Dear Jon,

Over the last year or so, I’ve become convinced of the biblical basis of the organic church espoused in much of your writings (along with those of Frank Viola and Steve Atkerson).

JZ: The phrase “organic church” itself needs some important clarification and qualification. First, authentic organic church is not a “movement.” Secondly, the phrase “organic church” originated with T. Austin Sparks and then had a very specific meaning. In a nutshell, it meant a group of believers in a locale whose birth and continuance flowed out of the Life of Christ – “an organic church is one that is naturally produced when a group of people have encountered Jesus in reality . . . and the DNA of the church is free to work without hindrance . . . . It’s a gathered community that lives by divine life” (Frank Viola, Reimagining Church, p. 32). In recent years “organic church” has become a buzz phrase used by many, with various definitions resulting. It has become a wax nose that can be shaped into numerous notions, even contradictory ones. Thus, as I see it, an organic church is not “started,” it is birthed by the Living Christ.

I am very interested in being a part of such a church but I do have questions. By way of introduction, (I’ve corresponded with you in the past) my name is Nick Mackison and I am 36 years old. I live in Glasgow, Scotland with my wife Sharon and I have three small children. My questions are as follows:

1. How do organic churches fit into the historic stream of confessional Christianity?

JZ: Of course, there will always be a few that are “way-out,” but for the most part the confession of Christ by non-institutional ekklesias would be in line with the general statements of faith found in most evangelical para-church organizations.

Could the council of Nicea, for instance, have been called within an organic church context?

JZ: Absolutely not. The major church councils were carried out in settings where church and state were joined together. Emperor Constantine called for the council of Nicea. There was a lot of politics, threats, bribes and duplicity occurring in these councils. A good read in this regard is Philip Jenkins, Jesus Wars: How Four Patriarchs, Three Queens, and Two Emperors Decided What Christians Would Believe for the Next 1,500 Years (HarperOne, 2010, 328pp.).

The organic-church biblicist impulse (I do not use the term biblicist negatively) would seem to militate against any complex formulation of historical doctrines like the Trinity, the Two Natures of Christ, etc. How should house churches view their place within the history of orthodox Christianity?

JZ: Groups that pursued Christ outside the visible church (which was in bed with the state) were basically killed off by the religious-secular forces until the printing press was invented. The Anabaptist movement in the 1500’s refused to be a part of a state-controlled church. They were chased and murdered by the Catholics and the Reformers, but they could not be snuffed out. Thus, today’s ekklesias would identify with those in the past who functioned outside the established religious institutions.

From AD 300 – 1700 the mainline visible churches were wedded to the state. It must be asked, How “orthodox” is a Christianity that for 1,400 years used the threat of the sword to keep its adherents under their thumbs? As J.C. Ryle astutely observed, any religion that depends on the sword has the stamp of apostasy on it, not the fragrance of Christ.

Had the ekklesia Christ initiated continued to be about Him, and not other things, it is doubtful that the doctrinal formulations of institutionalized church councils would have occurred. I believe it must be underscored that in the period of AD 250 – 1700, Christianity became all about believing the right doctrines, and not about knowing and following a person, Jesus. Today, we are still seeing the negative outworkings of this momentous shift in an evangelicalism that is often obsessed with right doctrine, instead of the Living Christ.

2. I do have another question for you, particularly pertaining to evangelicalism’s obsession with right doctrine. I think I’ve grown up a soft-fundamentalist, yet I always seemed to struggle with this deeply ingrained mindset in one way or another. My question would be, what are, if any at all, the doctrinal boundaries for fellowship?

JZ: Nick, a response to this area of concern is difficult to articulate, so please bear with me. Picture a group of believers coming together around Jesus Christ in a loving atmosphere. There is no agenda; they desire for Jesus to express Himself through them in whatever way He pleases. The Lord has been working in them and revealing Himself to each person every day. When they gather, He begins to bring forth Himself from the brothers and sisters in numerous ways. When everything is about the presence of Christ, something wonderful happens in the room – all the “doctrinal differences” that exist are put into perspective and recede into the background. The people of God increasingly understand that it is not edifying to bring their personal doctrinal bents to the meeting as an agenda.

If Christ is everything, then everything else can be put on a shelf. Can false doctrine be brought up in a gathering like this? Surely, it can. But I think you can see that in the Christ-suffused gathering I’ve described, unsound words are probably going to be met with, “What does that have to do with our life in Christ?”

