A Journal Journey with Brad Jersak’s “Different” Jesus - Day 3

Examining "A More Christlike Word" by Brad Jersak
                                    Day 3 

I begin by adding the main thought from yesterday’s accidental detour around the forward to BJ’s “A More Christlike God”. Perhaps it wasn’t an accident after all! 

Brian Zahnd presents the scenario that many of us have likely found in the Bible the God we wanted to find. The suggestion is that that book will show us who Jesus really is. But how will we know if BJ’s God isn’t the one he wanted to find and the one who found us with his word isn't the real one? 

Okay, now that I’m done that detour, I’m back to the trail at hand. 

Chapter 1: He Grew a Beard! 

Interestingly, BJ begins with a quote by C.S. Lewis (p. 26) that denies the author’s earlier suggestion that we need to choose between God speaking and working through the scriptures, or God speaking and working through his Son. Lewis is quoted as writing, 

“It is Christ himself, not the Bible, who is the true word of God. The Bible, read in the right spirit and with the guidance of good teachers, will bring us to him.” 

Okay, I’m smiling at that one. The Bible is God speaking to us and doing his work to lead us to experience him speaking to us and doing his work through his Son. That is what I see in the Bible, and it appears to contradict what BJ thinks he has found where the word and the Word are in conflict rather than divine cooperation. 

Then, when the BJs’ Brian Zhand is quoted immediately following Lewis, he makes a parallel between what is written of John the Baptist in John 1 and how that could be applied to the Bible. I need to break this down so the false statements are clearly seen. 

Zahnd states the following in his quote: 

1.     “What John’s prologue says of John the Baptist, we can say about the Bible:” Okay, says who?

2.    “‘There was a book sent from God that we call the Bible.” Yes, what we have in the Bible was sent from God, breathed-out by him, and carries that authority.

3.    “‘The Bible came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe.” Yes, no doubt about that. Jesus himself said that “everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled” (Luke 24:44).

4.    “‘The Bible itself is not the light’ it came only as a witness to the light.’” Ok, there’s that pernicious false dichotomy again. The BJ’s demand that we keep thinking that it is not the Bible but only the Christ when the reality is always that it is Christ through the scriptures (contained in the Bible). It’s the same as believers being “the light of the world” (Matthew 5:14), and yet when Jesus says, “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12) we know that does not invalidate what he said about us who are his disciples. Neither would we deny that he is the supreme light (the vine of light) who fills us with light to shine to others (as the branches of light). Scripture does not call us to choose between scripture and the Savior, but, as Lewis already stated, to attach to the Bible as the gift of God that “will bring us to him.” So, the above statement should read something to the effect that the scriptures as contained in the Bible is the light that leads us to the Light, but not that it is not the light.

5.    “This is not a low view of Scripture but a high view of Christ.” Which part? Lewis’s quote certainly fits. What he described is not a low view of scripture, but glorifying God for his word that brings us to the greater Word, Jesus Christ our Lord. On the other hand, Zahnd’s statement is a low view of Scripture because it forces that erroneous idea that the Bible isn’t the light that brings us to the Light. 

I would challenge the claim that BJ’s “heritage habitually and primarily referred to the Bible as “the Word of God.” No, if my own experience with all the evangelical heritage stuff is even close to parallel (I grew up in the same Abbotsford and surrounding area as BJ was when I first heard about him), I have never heard any evangelical refer to the Bible as “the Word of God.” The only way I have heard anything close to this is referring to the Bible as “the word of God.” 

What’s the difference? That “the Word” (upper case W) refers to Jesus, and “the word” (lower case w) refers to the Bible. To use the printed word “Word” as the preferred word for the Bible forces that ugly conflict like we must choose between the two. The reality is that in every church I have been in, every pastor I have ever been under, and every Christian book I have read that had reason to use such a phrase, everyone always distinguished that the Bible (the scriptures) is the “word” of God, and the Savior is the “Word” of God. We glorify Jesus Christ as the “Word” by getting to know him through the “word”! I can’t say the reason for using “Word of God” when printed statements would use “word of God” to speak of the Bible, but it is incorrect and misleading. 

