The Arian Captivity of the Church?

I have one preliminary truth to establish before I move into the heart of what I am laying forward. I must first make clear what I mean (which is what the Bible means) when I use the word “church.” This word comes from Middle English chirche, and further from Old English cirice, and ultimately from the Greek kyriakon, which meant “of the lord.” (Thank you Merriam-Webster’s!) It is not, as is the first definition in my Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, a building for public Christian worship. The church is not a building, first and foremost (though the building may be called a church since it is there where the Church meets for a gathering together, though it is not restricted to meeting there or in any building). It is also not the second definition given: the officials of a religious body. Rather, it is the whole body of believers in Christ throughout both time (past, present, and future) and space (all believers wherever they have inhabited and of whatever natural-physical origin, whether Shemite, Hamite, or Japhethite –Genesis 10:1).

The word that we translate as “church” from the Greek is the word ekklāsia (common Anglicized spelling: ecclesia). This word means an assembly of citizens. They are ones who were “called out” for such an assembling together (from the root words ek-out of, and kalein –to call). We have a good example of what this truly means in 1 Corinthians 1:2. Paul calls the recipients of his letter “The church of God which is at Corinth,” “those who have been sanctified” (sanctified here means set apart from the world), “saints by calling” (they were called of God to be set apart for His special use (cf. 1 Peter 2:9-10)), and they are saints—the church of God—“with all who in every place [we can add here “and time” as well] call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours.” This is the true Church—those who belong to God.

However, I will use the word “church” in two different meanings. Both, however, will mean an assembly of those who claim to believe in Jesus Christ and the ways of life which He preached. When I use the form “Church” (note the capital letter at the beginning of the word), I mean the true “church,” those who are spiritually the true Israel, the beneficiaries of Christ and those who are indwelt by His Holy Spirit. When I use the form “church” (note the absence of the capital letter at the beginning of the word), I am referring to the visible church—that which is plain to see for everyone in the whole world: i.e. the physical church. The word “church” here refers to Christendom (as opposed to Christian), or all those who claim to be Christian in whatever form throughout the world (excluding obvious divisions from the orthodox belief system, such as but not limited to Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses, for example.)

Now that I have hopefully made clear what I mean by my usage of this word, I will proceed with the matter at hand—for the benefit and edification of the Body of Christ: His bride, the Church.

It does not take even a Christian, let alone a deeply spiritual man to notice that the church of today is in serious trouble. Few churches look after the poor, visit those in prison, and help those in emotional need. They are also few in number that actually hold the Bible to be the inspired Word of God (and if the Bible is inspired of God 100%, it also carries with it God’s authority, and it is therefore both infallible and inerrant). Yet perhaps one of the smallest, if not the smallest division of churches is those who believe and seek doctrinal purity and to lay bear the true meaning of the Scriptures (I am assuming that these also seek to live by this doctrinal purity, but that ill has nothing to do with what I am discussing here). This final group is where I seek to focus my attention; for there should be many more that fall into this category that fail to do so.

For the sake of ecumenicalism, to keep there from being divisions in the church and from excluding anyone who comes claiming to believe the Bible and in Christ, many churches and para-church organizations do not make creedal confessions of faith that clearly outline what they (the members of these groups) believe. They leave the meaning of the Scriptures and the terms used in them to the subjective hearer (the individual interpretation). Often the argument is that they do not want to go beyond what the Scriptures say and interpret them, since then we are using extra-biblical language and stepping on a person’s right to interpret the text for themselves. They are correct in saying that we should not cause any unnecessary divisions in the Church. However, they usually go too far.

