My parents were very involved with a religious organization called The Way International. They left this organization as it splintered after the 1985 death of its founder Victor Paul Wierwille, or “Dr. Wierwille.” But a great number of those who left The Way International still held to most of the things they’d learned there – and that’s what both of my parents have done to this day.
Many of the people who left the Way’s organization while keeping its beliefs formed groups of their own, ranging in scope from international, to lone congregations. I grew up in one such lone congregation, or house church – or “fellowship,” as we called it.
One thing I was taught there, in a perfect echo of the Way, was that Jesus Christ is not God. In high school I became aware that all my Christian acquaintances believed otherwise, and I decided to study the matter – so that I would be able to persuade all those clueless acquaintances. That’s not the way my studies shaped up, though, and after my junior year of high school I concluded that the Bible teaches that Jesus Christ is God, and I left the fellowship I’d grown up in. I continued to study that issue, and a year and a half later, I finished a paper defending the biblical doctrine of the Trinity, and emailed it to every Way-influenced believer I knew.
Then recently, an old friend who was among those I emailed got in touch with me. She wrote that she had looked over that Trinity paper back when I first sent it out, but was now wanting to study the issue in more depth, and so she asked me to resend the paper to her. I replied:
I haven't looked back over it in quite a while, but I know that there are certain arguments and interpretations that I wouldn't make today, fyi. On the whole, though, it should definitely be a good resource for your studies.
Really, the paper boils down to this: the Bible teaches that the Father is God (1), Jesus Christ is God, and became a man (2), the Holy Spirit is God (3), and there is one God (4). Those few points, held together, form the doctrine of the Trinity.
Or one place you could start from is the question of when Jesus Christ first existed. I was taught that He came into existence when He was conceived in Mary. But all these scriptures seem to say otherwise (some more strongly or directly than others): Isaiah 9:6, Micah 5:2, Matthew 23:37, Luke 1:78-79, 13:34, John 1:1-3, 10, 14-15, 30, 3:13, 31, 6:33-35, 38, 41, 51, 62, 8:23, 42, 58, 11:27, 12:41, 13:3, 16:27-30, 17:5, 8, 24, Acts 2:25, 1 Corinthians 10:4, 2 Corinthians 8:9, Philippians 2:5-7, Colossians 1:16-17, Hebrews 1:2, 8-10, 2:14-17, 10:5-10, 11:26, 1 Peter 1:10-11, 1 John 1:1-2, Jude 25, Revelation 1:8, 17, 2:8, 3:14, 21:5-7, and 22:13.
So thank you very much for getting in contact with me, and please keep in touch as you continue to study the Trinity. I'd be happy to email or talk about anything. And I definitely do mean anything, because I've come to disagree with what I was taught on a lot of things in addition to the Trinity.
She wanted to hear about what else I had come to disagree with, so I wrote her an overview of my journey from roots in the Way, through evangelicalism, to where I am now:
As for the beliefs I've come to disagree with... there is actually quite a bit to tell. While the identity of Jesus Christ was the decisive issue which drove me from the fellowship, it wasn't the first thing I had questions about. For instance, growing up I had noticed scriptures about love, and service, and giving, and people in need - and concluded that a little volunteering was a good, biblical thing. But I never heard anything at all about that at fellowship, and my first volunteer outings in high school were actually frowned upon as an effort to earn salvation, or as just generally "religious." Then there was water baptism. It didn't seem like a huge issue, and I'm still not sure I understand it very well - but there in the Bible is water baptism, and Jesus commanding His followers to baptize the disciples they make (5), and no later command of "Ok, now stop!" Also, I had questions about the way we talked about spiritual gifts. I learned very specific things about the nine manifestations, and the five gift ministries (6). But in addition to the two lists which gave rise to that taxonomy, there are other lists in the Bible, made up of some of those gifts or manifestations, and some other ones (7) - and no single list is set off in scripture as preeminent, or exhaustive. So it seemed like we were being more specific than God's word was.