The author gives his “best I remember it” version of the Back to the Bible broadcast theme song. However, he puts “Word of God” in uppercase to make his point, but that isn’t the way we would write it if we were talking about the Bible. The Word is Jesus; the word is the Bible. So, who is using “the Word” for the Bible? Was it Back to the Bible, or is it BJs prejudice on the matter? It again appears to make a false argument that people are raising the Bible to Word-like status when that isn’t the case. 

So, when he asks, “See the issue?” that depends. Do I see the issue of BTTB using “the Word” to refer to the Bible (which I don't believe they did)? Or do I see the issue of BJ using “the Word” to make his case when it is doubtful that is the way BTTB would have used it? At best, this nullifies the point he is making because it isn’t even clear there is an issue since he isn’t quoting the ministry but writing what he remembers in his own words. And, since he said he only listened to the programs, he wouldn’t have seen these lyrics in print and is reading in the suggestion that this ministry would have mistaken “the word” (the Bible) with “the Word” (God’s Son). Again, misleading. 

“The Word is a person.” Yes, of course. Very clear in John 1. 

But the next part begins a serious misrepresentation of the facts. 

“The confusion or conflation of inspired texts with the eternal son of God is deeply problematic, especially when the Bible displaces Christ as the ‘Word of God’ and ‘Scripture alone’ becomes our sole and final authority instead of him.” (p26) 

First, the example he opens this argument with is a strawman. The likelihood that BTTB ministries would have written the “Word of God” about the Bible is slim. At least it is not something the author witnessed, so it is totally unfair to claim they would have used “Word” instead of “word”. 

Second, if there are real examples of Christians or ministries confusing the Bible with the Christ, of course that would be problematic. However, a Christian author misrepresenting ministries and Christians with strawman tactics is equally problematic. 

Third, “especially when the Bible displaces Christ as the ‘Word of God’” is also about whether this is really happening, or whether it continues BJ’s strawman argument. When we view the Bible as the light that leads us to the Light, or the word that leads us to the Word, the “word of God” never displaces the “Word of God”, but, as Lewis stated, it leads us to him. 

And fourth, “and ‘Scripture alone’ becomes our sole and final authority instead of him” also raises the question of whether this is what Christians are really doing when they speak of the authority of the Bible or whether it is the author’s false dichotomy coming through. The "instead" of him invents a conflict where the "final authority" of scripture in a human plane leads us to the ultimate authority of the Word of God overall.

“Still, in the ultimate sense, I contend that Christ alone is the eternal Word of the triune God and, as such, uniquely reveals his Father and unveils the true meaning of the Scriptures as pointing to him” (p. 28). If this means that we get to know the Word through the word (as pointing to him), fine. But if this means we must choose the Word instead of the word (as has been already suggested), not fine. 

Note: through the pages of personal testimony, the author keeps using “the Word” to refer to the Bible instead of “the word”. Not sure of the purpose of that, but it is misleading because it falsely gives the impression that people are thinking of the word as the Word when the author has not shown that to be the case. 

At this point (p.30), I do not buy the idea that when evangelical churches refer to “the Word of God, our final authority for faith and practice,” they had “the Word” as the author contends. It would have been “the word”, acknowledging we were speaking of the scriptures as gathered into the Bible. 

Also, there seems to be the suggestion that when we say that the scriptures are “the final authority for faith and practice”, this is about Christ, as though “the word” was the final authority over “the Word”. I have never heard any evangelical Christian suggest such a thing. 

Rather, the point of these statements was the governing of a congregation that would be filled with ideas and opinions on every matter under the sun, and everyone needed to know that the final authority amongst the people for what the church believed would be the word of God, not a church constitution, not the statement of faith, not traditions, not by-laws, not the Societies’ Act (however that works out in other countries than Canada or other provinces than British Columbia), and certainly not Robert’s Rules of Order! And this was with the faith that by turning people to the word to settle every claim of belief or practice, it would point us to the Word, the true head of the church. 

I simply deny this claim that referring to the Bible (the word) as the final authority in what churches believe or how they behave is in relation to Christ. It is about all the other beliefs and claims of the people in the church, and it would be the word that has authority over all such things because the word leads us to the Word. 

I sympathize with the author’s journey of discovering how Christian academia focused on the Bible independent of the reality of knowing the Christ of the Bible. Been there. However, that doesn’t call for us to swing to the other extreme of Christ apart from the Bible. I contend that both the word and the Word call us to get to know the Word through the word. And as we do, we will love them both for their place in restoring our relationship with God our Father in heaven. 

