An Answer to the Moral Dihlemma of Theism

Let's say you're omnipotent, and you want to make a clock. There are two ways to do it:

The first way would be to create a dial with hands that always point in the right direction in response to the actual time. The big hand would move around the dial once every hour, always landing on the twelve at the exact moment the little hand arrives at whatever o’clock it is, simply because you commanded it to. You could either command it to follow that pattern for all eternity, or else you could dedicate one small part of your infinite mind to physically moving it according to that pattern. There would be nothing of what we call clockworks inside, just a giant cosmic miracle dial responding to your decree on its own.

The second way would be to build it with all the wheels inside meshing together, timed by the flywheel, driven by the power-source, working with utmost precision, insuring that the hands point to the right numbers on the dial at the right time of the cosmic time progression. Any addition you made later on would be powered by and in sync with the existing clockworks. It would be designed to work all on its own without any effort from you - except you could add an input device whereby you could make any corrections, such as, “increase speed by one millionth of a second”. We'll talk more about this input device later.

From reviewing all the evidence, both from science and from scripture, I'd have to conclude that a certain Omnipotent being that we know, chose the second of the two ways, the “clockworks” model when creating this universe. A lot of folk religion does seem to favour the “miracle dial” method, as well as, perhaps a few early scientific models. However, even early scientists as Aristotle and others leaned in the direction of a clockworks type of universe.

How does science point to a clockworks model? There are the four forces (that we know of), gravitational, electromagnetic, the strong and the weak; and we now know that atoms consist of dozens of types of particles, each rendering possible, various facets of our existence, including life.

Though we've always taken it for granted, actual life integrated with physical substance isn't an easy thing to come by. We know that rocks can't be living. Minerals can't hold life, nor can any other elements or simple compounds - although we now have very complex electronic circuitry with the right programming to make it act like it's alive (isn't that right, Alexa? “Yes, that's right”). But only the extremely elaborate intricate structure of the DNA molecule can actually hold life. We still don't know how it works, nor how to recreate it. All we can do is grow it from existing DNA.

When God said, “Let there be light,” the big bang occurred at just the right intensity to divide that initial microscopic speck into a humongous mass of photons, all at the right density to enable the formation of atoms of every size and type - the clockworks that would eventually enable life. Had that big bang been even the slightest bit more intense, physicists tell us, all that would have been enabled would have been hydrogen atoms. Life could never come about. Anything ever so slightly less intense and the universe as we know it would, again, not have been possible.

Even at the right intensity, the time still had to be right. The Omnipotent Being said, “let light be separated from darkness.” Ripples appeared on the outward flowing stream of light, and gravitational and magnetic forces began to go to work at pulling it together to form galaxies and stars. The nuclear reactions within each star formed the various particles into atoms, splitting them again, completely dissolving them and remaking them into atoms again, while some that had spun off beyond the outer periphery formed into planets. When at least one planet had cooled sufficiently, God said, “Let the water be separated from dry land, and let an atmosphere appear.” Only then, was life even possible. We are living in what is called, “The Goldilocks Zone” where it is, like junior Bear's porridge, “Just right!”

So, how much time passed between these events that led to it being “just right” for life of any sort to make its appearance? Some say billions of years, others say only a few days. The thing about such intense gravitational force as was present at the big bang, is that it greatly speeds up time, so the first couple of aeons could have been a couple of days. To God, it doesn't make any difference anyhow, as a day and a thousand years (or a billion, as far as that goes) are all the same. It was all a part of fixing the clockworks to accommodate life, and setting up that relatively short Goldilocks zone where humanity could live and roam, and fulfil his destiny.

There is reason to believe that the seventh day of creation was much longer than twenty four hours. According to Hebrews 4:3-11 we are still in the seventh day. God has been resting, and it remains for some of us to enter that rest.

So, God told man on the sixth day, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea, the birds in the air and every living creature that crawls on the earth.” God gave His creation over to humanity for safekeeping, set His alarm clock, and rested.

Well okay, He's not exactly sleeping. Remember, there's that input device whereby He can make adjustments, and that is through interaction with humanity, to whom He gave the authority to manage things. That input device is, in fact, the life that He breathed into man that brought him to life. So, humanity is both a product of the grand universal clockworks that God had spent so much time designing and developing, and alive with the breath of God Himself. Where other creatures are simply products of the clockworks, and therefore subject to determinism, humanIty is above that and is capable of true creativity, making decisions that can't be predicted by knowing all the maths. So, humanity, created in God's own image, holding God's life in his DNA, both belongs in the physical universe that produced that DNA, and transcends it. He is a higher order of being, meant to be God's own friend. That's who God gave the authority over His creation.

But we also know that the first couple of humans blew it, creating a Mess (with a capital M) that all humans coming after would have to live with, so God has been making heavy use of the input device.

Everyone is affected by The Mess, some more than others, and in different ways, prompting many to say, ‘It just isn't fair!” There's nothing about The Mess that's fair. People are enslaved, bullied, tortured, slaughtered, bereaved, left destitute, while others reap the benefits, living high off other people's suffering; all because of how human nature has been skewed.

Early humans took on board something that they were told not to, and that gave us an acute sense of good and evil. On the surface that sounds good, but look closer. What it was, was an obsession to compare everything. The first humans looked at each other and then at themselves and said, “Your body is beautiful, but mine? Oh dear! Stop looking at me!” (To this day, we think of nudity as evil, but God made it clear that that’s only because we think it is, when He said, “Who told you you were naked?”)

Later, someone said to his brother, “You are better than me, so God loves you more than me, therefore, I hate you!” That led to the first murder.

Later still people began saying, “Sex with you is nice, but I could have a better time with someone more beautiful/handsome than you;” and, “You have a prettier woman than I have, and a stronger beast of burden, nicer tools and more land than I have; but I'm stronger than you, so I'm taking it.”

Actually, the basic desires aren't bad in themselves. A healthy sex drive is a good thing, and some desires and urges are simple survival instincts. It's when we're obsessed with comparing the quality or quantity with what others have that it gets out of proportion.

And so, because some were stronger than others, while following the same skewed logic, we've ended up with the unfair Mess that we're in.

Now, question and answer time:

First, how can a loving God allow those things to happen?

