SOME THOUGHTS ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN:

THE GOSPEL, THE PERSON OF JESUS AND THE AUTHORITY OF SCRIPTURE.

The thoughts expressed here do not suggest automatically that those who favour and promote the ordination of women actually are believing and teaching all that is stated here. However, the basis on which their claims are made does impact seriously on the three areas of concern.

The idea that doctrine developes and ought to do so to meet changing circumstances, has been around for a long time. Satan did it in the Garden of Eden. In more recent times, it has formed part of the theological arsenal of many churches who have given up on the authority of Scripture and rely much more on human experience and social culture to determine what one teaches. Truth has become relative! Absolutes are a no-no. But that is another subject.

We see the development of doctrine in such areas as: the infallibility of the Pope, the immaculate conception, and the assumption of Mary.

To that can now be added, the feminist theology which demands a re-interpreting of the Scriptures (we could even call it a “misinterpreting) so that what was once considered forbidden is now possible, because of so-called changes in theological thinking and understanding.

The presumption that change can occur because Paul did it, easily permits further change to occur to allow the ordination of women, and then of course, homosexuals both male and female, which has already occurred, e.g. in the UCA.

Add to this also the assumption (i.e. it has nowhere been proved or shown from Scripture) that Jesus selected only men as apostles and Paul refused women the right to be ordained at that time. The reason given is that Jesus had no desire to offend the people of his day, and Paul was supposed to be avoiding possible objections by a “majority of Jews” who made up the Corinthian congregation, another unproved assumption.

There is also the claim that the women clamoring for ordination today are doing so in the interests of the Gospel, and their desire to serve their Lord better than they are permitted right now. Male dominance is hindering the promotion of the Gospel!

Therefore the following is offered for consideration as thoughts relevant to: What is the Gospel? Who is this Jesus Christ? What of the Authority of Word and Sacrament? In reality it is difficult to separate these into three separate categories because they are so closely interrelated. However the following points are made.

1. WHAT IS THE GOSPEL?

· Some 30 years ago, a booklet was printed in New Zealand, titled: “What is our Gospel?” It surfaced at the same time as Bishop Robinson was proclaiming his “God is dead” theology. The two books reflect the same rejection of Scripture as authority.

· The Gospel is certainly a message: free forgiveness to guilty sinners for Jesus’ sake. However, it is also clearly the person who is at the heart of the message (John 3 v 16).

· Mark begins his Gospel by calling it the beginning of the Gospel of or about Jesus Christ, the Son of God. (Mark 1v1).

· Mark goes on to record that the coming of Jesus was in fulfilment of prophecy. (Mark 1 v 2-3), a theme which Jesus took up frequently.

· Jesus began His ministry by Himself preaching the good news about God, which was that the time had come and the kingdom of God was near and so people were called to repent and believe the good news. (Mark 1 v 14-15)

· The Gospel therefore cannot be separated from the person of Jesus Christ, or the Father who sent him according to the eternal plan.

· The Gospel includes that entire plan from eternity, into the fulfilment in time, and back again into eternity, (Luke 24 v 44-47) and the authoritative Scriptures through which it is revealed.

· Any diminishing of the fact that Jesus is the Son of God with authority, automatically also impacts upon the Gospel.

· So a Jesus Christ, claiming to be the Son of God, who is unwilling to offend the Jews on the issue of women in the ministry, reduces the Gospel, and is not the Jesus Christ of the Gospels, let alone the Son of God from eternity who enters this world as Saviour to suffer and die.

· A Jesus Christ, claiming to be the Son of God, who came to do the will of the Father in every respect, yet neglects the so-called “will of the Father” to ordain women, thereby reduces the Gospel.

· To claim therefore that it is now not only possible but also imperative for women to be ordained because they are freed to do so by baptism, impacts on both this one who is God in the flesh and on baptism as a means of grace and therefore reduces the Gospel to something other than salvation through the suffering and exalted Son of God.

· So also when baptism is reduced simply to a sign of something rather than actually giving that something as a means of grace, it has its heart ripped out, and this then impacts on the benefits provided from Jesus through the Holy Spirit. So the Gospel is effected.

· When baptism is supposed to make the God-given distinction between male and female cease to exist, then it is, in effect, another Gospel which is being proclaimed, because the purpose of Baptism has been changed.

· The same must be said regarding Holy Communion. Luther has been condemned for refusing the hand of friendship with Zwingli at the Marburg Disputation and thereby extending the disunity in the church.

· However, Luther rightly saw that what Zwingli was proposing ripped the heart out of Holy Communion too. He could therefore say to Zwingli: you have got me by the jugular! It was not just the denial of the real presence, but also a denial of the person of the Son of God, who was not permitted to make His body and blood available in this sacrament.

