Universalism: Isn’t God gonna save everybody?

UNIVERSALIST ju.nə'vər.səl.əst adjective. Believing all humanity will (eventually) be saved.

Generally, pagans believe good people go to heaven, and bad people to hell. There’s a minority among them who believe there is no hell—not even for genocidal maniacs; everybody goes to the same afterlife, and if you’re a westerner that’d be heaven. There might be some karmic consequences to the afterlife, like you might find yourself in the suckier part of heaven; but it’s all heaven, so it’s not that bad.

The reason many pagans believe this, is because they believe the universe is benevolent, or believe God is love. Which he is! 1Jn 4.8 And he does love everyone; “for God so loved the world” Jn 3.16 and all that. So they figure a loving God would never throw people into hell, especially for something so minor as not believing in him—which is an honest mistake, most of the time. Hardly sound loving of God to toss someone into hell simply because they were born in a part of the world where they were never taught God properly, be it North Korea, Nepal, Mali, or Mississippi.

Now I agree God’s unlikely to smite people for honest mistakes. But I also seriously doubt the bulk of humanity’s mistakes are honest ones. Face it: Lots of us embrace our God-beliefs purely out of convenience, pragmatism, or selfishness. That Iranian who’s never gonna hear the gospel: He already wouldn’t listen to it if offered. If he honestly wanted to hear the gospel, it doesn’t matter what filters his nation puts on the internet; he’d track down Christians (there actually are some in Iran) and ask questions. Or Jesus might personally appear to him, as he does throughout Christian history, beginning with Paul. (No, that wasn’t just a one-time deal.)

Or that American whose parents raised her a militant atheist: No matter how skeptical and free-thinking she claims to be, she honestly doesn’t wanna challenge her parents’ claims, and examine whether there’s anything to this God stuff. If she did, the first miracle she experienced would shatter her atheism like a cinderblock through safety glass.

Honest mistakes are like Calvinism: People try to defend God’s sovereignty, go overboard, and wind up teaching God’s secretly evil. But if they’re honest mistakes, these people are nonetheless pursuing God despite their errors. And the Holy Spirit’s still producing love and patience and kindness in them, and still letting ’em into his kingdom. (Unless they’re only pursuing clever arguments, producing no fruit, and wind up some of those poor souls who’re mighty shocked Jesus doesn’t recognize ’em. Mt 7.23) The whole “honest mistakes” cop-out is a convenient excuse to ignore God, avoid obeying him, and dodge religion, church, and Christians.

It’s a risky little game they’re playing, for Christ Jesus says not everyone’s getting saved.

Matthew 7.21-23 GNT

21“Not everyone who calls out to me, ‘Lord! Lord!’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Only those who actually do the will of my Father in heaven will enter. 22On judgment day many will say to me, ‘Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and cast out demons in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ 23But I will reply, ‘I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.’”

That’s the people who really thought they were Christian. How much chance does the “honestly mistaken” nontheist have? Well, God is gracious, so we’ll see.

Though God absolutely does wants everyone saved, 1Ti 2.4 he knows full well many people want nothing to do with him. Nor his kingdom. They don’t want saving. Since God did create ’em with free will, he permits them to tell him no. He won’t force ’em into his kingdom. They don’t have to enter. But man alive are they gonna hate the alternative.

Jesus’s resurrection: If he wasn’t raised, we’re boned.

Of Christianity’s two biggest holidays, Christmas is the easier one for pagans to swallow. ’Cause Jesus the Nazarene was born. That, they won’t debate. There are a few cranks who think Jesus’s life is entirely mythological, start to finish; but for the most part everyone agrees he was born. May not believe he was miraculously born, but certainly they agree he was born.

Easter’s way harder. ’Cause Jesus the Nazarene rose from the dead. And no, he didn’t just wake up in a tomb after a two-day coma following a brutal flogging and crucifixion. Wasn’t a spectral event either, where his ghost went visiting his loved ones to tell them everything’s all right; he’s on a higher plane now; in time they’ll join him. Nor was it a “spiritual” event, where people had visions or mass hallucinations of him, or missed him so hard they psyched themselves into believing they saw him.

Christians state Jesus is alive. In a body. A human body. An extraordinary body; apparently his new body can do things our current bodies can’t. But alive in a way people recognize as fully alive. Not some walking-dead zombie, nor some phantom. Jesus physically interacted with his students, family, and followers, for nearly a month and a half before physically going to heaven.

That, pagans struggle with. ’Cause they don’t believe in resurrection. Resuscitation, sure; CPR can keep a heart going till it can beat on its own, or doctors can revive frozen people. Returning from the dead happens all the time. But permanently? In a new body? Which he took with him to heaven? They’re not buying it. They’re more likely to believe in the Easter Bunny.

But that’s the deal we Christians proclaim on Easter: Christ is risen indeed.

It’s not the central belief of Christianity; God’s kingdom is. But if Jesus didn’t literally come back from the dead on the morning of 5 April 33, it means there’s no such kingdom, and Jesus is never coming back to set it up. And nobody’s coming back from death. There’s no eternal life; at best an eternal afterlife, which ain’t life. There’s no hope for the lost. The Sadducees were right. Christianity’s a sham. There’s no point in any of us being Christians.

No I’m not being hyperbolic. This is precisely what the apostles taught.

1 Corinthians 15.12-19 KWL

12 If it’s preached Christ is risen from the dead,

how can some of you say resurrection of the dead isn’t true?

13 If resurrection of the dead isn’t true, not even Christ is risen.

14 If Christ isn’t risen, our message is worthless. Your faith is worthless.

15 Turns out we’re bearing false witness about God: We testified about God that he raised Christ!

Whom, if it’s true the dead aren’t raised, he didn’t raise.

16 If the dead aren’t raised, Christ isn’t risen either.

17 If Christ isn’t risen, your faith has no foundation.

You’re still in your sins, 18 and those who “sleep in Christ” are gone.

19 If hope in Christ only exists in this life, we’re the most pathetic of all people.

No resurrection, no kingdom, no Christianity. Period.

Trusting God… versus trusting doctrine.

I’ve posted before about the “doctrines of grace,” as Calvinists call ’em—the things they believe about God and how he saves us. The doctrine they focus on most is God’s sovereignty, which they believe is so absolute, it overrides everything else: Everything in the universe happens because God decreed it.

Not merely allowed it to happen, even though he could totally intervene if he wants, ’cause he’s almighty and unlimited. Determined it would happen. Everything happens because God has a singular plan for the universe, meticulously decided what’d happen and what wouldn’t, and it’s playing out right now. It’s all part of the plan. Trust the plan. Trust God.

