Saturday, March 14, 2020

What kind of Christian am I?

One minute I'm talking about how I can't entirely endorse any of the Ecumenical Councils, the next I'm talking about areas where I might agree with Catholics over Protestants.  There is no denomination I agree with on everything, no Church who's Statement of Faith doesn't include something I object to, most mainline Protestant denominations include the Pseudo Athanasian Creed among their creeds.  My Soterlogy is not part of an official confession of any major denomination, and the main opinion I originally started this blog to promote is considered an excommunication worthy offence on it's own by most Evangelicals.

However if we started looking at things more broadly, define each denomination on what they were founded on or most known for, often the issue they were named after, then I might be able to qualify as part of many rather then none.  This is the same logic of course behind considering New Testament Christians to be Pharisees because of our Belief in The Bodily Resurrection in-spite of how it was mostly the Pharisees Jesus was criticizing.

I agree with the Baptists on Baptism, Independent Baptists that the Church should be Local [a form of Congregational Polity], Congregationalists and/or Presbyterians on Church Government and Clergy, and the House Church movement (Non Church Movement in Japan) on what church should be, and Pentecostals in that I'm a Continuationist on the Spiritual Gifts.  Perhaps claiming affinity with the Hebrew Roots Movement is the most questionable since I accept Paul at face value, but if you considered Chuck Missler close enough then so am I, the roots of our Faith are Hebrew and so I do see value is keeping that perspective in mind.

Those are forms of Christianity that have a significant presence in the modern West.  So I feel more informed on where I am and am not with them then I do the examples I shall list below.

Historically, if refusing to condemn Theodore of Mopsuesta as a Heretic in 553 makes me Nestorian then so be it, I don't consider Babai's Christology all that different from Chalecedon's anyway and I do renounce calling Mary Theotokos.  I'm with the Lollards in that the Scriptures should be made available in every language, I'm a Hussite on the Ultraquist issue, and I'm with the Taborites, Anabaptists and Diggers on their Communism.

Perhaps this is good, it can be beneficial to be foot in multiple worlds.

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