The answer: remember the Two possible ways for an omnipotent being to build a clock? Had He chosen the Miracle Dial method, that would be a very good question. If everything worked simply because He had His hands on it making it work, then everything would run perfectly, and all the aforementioned evils wouldn't be happening. But He didn't do it that way. He went with the Clockworks model, designing the universe to run according to the laws of physics and quantum mechanics in a cause-effect continuum. Moreover, because humanity is a transcendent being, as well as an integral part of the clockworks, we had the power to screw things up on a grand scale, which we did.

Then why didn't the Omnipotent Being do something about that before things got out of hand?

Keep in mind, the nature of the universe He made, the clockworks, the careful timing, the laws of physics and the quantum mechanics, and all the preparation that went into the Goldilocks Zone; it's clear that God took no shortcuts. All of that work went into the preparation of humanity's place in the vast clockworks of the universe, as a functioning part of the clockworks.

So, let's rephrase that question: Why didn't the Omnipotent Being do something he hadn't ever done since detonating the Big Bang; and stick His finger into the clockworks, stop the universe, undo the human mistake and then start it off again where it left off?

That's not His way. He had already put humanity into the pilot seat, and had begun His day of rest. Humanity was given the freedom of choice, and with that comes living with those choices. Freewill is a dangerous thing.

Perhaps the next obvious question would be, wasn't God morally wrong in giving humanity freewill when He knew where it would lead?

There are many angles to that one. Part of the assumption is that it was like trusting the keys of the family car to a young child. Others picture it as setting a bowl of sweets on the table, and telling the two-year-old, “Don't touch!” The way the Adam and Eve story is often told, one quite easily comes away with that conclusion. However, if we examine the accounts more carefully, we might get a far different picture: The first man had already named all the animals, and, according to Rabbinical tradition, used sounds that matched the nature of each creature, like a well studied Kabbalist would. So, was Adam no more than a small child? Perhaps it was more like the father entrusting the keys to the car to a son nearing adulthood, who already knows how to drive safely and responsibly, and has already proven himself on many occasions. The son is ready, by anyone's standards, to be trusted with such a potentially dangerous machine. But he still messes up at the critical moment, causing death and destruction. Who is morally responsible for that?

That leads us to another angle:  why was the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil there in the first place?

One thing we don't pretend to know is what ultimate purpose it served. There are a few theories, such as: maybe it was meant for  later after humanity had matured to a certain level; or that it was simply there to test humany's obedience; or as a chance to exercise his power to choose. Perhaps none of them completely satisfy everyone, but there is the other consideration: Adam, as we observed, had been there longer, knew what was what, and knew what he was doing. Eve was a new arrivals, so she was easily deceived.

When Adam discovered that Eve had eaten the forbidden fruit, why didn't he take Eve by the hand, lead her to where God would be walking in the cool of the day, and say, “I'm afraid we've had a miss-hap. Eve has gone and eaten from that tree you told us not to, because the snake told her it was good for her. Isn't there anything that can be done for her?” He didn't do that. He simply ate of it himself, knowing full well what the consequences were (and people point to the Genesis story to show how superior men are to women. How was that superior?).

Yet another angle is, would it really have been better to be products of determinism than free will? If we were, would we be enjoying the levels of creativity that we do, pushing the limits to what's possible, or indeed, even discussing free will versus determinism? It's clear from a close examination of Scripture that God's intent in creating humanity was to enjoy companionship on that level.

It's on that level that we see that God, by making use of that “input device”, initiated a midcourse correction intended to eventually bring everything back into line with what it's supposed to be. As anyone knows, who fixes things, some fixes may take a while, and in mid-fix, look even worse than when we started out. That Fix (with a capital F) involved instituting a covenant with various ones, which gave the Omnipotent One the leeway to manifest His Omnipotence in a limited way (things like parting the Red Sea, etc) without overstepping the mandate He had given humanity. In fact, that was the whole point of having a “chosen people”, so He could “legally” maintain a presence on the earth so He could carry out the Fix. Humanity created The Mess, humanity must play a vital part in The Fix.

What about those who have been suffering in the meantime, simply because The Fix is still in the works? What of those who have never heard of The Fix?

The traditional assertion is that every man, woman, boy and girl, puppy and kitten who hasn't read aloud the Sinner's Prayer from the back of a Chick tract, will spend all of eternity burning in the intense fire of hell; it doesn't matter how miserable their life was on earth.

I believe there is a hell, and also a world to come, in which the meek will inherit the earth. I also believe that being fully initiated into God's Kingdom is through repentance and faith - being born again by the Spirit of God. We’ll talk about that in another post. However I also believe it is a mistake to assume that Theologians have distilled the sum of all truth from the little we can read of scripture. I do believe God is just, and besides being omnipotent, He is all knowing. He knows the lives of every abused child, every slave, each bullied and beaten vulnerable person, from beginning to end - and He's just. I can only trust Him with that. That’s a part of having faith in Him.

We do get some vague hints from the Bible, the following from Yeshua's parables:

The parable of the rich man and Lazarus: A rich man who had everything, but never showed mercy to poor diseased Lazarus who sat at the door grabbing what crumbs fell from the dishes as they were being carried out to be washed. Both died, the rich man went to hell, while Lazarus went to a comfortable place and was held in the bosom of Father Abraham. We're not told that Lazarus was a born again Christian, nor whether he was Torah observant; only that he was receiving compensation for a life of misery. The rich man was, apparently receiving just compensation for non Torah observance, particularly of those parts of the Torah that command us not to neglect the poor of the land, to see to the needs of the widows and orphans and the refugees - about consuming the earth's resources without giving anything back.

The parable of the sheep and the goats: At judgement day, the Judge of all the earth sits on His throne, directing some to move to His right, and others to His left. To those on His right He says, “I was sick and you helped me; I was hungry and you fed me; I was imprisoned and you visited me etc… enter into the joy of the Lord.” Those people replied, “Huh?” “When did that happen?” “I've never even been to church!” “I never saw you…” And the Judge replied, “Oh yes you did. When you befriended that homeless kid, when you went out of your way to check how that very sick looking man was doing, when you paid out more than you could afford to feed that family… you were doing it to me.” To those on His left, He had other things to say.

As I said, the above are hints as to God criteria for judgement. A major one is according to how we judge others. Yeshua said, “Don't judge and you won't be judged. By what standard you judge others is how you will be judged.”

