistics and the historic reservation of the word Apostle to apply only to the 12 who followed Christ, with the later inclusion of St. Paul. Some churches have named their leaders apostles which to other Christians is an anathema whilst yet other denominations have performed linguistic acrobatics with names like church planter, envoy, delegate or church founder (I thought that was Jesus Christ) in order to avoid using the word apostle. In the koine Greek in which the New Testament and the Nicene Creed was written the word used is (apostolos) which had the broad meaning of a messenger and the narrower meaning of Apostle restricted to those directly linked to Christ. For most of Church history the word has lost its broader meaning except where translated into Latin as missio, from which we get the word missionary.

The use of the word apostolic, lower case please note, in the Creed combines both elements of the broader and narrower meaning of the word in that the Church is Apostolic. It follows and passes on the teachings of Christ handed down to the Apostles in addition to sending out missionaries.

Teaching

One of the most important but often overlooked roles of the Church is a teaching role: teaching people about Christ. Teaching in the Church is not just the Sunday School or the sermon on Sundays. It is the ongoing learning of individuals at all levels of faith in both formal groups like Bible Study courses and the informal learning that takes place between members of a congregation when an insight, prayer or thought is shared or when the example set by those mature in the Faith is followed by new Christians. There has to be a Learning “culture”71 within a church, promoting both formal and informal learning, for the growth of faith. 71 Learning Culture in the Church

If the opportunities for learning and understanding of faith are to be maximised within a church there must be opportunities for people to interact with and learn from one another in an informal setting as well as formal groups. Traditionally opportunities have been provided by church social events or church activities but the pressures of modern life and the financial costs have curtailed many churches efforts in this area. As a result many churches have become solely places of worship on Sundays or “Sunday in – outers” where there is very little opportunity for the New Christian to learn from those whose understanding is more mature.

The converse is also, unfortunately, true. In some churches the main focus is on the social interaction between members of the congregation to the detriment of both worship and learning. In these churches the social life around the church is everything from a fashion parade on Sundays to the “social round” with other church members during the week. Anyone seeking to obtain learning in such a church environment is seen as a nuisance or a bore and is left to their own devices.

In between the two extremes mentioned above where no learning activity takes place are the majority of churches. Yet even here there is a disparity among churches. In some churches there are a huge number of formal learning courses from an introduction to the particular church through different levels of instruction until the church member is deemed fit by the hierarchy to move on to a “higher grade”. All courses, content and delivery are tightly controlled from the top and anyone wishing to understand their faith in a manner other than the proscribed fashion is dissuaded from doing so and even threatened with expulsion.

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As far as we know, and it is pretty certain, Jesus did not leave any written word on both His teachings and His purpose, our salvation from sin. That we know so much of His life, death & resurrection is due not only to the guidance of the Holy Spirit over 2000 years but also the efficacy of the teaching of the Apostles. From Scripture we learn that not all of the Apostles Jesus chose were literate, educated men yet they have passed down through history to us in written accounts, letters and teaching the wonderful faith we are so privileged to have today. The Apostles did not just start churches then move on, they taught.

Teaching in the church today, whether formally in sermons, Sunday schools, Bible studies, talking to fellow church members or just plain setting a Christian example in one’s life is part of the Apostolic tradition set out in the Creed. We, as Christians, are all teachers – we follow The Teacher.

Mission

When one thinks of mission one almost certainly thinks of those exceptional Christians whose faith in Christ is so strong that they are able to forsake the comforts of home and establish churches in geographically remote areas that have yet to acknowledge Christ as Lord. Their faith is remarkable and all of us do not have such strong faith. This does not mean that we are exempt from the apostolic task of mission for Christ. Nor, thankfully, does it mean that we have to uproot our lives and move elsewhere to establish a new church. That is the good news. The bad news is that being a Christian means we have to step outside our comfort zones in other ways to be true to Christ and the Apostolic tradition of the Church.

We are those with a message from Christ both within and without the confines of the church. To work for the coming of the kingdom of God we are missionaries when we help in any way we can, be it teaching, supporting, praying with or just being there for new Christians. All these missions are contributing to the purpose of the church, namely the bringing of the Good News to all mankind and the establishment of the kingdom of God here on Earth.

