Conflicting lifestyles or everyone must be the same?

Koot van Wyk (DLitt et Phil; ThD) Visiting Professor, Department of Liberal Education, Kyungpook National University, Sangju Campus, South Korea, Conjoint lecturer of Avondale College, Australia.

In his book on the Book of Hebrews, King L. She (2011)(1) wrote that the biblical writers cannot have a conflicting ontology – both with themselves and with other biblical writers. What is ontology? It means in essence, lifestyle. Think about it. Can one author of the Bible be a drinker, the other one a womanizer, the other one a transsexual, still another a homosexual? Is the modern “embracing culture” part of the sanctification process or adult actions of a Christian that is expected by God? Modern cultures and jurisdiction is a mixture of biblical and other sources and mixed to create an anthropological theory of what a “good citizen is”. Pluralism and diversity is presented with so much kindness and acceptance that it is difficult for the modern person who watch Television the whole day, or reading the smartphone hourly or browsing on internet continuously, to make sense in this age we live in. “Kindness” spilt over the borders allocated by the norm of the biblical text. Since people do not have time to read the Bible any longer, ironically the period in history when the Bible is everywhere freely available except in the “persecuting countries of hardcore socialism”, the thing is, no-one reads. So what they do is to form a personal aligned norm of propriety in the brain that resonates well with the environment’s media norms.

What is the media norms? All types and colors and races and denominations, and religions and characters are embraced in a unity for peace and security. Peace and unity are two beautiful words that is very fashionable and popular. It is the highest goal of everyone in modern society. It is the secular theology of our times. It is not just a goal but a prerequisite and in some countries even forced upon those who do not abide by it. In some countries in Asia, non-alcohol supermarkets are forced to have alcohol on their shelves even though their own preference is non-alcoholic, attempts by the Asian government to break their particularism. Of course their particularism had shown as fruits violence and pro-death tendencies, also an irony. Since when is a true religion pro-death? Any religion that harbors just a grain of pro-death concepts are standing on the wrong side of the Bible. That is why ‘dying with grace and dignity’ philosophy is standing outside the biblical parameters and sounds so beautiful.

The reaction of scholars against She and his insistence that biblical writers must have the same ontology or lifestyle came swiftly in 2013 from Bryan R. Dyer (2). He calls for “varied perspectives that the individual biblical authors bring to their writing”. I have news for Dyer. Noah was a drunkard, Moses a manslaughter, David an adulterer, Hosea married to a prostitute, Peter with a temper, Thomas doubting, Paul “pigheaded” and obstinate, but I want to use the words of C. D. Brooks about them in his youtube video sermon in 1978, “God in Bad Company” where he tells the story of the alcoholic Willy who later became a pastor. He said: “All of them were messed-up – until the Holy Spirit came upon them.”(3)

So this is why the remnant of the End-time cannot follow modern niceties of modern culture: television lifestyles, newspaper definitions of right and wrong, smartphone twitter “I feel, I think, I have the opinion.” We cannot design our own destiny for the Future and neither for eternity. We need the biblical objective (outside of ourselves) norm. A subjective inside feeling norm is filled with selfishness, selfserving and self-grandizing.

Why do we stop cooking or touring on Sabbath? Why do I punish myself with sacrificing something that I normally in the week, like digital involvement but stop on Sabbath to have a digital Sabbath? Is it to please God? Yes. To glorify Him. Will He be happy? Yes, because He asked us to be particular on what we do or do not do on Sabbath and cooking on Sabbath is prohibited, although many churches locally do cook on Sabbath (see Nehemiah 8:10 and Exodus 16:23). Are we trying to earn salvation by our good deeds? No. We are trying as saved people not to sin any more. Remember what Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery in John 8? “Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.” What does no more mean? Is it a lifestyle of sinning through the week and on Sabbath coming to church to the “washing machine” to be cleaned soul laundry to go back in the week with a lifestyle of sinning again? Edward Heppenstall says in his book Christ our High Priest (see online) that “love is not leniency with sin” (paragraph 57, chapter 3); cheap grace is “if sin can be forgiven without judgment then death is no longer wages of sin” (paragraph 61)’ “obeying the law with selfish gains is wrong” (paragraph 77, chapter 4); “saved to the uttermost: Christ seeks to develop moral purity” (paragraph 75, chapter 4); “who lives on a lower nature will have their outlook formed by it” (paragraph 93, chapter 4); “faith is holistic and not merely mental” (paragraph 104, chapter 4); “emotional excitations is not the presence of God” (paragraph 111, chapter 4); “saving faith turns outward from the subjective to the objective Word of God” (paragraph 112, chapter 4); “faith of the Faith Chapter [Hebrews 11] people had not ecstasy to rely on” (paragraph 114, chapter 4); “one cannot test the truth by the way we feel” (paragraph 115, chapter 4).

Some modern Adventists, even at seminaries are advocating, drop traditional Adventist preaching on prophecy, End-Time, Second Coming, Sabbath, Baptism, and other doctrines and just preach Christ and the gospel. Heppenstall said “faith involves trust – commitment – involvement – knowledge – obedience” (paragraph 103, chapter 4). He said that there are people who are “watering down the moral code and says that love is all we need” (paragraph 35, chapter 7). He also indicated that “sickness of the soul cannot be resolved by changing the code” (paragraph 35, chapter 7). “Under the pretense of enlarging our liberties we are deprived of them” (paragraph 35, chapter 7). Why do these professors not follow in the seminaries the wisdom that is outlined upon biblical principles?

The way people live determines the way people think and the way they think determines their methodology and the methodology determines the final end-product like their thoughts, opinion, sermon, lecture, book, article, idea, concept, comment, tweet.

Next time Sabbath comes, why not decide on Sabbath Reformation? Why not dedicate some selfish gain or motive to God for His glory to attain unto holiness, unto sanctification, unto perfection as is called upon by the Scriptures in many places. Of course, all people start these on different levels of growth but it is not about salvation, but keeping salvation already received and if not received, stay on the knees and plead for forgiveness and ask for help since the Holy Spirit was given for just this task. One last thing, did you know that in 538 A.D. the Catholic Church wanted to stop people prohibiting fellow believers of cooking on Sunday saying that the Bible places a taboo against cooking on “Sabbath”? At the council of Orleans in 538 A. D. a number of bishops (38 of them) gathered to do just that. They pronounced it “jewish-like” and wrong to tell people not to cook or tour on Sabbath. Think about it. At the start of the 1260 years persecution cooking freedom and liberties were instituted and our Adventist brethren and sisters are leaping forward to grab this newly allocated “liberty” for their congregations in our own times without knowing this!

Sources:

1. K. L. She, The Use of Exodus in Hebrews (Studies in Biblical Literature, 142; New York: Peter Lang, 2011), 65.

2. ; J. Dyer, “The Epistle of the Hebrews in Recent Research: Studies on the Author’s Identity, His Use of the Old Testament, and Theology,” JGRChJ 9 (2013), 104-131, 118 at footnote 42.

3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX7htNR_c7k