Individual Cup
Dear Bro. Don,
The various letters that have appeared in the “Christadelphian Tidings”
regarding the communal cup concern infections that might be caught by the use of a common cup. I have noted that some have strong objections to the use of individual cups. However, an individual cup has been used for an entirely different reason than for the spreading of infections.
There has been a case, more than one I believe, when a rehabilitated alcoholic has been converted to our faith. This new member would have to drink the blood of the grape in an unfermented condition. The alternative to an individual cup would be some, or preferably all, the members of the meeting drinking unfermented grape juice.
With brotherly love,
Harry Perks, Stayner, ONT
Reasons For Resigning
(The following letters are depressing. They may provide useful insights, however, so that similar situations can be dealt with as they are developing and not allowed to come to the point of someone leaving the community.)
Dear Editor:
As a person who considers herself a former Christadelphian, I read with interest John Sommerville’ s letter to the editor entitled, “The Blight of Family Breakups.” I, too, left my husband after many years of marriage, but it wasn’t because we did not read the daily word to or pray together or because we failed to attend the breaking of bread or other ecclesial functions. The reason I left was because all these ecclesial functions took up so much time there was no time to discuss the real problems of daily living.
I resented feeling that it was my “duty” to have dinner on the table every Tuesday night so that my God-fearing husband could come, literally, running in the door, eat the meal after a quick word of prayer, bury his nose in a Christadelphian magazine while he ate, then expect everything to be ready so that we could leave only to be late for Bible class. I resent the fact that many times) got up on Sunday morning an hour before he did, made preparations for the day while he had a 45-minute shower and then have him wonder why we were always late for Sunday school.
Did we ever talk about how we felt about the way we lived? No! Because he felt that things were going just fine and nothing needed to be said. I burned, but it wasn’t from sexual lust, it was from plain lack of concern or caring.
John comes close to the truth when he says that “married people may forget that their spouse is a gift from God,not just another person.” But the truth is that the couple may not even see their spouse as another person at all. He or she might be seen impersonally as a nagger, lazy, having too much time on his hands so he can spend more time thinking up new problems. Instead of spending time discussing the problems and trying to fix them, the time is spent arguing about them, or not facing them at all. Church activities are an excellent excuse for not having time to discuss the real issues that cause a marriage to break down.
Another of John’ s comments was that, “Prayer should be a daily part of our life, but prayer will not mean much if we lack the understanding of the greatness of God that only comes from His word.” Understanding the greatness of God was never the issue for me. Verbal abuse that belittled me as a sister-in-Christ was. Lack of respect for each other, as male and female , husband and wife, that undermines the self-esteem of either party will break down the bonds of marriage quicker than any force imposed upon it from the outside.
Paul writes in Ephesians, “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husband in my growing up that meant the wife was slapped around and verbally abused. As a result, my mother slapped around and verbally abused her children. As the oldest, I was the one responsible for setting the “perfect” example that all the other children should emulate. But the Bible says, “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.” It just happened that my idea of “my Lord” was different from my husband’s, so I left.
I do believe John to be wrong when he states, “Many feel no obligation to consider God in the things they do, so every man does that which is right in his own eyes.” God has greatly blessed me in my choice to leave. I no longer live in fear for my spiritual or physical life. I no longer feel that I am on the constant verge of a nervous breakdown and that suicide is my only option (if God would not want me in His kingdom, anyway, why spend the rest of my life trying). I thank God almost every day for a second chance to have a warm, spiritual relationship with Him.
Sincerely,
(name withheld)
Dear All,
Many of you know me. ..To this day, there is no one who can say a word against my intelligence, my dedication, my discipline, or my love of Truth.. .I ceased attendance of ecclesial functions in the late summer of 1991 out of disgust with the pervasive attitude of Christadelphians toward non-Christadelphians.
Let’s put the matter plainly: What did Jesus say? Forget the bales of obscure prophetic study, the endless, canned marginal notes, the lame Greek-Dictionary exegesis, and the flood-tide of stupefyingly similar audio cassettes (none of which, incidentally, sufficed to drive me away) –what did the man say? Love your neighbor as yourself
To love my neighbor as myself! need at least two things: humanity and empathy. Love is the essence of the teaching of Jesus Christ and to love someone I need to understand them. Understanding is part of the essence of Christianity. What makes a person tick? How do our neighbors see things? People in general, even when they exhibit non-Christlike behavior, are not doing it out of malice or stupidity. Their actions really make sense to them. If we would love them, we should understand things from their point of view. How else are we going to do them any real good? Before we can share with them the beauty of Jesus’ teaching, we have to let them share with us how they see things…we have to communicate.. .So what do we see Christadelphians doing?…We see the most visible, exemplary Christadelphians acting as if they are afraid of any non-Christadelphian ideas, and carrying out a very visible social separation from non-Christadelphians.
