As a Gospel Preacher, (meaning that I, more than 95% of my pastoral and preaching ministry have used text from the four Gospels), I still believe that as Perrin suggests, Christianity must “re-discover the ‘Teachings of Jesus’.” I suspect that the Church has very deliberately built it’s foundation upon the ‘Teachings of Paul’. With two notable Pauline Theologians as advisors in my PhD work in New Testament, I discovered, what I think to be the most overlooked fact of the Gospel: Paul did not know Jesus! Read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John to see if you find Paul’s name in them. He is simply not there. You do the math.
It is no small thing, this ‘re-discovering The Teachings of Jesus’ for you may find how radically different Jesus’ teachings are from Paul’s teachings. At times even contradictions exist. To be sure, it is the teachings —no a SINGLE STATEMENT (now to divide what is said in limitations from those things that can be seen over and over across Paul’s writings, as thought, as word, as deed… as Teachings. Paul’s statement (found only in Letters outside his Authentic writings) that the Church used to lead to the historical oppression of life as it has been sanctioned and manifested and “Crusaded” to the planet by the Christian Church.
The making and holding of slaves (by a Christian Nation built for ‘Freedom from RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION’ —placed on Paul (a man who never held a slave). Slaves must ‘obey their master’ —as man took the title “Master” from God; to BE the ‘Lord AND Master’…himself! Never the Teachings of Jesus (a man who also never held a slave)! Did I say radical? I, perhaps alone, have identified that the ‘schizophrenia of the Church’, (as defined by ‘split personality’ and observed by the field of psychology to be the most common disease of modern man), must be found in the teachings of the Church. The fact is this: The Church, (even in 2024) keeps splitting and splitting… And splitting and splitting… And splitting and splitting…
Don’t get this twisted. I am not among the ‘traditional bashers of Paul’. I am prepared to argue these things on a deeper level. I am convinced that we want persons to be ‘all things, to all people, at all times’ when these omnipotent and omnipresent and omniscient powers are reserved for The Most High God, ALONE. It is man who specializes! For me, Christology in Christianity begins with Paul! And, the power of The Holy Spirit, now we are talking about my love for Paul. If the Church would only teach “The Fruits of The Spirit” it would certainly be a better world. But, that’s later in this course on faith when we reach the Pauline writings.
The fourth Gospel is where we turned— John’s use of ‘pistis/faith’. In the course of examining the use of Gospel ‘faith’. Young’s Analytical Concordance of the Bible gives no reference to this word translated as faith in John’s Gospel. Subsequently, only one column in my first volume of Faith of a Mustard Seed was given attention to John.
Now the realization that the word ‘believe’ is another English translation for the ‘Faith’ word group; as well as a couple of occurrences where ‘Truth’ is also an English translation of the ‘faith’ group. Where the limitations of this study has concentrated on the use of ‘pistis’ in translation as the word ‘faith’, ‘pistis’ is translated with the word ‘believe 90 times’ in The Gospel of John!
I can’t help but stay a moment on an introduction to John’s Gospel as it has become my favorite of the Gospel writings. John’s First Chapter is a ‘Genesis’ of this New Faith: “He came for testimony, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe (have Faith) through him.
I have previously indicated that my ‘life text’, the one most used in my preaching ministry and teaching ministry is John 5. So to capsule an introduction to John I would say that even when John is steeped in Faith, (more so than any of the other three Synoptic Gospel writers — ‘John speaks life!’. The word life is used in this Gospel more times than in any other Book of Bible. I would say that no one is as concerned about life as Jesus is in John’s Gospel! The ‘I Am’ passages peculiar to this Gospel have power to save, to heal, to deliver. John speaks Life! “I am… come that they might have life.” “I am… The Bread of Life.” “I am… The Way, The Truth and The Life.” “I am… The Resurrection and The Life.”
All inquiries By email: talk2therev@icloud.com. “Words of Life Study” Wednesdays on Zoom. 12:00 Noon & 6:30 pm CST. Join the Dialogue at my “Swellcast”. At all times: https://SWELLCAST.com/therev.
