The Extraordinary Significance of the Royal Priesthood of Believers

November 14, 2023November 23, 2023 Ryan A. French

The apostle Peter makes a somewhat shocking declaration about the Christian life in the second chapter of his first epistle. Well, actually, he makes several fascinating declarations, but for now, we’ll mainly focus on one. With all its implications, contemporary Christians largely ignore this doctrine. The current religious atmosphere of flagrant biblical illiteracy probably explains why most Christians have barely noticed Peter’s inspired proclamations. Yet, the practical applications of this doctrine touch every area of daily Christian life. That little tirade aside, if you’re reading this, you aren’t the average person. Just knowing that you clicked on an article titled The Extraordinary Significance of the Royal Priesthood of Believers, which is like an anti-click-bait title, tells me that. So, thank you for reading and for caring about the things of God.

A Few Pertinent Introductions

Before plunging in, remember that the book of 1 Peter is a treatise on holiness. The apostle called Christians to “sanctify Christ as Lord” in their hearts so that believers might live and act as Jesus desires during their short time here on earth (1 Peter 3:14-18). Peter lived alongside Jesus for nearly three years, and during that time, he witnessed the perfect standard of holiness that we should aspire to achieve. But understanding the apostle’s inspired epistles takes a little studying, primarily because of his mixing and matching of metaphorical certitudes. Let’s take a closer look at that for a moment.

The Mixing of Metaphorical Certitudes

If I were to say, “You’re fast like a ninja.” That would be a simile. I don’t know any ninjas, and you’re probably not a ninja. I’m just comparing your hypothetical nimble footedness to that of an actual ninja. Technically, an accurate metaphor declares one thing to be another. It might not be literally accurate, but it is accurately literal. For example, you might describe someone as being “tender-hearted.” Their heart, hopefully, isn’t tender, but in a sense, their metaphorical heart is undoubtedly tender. You might think I’m just playing a bunch of word games, but understanding how the inspired authors used metaphors is vital for a serious student of Scripture. The Old and New Testaments are brimming with the mixing of metaphorical certitudes.

So, when the apostle declared Jesus to be the head of the royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:5), He did not mean that Jesus was like a High Priest but instead that He was the High Priest. Although Jesus was not a Levite nor an officer in the sacrificial altars at Jerusalem, He is literally our final High Priest. From Christ’s resurrection until now, there has never been another legitimate High Priest besides Jesus. Of course, many powerful revelations are attached to Jesus because He was simultaneously the sacrifice and the High Priest (1 Peter 1:18-20). How could that be? Well, He sacrificed Himself as the only unblemished human sacrifice that ever was or could be. He was the sacrificer (High Priest) and the sacrificee (unspotted lamb). The Creator became created so He could save us.

A Lot of Mixing & Matching

We’re almost ready to reveal Peter’s shocking revelation about the Christian life with all its various nuances and truths. But first, I’d like to acknowledge the significant metaphorical mixing and matching that Peter weaves throughout 1 Peter 2:4-9. He refers to Jesus as the “head cornerstone,” to us as “living stones,” and together we comprise the spiritual house of God or temple (1 Peter 2:8). If you’re counting those mixed metaphors, Jesus is High Priest, sacrifice, and the head cornerstone of the Church. You, I, and every other true Christian who was and is and is to come are living stones built upon and around Christ. That’s five mixed metaphors right there.

The revelation that Christians are living, breathing temples of the Holy Ghost is not unfamiliar in Apostolic circles. Remember, Peter emphasized holiness. Therefore, the implications of conducting ourselves as sacred temples, living vessels, or walking containers of the Shekinah glory of God are staggering. Historically, Pentecostals have instinctively understood that if we are God’s temples, we must carefully guard against defiling our bodies inwardly and outwardly. How hurtful it must be to God when we use our bodies, sanctified for His holy presence, in sinful ways. When sin overtakes a Spirit-filled believer, it is no less devastating to God than when the Babylonians desecrated the temple in Jerusalem centuries ago. However, Peter further stirred the pot by saying believers are “a holy priesthood” (1 Peter 2:5). Later, in 1 Peter 2:9, he called believers “a royal priesthood.” Therefore, Christians are metaphorically and absolutely a holy royal priesthood of believers.

A Royal Priesthood of Believers

By the way, that was the big shocking revelation! In a metaphorically literal sense, you and I are (assuming we’re saved) priests. If that doesn’t shock you, it’s probably because you don’t understand all the responsibilities of membership in a royal priesthood of believers. Peter was conveying the great privilege of our priestly duties while also suggesting the seriousness it entails. Jesus is the head cornerstone and the High Priest; we are temples and priests. Therefore, Jesus is below us as our foundation, and He is above us as our High Priest. He supports us from below, inspires us from above, and empowers us from within.

Similarities Between Old and New Testament Priests

It should go without saying that Peter was a Jew. Jesus, too, was a Jew. Their lives were immersed in the daily importance of the priesthood. One of the tremendous mental dilemmas facing modern Christianity is our slow divorce from our faith’s Jewish roots. Rather than conforming our understanding to the Jewish context of Scripture, we try to squeeze those Jewish contexts into our cultural comfort zones. Sometimes, this tendency causes only minor problems. But it often results in full-fledged gaping black holes of false doctrine. Or it leaves entire Scripture passages to be swept aside as irrelevant. Of course, there is an opposite error where people become obsessed with reverting to pre-Christ rituals and diluting the power of the cross. For example, and these topics can be explored deeply at another time, people who insist on keeping Old Testament dietary restrictions or demanding the Lord’s Day should be observed on Saturday rather than Sunday fall into that category. I’ve seen firsthand the devastating spiritual spirals resulting from those errors. However, I still maintain that our current Christian climate is in far more danger of completely divorcing itself from vitally important Jewish roots. Most people have almost no concept of what Peter meant when he called New Testament believers a “holy priesthood” (1 Peter 2:5) and a “royal priesthood” (1 Peter 2:9). We’re going to unpack exactly what that means moving forward. To do so, we will examine several astonishing characteristics shared between the Old Testament and New Testament priesthood. You’ll see that it’s virtually impossible to understand our duties as New Testament priests without an understanding of the Old Testament priesthood. Even though many of these truths might seem strange to our contemporary sensibilities, every early Jewish and Gentile saint understood these inferences instantaneously.

Must Be Born into Priestly Privilege

In the Old Testament, the priesthood had no licensing process. It wasn’t an open position that could be filled by anyone interested. God instituted the priesthood, giving Moses strict instructions that only Aaron and his ancestry could obtain the priestly office (Numbers 3:10). Because Aaron was a Levite, only the Levite lineage could participate in the privileged roles of the priesthood. God was serious about this rule. He said, “Anyone daring to assume priestly duties or privileges who is not of the house of Aaron and called of God who even comes near the holy things must be put to death” (Numbers 3:10). Old Testament priests were born into service. They were birthed into ministry and privilege. Like it or not. Fair or not. That was God’s command.

Likewise, Christians must be born into priestly privileges. There’s no shortcut around that requirement. Members of the royal priesthood of believers, which comprises the Church of God, are born into service. Otherwise, God considers you a stranger, an outsider, unworthy of handling holy things. Fortunately, your physical DNA has nothing to do with the birthing process. There isn’t a single human besides Jesus whose bloodline is pure enough to enter the New Testament priesthood. The new era of priests operates on a spiritual level unavailable to the ancient ones. The royal priesthood of believers requires a bloodline untainted by the fallen blood of Adam. Therefore, it would be humanly impossible for anyone to be accepted into the new order of priestly privilege. Unless, somehow, they could be born again.

That’s precisely what Jesus explained to Nicodemus in John 3:1-31. Interestingly, Nicodemus didn’t specifically ask Jesus about salvation. Instead, he expressed a willingness to believe that Jesus was sent from God (John 3:2). Jesus responded to that openness with a more profound revelation for Nicodemus to consider. Jesus affirmed that He was the “son of man” or the Messiah (John 3:13), and as the Messiah, He alone held the key to inheriting eternal life. The first fifteen verses of John 3 can be viewed as a series of questions and answers. Let me paraphrase the first question: “Are you here to bring in the kingdom?” Jesus’ first answer is, “You will never see the kingdom without being born again.”

Nicodemus serves as a warning to us that religious training without spiritual insight is useless. Jesus wasted no time getting to the heart of the problem. He told the teacher he must be born again or from above (anothen), a word which appears again in John 3:7 and John 3:31.[i] Today, even thoroughly secular people are familiar with the phrase “born again.” Pop icons like Rihanna sing the term born again as a stand-in for the idea of starting over. Sadly, when secular culture adopts, or some might say, hijacks, sacred religious terms, they effectively cheapen their intended meanings. The actual words describe a garment torn from top to bottom. Discussing the kingdom is useless unless God changes our hearts from the inside out. All devout Jews connected the Messiah with the kingdom; Jesus drove to the heart of the matter immediately. But for Nicodemus, born again was an unfamiliar, paradigm-shifting term. To belong to the heavenly kingdom, one must be born into it just as one is born into this earthly kingdom.[ii]

How to Be Born Again

While the people, timing, surroundings, and circumstances of a baby’s birth might be unique, indubitably, the birth process is the same for everyone. Correspondingly (and Jesus drove this point home several times), there’s only one spiritual birth process. Anyone can claim to be born again, but that doesn’t mean they’ve genuinely undergone a supernatural rebirth. In Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus described a category of believers who will not be saved even though they do incredible things in His name. They claim the family name but have not been born into it. And in a gut-wrenching crescendo, Jesus declared: I will profess unto them, I never knew you, depart from me, ye that work iniquity (Matthew 7:23).

