Waking Up to Grace
Waking Up to Grace is a Bible-centered podcast for anyone who is weary of religious performance and ready to rest confidently in Christ.
Hosted by Lenny, each episode brings honest conversations and a fresh look at Scripture to questions about grace, faith, the New Covenant, identity in Christ, forgiveness, assurance, the church, and eternal life. The goal is not to give you another religious checklist, but to help you see the finished work of Jesus more clearly and reconsider long-held traditions in the light of Scripture.
Whether you are questioning what you have been taught, recovering from legalism, or simply longing to know Christ more deeply, join us as we wake up to grace—one conversation at a time.
Find companion Bible studies and more at WakingUpToGrace.com
Waking Up to Grace
Traditions of Men: Does Church Look Like the New Testament? | Episode 34
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What happens when we compare our church traditions with what we actually see in Scripture?
As we prepare to walk through Paul’s letter to the Romans, we look at the world in which the Roman Christians lived, the tensions between Jewish and Gentile believers, and why understanding their historical setting matters before applying Paul’s words to ourselves.
That leads to a larger question. What did the first century church actually look like? We examine early Christian gatherings, first-century synagogues, sermons, leadership, participation by the whole body, and the difference between traditions handed down by the apostles and the “traditions of men” Paul warned about.
Church may feel familiar simply because we inherited a particular way of doing it. But familiarity does not make a tradition biblical. Scripture gives us something better than assuming, “This is just the way church is done.” It gives us the freedom to examine our traditions and ask whether they help the whole body participate, learn, discern, and grow together in Christ.
Read the companion reflection and join the conversation:
https://wakinguptograce.com/034-intro-to-romans-and-how-to-do-church-romans/
Exploring Paul's Letter to the Romans
AnnouncementHello and welcome to the Waking Up to Grace podcast , where we celebrate and explore the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ . Tune in to the Waking Up to Grace podcast on every major platform . You can also listen to our episodes and read our full transcripts at wakinguptogracecom . And now here's Lenny .
LennyWelcome back to the podcast , everyone .
MelissaWe hope you had a happy Christmas with your families .
LennyYeah , hope you guys had a chance to relax and enjoy some time with your loved ones . I know we did and it was very satisfying and enjoyable . We're very blessed to have brothers and sisters in Christ within our family to gather with , so we're sharing fellowship as well .
MelissaAmen to that .
LennyAnd so that's always excellent . God is really producing fruit in our circles , isn't he ?
MelissaIt's amazing to see .
LennySo , on the note of Christmas , it's kind of interesting because we're doing our introduction to Paul's letter to the Romans . But we found that as we're looking at the kind of the overview of the letter , we realized how much tradition plays into all this . And so it's Christmas time , we're having this national holiday , this tradition , and then realizing how much tradition played into this letter to the Romans . It was a mix of Jews and Gentiles and their traditions . And then on top of that you look at how church looked in those days and you start to think , do our church traditions resemble what the early Christians in the first century would have considered their church tradition ? And you start thinking like maybe their church didn't look like ours at all and maybe that's a problem .
MelissaMaybe church today has stumbling blocks that need to be removed .
LennyYeah . So we're going to touch on that as well , Because what I really want is to both have the right mindset going into this letter to the Romans , which is so amazing , this writing from Paul Romans , which is so amazing , this writing from Paul . But as we're taking it in , I think it's important to put ourselves in their place and I think what we find is that this letter wasn't as if Paul was sitting on a podium speaking to an audience . That's not how their church is operated . I think it's important to realize these things . So we're going to touch on that , but we're also going to touch on all the elements of the letter the culture , the history , things like that .
MelissaI agree . I think it's very important for understanding to put ourselves in their mindset .
LennyYeah , the more we can put ourselves into their timeframe , their culture , their mindsets , their paradigms , the more we can gain from this letter to the Romans . Because if we just read this letter and try to impose it on ourselves , onto our culture , onto our views , and start applying it , there's going to be all kinds of issues . We need to put ourselves in their place before we can start applying what we've learned to ourselves . So true , and so that would be what I would call context . Let's not just read the words . Let's be looking at this letter and pray for understanding the words . There's people out there that could probably recite this . They could probably read the whole letter off the top of their head , but do they understand any of it ?
MelissaThat's where it makes me think of hermeneutics .
LennyYep .
MelissaRight , that's how we're to look at scripture .
LennyYep , and so hermeneutics is like a rule-based system of how to interpret writings can be applied to scripture . Sounds silly to make rules , but you see the poor application of scripture going on out there and you realize having some kind of a system is probably helpful . You got to look at audience relevance . You got to look at the time frame it was written , why they were saying the things they were saying , and then , like I always say all the time , you have to look at it in light of the gospel , because if you're pulling things out of the scripture that don't line up with the gospel , then you're going to go down a bad road well , the gospel is everywhere in scripture .
MelissaEverything points to christ right right and I scripture is supposed to interpret scripture . So if that's not happening , to me that goes along with , in light of the gospel , yeah , scripture interpreting scripture . And if that's not happening , then to me that goes along with , in light of the gospel , yeah , scripture interpreting scripture . And if that's not happening , then there's a problem and you need to go back through and figure out what you're not seeing correctly .
LennyYeah . But there's only one way to realize that , and it's to realize that double talk is not Christianity . Christianity has answers and there are answers to the hard questions Like why are we asking for more forgiveness ? How much love do we have to have ? If love is the law of christians , how much do we have to have ? These are good questions and they deserve answers , and all of these things in light of the gospel . We're going to start off with talking about some of the context of the letter of the romans and I know you had pulled some facts , I had pulled some historical facts and of the letter of the Romans , and I know you had pulled some facts , I had pulled some historical facts and we'll kind of bring those together and we'll talk about it .
MelissaYes , so the author of Romans is Paul , the Apostle per his own , greeting in the first chapter .
LennyYeah , that one's pretty easy , isn't it ? He opens the chapter .
LennyYeah , he does that quite often , and we'll be getting into that right off the bat when we're reading the first verses of Romans . We will , he announces himself in his greeting
Understanding Paul's Letter to the Romans
Lenny. So there's not a lot of theological question over that . One is there . You know , we don't know who wrote James . There's arguments over that . Who wrote Hebrews ? You know ? There's arguments of a lot of these letters actually , but this one , the scholars all agree . We've got all these scholars with their scholarly hats on saying I agree , that's right . So that makes it easy .