Calvinists call this “the doctrine of sovereignty”—doctrine being one of Christianity’s formal fixed beliefs. It’s something they insist Christians must believe. Not should believe; not can believe, ’cause it’s optional. To them, it’s not. You must believe it, if you call yourself Christian. If you don’t—if in fact you teach otherwise—you’ve gone wrong. You’re heretic. Or worse, you’re not even Christian.

So since I dare to say the “doctrine of sovereignty” is fatalistic rubbish which comes more from Platonism than the scriptures, certain Calvinists are convinced I’m heretic. Or, again, not even Christian.

One of ’em put it to me thisaway recently: “I trust God. You don’t.”

No, you trust your doctrine. Which isn’t God. Although you might not recognize the difference. There is one, y’know.

Word!

John 1.1-5.

I’ve written previously about when God became human. Now let’s look at God before he became human. Beginning with the beginning of the Gospel of John.

John 1.1-5 KWL

1 In the beginning is the word.

The word’s with God,

and the word is God.

2 This word is in the beginning with God.

3 Everything comes to be through the word,

and not one thing, nothing, comes to be without him.

4 What came to be though the word, is life.

Life’s the light of humanity.

5 Light shines in darkness,

and darkness can’t get hold of it.

“The word” which the author of John wrote of, exists at the beginning of creation. Is with God. Is God. And is the means by which everything is created.

And round 7BC, this word became a human we know as Jesus of Nazareth. Christians recognize him as the Christ.

Why’d the author of John (and for convenience we’ll just assume he’s John bar Zebedee; he probably is) use “word” to describe the pre-incarnate Jesus? You realize this passage is the reason so many Christians are hugely fascinated by the word “word” (and its Greek equivalent λόγος/lóyos, which they mistransliterate logos and pronounce all sorts of ways; and sometimes its Aramaic equivalent ܡܐܡܪܐ/memrá), and have written endless things about the Word of God. Some of it is extremely profound and useful… and some of it is sour horsepiss. I grew up hearing a lot of both.

This John passage tends to get translated in past tense. The KJV famously renders it, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Which is fine; the beginning of time and creation of the cosmos did happen in our past. But most of this passage was written in the aorist tense, a verb tense which is neither past, present, nor future. It has no time connected to it. You have to figure its time from other verbs in the passage, or from context. Well, there is a verb in this passage with a time-based tense; the present-tense ἦν/in from καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος/ke Theós in o lóyos, “and the word is God.” He is God, present tense. God at creation, and never stopped being God.

Okay, now to the concept of λόγος/lóyos. It literally means “word.” Why’d John use it?

For centuries, Christians presumed lóyos comes from ancient Greek philosophy. Blame ancient gentile Christians. As non-Jews, they had no idea what Pharisees taught about the lóyos of God—or as the Aramaic-speaking Pharisees called it in Jesus’s day, the memrá of God. They usually figured whatever the Pharisees taught was wrong, hypocritical, and heresy, so they ignored it altogether.

Instead they interpreted bible through the lens of their own culture. Which was wrong then, and is wrong now. Yet Christians still do it. But that’s a whole other rant; let’s get back to criticizing ancient Christian gentiles.

Ancient Greek philosophers had written a whole bunch of navel-gazing gibberish about the word lóyos. ’Cause they were exploring the nature of truth: What is it, how do we find it, how do we prove it, how do we recognize logical fallacies, and what’s the deal with words which can mean more than one thing? For that matter, what’s a “word” anyway? Is it just a label for a thing, or is it a substantial thing on its own? Maybe that’s why God can create things by merely saying a word. Ge 1.3 And so on.

Follow the Greek philosophers’ intellectual rabbit trails, and you’ll go all sorts of weird, gnostic directions. Which is exactly what gentile Christians did.

Now let’s practice some actual logic. John wasn’t a gentile; he was a Galilean Jew who grew up attending, and getting the equivalent of a middle-school education in, Pharisee synagogues. So let’s look at that culture: What’d Pharisees teach about what a memrá is and means?

Turns out Pharisees had a lot of interesting ideas attached to it.

Proud heretics.

Some months ago a coworker asked me what “heretic” meant. Apparently there’s a brand of wine called Heretic, and a northern California microbrewery called Heretic Brewery, and she wanted to know whether it’s a liquor term.

I was kinda curious about that myself later, so I looked it up. It’s not. But my internet search led me to a company called Heretic Spirits, who had this on their website:

HER·E·TIC /'herəˌtik/ a person holding an opinion at odds with what is generally accepted.

Heretics are driven by new ideas and experiences. They possess a soul that yearns for the nourishment of new and exciting sensory experiences. We call this the Ravenous Soul and it represents the core of all that we do.

Okay, you will find their definition in a typical dictionary. But it’ll be the second definition; the one developed much later than the original definition, which is “a person or belief which differs from established religious orthodoxy.”

The word descends from the Latin hæreticus and the Greek αἱρετικός/eretikós, “able to choose.” Over time, Christians used it to describe those who’d chosen poorly. Wrongly. Incorrectly. Dangerously so, ’cause if you believed some of the junk Christian heretics taught, you could profoundly undermine your relationship with God, if not destroy it.

But to be succinct, I usually refer to heretics as people who are wrong. And that’s what I told my coworker “heretic” means: Wrong.

“Wrong?” she said. “Why would you name your wine ‘wrong’?”

Because heretics don’t think they are wrong.

Anti-theology: How’s it working for you?

If you’re the sort of person who groans inwardly whenever I write yet another one of these theology articles, you’re likely anti-theology: You consider theology to be useless speculation about who God is, and about how salvation works, and you wish Christians would just stop it with all the guesswork. Get to the practical stuff!

Which practical stuff? Depends on the Christian.

