tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post4321352429495755006..comments2023-09-25T04:24:45.407-05:00Comments on The M Blog: Acts--description or prescription?J. Guy Musehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comBlogger53125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-71190336115194189242016-02-22T16:21:38.377-05:002016-02-22T16:21:38.377-05:00I think that it is both/and. There are descriptiv...I think that it is both/and. There are descriptive parts and prescriptive parts. The commands to baptize (in water) for the forgiveness of sins is corroborated in other parts of Scripture. Taking care of each other is necessary, but the selling that occurred in Acts 2-5 is due to their being upwards of 3000 new members to the church from other places that decided to just stay in Jerusalem. We do need to overcome our materialism and make sure there are "no needy persons" among our church.Fentonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12242874959774541960noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-25699125277755681432012-06-06T10:35:05.494-05:002012-06-06T10:35:05.494-05:00While Acts contains much descriptions of the early...While Acts contains much descriptions of the early church, I don't think those descriptions should be treated merely as historical accounts with no application for today.<br /><br />I would like the church today to be more like the New Testament church. But it won't happen by modelling ourselves after the early church. After all, the early church didn't become what it was by modeling itself on itself, but on Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit.<br /><br />We can only become (in practice) the church God wants us to be by submitting ourselves (as individuals and as a body) to God, being led by the Holy Spirit, and living to glorify Jesus Christ. This is what the early church did when it functioned properly.Andrew Bernhardthttp://fadingman.dtjsoft.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-45375163964697142552011-10-01T13:55:55.268-05:002011-10-01T13:55:55.268-05:00I didn't get a chance to read all the response...I didn't get a chance to read all the responses to the blog article, but I just wanted to give an amen to your position. I've gone back and forth with the "prescription description" debate with our leadership for a while. It seems to be a great tension to be faithful to the Scriptures in our modern context. I am with you, to think that we can do it better than the Apostles did it with the Holy Spirit seems arrogant and prideful to me. Not to mention, our results seem to have diminished in some sense.Rusty W.http://www.aboutaburningfire.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-50849637405728653172011-06-08T17:49:46.158-05:002011-06-08T17:49:46.158-05:00Stuart,
I appreciate your "delayed response&...Stuart,<br /><br />I appreciate your "delayed response" and understand your point. I think it is good to allow the tension to exist between prescriptive and descriptive. Once we think we have everything all figured out, we don't!J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-83732698808118124672011-06-04T22:22:57.736-05:002011-06-04T22:22:57.736-05:00So, apparently, I can't spell my name or bendi...So, apparently, I can't spell my name or bendiciones. Sorry.Stuartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-57964969743321833452011-06-04T22:22:08.704-05:002011-06-04T22:22:08.704-05:00Guy,
Sorry for the VERY delayed reply, but I was ...Guy,<br /><br />Sorry for the VERY delayed reply, but I was looking back over this thread and just realized that you had asked me a question. Sorry.<br /><br />As to my comment about Acts being prescriptive in an over-arching sense but not in its details, you asked me about some of the "grayer" instances and cited Acts 10:48. I think the answer lies in using Scripture to inform Scripture to inform our hermeneutic.<br /><br />In the case you cite, we wouldn't baptize only in the name of Jesus because we have Jesus' own words in Matthew 28. Another example is the way the Church of Christ takes this phrase from Acts, "Repent and be baptized for the remission of your sins" as evidence of baptismal regeneration. We have the reset of the NT, particularly the gospel of John and the Pauline corpus that speak clearly to belief and faith as the basis for salvation.<br /><br />That's probably the best I can do, but that's how I tend to approach the details in Acts. <br /><br />Beniciones.Stjuartnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-22877201474419499222011-03-19T19:26:24.643-05:002011-03-19T19:26:24.643-05:00Stan,
