Musings on Doctrine: Christian Beliefs Revisited

Copyright © 2014 John C’ de Baca.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Biblical quotes herein are the author’s translation from The Greek New Testament, United Bible Societies, 1983

Author Credits: Together Again: Reconstituting God’s Body; Tongues: Deception or Delight?

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-2985-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-2986-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-2987-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014904808

WestBow Press rev. date: 03/27/2014

CONTENTS

Introduction

Chapter  ONE The Security of Salvation

A Safe Danger?

Human Faithfulness and Other Myths

Making Sense of Salvation

Chapter  TWO Do Babies Go to Heaven?

Where Do Babies Come From?

What Did Jesus Say?

Chapter  THREE Crime and Punishment

Government and Civilization

Chapter  FOUR Marriage and Divorce

Confusing Law and Grace

Looking at Scripture

Chapter  FIVE Satan and Other Spirits

The Fall of Satan

The Demon in Human Government

Satan, Angels, and Other Laws of Nature

Chapter  SIX Doctrines of the Future

The Millennium

The Rapture

The Great Tribulation

This Generation

Chapter  SEVEN The Last Days

The Coming Destruction

The Abomination of Desolation (Matt. 24:15)

A Way of Escape

Mariolatry and Feminism

The Woman Jezebel

The Mark of Cain

Salvation

If I speak truth, why do you not believe me?

(John 8:46)

INTRODUCTION

By and large, most of the churches of Christianity preach essentially the same basic doctrines: the Trinity, sin, salvation, Christ, forgiveness, resurrection, and so forth. So it might be assumed that, while they differ on some minor points, the main teachings common to them all are in harmony with the truth of Scripture. That would be a false assumption.

The central doctrines of Christianity took form from failure to understand the Bible and the work of Christ. The fact that these doctrines are widely believed, and held by the mainstream churches, does not validate them. Follow them home, and you’ll find that they live in houses of ill repute. Both branches of Christianity, Catholics and Protestants, live in blasphemy. And they’re proud of it, thank you.

They’re babies birthed from the same womb. Indeed, now and again Catholics are inviting Protestants back home to their beginnings in Catholicism. And they’re being heard. The sound of ecumenism is in the air, and getting louder. Overtures of peace between the two groups are increasing. Churches are wrapping their arms around each other and hugging. We’re brothers and sisters, they cry. We’re family. Why should we fight? These ecumenical embraces are attempts to undo, or perhaps ignore, a shameful and bloody past. Historically, it has been eye for eye, and tooth for tooth between both sides. Each thought it better to give than to receive. So they gave all they could, as hard as they could, as long as they could!

Catholicism’s gospel, much copied in the past by Protestants, has been very persuasive. She has multiplied, and filled much of the earth. Convert or die, was her ultimatum. She added an s to the Word of God, and the word became sword, made of steel, sharp and shiny. And she swung it widely and long. Slaughter and persecution lie in the top drawer of her tool chest of evangelism, well-worn and not a bit rusty. Torture and genocide are in there too, blood-stained but still perfectly shiny from use.

Her hands are bloody. Her ground is blood-soaked. For centuries, inflamed with dogma and feverish with indignation, Rome’s fanatics flailed wildly against Protestants and Jews and anyone else who would not accept the authority of their Church. Her devotees believed that great zeal for the Catholic Church was the faith that finds favor with God.

Will she continue, or will truth, mutual respect, and true Christian love between churches prevail? The Scriptures say that she will continue. Rome’s outstretched arms hold a dagger up their sleeve. She wants no competitors.

Since Vatican II, Catholics have called for a cease-fire, a de-militarized zone between themselves and the other Christian churches. We mustn’t fight one another, they exclaim. We must set aside the doctrines that divide us, for the sake of peace and harmony, and focus on the things upon which we agree. Their invitation is to come back home.

The proposal is tempting. It sports a smiley face. But can ecumenical hugs and kisses correct false doctrine? If the two branches of Christianity agree to continue the same doctrinal errors, do these errors suddenly become truth?

The churches of Christianity share common roots. And those roots run deep within the soil of Rome. Despite their mutual finger-pointing, both Catholics and Protestants partake of essentially the same shameful doctrinal heritage. They’re brothers, well, sisters. They’re not twins, but they do share the same DNA.

And it’s true that sisters mustn’t fight one another. But ecumenism is not the answer. True doctrine can be found only by understanding the true Bible message. We must go beyond ecumenical embraces and non-aggression until we arrive at the true teachings of Scripture. Truth sings with reality, in harmony with actual fact. A lie is still a lie even if it’s told in church, and from the pulpit. False orthodoxy is false even if stamped with an imprimatur. Doctrines that contradict the Bible remain untrue even if a thousand pastors and ten thousand priests bless them and say amen. Blasphemy is blasphemy is blasphemy.

Because both sisters, the elder and the younger, were birthed by Rome, a right understanding and interpretation of Scripture will pull the doctrinal rug out from under both houses of Christianity, without playing favorites, without choosing sides. If telling the truth offends Catholics, so be it. If it offends Protestants, well, it’s the truth. Are you ready for the truth? Can you handle it? I said, can you handle it? We’ll see.

