Editor’s Note: Today’s AMI QT Devotional is written by Jabez Yeo. Jabez, a graduate of University of Pennsylvania, is currently working in NYC and serving at TRPC-E. He hopes to become a missionary.
Devotional Thoughts for Today
Ephesians 4:1-3
I (Paul) therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
The media often portrays conservative Christians as being not too intelligent. A while back, a prominent writer for TIME magazine quipped that Christian conservatives are “poor, uneducated and easy to command.” While I hope that’s not the case today, I know for a fact that it wasn’t so in the early church when some of the best and brightest minds led the new faith.
The 2nd century church spent much time combating Gnosticism, which proposed that Christ’s work on the cross was “purely spiritual…and that the human life and death of Jesus played no role in redemption.”[1] Irenaeus effectively refuted Gnosticism by using passages such as Romans 5. Olson writes, “Because Christ is the second Adam…; God reverses Adam’s life that resulted in corruption. For Irenaeus, Christ provided redemption by going through the entire scope of human life and…reversing the disobedience of Adam….” This was an essential point that Irenaeus emphasized, as it established redemption as a process of restoring creation rather than escaping creation, as in Gnostic heresy. Through Irenaeus, Christian theology became rooted in the truth that without Christ’s full divinity and humanity, salvation is impossible.
Because of his influence, Irenaeus was called upon to resolve all types of conflicts. One such non-essential conflict was the Quartodeciman controversy, which centered around whether Easter should be celebrated on Passover (the Quartodeciman position) or on Sunday[2]. After much debate, Victor, the bishop of Rome, was so fed up with the Quartodecimans that he excommunicated them from the church. Although Irenaeus believed that Easter should be celebrated on Sunday, he admonished Victor to preserve unity in the body of Christ. For Irenaeus, the fact that the Lord’s resurrection was being celebrated by both parties was sufficient.
As Christians, may we not only learn from Irenaeus’ writings but also from his eagerness to “maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Let’s pray for wisdom to engage in essential conflicts and to preserve unity otherwise.
Prayer: Lord, as I often engage in arguments and conflicts for the sake of doing so, give me the wisdom to fight over what is crucial and the discernment to look over non-essential issues. Help me to mediate the conflicts around me with Your peace and love. In Your Name I pray. Amen.
[1] Olson, Roger. The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition & Reform.
[2] https://www.gci.org/church/holidays/passover
Bible Reading for Today: Psalm 17
Lunch Break Study
Read 1 Cor. 1:10-12: I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another in what you say and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly united in mind and thought. 11 My brothers and sisters, some from Chloe’s household have informed me that there are quarrels among you. 12 What I mean is this: One of you says, “I follow Paul”; another, “I follow Apollos”; another, “I follow Cephas”; still another, “I follow Christ.” 13 Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul?
Questions to Consider
- What appears to be the problem described in the above passage? What would be its modern equivalent?
- What is so sad and tragic about this problem?
- What realization is necessary in order to keep the believers with a strong conviction from beating each other up?
Notes
- The Christians who favored or followed different Bible teachers became divisive probably because they insisted that their teacher was more biblical and spiritual than others. This would be equivalent to Calvinists and Arminians arguing over who is more faithful to the Scripture.
- The believers, while arguing over matters relating to the Bible and God, end up losing their Christian testimony before the world. It shows that the Christians are no different than the feuding politicians and contentious businessmen.
- They have to realize that Christ cannot be divided, that no human teacher can be placed above Him. Sometimes, the best policy is to agree to disagree, and leave it at that. As long as we agree on the essentials of our faith, we have reason to maintain the Christian unity in Christ.
Evening Reflection
As you wrap up this day, think about those situations that are slowly dividing your family and/or church: Are you part of the problem or solution? Please spend some time in prayer to ask God what to do. If you are the one causing the division, repent and ask for forgiveness; if not, then, ask God for boldness to address the divisive individual. Remember what Christ said: “I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity” (Jn. 17:22-3).
A renowned scholar Walter Brueggemann suggests that so much of our societal ills that continue to plague our culture are caused by embracing a mentality of scarcity. In other words, we always feel as though we never have enough. As a result, our lives are characterized by constant dissatisfaction and frustration, which inevitably leads to a perpetual need to buy the next best thing or to find a more fulfilling relationship in an effort to feel full and satisfied. However, the sad fact is that no matter how many promotions we receive or how much money we make, it still feels like it’s not enough. It is no surprise that so many people in our culture constantly struggle with a profound sense of emptiness.