Yes, comment interaction is not ideal. Thank...Stan,<br />Yes, comment interaction is not ideal. Thanks for the clarification. <br /><br />I think I see your point, and in theory and practice, I probably agree with you. I know of no person today in a brick and mortar church building who has the intimacy that people often share in a house church setting. <br /><br />What I am unsure of is whether this has always been true, or if it is a byproduct of our relationally disconnected culture. <br /><br />Maybe, back when church buildings were actually the community centers, and people had meaningful interactions with each other in their towns on a day-to-day basis, the Sunday gathering was much more meaningful and personal than it is now.Jeremy Myershttp://www.tillhecomes.org/blognoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-18031190083030520992011-03-17T08:58:37.698-05:002011-03-17T08:58:37.698-05:00Frank Doiron,
Sorry for the delay in your post ap...Frank Doiron,<br /><br />Sorry for the delay in your post appearing. Blogger had arbitrarily sent it to the SPAM file and I just got around to taking care of this.<br /><br />I think you are right on with, <i>The lesson of Acts is a call to radical way of coming to Jesus. The church meeting in homes is a radical call to community…a community that will take care of one another, look upon one another’s interest, and serve one another. It will be a church that has a passion to take the gospel of Jesus to the ends of the earth.<br />In the book of Acts, the church, that first alien community, wasn’t a building to go to once a week. It was a living breathing community that was “breaking bread from house to house,” sharing life, sharing resources, all centered in the presence of the living God (Tom Sine)</i><br /><br />What we see in the pages of Acts is what Jesus and the apostles intended church life to be. To say this was only cultural, or a thing of the past, is to miss what being the church is all about!<br /><br />I haven't had time to watch the Francis Chan video, but hope to in the coming days. Sounds interesting.J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-32777735004471034822011-03-16T22:16:02.170-05:002011-03-16T22:16:02.170-05:00Jeremy,
The written format is not the easiest to ...Jeremy,<br /><br />The written format is not the easiest to communicate in. Also, a response to a blog post is necessarily brief and I lack the gift of brevity in communication. So, please understand that extensive examples were not possible, nor are they still possible.<br /><br />I wrote, "The cultures at that time are different from the ones today, so a direct copy of everything is not possible." And I wrote, “Well, they are unbiblical in the sense that these other forms cannot be found in Scripture.”<br /><br />Perhaps the better word here would have been “models” of church.<br /><br />What we find in the NT is that the followers of Jesus met in their homes and also in larger groups from time to time. Outside Jerusalem in Acts 2 we are not ever given the frequency with which the followers of Jesus met in larger groups, but there seems to an indication that they were together weekly in their homes. As Chesed1 Points out, life together was a crucial aspect of NT Christianity. When I came to Brazil I was very open to the idea that a group could meet at McDonalds and “be church”. What I’ve come to realize is that you might rejoice in one anothers’ rejoicings at McDonalds, but you’re not likely to sorrow in one anothers’ sorrows at McDonalds. The level of relationship that we find among NT followers of Christ only develops in the home. It does not develop in any other venue. I’ve been working with a group of about 35 believers who meet in a building. They a cordial in the building, but few are friends and few have interaction on a personal level during the week. That has been my experience with pretty much every building based church on four continents.<br /><br />So, returning to the Biblical form/pattern/model (yes, we’ve used all three terms interchangeably already, which complicates matters). We meet from house to house and from time to time in larger groups to celebrate together. Both were aspects of NT church. One key is that the groups in the homes are almost always formed through the circles of friendship of the homeowners so they already have an established trust based relationship and most live close together allowing them ready interaction during the week. They do share life together. They do rejoice in their rejoicing and sorrow in their sorrows.<br /><br />We do not insist that people dress according to the Greek culture, nor build their homes in the Greek style, nor eat only the foods that were available in the NT era. We do not eat the Lord’s Supper laying on pillows with our heads near the table and feet going away from it.<br /><br />Several people have commented on the selling of property and laying it at the apostles’ feet. If we pay attention to the text we find this is only recording as having occurred in Jerusalem. In other parts of the NT we do see sacrificial giving, but never do we see a description of selling property. So, we balance the two examples that we find. Many will, like a church supporting Paul, give sacrificially from their own poverty. Others will, like the church in Jerusalem sell their possessions to meet the needs of others. We see both in the NT and we should see both today.<br /><br />I hope this has clarified what I attempted to convey in brief in my first post. To express fully my thinking would require far more words than a blog format allows.Stanhttp://www.rockymeadow.netnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-83202823413414573862011-03-16T17:37:39.335-05:002011-03-16T17:37:39.335-05:00Guy,