MelissaThough I did find it interesting and it says it plainly towards the end that it wasn't penned by Paul . It was penned by Tertius , stated in chapter 16 , as I mentioned at the closing of the letter and we talked about . There could have been a number of reasons why Paul didn't pen himself the letter . Maybe he was injured . Maybe Tertius just wanted to serve him because we had learned in our last podcast that writing was expensive and laborious , so maybe Tertius just wanted to take that on .
LennyAnd based on the closing and the stuff that we're reading in the closing of that letter , you could take that Tertius was kind of like his secretary . They kind of had their roles . So , Tertius , you know , was taking care of that for him . Right , they were helping each other out . Paul had a lot on his plate . How much can one person do ? He did a lot . You ask that question . You realize one person can do a lot , can't they ?
MelissaThey sure can , but he did have his sidekicks , his helpers . The message was delivered , probably by Phoebe , as Scripture says . I commend to you our sister Phoebe , who is a servant of the church which is at Centraea .
LennySeems logical . He's commending to them because she's presenting them the letter . He wanted them to know that he sent this letter through Phoebe so that they knew this letter was by me , sent by Phoebe . Look , here's Phoebe , here's my letter .
MelissaYes , see what I mean Authenticity . The church working together . Now the place that the letter was written . It's thought that Paul was either in Corinth or in nearby Centraea .
LennyYep , probably because of that , it's also written that she was from the church in Centraea .
MelissaYes .
LennyIt's likely that it was written there because she delivered it .
MelissaThe time frame of the writing is looked to be AD 55 to 58 . The audience is seen to be the church in the city of Rome . At the time of the writing , it was a blend of Jew and Gentile Christians , probably predominantly Gentile , based on recorded history .
LennyYep , and we'll get more into that too , as we go , won't we ?
MelissaMm-hmm . Now that has significance .
LennyMm-hmm . So you got Jews and Gentiles probably a lot of Gentiles at the time of the writing .
MelissaAnd then the theme is thought to be God's plan of salvation for both the Jew and the Gentile . Throughout the letter , paul puts emphasis on first the Jew , then the Gentile . He's reminding the Gentiles that the Jews were the first to receive the gospel and the Messiah . They were . Paul displays much compassion for his Jewish brothers throughout the letter , despite the persecution he endured from them , which is very loving .
LennyYeah , and we're going to read into that stuff and it's just amazing how loving he was towards his brothers . He actually went as far as to say that he wished he could take their place , Whoa , Take their place under condemnation . Take death for them so that they could receive the Savior .
MelissaI don't know how you could say that .
LennyIt's just so amazingly unselfish . He loved his brothers .
MelissaIn his letter , Paul exposes the error of thinking coming from the Jews as well as the Gentiles , giving us a very well-rounded understanding of the fullness of the gospel of Christ
Discussing Paul's Letter to the Romans
Melissa.
LennyI want to read this quote from Luther . So in Luther's introduction to Romans . He wrote it in 1552 . So he was one of the reformers . If you guys don't know Martin Luther one of the major reformers of the Reformation of the 16th century it's pretty interesting to learn about him and I know that one movie in particular was pretty awesome that somebody put together here I Stand Wasn't it .
AnnouncementHere I Stand , the old black and white version .
LennyThere's some parts in there that are just really cool , but his quote that comes from the works of Martin Luther , volume six . He said about Romans this epistle is really the chief part of the New Testament and the very purest gospel . It is worthy not only that every Christian should know it word for word , by heart , but occupy himself with it every day as the daily bread of the soul .
LennyWow , he goes on to say it can never be read or pondered too much and the more it is dealt with , the more precious it becomes and the better it tastes . We're going to have that experience that he's describing as we study this letter . You're going to find that it's becoming precious if you haven't read it , or if you haven't read it a lot as we dive in I I pray that these things occur . You know with you guys and with ourselves , that it becomes more precious and just keeps on tasting better as we go .
MelissaAnd I think understanding it is going to make all the difference . Like you said earlier , scripture is not a mystery , it's been revealed through God . There is one truth about it that's been given to us .
LennyAnd , on that note , paul's revealing the mystery of Israel in this letter , and it's going to be awesome .
MelissaYes , he is .
LennyA lot of people don't , revealing the mystery of Israel in this letter , and it's going to be awesome . Yes , he is . A lot of people don't know the mystery of Israel . I didn't Nation Israel versus true Israel . Did you know that true Israel is Christ Yeshua ? I mean , come on , this is cool , this is good stuff . If you've never heard that statement , well , wait till we get to that chapter . You got a lot to look forward to . It's really good information and as we proceed with this study , I know that we're both going to be learning , and I hope that our audience is learning and just understanding the depths of God's love more as we go .
MelissaWell , what you said about Martin Luther saying reading Romans daily , taking it in . We both feel that that's advantageous , to do with all of scripture , To be in it daily . You can never read it too much and you just constantly get more and more out of it . As you're praying and clinging to Christ , you get into that routine of that time with him . It's so precious . It's not a one-time wham-bam done , it's lifelong learning and that's exciting .
LennyAbsolutely , it is .
MelissaAll right , we're also looking at the setting of this letter . It's recorded in history that it was sometime between 41 and 53 AD that Jews had been banished from Rome .
LennyYeah , we read about it in the book of Acts , in Acts 18 , verse 2 , actually , don't we ? You want to read that ?
MelissaYeah , where it says . And he found a Jew named Aquila , a native of Pontus , having recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla , because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to leave .
LennyRome , it's recorded in Acts and it's recorded in other history . That's the cool thing about the Bible is that the Bible is history .
MelissaYes , so it seems this would be a reason that there was a majority of Gentiles in the area , because the Jews had been banished for some time in the area because the Jews had been banished for some time .
LennyIt's said by a lot of historians that the reason that Claudius probably banished the Jews and Christians is because of the rising tension between Jews and Christians .
AnnouncementJews and .
