Second Sunday After Christmas

Psalm: Psalm 147:12-20
  or Wisdom of Solomon 10:15-21 

Old Testament: Jeremiah 31:7-14
  or Sirach 24:1-12 

Gospel: John 1:1-9, 10-18 

Epistle: Ephesians 1:3-14

Happy New Year! If you follow the major dates on the church calendar, this time of year is full of celebration. After the 12 days of Christmas, with New Year’s in the middle of that, Epiphany is always celebrated on January 6^th. That makes today the 11^th day of Christmas and tomorrow the 12^th. You might remember Shakespeare play Twelfth Night, it occurs on the 12^th day of Christmas.

Well, that is just some extra information for you. I think this week we will deal mostly with the reading from Ephesians. We discussed John 1 a couple of weeks during Advent which deals with the Incarnation. Jeremiah 31 and Psalm 147 are both psalms of praise to the Lord. But the beginning of Ephesians is something we haven’t dug into in a while.

I would encourage you to read all 4 Scriptures this week, but especially Paul’s words in the beginning of Ephesians. Paul uses a word that has caused a lot debate from early on in Christianity: predestination. The question we have to ask is, “What is Paul talking about here?” There is debate in Christianity over what that means and just how much freewill humanity has in making decisions and especially in terms of salvation. I got a new book for Christmas, the Global Wesleyan Dictionary of Theology, so I decided to look up a bunch of terms that relate to this topic. Each article also gives you a couple of resources to check out for more in depth reading. I would encourage you to check out this resource or others like it to explore this topic.

Before Augustine in the 4^th century, according to the GWDT, there was a general consensus “that salvation is contingent on human response to God’s universal offer in Christ.” (428) However, Augustine began to teach that salvation was dependent on one’s predestination, or election, by God. You may have also heard of Pelagius, a British-born monk, who was Augustine’s opponent and whose followers were eventually condemned at the Council of Ephesus in 431. Pelagius argued that humans do not inherit the Original Sin or guilt of Adam and are able to live a life free from sin. Skip a few centuries to John Calvin, whose followers eventually propagated the doctrine of double-predestination—Some are predestined to salvation, others are predestined to damnation. Other important figures were Jacobus Arminius, and, of course, John Wesley.

John Wesley followed a more Arminian approach to human freewill, and through his understanding of prevenient grace, was able to hold both an Augustinian understanding of Original Sin and human depravity.  He argued that humanity is able to choose God and still be responsible for its decisions. Prevenient grace is the doctrine of the grace that “comes before.” God, through his love, is reaching out to all of creation enduing the ability and option to choose God. Without this grace of God we would be, as Augustine argued, completely unable to choose God.

So, that is the history lesson and a brief theology lesson of a few key terms. But what does this have to do with Ephesians 1? Well, we need all of this knowledge so when read words like predestination we can understand how to interpret them. The fact of the matter is we all approach Scripture with a framework and theological understanding. You might hear preachers say they are just going to “preach the Bible, and leave theology aside.” This is impossible. Every passage must be approached in light of other passages and an overarching framework. The Bible, Christian tradition, reason, experience, through the Holy Spirit, provide the boundaries of how far we can go in interpretation before we leave the bounds of Christianity and fall into heresy.

I have heard some people argue that we are predestined to adoption and to be holy and blameless. Those who freely choose God, by God’s grace, are then predestined to live life a certain way and inherit the promises of God through Christ. We are predestined to spend an eternity with God in his Kingdom. I will readily admit that I am not quite sure what Paul is saying and meaning. We suffer the unfortunate circumstance of reading and then trying to interpret and apply letters written almost 2,000 years ago, in a different language, to a particular congregation. We believe, however, through the guidance of those who have come before us and the Holy Spirit this possible, but we must acknowledge the task before us and approach it with humility.

Taking the whole of Scripture and my view of God’s love and mercy, I hold to a more freewill and less of predestination view. If were all truly predestined to salvation or damnation, much of our practices and beliefs cease to make sense. There would be no sense of accountability at all if every act was predetermined leading finally to salvation or damnation. Finally, to summarize the GWTD one last time, coerced love is not love at all. Since “God is Love” (1 John 4:8) and we have passages such as the self-debasing Christ in Phil 2:5-11, I think God has created in such a way that humanity has the capacity and ability to choose him or not, and to choose our own actions in life.

Just some things to think about this week. No real application or challenge, but let us seek God and his Kingdom.

Grace and Peace.