Chapter  ONE

The Security of Salvation

A Safe Danger?

Dogs have an amazing sense of smell. They can sniff out drugs hidden in the most ingenious places. That’s how biblical truth is. Biblical truth is like a narco-dog trained to sniff out deceit and error. When it barks, it’s because it has found something illicit. If it barks at you, well, admit it. You must be hiding something erroneous. The problem, then, is not with God’s Word. It’s with you. Don’t shoot the dog. Get rid of whatever you’re hiding that’s illicit and false, and make friends with him. Pat him on the head. Scratch his back. Face it, the truth only barks at falsehood.

But don’t feel too bad if he barks at you. He barks loudly at the churches of Christianity too, all of them. And sadly, in most cases they’d rather shoot the dog than admit their errors. Their errors are old family friends. They’ve grown up with them. They love their lies, and give them the place of honor at the Lord’s table. In such company, the truth seems rude and impolite. But it must be told.

Predestination and Security

Where should we start? Let’s begin with a question on which churches disagree. Can saved persons lose their salvation? Some say yes, some say no. Both sides wave the Bible in the other’s face. If they actually open it, it’s merely to parrot what they were taught, zealously and full of unction. The open Bible in their hand is mostly just a prop to support their posturing. They read with the eyes of their forebears, and impose their received tradition upon the various texts. We must not deviate from what we’ve been taught. It has already been interpreted correctly by our great past leaders, each side claims, confidently, full of fervor. But has it?

John Calvin was one of those leaders. Among other things, he promoted predestination, the idea that God in his sovereign and independent desire has irrevocably chosen and ordained specific individuals to salvation. And there’s nothing anyone can do to change this predetermined destiny. It’s a done deal, because God is sovereign. No one can change his mind. Once it’s written, no one can edit his manuscript. His chosen ones will absolutely receive Christ. God himself has decreed it. He ordained it long ago, and his word and will are set in stone.

Many proponents of this idea go further and imagine that in his sovereignty God spoke everything to be. He decreed it all. All things will happen the way they were decreed. This notion ties a knot around the neck of human freedom and pulls it tight. God controls the decisions that individuals make. His picks will come to Christ and salvation without fail, for God decreed it. Their choice is God’s choice, made eons ago, and is fixed. And he picks a winner every time. He’s rigged the game.

The flip side to this reasoning is that God has decreed all others to scream forever in the eternal fires of hell! What does that say about God? What does it say about Calvinism? Be honest. What does it say about God and Calvinism?

In Denial

Clearly, such a vile notion calls God’s character into serious question, and sets aside the whole of God’s Word. Would he really consign untold billions of helpless humans to unending torture, eon upon eon, simply because he can? Are hell’s horrendous, unending screams the music of heaven? Predestination coupled with the traditional doctrine of hell portrays God as a monster of enormous, infinite evil, a vengeful fiend offended because people supposedly didn’t do things his way. But if predestination is true, they did do things his way! Is it not blasphemous?

This hellish doctrine is regularly preached in many churches, passionately, oblivious to its implications, as if it honors God and shows him to be righteous and just. But blasphemy is never right worship, child. Making God into a vicious fiend does not honor him or please him.

Nor does the Bible promote slavery. In chapter after chapter the Bible clearly supposes human freedom. In page after page and verse after verse it calls for individual responsibility, and invites people to make choices, good and intelligent ones. And of course, choices require the freedom to choose. The idea of individual predestination spits at human freedom and then slams the door in its face. It spits at Christ Jesus too. Was he not free?

Jesus’ invitation to life in God’s love is not restricted to an elite few, or to just his close friends. He calls to everyone who can hear his voice. It’s for whosoever might believe (Isa. 55:1–3; John 3:16; Rev. 22:17). And whosoever includes you and me, and all our friends and neighbors, and first and second cousins. Heaven’s door is standing wide open. Inside is Christ Jesus, with his arms wide open as well. The gospel is an open call to one and all. Whosoever will, may come. Some will believe, and come. Others won’t. But always, it’s an individual’s decision. The choice can’t be coerced, for then it wouldn’t be a choice. It would be like the army sergeant who points and barks, We need three volunteers, so I’m volunteering you, you, and you.

Predestination would make the gospel a cheap gimmick, an act of false advertising. If Jesus’ supper is limited to a few pre-selected guests, why does he invite everyone? Didn’t he really mean whosoever? Is the gospel call a lie? Guests who accept his invitation, but who were not ordained unto salvation, will arrive only to be turned away, still hungry. Jesus will ignore their knock. They can ring all they want, but he just won’t answer the doorbell. The hungry can just go away hungry.

Thankfully, Christ is not the cheap, uncaring trickster that Calvinism makes him out to be. He promised not to turn anyone away (John 6:37). Jesus invites all who hear his voice to come and dine with him, to feast on choice morsels and tender delicacies. The Lord’s Supper table is not the place for playing the game of musical chairs. There’s room for everyone, with room to spare.