There was also a very gradual evolution in the way I approached the Bible in general. I was taught some guidelines that were good in principle, such as looking at context and asking who a given passage applies to. But good things were misapplied, and baseless things were brought in, and in the end we were hacking and twisting the Bible in so many ways. There were all these supposed tensions in scripture that would occasion statements of how the word had to fit together, followed by the bludgeoning of the part of the word which didn't seem to fit. In this bludgeoning, sometimes the Seven Church Epistles were the only parts of the Bible that counted for anything; sometimes a passage would mean the opposite of what it seemed to say because it was arbitrarily deemed to involve some figure of speech (6).
But by God's grace I moved away from that approach. I would broadly characterize this as a move from making the word fit together, to letting the word fit together - that is, just recognizing that it already does fit together, and submitting to that. I reached the point where when a passage of scripture conflicted with my thinking, I wouldn't just glaze over it or forget it; and I wouldn't change the scripture - I would change my thinking. God perfectly inspired His word, so we need first and foremost to respect it, and believe it, and obey it - not to chop it up, or treat it like a puzzle, or even, in a certain sense, to "research" it.
There were also more specific things along these lines, like noticing what 1 Timothy 6:3-5 says about the words of Jesus, and noticing that in Matthew 28:20 Jesus commanded the Apostles to make disciples and teach them to observe all that Jesus had commanded. So while Jesus' Lordship somehow hadn't been enough to make me take His words seriously - how blind and stubborn I've been! - this finally changed that, and I stopped writing off the words of Christ as pertaining to "a different administration" (8).
So with these issues rattling around in my head, and having concluded that the Bible says Jesus Christ is God, I left the fellowship after my junior year of high school. I soon joined a big evangelical church, got baptized, heard it preached and sung that Jesus is indeed God, His words indeed matter, and we should indeed love and serve our neighbors, including the poor ones - and I felt at home.
This feeling lasted into my freshman year at OSU, when some experiences, some hard thinking, and a couple of books shook things up for me once again. One of those books was The Cost of Discipleship by a guy named Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and it talked about God's grace being costly, and demanding, and leading to a radically changed life. Then I went back to the Bible - and saw that Bonhoeffer was right. Jesus says: "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me" (9). So I began to see the Christian life - being a believer, being a Christian, following Christ, being His disciple - as a radical, committed, holistic endeavor. And along with this, or under this banner, came some other big realizations.
Growing up, I'd learned that salvation was exceedingly simple: one need only say that Jesus is Lord, and think that God raised Him from the dead - and in that instant one is certainly and securely guaranteed heaven. (What I later heard from evangelicalism was a little bit deeper and more biblical - but not much.) The problem with this is that approximating or quoting a single scripture is not enough. The Bible is an entire book for a reason. So in addition to Romans 10:9-10, there are other scriptures which need to be known and believed in their own right, and also need to inform our understanding of Romans 10:9-10. That's the right application of rhetoric about God's word fitting together: it does fit together, and is one cohesive whole, so we must understand each part in a way which fits with all the other parts - that is the correct way to understand the part; that is what God means by it. So Romans 10:9-10 is huge and true; and so are Matthew 7:13-29, and Ephesians 2:8-10, and James 2:14-26, and 1 John 2:3-6. The resulting picture is complex and deep, and I don't have it figured out. I suspect that there are even limits to how precisely we can figure it out. But this picture which the whole of scripture gives, however mysterious or difficult, is what God says, and is the truth.
Also during my freshman year, I started becoming much more aware of the social and economic sides of the gospel. The Old Testament speaks continually about God's concern for orphans, widows, and immigrants. Jesus calls the poor blessed; and says that the way we treat the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and the imprisoned is the way we treat Him, and He will judge us by it (10). So in a world where so many people live in abject poverty, and we in America - even people like you and me - have such wealth, this becomes a very, very pressing matter. It seems to me that this should affect the way we spend every dollar.
In addition to those considerations, I've learned that there's another whole side to what the Bible says about money. Besides what money lets me do for others, there is also the question of what money does to me. And on this count, Jesus says to store up treasure in heaven and not on earth, and that we cannot serve both God and wealth, and He warns: "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed." Paul writes to Timothy that "we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either. If we have food and covering, with these we shall be content. But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs" (11).