Now here is a sticky point. I think what has happened in evangelicalism is that we have tended to meet around the Bible instead of Christ. There is nothing wrong with the Bible, but it would seem that 95% of how it is used has little to do with Jesus (cf. Christian Smith, The Bible Made Impossible, Brazos Press, 2011, 220pp.). One can see that if people are meeting around a Book, there is the real possibility they will end up wrangling with one another over its contents. I would suggest that this accounts for why since the Protestant Reformation we have 25,000 denominations and so many systems of theology. This is why it is so vital for us to realize, as Paul did, that believers can come together for the worse, instead of for the better. If Christ is in us, and Christ’s presence among two or three is not our end-all-be-all, then we might as well fold up our cards and leave the table. It sounds so basic, but many subtle shifts over the years have brought us to miss this crucial point – we meet around our Living Lord, not a Book (cf. my  session #1 in Auburn WA, 03/12)

As I see it, all our inordinate concern with “correct doctrine” has come to us through the grid of a Greek-influenced Christianity that has virtually snuffed out the simplicity of Christ. In saying these things, I am not denying the concerns found in the NT, but I am suggesting that our traditional fixation on doctrine has functionally displaced Jesus as our focus.

3. I know that you have egalitarian views on the role of sisters in the assembly. At the moment, I disagree with egalitarianism, at least on an emotional level (I was raised in and continue to meet with the Plymouth Brethren). I read your book “What’s With Paul and Women?” and your article “Were Women Silent at Pentecost“. I’m currently reading How I Changed about Women in Leadership by Alan F. Johnson and Finally Feminist by John G. Stackhouse Jr.

Part of my problem with egalitarianism is that it seems to overlook the patriarchy that seems to be affirmed in the NT. For instance, God reckoned us sinners in Adam and not Eve, Jesus chose 12 men, Paul’s descriptions of elders’ qualifications are always masculine, etc.

JZ: Patriarchy, as generally defined, is not affirmed in the NT. For example, in 1 Cor. 7:1-5 – the only place in the NT where the word “authority” is used concerning marriage – Paul speaks of the mutual authority the husband-wife have over each other’s body. They are not to separate physically without “symphony,” mutual consent. An excellent book in this regard is Del Birkey, The Fall of Patriarchy: Its Broken Legacy Judged by Jesus & the Apostolic House Church Communities(Fenestra Books, 2005, 392pp.).

I find it interesting that those who defend patriarchy blame Eve for the fall. The truth is, both are implicated in sin entering the earth.

Jesus did not choose twelve males because that function was inherently limited to men, but because He was a New Jacob, and Jacob had twelve sons. Jesus came to extend the believing remnant in Israel to the nations – a New Israel. In Romans 16:7, Paul mentioned Andronicus and Junia, who were “outstanding among the apostles.” Junia was an apostle in the sense that Barnabas and others were so designated.

The word for older men, presbutas, is also complemented by a feminine form for older women, presbutidas. In a family, it is natural for the more mature to help the younger. In a family, you do not think in terms of offices and titles, but in terms of abundant caring for all, from the youngest to the oldest.

I’m also finding it hard to navigate a way around the silence injunction in 1 Cor. 14:33b-35. I’ve read the various egalitarian proposals and have yet to be convinced by any of them, except a straight reading of the text.

JZ: If a “straight reading” flies in the face of the fact that Paul had already approved the public speaking/praying of women in 1 Cor. 11, isn’t that cause for your eyebrows to be raised? There is no reason under the sun to suspect that Paul would designate the speaking of the sisters as “lewd” and “vile.” As I said in Appendix Two of What’s With Paul & Women? –

Male and female prophesying was inaugurated on the day of Pentecost (Acts2:17-18).  Paul approved the prophesying of women in 1 Cor.11:5.  In 1 Cor.14 he saw the whole body involved in prophesying – “everybody is prophesying”(v.24), “each one of you has a teaching” (v.26), “you may all prophesy one by one” (v.31).  How could the same apostle Paul a few pen strokes later turn around and unequivocally designate women’s speech in the body as “filthy, lewd and vile”?  It makes no sense at all.  I have always felt that verses 34-35 didn’t sound like Paul.  Something was awry.

 

The English translation of the Greek word, aiskron,  as “shameful” or “improper”hardly conveys the strength of what the word encompasses.  The affirmation in v.35 is that a woman’s speaking is “lewd, vile, filthy, indecent, foul, dirty and morally degraded.”

