Some Christians love to emphasise the practical side of Christianity. They like ‘doing things’ and sometimes downplay theology and doctrine in favour of getting involved and getting going in fellowship meetings and church projects such as evangelism or ‘outreach’, or any number of other related fellowship activities, projects and meetings. Important as these may be, in terms of practicalities, the Apostles primarily focussed on Christians living a godly life day-by-day, whatever Christians were doing, and that is the theme of this series of posts.
But how did the Apostles approach teaching the very practical theme of Christians living a godly, clean life when they are still living in the world of fleshly, ungodly values, traditions and habits? A little more specifically, how did the Apostles approach and teach the dynamic process by which Christians live a godly life? What approach did the Apostle Paul for example use to motivate and teach Christians to set themselves apart from the world in godly cleanliness in their daily lives? Did he use God’s Law, such as the Ten Commandments, as a ‘spur’ to drive Christians on towards a clean, godly life? Did he teach that Covenant Law points out their missing of the mark causing Christians to turn to Jesus in repentance and exercise greater resolve towards godliness? Or did he teach Christians to surrender to the Breath of God or Holy Spirit? Did he instruct Christians to ‘let go’ of their problems and inner conflicts so as to abandon their efforts at trying to understand and harmonise difficult aspects of teaching and allow the Breath of God to fill them with power? Did he instruct Christians to surrender all their efforts at trying to live a godly life so as to allow the Breath of God to fill them with an impulse that carried them along towards godliness? Perhaps the Breath of God would then give them spiritual gifts, mystical revelations and experiences of God’s presence or even of union with Himself. Did he say that by seeking and obtaining such heightened or transcendent experiences Christians would find the means and power to cause their wayward behaviour to ‘fall away’? Did he exhort Christians to listen to and cultivate a sense of the passionate inner feelings of their heart towards God, to stimulate, seek and encourage a ‘felt experience’ of abundant life deep within them that would then give them energy and power to live a godly life? Did he promote the idea that Christians withdraw from the world with all of its temptations, so as to live the solitary life of an ascetic recluse or hermit, or to join an isolated community in a monastery or a desert or deep in a forest? Did he advocate that Christians attend worship meetings with fellow Christians in order to obtain a regular ‘uplift’ or ‘boost of power and energy’? Did such ‘praising and celebrating of God’ help Christians obtain the experience of an emotional/spiritual ‘high’ that was the means to godliness? Did he teach that singing lilting or rousing spiritual songs and listening to passionate sermons about victory in Jesus and being on the road to glory leads to optimism, a sense of triumph and an emotional uplift that carried Christians to godliness for a while? I propose that the Apostle proposed none of these courses of action as a means to godliness day-by-day.
Christian 2 Christians 