When we first began looking at dogma, I mentioned that some dogmatic beliefs could be spiritually dangerous. Well, today we’re going to look at spiritually dangerous dogma.
We’ve seen that as early as the end of the first century, and continuing on from there, even into the 3rd and 4th centuries when they had a completely compiled Bible, the biblical model of church structure changed from that of a plurality of elders and deacons, to a monarchical bishop (including the supreme bishop or Pope), a return to the Levitical priesthood (offering sacrifices for the people once more and having the authority to forgive sin), and a clergy/laity divide (setting some believers higher than others), thus changing the body of Christ from a “family” structure with Christ as the Head, to a feudal system based institution.
We must also remember that in 70 A.D., the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. As Jesus predicted (in Luke 21) there was not one stone left upon another. This was in keeping with prophecy and, after all, God had done away with the Old Covenant and given us a “new and better Covenant” by then. But perhaps the loss of the temple and the sacrifices, somehow entered into the reasoning here that led to a return to the Levitical practice of installing a priesthood that was still seen as mediators between God and man. Unfortunately, as the writer of Hebrews says: “For the law maketh men high priests which have infirmity; but the word of the oath, which was since the law, maketh the Son, who is consecrated for evermore.” (Hebrews 7:28) This priesthood was an infirm one indeed, and not the biblical model at all that says the believers are the priests.
Rather than be discouraged by the detour the church took, that in many ways we are still a part of, we must recognize that the problem is a combination of two things: man and sin. There’s a cycle that began in the garden: God creates a good thing, man enters into it with his own ideas and thinking, and God returns to “deliver” us from the work of our hands. This, among so many other things, ought to bring us back to that place of falling on our knees before Him and thanking Him for His mercy and grace towards us all. How longsuffering He truly is towards us!
I’m reminding us of His grace towards us, in preparation for the final dogmatic beliefs we want to look at which concerns the terms “Mediator” and “Co-Redeemer”. These are what I call the spiritually dangerous dogma. While there are many forms of this dogma in both Catholic and some Protestant churches, I still believe that within all of these churches, there are some who actually do read their Bible and have seen these more dangerous dogmas to be utter fallacy. I believe that God has a remnant in all the churches who are truly sold out to Jesus Christ, solely and completely. When we pray for Christians all over the world who are suffering persecution, these also need our prayers, for they are speaking truth against the fully established and dug-in dogmas of the “hirelings”. And rightly so, for the salvation of many is at stake.
“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time.” 1 Timothy 2:5-6
If, as Paul says, there is only one mediator, and that is Jesus Christ alone, then why would the church begin at some point to instruct believers to regard the Saints (the apostles and Paul, and Mary, and other disciples of Jesus, both men and women) as being endowed with mediatorial powers on our behalf? This dogma has had the disastrous effect of elevating Jesus way beyond our reach, and replacing Him with those more “human” that supposedly we can more easily identify with, to whom we then are supposed to cry out to for help.
Rather than strengthen mankind’s faith in the goodness of God through Christ Jesus towards us, they have taken the gift of God, Jesus Christ, placed Him on a “higher” pedestal that only bishops and priests have access to, and mis-directed the people to turn away from the One whom they are “not holy enough” to touch, to beg assistance from deceased humans who have no mediatorial powers at all. Where did this dogma come from?
It came from the seeker-sensitive church in Rome.
You probably thought the “seeker-sensitive” methodology was a new thing of post-modern churches, but it is actually quite old. But in those days, it was known by its former name: Compromise.
In order to more easily convert Romans and Greeks and others who had for centuries worshipped “many” gods, in order to help them come to the One True God, the Church compromised, and allowed the people to have numerous “mediators” to whom to pray, in the form of: Saints with a capital S. There are so many problems with that, but the biggest one being as I have stated earlier, that people naturally feel more at home with “human” saints than with a Savior God who was also human. So, who do they first turn to when in need of help or deliverance: the saints, including Mary, the mother of Jesus.
I thank God that it is because of Jesus Christ that I have access to the Father, directly through Jesus Christ, not through any other man, whether the church today calls him a bishop or a priest or a pastor! While we are to intercede for one another in prayer (one of our responsibilities as biblical priest-believers), that intercession is only possible because we each have been given that access to the Father, individually, through Jesus Christ alone! Jesus instruct us to pray to the Father in His Name. He never instructs us to pray to a saint, even those who were as Godly as the Apostles, asking them to speak to the Father for us. Yet that is what was taught back then in the times of Ignatius and beyond, and what is still being taught today. The point of all this being that If we can access the Father directly through Jesus Christ, then why would the church want to diminish that by teaching us to access the Father through the saints, thereby “detouring” us away from Jesus?