 

The matter is greatly cleared up with the realization that Paul did not write the negative words about women in vv.34-35.  Instead, those basing their view of women on the oral law did.  Paul never required women to be silent and never called female speaking “lewd and filthy.”  The Talmud was guilty of advocating both.

 

This is further confirmed in v.36 when Paul exclaims “What! Did the Word of God originate with you?”  The “What!” indicates that Paul is not in harmony with what was stated by others from the Talmud in vv.34-35.  Thayer’s Lexicon notes that the “What” is a disjunctive conjunction “before a sentence contrary to the one just preceding, to indicate that if one be denied or refuted the other must stand.”

 

A “straight reading” of any text is one that is faithful to the total context, the immediate context, and the language of the text itself. It would seem that my interpretation of this difficult text meets the criteria for a “straight reading.”

Brother, I would suggest that the preponderance of evidence in the NT indicatesthat women fully participated. To use 1 Cor. 14:34-35 as sweeping grounds to silence the sisters seems to be a very dubious way to handle the Scriptures. It creates an apostle who gave to the women in one hand, and then took away with the other.

This issue means a lot to me for various reasons. Firstly, my mother was the spiritual leader in my home. She taught me faithfulness to Christ and was the most amazing witness I’ve ever known (she went to be with the Lord 23 years ago now). Secondly, I have two small daughters. One is nearly 4 years old and the other is nearly 4 weeks old. I’m asking myself whether I want them growing up in the assembly and having their gifts stifled. Thirdly, I’d like to be involved in an organic church plant and I want to make sure that the sisters in any new plant were being nurtured along biblical lines.

JZ: Given the fact that the “new humanity” Jesus died to create is a setting in which there is neither male nor female, shouldn’t we be skeptical of a view that effectively muzzles half the priesthood? The full embodiment and expression of humanness involves the presence of both male and female. As Donald Joy noted, “We are always impoverished when a single sex group meets, discusses, and makes decisions, since only part of the full-spectrum personhood seems to be present.  So where urgent decisions are being made, we surely want both sexes speaking.”

4. As I’ve mentioned, I’d love to be involved in a church plant. Should I just leave my institutional church and endeavor to plant an organic church?

JZ: There’s a lot more involved in seeing an organic ekklesia emerge than leaving an institutional setting. I know nothing of your total situation, but it looks to me like you should stay where you are until you have the Lord’s guidance to leave.

The arguments for organic house-church seem compelling. Yet I still attend the Brethren assembly in which I grew up, and to leave would seem schismatic.

JZ: Leaving an institutional church is not inherently schismatic. Remember, not everything that calls itself “church” is ekklesia. Many people leave “churches” that are businesses, not ekklesias. How much “church” would be left, if we define it as “assemblies of believers where Christ is the functional Leader and the whole body is expressing Him”? Being “schismatic” would relate to how you left a group; leaving a group is not automatically “divisive.”

There are many positive aspects to my assembly -- the preaching is good, they have an open-participatory communion service each week and they have a lot of young people.

JZ: The problem is, “preaching” is not a part of authentic ekklesia. It is a Greek 3rdand 4th Century practice imported into the visible church (cf. David Norrington, To Preach or Not to Preach? Paternoster, 1996). Is it really an open-participatory time if only the men can speak? Doesn’t it really boil down to a men’s meeting?

5. If I were, by God’s grace, to help plant an organic church, would it be better if I did some form of seminary training? I am currently a mathematics teacher in a secondary school with no knowledge of the original languages. (BTW, my theological commitments can be summed up in the London Baptist Confession of 1644/46). Would it help me facilitate such a plant with seminary level education?

JZ: Absolutely not. Most seminary training would set you back, and possibly ruin you. You need to pursue Christ with others, not education. Down the pike, there is nothing wrong with learning Greek and Hebrew on-line, if you feel so led – but such things are not a priority now. Along these lines, I would see as a priority that you read Frank Viola’s Finding Organic Church: A Comprehensive Guide to Starting and Sustaining Authentic Christian Communities.

6. If such a church plant were to happen, would it be possible to align it with other groups across the world? I think a loose connection with doctrinal accountability would be desirable. The situation here in the UK, and Glasgow as a city, is desperate from a spiritual point of view. I really believe that house churches are uniquely placed to make a huge difference.

JZ: When the Lord brings organic assemblies to life, of course myself and others can help you be in contact with Christ-centered ekklesias. But it looks like you have a ways to go before this would be an issue.