Choices scampered like squirrels among the trees in Eden, and frolicked everywhere in the well-worn pages of Israel’s history. The Law was all about choices. Morality is about choices. Human destiny itself hangs upon the choice of receiving or rejecting the Son (Rev. 22:17). The gospel presupposes freedom of choice. Freedom floods over the Bible’s pages like the waters of Niagara flow over the falls. Predestination, then, is like a frog trying to swim back up the falls against the mighty torrents of the Spirit.

Predestination implies a God of guile, the fraud God. This world becomes a con game. If individual salvation is entirely God’s decree with no chance for change, the gospel and indeed all of God’s dealings with humans are pretense and make-believe. God becomes the Great Pretender. The world becomes unreal.

Without individual choice, humans are mere puppets. God becomes the Puppet Master. Reception of Christ becomes a jerk of the string, a joke to make the angels laugh. Trying to support the security of the believer with Calvinist predestination is like a cockroach trying to support the weight of the human who steps on it. Squish.

An Eternal Staring Contest

Individual predestination is sometimes reinforced with the idea that God has predetermined not only salvation, but all things. Strangely, God has gotten himself into a staring contest. There he sits, unblinking, staring at the world. He is immutable. He cannot blink. He cannot reach out for newness or variation from his decrees. In his mind, it’s all said and done. So now, he can only stare, helpless and unmoving. He’s the great Know-it-all. Because he already knows everything that will ever happen, it cannot be changed. God’s foreknowledge has everything pinned immovably in its place. He experiences the world all at once, panoramic but stationary. Time for him has no movement. Everything is decreed. And he knows it.

And so the world just stares back at him, transfixed in his mind. It can’t vary from what has been ordained, from what God already knows. Every change, every movement, is known in advance. There it lies, wild-eyed, in the staring mind of God. It must stare back. God’s sovereign decrees and foreknowledge are unchangeable. Neither God nor the world can blink. Que será, será. What will be, will be. God knows everything that will ever happen. Hell, as well, is forever on his mind, stuck there, eternity upon eternity, forever motionless in the all-knowing mind of God. He just can’t stop thinking about it. He said it, and that settled it forever. Those few humans that God chose unto salvation will receive Christ and enter glory. The billions he ordained to the eternal flames will writhe forever in unspeakable agonies, screaming endlessly in the unchanging mind of God. And there’s nothing God or humans can do to change it. Neither side can blink.

So the unchanging, petrified creation in God’s mind stares back forever at a petrified, immutable, unchanging God, two statues staring at each other for all eternity. Neither of them can move. Neither God nor his creation is free. Perhaps God was free in the past, before he created. But, once he made the world and decreed everything that was to happen, even God lost his freedom. His foreknowledge is like a batch of fresh concrete in his mind that hardened. The world is a Medusa that turned God to stone!

Stealing God’s Sovereignty

Predestination pretends to offer security to the believer, claiming that God’s choice of an individual for salvation cannot be undone. But when no one is looking it reaches out furtively and snatches the security away. Then it tries to sneak behind God’s back and steal his sovereignty as well. It grabs hold of God’s sovereignty with both hands, but his sovereignty immediately crumbles into dust.

Here’s the situation. How can I be sure that I am one of the fortunate ones whom God has irrevocably decreed unto salvation, if my choices aren’t real, and don’t and can’t change anything? They’re a sham. God has decreed my deception from all eternity. I thought I was free, but I was deceived. Even my decision to receive Christ may be just one more trick. I’m not really free. I did not make a real choice. God made the choice for me before I existed, before there was a world. There’s no way I can know which choice he made, for this world is just a stage show. It’s unreal. And I’m just a puppet. I have no choice in the matter, in any matter. I’m not free. Even my confusion was preordained. Everything that will ever happen is stuck in God’s mind. And God is immutable.

In fact, I can’t know whether he made any choice at all, for the Bible too is just another stage prop, written with indelible ink when God decreed everything. It’s all make-believe, all of it. God is pulling the strings, using ventriloquism so it will appear that his puppets dance and sing with a life and will of their own. It seems real, all right, but that’s just another jerk of the string, just another good joke. Yes, God is the big joker, and the joke’s on us.

And his sovereignty has disappeared! If the Bible is not dependable, then maybe even the doctrine Calvinists supposedly find within it of God’s sovereignty is just one more deceit, like his invitation to make choices. Is he really in charge? Did he really decree everything? How can I know for sure? I can’t. Perhaps he decreed, perhaps he didn’t. Who knows? Even Calvinists cannot know. Their argument turns and bites them. If the Bible is undependable, they cannot know if God’s sovereignty is real. And maybe even our not knowing is just a good joke. But it’s not funny. It’s just silly, a merry-go-round of nonsense.

Fortunately, the Holy Scriptures do not teach Calvinist predestination. Calvinism does not furnish a sound basis for the security of the believer. If it exists, security must be found elsewhere. Let’s look under some other stones.

Human Faithfulness and Other Myths

Another stone we can turn over in our search of security is the faithfulness of the believer. That’s me, and I’ll