That is an EXCELLENT answer, and I 100% agr...Guy, <br /><br />That is an EXCELLENT answer, and I 100% agree with you on it, with two thumbs up, a hearty pat on the back, and a full-body hug. <br /><br />...Well, maybe not that last part. <br /><br />Sorry for stirring the waters a bit here. I love all your posts, and have learned so much from you over the years.Jeremy Myershttp://www.tillhecomes.org/blognoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-81453381364389442782011-03-16T17:33:48.198-05:002011-03-16T17:33:48.198-05:00Jeremy,
Thanks for your thoughtful follow-up resp...Jeremy,<br /><br />Thanks for your thoughtful follow-up response. I'll let Stan speak for himself if he should stop by again and read this.<br /><br />Allow me to try to respond to you in the same way we deal with this in our local church planting training...<br /><br />For those starting new churches with new disciples, Acts is much closer the model we would want to see developing, rather than the model of the traditional/legacy churches of North America and the Western World. <br /><br />By default and upbringing what is seen in legacy churches is what gets imitated, copied, and modeled after. This is very hard to reproduce and multiply. What we see in Acts is much simpler and reproducible.<br /><br />What I am suggesting is, ACTS is closer to the model needed for us today than the complex and extra-biblical models of most churches today. <br /><br />Hopefully this helps rather than further muddling the waters.J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-28291403267677798962011-03-16T16:32:22.814-05:002011-03-16T16:32:22.814-05:00Guy and Stan,
My concern is exemplified with Sta...Guy and Stan, <br /><br />My concern is exemplified with Stan's comment. He says this:<br /><br />"The cultures at that time are different from the ones today, so a direct copy of everything is not possible." <br /><br />But then he goes on to say that other forms of church "are unbiblical in the sense that these other forms cannot be found in Scripture."<br /><br />Logically then, any form of church not found in Scripture is unbiblical. Therefore, since by Stan's own admission that some adjustments have to be made, there is no such thing as a biblical church. As soon as any adjustments are made whatsoever, you leave the biblical pattern. <br /><br />If you say, "Oh no! The adjustments we have made are necessary for our different time and culture," then my response is "Who gets to decide which adjustments are allowable and which ones are not?" <br /><br />Stan says that my view allows me to "dismiss [Acts] at will and do what is right in our own eyes." But are you not doing the same thing? Any adjustment that is not found in the book of Acts is an unbiblical adjustment. Therefore, if you make an adjustment to fit our time and culture, you also are doing what is right in your own eyes. <br /><br />But if you argue, "No, we follow what we see the Spirit doing in the book of Acts, as He led the believers to love, serve, and honor each other and people in the world," then I say, "Congratulations, you are now arguing for my position."Jeremy Myershttp://www.tillhecomes.org/blognoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-45089350692370726212011-03-16T12:14:01.364-05:002011-03-16T12:14:01.364-05:00solstallings,
Thanks for stopping by and for the ...solstallings,<br /><br />Thanks for stopping by and for the comment. For me, I think Stan above answers you best when he states,<br /><br /><i>It is descriptive of what was prescribed. The cultures at that time are different from the ones today, so a direct copy of everything is not possible. However, when one looks at the church in the entire NT there is only one model and no hints that other models would be forth-coming. A previous post stated, "My primary concern with the prescriptive way of reading Acts is that it tends to condemn other forms of doing church as unbiblical." Well, they are unbiblical in the sense that these other forms cannot be found in Scripture.<br /><br />The idea that it is fully descriptive or mostly descriptive allows us to pretty much dismiss it at will and do what is right in our own eyes. Of course, we keep the key words and define them as we please so people think we are today doing what they did in the NT. Self-deception is not always difficult to achieve.</i><br /><br />Sure we can go to extremes, but if left to our own definitions and add to that the way we use Scripture to back up our preconceived notions, I personally think Acts needs to be looked at more from the prescriptive side than merely narrative description. Just my 2-cents!J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-69311549943096494212011-03-16T11:36:25.331-05:002011-03-16T11:36:25.331-05:00I am kind of on the fence... kind of.