So, the overwhelming, all-consuming, life-altering, eternity-defining question every human should obsess over is, “How can I be born again.” Finding the answer to that question is the most impactful thing you and I, or anyone else, will ever do. That’s why my brain can’t compute why so many people invest such small amounts of thought, time, and energy into this question. I mean, you need to be sure. Really, sure. But oddly, some folks spend more time studying Pinterest boards than the Bible. Ok. Alright. I digress.

Jesus was prophetically cryptic and intentionally vague with Nicodemus about the “how” aspect of being born again. He said, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5). In this statement, Jesus echoed the ancient prophecies of Isaiah and Ezekiel (Isaiah 44:3-4, Ezekiel 36:25-27), reinforced the recent prophecy of John the Baptist (Matthew 3:11), and pointed forward to Peter’s seminal sermon on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2:38). Keep in mind that Nicodemus was a religious leader, well versed in Scripture, and supposedly filled with spiritual insights. The text reads as if Jesus was mildly annoyed at Nicodemus’ lack of spiritual awareness. Because of that, Jesus spoke enigmatically to the doubting Pharisee. However, that doesn’t mean He wasn’t unmistakably clear to us, who benefit from hindsight.

In John 3:8, Jesus said, “The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear the sound of it, but you don’t know where the wind comes from or where it is going. It’s the same with every person who is born from the Spirit.” The Greek word pneuma means “wind” and “spirit” interchangeably. I’ve read countless weak interpretations of what Jesus meant by that. Unsatisfying explanations that ignore the context of the New Birth. Clearly, Jesus was speaking precisely of the outpouring of the Spirit, which would occur on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2. Not only is this evidenced by the “sound of a mighty rushing wind” (Acts 2:2) but also by the fact that they were all “filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2:4).

I’ve written several times about how to be saved (here, here, and here). However, I’ve not addressed it meaningfully from the context of the New Birth. There’s a fair bit of bickering over how many “steps” are contained in the New Birth process or the plan of salvation. I usually describe the New Birth as a three-step process for illustration purposes mainly because that is in keeping with the Apostle Peter’s sermon in Acts 2:38: Repentance, water baptism in Jesus’ name, and the infilling of the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues. Furthermore, it coincides spiritually with the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Repentance is the death, baptism is the burial, and the infilling of the Spirit is the resurrection.

While all that is true, sometimes people are troubled that Jesus only mentioned two steps in John 3: Water and Spirit baptism. Let me tackle that briefly. First, the discourse with Nicodemus was intended to be understood after a period of time. The promise was still coming, and Jesus often used types and shadows in His teachings. Secondly, considering the New Birth in terms of steps is optional as long as the requirements are completed. For example, when Jesus spoke of water and Spirit baptism, He lumped repentance and water baptism into one category (water baptism). Technically speaking, you can’t have one of those things without the other. Just as the process of a physical birth might be categorized academically in a few different ways (labor, delivery, recovery, etc.), as long as the requirements are fulfilled and a baby is born, all is well.

Must Be Ordained into the Priesthood

Another fascinating shared characteristic between the Old Testament and our new priesthood is the role of ordination. God set apart the ancient priests and consecrated them for sacred service (Exodus 19:6, Exodus 28:1). In John 15:16, Jesus said, “I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go forth and bring forth fruit.” I suspect most folks are a little hazy when defining what it means to be ordained. We know that preachers can be “ordained.” But even at that, most aren’t sure exactly what that means. Most modern Bibles translate the word ordained as “appointed.” Which is almost just as confusing. What does it mean that God ordains us?

To gain understanding, we have to dig into the origins and framework of the word ordained. The word translated “ordained” in John 15:16 is the Greek word tithēmi. Depending on the context, it has a wide range of possible meanings and applications. In its broadest application, tithēmi means literally and figuratively to place in a passive or horizontal posture, and thus different from others.[iii] That’s how we get various uses of tithēmi: Set apart, consecrated, appointed, established, fixed, ordained, or placed. Therefore, these gradients of the word ordained begin connecting the Old Testament idea of priestly appointment with our new believer-priesthood paradigm. Ordination is God setting us apart to be a holy people and sanctifying us so that we can be used in His service. God is making us holy and calling us to walk in that holiness. That was the hallmark of the Old Testament priesthood. It is ours today as well (Exodus 19:6, Exodus 28:38, Exodus 30:28-30, Leviticus 11:45, Leviticus 20:7, Leviticus 20:26, Romans 12:1, Romans 15:16, 1 Corinthians 9:13, Ephesians 5:27, 1 Peter 1:15-16, 1 Peter 2:5-9, 2 Peter 3:11). There’s a significant symbolism in the idea that by being laid prostrate before God we gain God’s approval. But it’s deeper than the physical act of lying prostrate before God. Although that is good and right, our complete inward submission to God’s will and authority over us pleases the Lord.

There is one more layer to the idea of being ordained by God. An ordained individual is someone sent forth as an authorized representative accountable to the sender. Therefore, New Testament believers are appointed and sent forth by Christ on a specified mission and with His authority.[iv] Similarly, the ancient priesthood was an authorized representative of God and was held strictly accountable to God. It should be intensely humbling to realize we represent the work of God to the surrounding world. Apostolic believers are authorized representatives of Jesus in this present world. With that extraordinary privilege comes the breathtaking reality that we are accountable to God and are specifically ordained to bring forth lasting fruit (John 15:16).

Must Be Anointed for the Priesthood

Old Testament priests were externally anointed for service with blood and oil (Leviticus 8:12-30). New Testament priest-believers are internally anointed with the blood of Jesus and the oil of the Holy Ghost (1 John 2:27). While the anointing was upon ancient priests, it dwells within the new priesthood. While ordination provides authorization, anointing provides empowerment that accompanies that God-given authority. To use an imperfect analogy, ordination is the badge, and anointing is the gun. To give authority without the power to use it would be silly and cruel. That’s why God has enabled and equipped His priests with Apostolic authority to operate in the realm of the Spirit. The oil of anointing covers our frailties, strengthens our weaknesses, enhances our abilities, and breaks yokes (Luke 4:18). Operating without anointing is like going to war without weapons, flying without wings, or singing without sound. It’s dangerous and ridiculous.

Must Be Cleansed for the Priesthood

There’s a reason the priestly anointing ceremony required oil and blood. As mentioned, the oil represented God’s empowering presence, but the blood represented the ceremonial cleansing of the priest’s sins. A bullock was sacrificed, its blood placed upon the altar’s horns and poured into the bottom of the altar for reconciliation between the priests and God (Leviticus 8:14-15). This should serve as a reminder that the closer a person gets to the presence of God, the more they are required to be cleansed of offending impurities. God did the cleansing. However, the priest was then required to walk worthy of that cleansing.

Contrary to most pop theology today, the New Testament requires the same cleansing and commitment from believer-priests. The blood of Jesus doesn’t give anyone a license to sin. You might say, “Well, grace covers my sin.” But consider what the Scripture says, “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men” (Titus 2:11). So, in that sense, we are saved by grace because it was the grace of God that made salvation possible in the first place. But the passage doesn’t end there. It describes the role of grace in a believer’s life: Grace teaches us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world (Titus 2:12). Now it becomes apparent that the role of grace is that of a teacher or an instructor. It leads and guides us into righteousness and proper conduct before our savior. Titus 2:13 continues, “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our savior Jesus Christ.” We should maintain a posture of anticipation as we wait for Jesus to return for His Church. Finally, Titus 2:14 brings all these thoughts together: Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. Do you see? God does the initial cleansing, the preliminary purification, pulling us out of this world and making us a peculiar priesthood, and we then must walk in that glorious privilege.

Must be Appropriately Clothed for the Priesthood

God’s ancient priests were given a very distinctive dress code (Exodus 28:1-43). They were carefully clothed for service. God commanded Moses to make “holy garments” for the priests (Exodus 28:2). Their unique clothing set them apart, made them easily distinguishable from non-priests, and had practical applications. It also kept them appropriately modest, contained typological spiritual meanings, and served as a physical reminder to the priesthood of the sacredness of their duties. God called those garments “glorious” and “beautiful” (Exodus 28:2). Unquestionably, the symbolic aspects of the priestly garments are no longer necessary now that Christ has fulfilled prophesy. However, a timeless moral part of their attire remains in effect today: Modesty.