LennyChristians didn't get along , as we know . The Christians were trying to say , hey , the Savior's come . And then the non-believing Jews who rejected Christ are saying , no , that wasn't our Savior . And so they're arguing and having these heated things . The Jews wanted to kill the Christians and Claudius was probably like I don't need this . We don't even believe in one God , we believe in all these other gods . Get out of here .
MelissaSo that was his way of settling them down trying to make peace in the city , it seems .
LennyYeah , that's what I'm thinking . Just get this drama out of here .
MelissaBecause the Romans welcomed all kinds of beliefs , like you said , the belief of one true God , like the Jews and Christians proclaim that was not in their pagan wheelhouse was it ?
LennyNo , that wasn't at all .
MelissaIn AD 54 , the Jews were allowed back into Rome and , interestingly , you were telling me this would have been the beginning of Nero's reign as emperor .
LennyYeah , it's just kind of a weird thing . But you're like , why would Nero let them back in so he could kill them ? But when you read about Nero's beginning of his reign as his mother and he had another advisor in the beginning , his goal was to not have anybody getting in his way he actually killed his own mother . He's a nice guy , his mom , was probably just as evil as him , but you know he had her killed he had to get her out of the way of his amazing powers his story would make for quite a horror film
Melissahe was a sick individual the return of these jews would have brought back the jewish leaders to their church in rome , which would have now been mostly gentile , like we talked about .
LennyThe letter being written after this explains why paul is placing much effort into these two very different cultures having unity together in christ yeah , so you have the jews get banished for a time and then , before this letter got written , sometime before the letter , we don't know exactly how soon before the letter , the jews are let back in and they're probably like okay , okay , this is wrong . You guys are doing it all wrong . There's not enough law in this , you know .
MelissaRight .
LennyGentiles are like law . What law ? We're not under law . And then some were probably swayed like , yeah , we got to start doing this law thing . The Judaizers were common in those days . You know the people mixing law and grace .
MelissaAnd so Paul's having to clear up a huge mess , trying to get this cleared up in his letter . I would say Jewish tradition is getting in the way .
LennyYeah , the Gentile attitude towards the Jews would have been a problem too . Yes , get these guys out of here , I don't need this garbage . Well , hey , they were first guys . Right , paul would always remind them . You can sense there was hostility coming from both sides , because what happens when somebody's annoying you ? You get mad at them . So the population in Rome would , around the time of the writing , it's said to have been about a million residents , and about 40,000 to 50,000 of those residents would have been Jews . That's a pretty good number of Jews , yeah , not huge , but imagine , based on that number , how many must have gotten kicked out of Rome . I mean , that's a lot of people to kick out of Rome .
LennyThe Roman Empire was the dominant political and military force during the early days of Christianity . The city of Rome was originally built on the Tiber River , in the west-central region of modern Italy , near the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea . The city of Rome was the hub of the Roman Empire , the center of politics and government . The Roman emperors would have lived in Rome , along with the Senate . Rome was a relatively wealthy city . You had different economic classes . You had slaves , free people , roman citizens , nobles of different kinds , political and military . Then you had the Romans in the first century engaging in all kinds of activities , anything from the brutal practices in the arena to sexual immorality of all kinds . They were very open . In that way , rome was heavily influenced by Greek mythology and emperor worship .
LennyMost inhabitants believed in several gods , like we said . Worship Most inhabitants believed in several gods , like we said , and they welcomed all kinds of religion . In that way , they were home to outsiders of many cultures , and that would be Christians and Jews included . The Christians , being evangelical with their gospel , which was contrary to the Greek gods , were not well received by many . We're talking about Nero . It would have made it easy for him to unleash a massive persecution . It's actually said in historical documents that people think that he started a fire in Rome and said that he started this fire , which burnt down just and devastated so much of the city , because he wanted to make it his own . He wanted to make it better . So he just went ahead and started on fire and burnt down a whole bunch of stuff , and it was recorded somewhere that he was playing an instrument , music and singing along , happy as he was watching it from this tower , watching the city burn .
MelissaNero fiddled as Rome burned , is the saying . Yeah .
LennySo he's doing this gleefully . This warped individual and certain people observed it and they were disturbed and the people started to get a little riled up by that . Hey , what are you doing ? You're a screwed up dude . And then he turned around and well , what's an easy scapegoat here ? Well , nobody likes Christians , they're annoying . They burned down the city and then begins the games that he played .
MelissaSo he feared the citizens Yep . So he created a scapegoat Yep , using the Christians to blame .
LennyTypical politician right . So the earliest Christian converts in Rome were probably of Jewish origin . People speculate this , I think heavily because of what we read in Acts , chapter 2 , where at Pentecost people had come from Rome in different areas . And so you think , well , if they came from Rome not knowing the gospel , what they heard at Pentecost , they probably took it back to Rome . So it probably was started by Jewish Christians . That makes sense . To me seems like simple logic . Based on that , it's thought that the early churches were dominated and led by Jewish Christians . When Claudius expelled all the Jews , only the Gentiles would have remained , and then the church grew and expanded as a largely Gentile community . So when Claudius perished and Jews were allowed back into Rome , the returning Jewish Christians came home to find a very different church than the one they left . And we have the disagreements about rituals , circumcision tradition .
MelissaAll of a sudden they're together with all these Gentiles trying to mesh .
LennyYeah , and so Paul's trying to bring unity to that .
MelissaSo not only did the Roman Christians meet in synagogues , but they would also meet in house churches . So I was reading a little bit what those might be like and shows you how these people were living at the time . Apartment buildings were abundant . That's the main way that they lived . The wealthy people were the main ones on the ground floor . The ground floor often had running water . The common people were on the upper floors , which were said to be flimsy . That paints quite a picture .
LennyYeah .
MelissaAnd believers would mostly gather in these upper rooms . That's where the house churches would be . So no running water .
LennyYeah .
MelissaFlimsy , I picture it swaying in the wind . To meet under those kinds of conditions , they must have had a lot of passion to want to get together and encourage one another , learn .
Exploring Synagogues and Sermons
MelissaI thought it was interesting that it was said that Jews in many parts of the empire spoke Greek and were accustomed to the Greek ways culture . So in that way Greeks and Jews were not so different .