Eventually even the "food and covering" part of that last passage hit me: I had always taken for granted so much of the typical American standard of living, but God sets a very different standard of just food and clothing. It is food and clothing of which Matthew 6:33 says "all these things shall be added unto you" - this is not said of all the luxuries and "blessings" which I’ve heard it applied to. But I did indeed hear Matthew 6:33 grossly misapplied, and I likewise heard all kinds of biblical promises about supplying needs, and passages about material blessings in the Old Testament, used to guarantee things which God does not actually promise to us - some of which He even warns against! And the biblical truth that God can and does heal was wildly twisted to say that God will always heal.
Overall, it seems that as I was growing up, God was presented much like a genie to grant wishes; or like a doting grandparent - rather than a Father who cares about what is truly best for us, and not just what we might want or request at the moment. So I was taught that God would give me what I wanted, and God was paramountly concerned with my present happiness, and God would always heal me, and God wanted to bless me with money and material comfort. Any experience different than this traced to my unbelief, or to the devil - and was totally opposed to God's will. But eventually these beliefs were overwhelmed by the many contrary things which the Bible says: "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. ... But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full. Woe to you who are well-fed now, for you shall be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep," "to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake," "we suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified with Him," "Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps," "those also who suffer according to the will of God shall entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right" (12).
Together, all this paints a picture of Christianity which is very different from the picture I grew up with. It is not centered on a sort of belief that just means thinking the right things, and thinking them vigorously. Because as I've come to understand from scriptures in James, 1 John, the gospels, and all over the place: real belief isn't just an abstract mental thing - it bears fruit; it leads to actions. And I've realized that this makes perfect sense: if you really believe that God says something, you won't just think it harder and harder - you'll act in light of it, without twisting or ignoring any of it. And so it happens that real belief connects with all the things I've talked about, from commitment, to ideas about salvation, to giving and serving, to money, to suffering. Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7 is an incredible summary of most of this, as well as tons of other biblical truth.
So... I've said an awful lot. What are your thoughts on all of this?
- - - - - - - - - -
1) John 6:27, Galatians 1:1, Ephesians 6:23, 1 Peter 1:2
2) John 1:1-18, John 20:28-29, Acts 20:28, Philippians 2:5-7, Colossians 2:9, Hebrews 1:8, 1 John 4:2-3
3) Genesis 1:1-3 with Isaiah 44:24, Psalm 95:6-11 with Hebrews 3:7-11, Isaiah 6:8-10 with Acts 28:25-27, Jeremiah 31:33-34 with Hebrews 10:15-17, Romans 8:2-16, 1 Corinthians 2:10-11
4) Deuteronomy 6:4, Isaiah 43:10-11, Isaiah 44:6-8, Mark 12:29-30, Romans 3:30
5) Matthew 28:19
6) I’m not going to explain much Way or ex-Way terminology here, as it doesn’t seem necessary for the points I'm making. But feel free to ask me, or to google for yourself.
7) Romans 12:6-8, 1 Corinthians 12:28-30
8) The Way and its heirs use the term “administration” for what most others call “dispensations.” But they are often more rigid and exacting than the dispensationalists I’m familiar with.
9) Matthew 16:24, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23
10) Luke 6:20, Matthew 25:31-46
11) Matthew 6:19-24, Luke 12:15, 1 Timothy 6:7-10
12) Luke 6:20-25, Philippians 1:29, Romans 8:17, 1 Peter 2:21, 1 Peter 4:19
8 comments:
http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/galatians-46-and-the-trinity
Thanks man, but that link isn't working, and I can't figure out what post you might be referring to. Can you give it another try?
When Jesus became God
http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.com/2006/03/when-jesus-became-god.html
Read some church history to understand the pagan roots of the trinity. I've read this book and recommend it highly.
Hey my parents came to faith through the same organization!
Anonymous commenter, that is a part of the picture I grew up with, and have rejected. I heard that very book recommended. And here's the thing: regardless of any parallels in Paganism, or Platonism, or anywhere else; regardless of how long it took the doctrine of the Trinity to be articulated rigorously or officially, in councils like Nicea or Constantinople - it's in the Bible. So "when did Jesus become God"? Well the Bible calls Him God pretty emphatically:
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ... And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us."
