A Case For Biblical Truth and Spiritual Understanding

-Pastor Melissa Fain-

Seminary was a spiritual buffet for me. I was hungry for knowledge. I had listened to the sermons since before I was baptized, and they had begun to feel empty. Well, less empty, and more I already knew. I wanted new knowledge. The stuff they weren't preaching on Sunday morning. Seminary was a 10 course meal with seconds thirds and fourths.

True, my pregnancy brain struggled with the likes of Augustine and Maximus Confessor that first year. (I entered seminary only a month pregnant.) Sometimes I read the same passage three times before I digested their words, but there was zeal in getting new spiritual food. The best part being, I was taught how to enter that land and pull from those trees of knowledge, and eat of their fruit. (Not THE tree of knowledge. Don't get antsy on me.) I had been given keys to a spiritual orchard! 

The People are Hungry

I have witnessed the excitement at a minister giving a congregation just a tiny morsel of Biblical knowledge A Greek word here. A contextual clue there. They treat these minuscule pieces like a full meal.

Their eyes betray them. You see their hunger. You know they want more. They don't realize this because they don't realize they're starving. They've always been starving.

I exited seminary knowing I couldn't withhold the truth in that manner. I had entered the orchard, and I wanted to be a minister who taught IN the orchard. I wanted congregants that pulled freely from the fruit and asked my opinion on it's taste. Only it's a long road from Biblical starvation to satiation. The people have to be led to the fruit or they'll think it's poisoned and turn away.

Ten years ago, I decided to stand between the two. Speak to both worlds. I learned that while seminary had spiritual food through knowledge, Churches had spiritual drink through the Spirit. Too far in one direction or the other would cause the people to die of thirst or starvation. 

My promise as a minister

I believe there is more than what we understand.

Many churches profess something called the Apostles Creed. It's rooted in the first ever statement of organized religion, the 1st Council of Nicaea in 325.

​The Apostle's Creed goes like this:

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again;

he ascended into heaven,
​he is seated at the right hand of the Father,
​and he will come to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.

As someone born into the Campbell-Stone tradition of "No Creed but Christ," I have always bristled a little at the Apostle's Creed, and the numerous Christians that announce you can't be a Christian unless you profess it. (To be fair, my statements cause many of those people to bristle at me.) Part of the reason we even have our first council of Nicaea was because of a group of people making their own statements of faith. Statements as crazy as, there are really two Gods- Old Testament and New Testament. Statements and interesting as- Judas was working with Christ the whole time. Also statements we will never know because most of it was destroyed in counter protest.

Back in 325 the people generally believed in gods. They needed to explain what it meant to believe in the God of Abraham. This meant faith was not the starting point. Many had faith in something. The question was "What faith?" not "If faith?"

Today, the above Creed is difficult to digest. We don't consider the path to faith to be a journey, because many Christians grew up in it. That's just not the case for the average person anymore. Then, many who have were hurt by faith just walk away completely. 

So we have a crisis of Spirit and Knowledge. It's not enough to just lead those of faith to knowledge. There are also those of knowledge who need the Spirit. Then there are countless others who have neither. 

That's why my promise is simple: I believe there is something more. If that is making you knowledge camps and Spirit camps bristle, it's because you are at a destination, and I am at the trail head. It's okay that those at the beginning don't see a well or an orchard. You can't tell a people to eat or drink if they are nowhere near the food or beverage. That's why Sunday has become a journey to the Spirit, while Wednesday has become a journey of knowledge. Some people only need one. Some people need both. I know the fine line I'm walking in both camps, but luckily I'm unpaid so I can walk that path unleashed.