LennyYeah , so there wasn't a huge language barrier . It sounds like Makes sense to why the letter was written in Greek . You have predominantly Greeks for one , and then the Jews knew Greek , so why wouldn't it be in Hebrew ? Paul was a Hebrew .
AnnouncementThat's a good point he was writing to people that weren't .
LennyBut at the same time that we say that so much of the church you also read was illiterate . Yeah , there probably wasn't that many people that could read the letter anyway .
MelissaYes , how about that ?
LennyPretty interesting . You mentioned that they met in homes and synagogues , so I wanted to touch on synagogues a little bit . I'm going to be talking about sermons and synagogues , but we'll start with synagogues . We read in the New Testament Gospels that Yeshua taught in synagogues . One of them was Capernaum , and then Paul . According to the book of Acts , in chapter 17 , he is said to have taught in synagogues . They went around and they spoke in synagogues . How did they get allowed to speak ? You're thinking . You know this is kind of weird . They just what ? They just take the microphone . Hey , this is me . Get out of here to whoever is normally speaking on the podium . Well , it wasn't like that .
LennySynagogue in Greek is a word that literally means a gathering of people , but it also refers to the place of assembly . First century AD synagogues were found in both Palestine and Diaspora , where they were used for a variety of communal needs . They would use them at schools , communal meals , hotels , courts , a place to collect and distribute charity , political meetings . All these usages can be sourced from a combination of scripture and writings from the Jewish historian who was a Pharisee , josephus . He was a first century Pharisee who ended up being a historian who also wrote about the events of 70 AD and the destruction of Jerusalem . There was a first century Pharisee , who ended up being a historian who also wrote about the events of 70 AD and the destruction of Jerusalem .
LennyThere's a lot of writings that we have and they're very interesting . Needless to say , we have recorded history of these things . It's also said that worship took place in first century synagogues , but it wasn't worship like you saw in the temple . It wouldn't develop into what you see today in a Jewish synagogue until much later , and that would much later being after the destruction of the temple . What we do see in the synagogues in the first century is that reading and interpreting the Torah and the prophets was happening , and we read about this in Acts 15 . James is at the Jerusalem Council speaking At the end . You know they were kind of summing up their decision and he was talking about how great the law was . At the end there he closes by saying For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him , since he has read in the synagogues every Sabbath . Right there in Acts we see that Moses , which would have been the law , was read in the synagogues every Sabbath , so once a week . Yeah , so every week they'd be doing that .
LennyScholars disagree about the extent of the communal prayers . It's said that prayers took place . You know there's references to that . It's argued about how much and how often that took place . But we do see in Matthew , chapter 6, . That's when Christ Yeshua is talking about the Pharisees and the synagogues puffing themselves up and praying out loud so that everybody can hear them . Was it really used for that , or were they just being Pharisees and showing off ? I don't know if that was really like a custom . So much as it was like hey , look at me in my cool outfit praying really loud .
MelissaThey definitely had a reputation .
LennyYeah , it's not surprising that there's not a lot of evidence about any kind of centralized group determining what took place inside of these synagogues , Because of the fact that they were really nothing more than local communal institutions , the fact that they were really nothing more than local communal institutions . Most of the sources from the first century identify elders , priests and then these certain officials as the leaders of the synagogues . It wouldn't have been Pharisees and it wouldn't have looked like temple worship in any way where you had that kind of hierarchy . You would have had the leader leading things but interestingly there wasn't a hierarchy structure when it came to speaking . And we'll talk about that as we go .
LennyBut there are a few remains of some of the first century synagogues in Israel and Palestine . But unlike the synagogues from the later centuries , these ones didn't have any Jewish features or decor or any kind of furnishings . They were really just simple buildings with benches along the walls or any kind of furnishings . They were really just simple buildings with benches along the walls . So that would have very much reflected them being community centers . So next I'm going to hit on sermons a little bit . I'm going to talk a little bit about sermons , which ties into the synagogues . In Old Testament , temple worship preaching was not a common part of the experience , so if you were expecting to hear a sermon that didn't happen regularly in the temple , that's not what it was for . The temple would have been about sacrifices , rituals , prayers , singing and then reading from the scriptures .
MelissaReading no sermon Wow .
LennyNo sermon . No tradition appears in the Old Testament as far as a sermon being held in the temple of worship , which is interesting , most people would think . I know I used to think like , oh , that had to have been . Sermon after sermon , they're just teaching from a podium constantly , but it's not what you see . There's only actually one noteworthy time when you even see a podium being mentioned . In Ezra , chapter 8 , verse 8 , we read about Ezra standing on a high platform that was built for the occasion and he praised God and read the book of Moses , and then he had scribes with him , several scribes that were explaining the meaning of Moses to the people , and so this would have been kind of the introduction to the second temple , the grand opening . The first temple was destroyed . They went in and they rebuilt it all , and it was this long process getting ridiculed by people and everything else , and they finished this temple .
MelissaThat's right .
LennyAnd the people asked Ezra to go up and read from the law , bringing the law back into their reality again .
MelissaIt's their new temple .
LennyAnd so they're finally focusing on God again , after God literally had to wake them up . They were so awful and they were turning other gods rejecting God . He's like , okay , you reject me and I'm just going to wipe things out and you won't have me . And then they started appreciating again . But this order of worship was that wasn't the common thing , that's not what always happened . That , but this order of worship that wasn't the common thing , that's not what always happened . That was like a one-time thing Ezra , get up there and read and we'll have people interpret on a podium reading , for that matter , that wasn't the structure .
MelissaRight , almost like a ribbon cutting for the temple . Yeah .
LennySo it was a big event . That's where we see a podium in Scripture . To recreate that in Christian church is a bit of a stretch . It's kind of interesting .
MelissaWow , and they're everywhere , they're in every .
Comparing Early Worship Practices Today
MelissaI don't think I've been to a church or seen one on TV , or I can't even picture one without a podium .
LennyWhen we're reading scripture , when we're studying scripture , like we're about to do , we're going to dive into Romans . When we're going through our notes , when we're learning , I would say this is worship .
MelissaI like that .
LennyWe're learning about God's word , his truth , the written word , about the living word who is Christ . This is worship . So do you have to go to a church to worship is the question .