- John 1:1-14
"Thomas answered and said to Him, 'My Lord and my God!' Jesus said to him, 'Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.'"
- John 20:28-29
"Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men."
- Philippians 2:5-7
"in Him all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form"
- Colossians 2:9
"But of the Son He says, 'Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, and the righteous scepter is the scepter of His kingdom.'"
- Hebrews 1:8
Or consider how Isaiah 40:3 is quoted about Jesus in Matthew 3:3, Mark 1:3, Luke 3:4, and John 1:23; or consider Zechariah 12:1-10, and how Jesus was pierced. And let me know if you'd like to talk further.
It's interesting that everything you now believe lines up completely with the church you go to. It seems coincidental that everything you were taught, you now see in God's word as the complete opposite. And on top of that, it lines up with the entirety of most Christian churches. Doesn't that make you wonder if you really saw anything from God's word either from your fellowship or from your church? It would make me wonder if I truly saw it in God's word or if I was just getting tossed around by every wind of doctrine, you know?
Hi Nina, thank you for commenting, and I hope that you're doing well.
You definitely raise some valid questions. If I have changed my beliefs to move from completely agreeing with one group, to completely agreeing with another group, then sure, that might not seem like the result of independently studying God's word. But at the same time, if you still believe the things you were taught your whole life, and are a part of the same group you were born into (please correct me if that's no longer the case?), that might not seem like the result of independently studying God's word, either. And really, these questions run very deep, because there are whole groups composed of people who claim to have independently studied the Bible and come to all the same conclusions as each another - and there are multiple groups like this, in disagreement with one another. So let's take a closer look at things.
First, I began having questions about the beliefs I grew up with as soon as I looked at them closely enough. As I grew out of childhood, and tried more and more to really grasp and understand my beliefs, and read the Bible a lot more - questions began to arise. So it wasn't as if I jumped in, and then later jumped out. I was born in, and as I matured and grew and read the Bible, the Bible led me out.
As for agreeing with churches, I want to mention two categories. In one category are beliefs like those that there is one God, the Father is God, the Holy Spirit is God, the Son is God, He became a man, He was crucified, and He rose from the dead. The vast majority of people and groups who have ever called themselves Christians, and ever read the Bible, have believed these things. And yes, I believe them. I certainly don't believe them just because most other Christians have always believed them, though. For on the one hand, that consensus doesn't prove anything - only the Bible itself can do that. But on the other hand, that consensus does count for something. I mean, it should give one pause to think that so, so many godly and brilliant men and women have seen those tenets in the Bible. They could all be wrong, it's true, but the conclusion that they were all wrong would take some explaining. And what is a Way, fellowship, SSGCO explanation? Men I heard spoken of highly in fellowship, like Martin Luther, George Müller, and E. W. Bullinger - as well as countless other readers of the Bible throughout the past 2000 years who have been great scholars, holy people, or both - they were all foolish to believe that Jesus Christ is God. But Victor Wierwille finally figured out that Jesus is not God? Or God revealed that to him, as part of a revelation that was unparalleled since the time of the Apostle Paul? It seems to me that a belief in that divine revelation to Wierwille - as hard as that is to swallow - is the only possible grounding for belief in his teachings. (In the grand scheme of things, a little tweaking of his teachings on gift ministries, or a move away from reading his books directly, doesn't amount to much; the whole system is still Wierwille's.) But instead of that explicit faith in Wierwille, I've always heard claims that everyone has studied things out for themselves. Really? Each person studied things out for themselves, and came not to the conclusions of most people who've ever studied the Bible, but to the exact conclusions of of every other person in the group, and of Victor Wierwille? No one wondered if Christ might be an important part of Christianity? No one noticed that 3 John 2 is John speaking to Gaius? No one noticed that 1st and 2nd Peter are addressed to Christians just like the "Church Epistles" are? No one noticed any of the scriptures I mentioned in this post?
