The Most Important Verse

Years ago, I was having deep communion and discussion with two of my brothers in the Lord. It was what we called discipleship: weekly meetings with our leader, where we discussed matters of faith and the word of God. Our leader, Chris, posed a random question to us:

What is the most important verse in the entire Old Testament?

He wasn't necessarily seeking a right or wrong answer, he just wanted to see what we came up with. Chris gave us a couple of minutes to look through our Bibles and find what we wanted. I didn't need more than a few seconds, to tell you the truth. You see, the moment he asked that question, I had a flash of remembrance.

One of my brothers has an amazing painting, a painting linked to a verse. The verse for that painting, I knew, was the one.

It may seem silly to want to sum up the entire, massive Old Testament in one verse. After all, the Old Testament has sections on History, law, poetry, songs, philosophy, prophecy, and people-- quite a broad spectrum. I'm not really sure what Jews think of Christians using their book for our own purposes, but they probably feel as though we've hijacked their scriptures or something. Still, I often wonder if they see a universal theme, a point, if you will, for their entire canon. I know we do.

Christians, I think, should view everything in the Old Testament through the lens of Christ, and his salvation. I am convinced that the entire reason for the Old Testament is to point us to the New Testament: Jesus, and his atonement for all our sins. The Bible is one giant salvation story, a salvation arc. There is a beginning, a catalyst, rising action, a resolution, and a new beginning.

With that said, I give you the most important verse (in my opinion) in the whole Old Testament:

Genesis 22:8

Isaac, being Abraham's only child by his wife Sarah, is the child of promise. If it had not been for God's miraculous intervention, Sarah could not have borne Isaac-- she was in her 90's. Nonetheless, God speaks to Abraham one day, and tells him to sacrifice Isaac as a burnt offering to the Lord (!). Miraculously, Abraham sets out to obey God's command. Abraham and Isaac travel up to a mountain, where Abraham prepared the altar and the wood, bound Isaac, took his knife, and was about to slay Isaac when an angel stopped him, and God told Abraham not to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham then looks up and sees a ram on the mountainside, which he takes and sacrifices to God as a burnt offering, instead of his own son. God tells Abraham that because Abraham had not witheld anything from God, not even his own son-- who himself was a gift from God-- HE would forever bless Abraham, making his descendants as numerous as "the stars in the sky, and as the sand on the seashore."

That's the story most people know, but there was a critical moment before the conclusion.

Now, when Abraham and Issac had prepared the altar and the wood for the sacrifice, Isaac realized that they had nothing to sacrifice. Not knowing Abraham's intention was to sacrifice him, Isaac asked "Father, the fire and wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" Abraham answered Isaac by saying:

Genesis 22:8

"My son, God himself will provide the lamb"

and provide the lamb for the sacrifice, God did. Then, and forever.

"Just Christian"

I had a conversation with a close friend a while back. Himself a Pentecostal, he was concerned what my newly aquired Catholicism meant in a lot of ways for me, practically. He was specifically concerned with how and where I went to church, and how that would affect future decisions.

Question 1:

"For example, would you not move somewhere if there wasn't a Catholic church there?"

Of course, I briefly responded that the likelihood of that even being possible was slim to none. I'd probably have to move to the middle of West Texas, or something like that, to find myself outside of the (reasonable) reach of some Catholic church.

Nonetheless, this idea propelled us into a discussion on what it is to be "Christian first" or "Just Christian." In a lot of ways, I agree, understand, and even champion this idea. But in some ways . . . I can't help but see it as utter foolishness and lacking in circumspection. The main idea behind "Christian first" is that there is a higher loyalty to Christ than to any denomination, and that one's faith in Jesus weighs more than one's loyalty to a particular church or denomination. AMEN!

1 Corinthians 1:2

To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ—their Lord and ours

Now, we see from a number of passages in the Epistles that there were indeed theological disagreements among the early Christian churches. Nonetheless, what was prized more than anything else was (and still is) is faith in Jesus Christ, him crucified, and knowing God. If I were to speak to lots of Catholics (and MLP's for that matter) for a moment: you do not have salvation simply because you are Catholic or whatever else. It is more important to be a Christian (one who emulates Christ) than a Catholic, or Lutheran, or whatever.