Meeting around Christ in informal atmospheres is a wonderful experience, and it can come to expression anywhere in the world – without cumbersome expense and bureaucracy.

7. I’m an avid reader. Are there any commentaries and systematic theological works that you could recommend as particularly helpful?

JZ: Recently, Jamal Jivanjee interviewed me, and asked what books have impacted me over the years. The interview is here.Here is the list of books:

Leonard Verduin, The Reformers & Their Step-Children (Eerdmans, 1964). This book turned my world up-side down when I read it in 1977. [Nick started reading it and said, “Verduin book is mind blowing”].

Howard Snyder, The Problem of Wineskins: Church Structure in a Technological Age (IVP, 1975). I read this one soon after Step-Children. It further rocked my status quo.

F.F. Bruce, Paul: Apostle of the Heart Set Free (Eerdmans, 1980).

Richard Longenecker, Paul: Apostle of Liberty (Baker, 1980).

Oscar Cullmann, Christ & Time: The Primitive Christian Conception of Time and History (Westminster Press, 1964).

C.H. Dodd, Gospel & Law: The Relation of Faith & Ethics in early Christianity (Cambridge, 1951).

Bruce Larson, No Longer Strangers: An Introduction to Relational Theology (Word, 1971).

Thomas Dubay, Caring: A Biblical Theology of Community (Dimension, 1973). This is the most profound, practical & challenging book I’ve ever read.

Carl Hoch Jr., All Things New: The Significance of Newness for Biblical Theology (Baker, 1995).

Robert Banks, Paul’s Idea of Community: The Early House Churches in Their Cultural Setting (Eerdmans, 1988).

Ray Abrams, Preachers Present Arms: The Role of the American Churches & Clergy in World Wars I & II, Round Table, 1933; Herald Press, 1968. Shows how easily the church succumbs to government propaganda and becomes a tool of the state. The chapter on “The Church Contributes to War-Time Hysteria” is chilling.

Mark Strom, Reframing Paul: Conversations in Grace & Community (IVP, 2000). I don’t say this lightly:  Reframing Paul is one of the most significant works since the Reformation.

Willard Swartley, Slavery, Sabbath, War & Women: Case Issues in Biblical Interpretation (Herald, 1983).  

Chuck Swindoll, The Grace Awakening (Word, 1990). A popular treatment worth its weight in gold.

Jacques Ellul, The Subversion of Christianity (Eerdmans, 1986).

Richard Gaffin, The Centrality of the Resurrection: A Study of Paul’s Soteriology (P & R, 1987).

Donald Joy, Bonding: Relationships in the Image of God (Evangel, 1996).

Keener, Craig.  The IVP Background Commentary, New Testament.  (IVP).

Bruce Malina & Richard Rorhbaugh, A Social-Science Commentary on the Synoptic Gospels (Westminster Press, 1992).

Frank Viola, From Eternity to Here (David Cook, 2009).

Jon, I just want to express a heartfelt thanks to you for all that the Lord is teaching me through your ministry. I’ve been listening to your audio sermons on searchingtogether.org and am absolutely blown away by just how Christ-saturated your words are. I’ve honestly never heard anything like it and I’ve been telling all my friends about your talks. I’m trying to give them as much publicity as I can!

JZ: Thank you, Nick, for those very kind words! My heart-cry would be for Jesus to be lifted up.

Jon, you have a greater impact than you realize.

God bless,

Nick Mackison, Scotland

I’ve been shocked at the weak arguments and wilful blindness exhibited by many who have reviewed the book. Why must this book be disproved at the cost of one’s intellectual integrity? Upton Sinclair gives us a possible reason:

It is difficult to get a person to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it. (Quoted by Frank Viola)

The introduction certainly whet my appetite for what lies ahead. In it, Verduin explains that within ten years of the Reformation, it became clear that the dissenters from Rome were not all of one mind. A group within the dissenters which came to be known as “The Second Front” or “The Radical Reformers” were causing great concern to Luther and Zwingli. This group were to be known by many names, among which the least misleading, according to Verduin, seemed to be “The Stepchildren of Reformation”. Like modern evangelicalism, this was not a theologically homogeneous group. As the word “evangelical” can be applied to a Benny Hinn on the one hand and a D.A. Carson on the other, so the term “Stepchild” or “Radical” could be applied to a Muntzer on the one and a Menno on the other. It seems that Verduin’s approach is to focus upon the more orthodox of the Stepchildren.

