I asked, as an aside, in an earlier post, how the Roman Catholic church calculates which Sunday is Easter Sunday in its liturgical calendar.
I got no bites, either on or off the blog.
Does that mean that no one care or does it mean that everyone already knows? Who knows?!
Since we moved to the home, our bedroom windows face sort of south-ish.
One of the nights during what you High Church people call Holy Week, there were no clouds in the sky and when I woke up to practice insomnia I saw a brilliant moon shining in my eyes.
And, I remembered. Easter is this Sunday.
Because...
...as the Catholics, and all of you who thought that that week was holy, have it...
...Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon in spring.
How biblical is that, eh?
Only rule of faith and practice? Right!
I think the question you need to ponder is this: How does the calculation and designation of a special day like this go against the Bible? Colossians 2:16, while specifically addressing the issue of upholding or not upholding Old Testament feasts, days and practices appears to give liberty to those who choose to designate certain days to honor the God of the Bible. In a nutshell, where does our rule of faith and practice specifically say, "Don't you dare pick certain days to honor the Lord Jesus?"
ReplyDeleteGeorge, my young, Gen X friend, I've been pondering that question since you were catching furtive glimpses at that cute girl in your JUNIOR HIGH SUNDAY SCHOOL CLASS.
ReplyDeleteIt's very possible to have a strong conviction that the designation of humanly devised Holy Days goes against the Bible. And, you know it!
In fact, in the Church of God, in the days when ours was a dynamic, growing and Spirit-empowered movement, it was our strong conviction that, as the 27 point description of THE FAITH AND PRACTICE OF THE CHURCH OF GOD says, it believes in "the Lord's day, or Christian sabbath." (Point 13)
As you know, many of the first members of our body left the German Reformed Church, an old European High Church...a church that practiced Holy Days in the way you yourself do.
Our people sought authority very literally from the Bible and adopted what they called, "the New Testament plan." Our people committed themselves to a pure imitation of the Way of the first disciples.
As point 13 in THE FAITH AND PRACTICE OF THE CHURCH OF GOD makes clear, they practiced the Lord's day. There was no Easter or Christmas in the New Testament...
...so there was no Easter nor Christmas in the Church of God.
So, you ask, "How does the calculation and designation of a special day like this go against the Bible?"
I, of course, can offer my own answer.
But, for you, as a man who's taken ERC ordination vows, a higher authority than my opinion is the faith and teaching of our body.
As far as I can tell, what you actually do is precisely what early Church of God people rejected in favor of the New Testament plan. How ironic.
I'll acknowledge that many in our body today practice Easter and Christmas and others, like you, fiddle around with High Church notions such as "Eastertide," though I think you are ahead of the curve in making us a High Church church.
But I'll say this to you and all our High Church brothers and sisters: The days in which the Church of God rejected Holy Days because they weren't practiced in the New Testament, were the days in which the Church of God was blessed and grew in number and in the Spirit.
On the other hand, these days, as we adopt humanly devised High Church practices with increasing comfort, are days of spiritual decay and numerical decline, as the statistics and other reports from last year's General Conference sessions make clear.
How do those practices go against the Bible? Take your answer from the beliefs and actions of the men and women who were members of the Church of God in our blessed days.
How can you know anything about Church of God history and ask your question, "...where does our rule of faith and practice specifically say, "Don't you dare pick certain days to honor the Lord Jesus?""
New Testament plan, George. New Testament plan.