Modesty matters to God, and therefore, it should matter to us. We see God’s emphasis on modesty due to sin way back in Edan (Genesis 3:21). Modesty permeates the Old Testament, deeply embedded itself into Israelite culture, and was inculcated into the priesthood. Contrary to popular opinion, the moral principles of modesty didn’t die out in the New Testament. Peter understood that perfectly when he, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, referred to believers as a “priesthood” (1 Peter 2:5-9). The nuances and implications of priestly modesty weren’t lost on the apostle. Consider this command to the priesthood in Exodus 28:42: And thou shalt make them linen breeches to cover their nakedness; from the loins even unto the thighs they shall reach. For the priest, however, it was essential that his “nakedness” not be exposed, particularly when ministering before the people. Carelessness about how priests presented themselves to God would be tantamount to blasphemy.[v] For this reason, God insisted that priestly garments include “breeches” made of linen and covering the thighs for reasons of modesty.[vi]

God Defines Nakedness

To understand this better, let’s consider the biblical meaning of the word “nakedness.” In modern contexts, naked means to be completely undressed, totally exposed, and without any covering. Unlike contemporary English usage, nakedness in the Bible can refer to a range of undress from total nudity to being inadequately clothed (Job 22:6, Ezekiel 18:7, Matthew 25:36, 2 Corinthians 11:27). Even the more literal uses of the Hebrew and Greek terms for nakedness are loaded with figurative and symbolic meanings and allusions.[vii] The biblical images evoked by the word naked are many and varied. They include, among other things, original innocence, defenselessness and vulnerability, exposure and helplessness, humiliation and shame, guilt and judgment, and sexual impropriety and exploitation. Each of these nuances needs to be carefully identified in each scriptural context, although there may be some degrees of overlap.[viii]

So, for thousands of years, the Jews and most civilized Christian cultures, until recent decades, defined nudity as anything above the knee. Why? Mainly because that’s precisely how God explained it in Exodus 28:42. This modesty commandment was so vital that God threatened death as punishment if it were to be ignored (Exodus 28:43). Three more words from Exodus 28:42 need expounding on to understand God’s definition of modesty. First is the word “breeches,” from which the English word “britches” is derived. They were garments extending from the waist to or just below the knee or ankle, covering each leg separately. In many ways, they resembled modern trousers or pants.[ix] The word breeches itself contains a root word that means to “hide” or “cover-up.” [x] Second is the word “loins,” which would have already been covered by the priestly robe and tunic. It’s the Hebrew word moṯnayim, meaning waist or lower back.[xi] It refers to the area where you would comfortably wear a belt. And finally, the word “thighs” is crucial in this context. This is the specific area God commands to be covered or hidden from public view. It’s the Hebrew word yarekh, which refers to the portion of the leg from the knee to the hip.[xii]

The text makes the Hebraic assumption that the reader already realizes the necessity of keeping the hips covered for the sake of modesty. Therefore, the relevant lesson for the priesthood and us is that God considers showing anything above the knee to be nakedness and unholy. Furthermore, it should be noted that this standard of modesty was already understood and practiced in Israelite culture. God was dealing with exigent circumstances where nakedness might unintentionally or accidentally be displayed while performing a task, which adds even more gravitas to this standard of modesty because if God cares that much about accidental immodesty, imagine how He must feel about intentional immodesty. Of course, Exodus 28:42 isn’t the only place God defines the exposed thigh as shameful nakedness. God compared Babylon’s downfall to a woman’s shame in having her nakedness exposed when she bares her leg and uncovers her thigh (Isaiah 47:1–3).[xiii] The bottom line is that God gets to define what nakedness (or nudity) is and what it is not. Culture, especially sinful culture, has no authority to determine what is or isn’t modest for called-out believers.

The Morality and Righteousness of Modesty

Tucked away among the Songs of Ascent is Psalm 132:9: Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness; and let thy saints shout for joy. The priests who served in the presence of the Lord were His instruments for dispensing righteousness. Righteousness here signifies more than a relationship with God or some abstract figurative illusion of inward purity. It’s synonymous with salvation (2 Chronicles 6:41). The blessedness of God’s presence was represented by the priests “clothed” in their priestly garments, which resulted in great joy for the saints.[xiv] The outward garments of the priests were a visual representation of God’s moral character, royalty, and righteousness.[xv] To summarize, Old Testament priests were clothed for service in modesty and righteousness, with dignity and distinction, purpose and precision, and they were never to approach their sacred lifestyles casually. We, too, have a responsibility to represent righteousness in our clothing. Modesty is a moral imperative for the believer-priests.

Carnal Garments

Let’s approach this subject from another angle. Look at Jude 1:23: And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh. First, notice that we are to “hate even the garment spotted (or stained) by the flesh.” That’s interesting, and we certainly need to know what that means. Jude 1 deals with false teachers and doctrines that “crept in unawares” (Jude 1:4). These ungodly men turned the grace of God into “lasciviousness” (Jude 1:4). Somehow, they made the grace of God sensual or lustful.[xvi] Jude 1:7 mentions the hedonistic sexual sins of Sodom and Gomorrah. In the next verse, Jude called these false teachers filthy dreamers who defile their bodies with debauchery and wicked imaginations (Jude 1:8). Two more times, Jude mentioned their ungodly lusts and sensuality (Jude 1:18-19). He gave various ways to deal with these backslidden evil teachers (Jude 1:20-23). While closing, he gave the admonition to “hate even the garment (of these teachers) spotted by the flesh (or carnality).” Loath as I am to quote John Calvin, he defines “garment spotted by the flesh” (Jude 1:23) as “anything that in any way savors of sin or temptation.” [xvii] The flesh-stained garments in Jude 1:23 are both literal and figurative. Carnal, immodest, flesh-displaying garments are defiling, and Christians should hate those garments.

Fascinatingly, much of the language in Jude 1:23 is direct quotations from Zechariah 3:2-4.[xviii] In that instance, a High Priest was snatched from the fire, and an angel of the Lord exchanged his filthy clothes for a change of clean clothes.[xix] Once again, the imagery evoked in both passages is figurative and literal. When people are saved, they will change how they dress, not because of legalism but because motives, agendas, and behaviors change when the heart and mind are purified. When God changes us, it is a comprehensive inward and outward transformation. It’s worth noting, although I’ve yet to find a commentary that makes the correlation, the imagery of outer clothing being changed by God in Jude 1:23 and Zechariah 3:2-4 also connects hermeneutically back to Genesis 3:21, where God clothed Adam and Eve.

Defiled Garments

In the middle of admonishing the church in Sardis, Jesus mentioned a remnant of believers that had not “defiled their garments” (Revelation 3:4). He said, “And they shall walk with me in white for they are worthy” (Revelation 3:4). The city of Sardis was famous for its textile industry yet most of the church had defiled garments.[xx] This is significant in John’s vision. In the Roman world, persons were identified by their clothing. Only the emperor and the patrician class could wear togas with purple. The equestrian class could wear red, and so on. A person’s clothing manifested the person’s nature to the world, and in many ways, it still does. John seems to play upon this feature of his world. A Christian’s “garment” was the outward witness of their faithful discipleship.[xxi] In the pagan religions, it was forbidden to approach the gods in garments that were soiled or stained. Soiling seems to be a symbol for mingling with pagan life.[xxii] The few people in Sardis who had not soiled their clothes were those who had resisted the temptation to accommodate their lives to the heathen customs of their neighbors, which most certainly included the way they dressed.[xxiii] Of course, inwardly, that remnant of believers in Sardis remained undefiled, but the obvious reference to clothing isn’t purely symbolic. Godly people wear clothing that differentiates them from surrounding worldly, carnal, defiled, pagan cultures.

Keep Your Clothes On

It’s overly simplistic, but I like how the Easy-to-Read-Version (ERV) renders Revelation 16:15:

Listen! Like a thief, I will come at a time you don’t expect. Great blessings belong to those who stay awake and keep their clothes with them. They will not have to go without clothes and be ashamed for people to see them.

The King James says, “Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame” (Revelation 16:15). Obviously, the primary notion here is that we are to always be ready for the Lord’s return. However, the subtext is that godly people must make modesty a priority.

Fundamentally, there are at least four essential elements of proper clothing for today’s priesthood of believers. One is modesty, as discussed above (1 Timothy 2:9). However, the remaining three are previously unmentioned concepts that deserve far more attention. Still, for now, they will receive only brief honorable mentions. The second essential element of godly clothing is the clear distinction of genders (Deuteronomy 22:5, Genesis 1:27). Men should dress like men and women like women. Thirdly, believers should avoid displays of vanity or pride in their adornment (1 Peter 3:3-5, 2 Kings 9:30). And fourthly, holiness demands a humility that rejects the wearing of gold and silver ornamentation, jewelry, piercings, and tattoos (1 Peter 33-5, Proverbs 7:10, Proverbs 33, 1 Timothy 2:9, Leviticus 19:28). These moral principles carry over from the Old Testament, find affirmation in the New Testament, and solidify the standard of holy attire for the new priesthood.

Priesthood is Held to Strict Standards of Obedience

Ancient priests were held to rigorous standards of obedience to God and the man of God (Moses, Joshua, etc.). They lived under the threat of death if they disobeyed the law intentionally or unintentionally (Leviticus 10:7). Of course, this was also true for people outside the priesthood. As the prophet Samuel rhetorically asked King Saul, “What is more pleasing to the Lord: Your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to His voice” (1 Samuel 15:22)? Without waiting for an answer, Samuel said, “Obedience is better than sacrifice, and submission is better than offering the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15:22). New Testament priests are called to that same strict standard of obedience. Jesus affirmed this by saying, “If you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine” (John 8:31). All the spiritual sacrifices in the world will never be an acceptable substitute for simple obedience to God’s Word.

Messengers Calling the Lost to Repentance

Yet another shared characteristic of Old Testament and New Testament believer-priests is their mandate to be righteous messengers calling the lost to repentance. Malachi 2:5-7, New Living Translation, describes the ancient priesthood’s mandate:

The purpose of my covenant with the Levites was to bring life and peace, and that is what I gave them. This required reverence from them, and they greatly revered me and stood in awe of my name. They passed on to the people the truth of the instructions they received from me. They did not lie or cheat; they walked with me, living good and righteous lives, and they turned many from lives of sin. The words of a priest’s lips should preserve the knowledge of God, and people should go to him for instruction, for the priest is the messenger of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.

