"As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today."
Joseph to his brothers, Genesis 50.
The cryptographers held an ent moot last night in my basement to explore 300 years of history. What we discovered is the recurrent theme of redemption. Even those second and third century heretics, Marcion, Montanus, and Arius, were used by God redemptively.
Heresies, in an odd way, have a beneficial effect on the church. They refine things. They cause truth to be clarified. They act as a catalyst toward a better understanding and better articulation of orthodoxy.
The heresy of Marcion and Montanus caused the early apologists like Tertullian write reams and reams of refutations to their heresy. These refutations have survived eighteen centuries and give us a clear picture into what the early Christians believed and stood for. The heresy of Arius provided the occasion for one of the best, most succinct articulations of Christian truth : the Nicene Creed.
Marcion also gave evidence, in a backwards kind of way, to the books that the early church considered authoritative. True, he butchered most of the New Testament and the entire Old Testament, but his endorsements of the Pauline epistles and (parts of the) gospel of Luke (and Acts) certainly stand out (a full century and a half earlier than the council of Nicea). His heresy and that of Montanus forced recognition of which were the true gospels and which were the forgeries. It also forced a recognition that God's written revelation to man was closed in the first century.
False teaching and error will always be around. What I find encouraging and reassuring, is that no matter what, our God reigns. He works redemptively in this world -- even through heretics.
That is an amazing thought -- especially as today's headlines are filled with the continued spread of error and cultural capitulation in the main line denominations -- not to mention, 65 million copies of Leah Teabing spitting out venom against the church in The Da Vinci Code.
Know this, our God reigns. I expect future generations of of Christ's followers to look back on our generation and marvel at how God took what was meant for evil, and made it good.
It is so true, our God does reign!!
The course that I took this past semester on The History of Eastern Orthodoxy very much confirmed what you speak of in your post. There was so much heresy that arose, but it always ended up resulting in a more powerful proclamation of God's truth.
As was pointed out to me in a sermon recently, without heresy and division within the early church we would not even have much of the New Testament! Paul's books, John's books, Peter's books, James' letter, etc, all were the result of heresy and division that needed addressing!
Posted by: | June 22, 2006 at 11:30