• We got the sort who thinks Christianity is meant to soothe people. Agitated because you’re not sure God loves you?—relax; he does. Agitated because of some deficiency you think you have?—relax; God’ll fix that or cure you. Agitated because you’re not sure you’re going to heaven?—relax; you are. Agitated because the world is crap?—relax; Jesus is returning.
• We got the sort who thinks Christianity’s primary job is to denounce sin. Loudly. Angrily. Because we gotta warn sinners away from hellfire! We gotta tell them hell is real, and they’re going there unless they repent! If we don’t do something about the sin, God’s gonna smite America with tornadoes and atmospheric rivers and plague and critical race theory! I forget which of the horseman that was, but it’s one of them.
• We got the sort who thinks Christianity is meant to make us blessed and highly favored, and wealthy. Who thinks we learn the secrets of prayer, God will answer every request with yes and amen, and we’ll get everything we ever wished for, like Aladdin’s genie but with infinite wishes. Pity nobody seems to know the secrets of prayer but Pastor, whom God gave the mansion and the Gulfstream jets. Maybe if we give him money he’ll clue us in.
• We got the sort who covet power, and heard the Holy Spirit grants supernatural gifts to Christians, so they want some. How do we activate these gifts? How can we become prophets, or faith-healers, or do mighty miracles? How can we get a revival started in our churches, and use it to boost our attendance, boost donations, and finally afford some of the things our churches have always wanted to buy? Let’s get a swimming pool!—we can use it for baptisms and youth group pool parties!
• We got the sort who thinks Christianity is meant to take over our country like its Founders always intended, and the reason they go to church is to network with fellow party members. Shh, don’t tell the IRS that’s what we’re really up to. And don’t tell the FBI, lest they find the stash of guns in the basement. If the guns make you anxious, don’t be!—they’re for the End Times.
• We got the sort who wants to know which current events are actually part of the End Times. They want our preachers to start interpreting the news this way. They wanna know whether the rapture’s coming, and how soon. They wanna know who the Beast is. (But don’t you dare tell ’em it’s Donald Trump. It’s not. Though yeah, he frequently acts beastlike.)
• And we got the sort who just wants to be left alone. They just wanna go to church, sing nice songs, hear nice sermons, take holy communion, and be under no obligations whatsoever to do anything further. Don’t have to donate money; rich people can fund the church without ’em. Don’t have to share Jesus with their neighbors; they can mass-mail flyers. Don’t have to change their lives at all. Salvation’s a free gift, after all.

And so forth. I used to attend a church which regularly held self-improvement classes of all sorts: How to improve your marriage. How to handle your finances better. How to rein in your out-of-control kids. (More spanking, apparently.) How to deal with the Jehovah’s Witnesses when they came to your door. All these classes were supposedly based on “biblical principles”… and yeah, some of these principles were acquired in some very iffy ways. But people really appreciated these classes. Self-help books are really popular with just about everyone, y’know… and whenever you Christianize them, Christians just love them.

So yeah, many a Christian would much rather have that than theology. Certainly much rather I blog about that than theology.

But how do you know I’m even giving you good advice? How do you know I’m not just taking the same old philosophy you find among pagans, slapping Christian labels all over it, and pretending it’s biblical? You know, like Christian counselors who paste Christian stickers over Freudian psychology of the self, and tell people the id body, ego soul, and superego spirit are how God actually created us to think. Or like when John Eldredge took the Mythopoetic Men’s Movement, added a bunch of bible stories and verses, and tells men it’s right and biblical to indulge their fleshly human impulses to be sexist and bossy… and kinda toxic.

How do you know I’m not just leading you utterly astray with my “proper Christian worldview”?

Didja guess I was gonna answer “Theology”? Goody!

Fruitless theology.

If Christian theology doesn’t produce good fruit, it’s either worthless or wrong.

Felt I’d better not bury the lede. Because, sad to say, Christian theologians too often go the fruitless route. And that’s why so many Christians dismiss theology as irrelevant, as nothing but a bunch of philosophers trying to reduce the Christian life to a bunch of navel-gazing theories which have no practical use. In the hands of fleshly Christians, that’s precisely what it becomes.

I was reminded of this recently, ’cause I read a dialogue between two Christians debating politics. (If you really wanna suck all the Jesus out of Christianity, watch Christians debate politics sometime. Better yet, don’t.) These guys didn’t just condemn one another’s beliefs; they condemned one another. Full-on ad hominem attacks. Both accusing one another of being depraved, selfish individuals; the conservative claiming the liberal only wanted the freedom to sin, and the liberal accusing the conservative of lacking God’s love for humanity. As conservatives and liberals usually do.

I wrote on this same subject years ago for another blog; at the time it was a debate between a Calvinist and a Catholic. Again, personal attacks instead of substance. Both of them felt they were right, and it justified them punching away at one another.

It’s typical depraved human nature. But it drags Christianity, and Christian theology, through the mud.

God has forgiven you.

Frequently I meet Christians who can’t stop praying the “forgive me” prayer.

• Sometimes because it’s already part of their rote prayers. “Forgive us our debts” (or “trespasses”) is already part of the Lord’s Prayer, y’know. And part of many other memorized prayers.
• Sometimes because they sin a lot. All Christians sin, but these folks figure they sin way more than average—and let’s be honest; maybe they do! So they have a lot to apologize to God about.
• Sometimes because they’re under the misbegotten belief that once you become Christian, you spontaneously stop sinning. Well, they’ve not stopped sinning… so they’re kinda worried about their salvation. Did the sinner’s prayer take?—’cause sometimes it doesn’t.
• And sometimes because they’re in one of those dark Christian churches which tell them every time they sin, it’s like they personally have crucified Jesus all over again. Which, if you’re the literal-minded type, is a traumatizing thing to believe. So of course these folks are begging forgiveness all the time.

Lemme address that last idea a bit more. The whole “crucifying Jesus all over again” idea comes from this verse:

Hebrews 6.6 KJV

If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

In context it’s not talking about just any sins. The author of Hebrews is writing about apostasy—about quitting Jesus—and how Christians who’ve had the full experience of God’s grace and the Holy Spirit’s supernatural power can’t just casually quit Jesus, then come back. These people didn’t quit Jesus; they sinned, but they didn’t commit that sin.

Problem is, dark Christians are gonna insist they kinda did commit that sin. If every sin alienates God (and it doesn’t), then every sin is functionally the same as quitting Jesus. Every sin is apostasy. Every sin has the power to plunge us into fiery hell: If we die with unrepented, unconfessed sin in our lives, we’re going to the hot place. Yeah God is gracious, but not that gracious.

So you can see why these people are constantly begging God’s forgiveness: They think they’re constantly dangling over hellfire, and their relationship with God is like a thin bungee cord which might not actually be able to hold their weight.

It’s awfully hard to think of God as love when you’re living with this kind of stress. Sure doesn’t feel like love. Feels like God is only moments away from pouring a bowl of heavenly fire upon you. Feels like the sins of the world might trigger the same response upon our country too… which is why so many dark Christians are big fans of Christian nationalism: Screw democracy; we gotta purge evildoers! But I digress; let’s get back to their mental picture of a very unforgiving God.

Okay. In God’s process of salvation, at what point do you believe he forgives you?

Those who don’t use bible as a source of revelation.

So I wrote about how the bible’s a source of revelation, and how it can be a useful tool as we Christians develop good theology. Problem is, not everybody who calls themselves Christian does this. Whether unintentionally or deliberately, way too many of us don’t bother with bible at all.

Whenever I bring up this fact with certain Evangelicals, thanks to certain prejudices they have, they immediately think of mainline churches. The assumption they typically have, is old-timey churches don’t bother with bible; their theology is based on feel-good junk. This assumption’s not based on anything valid, ’cause I’ve visited and studied the history of mainline churches, and know a few of their pastors. Their churches’ official doctrines are based on longtime traditions… and these traditions are regularly based on bible.