Take the ch...I am kind of on the fence... kind of.<br /><br />Take the church building as an example. Is meeting in houses prescriptive because that is what they did? Or is it descriptive only. I kind of think descriptive, but not only.<br /><br />When we take the church meeting out of the house, many times feeling like we have the liberty, we end up going against a different principle of scripture. You may have the liberty to have a building to meet in, but do you have the liberty to spend a ton of money on that building. I believe that would go against another biblical principle. <br /><br />No description is in a vacuum. Even meeting in a certain house could go against some biblical principle. What if you picked the house of a member who lives furthest from an old lady who has to walk to the meeting. <br /><br />So I guess I believe a lot of Acts is descriptive, but that it is actually describing the way in which you are probably safest from going against some other biblical principle you may be missing, which may end up being the perfect prescription for being in line with God.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-78229630587147309672011-03-16T08:58:24.848-05:002011-03-16T08:58:24.848-05:00Chesed1,
I'd be interested in reading your up...Chesed1,<br /><br />I'd be interested in reading your upcoming book "Community Life." While many of us glamorize the lifestyle and way of life of those in the NT, the reality is that is was a pretty brutal time--just ask Paul and Silas when they were in Phillipi. While I agree that the description found in Acts 2 sounds wonderful, I wonder how many of us would readily give up our current lifestyle, sell our houses and lands and lay it all at the apostles feet? These are things that are easier written about than lived out in my own life. Again, I would be interested in reading what you have to say about all these matters. Keep us posted!J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-51441959202795406112011-03-16T07:17:21.624-05:002011-03-16T07:17:21.624-05:00I'm in the process of writing a book on "...I'm in the process of writing a book on "Community Life." I call it the missing theology, since not a single textbook on ecclesiology talks about it. So where are the congregational opportunities to "confess your sins one to another?" Does that happen in Mr Megachurch service with 10,000 people, and most of the folks there are hiding in the crowd from truly being submissive to one another? If the present church structure is Biblical, then why does George Barna's studies show us over and over that we are no different than the surround culture? No, Acts, in the context of the whole Bible, and especially when read with the rest of the NT, is description of the Biblical lifestyle that works. Reading the NT without an eye on Jewish history and culture, and without the context of community life as it can only be lived in the house churches, is doomed to failure.Chesed1https://www.blogger.com/profile/16637424273623366853noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-30012863608092000152011-03-15T14:24:17.122-05:002011-03-15T14:24:17.122-05:00Esteban,
Very well said. I think you are on to so...Esteban,<br /><br />Very well said. I think you are on to something when you bring up the point that possibly we have side-lined or do not understand the Holy Spirit, or his work in the world today. Whenever his Spirit is quenched, there is a drought. We then resort to doing things as we deem best, and find the needed Scriptures to back up our propositions.<br /><br />While I too was greatly impacted by the book you make reference to, one of the problems with big churches and ministries is that it is very easy for them to take a missions approach of, 1) seeing what needs to be done, 2) praying about it a little, 3) doing it. Again, Acts/Epistles is very much a daily walking in the Spirit approach to ministry, rather than a ministry-by-objectives approach. I am currently working on a blog post where I extensively quote someone who is saying this very thing. Stay tuned!J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-74625782471619588592011-03-15T10:25:04.119-05:002011-03-15T10:25:04.119-05:00Guy,
