Hello and welcome to the inaugural post of The Holy Huddle blog!
The purpose of the blog is to give members of The Holy Huddle small group a venue for ongoing discussion. Each discussion will have a post; simply add your comments to the latest post to join in.
The first post concerns the discussion based on Craig Blomberg's article The New Testament Definition of Heresy (Or When Do Jesus and the Apostles Really Get Mad?). In our discussion we first looked at the parables to get a feel for what sorts of issues/actions were most roundly condemned or warned against by Jesus. (Mary rightly pointed out that separating beliefs from actions may be artificial, as one leads to another.) Then we considered a summary of NT heresies from the article, as well as a list of the things which currently get the American church "het-up". Finally, we tried to assemble our own lists, and think about the criteria we might use to order them--in an effort to reflect Biblical priorities.
We covered various possible additions to our lists. It helped to ask the question: If you were choosing a church, what criteria would rule a church our? Besides the obvious Trinitarian issues, we added:
- they must have a high view of scripture
- do they walk the walk? I.e., to what degree does this church resemble the culture?
- do they show mercy to the needy, both in and out of church?
What would you add? How would you prioritize your list?
2 comments:
Okay, I will start the ball rolling. I have been thinking about the parable of the Good Samaritan. Given the poor theology which characterized Samaritans--they only accepted the Torah and were reviled by the Jews for syncretism--I wonder if this parable suggests a priority of loving service over doctrinal purity.
A modern reading might have the Good Samaritan as a far-left Jesus-Seminar fan with a weak view of Scripture. What did Jesus mean by choosing a Samaritan?
Why not? The questioners, the way I read it, were looking for a legalistic, narrow definition by which they could justify their own merciless behavior. Jesus spent a fair amount of time demonstrating that needy and outcast peoples of all levels of theology were welcome to come to Him--not just ethnic Israel, but spiritual Israel. If someone who was a theological outcast could walk the walk better than those who spent their days talking the talk, it was a lesson to them that their hearts, like the Grinch's, were several sizes too small. And so were their definitions of neighbor.
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