Don’t believe me? Look at their catechisms. A catechism is a list of a church’s official doctrines, frequently presented in the form of a list of frequently asked questions, ’cause it’s easier to memorize that way. They regularly encourage children and newbies to memorize ’em so they know exactly what Christianity—more accurately, their church—teaches.

17. “What is the chief end [by which they mean purpose] of man?”
1. “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and enjoy him for ever.”

Now, does that question-and-answer pair come from bible? Kinda.

1 Corinthians 10.31 KJV

Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.

 

Psalm 145.1-2 KJV

1 I will extol thee, my God, O king;

and I will bless thy name for ever and ever.

2 Every day will I bless thee;

and I will praise thy name for ever and ever.

That question and answer is based on bible. Most of the catechisms connect right back to bible. Or at least they claim to; every once in a while you’ll find a Q&A where you’ll balk: “Wait, is that what the bible meant?” and no, not really. Catechisms are the work of humans y’know, and humans make mistakes.

Hence every so often there’s gonna be an official teaching of that church where y’might wonder, “How’d they come up with that?”—and nope, it’s not from bible. The church’s founder, or one of its more famous preachers, or some significant author, coined it. The people of that church thought it sounded like godly wisdom—and hey, maybe it is! But maybe it’s not. And either way, since it’s not bible, it’d better be consistent with bible. At the very least it’d better not contradict it!

So that’s what you’ll find in mainline churches: People who are trying to be consistent with the scriptures. But also consistent with their traditions. Traditions are very important to them!—they help connect ’em with one another, and with the Christians of the past. Likewise they figure those traditions are ultimately, originally based on the apostles’ teachings, i.e. bible: We shouldn’t find any contradictions between them.

Yeah, those people with hangups about how biblical mainliners are, don’t really know any mainliners.

Me, I’m not necessarily even thinking of mainliners and catechisms. I’m thinking of heretics. ’Cause I know a few.

The bible as a source of revelation.

Many Christians firmly believe the only way God reveals himself to humanity is through the bible. Which contradicts what we find in the bible.

When I talk about our sources of revelation, the’s bible most definitely one of them. Certainly a primary source. But in the scriptures themselves, God first reveals himself to humans with a God-appearance: He hangs out with Adam and Eve. Ge 3.8 The humans ruined those original regular visitations—but no, their sin didn’t drive God away; sin doesn’t do that. God still appeared to people from time to time in the scriptures, and of course he became Jesus.

And there’s the other forms of revelation—all of which we see in Genesis. We get miracles. We get God speaking back to people in prayer. We get dreams and prophets. And while Genesis doesn’t really talk about revelation from nature (despite what young-earth creationists claim) plenty of people claim it’s a legit form of revelation, and point to it often.

The bible is the product of all these sources of revelation. People saw God, or heard him when he spoke, or saw the miracles he empowered. If they didn’t see any of that, they at least heard his prophets speak for him. They recorded these things—and that’s our scriptures. That’s bible.

The difference between bible and other forms of revelation, is the bible’s been repeatedly confirmed as reliable. In its day, and many times since. Yes, even Revelation—even though the visions talk about the very end of history, plenty of it is about its present day, and that stuff came to pass. It’s why ancient Christians kept it. I can’t help it that “prophecy scholars” make tons of wild claims that everything has yet to happen—and y’all believe them. Don’t. They know not what they do.

The fact the bible’s been confirmed is why we kept its books: Why keep supposed “revelations from God” which haven’t been proven? And since they have been, we Christians consider the scriptures faithful and reliable revelations of God. If you want to fact-check it again, go right ahead; it can stand up to scrutiny, which is why we Christians have historically trusted it. Archaeologists still keep digging up stuff which confirms it—sometimes in ways they never expected, ’cause their discoveries put a whole new spin on the scriptures.

Now, with every other source of revelation, we still have to confirm them. We gotta watch miracles to see whether they produce the sort of good fruit we should see in God’s handiwork. We gotta confirm prophecy, prayer messages, and dreams, lest people were mistaken, or were tricked, or are lying. But with bible, not so much. From the time the very first books were written, all the way to today, God’s followers have confirmed and re-confirmed and re-re-confirmed the scriptures are valid. Solid. Trustworthy. Relevant. Consistent with who God is.

Humility, and the “cage-stage” Christian.

The starting point of theology may be revelation, but the first principle of theology is humility: Recognizing we’re wrong about God, and Jesus is right, and following Jesus so we can know God better.

The purpose of theology isn’t to learn so much that we become God-experts, then correct everyone else around us. It’s to correct ourselves. Our beliefs. Our poor character. Our bad attitudes. Jesus may have redeemed us, and granted us access to God’s kingdom, but we still suffer from a depraved sense of selfishness, and need the Holy Spirit’s help and power to overcome that, and become like Jesus—the only human who ever did it right.

The problem? A lot of Christians have utterly skipped this first theology lesson. Or weren’t paying attention, ’cause we were too busy staring at the syllabus. Or promptly forgot all about it, ’cause all our new knowledge puffed us up. However it happened.

Hence too many of us imagine theology’s first principle is, “I was wrong. But now I’m not! Jesus fixed me.” Supposedly when he gave us new life, he also gave us a new nature. His nature. And now we have a Jesus nature, and fruit of the Spirit now grows in us spontaneously on its own, and we have the mind of Christ. 1Co 2.16 Whatever we think… it’s miraculously just as Jesus thinks. All our motives are good and pure and noble and godly. We have arrived.

And if you claim we haven’t… well, [UNNATURAL ACT] you. I have the mind of Christ, and you’re just some dirty heathen who thinks he’s Christian, but you probably voted for the other guy, didn’tcha? Who are you to claim I’m just as corrupt as before I came to Christ? You don’t know Christ. I do. [Cue Genesis’s “Jesus He Knows Me.”]

I run into Christians with this mindset all the time. They’d be the folks who email me to explain, patiently or in full fiery wrath, why I’m wrong and heretic and going to hell. Or who show up on discussion boards to loudly, angrily correct everybody who varies ever so slightly with their infallible doctrines. Back when they were pagan, they’d get this way about plenty of other subjects, like politics and Star Wars. Now they do it with doctrine. Or apologetics.

There’s a term the Calvinists use when their young, overzealous theologians get like this—when they’re a little too enthusiastic about “the doctrines of grace,” and forget to be gracious altogether. Calvinists call it “the cage stage.”

Revelation: The starting point of theology.

REVELATION rɛv.ə'leɪ.ʃən noun. A previously unknown fact [about God], often surprising or dramatic.

2. An act [usually God’s] of making the unknown known.

3. [capitalized] Christ Jesus’s apocalypses of the future, given to John of Patmos; the last book of the New Testament.