MelissaAbsolutely not . We're taking the time to sit down . Get to know our Lord .
LennyWho's doing the worshiping in your church ? Who's speaking ? Who's studying ? Who's sharing ? Week after week when you go to church , who's doing all the talking ? Who's doing all the sharing ? Somebody in the audience , or is it one person ?
MelissaIt's no one but the man behind the altar .
LennyWho's sharing what they've learned , who's sharing their insights and who's being listened to . If you were going to go to your church this week and you heard your pastor speaking , if they said something that you didn't agree with and you interjected , I don't agree with that .
MelissaWhat do you think would happen ?
LennyYou'd be shown the door very quickly because it's not set up for that . You'd be a troublemaker . That's not something you do here . You don't interject with the pastor . You don't do that . Just like at a study group . If you're going to raise a ruckus by trying to share something that's not in line with what they teach at that institution , you're going to be asked to be quiet or leave . If you don't believe me , try it sometime , but only if you're willing to take that sacrifice .
MelissaYeah , we tried that . It was quite a rude awakening . We also stayed after church and tried respectfully asking our pastor a question about his message after church , but he was surrounded by bodyguards and was quickly hurried off and let us know very obviously that we weren't important , our question wasn't relevant and just told us to trust him , and that was that .
LennyThose were his exact words . Trust me , what was going on in the synagogues , you would think , would resemble what we see in church today . You would think , well , where did they get this from ? Probably the synagogues . But this is what was happening in the synagogues .
LennyThey started by repeating the Shema of Deuteronomy , and so that was Deuteronomy , chapter 6 , verses 4 and 5 . And they would have expressions of praise to God and then they would read from the Old Testament . Evidently , they organized the reading systematically in order to read through the whole Torah regularly . So they'd be wanting to go through those first five books of the Bible regularly . But then what we could call the sermon followed . I don't know if that's really politically correct , but we're just going to call it a sermon . And the sermon would have been a simple explanation of the meaning and the application of the text that was read , and it would have depended on the ability and the training of the one speaking . In other words , whatever they were able to share and the way they were able to share it . That's how it was done . Guests could come , people could speak .
MelissaWow .
LennyAnybody could take the floor . Anybody could take the floor . Anybody could take the podium , so to speak . If there was one Sounds more like it was if you stood up , people were sitting down . If you stood up , you talked , anybody could come and share their insight . And that's in a synagogue , that's in a Jewish synagogue . What do we see in our churches today ? It's like what is this ? What would the apostles say if they came into one of our churches today ? Interestingly , on top of that , the reading of the scriptures , the preaching and the prayer officials weren't appointed to this . So if there was officials , if there was leaders , they were just kind of overseeing things , just like you see in the early churches . It's a parallel there . You had leaders and overseers , elders . They had jewish elders , just like they had christian elders . The structure seems pretty similar when you actually analyze it . The early churches were like huh , you know , we can kind of go by this basic structure because it's fair People share , we all partake , right .
MelissaEverybody's learning .
LennyYeah , so you just had people overseeing . What would those people do ? Well , I'd have to say that if you were a leader in those days , it might have been a little more challenging , because if you were going to try to say as a leader , like , no , this is how it is , you're going to have to prove your case to the people .
MelissaYes , people will have questions .
LennySo if you took your pastor down from that podium and put other people up there speaking and they didn't agree with him , and then he had to speak , he'd have to prove his case , wouldn't he ?
MelissaRight , no more .
LennyHollywood going on . You know he prepared his sermon . He wasn't ready for this . Now he's got to prove his case in scripture . Now he's got to prove his points . Now that's a more difficult position , and so you can see why a leader wouldn't want this . A leader wants it easy , and I'm not saying a good leader . Those acts of worship that you saw in the synagogues would have been freely performed , taking turns . For those in the assembly , just ordinary people . The sermon would have closed with a blessing . If somebody from the Levitical class , like a priest , was present , they would perform that closing blessing . Otherwise there would just be a common prayer .
MelissaThat sounds a lot more like church and less like the world . I like the sound of that .
LennyDoesn't that sound nice ?
MelissaI mean .
LennyI'm thinking like you can just go there and share . If you learn something , you'd have an opportunity to share that .
MelissaIf you had questions , you could get them answered .
LennyAnd I'm not even an extrovert at all and I craved seeing something like this in a church . I might actually want to go to a church again if I saw these things Be like whoa , I can actually share what I'm learning . Whoa , I got kicked out of the study group for doing that the last time I did it . They didn't like it , and we saw a friend of ours get kicked out of a study group as well . Did we ever explore the issue ? I suggested that we look at it . I said we should look at this issue . He made a lot of good points . Nope , the leader went to the pastor and said he's a problem . He's a wolf in sheep's clothing , get him out . The immediate answer was eject . There was never an argument and never an opportunity for an argument . It was eject , right to the eject button .
MelissaThat's not church . The more we compare the two , what we have today is not church . It's some kind of . It's just some kind of entertainment Honestly sounds more like a cult . Everybody just listens and nods their head and you don't get to ask questions and deeply learn .
LennyThat's the definition of a cult . What you just said One person doing all the talking , everybody else doing all the listening and you just agree , or else Everything's fine . If you agree , Come back weekly for your programming .
MelissaI have a problem with that . I hope other people have a problem with that too . The fact that the churches today don't look like the fruitful churches we saw in early history that bothers me .
LennyAnd there was problems in all the churches , and there always has been . But the problem shouldn't be participation , Because without participation there is no body . Paul writes in Corinthians that every member of the body is important .
MelissaI was telling you today that I've been a Christian my whole life and gone between Catholic and Protestant churches and I honestly can't think of one service , not one where I learned something , where I really came away with something . I didn't learn anything . It wasn't until I started really reading in my Bible for myself that the learning began , the learning and growing and the excitement and the passion .
Deciphering Paul's Correspondence With Corinthians
MelissaSo why are we going every week ? What is the point ? Well , we kind of touched on that .