When you read that alongside the Great Commission, the similarities become striking: Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you… (Matthew 28:19-20). I think many Christians have a default tendency to assume the Great Commission is mainly for pastors, missionaries, or evangelists. While it is undoubtedly for them, it is for all believers. Every member of the new priesthood of believers is mandated to be a messenger of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We’re called to minister to faltering believers while keeping ourselves free from sin (Galatians 6:1). Teaching, sharing, and studying the Word of God with believers and unbelievers should be an intricate part of our identity and daily lives. Helping new disciples learn, understand, and obey the commands of Jesus is our great privilege and responsibility. Absconding from this obligation is a betrayal of God’s sacred trust.

Access to God Through the Offering of Sacrifices

The ancient Israelite priests are best remembered for their sacrificial duties. Every day, they sacrificed animals that could not take away sins (Hebrews 11:1). It was a repetitive, exhausting, bloody job. Thankfully, Jesus was the final sacrificial offering for sin (Hebrews 10:10). Therefore, we no longer must bring animal sacrifices to God. However, that doesn’t mean God doesn’t require spiritual sacrifices from His new royal priesthood of believers. This brings us back full circle to our original text, where Peter referred to us as a “holy priesthood” that should “offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:5).

Spiritual sacrifices are acts of worship necessary for those who live in the Spirit—these spiritual sacrifices, as opposed to ritualistic sacrifices of old, transpose worship to a higher key. Whereas the Jewish sacrificial system required the worshiper to offer an animal or produce at the temple, life in the Spirit requires the worshiper to offer themselves. For those who bring something to an altar, the act of worship ends when the offering is consumed; for those who present themselves, the sacrificial act is just the beginning. The Christian is a “living sacrifice,” meaning worship is transferred out of the temple and into the streets. In short, the degree of personal responsibility is heightened for the one who walks in the Spirit instead of according to the law.[xxiv] Therefore, contrary to hyper-grace teachings, New Testament believers, in a certain sense, have more significant holiness requirements than the ancient priesthood.

The Body as a Spiritual Sacrifice

Romans 12:1 makes this distinctive command, “present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” The words “present” and “sacrifice” the Apostle Paul used here are purposefully reminiscent of Old Testament language. Before a priest in Israel could minister on behalf of others, he was obliged to present himself in a consecrated condition, and the sacrifices he offered were to be without blemish (Malachi 1:8-13).[xxv] The sacrificial language of Romans 12:1 also reinforces an earlier contrast made in Romans 6:13 between those who serve God and those who serve sin. The appeal to “offer your bodies” reminds the reader of the earlier injunction in Romans 6:13: “Do not offer the parts of your body to sin… but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life.” The heightened responsibility of the Christian not only involves a life of worship that extends beyond particular times and places of sacrifice but also entails a personal commitment to determine how such a life is to be lived. In contrast to Judaism, where the law prescribes righteous conduct, Christianity requires a greater degree of personal discernment.[xxvi]

God doesn’t compel and coerce a believer into presenting his body. He doesn’t corral him and bridle him like a horse and force him to obey. He implores him. He wants an unbridled sacrifice.[xxvii] Presenting our bodies as a living sacrifice represents a complete lifestyle change, involving both a negative and a positive aspect. Paul commanded, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world” (Romans 12:2). Living according to the lifestyle of “the present evil Age” (Galatians 1:4, Ephesians 1:21) must now be put aside. Then Paul commanded, “But be transformed (literally, keep on being transformed) by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). The Greek verb translated “transformed” (μεταμορφοῦσθε) is seen in the English word “metamorphosis,” a total change from inside out (2 Corinthians 3:18). The key to this change is the “mind” (νοός), the control center of one’s attitudes, thoughts, feelings, and actions (Ephesians 4:22-23). As one’s mind keeps being made new by the spiritual input of God’s Word, prayer, preaching, and Christian fellowship, one’s lifestyle keeps transforming.[xxviii]

Alexander Maclaren astutely observed that Romans 12:1-2 provides “an all-inclusive directory for the outward life.” [xxix] The ancient sacrifices gave a sweet-smelling odor, which, by a strong metaphor, was declared fragrant in God’s nostrils. In like manner, the Christian sacrifice is “acceptable unto God” (Romans 12:1). The keyword for the life of a Christian is sacrifice. That includes two things—self-surrender and surrender to God. Just like a priest needed to be consecrated before he could offer sacrifices, we, too, must be inwardly consecrated before offering outward sacrifices to God. The Apostle Paul didn’t make the mistake of substituting external for internal surrender, but he presupposes that the latter has preceded. He described the sequence more understandably in Romans 6:13: Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. So, first of all, we must be priests by our inward consecration, and then, since a priest must have something to offer, we must bring the outward life and lay it upon His altar.[xxx]

Christian obedience means imitating God in holiness (1 Peter 1:15).[xxxi] Our holiness is made possible through Christ, who made us holy through His blood (Hebrews 13:12). The Holy Spirit sanctified us by separating us from evil and dedicating us to God when He gave us new life and placed us into the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 6:11). But that is only one aspect of our sanctification. Paul prayed that God would sanctify us “through and through” or “completely” (1 Thessalonians 5:23). There’s also a continuing aspect of sanctification in which we must cooperate. We must, as we’ve been discussing, present ourselves to God (Romans 12:1-2), and by the Spirit, pursue that holiness (dedication, consecration in right relationships to God and man) because, without holiness, no one will see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14). This is a holiness like the Lord’s, which the Holy Spirit helps us to achieve (1 Peter 1:15, 16).[xxxii] By the Spirit, we must keep putting to death the old life’s impulses and winning victories as we live for Jesus (Romans 8:1-14, Galatians 2:20, Philippians 2:12-13).

Recently, I read a quote from my friend, Reverend Coley Reese, “Learn to be a living sacrifice rather than an occasional offering.” [xxxiii] Doing that takes more than good intentions. It requires a complete lifestyle makeover. It’s often been quipped, “The problem with living sacrifices is that they keep crawling off the altar.” [xxxiv] That’s why holiness is a daily endeavor, a constant struggle, and incredibly vital. In his influential work What the Bible Says about the Holy Spirit, Stanley M. Horton makes this remarkable statement:

The whole work of sanctification is the work of the Spirit, which receives by far the greatest attention in the New Testament. It takes precedence over witnessing, evangelism, giving, and every other form of Christian service. God wants us to be something, not just to do something. For only as we become like Jesus can what we do be effective and bring glory to Him.[xxxv]

As I’ve read and pondered dozens of books and commentaries on the command to “present our bodies as living sacrifices, holy, acceptable unto God,” I’ve been struck by a collective inclination to gloss over the obvious meanings in the text (Romans 12:1). For example, it goes without saying that presenting one’s body to God includes the whole person, inward and outward. The body consists of the thoughts, intellect, soul, desires, etc. However, while presenting the body includes those somewhat intangible things, it does not exclude the outer elements of the body itself. The commentary by John Phillips, which I often find helpful, is typical of the omission I’m referring to. He mentions how when believers present their bodies as living sacrifices, they are changed morally, mentally, and motivationally.[xxxvi] Yet not once does Phillips mention a practical way the outward man is presented as holy to God. Sadly, Phillips is not unique in his handling of external sanctification.

Considering everything we’ve already examined concerning the priesthood of believers, hopefully, it’s becoming more evident that internal sanctification will produce outward fruits. We aren’t to be conformed to this world like playdough in the hands of a demonic creature (Romans 12:2). We are forbidden to allow ourselves to be fashioned (or patterned) by the fads, opinions, fashions, philosophies, and spiritual darkness of this world. A Spirit-filled believer’s life will not be molded from without but from within. That inward pressure from the Holy Spirit will change our outward fashions, expressions, conversations, operations, actions, inactions, and more. There will be a comprehensive external transformation in the life of a believer-priest. In other words, a consecrated holy lifestyle involves how a believer dresses, what they do and don’t ingest into the body, how they speak, what they watch and listen to, and where they do and don’t go. To suggest otherwise is a gross misrepresentation or misinterpretation of Scripture.

The Sacrifice of Praise

Hebrews 13:15 tells us to “continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God.” The writer goes on to identify the sacrifice of praise as the verbal praise of God’s name.[xxxvii] Hebrews 13:16 continues this theme of sacrifice, reminding us not to neglect giving, doing good, and sharing with others, for with “such sacrifices God is well pleased.” Included in this topic of sacrifice is the command to “Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you” (Hebrews 13:17). The reference here is to religious teachers and not civil rulers.[xxxviii] So, Hebrews 13:15-17 lists three generalized areas of spiritual sacrifice for believer-priests: The uttered exaltation of Jesus’ name, the good work of giving, and obedience to spiritual authority. And while the three areas of spiritual sacrifice mentioned in this passage aren’t intended to be comprehensive, they are expounded on throughout the totality of Scripture.

