You Believe What?!

So what exactly do you mean by Church?

"Let's go to Church this morning." "Shoot, I left my sweater at Church." "That practice is not lawful in the eyes of the Church." The word Church gets used lots of different ways. But what exactly do we mean by it? Is it the building where Christians gather. Is it the Christian gathering itself or is it both of these and more? The Anglican Reformers tackled that question in the 39 Articles of Religion. Let's take a look at what they said:

“The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in which the pure Word of God is preached, and the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance, in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same. As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch, have erred; so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of Ceremonies, but also in matters of Faith.” ~ Article XIX.

The Church is a community of faith. The Greek word ekklesia from which we get the word Church in fact means, gathering. That is an essential point right there – we were created for community. Not just community with the living God, who is in fact a community of Persons within His very nature. But we were created to express that community in the world, living out this faith together with one another.

Sadly the American experiment has wreaked more havoc on this essential truth than on any other aspect of our Christian faith. American Christianity, and dare I say, evangelicalism in particular has imbibed the rugged individualism of the American way and as a result the Church, the Bride of Christ is the weaker for it. But Christianity is a communal faith. And to be a part of the Church then is to be a part of the community of the faithful.

And how do we know where the Church of Christ is? It is wherever the Word of God is preached and the Sacraments are duly administered. If you want a quick and easy way to distinguish a cult from the true church, look at what is preached – is it the True Word of God or is it something else. Are home fellowships and Bible studies acceptable substitutes for the Sunday gathering of the Church? What about the Sacraments? Other kinds of groups may express the fellowship of the Church. But they do not express the Church in her fullness

In general Anglicans take Sunday morning worship rather seriously because that is the one place where we, in the fullest sense possible, represent what God intended his Church to be. Do we have fellowship? – You bet. Do we break open the Word of God and sit at His feet and learn from Him? – Absolutely. Do we break bread together and experience the manifest Presence of Christ in our midst? – Praise His Holy Name we sure do! You cannot experience the fullness of the Christian experience, without the gathering of the Church. And guess what – the rest of us can’t experience it fully when you aren’t there either.

We need one another, just as much as we need the Word and the Sacraments. That is why Anglicans begin so many of our prayers with the call and response, “The Lord be with you…And also with you.” It is a recognition that the Lord, by the manifest Presence of His Spirit is with each of us – not just the priest, but all of us. And by acknowledging that we are saying, “I need you to complete this act.” Could I as a priest complete the act of the Eucharist without the congregation praying along with me – I would submit to you that the answer is indeed no. That is why Jesus said to us, “where 2 or 3 are gathered together in my name I am in the midst of them.”[1] We need one another. The Church needs YOU to truly be the Church. And like it or not, you need the church. But enough of my soap box. I digress.

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[1] Matthew 18:20

You Believe What?!

Lex Orandi Lex Credendi (the law of prayer is the law of belief)

One of Anglicanisms favorite sayings is that as we pray so we believe. If you want to understand the Anglican theology of baptism or Eucharist, start by reading through the baptismal and eucharistic liturgies. This principle is also seen in Anglicanism's approach toward the Saints.

Do you venerate the saints?

There is another good question that I get all the time. Anglicanism recognizes a lot of the "official" saints of the Church and even marks their feast days. We celebrate All Saints Day in November as one of the principle feasts of the Christian year. Yet, you claim to be Protestant?! Explain yourself. And so to answer lets take a look at the following prayer and see what it teaches us about Anglicanism's balanced approach toward the Saints.

"Leader: The righteous live forever more;

Response: Their reward also is with the Lord.

Leader: O God the King of Saints, we praise and magnify thy holy Name for all thy servants who have finished their course in thy faith and fear, for the Blessed Virgin Mary, for the holy Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles and Martyrs, and for all other thy righteous servants; and we beseech thee that, encouraged by their example, strengthened by their fellowship, and aided by their prayers, we may attain unto everlasting life; through the merits of thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen." ~ From the Scottish Book of Common Prayer

Note a couple things right off: First, this prayer begins with Scripture, reminding us of the promises of Psalm 37 and the words of Jesus about our reward in Heaven. As always, Anglicanism holds Scripture as THE final authority in questions of belief. Note also that the prayer is not addressed directly to any saint, but rather to God the King of Saints. God is glorified in his people both living and dead and it is ultimately to Him that all our praise is due and to Him all our prayers addressed. He is the source of all good things and so we give Him all thanks for the gift of godly examples.