This suddenly reminds me of something Spurgeon said when he was asked how he reconciled divine election with free will. His reply was something to the effect of, “I don’t need to reconcile friends.” In the same way, I would challenge this idea that us poor church folk are picking between the word and the Word when the reality is that we love the way the word brings us to the Word. And that’s where I’m pitchin’ my tent for tonight so I can pick up my journal journey as soon as I am able on another day.

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.) 

A More Christlike Word © 2021 by Bradley Jersak Whitaker House 1030 Hunt Valley Circle • New Kensington, PA 15068 www.whitakerhouse.com 

Jersak, Bradley. A More Christlike Word: Reading Scripture the Emmaus Way. Whitaker House. Kindle Edition.

 

A Journal Journey with Brad Jersak’s “Different” Jesus - Day 2

Examining "A More Christlike Word" by Brad Jersak

Forward: “Interpreting the Bible in Five Words” Peter Enns

I accidentally downloaded Brad Jersak’s book, A More Christlike God, and was well into my journaling before I realized that wasn’t the one I was asked to examine. So, I’m back to the beginning and starting over with the correct copy! 

First, the five words summarizing biblical interpretation according to Peter Enns. 

·   Genre-calibration – no problem with the sense of that. My personal concern is whether genre is partnered with the timelessness of God’s word that also takes in the contexts of each generation’s contemporary readers.

·   Christotelic – hmmm… sounds okay, but “the gospel requires creative reframing of Israel’s story” needs other parameters.

·   Incarnational – jury’s out on that one. I’ll watch how it is developed.

·   Ecumenical – “Genuine and deep insight into the nature of the Bible and its interpretation comes from Judaism, the Roman Catholic and Orthodox traditions, agnostics, atheists – even mainline Presbyterians.” Not sure about that. Again, how this will be used to make points will be watched carefully.

·   Pilgrimage – yes, we continue to learn and understand the Bible throughout our lifetime. I will be watching to see if this is used to make clear passages of scripture sound uncertain as though we can never know if we have arrived at a proper understanding of the truth (I think there’s something in the Bible about people like that), or whether it will allow for the ways that our understanding grows and matures on what we have already known (seems like Paul talked to someone about that). 

None of these five words are authoritative as the scriptures themselves, so my Berean focus will watch for all the ways one authority is presented over another. My aim is to see what the BJ’s (Brad Jersak and his allies) think us readers should believe, and what is the authority that should convince us to see it that way. 

Preface: Decisions, Decisions 

So much of this depends on where the BJ’s go with it. 

“Everything said in the Bible about God submits to his revelation of the Father.” As long as this includes “everything said”, and as long as submission doesn’t include nullification of what God himself already communicated. 

Part 1: Jesus is the Word of God 

Introduction to Part 1 

Okay, I see why the discrepancies. In quoting Kenneth Tanner, the author presents: 

“If God wants to show humans what he is like, and to make clear in whose image we are made – to show us what it means to be God and what it means to be human – does God send a sacred book or a human who is God?” 

The “or” skews the options. There are three options, not two. 

“The Bible is vital to Christian preaching and central in the life of the church but a book cannot proceed from the Father, a book cannot be one with the Father, a book cannot – as a human person who is God – do what the Father does and say what the Father says.” 

Again, the either/or focus requires throwing out the ways the scriptures do proceed from the Father and do some of what the Father does and say some of what the Father says. I don’t argue about the supremacy of Christ as the Word of God, but this kind of reasoning that forces such contrasting options means that people are required to ignore parts of the picture, how the scriptures speak of the scriptures. Jesus quoted the scriptures, showing us that “every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD/God” included the scriptures he was quoting. He is greater than what is written, but we are not required to choose between the ways God speaks and works through his breathed-out words and the way he speaks and works through his Son, the Word of God even though we know the one way that is superior to the other. 

I suspect this false contrast will be a continuing pebble in this hiker’s shoe as I journey along with BJ’s different Jesus. 

In referring to the above quotes, including the third part, “I love what God says in the flesh of Jesus Christ. One greater than Moses is now here and is human. God sends himself”, BJ concludes, 

“Readers will perceive in this statement dual correction, first of those who habitually displaced Christ with the Bible as the fullness of divine revelation, and second to those who dismiss the authority and inspiration of Scripture.” 