I picture one of us standing in the queue at the final judgement: The man just two ahead of you approaches the throne and says, “I was really bad, I know. I had such a bad temper, I beat my wife and my kid A couple of times, and…”

The judge interrupts him, “Yes, you confessed that to me, and by my grace, you were beginning to overcome in that area. You were on your way to becoming a truly good gentle husband and father before your brother-in-law shot you. You are forgiven. Enter into the joy of the Lord.”

The one just before you approaches, saying, “I'm not sure I'm worthy to enter. I couldn't keep my hands to myself, always flirting, my wife divorced me…”

“But you kept looking to me for forgiveness, and you were slowly being transformed by my grace. Enter into my joy.“

Then it's your turn. “I can't think of any reason I can't just enter, can you? I mean, I wasn't nearly as bad as those other two, and they…”

“Not so fast. What about when you went to church wearing a shirt that hadn't been ironed, or that time you were seen picking your nose in front of the City Hall? And then there's the time you bent over to pick up a coin, and the top of your bum was showing!”

“C'mon! Those are such small thing! Those two ahead of me were…”

“I can't judge you the same as them. You wrote your own rulebook when you judged others by how they conduct themselves in public, so I have to judge you by the same standard you judged them.”

Maybe not exactly like that, but you get the picture.

James says in his epistle that by fulfilling the commandment to love our neighbour as ourselves instead of judging and favoring some over others, we qualify ourselves to be assessed by the royal law of liberty.

This brings us to our biggest obstacle; by taking on board the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we've made ourselves experts in judging others, and that, in turn, subjects us to judgement.

By showing mercy, giving people the benefit of the doubt, forgiving personal offences, releasing grudges, we place ourselves under God's mercy. However, we can't simply “unknow” the Knowledge of Good and Evil, can we! As much as we try to forgive and forget, it just keeps coming back. Also, some wounds are so deep that we find it impossible to forgive. That's where we especially need The Fix.

Just as The Mess was created by humanity, so also was The Fix, in the person of Messiah Yeshua. The Omnipotent One had been spending all of human history setting it up so that He, by human consent and cooperation, could send The Fix in the person of His Son, the human, Yeshua.

After spending a lifetime telling us about The Fix, Yeshua Himself became the target of every injury, abuse, slander, false accusation, and was finally subjected unjustly to the most torturous death imaginable; absorbing the shock of all human injustice, while uttering His last words, “Father, forgive them.”

As a human, Yeshua had the authority of a human, but without the setback of having gone wrong. He expended all the energy He had been given, and all the authority He had, until there was no more to expend. The intensity was such, He underwent death; thus, the perfect exercise of human authority, completely undoing the Mess, making The Fix available to all of humanity.

So, what exactly was it that this perfect exercise of human authority enabled the Omnipotent One to do? Something along the line of what He did with the first human, when He breathed into him the Breath of Life. It was so powerful that it brought Him back to life, complete with his body, but in a highly enhanced state. What's more, because it was officially enabled by human authority, it has the potential to affect all humans, solving all the world's problems, eventually bringing resurrection from the dead (in the same enhanced state). It's a force greater than we can imagine, and it's been in our hands ever since.

So what's wrong? We’re like a bunch of kids sitting on top of a machine more powerful than a nuclear reactor, but we're fighting over a game of marbles. … a bit like having a supercomputer in our pocket -or in my case, at the end of a selfie stick - and using it to look at pictures of cats, and getting into arguments with people we've never met. Isn't that just like us?

So now the Fix is in place, it's there in the clockworks, but it's still up to humanity to apply it. That's what we're on about now - some of us anyway.

Israel had twins, their names were Christianity and Islam...

...perhaps not in the sense that we normally think; they were born 600 years apart. The elder twin, Christianity wasn't called by that name at first. It was the local street urchins and the bullies who began calling him that as a taunt. They kept it up for so long that soon he was calling himself that, and the name stuck.

At first, Christianity took after his mother, which meant he reflected the two divine attributes, Justice and Mercy -- also known as Holiness and Love. In fact, he reflected them so well that the mother became jealous, and he began to find it difficult to live in the same house with her. This was also due to the fact that Israel's husband had called, dressed as a beggar; and she, failing to recognise Him, had turned him away. However the son had recognised him, and they stayed in communication. He promised the child that one day, they would all be reunited.
As time went on, the son could no longer stand to live in the same house as his mother, and left home. About that time, the house was seized and the mother also had to leave. They became a broken family.

Cut off from his mother's influence, Christianity began to emphasise the divine attribute of Love and Mercy, neglecting that of Justice and Holiness -- receiving only the new and rejecting the old. He also began to emulate the neighbourhood boys in other ways, and was soon unrecognisable as the son of his mother.

This was truly sad, as the child had been destined to reign as a prince alongside his mother, a queen, and his father, King Messiah. This would bring perfect balance to the universe, however it couldn't happen, because the child who was to be prince was away from home, and his character was becoming increasingly unbalanced. Even as it was, the mantel of “Prince of the Universe” was still on the child, and as such, his imbalance also affected the universe.

What happened next was not the original plan of Him who was to reign as King, but it was as though nature were correcting the imbalance. He allowed it to happen, knowing that it would bring about his purpose in the end, and in the mean time, there would be a semblance of balance in the universe. So, because of the imbalance in the cosmos, a twin was born. Just as the older twin was the son of Abraham through faith, the younger was also a son, through Ishmael. That twin's name was Islam.

Everything that the elder twin rejected, the younger twin embraced. The elder child had clung to mercy at the expense of justice, so the younger twin clung to justice, but rejected mercy. The elder twin had become careless in describing the Holy Trinity, giving the impression that he believed in three gods instead of One God manifested as three persons. The younger twin responded with, “That's polytheism! There is only one God,” and rejected the Trinity. The elder child had begun to describe the doctrine of the Incarnation and Virgin Birth in a pagan sort of way, as though God had intimate relations with Mary to give birth to Messiah, thus His title, the “Son of God”. The younger brother was repulsed by this idea, and retorted, “No! God cannot have children!”