As Christians we are witnesses to Christ outside the church in our daily lives. It is our responsibility with the help of the Holy Spirit to bring others into the kingdom of God. Persuading people to migrate to another country is not easy; much has been spent by countries wishing to attract immigrants and they have not resorted to beating people about the head until they come. So too, we as Christians cannot force the people we meet in our lives into the kingdom of God, we have to persuade them. In His earthly life there is no mention of Jesus using physical or psychological violence to make people follow Him. He persuaded by love and this must be the example we follow in our dealings with others in our daily lives, reflecting the love of God for us to others, being prepared to speak of and for our faith backed up by having the

At the other extreme of learning within a church there may be one formal introductory course after which members are left to their own devices and, not having the knowledge or understanding of a person mature in the Faith, struggle from one subject to the next without gaining the depth of understanding which builds faith.

Successful learning cultures within the church allow those new to Christianity to learn both formally of Jesus Christ within courses and also to gain an understanding of their faith in Christ through interacting and studying with others on an informal basis that allows them to address issues pertinent to them.

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understanding of our faith that gives us the confidence to speak. In our secular world this mission may be as hard and as far outside our comfort zones as going to another country but we do have hidden resources supporting us – the Holy Spirit.

Those who formulated the Nicene Creed did not intend controversy about whether the Church should be apostolic or Apostolic. They meant both; the church must be both a messenger and follow the teachings of the Apostles in order to achieve its purpose of bringing all mankind to Christ.

DELIVERY

MATERIALS to be Prepared before Session

Figure 1

Note that on this title page the E of THE lines up with the U of Church. At the end of the session a “path” S will be placed below the U to make a vertical THEUS and THE US.

T

H

E

C H U R C H S

Figure 2

PURPOSE

Ecclesia ( FEMALE

Mother CHURCH

Sperm & Egg Christ & Soul

Foetus grows Faith grows

Birth Mature Christian

Figure 3

ONE

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UNITY

Physical

Spiritual

TASK

Coming of the Kingdom of God

DISCIPLINE

Resources

Figure 4

HOLY

CONSECRATE

Man sets aside, only Holy when God is present

GOD PRESENT

Sinai

Temple

Curtain

GOD’s WORK

Figure 5

CATHOLIC

Uriah the Hittite

The Dogs of Canaan

The Animals of Caesarea

Family

Eye of the Needle

Church pillars

Figure 6APOSTOLIC

(Messenger) apostolos, missio

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“A” or “a”

TEACHINGFaith MUST Grow

“in – outers”

“course of course”

Apostles

MISSION

The SESSION

In order to put this session in context it is Necessary to introduce the idea of the Church as the mother of Christian faith. Ask the group to consider pregnancy and what is involved in the growth of a child within the womb from a single egg to birth. Ask for & make a list of what the group considers significant.

Once the “list” has been generated ask the group to consider the “birth” of a Christian using Figure 2, pointing out that “conception” need not be in the Church but where ever a person makes the commitment to Christ. Emphasise that this concept of the Church as a mother to Christians is not a dogma but a convenient way of thinking about the role of the Church.

ONE

Introduce this section by pointing out how important it was for the early church to present a unified front against those many different heresies that were each seeking to claim that they had the truth of Christ. To counter these threats strong unity of teaching & purpose was not a luxury; it was a necessity.

In addition to task the Eucharist (or Communion if you prefer), stresses the sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross for all of mankind. In this act of worship we are linked together in our faith in a very real & unique way.

The Church exists to connect people to God; all churches have the common task of working for the coming of the Kingdom. The leader can dwell on various denominations & pick out the commonality of their aim.

All the resources of the Church, whether spiritual, physical or intellectual must be committed to Christ. Once arguments within the Church, on whatever level, start draining away these resources for other uses it diverts resources away from doing the work of Christ & is, therefore, sinful.

HOLY

Introduce this section by asking the group the meaning of the verb to consecrate. Among the replies it is likely there is one that will be it is “to make Holy”. Pick up on

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this with the dictionary definition that it is “to set aside” but that it is widely held to mean that actions of man can make something holy. From this restate that man is a fallen creation of Holy God. Only God is Holy.