The Selfless Sacrifice of Love

Ephesians 5:1 encourages us to work to be like Christ. Then we are told one of the ways to imitate Christ in Ephesians 5:2: Walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savor. We should imitate His sacrifice of love in our lives. The Apostle Paul pivoted from the self-sacrifice of Christ to the very opposite, the self-indulgence of the sinner (Ephesians 5:3–4), from agape love to its perversion, lust; he mentioned three manifestations of self-indulgence and love’s perversion. “Sexual immorality” and “impurity” comprehensively cover every kind of heterosexual (premarital and extramarital) and homosexual sin possible, all of which defile the conscience and destroy love. “Greed” describes the heart’s inner desire for one that is not rightfully theirs. It can also refer to sin in the sexual realm, such as coveting another man’s wife or someone else’s body for selfish gratification (Exodus 20:17, 1 Thessalonians 4:6). These three sins are not even to be mentioned or talked about among “God’s holy people,” so completely are they to be banished from the Christian community.[xxxix] The Bible is clear: Sexual immorality is contradictory to the selfless love of Christ-like people. Therefore, love encompasses more than what we do but also what we don’t do.

The Sacrifice of Evangelism

Evangelizing the lost is a spiritual sacrifice. The apostle Paul referred to his ministry to unbelieving Gentiles as a “priestly ministry” and “offering” (Romans 15:15-16). I believe that every action we take on behalf of evangelizing the lost is a pleasing sacrifice to the Lord. Everything, no matter how seemingly small, matters, whether it be giving for the sake of evangelism, inviting a stranger to church, teaching an impromptu Bible study, giving your testimony, tarrying with sinners in an altar service, or any number of other practical ways we participate in the sacrificial work of evangelism. For believer-priests, evangelism is a lifestyle and not just a liability.

The Sacrifice of Prayer

Acts 10:1 tells the story of a Roman army officer named Cornelius, a devout God-fearing man. He gave generously to the poor and prayed to God regularly. Acts 10:3-4, New International Version, details how an angel appeared to Cornelius, saying, “Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.” In Revelation 8:3-4 an angel of the Lord is said to be “standing at the altar, holding a golden censor, that he might add incense to the prayers of the saints.” Using language reminiscent of Old Testament ceremonial, priestly duties, the New International Version says, “And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, went up before God out of the angel’s hand” (Revelation 8:4). That fascinating terminology likens the prayers of believers to incense or memorial offerings that waft like a sweet-smelling aroma to the Lord. What beautiful timeless imagery of prayer that evokes in our minds. This helps us to remember that prayer is not only effective but also sacrificial.

The Perversion of the Priesthood & Invention of the Trinity

Time and attention spans don’t allow for a detailed dive into the historical perversion of the priesthood. However, it would be neglectful to cover the topic of believer-priests without addressing the elephant in the room – the Roman Catholic Church and its spinoffs. Arguably, one of the most tragic things that ever happened to Christianity was the supposed conversion of the Roman Emperor Constantine (306 A.D. – 337 A.D.). While we can be thankful the avid physical persecution of Christians ended under Constantine, the politically motivated doctrinal perversions he ushered in still plague us today. Christianity became the Roman Empire’s official religion during Constantine’s reign and continued with Theodosius (379 A.D. – 395 A.D.). As imperial largesse transformed Christianity in Rome, Constantinople, and Jerusalem, the view of the priesthood drew on Roman ideas of civic and pagan priesthoods and the pompous ceremonial aspects of the imperial court.[xl] Among the many foul doctrines concocted in the bowels of the ancient Roman Catholic Church, which remains firmly ensconced, is its insistence that an earthly priesthood of men is required to act as a mediator between God and humanity.

How could something so outrageous become so dominant? Simply put, the pressure of big government corrupted the official theologies of the Church through the usual suspects of compromise, power plays, intimidation, murder, and political marginalization. Once that powerful engine gained momentum, it just kept expanding until it reached a bloody culmination with the Crusades, governmental coups, serfdom, and religious persecution. Satan turned the so-called “Church” into the murderous regime it had endured in the Catacombs and Coliseums of Rome in the first two and a half centuries after Christ. A reformation was necessary and inevitable. But, the Protestant Reformation didn’t occur until the 16^th century.[xli] The Protestant Reformation admirably emphasized and rallied around the biblical teachings of the “priesthood of believers.” Yet, while Lutherans would disagree, reforming all the perverted doctrines, traditions, and influences of the Catholic Church and its ilk took roughly another three centuries. It wasn’t until the emergence of Pentecostalism at the beginning of the 20^th century that an authentic reformation began to take shape.

Another of many notable perversions that sprang like a poisonous tree from the soil of Roman Christianity is the doctrine of the Trinity. The dogma developed slowly over 200 years and continued to be refined in how it was explained for hundreds of years. Its development began with an attempt to understand the nature of God in terms of Greek philosophical concepts while rooted in Roman political soil.[xlii] As the lightening rod Presbyterian minister Robert Elliott Speer wrote at the turn of the 19^th century: It is an unquestionable historical fact that the doctrine of the Trinity is a false doctrine foisted into the Church during the third and fourth centuries, which finally triumphed by the aid of persecuting emperors.[xliii] A tragic truism is that the same power brokers who conceived and mainstreamed Trinitarianism would have burned most modern Trinitarians at the stake for various perceived heresies. It’s sad to hear and read Trinitarians naively quote theologians (they reverentially refer to them as church fathers) who lived centuries after Christ as if they were just as inspired and inerrant as the Apostles and prophets. Trinitarians cannot legitimately be considered Apostolic, for the Apostles knew not of the nonsensical Trinitarian distinction of persons. Furthermore, the Apostles baptized exclusively in the name of Jesus and not with titles (Acts 2:38, Acts 4:12, Matthew 28:19).

Incredibly Amazing Priestly Privilege

People often ask what distinguishes Apostolic Pentecostals from other flavors of Christianity. And, of course, there’s no short answer to that question. However, an excellent explanation to begin with is the reality that the Apostolic Church is the result of continued Church Reformation. We genuinely believe in sola scriptura (Scripture alone). We’re unmoved by post-biblical historical doctrines or their bygone champions. Apostolics emphatically and passionately believe that all truth necessary for our salvation and spiritual life is taught explicitly or implicitly in the Bible. It’s been a hard fight, but the Apostolic Church miraculously reemerged from the ash heap of Church history while effectively, although often imperfectly, struggling to return to the Apostolic doctrines of the first Church founded by Jesus. Furthermore, Apostolic Pentecostals fully embrace their priestly privileges while acknowledging Christ as their final High Priest. With its Levitical priests and continual and inadequate offerings, the Mosaic Law was a shadow of Christ’s coming and once-for-all offering (Hebrews 10:1-4).[xliv]

Remember the thick temple veil that separated the most holy place (or holy of holies) from the holy place (2 Chronicles 3:14)? Only the High Priest was allowed to pass through that veil, and then only on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:2). At Jesus’ death, the temple veil was ripped from top to bottom, illustrating that Jesus had obliterated the barrier separating humanity from the presence of God (Matthew 27:51, Mark 15:38, Luke 23:45).[xlv] A Levitical caste can no longer mediate between the sinner and his Judge. We may come boldly with loving confidence, not slavish fear, directly through Christ, the only mediating Priest. Of course, Jesus is a superior High Priest, or as Zechariah 6:13 prophesied, “a priestly King.” [xlvi] Because Jesus is superior in every way, believer-priests have incredible, unprecedented privileges. We can do something even the ancient High Priests only did once a year and even then, with great trepidation: Boldly enter into the holy of holies any time, day or night Hebrews 10:19-20). We have constant access, communion, and relationship to and with the presence of God. The blood of Jesus made these new priestly privileges possible once and for all.

In Conclusion

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed writing about the holy priesthood of believers. The beautifully intricate ways the Old and New Testaments complement and complete one another always astonish me. It’s so elegantly simple yet intensely profound. The perfection of it irrefutably proves the infallibility of the Bible. Each book, prophecy, revelation, precept, and illumination fit together like a hand into a custom-fitted glove. Of course, I know there is a danger of seeing correlations in Scripture where there are none. Still, we must fully integrate correlations into our daily Christian lives whenever they are well-defined. And the Bible is abundantly clear that believers today enter a holy royal priesthood via the New Birth. This new priesthood of believers gives us the ultimate privilege possible: The ability to step into the presence of God and have a personal relationship with Him. However, like all privileges, that privilege comes with significant expectations and responsibilities. Believer-priests must live holy lives separated from the defilements of this fallen world. They must reach, love, preach, and teach the lost. They must do the same for the saved. It’s a lifestyle of relationship with God, separation from the world, and daily spiritual sacrifice. It’s wild and exhilarating, all-consuming, transformative, and extraordinarily significant.

[i] Gangel, Kenneth O. John. B & H Publishing Group, 2000

[ii] Gangel, Kenneth O. John. B & H Publishing Group, 2000.

[iii] Strong, James. Strong’s Greek Dictionary of the New Testament. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.9. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 1999.

[iv] NAS Topical Index. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.1. La Habra: The Lockman Foundation, 2000.

[v] Garrett, Duane A. A Commentary on Exodus. KEL. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.0. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2014.

[vi] Butler, Trent C., Chad Brand, Charles Draper, and Archie England, eds. Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.0. Nashville: B&H Publishing Group, 2003.

[vii] Cargal, Timothy B. Freedman, David Noel, Allen C. Myers, and Astrid B. Beck, eds. Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 3.8. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000.

[viii] Ryken, Leland, Jim Wilhoit, and Tremper Longman, eds. Dictionary of Biblical Imagery. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.2. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1998.

[ix] Wolf, H. J. Orr, James, ed. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1915.

[x] Wolf, H. J. Orr, James, ed. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1915.

[xi] Kohlenberger III, John R. and William D. Mounce. Kohlenberger/Mounce Concise Hebrew-Aramaic Dictionary of the Old Testament. Accordance electronic edition, version 3.4. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2012.