[Reveal rə'vil verb, revelator 'rɛ.vəl.eɪt.ər noun, revelatory 'rə.vɛl.ə.tɔ.ri adjective, revelational rɛv.ə'leɪ.ʃ(ə)n.(ə)l adjective.]

When I first taught theology, I found whenever I spoke about revelation, Christians nearly always assumed I’m talking about the book. And half the time they think the book’s called Revelations, with an -s. And half that time, when they write it out, they put an apostrophe on the -s, for no reason. Don’t get me started about the overuse of apostrophes.

But revelation, without an -s, refers to anything God reveals to us humans. That’s all revelation is: If God tells you something—and you didn’t already know it, or couldn’t have deduced it on your own; you needed him to reveal it to you—it’s revelation. God revealed something to you.

Yeah, you couldn’t have deduced it on your own. If the weather forecast tells you, “Bring and umbrella,” and God tells you, “No really, bring an umbrella,” that’s technically revelation, but big deal. It’s not gonna stretch and grow your faith when God repeats what your Echo Dot just said. Now if the forecast says, “Sunny and 80 degrees,” and God says, “But bring an umbrella,” and later that day you find yourself in the middle of a thunderstorm nobody predicted: Okay, now it’s more obvious you heard something from the Almighty.

That’s the thing about revelation: It’s obviously a God-thing. “Natural revelation” isn’t so obvious—because every religion tries to deduce what God is like by looking at nature, and all of them get him wrong. Read Job sometime; all Job’s friends had a lot to say about what they saw in nature, and what they concluded about God from it, and the LORD bluntly stated all of them got him wrong. Jb 44.7 Christians try to deduce God-things from nature all the time, and likewise get him wrong; I’ve heard the sermons. Our logical deductions might be pretty good, and impressive… and woefully inaccurate. Because they’re no substitute for God revealing and explaining himself to us.

That’s why good theology has to be based on revelation. We humans are just making guesses about God; some of them wild, some of them reasonable, but they’re still just guesses. Whereas Jesus knows God, ’cause he is God—so we need to follow Jesus. And the Holy Spirit knows God, ’cause he is God—so we need to listen to the Spirit. And the Spirit inspired the bible, so we oughta read the bible. And the Spirit speaks to fellow Christians, so we need to bounce the ideas we think are God-ideas off these fellow Christians, and make sure. But all of this threads back to revelation: We hear from God, and that’s the basis of our theology.

Simple, right? But of course we humans gotta overcomplicate the idea.

Too many of us assume revelation is always a big profound mind-scrambling experience. With lights, visions, seizures, euphoria, and Hollywood-style special effects. This is why people assume God’s never given ’em any revelation, or even claim he doesn’t do this sort of thing anymore: They’re still waiting for the light show. They expect to have Isaiah- or Ezekiel- or John-style visions of God’s throne room. Or see Jesus in glory like Simon Peter, James, John, Stephen, and Paul did. Or at least have some glowing angels or burning bushes or something like that.

Nah. Most of the time, revelation is so ordinary-looking, you’d never realize it’s God talking till he tells you it’s him. Kinda like what happened to the prophet Samuel. He kept pestering his guardian, the head priest Eli, like any other little kid who “just wants a drink of water,” i.e. won’t go to sleep.

1 Samuel 3.1-10 NLT

1 Meanwhile, the boy Samuel served the Lord by assisting Eli. Now in those days messages from the Lord were very rare, and visions were quite uncommon.

2 One night Eli, who was almost blind by now, had gone to bed. 3 The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was sleeping in the Tabernacle near the Ark of God. 4 Suddenly the LORD called out, “Samuel!”

“Yes?” Samuel replied. “What is it?” 5 He got up and ran to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?”

“I didn’t call you,” Eli replied. “Go back to bed.” So he did.

6 Then the LORD called out again, “Samuel!”

Again Samuel got up and went to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?”

“I didn’t call you, my son,” Eli said. “Go back to bed.”

7 Samuel did not yet know the LORD because he had never had a message from the LORD before. 8 So the LORD called a third time, and once more Samuel got up and went to Eli. “Here I am. Did you call me?”

Then Eli realized it was the LORD who was calling the boy. 9 So he said to Samuel, “Go and lie down again, and if someone calls again, say, ‘Speak, LORD, your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went back to bed.

10 And the LORD came and called as before, “Samuel! Samuel!”

And Samuel replied, “Speak, your servant is listening.”

Quite a few stories in the bible consist of God showing up to talk to someone, and their first reaction is, “Wait… is that… God? Holy crap, am I talking to God?” Frequently followed by sheer terror, ’cause most people assume if you encounter God, he’s too holy to abide sin, so you’re gonna die. Ge 32.30, Dt 5.24, Jg 13.22 Or you’re already dead.

But no: God wants you to know him, so he’s making contact. Don’t listen to the cessationists: He does this. A lot.

When God became human.

INCARNATE 'ɪn.kɑrn.eɪt verb. Put an immaterial thing (i.e. an abstract concept or idea) into a concrete form.

2. Put a deity or spirit into a human form, i.e. Hindu gods.

3. ɪn'kɑr.nət adjective. Embodied in flesh, or concrete form.

[Incarnation ɪn.kɑr'neɪ.ʃən noun, reincarnation 're.ɪn.kɑr.neɪ.ʃən noun.]

Most of our christology lingo tends to come from Greek and Latin. This one too. Why? Because that’s what ancient Christians spoke… and over the centuries westerners got the idea Greek and Latin sound much more formal and sanctimonious than plain English. But they absolutely weren’t formal words in the original languages. When you literally translate ’em, they make people flinch. Incarnate is one of those words: In-carnátio is Latin for “put into meat.”

Yep, put into meat. Nope, this isn’t a mistranslation. And it’s an accurate description of what happened to Jesus. The word of God—meaning God—became flesh. Meat.

John 1.14 KJV

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.

This isn’t a temporary change, solely for the few decades Jesus walked the earth. When Jesus was resurrected, he went right back to having a flesh-’n-bone body. When he got raptured up to heaven, he still had, and has, his flesh-’n-bone body; he didn’t shuck it like a molting crustacean. It’s who he is now. God is now meat. Flesh, blood, spit, mucus, cartilage, hair, teeth, bile, tears. MEAT.

God doesn’t merely look human. Nor did he take over an existing human, scoop out the spirit, and replace it with his Holy Spirit. These are some of the dozens of weird theories people coined about how Jesus isn’t really or entirely human. Mainly they were invented by people who can’t have God be human.