First, why have they gone too far? Let me start out with the proper model of communication that ought to be followed. This model is simple and goes like this: The source encodes the information that he/she desires to communicate to the receptor: this information is thus a signal, which has been sent by the source in a manner that is to be understandable to the receptor. When the signal gets to the receptor, he/she decodes it into a form in which he/she understands what the source of the signal meant. (Source (encodes)<(((signal)))>(decodes) Receptor). However, if the receptor is not able to decode/understand the information from the source, a breakdown has occurred, and communication has not taken place. For example, if a person were to speak information in Chinese (the form of the signal) to a person who only understands English, communication has failed, since the receptor is unable to understand the information encoded. Unfortunately due to false presuppositions, the contemporary culture in which we live says this model of communication is incorrect, and that we ought to leave the interpretation of the signal up to the subjective receptor as his/her view understands the signal. However, if this were the case, then communication would practically never occur, since the information sent by the source is never actually understood by the receptor (even if the receptor interprets the signal correctly, it is still relative to the receptor, not the source). To show how absurd this modern model of communication is, let me give you an example. I own the Nintendo game Mega Man 2 (don’t mock me just because I own and enjoy an outdated game). While some of you may not know anything about Mega Man 2, that is just because you are ignorant of the objective information about this game, communication has not broken down, for you realize that I own (it belongs to me, not John Doe down the hall) the game Mega Man 2 (not Mega Man 3, not Contra, not a Black Labrador dog). Though I may own these, that is not the information I have encoded to you. That is irrelevant. This is an objective fact; the game is the specific game Mega Man 2. You are not confused that I own this, even though you may have no idea what it is.

With the Bible communication occurs in this fashion. God (the Source), encodes His words in the form of human speech in an understandable and real human language (signal) to an apostle/prophet/author (receptor). How He does this (in other words His method of inspiration) is irrelevant to our discussion. The author then (who was the primary receptor) becomes the new source. If he failed to fully and properly interpret the information correctly, then communication has broken down to the degree that he failed to interpret it correctly (but let us remember that God is sovereign, and would not allow this to occur to His Word). So the author, who is now the source, encodes the information into a signal, the Bible, and those who read the Bible become the receptor and interpret (decode) the information. To the degree that they interpret this information correctly, communication has occurred. The message sent (the signal) has an objective meaning—what the author and the final Author—God, intended for it to mean. This is what Peter says when he tells us in 2 Peter 1:20-21, “Know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.” In other words, Scripture has an objective meaning intended by God. It is not open to the individual/subjective interpretation! The original authorial intent is the absolutely correct understanding of the text.

So who interprets the meaning of the text? The Church interprets it; and to the degree that they interpret it to the original authorial intent is the degree to which communication has occurred between God and has people. Interpretation is absolutely necessary.

The early church (indeed Church), understood this and lived by it. They called synods and councils for the very purpose of gaining the proper meaning of the passages of Scripture. They knew very well that many people could agree with John 3:16, Romans 9, and Genesis 1-3 without actually properly understanding what the text was originally, objectively supposed to mean when it was written by the author. Many heretics through the ages agreed with the entire Bible and yet had damnable heresies. For example, some could easily agree with John 1 and 8, Colossians 1, and Philippians 2 and still deny the full deity of Christ. Thus they needed to interpret the texts and use extra-biblical language to make clear what it is that they meant. This is why we today have what is known as the “Apostle’s Creed.”

One of the most notorious heretics was Arius. He was a presbyter in Alexandria who taught the subordination of Christ to the Father. In other words, Christ was created, or “there was when He was not.” While his motive of avoiding modalism was commendable, he became a heretic by putting forth a supposition that was not theologically correct. He proposed that Christ was created out of nothing (ex nihilo), and that everything else was created by Christ. However, Athanasius rightly opposed him and used non-biblical language, such as Jesus Christ is “of the essence of the Father,” “begotten, not made,” “of one substance with the Father,” and that He “was made man.”

Arius was stern and set forth that non-biblical/metaphysical language should be avoided, and that biblical words should be the only language used to make theological assertions and to establish doctrines. This is much the same as is claimed today, which I will get to in just a minute. If Athanasius and the Council of Nicaea would have agreed with Arius and used only Biblical language, Arius could have stayed part of the church and kept teaching his heretical view that Jesus Christ is subordinate to God the Father. But God, for the purity of His Church, did not allow this to occur. The council used extra-biblical language and so kept the church from this heresy. For as Jesus Himself said, “unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins” (John 8:24, the “He” is not in the original Greek and is not necessitated by the Greek wording, making Jesus’ meaning here absolutely clear). Jesus is clear, if you do not believe that He is God, you will die unforgiven in your sins. If Arius would have won, many more people would have been deceived than were by this heresy, and would hold to a damning doctrine.

