“THE SPIRIT MOVES TO RENEW THE ANGLICAN CHURCH”

By Michael L. Carreker

It seems clear that with the ever-increasing demise of ECUSA and the Anglican Church of Canada, the inheritance of Christian Theology among Anglicans lies in the hands of the orthodox remnant. The reason why this is so is simple enough.

There can be no Christian Theology apart from the supremacy of Holy Scripture. The historic Church has believed and shall always believe that in the Scripture God has spoken definitively for all times and places. The Church proclaims this confidently because at the center of Scripture is the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. He is the focal point, the true intersection of time and eternity, through whom we look backward to the promises of the Old Testament, and through whom we look forward to the Church, the Body of Christ, and her record of the New Testament. The Church has remembered her Lord, and the significance of him, and vouchsafed this sacred memory to us in texts written in the power and inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

It is a first principle, therefore, that the Christian Church in general, and the Episcopal Church or the Canadian Church in particular, has no authority whatsoever apart from what is granted her in the teaching of the Bible.

Now, however, within the institutions of ECUSA and the Anglican Church of Canada, a revisionist mind casts a shadow upon the authority of the Bible. Their purpose is to purge it of what they claim is patriarchal prejudice, or outdated sexual mores, or language deemed inappropriate for God. Most of our seminaries echo this ideology with specious scholarship and smug superiority.

And so we have a glorious responsibility—and joy—set squarely before us. Thinking about God, growing in the knowledge and love of him, participation in his very life, the comfort of his love—these are steps in the journey Scripture sets before us. And more than this. Discovering what and who we are, how human life is to be lived, what is the dimension of our sinfulness, how the truth and mercy of God are found through faith in Jesus Christ, and how he has left us his own knowledge and the benefits of his sacramental grace. These, and more, are the treasures of the Bible.

But given that this treasure of Holy Scripture lies in the hands of the orthodox within the Anglican Church, we must be careful how we approach the task of Theology.

If we would understand the mysteries and the depths of God’s own revealed word, we must begin with humility. “God resisteth the proud but giveth grace unto the humble” (James 4:6). I emphasize the prerequisite of humility, because it is only by this most essential virtue that the soul submits to authority. He cannot expect to hear God speak who occupies his mind with the vanity of his own imagination. Human ideation is no substitute for God’s self-revelation. The paradigm for this humility is of course the Lord Jesus himself who said repeatedly that his teaching was not his own but the Father’s who sent him.

And so the Christian’s vocation to humility is the first step in discovering the treasures of the Bible. But once that step, which is not easy, is made, then we must be prepared to listen to the historic teaching of the Church Catholic. Humility must be thoughtful. “Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). The Christian Church is nothing other than the lives of believers filled more and more with the Word of God. And those who are filled most with the Word, the saints of the Church, become our teachers and examples. By grace we follow their wisdom in faith and their godly life.

As I say this about the need for thoughtful humility, I am thinking especially, though not exclusively, of those who serve in Holy Orders and whose vocation it is to teach the faith. The laity depend on us to articulate the faith once delivered to the saints. Only by the clear articulation of Christian truth can they make sense of their everyday lives.

For instance, the issue of marriage is not for laymen a matter of theological speculation but a primary form of human experience. And therefore the duty of the clergy is first of all to understand the biblical doctrine of marriage and then for the sake of the good health and salvation of souls to teach and defend it. This requires humility both on the part of the priest in understanding the doctrine of the Church, and then on the part of the layman, to learn the doctrine and to practice it with joy.

In the end the experience of Christian truth is a matter of practice. Humility must be thoughtful and godly. “But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.” (James 1:22). One may show me how to swim, describing methods of breathing and different techniques, but the joy and delight of the lake moving all about me is a matter of my actually swimming in it. To learn what the Church teaches about marriage, and then to live into the designs of marriage that God intends, is the final and definitive proof of its truth.

Only by adhering with humility to the authority of Scripture, understood in the doctrines of the church, can we live as the saints have lived. Put in another form, the only way that the faithful remnant may truly approach Theology is to live a humble life of godliness. With this as our intention, the remnant can begin ever more carefully to respond to the questions of our day from the standpoint of an informed and experienced Christian theology.

Some have warned rightly that we must be careful how we use the Bible to respond to our culture. We shall not respond effectively to questions of our day simply by resorting to proof texts from the Scripture, as if that were in and of itself a reasoned argument. On the other hand, neither shall we be free to offer a Christian theological perspective apart from the explicit testimony and authority of Scripture, as if the wisdom we share were of our own devising. And finally, both the relevant texts of the Bible and careful theological reasoning will prove futile in evangelism and in the defense of the gospel, if we have not tasted, at least in some small measure, the fruit of godliness. An abstract religion puts us right back in the position of our adversaries, ready to conjure up our own ideology. The glory of the Incarnation derives from the fact that the Word truly does become flesh. There is no other authentic witness.

If the Anglican Communion is to flourish, and if it does not flourish it will die, it must demonstrate the authority of Scripture both in theological coherence and in the joy of lives made new. Both the mind and the heart must be saved.

And so, as the Spirit moves to renew the Anglican Church, and we live into his leading, painful and difficult as that may be, the first responsibility is the thinking, teaching, and living of Christian Theology. We are no longer able to live off the ease of the former dispensation, relying on the opulent inheritance of what are now corrupt and worn out institutions. With our own repentance, faith, prayers, toil, joy, and love, we hand on to the next generation the good news of Jesus Christ, led by the Spirit in the Anglican Way of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church.

The Rev. Dr. Michael L. Carreker is rector, Saint John’s, Savannah