To such people, humanity makes God no longer God. It undoes his divinity. He’d have to be limited instead of unlimited. And these people, like most humans, define God by his power. Power’s what they really admire, really covet, about God: His raw, unlimited, sovereign might. Not his character, not his goodness, not his love and kindness and compassion. F--- those things. God has to be mighty, and they can’t respect a God who doesn’t respect power the way they do.

So that, they insist, is who Jesus really is. Beneath a millimeter of skin, Jesus was secretly, but not all that secretly, all that raw unlimited power. He only feigned humanity, for the sake of fearful masses who’d scream out in terror if they ever encountered an undisguised God. He pretended to be one of us. Peel off his human suit, and he’s really omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omni-everything.

To such people incarnation dirties God. It defiles him. Meat is icky. Humanity, mortality, the realness of our everyday existence, is too nasty for God to demean himself to. Sweating. Aching. Pains and sickness. Peeing and pooping. Suffering from acne and bug bites and rashes. Belching and farting. Sometimes the trots from bad shawarma the night before. Waking up with a morning erection.

Have I outraged you yet? You’re hardly the first. But this, as we can all attest, is humanity. Not even sinful humanity; I haven’t touched upon that at all, and I needn’t, ’cause humans don’t have to sin, as Jesus demonstrates. I’m just talking regular, natural, physical humanity. When God became human, he became that. And people can’t abide it.

Yet it’s true. God did it intentionally. He wanted us to be with him. So he made the first move, and became one of us.

Election: God did choose you, y’know.

ELECT ə'lɛkt verb. Choose for a purpose or position, like a political contest or a job.

2. noun. A person (or people) chosen by God for a purpose or position. [Often “the elect.”]

[Elector ə'lɛk.tər noun, election ə'lɛk.ʃən noun.]

I grew up with a Christian mom, a Christian upbringing, and lots of relationships with people who happened to be Christian. Whole lot of opportunities to have God-experiences.

It’s kinda like I was set up. As if stuff was deliberately stuck in my path to influence me to become Christian.

Obviously other Christians haven’t grown up the same way. Things were a lot less Christian, a lot more pagan—or they grew up in another religion altogether. But at one point in their lives they were obviously nudged in Christ Jesus’s direction. Maybe they had a rough patch and Christians showed up to redirect ’em to Jesus. Maybe a miracle happened and they realized, not just that God’s real and here, but that Jesus defines him best. In some cases Jesus even personally showed up and told them to follow him. He does that.

The fact is, God wants to save everybody. Jesus died to make it possible, and everybody’s been given the invitation to come to Jesus, become adopted by God, and enter his kingdom. Everybody. Without exception. He’s not turning anyone away. (Unless they clearly don’t want him—as proven by their defiant, godless behavior. But that’s another discussion.)

But. Even though God’s invitation is for anyone and everyone, there are lots of individuals whom he makes a particular effort to save. Like me, ’cause he clearly set me up to become Christian. Like most people who grow up in a Christian family, or in a predominantly Christian country or community.

Like you, more than likely: When you look back on your life, chances are you can think of many situations where God got your attention, moved you into place, and came after you. Some of them were subtle, and some of them were outrageously obvious. Hey, whatever got you into his kingdom! But God definitely, specifically, wanted you.

Christians call this idea of God choosing us election.

Jesus still appears to people, y’know.

Several years after Jesus was raptured, Paul of Tarsus (sometimes referred to by his Hebrew name Saul) met him enroute to Damascus. Ac 9.1-9 He later retold that story to King Herod Agrippa 2.

Acts 26.13-16 NLT

13 “About noon, Your Majesty, as I was on the road, a light from heaven brighter than the sun shone down on me and my companions. 14 We all fell down, and I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is useless for you to fight against my will.’

15 “ ‘Who are you, lord?’ I asked.

“And the Lord replied, ‘I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting. 16 Now get to your feet! For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness. Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future.”

Up to this point Paul was dead set on destroying Christianity—and he flipped hard. Preached Jesus with such fervor, his former backers wanted him dead. Went to his own death for Jesus.

That’s not the behavior of a man who merely changed his mind. Paul saw something—and for the rest of his life, claimed it was Christ Jesus.

Nearly all Christians accept Paul’s story without question. Not just ’cause Paul produced fruit of the Spirit from then on, and performed various miracles. Usually it’s because Paul wrote 13 books of the New Testament, particularly Romans, which spells out how the self-sacrifice of Jesus revealed God’s grace to the world.

But as far as further Jesus-sightings are concerned, they’re pretty certain Paul’s experience was a special circumstance. Only Paul got to have a special Jesus-appearance. Nobody else. Nobody since.

There I gotta disagree with them.

“By faith alone.”

SOLA FIDE 'soʊ.lə 'fi.deɪ noun. Short for the Latin iustificatio sola fide jus.ti.fi'kat.jo 'so.la 'fi.de, “justification by faith alone”: The Protestant doctrine that our right standing before God depends only on the basis of our trust in him.

2. The popular Evangelical belief that salvation is solely achieved through orthodox Christian belief (i.e. faith).

Yeah, I listed two definitions of sola fide above. One’s right; one’s wrong.

One’s taught in seminaries, and debated by Protestants and Roman Catholics, ’cause Catholics insist justification is a little more detailed than that. They would argue it has to include God’s grace, and our faith-response has to produce good fruit. I don’t disagree! But they’re just going into greater detail about what justification means, whereas the Protestant Reformers simply put the complex idea into very basic words. God’s looking for people to trust him. When we do, he justifies us. We now have a connection to him, a relationship with him; we must abide in him, and he will abide in us. Jn 15.4 And fruit will grow, and we’ll inherit his kingdom.

The other is all over popular Christian culture, and is taught in way too many churches by people who never bothered to learn sola fide is short for iustificatio sola fide. They don’t know “by faith alone” refers to justification. Or they do, but they just presume justification and salvation are the same thing—if God considers us right with him, doesn’t this automatically make us saved?

Plus they’ve defined faith wrong. When they say faith, they don’t mean “trust in God.” They mean religion. They mean orthodox Christian beliefs; the faith of the first Christians, the faith of the ancient church, the faith of our fathers, the creeds, the church’s faith statement, the right stuff to believe. To them, sola fide means we believe that—and once we believe all the right things, we’re saved!

(And conversely, they also believe if we don’t believe the right things, we’re not saved.)

In short, to them sola fide means “saved by the Christian faith alone.” Saved by orthodoxy. I call it “faith righteousness.” Thing is, it’s not at all what the scriptures teach. We’re not saved by the good work of making sure we embrace all the proper Christian doctrines—because that’d mean we’re saved by good works. And the gospel doesn’t teach we’re saved by karma, but grace.

Justification: How God considers us right with him.

JUSTIFY 'dʒəs.tə.faɪ verb. Show or prove to be correct.

