Sunday School - Church History

Chapter 2 – Second and third centuries

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The church began to mature and change form as it faced opposition from Gnostic heretics. Gnostcism was varied, but most all Gnostics shared two common beliefs:

• To have salvation you must have their group’s secret, proprietary knowledge.
• The physical world is corrupt, evil, and detestable. Something to be avoided or transcended (which you could only do if you had their secret knowledge).

Gnosticism was a very marketable heresy for several reasons.

• They could claim to be Christian or not, as convenient to them.
• They claimed to have “The Secret Knowledge ®” that nobody else had. This appeals to everyone’s intellectual vanity.
• In a decadent society where life was hard, Gnosticism was popular because it suggested the possibility of transcendence to a purely spiritual realm.

A major problem for Gnostics was the fact that you cannot make Gnosticism consistent with the Apostolic writings (e.g. John 1:14, 1Cor 6:19, 1Cor 7:3-5, John 14:6), so they tended to write their own “gospels” or abridge the pre-canonical scriptures (e.g. Marcion, p18-19)

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Another interesting example is Origen, a child preacher who often slipped into Gnostic teachings while trying to denounce Gnosticism (p19).

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The Christians responded in three ways to Gnosticism (p20 1st ¶):

• A Canon of scriptures (p20) a group of perfectly self-consistent scriptures of widespread use and apostolic origin. There were debates until about 300 AD but for the most part the Canon was complete by 200 AD. (canon, incidently, means measuring stick. The implication is that we are to measure things against this specific group of scriptures)
• A Rule of faith (p21 sidebar) Though we call it the Apostle’s Creed, it was not actually apostolic in origin, but was developed in the second century as a set of baptismal questions. “Christian, what do you believe? …" This was a statement of hte Essentials of the Faith. The things you had to confess to be called Christian.
• A Priesthood of overseers (p21 last ¶). Early in the first century the church was led by lay elders (A.K.A. presbyters, overseers, or bishops) but as the church grew, a hierarchy began to grow up within the church. Regional head-elders started telling other elders what to do. (e.g. Philemon) They eventually became a class of Priests that ran the church and protected the apostolic traditions.

In addition to dealing with Gnostic heresy, there began to be questions of authority. What was to be our rule of faith and action? There were three basic ideas:

• Canonical scriptures (p20)
• Apostolic traditions (see the Easter debate, p22)
• Holy Spirit (see New Prophets p23-24)

The Catholic church grew into the use of canonical and apocryphal scripture as interpreted by a priesthood of overseers using church traditions as a guide. The Gnostics used non-canonical texts and/or Holy Spirit (how they felt) as their guide.

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What do we as Presbyterians believe about these issues?

There is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ. Nor can the Pope of Rome, in any sense, be head thereof. (Westminster COF 25.6; WCOF 25.6 originally stated that the pope was Antichrist, but that was later removed.)

The Lord Jesus, as King and Head of His Church, hath therein appointed a government, in the hand of Church officers, distinct from the civil magistrate.(Westminster COF 30.1)

The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelations of the Spirit or traditions of men. Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word: and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature, and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed. (Westminster COF 1.6)

And the bottom line, the thought that the author leaves us with...

So, how should we love and deal with Christians who have differing beliefs without tolerating heresy?