Doctrine Police

If I think it or believe it or observe it, it's valid; it's orthodox.  If you think it or believe it or observe it and it "disturbs" me on some level, I have to investigate.  That's just what I do.  I'm the doctrine police.

I wish I would have policed ME like that 20+ years ago when I was professing and proclaiming all kinds of things that did not align with an all-loving, all-merciful God.  I had this one line, ha ha how embarrassing, that went something like this: "Yes, everyone has the right to believe what they want; they also have the right to burn in hell."  I didn't just think that y'all, I said it, out loud, multiple times.

When I was in my 20s, my husband and I had just started attending a particular church.  And like good little church-goers, we started going to Sunday school as well.  They were studying a book in which the author was espousing all this love, love, love but there wasn't a sufficient mention of Jesus (maybe none at all, it's been too long to remember).  Well, that can't be right!  There was no internet in those days (shock!).  And I was telling my boss, who was of a certain conservative denomination particular to the south, ahem, and she said I should look for the book at a book store.  And so I did.  And it was in the "new age" section of the store.  Well, that was enough to prove beyond any shadow of a doubt that this book was not to be read in any church, anywhere!

Having at this point a whopping 2 years of Bible study under my belt from attending a certain non-denominational Bible study that you would recognize if I named it, I marched to my senior pastor and told him my concerns.  He needed to do something!  Everyone had to stop reading this book! It was pure heresy, all that love, love, love and no Jesus!  Guess what he said?  He suggested that maybe I attend a different Sunday school. LOL!  That was ingenious.  But what actually happened is that the woman who was teaching the book left the Sunday school class and never came back.  (There will likely be reckoning for me for that one in the next world.)

Another time when the doctrine police flared mightily is when I was reading that book The Da Vinci Code. I'm naming this one because I still don't like it.  I remember back then, reading these depictions of Mary Magdalene and Jesus as a secret couple, and thinking, "You know, there are some subject matters you just shouldn't mess with."  You can ask my husband to verify this, I literally would hurl the book across the room and against the wall. LOL.  But again, I will stand by my police report; and that's probably a pretty good way to react to a book one finds questionable to offensive.  I remember telling another woman at my church about it and how upsetting it was.  Guess what she said?  "It's just a book."  Horrors!  

Now, for the last few months, I have been stumbling through a book that describes at times this complicated process of what us Wesleyans call justifying and sanctifying grace.  Justifying grace is the power of the Holy Spirit at work in those moments when one has a perceptible experience of God's forgiveness (in particular, when one makes a first confession of faith; that "load" being lifted).  Sanctifying grace is the power of the Holy Spirit at work constantly in me to shape and form me into the image of Christ.  (And friends, this process goes much better when we cooperate.)  At any rate, this book lists so many steps and stages and processes and instructions, it makes my head hurt.  I'm too old for this and God has taken me on my own path where all these things are concerned.  I'll try to finish it, mostly because someone gave me the book.  And I won't throw it against the wall, because there are only a few statements here and there that the doctrine police don't agree with.  

Karma being what it is (I'm not clear to what extent I believe in Karma), I was on the receiving end of the doctrine police about 15 years ago.  I was attending yet another nondenominational Bible study (ahem) at a particular church where many members of this church also attended (ahem) but no one was supposed to talk about that (ahem) but often they did (ahem) especially when the pastor preached a particularly good sermon (ahem).  Anyway.  I had the audacity to quote Paul (Romans) quoting Exodus 33:19 -- "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy."  I said this in response to a woman who was tearfully and anxiously telling about trying to bring a family member to faith in Jesus as they were being wheeled into surgery.  She was just so worried that if they died, their eternity would be hellfire and damnation.  I had reached the belief of "judgment is God's job" by this point in my journey and didn't see a problem with expressing that.  Well, she replied, "I'm sorry Tammy, I can't be as complacent as your are about salvation!"  Well! To say my feathers were ruffled is an understatement.  I thought, you know, I've had about enough of these perfect women whose biggest problem is how they will survive with their adult children living with them while their mansion is remodeled.  Lol.  Yeah, that was a real thought that I said out loud to others.  At the time, I was involved in a ministry with women in treatment for drug addiction, most of whom were also dealing with CPS taking their children away and their lives in general being a big 'ole sh*t storm.  So I was pretty sure there was a good chance that God's mercy was much bigger than we thought.  And maybe I was coming to terms with my own messed up life history, but I just couldn't embrace "You are bad and God is disappointed in you" anymore.  I mean, so much focus on one isolated moment in time when one would recite the magic words and then God would acquiesce and pronounce forgiveness, "But not one drop of mercy or grace for you until you do missy!"  Hadn't these people heard of prevenient grace?  Didn't they know God is constantly at work in everyone's life and the world?  Didn't they know that our "small" concepts of God probably sound laughable to those who have crossed over to the other side?  

OK, I have digressed enough for today.  Spoiler alert, at the end of the year, I decided I wasn't interested in returning to said nondenominational Bible study.  Now I teach Bible study.  And I think about my words at times, often couching them with "This is just speculation on my part...." I pray I won't turn people off or cause them to question the validity and authority of scripture.  And I know the scriptures say that teachers will be held to a higher standard than others.  But I'll be darned if the doctrine police still rise to the occasion.  Only now, the claims are an attempt to point to the largeness of God; how Jesus only criticized those who thought a little too much of themselves; and how he prayed to the Father that we might all be one as he and the Father are one.

Maybe it's a good thing when people make faith statements that disturb us.  Maybe it's good when we make those same statements and must face the reactions we get.  Maybe none of us has it right and we need one another to be reminded of this fact and struggle and grow together!