2. Make morally right [with God].

[Justification dʒəs.tə.fə'keɪ.ʃən noun, justificatory dʒə.stə'fɪk.ə.tɔ.ri adjective.]

In our culture “justify” usually means we have an excuse for what we did. Not necessarily a good one.

Fr’instance, let’s say I took someone behind the church building and beat the daylights out of them. Ordinarily and rightly, that’d get me tossed into jail for battery. When I stand before the judge I’d better have a really solid reason for my actions. “He started it; I just finished it” sounds like a good enough explanation for most people, but legally it’s not gonna work: Outside of movies, the law doesn’t give free passes to badasses. Neither do juries. They still send plenty of these badasses to prison.

Nope; justification means I need a profound reason for why I shouldn’t be jailed or institutionalized for my behavior. One that’s either in accordance with the law (“I reasonably feared for my life if I didn’t”) or is good enough to make judges and juries actually set aside the law, declare me not guilty, and set me free.

Now when it comes to sin, I am so guilty. I have no good excuse. Neither do you. Neither does anyone.

Yeah, we all have accidental, unintentional, or omissive sins in our past. But we have way more sins which we fully, thoughtfully, deliberately meant to do. We weren’t out of our right minds; we weren’t backed into tragic moral choices; we weren’t predetermined by God to sin in order to fulfill some secret evil plan of his. We have no excuse. There’s no justification for our behavior. We’re totally guilty.

Yet God forgives us anyway, adopts us as his kids, and lets us inherit his kingdom.

Why? Why does God let us off the hook?

Well, various theologians are gonna pitch all sorts of theories as to how ritual sacrifice and Jesus’s death might actually plaster over those sins in a meaningful way. But while that’s awesome and impressive and all that, that answers how, not why. Why’d Jesus bother to apply this plaster in the first place? Why does God even bother to have a relationship with humanity and Christians, despite our obvious unworthiness?

It’s a really simple explanation: God is love, and God is gracious. He loves us too much to not find some way to restore our relationship with him. So Jesus died to totally, absolutely wipe out the sins of the whole world. 1Jn 2.2 Anybody can have a relationship with God! Our sinfulness is no barrier whatsoever. We might imagine it is, ’cause we prefer karma, in which we merit that relationship instead of getting a free pass from God. But we needn’t waste our efforts—as if we ever could wipe out our own sins. Jesus already took care of that. Sin is defeated. We don’t need to do anything more. We’re forgiven.

So if everyone’s forgiven, why are some people saved, and some people aren’t, even though God wants to save everyone? 1Ti 2.4 Why does God have relationships with some individuals and not others, even though he loves the world? Jn 3.16 Why doesn’t God just drag everyone to heaven, no matter how they kick and scream?

Well it’s not, as Calvinists insist, because God doesn’t wanna save everyone, doesn’t really love everybody, and limits his forgiveness to a select few. It’s because God figures only one thing justifies his having a relationship with us: Whether we’re gonna respond, in any way, to such a relationship. Whether we’re gonna love him back.

The apostles distilled this idea to one word: Faith. I mean, people respond to God in all sorts of ways. Pagans pick and choose what they wanna believe God’s like—and as a result they basically invent their own fictitious “God,” and sometimes then don’t even follow him. Nontheists don’t even try. But if we do try—if we trust God to love us, forgive our screw-ups, make up for our deficiencies with Christ, 1Jn 2.1-3 work with us, guide us, and glorify us Ro 8.30 —and y’know, God’ll accept faith in the tiniest of servings Lk 17.6 —we’re good. It justifies God’s interactivity in our lives: It won’t be time wasted! It’ll lead to our salvation.

So God made faith a condition of our relationship with him. No faith, no relationship. No relationship, no kingdom. Mt 7.22-23 Kinda important.

Not going to church is heresy.

Yeah, this article’s title, “Not going to church is heresy,” is gonna be provocative. Mostly because most people don’t understand what heresy means. It means “not orthodox”—when people don’t believe what Christians have historically believed, and oughta believe, because to believe otherwise is gonna lead us away from Jesus. Most people presume heresy means “a belief that’ll send you to hell.” No; we’re saved by grace, remember? Not good works. And our belief system (our “faith,” if you wanna call it that) is a good work.

Going to church is one of those good works. Jesus created the church when he picked the apostles and told ’em to go make him more followers. Which they did; which we still do, I hope! And he expects us followers to fellowship. That means we talk about Jesus with one another, share what he’s done in our lives, encourage one another, confess shortcomings and sins if necessary, pray together, worship together, do sacraments together, listen to some teachings about Jesus together… in other words, do church. Go to church!

But people don’t wanna.

Which I get. There’s many times I didn’t wanna. I wanted to sleep in on Sunday mornings like a pagan. I wanted to listen to anything other than my pastor’s sermon series—either it was full of stuff I already know, or it’s full of stuff I don’t believe. I likewise wanted to listen to anything other than the worship music: Our worship pastor didn’t care to stay current with music, and was stuck in the 1980s… as you could tell by his wardrobe. And I wanted to avoid the jerks in my church who just frustrated me about how much partisanship has infiltrated American Evangelical Christianity, and made us less patient, generous, kind, and gracious.

Plus nowadays there are entire church services on YouTube! Didn’t have those 20 years ago; at most we had radio, and Christian radio shows are often just sermons, abridged to 25 minutes, or edited into two or three parts. But I could watch video church instead! I could even watch ’em from the bathroom, during my high-fiber-cereal-induced B.M. I love modern technology.

But. But but but.

All these things are convenient substitutes for the Sunday morning services. And while the coronavirus pandemic was raging in 2020, they were a godsend. But do I need to remind you Sunday morning services are not church? Guess I do: They’re not.

The church is people. Not the denomination, not the 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, not the leadership, not the building. It’s people. It’s the collective Christians who make up the Holy Spirit’s temple, and when we got the temple, we got church. Yet usually, those who wanna ditch church don’t even think of the people when they think of church. They’re thinking of the Sunday morning services, the unimpressive pastors, and the uncomfortable building—which is never at the right temperature. Poorly ventilated, or someone went a little bonkers with the air conditioning. Why is the only pastor undergoing menopause in charge of the thermostat?

But I digress; back to the point. The church is people. If you’re avoiding the people, you’re not doing church!

And that’s why we’re instructed to not skip meeting with one another He 10.25 if we can help it. If we’re gonna have healthy and productive relationships with our fellow Christians, and encourage one another to follow Jesus, we gotta interact. The ancient Christians, who spent most of their lives under persecution, realized this support system is absolutely necessary—and intentionally put “the fellowship of saints” in their creeds. It’s not an afterthought; it’s not something they threw in there ’cause it sounds nice. People were ditching church even back then.