· Current concerns regarding what is happening in relation to “eucharistic hospitality” raises the same issue. Care of human souls always remains but not at the cost of denying the truth! When what Christ has instituted is denied or rejected, then any outward appearance of unity, vaporizes because of the deep gulf fixed between by human reason.

· It was precisely this erasing of doctrinal and confessional differences which brought Lutherans to Australia and America. We forget that history at our peril.

· The late Dr. Sasse saw clearly, already in 1949, that the malaise in the Lutheran Church was due to just such a lack of conviction on the part of many Lutheran churches in Europe and America.

· It is of course true, that the Gospel may be spoken in informal discussion by any Christian to another Christian, or to one who is not a Christian by any believer. Also there is provision in emergencies for any Christian to baptize. Such is the nature of the Priesthood of All Believers. But that is not the issue here.

· It is quite clear that the Augsburg Confession links Articles IV (Of Justification) and V (Of the Ministry) when in the first sentence it is stated (Art. V) “That we may obtain this faith etc.”

· We are to note the close connection too between: Article III: The Son of God, Article IV: Justification; and Article V: Of the Ministry.

· Add Article XIV (Of Ecclesiastical Order) which makes it quite plain that only those may publicly teach in the Church and Administer the Sacraments who have been duly called.

· Therefore any tampering with what constitutes the Office of the Ministry, and its task in Word and Sacraments is in effect impacting on The Son of God and Justification. That is why the Call document and the Rite of Installation give such emphasis to: Word and Sacrament.

· This issue is now taken up regarding the Son of God.

2 THE SON OF GOD.

· John’s Gospel begins with the grand statement regarding “The Word”. (1v1)

· This one called “The Word” was there in the beginning, was with God, and was God. (v.2-3)

· This ”Word” is linked with the powerful “And God said: Let there be” at the beginning of creation.

· Life and light are ascribed to Him, which darkness has neither understood nor conquered. (v.5)

· This light is one in whom all are to believe for He gives light to them. (v.6-9)

· A tragedy unfolds: He made the world but His creatures rejected Him. (v.11)

· Still, all is not lost: some come to believe not by human action or descent but by action of God Himself. (v.10-13)

· Only now is this Word identified as the one who became a true human being and lived as a “tent dweller” with us. (v.14)

· Yet the glory of the Only Begotten, full of grace and truth, is not displaced by that humanity that He took on.

· In fact He came to make known the Father, and the plans the Father had because He Himself came from the Father. (v.14-18).

· The first miracle at Cana plainly showed His glory. (John 2 v 11)

· This is hardly the picture of one who wanted to avoid offending Jewish leaders by appointing women as apostles, or to the ministry.

· The unique nature of the conception and birth of Jesus is introduced to us in the message of the angel to Mary: The one to be born will be called the Son of the Most High. (Luke 1v 29-35).

· Jesus therefore did not have to learn the meaning of this because He always knew.

· He was fully aware at 12 what it meant to be in His Father’s house. (Luke 2 v 41-51).

· However it is in John that we have a thorough and consistent presenting of Jesus, the Son of God.

· The fact of Jesus being Son of God was a constant stumbling block to the leaders who reacted at least twice by wanting to stone Jesus for blasphemy. (John 10 v 31-33).

· The ultimate claim of Jesus to be the Great I AM brought further cries of blasphemy. (John 8 v 58).

· It came up in his trial before Caiaphas, when under oath, Jesus said it: I am the Son of God. (Luke 23 v 70).

· This is the crunch point: either those leaders were right in their charge of blasphemy and Jesus deserved to die. Or: Jesus was right, in which case every knee shall bow. (Phl.2 v 10-11)

· Ultimately, the death sentence was demanded because Jesus claimed to be Son of God. (John 19 v 7).

· This is not the picture of one who did not want to offend Jewish leaders.

· Now what about the will of the Father? It was a claim often made by Jesus that He came, not to do His own will, but that of His Father. (John 6 v 38).

· The humiliation of Jesus does not alter this fact.

· Even the passionate cries as He wrestled in prayer in Gethsemane, meant that the will of the Father would still be done.

· So, if it is indeed the will of the Father that women should now be ordained, we have to ask the question: Did Jesus know that?

· If He did not know, what happened to His being the Son of God?

· If He did know, yet failed to act for fear of the Jews, what happens to His much vaunted relationship with His Father?

· Being the Son of God, even in His humiliation, meant that Jesus acted with authority. He acted out of the very nature of His being.

· His authority is challenged after He cleansed the temple. (Matt. 21 v 23-27)

· That authority is already stated in the Old Testament to which Jesus appeals on the question about whose Son He is, a subject raised by Jesus Himself.(Luke 20 v 41-47).