It is the Presence of God that is responsible for things being made Holy. Use the examples in the notes to illustrate this, bringing in that no man can look upon the face of God and live (Yom Kippur). But man has looked upon the face of God in Jesus Christ hence the tearing of the temple curtain which signifies that all places where Christ is present are now holy. The Church is not Holy due to the actions of man but to the very presence of God.

The church is also Holy its work, working to establish the Kingdom of God upon Earth. In nurturing the faith of the human soul meeting Christ the church becomes Holy.

[Turn to the title page. By drawing people to Christ the Church becomes Holy. Draw an S shaped path to the U of CHURCH. Join the verticals of the H & E above the U forming a church tower with the T becoming a Cross. Explain that THEUS is the Greek word for God and the Church is Holy when the US in Church meets THEUS and we contribute to His work.]

CATHOLIC

Once again we are dealing with the precise meaning of words, catholic in this case meaning inclusive. The Church too is inclusive. The idea that God’s love extends to all is not something new to the New Testament. It is clear from the story of David & Bathsheba that David incurs God’s wrath not because he wanted Bathsheba but because he caused Uriah the Hittite to be killed. Uriah was a member of the Covenant of the O T & it was this breaking of the Covenant that provokes God’s wrath upon David.

Using the examples in the Notes concentrate on how the idea that Christ’s sacrifice was for all became clear both in the Gospels and Acts. Remind the group how they encountered the idea of Christians being a family having a kinship with all other Christians through Christ.

As a final point regarding inclusiveness within the church ask the group to remember the great medieval cathedrals of the world with their round columns & square bases. The circular columns were built to represent Christ and the square the Earth, indeed it is from here we get the expression “from the 4 corners of the World”. In the very fabric of Church architecture we are reminded that the Creed states the Church is Catholic.

APOSTOLIC

As an introduction begin this session by defining the word apostolic and outlining the arguments that have been associated with its usage over the years. The Creed uses

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both meanings of the word apostolos, passing on the teachings of Christ as well as being a missio or envoy for Christ.

Teaching

That we have our faith as Christians today is in a large part due to the teaching ministries of the Apostles who passed on their first hand knowledge of Jesus Christ so well that we believe some 2000 years later.

Yet teaching in the church today is not always so high a priority. Nor are there always the opportunities for people to learn & deepen their Faith. Expand on the notes to cover the rest of this section, ending with a brief summary & a short agreement by the group as to how many learning opportunities there are in their church and what can be done to improve this, if necessary.

Mission

Mission takes many forms. Explain that being a missionary for Christ does not always mean going on an overseas mission. It can mean fulfilling a mission within the church like guiding & teaching new Christians, contributing to the growth of others faith by being there for them when they need us or by engaging with others outside the church & bringing them to Christ. None of these actions is an easy option and it requires effort on our part to work for Christ in today’s world.

End this session with a general discussion on the Church & how you and members of the group see yourselves contributing to the Church.

THE NICENE CREED

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Session 9: “We acknowledge one Baptism – Life of the World to Come”

Introduction

Having examined the Father, Son and Holy Spirit followed by the Church the last three statements of the Creed are interrelated and, as we shall see, are more forward looking, examining what lies before us after death. This does not mean that these three lines of the Creed are separate from all that has been said before. Far from it; these lines are perhaps among the most important for us as Christians as they are the outcome of “We believe in…” They are the hope of many and the certainty of believers, the culmination of the Creed.

These last three lines are predicated on the three core beliefs that dominate the Creed and all Christianity, namely,

1. God loves us.

2. Rather than God’s love we chose sin.

3. Through Christ we are redeemed from sin.

We start with Baptism.

