Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees!

In recent times there has been an imbalance in some biblical doctrines on which the pendulum of opinion has gone from one extreme to another, leading principles that had somehow been overlooked by most Christians to be the central dogma held by many ministries. In such a way, that these ministries tend to discredit anyone who disagrees with their extreme position. This does not mean there hasn’t been a previous lack of teaching on real issues of Holly Scripture, but the problem is that “fashionable” doctrine; seem to overwhelm those believers who spend their efforts seeking the latest revelation.

This reminds me of toothbrushes propaganda, in which every week appears the only brush that really cleanses teeth and makes the others totally useless. Beloved, this is only possible due to our lack of maturity as believers. However, my concern on this occasion, rather than the well-documented lack of sanity in the ministries that preach only one aspect of the gospel, be it prosperity, ministry, church growth, healing, and therefore incur in doctrinal imbalance; it is to teach something to those ministries that focus on sound doctrine.

It's good that we try to maintain sound doctrine, but for those who talk a lot about being advocates of sound doctrine I have a disclaimer: no one has the perfect doctrine. In theology we often categorize doctrines as first level and second level doctrines, which means that there are things that do not define us as Christians and others that do have such importance, so that we agree on those issues that are central to faith and salvation, and we agree to disagree on those issues that provide denominational identity but are not essential in order to be called Christians.

For example, Pentecostals and Baptists have doctrinal differences, but they all such differences deal with aspects that are not first level, not that they are unimportant, but still we consider each other brothers in Christ. 50 years ago the debate in Venezuela between these two denominations were so heated that bordered on the mutual excommunication, today we’ve overcome intolerance allowing us to work together on multiple initiatives.

This is something essential to be remembered when correcting brethren who hold different views from ours, where the law of love is what must prevail (1 Corinthians 8) above other biblical but secondary criteria, as was the case with the discussion that was raised in the early church about appropriate food, sometimes we are very confident that we are right (and possibly we are) but the issue is to let the law of love prevail in terms of tolerance to divergent opinions, since these opinions do not put our salvation at risk.

But, let us remember that the spirit of human religion is also to be considered a spirit of error since it causes believers to focus only on external and intellectual aspects of their faith and makes them neglect their personal life with the Lord, this results in pastors and ministers who persist in all kinds of sins and in parallel are mounted on a witch hunt against false doctrines. This is the leaven of the Pharisees Jesus spoke in Matthew 16:5-7.

Moreover as I said earlier, no one (except Jesus) has overall doctrinal perfection to always be right in each of the topics touched on Scripture, and sometimes we can be too proud by thinking that we know them all and Over time God shows us that maybe we were wrong. Maturity is the balance and sanity to keep biblical positions with humility, knowing that we are not infallible.

I'm not saying it isn’t right to correct erroneous or out of balance doctrines, but I have seen a greater danger in the Church which I mentioned earlier, and it is greater as it goes undetected. Boast, arrogance and hypocrisy. The Pharisees most times taught correctly divine law (Jesus told his disciples to obey what they said Mt 23:3) but they did not live properly that divine law. Though it is true that nobody knows and understands with absolute certainty all the doctrines of Scripture, there are many things that we can defend with big confidence but there are things we just can’t be dogmatic about and excommunicating our brethren over them is only an act of arrogance.

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. Some reflection after I watched it.

I agree with many things said by fellow believers on this movie (http://christiananswers.net/spotlight/movies/2011/piratesofthecaribbean2011.html#issues) But the reviews generally miss one point which is mostly invisible to the average American, who is not acquainted to African/Caribbean witchcraft and magic. For us Christians living in this area dealing and fighting against evil supernatural evil powers is quite common, though they are at work in America as well they are usually denied, because they aren’t so widely spread as actual religions and because of dominant Christian religious beliefs. But this movie does portray aspects of reality regarding factual sorcery practices (just as Harry Potter does) by mingling regular fantasy with devilish work. Voodoo is Not fantasy. It’s quite real and it’s a terrible enemy to Christianity, just check out news on Haiti and evangelicals for instance. We as Christians should be aware of this fact when dealing with Hollywood’s trivialization of witchcraft practices which are becoming a common personal religion among many world leaders.

REFLECTIONS ON CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY I

True Christian Psychology.

Psychological Christianity versus. Christian psychology.

Throughout my studies in the area of Psychology, and within the Christian scope, I have been in touch with a diversity of people who use the knowledge they have acquired from the “Science of the Mind”, in order to minister or help the members of Christian congregations. Under this approach of work numerous literature has been written, that at the present time occupies the shelves of many Christian bookstores and secular bookstores as well.

Their effort is more oriented than everything to extract specific truths that have been originated and used within each theoretical approach, an then translate them into a Christian language by sustaining them with some Biblical passage. This technique is widely used by pastors, advisors and Christian therapists. The result: even within churches we listen to Freud, Pearls, and Maslow, among others, exposing their ideas through the preaching and during Christian prayer meetings once their scholar language has been translated into a Christian language.