[xii] Easton, Burton Scott. Orr, James, ed. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1915.

[xiii] Bernard, David K. Practical Holiness. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Hazelwood, Missouri: Word Aflame Press, 1985.

[xiv] VanGemeren, Willem A. Psalms. EBC 5. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and J. D. Douglas. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.9. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1991.

[xv] NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015.

[xvi] Zodhiates, Spiros, ed. The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament. Revised, Accordance electronic edition, version 1.3. Chattanooga: AMG Publishers, 1993.

[xvii] Macalister, Alex. Orr, James, ed. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1915.

[xviii] Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament. 2d; Accordance electronic edition, version 1.0. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2014.

[xix] Walton, John H. and Craig S. Keener, eds., NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.1. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016.

[xx] NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2015.

[xxi] Mulholland Jr., M. Robert. “Revelation.” Pages 399-606 in James 1–2 Peter Jude Revelation. Vol. 18 of Cornerstone Bible Commentary. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.1. Carol Stream: Tyndale House Publishers, 2011.

[xxii] Johnson, Alan F. Revelation. EBC 12. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and J. D. Douglas. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.9. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1981.

[xxiii] Beasley-Murray, George R. Revelation. New Bible Commentary: 21st Century Edition. Edited by D. A Carson, R. T France, J. A. Motyer, and Gordon J. Wenham. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1994.

[xxiv] Johnson, Van. Romans. Life in the Spirit New Testament Commentary. Edited by French L. Arrington and Roger Stronstad. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.5. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999.

[xxv] Harrison, Everett F. Romans. EBC 10. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and J. D. Douglas. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.9. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1977.

[xxvi] Johnson, Van. Romans. Life in the Spirit New Testament Commentary. Edited by French L. Arrington and Roger Stronstad. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.5. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999.

[xxvii] Phillips, John. Exploring Romans. John Phillips Commentary Series. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.6. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1969.

[xxviii] Witmer, John A. Romans. The Bible Knowledge Commentary. Edited by John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.7. 2 vols. Wheaton: Victor Books, 1983.

[xxix] Maclaren, Alexander. Expositions of Holy Scripture. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.3. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006.

[xxx] Maclaren, Alexander. Expositions of Holy Scripture. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.3. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006.

[xxxi] Packer, J.I. Wood, D. R. W., ed. New Bible Dictionary. 3d, Accordance electronic edition, version 2.5. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1996.

[xxxii] Horton, Stanley M. What the Bible Says about the Holy Spirit. Revised; Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Springfield: Gospel Publishing House, 2005.

[xxxiii] Reese, Coley (2023, November 6). This is a quotation of the entire post [Facebook status update]. Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/coley.reese/posts/pfbid02SUknCVgY5KA3KU2349S1wSCXp8uFEU7QtUhUCVm4xGLByUdyRJwyQ4X3w5f9kLaTl

[xxxiv] Harris, W. Hall, ed., The NET Bible Notes. 2nd edition, version 5.8. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2019.

[xxxv] Horton, Stanley M. What the Bible Says about the Holy Spirit. Revised; Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Springfield: Gospel Publishing House, 2005.

[xxxvi] Phillips, John. Exploring Romans. John Phillips Commentary Series. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.6. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1969.

[xxxvii] Dennis, Lane T. and Wayne Grudem, eds., The ESV Study Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.0. Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2008.

[xxxviii] Barnes, Albert. Barnes’ Notes on the New Testament. Accordance electronic edition, version 2.2. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006.

[xxxix] Adams, Wesley and Donald Stamps. Ephesians. Life in the Spirit New Testament Commentary. Edited by French L. Arrington and Roger Stronstad. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.5. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999.

[xl] “Priesthood: Christian Priesthood.” Encyclopedia of Religion. Retrieved October 18, 2023, from Encyclopedia.com: https://www.encyclopedia.com/environment/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/priesthood-christian-priesthood

[xli] Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopedia (2023, October 29). priest. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/priest-Christianity

[xlii] Berkhof, Louis. The History of Christian Doctrines. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1937

[xliii] Robert Spears, The Unitarian Handbook of Scriptural Illustrations & Expositions. London: British and Foreign Unitarian Association, 1883.

[xliv] Ryrie, Charles Caldwell, ed., The Ryrie Study Bible. Expanded, Accordance electronic edition, version 2.3. Chicago: Moody Press, 1995.

[xlv] Blum, Edwin A. and Jeremy Royal Howard, eds., HCSB Study Bible: Holman Christian Standard Bible. Accordance electronic edition, version 1.2. Nashville: Holman Bible Publishers, 2010.

[xlvi] Jamieson, Robert, A. R. Fausset, and David Brown. A Commentary, Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible. 1871, Accordance electronic edition, version 2.6. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 1996.

Should Christians Get Tattoos?

October 11, 2022October 16, 2022 Ryan A. French

The cultural tattoo fad shows no signs of slowing down. If anything, tattoos are becoming more popular each year. I’m pushing up against forty, which means I remember when tattoos were rare in law-abiding circles. Most Christians were united in their stance against tattoos. It certainly wasn’t a controversial subject or a topic of hot debate among professing Christians. I don’t claim to understand exactly when, why, or how the shift towards accepting tats began. I have a specific memory of seeing a reasonably well-known “prophet” on YouTube with tattoo sleeves coiling down his arms and ringing up his neck and onto parts of his face. I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I was still naïve enough at the time to be shocked.

Since then, a slew of “name brand” preachers have given cheeky pro-tat arguments on social media. Typically, their statements are flippant, funny, theologically thin, and arrogant. What they lack in character, they make up for in charisma, making them popular and convincing to many people. So, with the ever-increasing popularity of tattoos and all the theological misinformation floating around, I felt it was time to weigh in with why I (and many others) remain firmly against tats. However, I want to be clear for those who already have tattoos – that sin and all other sins can be placed under the blood of Jesus. And, while I’m all for conviction, this article is not intended to instigate condemnation against the forgiven. That said, the following are seven biblical reasons why tattoos violate God’s standards of holiness for men and women, and then I’ll answer a few common questions relating to tattoos.

God’s Clear Command in Leviticus 19:28

Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord (Leviticus 19:28).

Never slash (cut) your body to mourn the dead, and never get a tattoo. I am the Lord [God’s Word Translation] (Leviticus 19:28).

I consider tattoos to be a watershed issue of holiness. And by that, I mean it’s challenging to find a holiness standard more clearly articulated than “…never get a tattoo. I am the Lord.” We don’t have any Scriptures against meth or cocaine, yet we understand the principles of God’s Word to be in opposition to illicit drugs. But here, we have a clear and straightforward command directly from the Lord, and still, people find a way to wriggle around it. I’ve found that if someone can read this command and still not care about tattoos, there is very little else they will take seriously regarding holiness of lifestyle. If you can ignore one Scripture, you can easily ignore others.

Perhaps it would help to examine why God gave this command. First, “Both cutting and tattooing the body were done by the heathen.”_^[1] And secondly, “Tattooing was probably practiced in ancient Egypt… Any voluntary disfigurement of the person was in itself an outrage upon God’s workmanship and might well form the subject of a law.”^_[2] We are God’s workmanship (Ephesians 2:10) and significantly altering His design is an affront to His artistry. The Holman Old Testament Commentary clarifies the principles of holiness outlined in Leviticus 19:28 even further, “They were not to disfigure their bodies in any manner or adorn their bodies with tattoos.”^_[3] So, here we see that any bodily disfigurement and vanity of adornment are connected to this holiness standard. The IVP Old Testament Commentary agrees, “The Israelite law may prohibit this practice since it involves a self-imposed alteration of God’s creation, unlike circumcision, which is commanded by God.”^_[4]

Usually, pro-tat preachers give the feeble excuse that the Old Testament moratorium against tattoos is exclusively about getting a specific kind of tattoo. For example, they might say something like, “As long as you don’t get a tattoo of a false god, you’re fine.” While it is true that pagans often used tattoos to express allegiance to a particular false god, it’s far from the only reason pagans tattooed themselves. If that’s the only reason God forbids tattoos, He could and would have made that clear. Also, using that logic, God should have said something like, “If you do get a tattoo, make sure it shows allegiance to Me.” God’s previous and often repeated commands from Exodus 20:3-5 already forbids anything associated with idolatry or false gods:

Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God…

I think God covered it thoroughly in the above Scriptures. No Hebrew in their right mind would read that and think, “Ah, but surely a Baal tat would be ok.” No. Leviticus 19:28 means something more profound than that. This leads us to the second and more misleading claim people typically use to justify tattoos. Because the context of the first portion of Leviticus 19:28 deals with mourning the dead, pro-tat folks might say, “Tattoos are fine; just don’t get a tattoo to mourn dead friends or family members.” The King James Version does make this exegetical error easy to make. However, even the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible (hardly a shining bastion of conservative theology) states, “Unlike the first part of the verse, tattoos are not associated with mourning rites.” _^[5]Ironically, scores of Christians tattoo the names of dead friends and family members on their bodies in mourning and remembrance. Which further illustrates the sad pervasiveness of biblical ignorance or blatant disregard for biblical authority over modern lifestyles.