One of the most fascinating and riveting dial...Guy,<br />One of the most fascinating and riveting dialogues in a long time. One of the first books that I downloaded on my kindle for PC program was a very popular book on being radical. Encouraged by the read I decided to listen to a sermon or two on line. Said speaker connects and communicates well. His desire to make disciples in his church and among the peoples of the world is very admirable. However, I was completely blown out of the water when he began his sermon series on the book of Acts by saying that Acts was the most difficult book in the Scriptures to understand because his mentor told him so. And there was some initial attempt (even by the author on the book about being radical) to water down some things. God is sovereign and His Spirit comes and goes like the wind. I wonder (especially after examining my own life) if “we” have not quenched His spirit and made Holy Spirit terribly sad. Our tendency is to completely ignore the third person of the trinity or treat Him as many UPGs do as some good spirit but never recognizing Him as God. We have capitalistic formulas on one side of the spectrum and animistic magic on the other side of the spectrum. And worse yet is what we see frequently in South America, some weird mixture of both. Perhaps our spiritual impotence and ignorance is related to a total misunderstanding of who God’s spirit is. EstebanAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-67787884026503858872011-03-15T09:01:58.028-05:002011-03-15T09:01:58.028-05:00Pa,
Good point. One of my favorite Reggie McNeal ...Pa,<br /><br />Good point. One of my favorite Reggie McNeal quotes, "The church in North America is not <i>like</i> the Pharisees--we <i>are</i> the Pharisees, and Jesus does not like Pharisees."J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-42006962261067747752011-03-15T08:58:23.893-05:002011-03-15T08:58:23.893-05:00Missiorganic,
What I mean is that when placed sid...Missiorganic,<br /><br />What I mean is that when placed side by side, didactic imperative teaching carries more weight than a portion of Scripture that is merely describing something that happened. I am not saying there is no point to descriptive passages--that is the point of the post!--but that those passages that clearly teach we are to do something like "make disciples..." have more authority/claim over us than the narrative where Jesus casts the demons into a herd of pigs. Making disciples is more important than spending time casting demons and sending them to herds to pigs.J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-5706885622305202712011-03-14T23:18:39.767-05:002011-03-14T23:18:39.767-05:00I wonder if the Pharisees of Jesus' day would ...I wonder if the Pharisees of Jesus' day would have said that their form of temple worship had matured from that which Moses birthed and put the first diaper on ;) .Pa Ottnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-86494531523472233682011-03-14T22:58:48.594-05:002011-03-14T22:58:48.594-05:00Guy, I have to admit that I am uncomfortable with ...Guy, I have to admit that I am uncomfortable with "carrying more weight." It seems a bit subjective. But, I enjoy the thoughts that this discussion is bringing to the surface.Missiorganichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15207580042116894083noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-41125770845775347902011-03-14T22:40:45.117-05:002011-03-14T22:40:45.117-05:00Martin,
I think many of us are on the same journe...Martin,<br /><br />I think many of us are on the same journey along with you. For me it is a process of taking off my glasses and rereading afresh the NT through a different set of lenses. One of the things that bothers me is how far we have drifted from NT standards, and yet we are able to justify nearly everything we do in church and back it up with Scripture. We use Scripture for our own purposes making it say just about anything we want it to say.J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-75421901557604905042011-03-14T22:35:32.535-05:002011-03-14T22:35:32.535-05:00Frank Doiron,
Something happened to your comment....Frank Doiron,<br /><br />Something happened to your comment. For some reason it went straight to my email address, but does not appear here. Please retry commenting again. Thanks!J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23191203.post-3672006180107040772011-03-14T22:26:17.062-05:002011-03-14T22:26:17.062-05:00Missiorganic,
Thanks for tackling not only the is...Missiorganic,<br /><br />Thanks for tackling not only the issue, but for sharing some excellent questions to help us all! <br /><br />Over the years we have run into these descriptive vs prescriptive issues in Acts/Epistles many times. What is clear to us is that what we do today has little in common with what we see in Acts/Epistles.<br /><br />Our own solution is much simpler:<br /><br />1) the didactic portions always carry more weight than descriptive narratives<br /><br />2) descriptive narrative should not be followed if it contradicts what is didactically being taught<br /><br />A good example of this is the Acts 10:48 teaching <i>...he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ...</i> We would not teach someone to baptize only in the name of Jesus because this narrative contradicts a direct teaching of Christ who commanded, <i>baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit...</i> Jesus command trumps what Peter told his disciples to do in Acts 10.J. Guy Musehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17751691713410311094noreply@blogger.com