Question 2:

"Are you a Christian who happens to be a Catholic, or just a Catholic"

Well, the two certainly needn't be at odds. Yes, it's unfortunate that there are many "just Catholics" who aren't really Christians, but that doesn't mean the real, honest-to-goodness Christians who are Catholic need to be checking their denomination-barometer every now and then thinking "Have I gone too Catholic, now? Let me get back to being Christian first." Again, they needn't be at odds.

I hope to always champion being "Christian First"-- loving Jesus more than anything else, including one's church. This even helps you relate to other Christians with whom you may disagree (hey, at least they love Jesus). When you love Jesus more than anything else, you love others who love Jesus too, despite "anything else."

BUT, I now must address the part of this idea that I called foolishness, and lacking in circumspection earlier, and that is "Just Christian"

You see







. . . there is no such thing.


Reason A: where you go to church
I grew up in a church culture where we pretended we didn't have a denomination. My Dad referred to people who really liked our denomination, the Assemblies of God, and were subsequently somewhat into the Assemblies of God, as having "AG Underwear." He also joked about some churches signs having a big AG logo on them.

We wanted to think of ourselves as above denominational practices, disagreements, politics, and the like. We wanted, really, to just love Jesus, plain and simple. A noble goal, certainly, but pretending you don't have a denomination that you have (admit it) some degree of loyalty to doesn't make you more of a Jesus-first-lover

it just makes you disingenuous about your loyalties.

After all, how many "Just Christian" people visit (much less attend) any old church they come across, as long as the people seem to genuinely love God? The funny thing I've noticed about AG-ers who are "Just Christian", when they move, etc. and look for a new church: they either find the first AG church, or one that pretends it's not AG even though it is, or one that is just like an AG church, but a non-denom-er.

Little Flower Catholic Church, where I attended up until I moved away a month ago or so, is somewhere where people really love Jesus. They may say it, show it, and act it differently, but you can tell very quickly, when you're there, that they really do love Jesus. I could tell it from the first Mass I went to there, and I wasn't even a Catholic then. Now, how many new-in-town-Evangelicals do you think would try that place out? I'm guessing, given the 'Catholic' part of the name, none. So, apparently, it's not just about loving Jesus.

To reverse question 1:

"Would you move somewhere where there was only a Catholic church?"


Reason B: what you believe

"I just follow scripture"

Those who claim this would like to think so, and you most certainly do try, but they don't follow scripture in the same way they think. Each of us, through forces far beyond our control, is indoctrinated into a particular Christian culture from the moment we recieve the faith (and often beforehand). These particular Christian cultures I speak of include certain vocabularies, practices, unspoken rules and taboos, liturgies, areas of Christianity they focus on, style of church governance, and yes: methods of interpreting scripture.

As much as a good many Evangelicals want to think, there is no such thing as a default, neutral Christianity that just follows the Bible. You interpret scripture and evaluate churches and church beliefs based on the Christian culture into which you were indoctrinated-- you cannot avoid this, it's impossible. If there is a "default" Christianity, it's Catholicism (sorry), because, after all, it's the oldest one there is. There is not, however, a neutral, Bible-only Christianity. Truly, Bible-only Christianity is itself a unique form, since it isn't practiced by everyone, and wasn't even a legitimate form, say, back in the 100's, when there was not yet a Bible, so to speak. There are only forms, traditions, and methods of scriptural interpretation, and so on; there is no "I'm just a plain Christian."

If I were to speak about this with someone who attempts this reasoning, I would have to tell them something like:

"You're an Evangelical, plain and simple. Whether you want to admit it or not, you talk like an Evangelical, worship like an Evangelical, attend Evangelical churches, and intrepret scripture like an Evangelical. If you observed an Eastern Orthodox Christian, in all his rituals, styles of prayer, and thoughts on scripture, would it not seem absurd to you if he claimed he was 'just Christian'? No, you'd want to tell him "you're not just Christian, you're obviously Eastern Orthodox."

So it is when Evangelicals attempt to brand themselves as "Bible-Christians," or something of the like.

Are you a Christian, first and foremost? Excellent. But let us not get into this business of being "Just Christian;" no one is above denominational differences, they just think they are.