Today many in the church also argue for this same procedure that Arius did approximately seventeen centuries ago: that we should not use extra-biblical language when creating creeds and when making distinctions between ourselves and others who claim to be believers in Christ. However, if we did not use extra-biblical language, we would not have such terms as the “Trinity” or “original sin.” Since, for example, both Calvinists and Arminians agree that John 3:16 is absolutely truthful, to distinguish between the two they must define what the word “world” in this passage means. They could shout back and forth all day at one another the words of John 3:16 and get absolutely nowhere in their discussion. Thus they must give their interpretation of the text so that each one can know what the other believes. This is known as expositing the text. They are seeking to be exegetical (bringing the meaning from the text) and to lay forth what John 3:16 actually means. Without a person using extra-biblical language to clarify what he/she means, we can never know what another person is actually saying. Thus, communication breaks down.

For this reason, we must establish creeds. They do not just quote Scripture, but actually give our interpretation as a local body of believers as to what the text actually means, and what our doctrine is. The Roman Catholics pseudo do this. The Pope or a bishop interprets the text and relays what he believes it means. Yet they still have great schisms and breakdowns in communication, as later popes, bishops, priests, and yes laity interpret what was meant by the earlier assertions and even of the modern interpretations (take Vatican II for instance, and all the many interpretations that Roman Catholics have of that one council). It is the same for Evangelicals and all denominations throughout Christendom. We must make interpretations.

I could argue with Jehovah’s Witnesses for hours, and we would all agree that what Scripture says is true. Yet their interpretation is so radically different than mine that I would not claim fellowship with them. It is the same way among Evangelicals. If we do not clarify what we mean by laying forth creeds/doctrinal statements that clarify what we mean, we will inevitably run into great troubles as we seek to fellowship with those who are actually in great disagreement with us. This forces us to interpret the Bible and use extra-biblical language. Yet, we can then discuss our interpretations with others and seek to sharpen one another and make sure that we are all believing the truth. For as Paul says, we are to speak “the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ” (Ephesians 4:15). We speak and seek the truth—what is the objective, absolutely true meaning of the text. And we do so in a loving, kind manner, putting others first.

Paul himself gives us an example of how we ought to conduct ourselves. There were false apostles in his day, preaching the name of Christ, but preaching a different Christ than he and the other true apostles were preaching (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:13-15). Sure they were preaching one called Christ, yet this one was defined differently than the true apostles defined Him. Paul was preaching Jesus the Christ, the Son of God, the incarnate Word of God, born of a virgin, a descendent of David, who lived a sinless life in the eyes of God, died upon the cross, was buried, rose again from the dead, ascended to the right hand of God, and will return to judge the earth, the only Savior offered by God for mankind, and he was preaching all that He taught.

While Paul’s words in the Scriptures were both infallible and inerrant, we should follow his example, for we are the heirs of his teachings and instructions. We must test the words and interpretations of others against the entirety of the Scriptures and against the proper understanding thereof. This is the only way to keep the Church pure of every blemish and abiding in the truth of God. Communication will breakdown if we do not make clear assertions of what we mean by our understanding of passages of Scripture. We must give clear doctrinal confessions that lay this open for others to see and to critique; for them to agree or to disagree. If we fail to do this, we fail to teach them all Christ has commanded us. Let us flee from this partial Arian captivity of the church and seek to expose with the light of a holistic Biblical perspective and interpretation, errors of others so that correction may occur and so that we may disassociate with those who contradict the doctrines of God. If we do not do this, a full heretical captivity of the church may occur. We must do this for the edification of the Church, and for the Bridegroom who bought her with His own blood.