BAPTISM

My Christian name, not my forename, please note, is Robin. That may not be politically correct in this day and age but for me it is right for as a baby I was named by my parents in a baptismal service and it was by the name Robin I was accepted into the Christian community of the Church as one who follows Christ. The giving of my forename was recorded on my birth certificate by the secular authorities but the far more important record of my name as a member of those who follow Christ is recorded on my baptismal certificate and later acknowledged in my confirmation as a member of the Church. For Christians there is much more to baptism than just the naming of a child. When people from outside the Church approach clergy to get their child “done” in a baptism service because it is the “right” thing to do the clergy often have to spend a great deal of time explaining the significance and responsibilities of baptism as opposed to a naming ceremony. (It may come as a shock to those who only make use of the Church for births, marriages and funerals that some of the more cynical members of the clergy refer to them as the hatch, match & despatch brigade). We will now take a close look at a “naming ceremony” as opposed to a baptism and focus on the differences to establish why the Creed acknowledges only one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.Naming

The origins of giving people names are lost in the mists of pre history. It was probably done to avoid the constant use of long descriptions to identify individuals

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within a community, a form of shorthand identification if you like, and, being useful, the practise spread among our ancestors until all cultures gave newcomers either as children or as adults names by which they were identified. It is far easier to call someone Fred than to continually have to describe him to a third party as the man who mends shoes at his workshop in the third cave on the left on the large mountain where this stream originates.

If a name is assigned to an individual and that name is not made known to all members of the community within which the individual resides the giving of a name is pointless. To be effective the community has to be aware of an individual’s name and how better to let all know an individual’s name than to announce when all are present? Thus a naming ceremony came into being with the individual being presented to the community together with his or her name. When we examine baptism we will return to the concept of being named in front of a community.

At a formal naming ceremony it would not be good form for the individual being named before a community to create a bad impression on the community by appearing at anything but their best. Hence they would be clean and this involves the use of that universal solvent, water, another subject we will examine in the baptismal service. It is also possible that water, in a symbolic form, became associated with naming ceremonies. In many ways joining a new community is like starting a new life and at birth newborn babies are wet from amniotic fluid from their birth so it is not too much of a leap to suggest that wetting a newcomer became a part of the ceremony to give them a new name and to welcome them into the community, a symbolic birth.

In some cultures the name given to the individual joining a community is important as it reflects a characteristic of the individual. Some Native American cultures make use of this tradition and we find names among the Sioux like Sitting Bull. In some African cultures the tradition is also present. With the Zulu a popular female name is Tandewe meaning Beloved. Remnants of this tradition exist within our own culture where the meaning of names is no longer of such importance72. One that springs readily to mind is the name Barbara from the Latin for foreign woman. Within the modern baptism service it is not the names given to those who are baptised that is important, it is the symbolism and the Holy that is important. We now have to consider the baptism service itself and place the involvement of both water and community into context to fully understand the Creed.

Water and Cleansing

72 The name Jesus is a Latin translation of the Greek (Iesous) which is in turn a translation of the Hebrew Joshua or Jehsohua both of which convey the meaning YHWH is salvation. Bearing in mind that Jesus was also the Messiah (translated in Greek as Christ) or the one who leads to salvation, the purpose of His mission was abundantly clear in His name.

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Water plays an important role in many of the world’s religions. It is used as a symbolic cleansing prior to or during worship in Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and Christianity but the use of water in ritual cleansing was at its height in Israel at the time of Christ with the Sadducees.

The Sadducees circa 100BC to 68 AD

A sect of Judaic tradition at the time of Christ the Sadducees had developed very elaborate cleansing rituals. From the New Testament and other sources, especially the Dead Sea Scrolls,73 one gains the impression that these complicated74 ritual cleansings had ceased to be the symbolic cleaning of sin and had become to be seen as the actual method of removing sin, a sort of wash away your sin in the bathtub if you like.

In our examination of the Arian Heresy and the divinity of Christ we noted that mans’ sin had created a gulf between man and God that only God and not man could bridge. Furthermore the cost of bridging the gap between God & man was so costly that only the only begotten Son of the Father could pay it by taking our sin upon Himself upon the Cross. The Sadducees claimed that in their rituals they were freed from sins by cleansing. They, not God, had the power to remove sin.

