Blog - Page 163 of 318 - John H Armstrong

Is Gnosticism Making a Comeback?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:13-05:00February 12th, 2010|Categories: American Evangelicalism, Church Tradition|

The most pernicious and troubling of all heresies that the Christian church has battled against since the days of the church fathers has been Gnosticism. Gnosticism is a term used to describe a religious movement of the early Christian centuries which laid special emphasis upon knowledge (Greek: gnosis) of God and of the nature and destiny of man. This knowledge—"of who we were or where we were placed, whither we hasten, from what we are redeemed, what birth is and what rebirth" (Clement of Alexandria)—was believed by ancients to have redeeming power. It could liberate the soul from the sway of cosmic forces. The earliest information we have about Gnosticism comes from the writings of Christians who opposed it; e.g. Irenaeus (iconic image above), Hippolytus, Epiphanius, Tertullian, etc. They saw it, and its unique gospel, as a deadly enemy of the true gospel of Christ. The famous scholar Adolph Harnack called Gnosticism "the acute Hellenization of Christianity."

A one-sentence description of Gnosticism, offered at a popular Web site on the subject, […]

Cardinal Kasper’s Appeal for an Ecumenical Catechism

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:14-05:00February 11th, 2010|Categories: Missional-Ecumenism, Roman Catholicism|

Speaking at a Vatican symposium, Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, said that an ecumenical catechism would help Catholics and members of major Protestant communities adhere more faithfully to the foundations of the Christian doctrine. Such a catechism would promote "an ecumenism of basics that identifies, reinforces, and deepens Christians' common foundation in Jesus Christ and the Holy Trinity as expressed in our common creed and in the doctrine of the first ecumenical councils."

At the site www.Catholic Culture.org I found the following comments from people who are donors to this conservative Catholic voice. The range of reactions below will give you a good feel for how many conservatives in the Catholic Church react to the idea of "ecumenism." If I took these same comments, changed just a few words in them, and then posted them with Protestant "fear" words towards the idea that we could actually learn from deep relationships with Catholics it would provide the same sense that you get from reading […]

Why Did the Haitian Government Arrest Christians Who Were Attempting to Help Orphans?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:14-05:00February 10th, 2010|Categories: Current Affairs, Ethics|

I have followed the unfolding story of ten Americans, all Christians from Idaho who were arrested for trying to take children out of Haiti after the earthquake struck, with great deal of interest. What has made this seemingly unique story so intriguing to me is that numerous non-Christian journalists and radio talk show people here in Chicago have reacted fiercely against the Haitian government. Their stridency on this issue is rarely seen in defense of Christians from Idaho. While this story has been unfolding I have generally have "felt" that there has to be much more to this story than most of us really know and understand. Then I read an article by my good friend Jim Tonkowich and saw why I was unsettled about this story. With permission I reprint Jim's story and urge you to also read it. It is, as Jim originally titled it, a story of missionary zeal and practical wisdom. I think the story represents a common problem found among many conservative Christians in America. Our zeal is genuine, our knowledge is often limited […]

The Four Marks of the Church

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:14-05:00February 9th, 2010|Categories: The Church, Unity of the Church|

The classical theological view has always been that unity, holiness, catholicity and apostolicity are the "four marks" of the Christian church. Various evangelicals attempt to add "other" marks to these, some even popularly speaking of "nine marks of the church." I have no dispute with this notion in terms of a general consideration of the work of the church but there are not "nine" marks of the church in the confessional and historical sense. The danger comes when "nine marks," or any other number we come up with on our own, becomes a new form of sectarianism, adding to the confessional life of the church a list of items that a few individuals believe are central to faith and practice when the church catholic has deemed otherwise.

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Here Is the Church and There Is the Steeple, Open the Door and See All the People

By John Armstrong|2010-02-08T04:00:00-06:00February 8th, 2010|Categories: Missional Church, Missional-Ecumenism, The Church, The Future, Unity of the Church|

As a small child there was a quaint little saying that was common. We folded out hands and said, "Here is the church." We then put our two index fingers together and said, "There is the steeple." Then we turned our hands over and wiggled our fingers and said, "Open the door and see all the people." I know, it's dumb, really dumb. But I do remember it. There was one thing we felt really good about, back in the 1950s and 60s. The church was full of people. Some things do change.