In the first category I mentioned were things like the Trinity and the Resurrection, which have been pretty universally agreed upon by Christians. In the other category are things like money, what individual churches should look like, how Christians should relate to their nations and governments, how salvation works... and a lot more. On these things, there has been a ton of disagreement among Christians, and I have some substantial disagreements with the majority of American churches, and even with the church I attend. Some of these issues are kind of free-for-alls, with no clear consensus. Others, though, have some type of majority report, at least within America today, which I disagree with. And much like I said that disagreeing with the Trinity or the Resurrection would take some explaining, I think this does, too. So let's consider, for example, where Jesus said "do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. ... love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." I take this at face value, and conclude, in part, that I am not to serve in the military. Most Christians at most times have believed otherwise, though, and as I said, I think that takes some explaining on my part. To that end, I would say that there are clearly outside forces pushing us away from taking this scripture at face value. Governments want churchgoers as soldiers, and churches often want social standing and political power - and so lots of leaders in lots of places have a vested interest in Christians serving in the military, and these leaders are able to influence people's beliefs. I think that adequately explains why most Christians have disagreed with me on this issue.
The narrower the consensus with which I'm disagreeing, the less explanation I think is needed. So I disagree with most American churches about issues of money, but America is a very wealthy and greedy place; and we're all naturally greedy, and inclined to weasel out of commands which challenge our greed. And I disagree with most American Evangelical churches (and to some degree even with my own church) about issues of salvation and evangelism. But there are plenty of other churches which disagree with them, too; and their own ancestors 100 years back believed and acted differently than they do; and of course we are naturally inclined to want things to be more easy, and safe, and certain than they actually are. Etc.
One way of summing this up would be to say that on the one hand, there are things which Christians agree on because these things reflect the clear teaching of the Bible. But on the other hand, there are things which Christians agree on because we Christians are all human, and sinful, and selfish. I'm trying and hoping to agree with the former, and to disagree with the latter. And I know that the way to do that is by looking at the Bible. Again, I fully believe that that's the only standard - even though these other issues can be fruitful to consider, and can point us toward the Bible's truth.
One last point that I would like to make is that it's ok to learn from people, and to follow people. For the Bible talks a lot about teachers and leaders in the Church. For some of us, that might mean listening to teaching, and then rigorously comparing it to the Bible - as I'm doing, especially through reading books. But that might not be the case for everyone, since Jesus talks in Matthew 7 about recognizing false prophets not by out-thinking and out-studying them, but by simply looking at the fruit they bear. What I'm getting at is that the Bible doesn't seem to command that everyone figure everything out for themselves. And to whatever degree each of us is following others, we should honestly admit that. There is no shame or fault or deficiency in following someone, or believing someone's teaching - but there should be a humility in it, which doesn't claim to have studied what one has not studied, or to have seen conclusively in the Bible what one has not seen. Then, for one thing, when a person has believed wrong teaching on some point, and then encounters right teaching, that person won't reject the truth by claiming to have already studied the point, and to have seen in the Bible what is not actually there in the Bible.
What do you think about what I've said? Did I respond to your questions?
I love you, and Jared, and the rest of my old friends. I only want the best for you.
That makes sense from your standpoint. It is never my desire to argue about the word of God, I think it deserves much more respect than that. I was just curious how you came to believe what you did. I can say that I have studied the word of God for myself to the best of my ability. I'm not perfect, I never will be. Nor do I find the need to prove myself to any man. I know I stand righteuos before God, and before his face I can say "I've done my best." And I know that I'll know even as I am known when Christ comes back. I know that in Ephesians it says to keep the unity. And I endeavor to do that with all Christians, as much as they can stand it. I don't think we'll agree on things that you see in God's word, but that's ok. If you have honestly gone to God's word with a pure heart, then whether I agree or not is incidental. Because God is going to commend who he wants to commend. He will reward who he wants to. And whether I say you are right or wrong, it is God who will be the one to say it in the end. And SAME with me! He will commend me if I have been faithful. And if I haven't, well then he'll tell me! :-) All we can do is love one another, speak the truth and await Christ's second coming.
I love you too Phil.
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