Depends. These are the two extreme swings of the pendulum. But, if the plumbline is defined as Christ instead of the scriptures as God’s breathed-out words (as stated earlier), that isn’t the plumbline. The plumbline would necessarily be centered around the way the Bible and the Christ are the revelation of God, with Jesus Christ clearly having the supremacy. 

At this point, not enough is clear as to how far this division between the scriptures and the Savior will be taken. I see the way two opposing options are presented as the only choices when the one between them (the third option) seems different than the BJ's want to be there. I will need to wait patiently for the next day’s journey and see where it leads.

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)

 

A Journal Journey with Brad Jersak’s “Different” Jesus - Day 1

 Day 1 – Introductory Thoughts

I am beginning a journey through Brad Jersak’s book, A More Christlike Word. How do I feel about it? Mostly ticked. I see Brad Jersak as someone I have already tested and concluded is a false teacher. The expression, “you have been weighed in the balances and found wanting”[1] comes to mind. I don't like wading through resources I've already concluded are counterfeit.

However, when new friends-in-the-faith started posting things on social media that directly denounced what I have been teaching for years, they explained that this author and this book would summarize their views. Sigh. Okay. I trust that God will make this worthwhile. People before problems.

I’m writing this as a journal-journey because I want to be honest with myself about what I’m learning along the way while also watching for how these puzzle pieces fit with whatever else God is teaching me through his word and through my church fellowship. This way I should be able to maintain an objective view of what I read (I hate the kinds of discernment-mongers who misrepresent their targets and then tear to shreds their strawman version of the person they are criticizing). At the same time, I want to be able to admit where I need to adjust my subjective responses with anything new I learn that confirms or denies my suspicions. 

And so, the journey begins. The reviews are daunting. They cause me to consider whether all these people have received something good from this author that I missed when I heard him in person. They also make me wonder if they fit Jesus’ description of “many false prophets will arise and lead many astray”,[2] and Paul’s prophecy of how “evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.”[3] I’m all for discovering things in God’s word I have never seen before, but I’m always watchful with the concern Paul spoke about when he said, “But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.”[4] After all, “the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions”.[5]

My question to myself is, am I embarking on a journey through the scriptures like the Bereans who were excited to search the scriptures to see if what Paul was telling them was true,[6] or does Jesus’ warning to the Pergamum church apply where he rebuked them for holding to the teaching of Balaam and the Nicolations.[7]

As Jesus quoted from the Old Testament when he answered Satan with, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God’”,[8] I want to journey through this book in a totally honest way so that the measure I use to test this teaching is the same one I use to test mine. 

And I head out on this new trail quite certain that it will be for God’s glory and the good of others.

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)

 

 

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[1] Daniel 5:27

[2] Matthew 24:11

[3] II Timothy 3:13

[4] II Corinthians 11:3

[5] II Timothy 4:3

[6] Acts 17:11

[7] Revelation 2:12-17

[8] Matthew 4:4 quoting Deuteronomy 8:3

The Harmonies of God’s Coming Kingdom

THE MORE I meditate on what it means to pray, “your kingdom come,” the more layers of meaning come to the surface of my mind. And just now, at this moment, I heard them in harmony. 

WHAT I MEAN is that there are so many different thoughts about God’s kingdom coming, and so many ways it affects everything about life, and for a moment (in my early morning brain fog) I was struggling to try to hold on to all the thoughts. But suddenly I was hearing them all at the same time without any discord in my mind. They were in harmony. They blended into one beautiful expression of God’s rule and reign over the universe and filled my heart with hope about how to pray for God’s kingdom to come, and how to live in light of this coming. 

SO, WHAT harmonies of the kingdom do I hear this morning? 

I HEAR the “good news of great joy” that God has given us his Son to be the Savior of the world. I hear the “gospel of the kingdom”, that “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand,” so we must “repent and believe in the gospel”, or, “repent and believe the good news” of the kingdom of God’s beloved Son!  

I HEAR the wonderful good news that the blessings of God are seen in the poor in spirit, and those who mourn, and the meek, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, and the merciful, and the pure in heart, and the peacemakers, and those who are persecuted for the sake of the righteousness of Jesus’ kingdom. 