To review a few reasons God forbids tattoos, “Holiness requires Israel not to act like the pagans in any areas of life.”^_[6] In other words, we are to be inwardly and outwardly separate, distinct, and different from the world’s people. Furthermore, “Leviticus 19:28 forbids the marking of the flesh.”_^[7]In the end, God doesn’t need a reason that makes sense to us. If God says don’t get a tattoo, the question should be settled regardless of our opinions. If God can’t tell a person how to live, then He is no God at all to that person. Tattoos violate several other holiness principles, which I will take a closer look at below. However, God’s clear command in Leviticus 19:28 is by far the only reason any Christian should need to abstain from tattoos.

Wisdom & Cultural Associations

In 2017 The Journal of Social Psychology released a research paper titled Tattoo or Taboo? Tattoo Stigma and Negative Attitudes Toward Tattooed Individuals. It’s long but fascinating, and I must resist the urge to highlight hundreds of quotes in the paper. I’ll try to use self-control and keep things concise and relevant to the point. This research confirms something I’ve long suspected to be true. Tattoos are socially problematic on several significant tiers. And even if God had no opinion on the matter, wisdom would dictate that Christians should stay away from tats.

The research found that “People view tattooed individuals as possessing a number of negative character attributes, including being less inhibited, less competent, having worse character, being less sociable, and being more sexually promiscuous.”^_[8] This creates real problems for tattooed people in the workplace. The research states:

Interviews with tattooed persons revealed that many tattooed individuals believed that they could not find employment because their tattoos were visible, suspicions that hiring managers confirm. Indeed, most hiring managers in Timming’s study explicitly stated they would not hire a visibly tattooed candidate, both because it would mar the image of the company and because of their personal dislike of tattoos. Potential customers have also tended to perceive tattooed employees as less capable and as riskier, and less physically appealing.^_[9]

Complicating things even more, tattooed people often discriminate against other tattooed people for a variety of reasons contained in the quote below:

Tattooed individuals may stigmatize other tattooed individuals if their tattoos are large or unconcealable, such as on the face, hands, or neck, or if their tattoos are seen as overly trendy and lacking authenticity. Thus, the stigmatization of tattooed individuals is not limited to the non-tattooed.^_[10]

And while the roots of the negative stereotypes might be sexist, the reality is that women with tattoos are viewed in a very undesirable light. Here’s just one tiny blip of what the research found:

In Britain, tattooed women were judged as more promiscuous, heavier drinkers, and as less attractive, and in France, men expected that tattooed women would be more likely to have sex on a first date than non-tattooed women. Studies on American college student participants have also found that women with tattoos are perceived as less attractive, less caring, and less intelligent or less honest and religious, depending on the type of tattoo.^_[11]

Men don’t escape that harsh judgment either. When the studies lump men into the equation, things are just as dire:

Differences have been found between tattooed and non-tattooed individuals in Big Five personality traits, measures of rebelliousness or needs for uniqueness or distinctive appearance, risk-taking behavior or attitudes, the prevalence of problem drinking, illegal drug use, and uninhibited sexual behavior, and education levels with tattooed individuals generally having less desirable traits, greater risk-taking behavior and rebelliousness, and more deviant behavior._^[12]

The debate rages on whether these stereotypes contain any truth. While it’s glaringly apparent that the researchers are biased in defense of tattoos and do their best to mitigate the damage of the findings, they are forced to acknowledge that some of the stereotypes may have a factual basis. For example, “Tattooed participants reported significantly higher quantities and frequencies of drinking behavior than non-tattooed participants.”^_[13] The findings also indicated that tattooed individuals display a higher tendency to dominate others._^[14]Regardless, Christians should exercise wisdom and avoid these negative cultural associations, whether warranted or unwarranted. The workplace problems alone are reason enough for a wise individual to stay away from tats.

Modesty & Vanity

By their nature, tattoos violate the holiness principles of modesty and vanity. Both subjects are worth a long discussion. However, for this conversation, I’m going to assume we already agree that Scripture emphatically opposes vanity and requires modesty of dress and conduct. The entire purpose of a tattoo is to draw attention to a particular portion of the body. Often, tattoos are exhibited on areas of the body that should be covered for modesty’s sake. Furthermore, the desire and willingness to use the body as an attention-grabbing canvas violates the biblical imperatives of meekness, shamefacedness, and humility (Colossians 3:2, 1 Timothy 2:9, Philippians 2:3, James 4:6).

Health Concerns

It amazes me that people have no problem covering their bodies with carcinogen-laced inks in a culture obsessed with finding things that cause cancer. I bought a guitar strap the other day, and the tag had a warning that said, “Some of these materials may cause cancer.” We’re worried about cloth guitar straps but not inking our skin! Many of the same people who ink their bodies are busy making their own “safe” soaps and worrying about the effects of pest control chemicals. There’s a disconcerting mental disconnect on display here.

Penn Medicine released an article called Think Before You Ink: Tattoo Health Risks which raises safety concerns that go largely unreported. Essentially, the ink in tattoos contains definite cancer-causing ingredients. But what I found most interesting was this concern:

In addition to the fear of carcinogens contained in the ink, individuals are also concerned about how these tattoos cover the body. A change in skin pigmentation is one of the earliest signs of skin cancer, particularly melanoma. When the body is “blacked out” with tattoo ink, individuals may not be able to notice these changes right away.^_[15]

An article in the Journal of Cutaneous and Aesthetic Surgery says:

Tattoos can cause bacterial infections caused by Streptococcus pyogenes, which could lead to impetigo, erysipelas, and septicemia; Staphylococcus aureus can cause rare toxic shock syndrome; skin and soft tissue infections can be caused by community-acquired methicillin-resistant S. aureus (CA-MRSA); treponema pallidum can cause syphilis; and Mycobacterium leprae which causes leprosy.^_[16]

Permanent Life Impact

Everyone knows someone these days stuck with an embarrassing tattoo of their ex’s name. Tattoo regret is common and creates a lot of anxiety, humiliation, and distress. That unicorn on a cloud might seem super silly as maturity sets in. That phrase that seemed so profound a few years ago might sound stupid now. Wisdom should inform us that permanently marking our bodies could lead to frustration and mortification later in life. No matter how sure you are now, you can’t be sure that you’ll be sure in the future.

You might say, “But they have tattoo removal procedures now.” Out of curiosity, I investigated that and found a lot of conflicting information. For one thing, it’s not a completely sure thing that every tattoo can be removed entirely. And even if you can remove one, it’s an awful process. Lauren Chan talks about it in a fascinating Glamour article, Tattoo Removal: 14 Things I Wish I Had Known Before Getting It. Lauren writes, “A complete tattoo removal takes a minimum of two and a half years.”^_[17] By all accounts, the process hurts and costs thousands of dollars to remove a single tattoo. And if that isn’t discouraging enough, the process usually leaves permanent scarring and possibly discoloration. And the common side effects are terrible, according to Lauren Chan.^_[18] In other words, it’s unrealistic to assume you can wipe away a tattoo later if you decide you don’t like it. I wish you could, but it just doesn’t work that way.

The Body Is God’s Temple, Not Ours

The Bible teaches that we have been “bought with a price,” therefore, we must “glorify God with our bodies” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). We are God’s temple because His Spirit dwells inside us (1 Corinthians 3:16-17). Our bodies are meant to be the temple and a sacrifice. We are instructed to “present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God” Romans 12:1-2). I’m emphasizing this because I hear things like “it’s my body and my choice,” even in Christian circles. But the reality for a believer is that it’s God’s body, and He makes the choices. I don’t get to do anything I want to do with this body I’ve been given. I’ve given my life to Christ, and that includes my body. Tattoos defile our temple with rebellion and render our sacrifice unacceptable to God.

Associations with the Occult, Death & Paganism

Throughout recorded history, tattoos have been intricately associated with occultism, death, mysticism, and paganism. Modern Christians either don’t know this, don’t care, or both. Many Christians no longer believe in the supernatural. To them, demons, witchcraft, and all things associated with it are biblical metaphors for something else. Just like Harry Potter, it isn’t to be taken seriously. They aren’t worried about the dark implications and associations shrouding tattoos. While researching, I noticed a testimonial on a blog by a woman identified as EB. Her real-life experience brings insight into the issue of tattooing that I couldn’t possibly give. Here’s what she had to say:

Prior to becoming a believer, I worked as a tattoo artist and am covered in ink. I spent years in that industry and have more tattoos than you’d care to count. Let me start by saying that the world of tattooing is absolutely and utterly demonic in every conceivable way. While its cultural roots are in paganism, its present life source is pride. I’ve tattooed hundreds, if not thousands, of people, and, without exception, each one of them (including my own and including the “Christian” pieces) were conceived of and carried out for purposes of self-exaltation and boastful individualism.