· Is this the picture of one who bows before human opposition?

· Let’s have no more of this exegetical and hermeneutical nonsense.

· Jesus appointed men only. Paul was guided by the Spirit when he acted as he did in 1 Corinthians and appealed to the word of the Lord and the rule in all the churches, not just in Corinth. Or did the Holy Spirit make a mess of inspiration at this point?

· The bishop being husband of one wife is not the result of Paul’s unwillingness to offend, any more than it was the unwillingness of Jesus to do so.

· Let’s not forget the authority claimed and the task assigned and the assurance given. (Matt. 28 v 16-20)

· Jesus was indeed proved to be the Son of God by His resurrection from the dead. (Rom. 1v4).

· The resurrection of Jesus was the one sign to show that He was what He claimed to be: The Son of God with power. (John 2 v 18-22)

· So Paul could assert that the Resurrection proved Jesus to be the Son of God with power. (Rom. 1v4)

· The leaders chose to ignore the claim about destroying the temple so Jesus had to remind them of it at his trial, that he would be judge. (Luke 22 v 69)

· The purpose of John’s Gospel is clearly that we might believe that Jesus is the Son of God and have life in His name. (Luke20 v 30-31)

· Let God BE God and let Jesus BE Son of God.

3 THE BIBLE AS WORD OF GOD.

· The foundation on which the Church is built is clearly that of apostle and prophet, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. (Eph. 2v 19-22)

· It is not that apostle or prophet personally are the foundation, but rather it is the message evealed through them by inspiration of the Holy Spirit that is the foundation.

· With that combination of apostle and prophet, we have the Scriptures of both Old and New Testaments as foundation.

· What is at the heart of both is the one who is cornerstone: Jesus Christ.

· The leaders of Jesus’ day were constantly searching the Scriptures but failed to find the one who was foretold in them. (John 5 v 36-40)

· They were correctly searching for life in the Old Testament, but failed to recognize that life when it was right under their noses.

· One who wrote about Jesus in the Old Testament was Moses. Jesus here gives His seal with full authority to the Old Testament. (John 5v 46)

· This same authority is reaffirmed when Jesus links belonging to God with hearing what God says. Lack of hearing is proof of not belonging. (John 8 v 47)

· Jesus links keeping his word, with never seeing death. (John 8 v 51).

· Jesus required new found disciples to continue in His word which then guaranteed knowing the truth and finding the truth which frees. (John 8 v 31-32).

· Jesus most definitely made provision for the work of the church, and in particular the ordained ministry when He sent out the twelve. (Luke 9 v 1-6)

· There is power and authority to act; there is preaching and the subject matter of the Kingdom and healing; there is total dependence on Jesus to provide; there is correct procedure; and there is their response in preaching the Gospel.

· Just so we do not see the ministry as being the exclusive realm of the 12, Jesus later sent out 70 (72?) others with a similar ministry. (Luke 10 v 1-16).

· We note that the authority is re-stated though in somewhat difference words in v.16. but it remains still today the authority of the Office of the Ministry.

· If women were meant to have this authority, it is strange that in the light of the extent of the harvest, and the lack of workers, and the prayer for more, that women should have been overlooked by Jesus then, leaving it up to people now to “discover” what Jesus failed to recognize and authorize. (10v2)

· However, there is one aspect of this authority which is often overlooked: the context in which v.22 is spoken: the revealing of the Father by way of the authority assigned by Jesus.

· There is also reference to the immediate judgment on towns which failed to listen to Jesus, whether rejection of him directly or rejection indirectly through His chosen messengers.

· Clearly, it is the rejection of the authority present, even in humble human beings, which calls down the judgment of Jesus upon those who rejected. (10 v 8-15).

· Just prior to His death, Jesus reiterated this judgment but added that it was His authoritative word rejected which will be the judge and will pass sentence on judgment day. (John 12 v 44-50)

· Any reflection upon the person of Jesus as one who could on occasion speak with authority, and on occasion bowed to the local culture, is a rejection both of His authority and of the Word’s authority.

· I repeat: I am not accusing those who favour and promote Women’s Ordination, of knowingly and deliberately rejecting the Gospel, the Person of Jesus, and the authority of the Word.

· What I am saying, is that they are running the risk of doing so and should beware because the denial of the deity of Jesus, even on this earth in his humiliation, borders on heresy for it denies that Jesus is the Son of God, or, at the very least, weakens the declaration of the Word on this matter.

· Remember Peter, who sincerely believed he was caring for Jesu when he told Jesus to forget the nonsense of crucifixion. Jesus aligned Peter at that moment with the devil and not with the heavenly Father.

Geoff Noller: Ararat – 22/05/02