With this “power” came benefits. In addition to the prestige they enjoyed among the people of Israel they had material wealth far above that of the majority of the populace at that time as evidenced in the archaeological excavations of the high priest’s house in Jerusalem with its fine décor and cleansing facilities. In the Old Testament prophets rise up to oppose those who would lead the people of the Covenant astray, just as the Sadducees were doing, and a prophet did rise up against the Sadducees, a prophet called John the Baptist.

John the Baptist

It is against the background of the Sadducees that we must see the work of John the Baptist. Suddenly, shockingly there appears a man, who is not a Sadducee, who is

73 Discovered in 1947 at Qumran near the Dead Sea the scrolls are the written works in Hebrew, Greek & Aramaic of the Essene community, thought to be a strict sect of the Sadducees. Consisting of over 10,000 fragments, the content of the scrolls covers 3 main areas. They are:-

Most of the Hebrew Old Testament.

The Hebrew Apocrypha, those writings which were not included in the Old Testament.

Secular Writings including commentaries on the O T, rules for the community and various edicts, including ones on cleansing in the so called Damascus scroll.

74 The Essene community appears to have vanished shortly after the Roman Invasion of Israel in 68 AD.

? The whole point about the Sadducee in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:33) is that if the Sadducee had touched the wounded man he would be ritually unclean and have to repeat the whole time consuming process of ritual cleansing – better to cross the street & save time & energy

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using water to wash away the sins of people, but not in the correct ritualistic fashion. He baptises people after they confess and repent of their sin.75 He does not claim that the ritual of using water cleanses people from sin. Worse still he points to Christ saying that His baptism of people will be done without water but with the Holy Spirit76. The focus is changed from ritual cleansing to repentance, forgiveness and the receiving of the Holy Spirit. God forgives, not a ritual, and thus water is a symbol of this change.

The message of John the Baptist was a threat to the Sadducees. It threatened their power over the people of Israel, it threatened their entire livelihood & lifestyle and it threatened the prestige they held due to their position. When they challenged John he attacked them in no uncertain terms going so far as to call them vipers77. Small wonder then that they kept such a close eye on Jesus during His ministry for if John was a threat to them what would “One who is greater” than John be? Their end?

Before we leave the subject of washing sin away with water there is an account in the Gospel of St. John78 that we would do well to consider. Constrained as he was for space St. John includes these verses to show how the prophecies of the Old Testament were fulfilled in the Crucifixion. It is interesting that he does mention water coming from the body of Christ. In the 21st century we have come to understand that water is a finite resource. Although our planet consists mainly of water there is only so much water, no more or no less. (The only way to create more water is by chemically combining Hydrogen and Oxygen). All the water on our “Blue Planet” is recycled by nature over and over again. Water evaporated from the sea falls as rain, forms rivers, and is returned to the sea to become, in time, rain again. Even our bodies are 98% water, the same water that contains the water that flowed from Christ’s wounds. The message of redemption is clear; all we have to do is believe in Christ for salvation is quite literally at hand.

Water in baptism

The use of water in the baptismal service is not to wash away sin like the Sadducees tried to do, it is rather the symbolic cleansing of sin. The actual forgiving of sin is done by God through belief in Christ and the use of water is show that sins are forgiven. Water and the bestowing of a Christian name is also used to show the one baptised is counted among the community of those who believe & we ask the Holy Spirit to enter into the person’s soul for life to guide and keep them in the Faith, guarding them from evil.

Baptism, in itself, does not stop sin; because we are human, we all have the propensity to sin even after baptism. Yet the Creed acknowledges only one baptism for the forgiveness of sin. In the early Church this led to people only being baptised on their death beds to ensure that they were free from sin at the end of their lives and were

75 Mark 1: 5, Luke 3:376 Matt 3: 11, Mark 1:18, Luke 3:16, John 1:2677 Matt & Luke 3: 778 John 19: 34 - 36

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thus able to enter heaven79. Others, like St. Ambrose,80 who was baptised after becoming Bishop of Milan, were only baptised after significant episodes in their lives.

Today the majority of baptisms are infant baptisms and this means that we have to consider baptism in a slightly different way. For myself I see baptism like the connection of a shower to the mains; I know that as a human I am weak and will sin again but, through my baptism, I am able to access at any time & in any place, even the darkest place, the shower of God’s forgiveness by faith in Christ and through prayer & repentance. This is the power of baptism.