But then note how the prayer goes on from this foundation, it recognizes the reality of that very first statement, the righteous do live forevermore. They are in fact still living in the very Presence of God before his throne. And as such, we can look to their example of godly living. How many of us benefit from reading the writings and biographies of these great men and women of faith. We can also recognize that the Church is one Church comprised of both those who are here now as well as those who have gone before, one Church in Heaven and Earth. As such we know that when we bow our heads in prayer or when we join together in the words of a hymn or the liturgy, we are praying with all of the "Angels and Archangels and all the company of heaven" (ie the Saints) who forever sing their hymns and pray their prayers before the Father. We really do have fellowship with these and that thought should inspire joy and hope in us. And finally we recognize that they are always praying and worshipping around the throne, so why should we not expect that the members of the Church at rest should not be praying for us the members who are still fighting the good fight here? I have often heard it said, if you go ahead and ask your brother or sister at church to pray for you, why wouldn't you want a brother or sister who has been fully sanctified and who stands face to face with the Father praying for you? In the Revelation we see the prayers of the saints going up from under the altar of God just like incense. Who are they praying for? Certainly not themselves. They have no needs. I believe it is more than reasonable to assert that they are in fact praying for the faithful who have not yet departed - you and me. And that is a very encouraging thought indeed. One which we should pray and thank God for.

And finally, we note once again that all this is done through the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. All prayer is offered in Jesus' name because he is our Great High Priest. All the work of salvation that we and the saints in Glory have experienced comes to us because of him. Our prayers, and theirs are only acceptable because of Him. Even the saints themselves are only acceptable because of the work of Christ that has made them so.

So, there you have it. The Anglican approach toward the saints. They are there. They encourage us through example and through prayer. And their lives are lived only to the Glory of God the Father and His only Son Jesus Christ our Lord, through the Power of the Holy Spirit.

You believe whaat?!

The 39 Articles of Religion

In the first and second centuries AD it was not uncommon for rumors to persist about the Christian community. It was said that they offered human sacrifices and drank blood. Perhaps they were vampires or cannibals? After all, their leader said to eat his flesh and drink his blood. It was said that they practiced infanticide, drowning their own children because their founder told them to. These rumors are perhaps excusable if we seek to put ourselves in the shoes of outsiders hearing about the practices of baptism and communion for the very first time. This only serves to illustrate that an outsider’s perspective is not always the most accurate perception of the beliefs or practices of an otherwise unknown group. One of my aims then in this blog is to dispel some of the myths and put straight the record on what we believe as Anglican Christians (or, as I would prefer it for sake of emphasis, Christians who happen to fellowship and worship in an Anglican style).

Toward this end one of the themes of posting I hope to make a regular feature on this blog will be an exploration of the substance of the Christian faith – what it is that Christians believe. Not simply what Anglicans believe that marks them as distinct; but first, where do Anglicans stand with millions of believers worldwide and throughout history, proclaiming the historic faith of the Church.

The guide that I always come back to in shaping a discussion on Anglican beliefs is a 500-year-old document called The 39 Articles of Religion. The 39 Articles were a summary statement of the essentials of the faith which became necessary as the English Church struggled to sift through the unhelpful and unbiblical practices that had crept into the medieval Roman Catholic Church while Anglicans at the same time tried to avoid the pitfalls of the “anything goes” Anabaptist ethos that emerged on the other side of that continuum. So the Articles were an attempt to codify and preserve an essentially “Reformed-catholicity.”

There are 39 different points to these Articles, but they can helpfully be subdivided into 3 sections. First are the essential foundations of the Christian faith. Then there is a second section that follows from it that spells out some of the implications of this faith in the life of the Christian believer. This section addresses how we relate to the God who has revealed Himself in Scripture and in the God-man Jesus Christ. And finally there is a practical application section. It’s the “so what” section. What does all this mean for the way we organize ourselves as a Church and live out this witness of faith in the world. Clearly this document was written by a bunch of preachers because it is essentially a three-point sermon, divided into 39 sub-points!

In future posts I will explore some of the content of the Articles but today I simply wanted to introduce them to you. You can find a good edition of the Articles online to begin further reading. As always, feel free to post any questions or comments as you do so.

Peace.