My purpose is not to ridicule the contributions of the different theories, nevertheless, what I have exposed before is the best Christianity has often done to exercise influence within psychology, in fact until now and mainly in the most modern approaches, it is psychology the one that has penetrated Christianity. I consider that Christianity’s worldview, has much more to contribute than just Biblical appointments to corroborate what has been already said by some famous theoretician. In fact, Christianity raises very convincing points of view to explain personality, human conduct, normal and the abnormal behavior, motivations, and so many other concepts that have been basic in our studies on the human mind.

It is important to emphasize that most of the efforts made until now by the majority of Christian psychologists could be labeled as Psychological Christianity, a Christianity that lacks conceptual purity, when trying to cientificize its religion while its fundamental doctrine is altered to adapt it to the most fashionable scientific theory. As an example of the way in which the scientific theories have influenced the most universal religious doctrines, even beyond the field of Psychology, it is enough to consider how the authorities of the Roman Catholic Church decided to deny the historical validity of the facts narrated in the first chapters of the Genesis, failing in favor of the Evolution theory as the most reasonable explanation for the origin of alive beings and forgetting that this is only a THEORY.

The Evolution has still not fulfilled the necessary empirical requirements of origin to be universally accepted as true, in fact; sincerely and in spite of the respect that my catholic and evolutionist friends deserve, I consider that just as it happened with previous theories such as “the Spontaneous Generation”; “The Evolution” as conceived at the moment, though solid and universally accepted as it pretends to be, it will possibly be a past and even shameful position around time, because of the introduction of newer more modern theories, with more reliable foundations, as soon as new scientific paradigms appear.

Which will have to be the position assumed by the Church in case what I mentioned in the previous paragraph actually happens? , Will the church have to adapt her beliefs in order to be updated according to science?, Is not the Bible the same book since its edition was finished at the beginning of our era? The Bible has demonstrated to be able to surpass the stumbling blocks of time, the community of scientists after all has had to recognize in numerous occasions that the Bible was right and they were wrong, and the only reason we could find errors in the sacred book was the deformed way in which we perceived its reality.

(Note: The reader should remember the battle of Louis Pasteur who was a Christian scientist and who faced the scientific community of his time, maintaining that life can’t arise from the inert matter and that only an alive being can give origin to another alive being. Such thing contradicts the majority of modern positions, which postulate that in the primordial world, under certain conditions such as a reducing atmosphere and other highly improbable special circumstances, the first living cell was originated from a series of chemical processes by which the amino acids were transformed into proteins and these were grouped as well, breaking the second law of the thermodynamics, to conform the first organism, everything as result of mere chance).

On the other hand: Who said that the religion must adapt to science? , the principles that sublie it are usually accepted by believers by means of faith, thus are not susceptible to be verified a priori, since the evidences of the reality of its arguments can only be obtained once a person has accepted them as true. This is not what it happens with science, as it would be a terrible mistake,since scientific method will only accept that a statement is valid once pertinent evidences that sustain it are obtained.

According to what I’ve said, Religion does not require being penetrated by scientific principles, unless it wishes to lose its identity; however, science does take elements from any source to put them under its consideration, even philosophy can do it without losing its essence as a studious discipline of the human thought; because the requirements of science are not satisfied by the origin of the arguments that are put under its scrutiny, but by the validity of the evidences displayed in favor of the such.

Then, our effort should consist, not in doing a Christian like application of such-and-such theory, but in offering examples on how it is possible to translate some of the old principles that Christianity and the Bible have defended for centuries, into a comprehensible language for the scientist. Simultaneously, many theoretical explanations can be derived about behavior, once the basic principles of Christianity are extracted, achieving what I call a TRUE CHRISTIAN PSYCHOLOGY.

On the other hand, in order to fulfill the intention mentioned previously, it is necessary to understand in first instance some of the historical foundations that gave origin to Christian world vision, in such a way that it will be possible for us to attain how such facts were associated with its lessons and with the values that it professes.

It is my desire also to fortify the faith of those Christians dedicated to aid professions, that in numerous occasions have been attempted to be ashamed, shut up or still deny their faith, out of fear of social retaliation that they would obtain from their non Christian colleagues, whom although usually do it silently, don’t avoid being harsh, because they are generally oriented towards putting in doubt the professionalism, seriousness and the objectivity of those exerting a profession of psychological attention who embrace the Christian faith with integrity.

The result that I hope we will achieve is not a secular Psychology adapted to a Christian scope in order to reach it or “to enrich it”, but a Christianity that says its truths, which I believe with all vehemence, by using the psychological language in order to fill us with faith, optimism unto life, its hope of eternity or to at least help us to reach a greater understanding of ourselves.

The latest action is by no means mere proselytism, or Isn’t it true that the most serious scholars strive to gain followers for their theories by means of the persuasiveness of their reasoning? So that I consider my effort as totally valid, and I leave it in first instance to God to be the judge, secondly to the reader and thirdly for the future generations to admit or to reject.