Perhaps that compromise helped better establish the authority once more of the priests and bishops. For this dogma also teaches that directly below the “saints” (with a capital S), are the bishops and the priests who are themselves dogmatic mediators, not according to the Word of God, but according to these “fallible” traditions of men. Priests that as Hebrews points out “have infirmity” – in other words, they are NOT infallible.
The book of Hebrew speaks so much of the “imperfection” of the Levitical priesthood and points us instead toward Jesus, the perfect High Priest, the mediator of a NEW Covenant by which we now live.
“For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified. Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before. “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them; and their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.” Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.” (Hebrews 10:14-18)
If there is no more offering for sin to be made, then there are no more spiritual sacrifices to be made by the bishop or priest (or even pastors or ministers) on behalf of the people. The people themselves, as we have already seen, ARE the priesthood of the new Covenant offering their own bodies as living sacrifices unto the Lord, with Jesus Christ being their High Priest.
So now let’s look at the term Co-Redeemer. What does that term mean and to whom does it refer?
Co-Redeemer is a term used by several of the Roman Catholic Popes of modern times to indicate that in some way, Mary, the mother of Jesus Christ, is to be considered a co-redeemer along with her son, Jesus Christ, even if in some not “quite” equal sense. While no official dogma has been instated as of yet, the term has been bantered about enough that the concept has taken hold with many who faithfully give more credence to the words of the Pope(s) than the Word of God (which, of course, happens because they are still not reading their Bibles and testing their words in light of it.)
Again, I will refer you to Wikipedia where a lot of historical research has already been compiled together on this point. Just go to the Wikipedia website and type in: Co-Redemptrix. There you will see all the quotes of the past and current Popes, showing their dogmatic thinking that brought this concept about.
All of which, I present to you as a very real and present danger of dogma. Just as so many have turned from Jesus towards the saints, feeling not worthy to call upon His Name, but more worthy to call upon humans for help (my own father believed this at one time); how many will then further turn away from Jesus, the only name by which we can be saved, and turn instead to Mary for that hope, feeling that in her “humanity” she will better understand us, since she is not God; and yet, contradictorily, giving her status that is equal to Jesus who Himself IS in fact God?The awesomeness of what Jesus did for us is the very fact that He WAS and IS GOD, and as GOD, offered Himself up on our behalf! Why would anyone want to replace or equate a human with our Savour God? How blessed are we because of Him! Our own Father and Creator, taking care of all that we have need of...even redemption from sin! What is behind the thinking of anyone who would want to diminish that?
Revelation 12:1-6 speaks of “a great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars…and she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.”
We once had a statue in our house that a close relative had given us as a gift. It was one of the most beautiful statues I had ever seen; I remember, as a child, admiring it every time I walked past it in our hallway. The colors were beautiful on this version of Mary who had a crown on her head with twelve stars, while her delicate uncovered feet stood on a half circular moon, and in her arms was the baby Jesus. It is obvious from that statue who the Catholics believe the woman is in this verse.
But while there is much discussion about who the woman is, one thing is clear: it is not the physical Mary, mother of Jesus. She is no longer here to flee “into the wilderness, protected by God, for 1260 days” or approximately 3-1/2 years, thought to be half of the 7 year period known as “TheTribulation”. She has died as we all must die. She is with Jesus, as will we all be with Jesus when we die, if we have believed and trusted in Him. She was not carried physically into heaven. And she never became the sin offering, the unblemished Lamb of God, that Jesus became for us, making Him the ONLY Redeemer of the lost, in ANY sense of the word, that we have.
This chapter of Revelation continues on and speaks of the battle the devil does with the angels in heaven (spiritual warfare in heavenly places) trying to destroy the “child” of the woman which are, by the way, the “redeemed of the Lord”.
Dogma that puts Mary on an equal plane as Co-Redeemer with Jesus Christ is one of the strongest evidences since the Inquisition, that the devil has had his way, even within our churches, in destroying many who Jesus came to save.
But we thank the Father for Jesus and for the power of the Comforter that He sent to us when He left this earth, knowing that waiting for His return are a remnant that trust in Him alone: the redeemed who “overcame him [the devil] by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.” Rev. 12:11
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