LennyIt's like a white coat syndrome . We go there because we want to be told what to believe , what to think , what to do , because it's difficult to be free , it's difficult to have freedom in Christ . It's harder to be free and shift your paradigm to full freedom than it is to just go somewhere and follow the herd . You know . You just go there and what do I do ? What's next ? Do I get plugged into a group ? What do I need to do next ? What do I need to believe ? How do I need to clean up my life and what do you find the focus at most churches ? Do I get plugged into a group ? What do I need to do next ? What do I need to believe ? How do I need to clean up my life and what do you find the focus at most churches ? What I found was that the focus is on you . You're focusing on cleaning up yourself , cleaning up your act , being a better , this being a better , that the whole thing is like a self-development program .
LennyThe closest thing that we see to a Christian church in scripture is found in 1 Corinthians , chapters 11 through 14 . Now there's a lot of discernment needed to get the full context of some of the challenging passages in 1 Corinthians . A few things that I noted was that the letter was written to first century Christians who had supernatural spiritual gifts like healing , interpreting and speaking in tongues languages they didn't study or know . Then there was the gift of knowledge not attained by studying or reading . Like you set your Bible on the nightstand , you go to bed and you pray for knowledge and you wake up and you're a pastor doing a sermon . Those gifts don't exist anymore and if they did , they're not the norm . This is not normal . And people that try to tell you that , oh , you just got to tap into something . It's not the norm . That age is over . That age was a time of miracles , signs and wonders .
LennyThe time period from the cross to the destruction of the temple is considered by many scholars to be a second exodus . So you have the first exodus where Israel came out of Egypt . Right , you had all the signs and wonders going on . They were being fed in the desert with this manna , and then the destruction of the Tower of Jericho , and then they entered the Promised Land . So , with the apostles , you had the signs and wonders . The apostles were performing all these signs and wonders after the work of the cross and then all these things were taking place . They were healing , they were doing all these things and then that kind of fizzled away and then there was destruction of the temple and the beginning of the new covenant age , second Exodus . Right , that's when the spiritual gifts ended . A lot of people don't see things that way , but bottom line , those gifts aren't the norm today . If it was , you know , if you had healers , where would you send all the people that know how to heal if you want them to make some progress in our world ? I'd send them to the hospital . All prophecy has been fulfilled .
LennyA lot of people say prophesy is just to speak or encourage . Prophecy is foretelling the future . But that's not the case . That's an error . But if you're going to define prophecy and prophesy , prophesy is the verb , prophecy is the noun . They're not two separate things . As an example , if you're willing to prophesy , can you say how big your department will be in five years ? Or I feel hesitant to prophesy about the future of our industry . And then for prophecy , you can say she made a prophecy regarding what she saw as her department's growth potential , or I feel I'm not qualified to make a prophecy about our industry in the future . That's a noun versus a verb . They're not two different meanings .
LennyI just wanted to point that out because if you go back and read the letter of the Corinthians and you want to see this view of early church , you're going to run into these things right .
LennyAnd another thing that I wanted to point out , if you went back to those chapters in Corinthians to look at the early church , was that the letter to the Corinthians was a correspondence between Paul and the church . Throughout the letter you'll see this correspondence going on . So when we look at passages like where he says , according to the law , women should be silent in the church , that was likely the Corinthians being misled saying that and Paul , who realized that was not in the law , was correcting them because that wasn't the law . It was more likely part of the Talmud , because you read about those types of things in the Talmud and it was probably being taught by the Judaizers . So there's certain passages that you can get hung up on . I just wanted to mention that because I'm mentioning that the view of the church is in the Corinthians . But that correspondence scenario would explain why in other places he clearly says that all should prophesy and he doesn't exclude women .
MelissaThat was a real eye-opener for us to learn about that fact , and I think we said we wanted to do a message on it eventually .
LennyYeah , and in the time being I'm going to link to an episode . I think it was the Grace Cafe podcast that did a really good take on that . There's another one on federal headship the Berean Bible Church had done . That was really good . We liked his take on the place of a man in the household and marriage things like that .
MelissaYeah .
LennyI kind of liked both of those views a lot and I feel like you could really gain a lot from both of those . We're going to share that with you guys if you're interested and you've ever come across those topics in Corinthians and looked at it with your eyes crossed like what Paul doesn't like women Shut up in the church that doesn't sound right to me . Well , it doesn't sound right .
MelissaThere's a reason for it .
LennyLook at it carefully and discern .
MelissaRight , that was so helpful for me .
LennyYeah .
MelissaI hope people will check that out .
LennyTo summarize , it's like the Corinthians are saying women shouldn't speak in the church , and then Paul's like what ? What gospel did you hear ? You know , but you don't pick up on that due to punctuation . Translators can mess up as far as like giving us the right view with punctuation , because they didn't have our punctuation , did they ?
MelissaThey didn't , not to mention there was another letter .
AnnouncementPaul references .
MelissaSo , it seems that they wrote him a letter asking questions and he's responding with a letter answering their questions . Yeah , how about ?
Lennythat . That's a very interesting point , because it's like 1 Corinthians isn't 1 Corinthians . That's just what we call it . It's our first letter that we have to the Corinthians from Paul , but it wasn't the first one . There were several . And that wasn't the first one because it's a correspondence that they had already had .
MelissaBut that's a good example of using hermeneutics and interpreting scripture . Why would Paul be cutting down women in such a way ? Christ never did that , so that doesn't make sense , that doesn't fit right with what we know about christ and the gospel , but we do know that jewish tradition did do that .
LennySo and with context , like you said , with hermeneutics context . What was going on ? What's the context of the letter ? Well , we know there was a different letter because he talks about . It talks about corresponding with them . Were Were you part of that correspondence ? No , you weren't , and you got to be careful . Also , as we said , with the punctuation . Is this them saying it or is this Paul saying this ? There's some great insight on those links . So I definitely encourage you guys to check it out , because it'll blow your mind and only in a good way , to be like . Those crazy passages are not as crazy as they seem yeah they're crazy to us because we weren't there .
LennyWe don't get it . This is thousands of years ago and we weren't there , so we got to put ourselves there the best we can , and that's how we're going to discern difficult passages . Um , there's several things that we need to realize about the church in corinth going into the chapters to get that true context before we start applying it to ourselves . And that's the same way in Romans , and so that's what we're going to do . We're going to be going in . Before you start applying the words you read in Romans to yourself , let's look at it carefully . You know , be careful .