You who read this might well object: but I’m not like that, and Bro . A isn’t like that, and Sister Y isn’t like that. No! There are still lots of Christadelphians who are good disciples and can actually carry on a conversation or fix a motorcycle or attend a party with their neighbors. But here is what frightens me: Those disciples don’t seem to get any respect. The Christadelphian who is respected and influential spends most of his time with other Christadelphians, thinking only Christadelphian thoughts. This is the impression I got from all the prominent speaking brethren I ever met and from all the mass of Christadelphian periodicals and publications I ever read and from all the Christadelphian functions I ever attended. Having friends in the world– loving one’s neighbors — is not regarded as a sign of health but as a sign of disease.
This all seems based upon the following gross misunderstanding of scripture: assuming that the word “world” = “non-Christadelphian environments… This pervasive assumption…is given the lie by the example of our Lord. He came eating and drinking, a friend of publicans and sinners. No amount of exegesis, no amount of subtle twisting round this declaration or of bringing in irrelevant passages from everywhere else in scripture. ..can deny that Jesus mingled with every sort of person. He didn’t hide his lamp under a bushel.
We should also address the fear of ideas that is pervasive among the Christadelphians. What is its basis? It is widely rumored (among those who knew me) that I have been reading “men’s philosophy.” What a stupid thing to be worried about! If the truth is the truth there is nothing to be feared from new ideas…The Christadelphians are very rational and thorough. How can they not have enough confidence to examine say, modern textual criticism?…
The objection to new ideas (or anything resembling a vibrant mental life) was very nearly put to me this way. “Tom, we have a very good reason to discourage the reading of philosophy: anecdotal evidence strongly suggests that Christadelphians who read philosophy leave their faith.” Well, such an argument can only be regarded with contempt. “Yes,” it says, “I believe with all my heart that this doctrine is the Truth, but I dare not read those books,, or ask those questions, for fear that I might be convinced otherwise, and that’s the last thing in the world that I want.” Such a position is no better than the lowest form of fanaticism.
That’s why I quit. Pervasive functional disagreement with the plain words and example of Jesus Christ and hints of intellectual dishonesty. My conclusion is that there has got to be something wrong with the Christadelphian communities at a very fundamental level. So I am no longer a member of one…
I would be glad to carry on further correspondence at the address below. Tom Price, 5631 Melvin St., Pittsburgh PA 15217
Space does not permit an extensive response, and we hope readers will send letters to both Bro Tom and the magazine addressing the issues.
There are four major points that came to mind when reading the above.
- Christadelphians have no difficulty understanding how the non-Christadelphian thinks. Fully 50% of Christadelphians were raised outside the community; they know exactly how they used to think. Others have lapsed from the Truth for a time or have close relatives who are not Christadelphian. Furthermore, Christadelphians and non-Christadelphians all share the same basic humanity and inherent emotions and ambitions. We thus have plenty (too much, in most cases) of empathy with the “world.”
- Jesus did not initiate contact with publicans and sinners. They came to him because they were interested in the gospel of life. The Lord took the initiative in reaching out to the disciples of John the Baptist and in teaching in the temple and synagogues (John 1:39; 2:13,14; Lk. 4:15-16). He was a friend of publicans and sinners in that he did not reject the repentant among them, but encouraged their sincere interest in following him (Lk. 5:27-30). The inference that Jesus deliberately sought out the worst of sinners and consorted with them is a wrong assertion that arises from a careless reading of the gospels.
- Since the unbeliever does not share with the true believer a yearning for the kingdom, a love of the gospel and a desire to follow its principles, the unbeliever often does not care for the company of the believer. The lack of voluntary social association is a mutual matter not just a case of the Christadelphian standing aside. From our own observation, we would say the truth of the matter is that many of us get along much better with people of the world than we probably should.
- The problem with filling our minds with a lot of wrong ideas is the time it wastes and a peculiarity of the human mind. Our minds are swayed by what we put in them, even though we may recognize the input as being unprofitable. It is a simple fact of human nature that we are greatly affected by what we read and experience.
Acts 10:28 Unlawful to Eat…
The following was asked at a Bible school question and answer session regarding Acts 10:28.
Where does it say in the Law that “it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or come unto one of another nation”?
There is no such command in scripture. Rabbinic tradition legislated, however, that a Gentile house was unclean and any Gentile-used utensils or Gentile-prepared food was unclean. Even in a Jewish home, if a Gentile was left alone in a room, all of the food in that room was to be considered unclean (Edersheim, Sketches of Jewish Social Life, pp. 26-28).
The stipulations were an extension of Leviticus 7:19 which speaks of the communal meal associated with the peace offering. Once the regulation was applied to any meal, it was virtually impossible to allow eating with Gentiles. If the Gentile did not keep the Law, they would almost certainly be contaminated in some way as would the food and utensils in their homes; ceremonial contamination could occur by contact with a dead body, unclean animal, blood or human issue and could then be spread to any food or utensil used for eating or cooking (Lev. 5:2-3; 7:19).
From his response to the Lord’s vision, we can infer Peter still observed the dietary and social restrictions of the Law as he understood it. Following that vision on the roof (Acts 10:10-16), Peter would have reason to believe he would be expected to eat with the Gentiles who had summoned him. While Peter did not feel bound by the fanatical traditions of the elders (Mk. 7:2-4), he had evidently concluded that restrictions about eating with Gentiles were a reasonable application of the Law (cf. Gal. 2:11-13).
Strong’s Concordance