Never-the-less, the younger twin did believe in the Messiah, even acknowledging that He was the Word of God, not realising that that's what the term, “Son of God” really meant in the first place. But he didn't believe in the crucifixion and the resurrection, because those were the ultimate expressions of Mercy. In essence, he had rejected Mercy because his elder brother had so distorted it by divorcing it from Justice. However, his own understanding of Justice was likewise distorted.

It was truly a broken family, and all nature wept. The mother, having fled from her home and living wherever she could, was tormented and persecuted by both of her children – when they weren't too busy fighting each other.

Then, one day the first child had an awakening. He began to realise what a horrible son he had been, and began, by degrees, returning to his mother. The mother's heart also began to open to her son. The son asked her, “Please, remind me of the truths I've neglected this past 2000 years, like Justice the Fear of the Lord.”

As the mother began to open up to her child, her eyes also opened to King Messiah, whom she had once turned away from her door when he came dressed as a beggar. He had been communicating with the elder twin from a distance all along, but the child had not been very good at remembering all that he told him, and didn't know how to mix the new with the old. But now that the King was revealing Himself more directly, the elder son also began to think more clearly and understand the will of the King, and the divine attributes of Justice and Mercy.

Another thing began to happen: the more the older child embraced the more balanced view, his twin began to fade away as his soul began to merge with that of his older brother. Soon, they were no longer two separate twins, but one child. Only a shell of the younger twin's body remained, sort of like a zombie that continued to put up a fight until it disintegrated. There were also other zombies, clones of the mother and elder child that had spawned when the reunion came. For a short time, all the zombies joined forces in an attempt to devour the Queen and the Prince, trying to bring about a zombie apocalypse. That was short-lived, and soon total harmony was restored in the universe as King Messiah reigned with the Queen and the Prince for the rest of eternity.

Image: By William Fraser [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Review of Iranaeus' The Proof Of The Apostolic Preaching

Subtitled: Towards a much more simple and basic theology
Find it hard to get your head around Calvinism, Armenianism, Original Sin, Predestination and other focal points of Augustinian theology? Try simplifying things by shifting your focus to much earlier in history -- the time of Irenaeus.

Mind you, St. Augustine was a deserving of the honour of sainthood. His dedication and devotion to God are exemplary, and his testimony of his conversion is a great inspiration. The story of his mother's dedication and unceasing prayer is especially inspiring.

But his Bible teaching....?

St. Augustine lived in the fourth century, was heavily influenced by his Greek style education -- though he never learned the Greek language. In other words, he based his theology on the Latin scriptures (with all their translation errors), and used his Greek style reasoning to interpret it. Many of the doctrines that he passed down to us, we are hard put to find in the writings of earlier Church Fathers.

St. Irenaeus, on the other hand, lived in the second century. He was well versed in the Greek scriptures in their original (or closer to the original) texts, but interpreted it in the Hebraic style rather than Greek. In fact, he was the pupil of St. Polycarp, who was the pupil of St.John.

A great piece of work is St. Irenaeus' THE PROOF OF THE APOSTOLIC PREACHING. He goes systematically through what the early believers had received directly from the Apostles. Free will vs determinism wasn't even a question yet. Original Sin isn't mentioned, nor alluded to. Instead, the emphasis is on death and resurrection. Sin -- or disobedience -- resulted in death. Jesus came to bring life, and the resurrection.

Overall, you'll be edified by a challenge to walk the life of faith, worded in the simple language of the earliest believers.

You can read it for free at www.tertullian.org/fathers/irenaeus_02_proof.htm
Or download a copy here: www.ccel.org/ccel/irenaeus/demonstr.html

Scot McKnight reviews Tolkien's Leaf by Niggle

Scot McKnight has a good review of a short story by J.R.R.Tokien, Leaf, by Niggle. I remember reading that book as a teen, not long after reading the Trilogy. I had recently thought that I would like to get my hands on it once again, as I remember that it dealt with issues of the present life, and how it affects the after life.

Anyway, Scot McKnight highlights some issues in which Tolkien demonstrates that the Christian belief is in stark contrast to that of Neo Platonism. That Greek philosophy held that this life is unimportant in comparison to the after life. In Leaf, by Niggle, the protagonist finds that his life long endeavour is only a prelude to what's to come.

Allegory on PDF

I've now distilled my latest edition of the novella, Allegory, and the accompanying article, A Study on Judgement, as a PDF file. My present intention is that this remains as a free download. It's copyright in my name, but that's to insure it isn't misused. Anyone who downloads it is free to make copies to give to people, as long as they don't change it.

Anyway, here it is.

I'll post a permanent link to it later on this page, in a prominent place.

Enjoy...

Why did G-d create the world?

From Rabbi David Fohrman, Jewish World Review

It's not just an idle, philosophical question. From a religious standpoint, this innocent, child-like query packs a big theological wallop. For if G-d is a perfect Being, a being who has no needs, then why would He bother creating a universe? What could a universe possibly give to a Being who doesn't need anything at all?

In the beginning of the 18^th century, a Jewish thinker by the name of Rabbi Moshe Chayim Luzzatto proposed what has become a classic answer to this dilemma. His answer is deceptively simple. Luzzatto says that G-d created the world in order to be capable of love.

The words seem like a cliché, sort of like the "G-d is Love" bumper sticker you might see plastered to the back of someone's rusting VW Beatle; but rest assured that Luzzatto lived long before the beatniks, and he meant what he said seriously. His argument goes as follows:

One of the axioms that most religions, Judaism included, accepts about G-d is that He is good. But those are just words. What does it actually mean to be good? One of the things it means, Luzzatto says, is that one acts to benefit others. If there is no world, though, then there are no others that G-d can benefit; He exists alone in numinous solitude. G-d acted to create a world so that there would be other beings existing besides Himself, beings upon whom He could bestow goodness.

In short, G-d created the world because goodness demanded it. more...

What makes Church? 7 - Foundations

Foundational teaching is among the most important things that make up the stability and vitality of church. It can make the difference between a handful of cheery believers who think this idea of Emerging Church (or Messianic, or whatever) is a cool idea and get on for the ride; and a committed taskforce that all know who they are, what they are, and where they're going. Both groups, by our definition, are "church", but the second one will stay together much longer.

The true foundation is Yeshua. All foundational teaching will focus on Him, and will plant us firmly on who He is. In one way, it's a simple concept -- simple enough for new believers to know which direction to begin going without complicating the issue.