The baptism of infants opens up the promise of eternal life for them as it does for all who believe in Christ. Yet the baptism of infants is not enough in itself to ensure the salvation for the adult with the choice of free will the child will become. Having the free will to follow Christ adults also have the free will to reject their baptism and turn from Christ. As we saw earlier on the section dealing with the Church it is necessary for “new” Christian to develop their faith and in the case of infants baptised with the water of God’s forgiveness the community of the Church has a vital role to play.

Baptism & Community

It is the privilege and duty of every Christian to welcome, nurture existing faith and develop the deeper faith that comes from understanding in “new” Christians, whether they are mature adults or infants. Now there are those who say that this is the duty of the clergy; the nurturing of faith in baptised infants is catered for in Sunday School and the faith of adults is “taken care of” in Sunday Worship and the odd Bible study course or, if they are lucky, in a Lenten study course. In this they are wrong.

Being a follower & disciple of Jesus Christ sets the duty of love upon us. It is not enough to love fellow Christians as our neighbours, there is more to it than that alone. When Jesus summarised the 10 Commandments into “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and love your neighbour as yourself.”81 He was quoting Deuteronomy 6: 4 –5 for the loving of God and Leviticus 19: 18 about loving one’s neighbour. In other words He was setting out already stood as God’s expectation of mankind in general. The love Christians are called upon to display for one another is something quite different. Just before His arrest at the last supper, St. John reports that Jesus gave His disciples one last commandment, “Love one another as I have loved you.”82 “As I (Christ) have loved you.” To love our fellow Christians as Jesus loved His disciples is an awesome responsibility for all in the Church. It entails not only being there for each other in a passive form but also a highly active form of love, covering help in times of need both spiritually and physically, a form of love that means going out of our way to care for the problems of others, a love that can mean a willingness to lay down our lives for the salvation of others. It also means a commitment to the developing of faith in Christ by those whose faith is not, as yet, developed as our own, just as Jesus taught His disciples about the Father we too have 79 A notable example was the Emperor Constantine who was baptised as a Christian only on his death bed. A neat attempt to expiate the sins, including murder, needed in those days to retain power & stability in the Empire.80 St. Ambrose, 340 – 379 AD, Bishop of Milan, Scholar and Theologian is noted for his stand against the Arian heresy in Italy.81 Matt 22: 37, Mark 12: 10, Luke 10: 2782 John 13:34 - 35

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to teach not only by word but also by deed what it is to be a Christian to those who are “new” in their faith.

In baptism we, as the community of Christ, take on the responsibility of care for new members of our community whether adult or infant. Reaching out to the families of those who have had their children baptised at the local church is not just the pastoral work of the clergy “because they are paid to do it”; it is the responsibility of all in the Church because we have been commanded by Christ. Reaching out to and helping faith to grow in new adult members of our Church is not just the duty of those who may hold office in the Church “because it goes with the job”; it is an integral part of being a Christian and we all are responsible for their continued growth in the Faith. It is fundamental to what makes us a Christian community.

We look the Resurrection of the Dead

Death no longer has any power over all mankind thanks to the defeat of Sin & Death by the Resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Through Him a new future for all is now possible and, being open to all, those who are dead will have the opportunity to take the path that leads to eternal life through belief in Christ. To be truthful no one, other than God, knows how this will be accomplished.

Some have seen the resurrection of the dead as decayed bodies rising from countless graves all over the world. Others claim that everyone will arise from the grave with a perfect body; but what is a perfect body? In a male is it the musculature of a body builder or the ideal of a sumo wrestler or perhaps the symmetry of Michelangelo’s David? In the female form is the Junoesque form of the 18th century, the flat chestedness of the 1920’s or the surgically enhanced mammary glands of the present time that are the ideal? There is also the question of what will happen to those who, in their lives, had a disability. When they are resurrected does this continue because it is part of who they are? We can not answer all these questions to try is to reduce God to a cosmetic surgeon; only God can, so it maybe better to leave it up to His wisdom rather than to try to second guess Him.