Thing is, going it alone leads people astray constantly. Constantly. CONSTANTLY. Do I have to emphasize this harder?

People go astray even when we do attend church services faithfully! But when we’re not attending at all, we’re guaranteed to go wrong. Not sometimes gonna go wrong; will. Without fellow Christians to correct one another, reinforce one another, confirm what the Spirit is telling us, it’s a given that we’re gonna develop wrong beliefs and heresies, and become less and less Christian over time. I’ve seen it happen more times than I can count.

So no, it’s not just me saying skipping church is heresy. I don’t get to define orthodoxy and heresy, y’know. (Neither do you. Neither does your denomination.) Christianity determined it, centuries ago. They recognized it’s vitally important we interact—because Jesus made it important. It’s why he created the church to begin with.

Unitarians: Those who insist God’s not three.

UNITARIAN ju.nə'tɛr.i.ən noun. A person or doctrine which emphasizes God’s oneness, and rejects the doctrine of the trinity.

2. [capitalized] A member of a church or group which asserts this belief.

3. adjective. Having to do with this belief, or with unitarians.

[Unitarianism ju.nə'tɛr.i.ən.ɪz.əm noun.]

Christians correctly understand God’s a trinity. One God; three people (or “persons,” as theologians prefer, but it’s bad English) who are the one God. Well, most of us do; there are holdouts who insist he’s not. They tend to fall into one of two camps:

• MODALISTS. Those who say the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are God… but really all three of them are just one person. Not three people. Just one person in different modes.
• UNITARIANS. Those who say the Father is God—and the Son and the Holy Spirit are not.

People are more familiar with unitarians—mostly because there are entire unitarian denominations, like the Unitarian Universalists, the Unitarian Christian Church, and Unity Church. (The United States has even had four Unitarian presidents.) But that’s also because unitarianism is very obviously non-trinitarian, and very obviously denies Jesus is God. Whereas modalists will never say Jesus isn’t God. For that matter you’d likely never even know they were modalist… until you start asking ’em about trinity and they reply, “Well I really don’t like to use the word trinity to describe God…” then go on to explain why they say he’s not.

The main difference, y’notice, is modalists believe Jesus is God and the Holy Spirit is God. Unitarians do not. Well, generally unitarians do not; some of ’em are kinda pantheist and believe everyone is God. But for the most part, they insist God is One: One person, one being, one heavenly Father (or Mother; some of ’em aren’t particular); our Creator, the Almighty, and infinitely good. And while they consider Jesus to be Lord and Savior and King, they don’t consider him God. Same with the Holy Spirit—although I’ve known a few unitarians who believe the Spirit is God, but like modalists, don’t believe he’s a different person than the Father. To them, “Holy Spirit” is just one of God’s titles, like when certain indigenous Americans refer to God as “the Great Spirit.”

But unitarian doesn’t just describe Christians. Technically it describes everyone who believes in the One God, and doesn’t believe he’s a trinity. Most unchurched pagans figure there’s one God, aren’t so sure about Jesus, and know nothing about the Holy Spirit—and this description would mean they’re unitarian. Every Muslim would be unitarian: They definitely believe in one God, believe Jesus is a prophet but not God, and believe the Holy Spirit is a messenger of God but also not God. Religious Jews are unitarian, Sikhs are unitarian, Baha’is are unitarian.

But if you’re unitarian and call yourself Christian, you’ve chosen to ignore the scriptures which reveal God as a trinity. Which puts you outside historical orthodox Christianity and makes you heretic. And here I gotta remind you heresy does not send you to hell—but it does greatly interfere with getting to know and trust God, so it always needs to be dealt with.

Hearing God. It’s vital!

Prayer is of course talking with God: We talk to him and he talks back. It’s not a complicated idea—though Christians obviously overcomplicate it all sorts of ways.

And because it’s talking with God—’cause he talks back—prayer is therefore the most common, usual way God communicates with people.

Yep, even more common than bible. I know; I’m fully aware plenty of Christians claim bible is the only way God communicates with people. They believe this because it’s what they’ve been taught: “God doesn’t talk to people anymore, so stop trying to hear him and read your bible.” And hey, if you shut your ears to everything God tells you in prayer, in dreams, through prophets, or even full-on personal appearances, of course you’re gonna claim he only communicates through bible. It’s like someone who throws out their phone and computer, burns their mail, refuses to interact with anyone in person, and only communicates by carrier pigeon: Okay, guess we’d better get some carrier pigeons. God’s frequently willing to work around our ridiculous arbitrary rules. But for normal people, we pray and he talks back.

I’m also aware there are Christians who insist they don’t hear anything. They’ve tried hearing God, but they got nothing. So they gave up and presume prayer is unidirectional: We talk, he hears, but he says nothing—’cause he doesn’t need to say anything, ’cause he said everything he cares to say in the scriptures. Such people are easily swayed into believing God only talks through bible. You can find whole churches full of people who claim they never, ever hear God in their prayers.

But you’ll also find that’s what they tell you when other people from their church are around. In private, they’ll confess they did hear God once. Or twice. Or all the time.

And hearing God is confirmed by the scriptures. All over the scriptures. ’Cause the guys who wrote the scriptures heard God, and they’re writing about other people who likewise heard God. The whole reason there are scriptures in the first place is because people hear God. Yeah, certain cessationists are gonna claim prophecy doesn’t work that way; that prophets opened their mouths, God took ’em over like a ventriloquist manhandles a puppet, and his voice came out of ’em. Or his words flowed from their pens. Whichever. But that’s more like the mumbo-jumbo we find among Spiritualists and pagan religions; it’s not at all how God works. The prophets came to God with questions—

Habakkuk 1.2-4 GNT

2 O LORD, how long must I call for help before you listen, before you save us from violence? 3 Why do you make me see such trouble? How can you stand to look on such wrongdoing? Destruction and violence are all around me, and there is fighting and quarreling everywhere. 4 The law is weak and useless, and justice is never done. Evil people get the better of the righteous, and so justice is perverted.

—and God responds with answers.

Habakkuk 1.5 GNT

Then the LORD said to his people, “Keep watching the nations around you, and you will be astonished at what you see. I am going to do something that you will not believe when you hear about it.”

(Followed by an answer they probably didn’t like at all—if you keep reading Habakkuk.)

This is why prayer and prophecy is so closely connected: It’s how God gives prophets his messages for other people. We’ll ask God questions; he’ll give answers, and add, “Tell this to others.” ’Cause other Christians have the same questions, and God’s answer applies to them too.

But of course if you don’t pray—or you think all your prayers are unidirectional—you’re not gonna get prophecies like this. Or have any prophecies in your church at all. Or you’ll have what your preachers claim are “prophecies,” but they’re all angry, political, fruitless, and otherwise inconsistent with God’s character.