However, if we consider that the entire Bible, both Old and New Testaments also focuses on Yeshua, we realise that there's more to it than meets the eye. If we further realise that to understand the Old Testament helps us to understand the New, and thus roots us all the more deeply in Yeshua, we realise that we may have a ways to go to being firmly built on the Foundation.

The Messianic movement has done a valuable job in returning us to our foundations. By highlighting the Jewish source of our faith, we can now see a few things in perspective. Some may feel that they are among those complicating the issue. However, the issue became complicated long before they arrived on the scene. If anything, they're helping to un-complicate things.

We have to understand that the writers of the Gospels and the Epistles were Jewish. As revolutionary as their message was, it was rooted in Jewish culture, and in a Jewish understanding of divine revelation. But somehow, we've lost that. We no longer look at biblical revelation with a Jewish mind, but with a Greek philosopher's mind. How did this happen?

I'll answer with a short history:

To the rabbis, what Yeshua and His apostles had to say was quite radical -- radical enough for many of them to reject it outright as heresy. The early believers knew that their message was radical. The idea of Gentiles being accepted as equals without them having to become Torah observant, was extreme!

The Gentile believers knew that their new found faith was radical for their Jewish brethren. In fact, they were warned, by Paul et al, to be on guard for some of their Jewish brethren of the old school who would try to make them Torah observant. So they were. They knew they were radical.

But how radical? some of them wondered. Can we be this radical? Can we dump everything that Judaism ever taught and base our understanding on Greek style logic? By the time they were asking loud enough to be heard, the original writers of the New Testament had already passed from the scene. The majority of the Messianic population was now Gentile. So, they began to interpret the whole of the New Testament and as much of the Old Testament as they could using mathematical logic learned from Plato and Aristotle (in fact, they even began forcing Jewish believers to become Gentiles!). Because Paul sounded more Greek than the rest, and was, after all, the one who told the Gentile believers to avoid being forced into Torah observance, his epistles were understood as being foundational to Christian belief. The Gospels, because they made Yeshua sound Jewish, was understood to being targetted to Old Testament Judaism, and not to New Testament Christians. They were only good for historical value. But the real meat was the Pauline epistles.

Unfortunately, this was the theological equivalent of mistaking the window and door frames, the drywall and the roofing material for the foundation of a building, and using the foundational material for decoration.

Consider that when the New Testament writers talked about the scripture, they were referring to the Torah and the Prophets and other Old Testament writings. Only Peter, shortly before he and the other New Testament writers passed from the scene, referred to Paul's epistles as "scripture", but also said they were easy to misunderstand, and that many had twisted them out of context to their own destruction (II Peter 3:15,16). This means that one has to have a good foundational knowledge of God's revelation in Yeshua before they can understand Paul's epistles.

Yeshua said in Matthew 7, "He who hears these words of mine (i.e. the Gospels), and does them is like a man building on the foundation". Hebrews 6 gives us a list of what the foundations are, referring to them as the "elementary principals of Messiah": Repentance, faith, baptisms, laying on of hands, resurrection and eternal judgement. The Gospels open up with repentance and faith. The General Epistles, James, Peter's and John's epistles, and Jude also deal directly with faith and repentance and the other foundations.

For example, they give us a good definition of faith. The Pauline epistles talk about faith, but they don't supply a definition.

If we were to go straight to Ephesians chapter 2, and forget James 3, we would read, "By grace you are saved through faith...not of works." Later on, if we read James, who says, "Faith without works is dead," we'd think the two passages were contradictory.

In the mean time, our faith might not amount to very much. We would think, "Yeah, I believe. I said the sinner's prayer, so I'm saved. I can claim every spiritual blessing in Messiah," while living a very carnal life. Anytime someone pointed out our carnality, we'd retort, "Salvation isn't of works! I'm saved by faith!"

However, if we established our definition of what faith is by understanding the message of James, then we'd know what kind of faith Paul is talking about when he says we're saved by faith.

We're not saved by works, but real faith that saves will produce works. A life based on true faith will be readily distinguishable from a life that isn't. James and I John is full of that.

When many pollsters today tell us that the life of the average "born again" Christian looks no different from that of an average non-Christian, that tells us that we've got our foundation all wrong.

p.s. I've got a project underway, writing series of study outlines that cover foundational truth. It begins in the Old Testament, and takes us into the New. It's not complete yet, but I'm sure you could learn a lot. Click here...

This is the last in the What Makes Church? series. I haven't covered the subheading Worship yet, but there's so much good material out there on that already, and I don't feel I have anything to add to it. However, I'm sure we'll discuss issues related to this and the othe subheadings, and more besides, in future posts.

What Makes Church? 6 - leadership, authority, ministry, giftings, etc.

Just a short one today, with a few links to some useful articles regarding church.

Two are by Rick Joyner, who believes that one of the priorities that churches generally fail in is equipping the believers for ministry. Usually, only 2% of church members take any part in ministry. At Morningstar Fellowship, at the time he wrote the articles below, 15 to 20 % are involved, and he feels they have a long way to go. The two articles are:

Megatrends in the New Millennium (on Next Reformation website)

Shepherd's Astray (from Morningstar website)

Another one who has a lot to say is Andrew Strom, who believes that the next revival will be a street revival. Even calling it "house church" would be incorrect, as it will be on the streets. His website is called, Revival School. He has written an e-book called The Nine Lies of Today’s Church, available in PDF format from the adotadonai.net website. He comes on very strong, and many won't agree with everything he says. However, the last chapter qualifies the overall message by saying that to expect a church to immediately adopt all of his points (ie. selling their church building, changing the pastor's roll, trashing all programs, etc) may be impossible, and perhaps unwise to attempt. To be honest, there's nothing in it that I can say I disagree with -- though I may not come on as strongly as he -- but I would agree that the church described as the antithesis to the "9 lies" may be impossible in most places (at least in the free world) until after a major shaking has happened to Western society. We may discuss some of his points at another time in this blog.

There are also many other websites and blogs, some of which you'll find in the sidebar, that are good resources for doing church the organic or emergent way. Some of them simply offer a window into various local fellowiships. Others also offer valuable resources, as well as links to yet more.

