In the Name of
one Lord, one faith, one baptism, Ephesians 4:5 NASB
One faith – “‘Religion’ comes from the Latin ligare, meaning to join or bind. Religion binds people within a group – Christian to Christian, Muslim to Muslin, Jew to Jew. More specifically, since some of the most bitter conflicts take place within a faith, it bonds members of the same sect, church or denomination. It invests group solidarity with sanctity. What it does not do is provide people with a reason to be gracious to, or even tolerant of, those outside the group. To be sure, the great monotheisms believe in humanity as such, but other with one significant qualification: you must share our faith to be fully human.”[1]
Sacks is right, of course. More human beings have been killed in the name of religions than by any other justification in human history. Christianity is no exception. Today we see the true colors of Islam; colors that exhibit the sagacity of Sacks’ insight. We decry the outcome, but five hundred years ago it was the Church that slaughtered by the thousands in the name of God and faith. History is a cruel storyteller.
What are we to do with Paul’s apparent exclusivity? If there is only one faith, are all the rest un-faith? Wrong? Condemned? Worthy of extermination? Sacks suggests that the mistake of religion is to think that the chosen are a “master race,” destined to rule in God’s stead. This leads immediately to the conviction that serving God means mastering others. But the Bible teaches that God’s chosen are the servants of all mankind, not its masters. Rather than pride, honor and fame, the chosen are to exhibit humility, responsibility and invisibility. The chosen are the ones who are supposed to call others to God, not to force, dominate or compel others to serve God through serving them. There is a world of difference. Insofar as religion has embraced the idea of master, it has left a trail of blood the width of the Nile on the pages of history.
Paul’s “one faith” is not a faith of the strong, the powerful or the recognized. It is the “one faith” of ignominy. The “one faith” of small acts of compassion, sacrifice and hesed. It is the faith that goes to the cross, not the faith that builds crosses. Yes, it’s true that this “one faith” is faith in the One True God, but that does not mean that the One True God can only be found by ascribing to this “one faith.” God finds His followers everywhere and through all sorts of means. The “one faith” is a statement about our commitment to Him. It sets us apart, but it does not set Him apart from whomever He wishes to pursue. “One faith” tells us that there can be no disunity, no division among us. It does not tell us that God has only one way of revealing Himself. A follower of YHVH is “true to his faith while being a blessing to others regardless of their faith.”[2]
Topical Index: faith, one, religion, Jonathan Sacks, Ephesians 4:5
[1] Jonathan Sacks, Not In God’s Name, p. 182.
[2] Ibid., p. 203.
Good Morning. Skip, does Rabbi Sacks link religion to violence directly per se or is it the dynamics that play out within a group? He talks about altruistic evil. So within a group a person or persons take altruism and turn it into altruistic evil to serve their purpose.
I read this book and it made me admire Abraham for the man he was.
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, [in order] that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, — to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
~ For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them.
And He has given unto us this wonderful message of reconciliation ~
I have the daily nagging feeling that just will not go away. In short, that feeling is that there is something not quite right about the Christian religion. Forget for a moment, that many will claim it is not a religion, but rather a relationship. Maybe it’s in the packaging, marketing, history, backbiting, salvation focus or just plain, attitude of the faith. I’m not sure, but it’s nagging and it is annoying. One Bible, yet at my last hearing, fifty thousand denominations, all claiming that their statements of faith and doctrines are correct and many times, the only one that is correct. So what do we have? Baptist claiming Catholics are ‘not saved’, Catholics claiming, or so they used to, that all Protestants are unsaved. Calvinist claiming only those predestined can be saved. Universalist claiming all will be saved. Evangelist, like say Greg Laurie, claiming that if you want assurance that you will go to ‘Heaven’ when you die, just say this ‘prayer of salvation’. Conservative fundamentalist like John MacArthur claiming that seventy five percent of people sitting in your row at church, are not saved, though they think they are. It’s almost like, God is speaking, yet can’t get a word in edgeways, because of all the chatter and rhetoric from these various talking-heads. Like God is saying, ‘Hello, hello, I am speaking’, but can’t ‘be heard, or seen, or touched’ because of all the denominational noise. Maybe God needs to place a large ‘filter’ over the faith and just shout, ‘shut up and listen’! I want to worship God in truth, and there in is the problem. And that’s why I dig and dig and ask questions. Often times questions make ‘believers’ uncomfortable. But I am looking for truth. I am thankful this Monday for work of Dr. Skip Moen and every other author and thinker who deems worthy, the search for truth and puts in the hard work necessary to help us see God as He intends to be seen. And it that seeing is understanding. And in that understanding is peace and joy. I am happy to be a ‘recovering Baptist’, knowing I don’t have it all nailed and neither does anyone else, at least that I have met, that is human in nature.