The greatest value and comfort I found from the introduction was the revelation that the convictions of the Stepchildren were nothing new. You see, I grew up in the Plymouth Brethren and for the last 5 or 6 years I’ve felt something of an uneasy peace as I juxtaposed the history of the Brethren with that of the confessional churches. Put it down to insecurity or whatever, I couldn’t quite believe that the almost the entire church had “got it wrong” in areas like, the clergy/laity divide, infant baptism, sacramentalism, the lack of open participatory worship, etc. (I went on something of a journey as I read Reformed theology and visited Presbyterian churches – more on that another time). Yet it seems that the Brethren convictions are, generally, as old as the NT documents themselves. For while these Stepchildren took part in the great breach of 1517, they were never really of the Reformation. Verduin puts this down to the fact that they had already been conditioned to think a certain way.  Verduin structures the book in eight chapters, each headed with a swear-word that the opponents of the Stepchildren used to smear them at certain points of faith and practice. Notable to the author is the fact that these swear-words were not new and had been coined earlier in church history to deal with other dissenters.

The crux of the difference between the Reformers and the Stepchildren is summed up thus:

The Stepchildren believed that the Church of Christ is by definition an element in society, not society as such. Their opponents, the Reformers as well as the Catholics, were unwilling to go along with this; they continued to look upon the church as coextensive with society. (p17)

Maybe those who see a conflict between what they read on the pages of the NT with the structure and practices of the institutional church will be strengthened by a reading of Verduin’s volume.

O, how we need to meditate on the horror of rejecting the gospel. Satan does his best with television and radio to create in us a mind that is so trivial and banal and petty and earthly that we find ourselves incapable of feeling what terrifying truth is in this word anathema. O, how we need to guard ourselves from the barrage of eternity-denying entertainment. We need to cultivate a pure and childlike imagination that hears a word like anathema the way a child hears his first peal of thunder, or feels his first earthquake, or suffers his first storm at sea. The Bible does not reveal to us the eternal curse of God that we may yawn and turn the page. The wrath of God is revealed to shake unbelievers out of their stupor, and to take the swagger out of the Christian’s walk and the cocky twang out of his voice. Don’t skim over verses 8 and 9 quickly. There is much humbling and sobering and sanctifying to be had here. Ponder these things in quietness.

“When I get out of this crappy job and head off to seminary, then things will really take off. Then I’ll have real time for prayer and study and my ministry will change lives.”

“When I get married, then I’ll conquer lust. Then I can fulfill my life’s work for Christ.”

“When I get baptized in the Holy Spirit, then I’ll experience power for evangelism and personal victory. Then I’ll know true joy in God.”

Well, what happens when you go to seminary and find that your prayer life is still in the doldrums? What happens if you pastor a church that no one attends? What happens if you experience ministerial burnout like so many of the men labouring in this unbiblical position? What happens if you never get married? What happens if you do get married and lusting after different women takes on a more dangerous turn? What happens if the lust that remained un-dealt with pre-marriage causes sexual disfunction within the marriage? What happens if you spend your whole life waiting for a spiritual experience that is nowhere promised in Scripture? What happens if this is it?

I believe that many of us suffer from this procrastination (i.e. waiting for the Christian life to truly start) because we have a defective view of the gospel. It comes from a works-righteousness ethic fed by remarkable testimonies like those of saints who prayed long and hard and “brought revival” down. Is there such a thing as a life that counts for God?

If the history of the human race has taught us anything, it’s that we’re a miserable bunch. Look at the great saints of the OT. Abraham was so scared of being killed that he was happy to pimp out his wife. Moses, as great as he was, failed to make the promised land because of his temper. David, a man after God’s own heart, committed adultery and murder and went on to raise a family so dysfunctional it made the Sopranos look like the Waltons. Samuel’s family life wasn’t great either as his sons were a waste of space, profaning God’s sacrifices and sleeping with the temple cleaners. Did I mention that these were the”heroes” of the OT? The LORD doesn’t do smoothed over hagiography.

“Ah,” retorts the fundamentalist-pietist, “that was the pre-Pentecost dispensation of the law. Now in the NT, Christians are called to a victorious life through the power of the Spirit.”

Now I don’t wish to say that Christians can’t experience victory. Yet in the NT, we have Peter, post-Pentecost Spirit-filled Peter, retreating in fear because of the circumcision party and abandoning the gospel.

What marked the Biblical saints was not that they had lives that counted for God, but the fact that they were sinners, righteous-ed through faith. Read through the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11. Even Samson is a hero of faith; hooker-loving, Gentile-marrying, compromising Samson. What made these saints heroes is that they believed the gospel (with faith given them by God, see Eph. 2:8-10).