What Makes Church? 5 - leadership, authority, ministry, giftings

In many ways, the two subheadings Leadership and Authority, and Ministry and Giftings, overlap. That's because good leadership is not only a gift, but it facilitates gifts and ministry among the members to the extant where it could be hard to tell the difference between the "full time ministers" and what we previously thought were "laity".

A few years ago, at a church conference in Thailand, I was asked to interpret for one of the speakers. He was the pastor of a Baptist church in New Zealand, who had led his church through a very interesting transition. It began as he was pondering and praying about how the church could fulfil its mandate of reaching the world, then realising that it wouldn't happen unless some drastic changes were made. The transition he took the church through was difficult, he lost many valuable members, but was worth it in the end.

Not only did the process change the structure of the church, but it redefined their concept of ministry. Under the new structure, more of the responsibilities lay with the group of elders. Some were the same who originally served on the board, but they were had a calling in one of the five-fold ministries listed in Ephesians 4. Their role wasn't so much to minister, but to lead and enable the members to minister in the five areas. The pastor reduced his own role to that of a fellow elder, albeit a leader among equals. They were only ministers in so much as they ministered. It was no longer a job that came with a title. Moreover, anyone could be a minister. It wasn't so much a matter of being chosen for a position, but simply doing what they saw needed to be done. In doing that, they had the support and mentoring of whichever elder was called to that gifting.

The whole idea of a separation between clergy and laity was obsolete. Furthermore, as a minister in this sense, it's so much easier to be humble -- no title to maintain.

As I was translating for him from English into Thai, I was becoming more and more excited by what I was hearing. I had just recently started following the Emergent conversation, and pondering what exactly is church, and what would it look like if reduced to its bare essentials. Some of the aspects, such as the definition of ministry, had been in my head and heart for many years. But now, here was someone who was actually doing it. Now, I know it's possible.

What Makes Church? 4 - Leadership and Authority...continued

I believe that Matthew 18 is key to understanding what the church and leadership in it is all about. It is very significant that this discourse begins with the following:

At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, “Who then is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”
Then Jesus called a little child to Him, set him in the midst of them, and said, “Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever receives one little child like this in My name receives Me..."

First, we must understand that the concept of "church" didn't exist in the understanding of Yeshua's disciples. While the word appears in some English translations later in chapter 18, quoted in yesterday's blog entry, the word should be understood as "congregation", or "minyan", a concept understood in Judaism.

Judaism also understood the concept of "kingdom of God", or "kingdom of heaven" (which are synonymous terms), used in the above passage. They might not have understood exactly what Yeshua meant by it. What Yeshua meant, includes what the Pauline epistles later refer to as "church". I realise that this is something that could take up more space in explaining than I intend to do here. Instead, I'll refer you to Scot McKnight's recent blogs on the subject. I'll just say here that too often, we've separated the concepts of Kingdom and Church.

What Yeshua is referring to here isn't just the way things will be in the sweet bye 'n bye. To be sure, our life in heaven will reflect this, but what we need to grasp is that what Yeshua is saying is, leaders in the church are to be those who are the most humble, and accessible -- like children. Later in the chapter, we see, in the parable of the lost sheep, what Yeshua expects in leaders in the way of compassion, and priorities. All of this is something we, who think we're leadership material, ought to be considering very seriously.

Again, you'll find all of this discussed in more detail in chapter 12 of my online book, Culture Shock.

What Makes Church? 3 - Leadership and Authority

Continuing our discussion on Church, leading into our second subheading on leadership and authority, compare the following two passages, one from Matthew 18, and the other from the Talmud tractate, Berachot 6a:

Matthew 18:15-20:

"If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.' If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church (or "the congregation"), treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
"I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
"Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them."

Talmud, Berachot 6a (remember the Jewish concept of a congregation being a minimum of 10 attendants):

Whence is it that when ten assemble for prayer the Shechinah is in their midst? As it is said, "God standeth in the godly congregation" (Ps. lxxxii. 1). And whence is it that when three sit and judge, the Shechinah is in their midst? As it is said, "In the midst of the judges He judgeth" (ibid). And whence is it that when two sit and occupy themselves with the study of the Torah, the Shechinah is in their midst? As it is said, "Then they that feared the Lord spoke one with another, and the Lord hearkened and heard" (Mal iii. 16). And whence is it that even if an individual sits and occupies himself with the study of the Torah the Shechinah is with him? As it is said, "In every place where I cause My name to be remembered I will come unto thee and will bless thee" (Exod. xx. 24).

Notice the reference in both passages to the numbers two, three, and the congregation. As an aside, it's also interesting to note that Yeshua identifies Himself as the Shechinah -- which could be a clue to how the concept of the Trinity can be made to fit into Judaism.

When we look at it in the light of the two passages above, it seems clear that in Matthew 18, Yeshua was outlining the authority structure in the church along lines familiar to Jewish understanding.

For a more in depth study on this, read this ...

Scot McKnight on Calvinism

Scot McKnight, on his blog, Jesus Creed, is doing an interesting discussion on Calvinism. So far he's talked about how he became a Calvinist, and then he shares why he rejected it, as a theological student (now with his Ph.D.). For anyone who has ever had questions about the issues of Calvinism, this is worth a good read. There's also more to come, so stay tuned (to Jesus Creed that is).

What Makes Church? 2 - Community and Relationship

The first component in church is community, and relationships within that community. This is the most fundamental aspect, and it is, I believe, the only one that actually defines church -- believers together in fellowship centred around Messiah. It's as simple as that. The other four headings -- authority structure, ministry and gifts, teaching, and worship -- don't define the church, but only help it become what it's supposed to be: transforming, missional, an army, a family, a "spiritual hospital" etc.

It's interesting that there is no reference in the New Testament of anyone outside of Yeshua, ever planting a church. Yeshua said in Matthew 16:13-20, "I will build my church." Other than that, there's no record of Paul, Peter or anyone else literally starting a church. What they did was call people to repentance and make disciples, and only then does the New Testament refer to the resulting group of believers as the church. (In the sense of one's ministry, I won't argue with anyone who calls themselves a "church planter". In fact, I use the term myself. In our 20th century terminology, it's become synonym for making and gathering disciples.)