LennyJumping into that application . It's always like well , how can we apply this to ourselves ? If you jump into that before you apply all the other principles , you're going to get yourself into trouble . Doing that . It's not going to be good . Would you take out bits and pieces of a letter from a loved one and just pick out little pieces ? If you were to take a sentence out of a letter that you received from somebody , do you think you could make it sound bad ? Do you think you can make that sentence sound something like it was never meant to be ?
LennyOh sure , but we read the Bible . Chapters and verses got put in . You know , in the what ? 13th to 15th century there was verses and there was chapters . And all of a sudden we think that that's how you can just read a verse . It's a verse , so you can just say it and that's what God told you . It doesn't work that way . So we're not going to be looking at scripture that way . So if you're going to go into this letter with us , we're going to make every effort to see what they meant . We want to see what Paul meant when he wrote it , not just what you see on the surface .
MelissaThat's why it's going to take a little time .
LennyYeah , and it's going to be very rewarding . We're all going to learn . Case in point , about the Corinthians . You look at that letter , the Corinthians , chapter 11 through 14 , you see this , that's the only view of what you could say church , a gathering , a structured gathering would look like , and you had spiritual gifts . So you got to take that out . Those things don't come naturally . We're not babbling and people interpreting and none of this kind of stuff . We're not performing miracles . So you take that out . But that's okay . But you still have sharing and encouragement . You didn't have one person speaking . You don't see that . You don't see a sermon . You don't see the overseer doing all the talking and put himself on a podium . You don't see it . It's not present . Where did they get it ? Not from these guys , it didn't come from the apostles . The gathering of the Corinthians . If you compare and contrast it to the synagogues , what we were just talking about , it's actually pretty similar . There's a lot of similarities there . That's the way they did stuff . Then you could openly share .
MelissaI just think that would make all the difference if we did that today . All the difference , for we did that today .
LennyAll the difference for people , for their growth , confidence , people sharing A lot of the grace . Teachers say using their spiritual gifts and contributing to the body , the supernatural gifts . No , but we do have the gift of the spirit and we're all part of the body . It's still the same thing . It's still the same , it's just not charismatic gifts . It's not those types of gifts . Our gift is love through the Spirit and we all should be able to share our love for Christ and to share what we're learning for Christ . And if we're not doing that , if we're not allowed to do that , where are we going ? What are we doing ?
MelissaI don't see a point .
LennyYou have all these useless members . There's only like one part in the body of Christ . It's supposed to be a whole body .
MelissaI don't see a point . I just see people going to be entertained and paying the salary of the pastor .
LennyThat's a talking head . Yeah , there's no body .
MelissaThat's a problem . That's a problem .
LennySo we see that today's leaders are more like celebrities . Why is that the established way ? Because we're not looking for leaders . We stop looking . We just want somebody to do all the work for us , but we're making ourselves dormant by doing so . I also have a message about church that I'm going to link to . It was just a really cool message that he did on church , kind of the same things that we're talking about Matt McMillan . He refers to today's churches as box churches , kind of like box stores .
MelissaThey really are .
LennyIt's like a corporate thing . You know , there's all these different denominations . Right , I was talking to my sister at
Challenging Denominational Differences and Traditions
LennyChristmas time . I was just saying came to my mind thinking , if you took two different churches , two different denominations that didn't agree on something , you bring these two churches together , these two congregations that are meeting , and you sit them down and say you guys all have to work through your differences . You need to prove your case , church A and Church B . You need to prove your case and your pastor is going to be overseeing . These pastors are going to be overseeing the process . Make sure it doesn't get ugly stays peaceful , but you guys are going to work out your differences together and we want to hear people sharing want to share your input and we're going to try to come to a conclusion as a body as to what's true .
LennyLeader , he can even prove his case if he wants to , but everybody standing here is going to have to discern for themselves what they think is true . What do you think would happen ?
MelissaI think that would be amazing . I would think that that would make these denominations dissolve and we'd be down to the one truth of Scripture .
LennyIt could only help if people actually said you know what , yeah , let's do this . And they're digging in and they're going to try to come to a conclusion Truly Not biased let's pray beforehand , even that we'd look at this without bias . I mean , imagine the world if we were actually trying to come together . That would be amazing If we actually cared about truth rather than just saying well , you know , truth is whatever we take from it .
MelissaAll the denominations are a stumbling block to unbelievers . Yeah . All the denominations are a stumbling block to unbelievers . To see that , because you don't pick and choose what you want to believe about Christ , there's the one truth in scripture and that's what Christians ought to want to learn and teach . So it's , quite frankly , garbage having all these denominations , and that's what we ought to do is come together and teach the truth .
LennyThe denominations prove that there's a problem in the church today , agreed , they're all trying to say no , we did the research , we established our doctrines , these are our doctrines and this is what we teach , because it's sound and we've reviewed it and looked at it . But yet you go to every street corner and there's a different view on something .
MelissaYou're right . That reveals there's a problem in the church . We should see that as a problem that needs to be corrected .
LennyThere again , we have Catholic and Protestant . Why do I have to be a Protestant if I'm not a Catholic ? Where does that even come from ? Oh , I have to proclaim that I believe everything the reformers said . What does that mean ? I don't agree with everything the reformers did .
MelissaThe denominations and the labels . It's no good .
LennyWhy don't we just look for truth ? If every church out there looked like the synagogues even just the synagogues in the Jewish days of the first century , where you could share , where people would hear you and you could share your insight on every street corner , you could go there and at some point you'd get a turn sharing something that you know about scripture what would church look like ? Just think about that .
MelissaI think it'd be so fruitful , be beautiful . I don't know if we'll ever see that , but there's no reason not to have hope and to be certainly no reason not to promote it .
LennyWhen you look at the history , yeah , you think like , oh , that could never one of those things , like that might never happen . But if you were in the days of the reformers and you said , yeah , having a Bible , that'll never happen for the common folks , you would have been wrong . That's very true , because God said no , you're all going to have Bibles .
MelissaHe controls the history .
LennyWe don't know when there's going to be another reformation , but you see that there's one that could happen . That would only benefit the entire world .