Human flesh is a bio degradable substance and in time in the grave becomes dust. Yet the Word became our fallen flesh83 and it was not degraded after He redeemed it from sin & death. It was something that was taken up into heaven and sits on the right hand of the Father. Our fallen flesh, the that contains our souls could, through our belief in Christ, be transformed by God into what we do not & can not yet know.

And the Life of the World to Come

83 John 1:14

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In the Medieval Church people were told what their spouses would look like and how big their farms would be with bounteous crops in the world to come; the world to come was seen as much like this world, only better with more leisure time. Today we can look upon that notion of the world to come as somewhat quaint and amusing but I think that the medieval view may hold a clue about the world to come.

The clue is not to be found in the beauty of a spouse or the size of a farm but in the implication that with such abundance the farmer will no longer go hungry. Now hunger was an ever present problem in Biblical Times too as we shall see and, in the Gospels, we find numerous references to food or the production of food – in fact Jesus uses food more than any other example in parables and describes Himself as the Bread of Life,84 a real Vine85 and uses bead & wine to describe His Body & Blood at the Last Supper. Let us try and find a reason for this and see what it tells us about life in the world to come.

Food in New Testament times

Modern medical science has established a strong correlation between the height of a population and nutrition. The modern American soldier is, on average, just below 6’ in height and has a diet of 3600 calories per day,86 some 1200 calories more than the Recommended Daily Allowance for a civilian male counterpart.87 Recent forensic measurements of the leg bones of Roman Soldiers of the time of Christ reveal an average height of 4’ 11”, one sixth shorter than their modern day counterparts. The ration of a Roman soldier was 3000 calories per day, also one sixth of his modern counterpart.88 If we use the same differential between modern soldiers and civilians we can conclude that the average daily calorie intake of someone living in Israel at the time of Christ was 3000 – 1200 = 1800 calories per day. With their share of offerings the priests would be much more well - nourished compared to the average person. Bearing in mind that 1800 calories per day is only 100 calories greater than the amount prisoners on hard labour at Auschwitz received89 you can see why food was of such importance to those living in Israel at the time of Christ. (This, for me, goes a long way to explain why Jesus on the morning after Palm Sunday cursed a barren fig tree90 – it seems so out of character to destroy purely to make an example). [It would also explain why the emperors became so popular when they gave out bread & circuses.]

The World to Come in terms of Needs

If we accept that the people of Israel were faced by hunger by claiming that He is the Bread of Life Jesus is saying to them that by following Him they will have their needs 84 John 6: 3585 John 15: 186 Source: US Dept of Defence87 Source: UK Dept of Health Guidelines88 Source: J P Roth; Logistics of the Roman Army 264 BC – 235 AD.89 Source: Auschwitz Museum90 Matthew, 21: 19 - 27

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met. In the Gospel accounts of the Temptations91 Jesus had rejected the path of providing bread to entice people into following Him, so, could the claim that He is the Bread of Life be an indication that in the world to come the followers of Christ will have all their needs met? By needs I do not mean our physical needs of food, warmth & shelter or even our psychological needs of esteem, achievement and confidence for these needs are of the human, not those who, through belief in Christ are within the Kingdom of God. I think that the world to come will satisfy our greatest need, the reason we exist, to be with our God.

You know something? I am glad I have a Christian name and follow Christ.

DELIVERY

MATERIALS to be Prepared before Session

Figure 1NAMES

REASONS

Identification within COMMUNITY

Recorded as part of the COMMUNITY

CEROMONY

All know & welcome newcomer

Candidate looks their best – CLEAN

BIRTH - WATER

Figure 2WATER

WHO is in CHARGE?