I HEAR that the righteousness of Jesus’ kingdom makes his brothers the salt of the earth and the light of the world. I hear Jesus singing out how the righteousness in his kingdom exceeds the righteousness of the religious elite, the religious hypocrites who do all their good deeds for show. The righteousness of Jesus’ kingdom is a real, genuine experience of the activity of God in our hearts. God gives us the new hearts he promised to the prophets. We can now be righteous by faith in Jesus Christ in ways that could never happen by keeping laws and rules, even the very best system of laws and rules the world has ever known, what is now the old covenant. 

I HEAR how the stanza of the song of the kingdom is now playing out the glorious harmonies of how to pray according to the righteousness of faith so that we are filled with the knowledge that our heavenly Father knows everything we need before we ask him for a thing, and so we are not going to babble on in prayer hoping our many words will get us what we want, but we attach to “our Father in heaven,” and then ask that his name would be hallowed, honored, and revered in our lives, that his kingdom would come both now and at the end of the age, and that his will would be done here on earth in the same ways it is done in heaven. 

AND BECAUSE we are those who are always seeking first the kingdom and righteousness of God instead of the things of the world, we ask him to “give us this day our daily bread” knowing that he will give us what we need, sometimes through our own employment, and sometimes through the sharing of the body of Christ. We pray that the church would be a place where we are always confessing our sins to one another (however it is needed where we have wronged someone or they have wronged us) so that we keep being forgiven as we keep on forgiving. And we are always seeking God to “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil”, or from the evil one and his evil ways. 

I ALSO HEAR the harmony of how Jesus concludes his Sermon on Mount where he gives the illustration of the wise and foolish builders. I hear the beautiful sound of the wise builder who hears Jesus’ words and puts them into practice, and I hear the mournful sounds of the foolish builder who hears Jesus’ words but does not      put them into practice, and so I know how to pray that God’s kingdom would come to us in power and glory so we would be known as those who love to do God’s will just like Jesus. 

AND I HEAR the realities of the new covenant that tell me that there is also a future aspect to the coming of God’s kingdom. I know that God has already “made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father,” and that we are to live accordingly right now in every aspect of our lives. But I also know that we are always waiting for Jesus’ “appearing and his kingdom”. We are looking forward to when we will have our “entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” in a way that can only happen at Jesus’ return when he comes to judge the lost and gather the elect to himself. 

I HEAR how Jesus could say as with one set of instruments in the orchestra, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age”, and with another set promise, “Surely I am coming soon”! to which the rest of us harmonize with our brother John, “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!”

MY POINT is that God’s kingdom is always coming. It is coming near to people all the time through the presence of the church Jesus is building, and through the ongoing proclamation of the “good news of great joy” that God has given us his Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord. 

BUT GOD’S KINGDOM is still to come. It is coming. It is on its way. It has not yet arrived. The final consummation of all God’s work in the coming of Jesus Christ is yet to happen, and we are constantly asking Father, “your kingdom come!” “Come, Lord Jesus!” 

OH, AND one more thing: you and I are adding our own harmonies to Jesus’ teaching on prayer. If we are in Christ, we are equipped with new hearts and new minds and new life that is fully able to pray as Jesus instructed. We can pray from our new hearts with the righteousness of faith that wants everything Jesus taught in his model prayer. When we pray it, it is our prayer. It is our harmony to the “golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.” 

AND EVEN if we all were to pray the exact words of Jesus’ model prayer all at the same time, guess what: it would sound like the most beautiful harmony in the world to hear the voices of “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’”

AND SO, we pray as Jesus taught. We pray this model prayer in our own words, describing our own situations and circumstances, praying each request for the people in our lives, and the things we are going through, so that all our thoughts and prayers rise up to the Father in harmony with one another so that our Father in heaven is always hearing us praying together that his name would be hallowed, and his kingdom would come, and his will would be done on earth as it is done in heaven, and that he would provide the daily bread for all his children throughout the whole world, and that he would forgive us our sins as we confess them to him just as we forgive everyone who confesses their sins to us, and that he would lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil and the evil one, because, after all, HIS is the kingdom, and HIS is the power, and HIS is the glory for ever and ever, Amen! 

SO, LET’S raise our crescendo of prayer like we believe and know that everything Jesus taught us is TRUE!

 

© 2024 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8

Email: in2freedom@gmail.com

Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.)