David, you beautifully summarize why this recovering Catholic wakes up each day looking forward to Skip and TW complete with mostly succinct, meaningful responses such as yours lately. One day with Skip and friends is better than a lifetime with Augustine. Maybe that’s a really bad analogy.
Might be a bad analogy but it is certainly complementary. Thanks.
I’m not sure if you mean “complementary” or “complimentary” but either way I like it. And you’re welcome. Forever.
Oh, my. Yes, complimentary. Thanks.
David
Well put. You are not alone.
Daviw we are not all feet, hands etc. The tooth can never say I need not the tongue etc… own words. Christians as every other dogma all need each other as for the one the other could not make sense. Could Judaism have survived so long without all these different sects???
Skip very useful tw thanks. Faith determines all not doctrine or religion. I just need to be that one on the cross not creating crosses for others.
Seeker, I think the more relevant question might be “how has Judaism survived 3500 years in spite of Christianity?” If I have to describe myself it is as a “Messianic believer” and anything but as a “Christian” with all the baggage that typically carries for me.
This TW is just what I was thinking about the other day when I commented about a person’s relationship with God and how different groups (denominations)would try to help them define it. I would add other groups including other faiths. One group says you have to do it this way. Another group says no, this is the way you do it. I for one find it irritating when someone has a different interpretation tries to negate mine. That is my experience with God. If someone has had an “encounter” with the One True God, I say Hallelujah! And yes the focus on salvation is scary to me. I don’t think I would want a child of mine to be indoctrinated into that. Just too guilt inducing and narrow in focus.
Doxology is walking out our theology. Maybe the focus has been on theology way too long.
Laura narrow is the path to… and broad is way to destruction. We must just make sure of the theology we study from as that will determine our personal faith…
Theology is an exercise in abstracting compartmentalized ideas from a text that is basically the experience of men and women in the presence or absence of God. Theology is a secondary exercise, not a primary one. As such it is always subject to the paradigm of the one doing the abstraction. No better example of this can be found than my study of the influence of Greek philosophy on the development of the fundamental idea of God’s relation to time (see the book). No man is ever saved by theology, although we would like to claim so because that allows us to capture the truth for ourselves.
Love it. Doxology is walking out our theology, and who has the authority to tell you how you are to give glory to God? In my lecture on Black Fire/White Fire I point out that the rabbis who follow this idea conclude that there are 345,600,000 legitimate interpretations of the text. That should give us some room to talk–and still walk together.
RUN don’t walk.
Skip Sounds like a long walk of faith towards insightt…
Then again the ESV translation refers to insightful understanding as detrimental to ongoing faithful conduct Jude 1…
Sorry with draw this comment… My midnight memory oil runs low the ESV uses the word instinctively and not insightful… My morning revelation and patience seems to be a better approach to life.
This speaks to a realization that I’ve been coming to on my own over the past year or so. It’s not something I’ve talked about much with anyone because it makes people uncomfortable. The non-religious person can’t understand the need for a label or a set path at all. The very religious person can’t see the legitimacy of any path to God but their own. But we are the ones who put limits on God, because it makes us uncomfortable when He is unpredictable. It destroys our ego to think that God called us and approached us and redeemed us and blessed us because of who He is, and not because of our stunningly correct theology. But I for one am thankful that He has never followed my rules about where He should be and how He should behave, because I was an atheist when he confronted me. 🙂
great lesson, Skip. Spiritual arrogance !