91 Matt 4: 3 -4, Luke 4: 4 -5

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SADDUCEES “Wash & Go” - RITUAL

Vs

GOD - REPENT & FORGIVEN

Water SYMBOLIC

EFFICACIOUS

CHRIST’S CRUCIFIXION

Figure 3COMMUNITY

WELCOME

Befriending, Connect

NEIGHBOUR

Care, Love, Assist

COACH / MENTOR

Growth in Faith, Sacrifice

Figure 4THE WORLD TO COME

In terms of our needs

FOOD

Modern Roman DifferenceAverage Soldiers height < 6’ < 5’’ 1/6

Daily Calorie intake 3600 3000 1/6

Civilian Recommended Daily Amount 2400 1800? 1/6

Difference - 1200 - 1200

= FOOD SHORTAGE

Figure 5

MAZLOW’S HIERARCHY of NEEDS

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Spiritual Needs

Higher needsSelf Actualisation

(Confidence, self worth)

Intermediate needs(Friendship, Companionship, Belonging)

Lower Needs(Food, Warmth, Shelter)

The SESSION

To introduce this session ask one member of the group to tell a second member that a third member is a Christian. “Mary, please tell David that John is a Christian.” Now ask the same person to repeat the same message as if John is not present but not to use any names, including that of Christ.

This brings out how we use names a short hand form of a person. From this move on to naming ceremonies & acceptance into a community, stressing the fortune we have as Christians to have a Christian name.

BAPTISM

Lead on to the role of water in a naming ceremony. Cleaning, acceptability. Briefly revise the material covered on the gap between God & man caused by sin & that man does not have the power, or the real inclination, to heal the brake, only God can do this through Christ. Speculate that man, proud in his sinful state, always tries to bridge the gap on his terms as we have seen in the Arian heresy. Being clean before God is common to many religions.

The Sadducees

Explain how they attempted, through ritual to bridge the gap between man & God. Bring in the Dead Sea Scrolls at this point: It is an interesting insight and the group should be referred to sites on the internet when question are asked, as they will be.

John the Baptist

Emphasise the threat that John the Baptist posed to the Sadducees’ way of life as well as their erroneous teachings. Also concentrate on the teaching of John that the baptism was symbolic, cleansing from sin comes by repentance & forgiveness from God, not water.

Water in Baptism

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Before Christ water was purely symbolic in washing away sin. Water common on our planet, 98% of our bodies are water. The water flowing from Christ’s side on the Cross indicates the universality of the forgiveness for us – if we are prepared to accept it. Like the sacrifice Christ made upon the Cross for the forgiving by God of our sins in a once & for all action so too our baptism opens up the way for our acceptance of God’s forgiveness.

Baptism does not stop sin. We with freewill can choose to reject our baptism that has opened up access to forgiveness through Christ. At both the baptism of infants & adults there is the need to maintain & develop our faith in Christ & for this we need the support of the community of the church.

Baptism & community

Once again the importance of the role the church community plays in nurturing new Christians whether infants or adults is stressed here. Our duty is to build faith. Christ’s commandment is to “love one another as I have loved you (His disciples)”. It is an awesome but fundamental task, achievable with the power of the Holy Spirit.

Resurrection of the Dead

How, when, and in what form this work of God is to be achieved is beyond our speculation. Be honest about not knowing for we are not God.

Life in the World to Come

Explain to the group that although we have no definite knowledge of what life in the world to come will be like there has been speculation about it. In Medieval Times heaven was seen as this life but much better.

For myself, I see life in the world to come as being with God. There we have no need of anything more; it is enough; it is everything. To introduce this idea I have put forward an argument based on the need of food in New Testament times and focused on how Christ pledged our needs would be met. I offer it to you for your consideration.

IN CONCLUSION

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This book does not have a conclusion unless you wish it so. Our Faith, the same Faith of the Church Fathers who replied to Constantine’s question about their beliefs with the Nicene Creed, can not and must not be allowed to become static. If we allow our Faith to become static with no growth like a plant it will wither & die with the passage of time. Faith for all Christians is dynamic, not static. It is our living, growing Faith in Christ that will sustain us when we face the challenges of this modern world, not a Faith that that has no growth & stops 50 metres from the church on Sundays – and collapses when challenged.

Faith takes effort. All too often we will remember to put our effort into getting fit, or achieving a good work life balance or developing new skills that will enhance our employment but what about our Faith? Although Faith in Christ is a precious gift from God understanding and deepening our Faith takes some effort on our part and this book is, I hope for you, a beginning and not a conclusion to your learning.

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