For the last couple Christmas vacations, my younger brother and I have passed away our time by buying ourselves at least one new video game to play together. This past year, we bought our game with very little time left, so we used a walk-through manual to help us. The manual gave us all the tactics to solve different puzzles and to prepare against different enemies. After playing the game for a couple of days, I felt oddly dissatisfied with the experience. We were beating the game, but having all the answers completely detracted from the joy of actually playing and experiencing it.
Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is a collection of funny short stories I used read as a child. The main character, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, spends all of her time with the children of the neighborhood and cleverly instills various good habits in them. One such situation is called “The Radish Cure,” where one of the girls refuses to take baths. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle instructs the parents to let their daughter stop taking baths as she wishes. The daughter begins to get dirt and grime caked on her, and one night her parents secretly plant radish seeds on her. The next morning, the girl is horrified to find little sprouts on her body and immediately begs her parents to let her take a bath.
My dad has always stuck out to me as being exceptionally steadfast and solid in his faith, so I asked him how he came to know Christ in grad school. He said that he had grown up going to church only to please his mother, and he had no intention of keeping that up in America. Despite that resolution, he found himself going back to church each Sunday and even attending Bible studies. One day, realizing that he was spending a lot of time in these Christian activities, he decided that he should just continue to follow Jesus Christ. I was dumbfounded. That was it? Given my experience of his faithfulness and love for God, I was surprised that there was no dramatic moment or revelation that set it all in motion.
So little is written about Apollos, but it seems that he had great impact on the early church. His arrival was clearly very notable; and after he was joined up with Priscilla and Aquila, he went on to play a similar role as Paul, strengthening believers and defending the faith publicly. He clearly was so compelling and effective that people were tempted to break off into an Apollos camp in the Corinthian church.
Fear is an exceptionally powerful motivator in our lives. There might be smaller worries that create momentary fear, such as accidentally dropping a smartphone down a chute, which makes me cringe every time I enter an elevator. Or there are some fears that are so powerful that they cause us to entirely change our lifestyle – for example, one of my friends from college gave up eating certain foods altogether because of one particularly bad experience with food poisoning.
Editor’s Note: The AMI QT devotionals for April 17-23 are provided by Christine Li. Christine graduated from University of Pennsylvania and currently lives and works in New York City. She attends Remnant Church in Manhattan.
I love the movie Finding Nemo. Like every good children’s movie, it not only has beautiful visuals, memorable songs, and witty lines – the story has multiple layers that both children and adults can enjoy. You can take the story at face value about a sea adventure, or you could also find some life analogies, like the joy that comes from friendships pursuing a common goal. Marlin befriends so many creatures along the way. Some of these friendships last for a short moment; others, like his with Dory, are long-term commitments through thick and thin.
In 2014, Whatsapp, one of the most widely used global messaging apps, sold for $19 billion dollars to Facebook. What many people found more noteworthy than the price was the irony, since both of the founders had been rejected after interviewing at tech companies, including Facebook, years prior. One said optimistically at the time, “Looking forward to life’s next adventure.” Both men had decided to step off the path of finding an existing tech job and find something new to do. Eventually, they teamed up to build a platform that became much, much larger than they would have foreseen.
Part of the fun of being a parent of small kids is that children can be so logical and illogical at the same time. For example, we watch this cartoon called Paw Patrol (if you have small kids, you probably know it well), and it is undoubtedly one of the stupidest shows on TV. The premise of the show is that a ten-year-old boy named Ryder has adopted six dogs that he has trained as special rescue pups. Each dog has his/her own special skill set—so there is a police dog, a fire fighting dog, a water rescue dog, etc. And each dog also has a doghouse that transforms into a rescue vehicle corresponding to their jobs—so a police truck, a fire truck, a hovercraft, etc.; the dogs, of course, drive. Paw Patrol takes place in a city called Adventure Bay, where there are apparently no competent adults, because Ryder and the Paw Patrol are constantly called on by everyone from the mayor to the local grocery store owner to save them from various mishaps. And although several different types of animals, ranging from cats to eagles to whales, find their way on the show, for whatever reason, none of them have the ability to talk—except the six members of the Paw Patrol.