MelissaThere are a lot of people starting to speak out about this that notice that problem with the denominations and the structure of the church and starting to speak out . I'm thankful for that .
LennyIt always starts with knowledge . It starts with people waking up . It's just like with government they're going to get away with anything they want until people say that's enough . We don't need better government , we need people to stand for what's right . That's true . So there's a passage in Colossians , if you want to read it , verse 2-8 . And I took all these from the NASB . I wanted to read what Paul said about tradition . We've been talking about tradition . What did he say ?
MelissaPaul said See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception . According to the tradition of men , it sounds kind of like church today . If you ask me , wow , think of all the traditions that Gentiles had the Romans and the Greeks .
LennyThink of all the traditions that the Jews had . As we're going into Romans , All these traditions , Traditions . The Jews had so many traditions . We have so many traditions when we're born into this world . All these traditions . Church is the way it is . That's just the way it is .
Reevaluating Traditional Church Practices
LennyBut what did the Apostle Paul say to the early church to that effect ? In 2 Thessalonians 2.15 ? He said so . Then , brethren , stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught , whether by word of mouth or by letter from us .
MelissaThe traditions according to Christ .
LennyExactly , and what were those according to ? They would have been according to the gospel , based on the gospel , not traditions of man .
MelissaAmen .
LennyYou look at like today's house church . As some people say , house church is the other way to go , but if you just turn it into a mini big box church , how is that any more biblical ? You're still following the same format One person talking , everybody else listening , and maybe we'll call on you if you have a question .
MelissaThe common theme I'm hearing you saying is that the whole body should be participating , because the whole body is important .
LennyExactly . Another thing I quickly wanted to mention is this view of 1 Timothy , 2 Timothy and Titus being pastoral letters . People refer to those as the pastoral letters , but have you ever looked at what Scripture really says about pastor , deacon , elder leader ? What are their roles ? Study them . What are their roles ? What are the qualifications ? Do some studying on it ? But then when you look at the Corinthian church and how the church looked in those days , what do you see them doing ? As I mentioned in our last episode , pastor was a spiritual gift . There's no list of qualifications . It's not any kind of special title . It was some kind of spiritual gift that we really know nothing about . But people tie it into . You know it's the same as deacon . They'll say you know it has to be the same and they make these assessments . But either way , what did they do ? What were they doing in the church , overseeing leading ? They were not doing all the talking .
MelissaHow about that ?
LennyI just think it's important to realize those things we got to realize . These are traditions and these are not traditions that were handed down to us by the apostles .
MelissaI think we should know why we're following a tradition . If we are , why are we following yeah ? So church has become traditional , with its own set of expectations , and entertainment is usually involved with tradition .
LennyYeah , a lot of the Greek stuff we were talking about last week Theaters , rhetoric sermons .
MelissaYeah , the music . Not that there's anything wrong with having some fun .
LennyA lot of grace teachers and people in the grace community , for example and by grace I mean like they understand forgiveness , they understand the fullness of forgiveness , which a lot of times I refer to as full grace . They understand the fullness of our forgiveness . In that community it's kind of divided , Some people and some different teachers . They see like , oh , the biggest problem is what's being taught in the church . It's not the church itself , it's what's being taught . But then you're sustaining that broken church of the speaker up front and what you see taking place even in those grace communities is dangerous , because they're all looking to teacher , pastor , leader for all of their learnings , all of their insights .
MelissaInstead of to Christ .
LennyRight .
MelissaAnd then what does it do to that brother in Christ that's the leader ? All of their learnings , all of their insights , instead of to Christ Right . And then what does it do to that brother in Christ that's the leader ? It elevates him to a status that's not healthy .
LennySuddenly they have all the answers . They're the place to go to for every answer and that is not healthy .
MelissaSuddenly they're struggling to be humble .
LennyNobody has the market cornered on truth . When we listen to some of our favorite teachers , we don't agree with them on everything . I don't think it's that we're hard to agree with . It's because we are not people that just look at the surface . I think I'm right about everything . If I didn't , why would I teach it ? But I also know that I'll be wrong about some things . You have to have the right foundation . If you don't have a foundation of understanding the fullness of your forgiveness , what's your teaching going to look like ?
MelissaYou're going to cause people to stumble , including yourself .
LennyYeah , and those things need to be challenged . So what would church look like ? Well , if you're going to make your living off the gospel , these days , maybe that's just media that you're putting out there , but when you're gathering with your community of people , you guys are all sharing . It's like , hey , you know , if you have a passion for putting out messages , start a Christian podcast , wink , wink . What if people were evaluating their pastor's teaching every week ? Throughout the week ? They'd gather together and just go through it with a fine-tooth comb and challenge it .
MelissaThat's what we should be doing , like okay you put out that message .
LennyWe're going to talk about that and we're going to make sure you got it all right . Are people doing that ? No , they're not doing that . If they did , they would only come to a deeper knowledge of Christ and realize there's a lot of error and that their pastor needs some help .
MelissaThat's what we should be doing Doing our own research throughout the week , our own reading , and then come together and go through it with a fine-tooth comb .
LennyIt would be challenging to be a church leader . I'm not going to lie . I mean , we have a Christian podcast . If we had a large group of people that were meeting together and doing those kinds of things that I'm suggesting , you would have to be doing that full-time . Because you would have to be doing that full time ? Because you would have your hands full proving your case on a regular basis . But you would also be relieved because other people are sharing . So it's like , okay , a little harder on one hand , but you're just not on a platform anymore . You're not the most special thing going on .
MelissaThat's right .
LennyYou're not Mr Hollywood anymore . You know , that's it . You just got to stand down .
MelissaI think anytime we look like the world , we got to really think about that .
LennyYeah , so do you have anything else to say to that effect ? I think we're ready to actually dive in to Romans . I'm really excited about it . Let's go through it with a fine-tooth comb . Let's do it with a fine-toothed comb . Let's do it All right . See you guys next week . Can't wait to talk to you then .
AnnouncementThank you for listening to the Waking Up to Grace podcast brought to you by the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ . If you enjoyed today's episode , we would love to hear from you . You can send encouragement our way right from our episodes and transcripts page or reach Lenny privately from the contact form at wakinguptogracecom .