Because I see community and relationship as being the only defining factor, I can look at any Christian institution, totally ignore the sign over the door, and recognise that the church exists there. Their structure doesn't define the church, but as long as there are true believers there who are in fellowship with one another, they constitute the church. It doesn't even matter if they understand that fact. Even if the official doctrines of that institution were destructive to spiritual life (if one were to follow them), as long as there is life in the hearts of the believers, and they acknowledge one another in love, it's church.

Inversely, even if they had perfectly sound teaching and had a format that encourage true fellowship, they are only the church in so far as there are believers there actually doing it.

Fellowship is what makes us the church. Whatever we can do to enhance fellowship with G-d and with one another on a spiritual level, so that we become a part of one another, will strengthen and vitalise the church. That's where the other subheadings come in.

What Makes Church?

Before I go too far into this, let's get our priorities right, maybe with a very loose paraphrase of I Corinthians 13:

If a fellowship group happens to excel in all the points that I bring up in this and coming blog entries, if they are the model of the perfect church -- but don't have love: they are no more than a bunch of futile idealists.

On the other hand, if a church is so ingrained in all the traditional ways that the building and pulpit are looked on as icons of holiness; their cannon of scripture includes Scholfield's Notes; and when Messiah returns, they believe He will actually touch down at their denominational head office; and yet the first thing you notice about them is their sincere fervent love for the Lord and for one another and they would give their lives to extend that love to the world, I'd rather attend that church than the "perfect" one, as that's the one where you'll find Yeshua.

Becoming perfect is not the rout to perfection.

If you really want to know what I feel is most important in a church, here are my eight criteria. They have nothing to do with format, leadership model, authority structure, minor doctrines like eschatology etc, what day of the week they worship etc etc. I believe they are more important than any of the other points we've discussed so far in this blog, or that we will discuss. I'd really advise you to click on the link and read them before going on with this discussion. Yet, I don't know if there is a church that excels in all eight. If I did find such a church, I would stick with that one, no matter what good things could be said about Emergent and/or Messianic etc.

Having said that, I do believe that the quickest way to becoming such a church, one that fulfils the eight criteria, could be discussed under the following five headings:

1. community and relationship
2. authority structure
3. giftings and ministry
4. foundational teaching
5. worship

I hope to discuss these in the next few entries.

However, I suppose this should come with a warning label: I am not, at present, involved in the leadership of a church, let alone an Emergent or Messianic one. I believe that teaching like this should, ideally come up from one's experience. However, I have done church planting in the past. I believe I did a few things right, but I also made mistakes. I've also been involved in the development of various churches, though none of them are what I believe a church could be. I wrote a short autobiography called My Journey So Far for the express purpose of revealing where I'm coming from in what ever I teach or impart.

Does the New Testament call Jews "Christ Killers"?

A question that has come to the surface as the result of the recent release of Mel Gibson's film, The Passion, has been boldly printed on the cover of Newsweek: "Who Really Killed Christ"? The question being asked in this context is, does The Passion support the age old label of the Jews being "Christ Killers?" The fact that it's being asked by many who haven't even seen the film, on hearing that it is rigidly true to the New Testament account, begs the question, is the New Testament, in and of itself seen as anti-Semitic and therefore politically incorrect?
While I've read a number of reviews, I couldn't give a first hand opinion as to the film itself, as I haven't seen it yet. Therefore, I'll restrict my question here to, does the New Testament, in fact, accuse the Jews of killing Christ?
I'm afraid that I couldn't proceed too far in defending the political correctness of the New Testament without beginning to sound like I'm trying to make the Bible sound like something it isn't -- a systematic compendium of well ordered thought, brimming over with twentieth century enlightenment. How would I then explain why Joshua shouldn't have been brought before an international war crimes tribunal for genocide? Why Wasn't King David unceremoniously ejected out the same door as Jim Baaker and Jimmy Swaggart for his relations with Bethsheba -- not to speak of the murder of her husband, while King Saul was rejected for something that would only make the back page of the local rag? What about King David's, and King Solomon's numerous wives? What about Hoseah marrying a prostitute? Or Jepthah sacrificing his daughter? What about Yeshua saying to the Syrophoenecian woman, in effect, "Get lost you dog!"
Do I believe in the Bible?
Yes, very much.
So, how do I explain all of the above?
I don't. I don't take the Bible as a politically correct, systematic compendium of well ordered thought, brimming over with twentieth century enlightenment. Nor do I take it as a mathematically logical set of formulas on how to maintain a well ordered life.
What the Bible does do is get its point across concerning just about every aspect of life, but to understand it you must read it as it was intended to be read.

...but we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Greeks foolishness, and to people living 2000 years from now, politically incorrect... (I Corinthians 1: 23 Baruch's version)
So, back to the question -- er -- what question?
Let's go with this one: What if a few passages of the New Testament do insinuate that the Jews are "Christ Killers"?
Let's look at the context.
Who was Jesus? Was he a Roman Catholic? Was he a Protestant? Was he an Englishman?
No. He was a Jew -- a first century Jew, subject to Jewish law. He wasn't even a Roman citizen, like Paul was.
So, what happened?
A Jewish court tried a Jewish man, and judged, rightly or wrongly, that he had infringed the Jewish law in a way that warranted his death.
Is that such a big scandal? What nation has never been guilty of something like that?
Well, okay, so the one they sent to his death, in this case just happened to be the Messiah.
Okay, but whose Messiah? The Roman Catholic Messiah? The Anglican Messiah?
These institutions didn't even exist yet. Yeshua's only claim to Messiahship was based on Jewish Law and on the utterances of Jewish prophets.
Those Greco-Romans who were present at the crucifixion, far from being aghast at how Jews could do such a thing as kill "Our Christ", fully co-operated in the matter. They went even a step further by providing a crown of thorns and performing a mock coronation as "King of the Jews", a label obviously meant to insult the Jewish community as well. It's ironic that much later, the same Romans began calling the Jews "Christ Killers", but only when "Christ" was no longer thought of as Jewish. Never have we ever heard the accusation, "Killers of the King of the Jews".
When they mocked Him as "King of the Jews", the Greco-Roman world had absolutely no concept of a messiah. That only came later through Jewish preachers who came proclaiming what only became possible through His death. For the Gentiles to have any part in the whole affair to begin with somebody had to kill Christ as the atonement for the sin of humanity. It could happen no other way.
As Yeshua Himself once said, let He who is without sin cast the first stone. I'm very much afraid that we Gentiles, as sinful as we are, have gone and done just that by calling the Jews "Christ Killers", in fact, biting the hand that fed us.
Now, we've looked at how much weight the accusation carries given the historical setting of the act itself, and we've seen that, right or wrong, those making the accusation had no business making it. Now, let's see how the New Testament actually treats it.
Following the death and resurrection of Yeshua, the first one who sounds like he's calling the Jews "Christ Killers", is Peter. He makes the insinuation three times, the first, on the feast of Shavuot (or Pentecost as it was called in Greek) when he preached to the crowd who were attracted to the 120 followers of Messiah speaking in other languages:

Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. (Acts 2:36)
Perhaps a more telling statement is the one he made to the crowd in the temple following the healing of the paralytic:
The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified His Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let Him go. But you denied the Holy One and the Just, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses. And His name, through faith in His name, has made this man strong, whom you see and know. Yes, the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all. “Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers. But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. (Acts 3:13-18)
We notice three things here. First, he is addressing the members of the general public, and second, he is somewhat lenient with them, saying "I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers". Finally, he acknowledges that this was how it was meant to be from the beginning, so as to fulfill the plan of God.
When addressing the High Priest and other officials the next day, he doesn't sound quite as accommodating, probably because he's speaking to those who were directly involved:
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders of Israel: If we this day are judged for a good deed done to a helpless man, by what means he has been made well, let it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole. This is the ‘stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’ (Acts 4:8-11)
So, we see that Peter laid the responsibility directly where it rested, with those who actually did it, not the whole Jewish race, nor even the whole Jewish religion.
Let's now look at Paul's approach. Here is a passage from his speech to the synagogue in Antioch of Pysidia:
“Men and brethren, sons of the family of Abraham, and those among you who fear God, to you the word of this salvation has been sent. For those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they did not know Him, nor even the voices of the Prophets which are read every Sabbath, have fulfilled them in condemning Him. And though they found no cause for death in Him, they asked Pilate that He should be put to death. (Acts 13:26-28)
Here, we see that Paul lays the responsibility with "those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers".
So we see that while both Peter and Paul both state that it was the Jewish leaders who were responsible for the death of Messiah, they are very careful to lay the blame only on those directly involved.
Another point we need to make here is that both Peter and Paul were Jewish themselves. They did not see themselves as starting a new religion in opposition to Judaism. There is a big difference between the member of one group making a general accusation against another group, and someone making a statement about the group to which they belong. Peter and Paul were both insiders. They were not Roman Catholics (or even Protestants) making a sweeping general statement about the Jews. They were, themselves, Jews trying to bring change from within.
Paul was even more of an insider than Peter. He was a Pharisee (an Orthodox rabbi), who played by the rules, even when working for a change in the Jewish attitude towards Yeshua, as demonstrated by the events surrounding his first arrest. It began while he was going to the temple to offer a sacrifice to pay a vow according to Jewish Law. Shortly after that, when brought before the Sanhedrin, he was caught off guard on finding that the president was none other than the High Priest himself (often it was a member of the Pharisee sect, most notable of these being Hillel and Shammai, and later, Gamaliel). He acknowledged that because he hadn't realised this, he had said something out of order, so he apologised. Then, he said, "I am a Pharisee, and the son of a Pharisee..." and proceeded to use an insider argument to defend his case. Notice, he didn't used to be a Pharisee. He was still a Pharisee.
His approach to spreading the news of Messiah was "to the Jew first, and then the Gentile". He was the one credited with opening the door to Gentiles to become a part of the Messianic community. He didn't intend to start a separate religion. When the synagogue to whom he spoke the words quoted earlier didn't accept his message, he left saying, "I'm going to the Gentiles". He simply went out, with some of the Jews and interested Gentiles following and, in effect, started a new synagogue, officiated a similar way as other synagogues, with a committee of elders. His attitude towards the Jewish community can be summed up by the following passage:
I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen. (Romans 9:1-5)
His opening the door to the Gentiles wasn't a totally new thing. Orthodox Judaism then, as now, has a provision for Gentiles who wish to worship God without having to conform to the whole Jewish Law. They have what is called the "Seven Commandments of the Sons of Noah", or the "Noachide Law", derived from commandments God gave to Noah after the flood. These are remarkably similar to the guidelines the Apostles in Jerusalem wrote in a letter to believing Gentiles, which we have reproduced for us in Acts 15:23-29.
The only difference with the new Messianic sect was that Gentile believers can be a part as equals, not second class citizens. Again, this is made possible precisely because Messiah was put to death.
Having proclaimed the door open to the Gentiles, Paul gave them a stern warning never to take a superior attitude towards the Jews:
You will say then, “Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.” Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off. And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? (Romans 11:19-24)
So, faith seems to be a tentative thing. It simply won't co-exist with revenge or any other attitude such as would even come close to applying the Blood Libe. We are forgiven, according to Yeshua, only as long as we forgive. It is ironic that it is this very same church, the Romans, to whom Paul wrote these words, that later became among the biggest offenders (though by no means the only ones).
The point is, it was a Jewish thing. The New Testament is a Jewish book. What we now call "Christianity" was a sect of Judaism. There was no such thing as a convert from Judaism to Christianity. The issue that Paul fought tooth and nail for was for Gentiles to be recognised as fellow believers without having to become Torah observant. There was never the question of whether Jews could or should keep kosher diets or keep the Sabbath etc. etc. -- until about one or two hundred years later. Once there was a Gentile majority in the Church, then leaders began demanding that Jewish converts forsake Jewish observances and pactices. The date for Resurrection Sunday was set so that it would never co-incide with Jewish Passover, because this was a "Christian" thing, not "Jewish". In fact, the name for it became "Easter", borrowed from a pagan Roman holiday (we'd rather be pagan than Jewish!). Now Christianity was a separate religion from Judaism, a concept totally foreign to Peter's and Paul's way of thinking.
My point is, the New Testament is a Jewish book, meant to be read in the context of the Jewish understanding of things. Of course, you'll read rebukes by Jews directed at their fellow Jews, but to use it to support the blood libel against the whole Jewish community, is not only out of context, but is about as far from the original intent as can be imagined. For myself, I humbly apologise to the Jewish community that we've done this.