I have documented here before the simple, identifiable fact that the church is in numerical decline in the West. Europe is already post-Christian and America is going down the same road, just not quite as rapidly. There are many theories about this decline. One is the impact of secularism on the culture. Another connects this loss to the way the boomer generation failed to disciple its own children, leaving them to the local church to do that job. Other theories have […]

The Great Political Snooze

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:14-05:00February 7th, 2010|Categories: Politics|

We had a primary election in Illinois this last Tuesday. It was the first of the 2010 season. There was an interesting race for governor and for the U. S. Senate seat once held, for only four years, by President Barack Obama. Illinois is a heavily Democratic state. This was not always the case but it is now. It has been blue for some years now and the Republican Party has again and again made huge mistakes in selecting candidates. Of 29 Illinois members of the Congress (House and Senate) only seven are Republicans. With the exception of a few congressional seats outside of Chicago these seven congressional members come from downstate as we call the rest of Illinois.

This state is in almost as bad of shape (economically and otherwise) as California. Yet we hear about tax increases, spending more money on social services, etc. almost every day. Our state government is a mess and people on both sides tend to agree. Chicago is noted for machine politics and corruption of power and has […]

The Disturbing Ministry of Jesus

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:15-05:00February 6th, 2010|Categories: Christ/Christology, Lordship of Christ, Missional Church|

Viktor Frankl, the famous psychotherapist who endured the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust, maintained that to love you must encounter. I agree with Anthony J. Gittins, a priest in the order of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit (CSSp), who says that Jesus' ministry could best be described as loving encounter. He moved beyond familiar reference points, broke through boundaries and reached out without discrimination to all people. He also disturbed the status quo and routinely challenged the complacent. He repudiated the notion that some people are more worthy than others and seems to have regularly called those that society deemed the most unlikely into his kingdom. His essential message was inclusion, unification and reconciliation. This does not mean everyone will come but everyone is invited without distinction.

The gentle Jesus meek and mild, of so much popular Christian imagination, is quickly shattered by any careful reading of the Gospels. Gittins says, "Jesus was undoubtedly a disturbing figure." This is why we need a sanctified imagination to adequately grasp how this boundary-breaking, healing servant of […]

Prayers for Epiphany

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:15-05:00February 5th, 2010|Categories: Prayer|

In the Greek the word epiphany means "apparition." In comparative religion it refers to the sudden appearance of deity. But the Scriptural conception, and the reason the church celebrates this time of the church year, is very different. Epiphany refers to the historically tangible invasion of our world by the personal God of incarnation. Theology rightly distinguishes between theophanies, Christophanies (Christ's baptism, the transfiguration, his walking on the sea, etc.) and angelophanies. But apparitions, in the sense of purely private revelations intended for private use, seem to me to be unknown in Scripture. All epiphanies include a message for the whole community of God, underscoring the nature of Christian faith as personal and communal but never private and gnostic.

This season of the year is called epiphany because during this time in the church calendar we recall those events in the life of Jesus wherein the Son of God manifested the divine in the paradoxical acts of veiling and unveiling. The Divine Hours, a marvelous resource I use for daily prayer appoints […]

What Is Vision and Why Does It Matter?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:15-05:00February 4th, 2010|Categories: Biblical Theology|

The writer of Proverbs (29:19) says, "Where there is no vision the people perish." Another translation (TNIV) renders the verse this way: "Where there is no revelation, people cast off restraint; but blessed are those who heed wisdom's instruction." The NASB says, "Where there is no vision, the people perish." The NIV ends this text with "blessed is he who keeps the law." And the NRSV says, "Where there is no prophecy, the people cast off restraint." Israel received revelation through the prophets. The idea here seems to be that vision, or revelation, came from the Law, the Prophets and the Testimony, or the whole of Scripture.

Most of my life I have heard pastors, church leaders and businessmen quote this verse and apply it to "human vision." They tell us that the number one function of a leader is to cast a clear vision for the people to follow. It is argued that vision is like the hub of a wheel from which everything else grows or develops. While […]

N.T. Wright on Hell

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:15-05:00February 3rd, 2010|Categories: Biblical Theology, The Future|

I am very often asked how I understand the doctrine of hell. I usually begin by saying two things: (1) Our common understanding of the subject is generally messed up. (2) Tough I wish universalism was true I cannot accept it as such.

I have wrestled with this biblical doctrine for my entire life. I wish that I did not believe in hell but I do. I also do not believe a great deal of what I hear people saying about hell in the Christian circles I grew up in and sometimes still find myself in day-to-day. Trying to explain this, cogently and simply, is never easy. Rarely have I seen anyone deal with this subject better than N. T. Wright does in this first rate video. If Wright is right then we need to have a much greater conversation in most of our Christian circles about this doctrine, both what it means and what it doesn't mean and […]