If the doctrine of Christ as the last Adam has taught us anything, it is that there is only one victorious Christian, only one person whose life really counted. His “one act of righteousness”, i.e. his perfect sacrifice of the cross, is all that God is interested in. I once heard Carl Trueman say that God is only interested in two people, Adam and Christ. Either God sees you in Adam or in Christ. Are you hidden in Christ (Col. 3:1)? Then God doesn’t see your pathetic little life with all of it’s false starts, broken promises and mucky little secrets. You are already a conqueror ”through him who loved us”. Your life already counts, already is victorious because you are united to the Victor through the Holy Spirit by faith.

So stop waiting for life to happen. Stop waiting to experience the victorious Christian life. Grab hold of the Victor through faith and start basking in His victorious life now. Only by “getting” the doctrine of faith-union with Christ in his victorious righteousness will we rid ourselves of this perfectionist, works-righteousness slavery.

We’re constantly being told (by Christian pastors who should know better) to reach for the life we’ve always wanted. Christians only need receive and rest in Christ and his righteousness through faith and God sees us ALREADY with the Life He’s always wanted for us.

There are no easy answers to such a question, but my thinking leads me towards the maturity motif with respect to the Mosaic Law. What I mean is this, under the Old Covenant, Law functioned as a school-master over those who, redemptive-historically speaking, were immature:

1 What I am saying is that as long as an heir is underage, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. 2 The heir is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. 3 So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world. 4 But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. 6 Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” 7 So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir. (Galatians 4:1-7 NIV)

The law was given to those who were “underage”, whose status was no different to that of slaves. To be under law was something the people of Israel needed redeeming from! It was something that they needed to grow out of! The law was completely inappropriate for a mature son.

This principle rings true in parenting, i.e. the younger the child, the more specific the instructions need to be. To a five-year old, one might say, “Go to the bathroom, wash your face, brush your teeth and change into your pyjamas. Don’t play with any toys until that is done.” As the child grows, the commandment might grow less specific, i.e. “Get ready for bed.” By the time the child has reached 18+ (and assuming he still lives at home) any type of command in this regard would seem inappropriate. The wise parent would rely upon the maturity young man to make the right decision with regard to rest and recuperation.

So when the law was delivered with all its specificity, all 613 regulations, the immaturity of the recipient was assumed. Israel was God’s son in the flesh, devoid of the indwelling Spirit, called to covenant faithfulness in the light of the Exodus. God was very specific when speaking to his infant son, i.e. with respect to rest, do it on the seventh day, with respect to giving, and if you own a farm, give a tenth of the produce, etc. This was the third use of the law writ large and it created slaves (more on this in another post)!

Yet now, in the light of Christ’s death, resurrection and the outpoured Spirit, God’s people have been brought to maturity. The church has a new canon, the New Testament Scriptures, and these documents give no specific “do this and live” instructions. Maturity is called for. Hard and fast rules are avoided while encouragement in heart-godliness is freely offered.

So when giving is in view, there is not a single text calling for believers to tithe. No, instead New Covenant believers must make up their own minds what to give in the light of the Christ-event:

7 But since you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in the love we have kindled in you—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.

 8 I am not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. 9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich. (2 Cor. 8:7-9 NIV)

Now in relation to the Sabbath and rest it gets tricky. There is no specific encouragement given with respect to rest. If regular rest was an eternal moral principle then one would expect to find something like, “In the past, you were told to rest on the seventh day. Now you choose which day you rest upon.” Or even, “In the past you were told to rest one day per week, but now it’s up to you both when to rest and how much time you take to rest” No, on the contrary, the only command to keep Sabbath relates to Christ:

9 There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10 for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his. 11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience. (Heb. 4:9-11 NIV)

The Sabbath that New Covenant believers enjoy is one of resting from one’s own law-works in Christ. It is a Sabbath rest which stretches into eternity.

So what of rest and recuperation? Should the New Covenant Theologian draw that principle from the OT Sabbath command? Perhaps he/she could, but only at a very derivative level. Perhaps what would be more biblical would be to posit that believers have TOTAL freedom with respect to any rest principle. Romans 14:1-5 and Colossians 2:16 seem to bear this conclusion out. Such a view seems to cohere with the non-Sabbatarian view without leaving the Sabbatarians thinking that New Covenant Theologians want to have their cake and eat it!