Up to my conversion, you would never have found me in long sleeves. My tattoos were my identity; without them, I was just. “Normal.” There is nothing the world hates more than normalcy. Almost immediately upon coming to Christ, my long sleeve shirt collection began to grow, and, at the present time, the only short sleeve shirts I have are undershirts that I wear… well, under other shirts. The only thing positive I can say about my tattoos is that they are a shameful and embarrassing reminder of how deep a pit I was pulled from and that it was not by my will but His that I was saved._^[19]

From the historical perspective, The Tattoo History Source Book speaks to the twisted religious heritage of tattoos:

“The actual tattooing process, which involved complex ritual and taboos, could only be done by priests and was associated with beliefs which were secrets known only to members of the priestly caste… historically tattooing originated in connection with ancient rites of scarification and bloodletting which were associated with religious practices intended to put the human soul in harmony with supernatural forces and ensure continuity between this life and the next.”^_[20]

According to Amy Krakow in her chronicle The Total Tattoo Book, “Tattooing has had well-defined roles: Marking a rite of passage at a stage of life, calling the spirits, proudly, defiantly or sneakily showing who you are via body art.”_^[21]

Here’s another disturbing quote for your consideration:

“The reasons why puncturing the skin should be regarded with some degree of awe are not far to seek, for, in the first place, there is the drawing of blood, which to the savage world over is full of significance as a rejuvenating and immortalizing factor. There is, in addition to the opening of numerous inlets for evil to enter.”^_[22]

If you think the spiritual aspect of tattooing is a thing of the past… think again. One quick Google search into tattoo insiders revealed the current tat trends include “astrology inspired ink, religious tribal art, spiritual tattoos, specifically mandala, hamza, and lotus designs that are deeply associated with healing, balance, growth, rebirth, and positive energies.”^_[23] One popular tattooer described the hot new trend of abstract expression art “that allows us to free ourselves from the mental blocks placed around what we know to be right or wrong.”^_[24]Honestly, the past and current tattoo connections with humanistic, hedonistic, and demonist practices are so prevalent that it would take a large book to document all of it. I’m convinced that overlooking these things would take willful blindness or intentional complacency.

The Divine Tattoo (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me (Isaiah 49:16).

People often use this verse to argue that God has a cosmically divine tattoo. And so, the reasoning goes, if God can get a tattoo, I can too. But that kind of thinking is wrong on several levels. First, we don’t get to do everything God gets to do. For example, we aren’t allowed to seek revenge or vengeance. Yet, God said of Himself, “vengeance is mine” (Romans 12:19, Deuteronomy 32:35, Hebrews 10:30, Leviticus 19:18). Secondly, people citing this verse are assuming the word translated in the King James Version as “graven” literally means “tattoo.” However, the Hebrew word used here is “chaqaq,” which means “to cut in.”_^[25] The illusion of something being “graven” on God’s palms is more closely connected to the symbolism of the divine engraving of the Ten Commandments into stone (Exodus 321:18). Or it might even be seen as a metaphor foreshadowing the nail-scarred hands of Jesus. But even if “graven” were meant to conjure up the image of tattoos on God’s palms, it still wouldn’t validate tattoos for us. Why? Because regardless of how you translate the verse, the imagery is a figurative illustration meant to drive a point home. God doesn’t have arms or hands, for that matter. Furthermore, God doesn’t need a string around his finger or a post-it note reminding Him to love us.

Jesus’ Cosmic Thigh Tattoo (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King of Kings, And Lord of Lords (Revelation 19:16).

This objection is even less plausible than the last one. Not only would Jesus not have a tattoo because it is forbidden in God’s Word (Leviticus 28:19), but neither would He immodestly expose His thigh (Isaiah 47:2-3). It’s offensive when people twist Scripture to their agenda. It’s a ridiculous and untenable leap from the word “written” to “tattooed.” There isn’t one shred of evidence that Revelation 19:16 hints at a cosmic tattoo on Jesus’ thigh. Admittedly, the King James’ translation is a little clunky here, which might cause some to wonder if the name is written on Jesus’ vesture and leg. Interestingly, out of the fifty or so English translations I checked; the Contemporary English Version was the most accurate (the CEV is not a paraphrase), “On the part of the robe that covered his thigh was written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords” (Revelation 19:16).

The Forbidden Haircut (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard (Leviticus 19:27).

One of the silliest and more childish arguments used to justify the Christian tattoo goes something like: “Hey man, do you get a haircut or trim your beard? God condemned getting a haircut or trimming your beard in the verse before forbidding the tattoo. Dude, the tattoo is the same as getting a haircut.” God wasn’t condemning haircuts or beard trims, but He was expressly forbidding hairstyles and beard styles that mimicked their pagan neighbors. The IVP Commentary offers the most thorough and compelling explanation of Leviticus 19:27 I’ve seen thus far:

The prohibition against trimming the “sides of your head” or the “edges of your beard” uses the same terminology as Leviticus 19:9-10, which deals with the harvesting of fields. In both cases an offering is involved—one to the poor and the other to God. The law’s placement here immediately after the prohibition against divination suggests that the restriction on cutting the hair is based on the Canaanite practice of making an offering of hair to propitiate the spirits of the dead (see Deuteronomy 14:1). Hammurabi‘s code penalizes false witnesses by having half the person’s hair cut off. The Middle Assyrian code allows a debt slave’s master to pull out his or her hair as punishment (see Nehemiah 13:25). Both laws suggest that shame is attached to the loss of hair. There is a Phoenician inscription from the ninth century B.C. reporting the dedication of shaven hair by an individual in fulfillment of a vow made to the goddess Astarte. In ancient thinking, hair (along with blood) was one of the main representatives of a person’s life essence. As such, it was often an ingredient in sympathetic magic. This is evident, for instance, in the practice of sending along a lock of a presumed prophet’s hair when his prophecies were sent to the king of Mari. The hair would be used in divination to determine whether the prophet’s message would be accepted as valid.^_[26]

This is the New Testament (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

Many Christians confronted with Leviticus 19:28 are quick to point out that they aren’t bound by any of those pesky Old Testament laws. Of course, this is a theologically illiterate argument. Unfortunately, theological ignorance is the norm in modern Christianity. What did Jesus do when confronted by Lucifer’s temptations in the wilderness? He quoted moral commandments from the OId Testament (Matthew 4:1-11). While it’s true that the Old Testament’s ceremonial laws don’t bind New Testament Christians, we’re still bound to every moral law of God. For example, did you know that bestiality is only forbidden in the Old Testament (Leviticus 18:23, Leviticus 20:15-16)? Does that mean that God now, under the New Covenant, approves of bestiality? It’s also worth looking at Leviticus 19:29, which is the verse right after the tattoo verse:

Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness (Leviticus 19:29).

This is the only place in the entire Bible where God directly forbids someone to prostitute their daughter. Would that still be a sin, or is it just an outdated Old Testament rule? Many other moral laws are only forbidden in the Old Testament, such as the human sacrifice of children. Nowhere in the New Testament is this forbidden. It’s only the moral laws we don’t like that we write off as irrelevant and antiquated. The Matthew Henry Commentary sums up how Christians should view Leviticus 19 in general, “Some ceremonial precepts there are in this chapter, but most of them are moral. Most of these precepts are binding on us, for they are expositions of most of the ten commandments.”^_[27]

^[1]Charles Caldwell Ryrie, eds. The Ryrie Study Bible. Expanded, Accordance electronic ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1995), paragraph 2041.

^[2]Albert Barnes, Barnes’ Notes on the Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006), paragraph 4789.

^[3]Glen S. Martin, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, ed. Max Anders, vol. 2 of Holman Old Testament Commentary. Accordance electronic ed. (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 2002), 224.

^[4]John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 134.

^[5]John H. Walton and Craig S. Keener, eds. NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016), paragraph 2017.

^[6]Lane T. Dennis and Wayne Grudem, eds. The ESV Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2008), paragraph 2740.

^[7]TDNT (Abridged), s.v. “στίγμα,” 1086.

[8] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[9] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[10] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[11] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[12] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[13] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[14] Note: One thing that makes this research paper interesting is its extensive references to previous areas of research on the subject.

[15] Think Before You Ink: Tattoo Health Risks, http://www.penmedicine.org, Penn Medicine, July 17, 2018, https://www.pennmedicine.org/updates/blogs/health-and-wellness/2018/july/tattoo-health-risks

[16] 5 Dangerous Health Risks of Tattoos, www.news24.com, News 24, May 4, 2018, https://www.news24.com/health24/medical/skin/about-skin/5-dangerous-health-risks-of-tattoos-20180504

[17] Tattoo Removal: 14 Things I Wish I Had Known Before Getting It, www.glamour.com, Glamour, Lauren Chan, September 7, 2022, https://www.glamour.com/story/tattoo-removal-cost-what-is-it-like

[18] Tattoo Removal: 14 Things I Wish I Had Known Before Getting It, www.glamour.com, Glamour, Lauren Chan, September 7, 2022, https://www.glamour.com/story/tattoo-removal-cost-what-is-it-like

[19] Tattoos: Pagan Demonism, Shamanism, Baal Worship & Occult Mysticism, www.5ptsalt.wordpress.com, 5 Pt. Salt, Joel Taylor, October 29, 2011, https://5ptsalt.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/tattoos-pagan-demonism-shamanism-baal-worship-occult-mysticism/

[20] Steve Gilbert, The Tattoo History Source Book, (Juno Books, 2001).

[21] Amy Krakow, Total Tattoo Book, (Grand Central Publishing, 1994).

[22] Wilfrid Dyson Hambly, The History of Tattooing, (Dover Publications, 2009).

[23] 7 Major Tattoo Trends You’re About to See Everywhere, www.bustle.com, Bustle, Carolyn Steber, February 2022, https://www.bustle.com/style/tattoo-trends-2022

[24] 7 Major Tattoo Trends You’re About to See Everywhere, www.bustle.com, Bustle, Carolyn Steber, February 2022, https://www.bustle.com/style/tattoo-trends-2022

[25] Strong’s Hebrew Concordance, 2710. חָקַק (chaqaq), www.biblehub.com, Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/hebrew/2710.htm

[26]John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 130.

[27] Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, (Thomas Nelson), 2003.

The Anatomy of a Failure (A Scriptural Survey of Why Sincere Souls Fail God) – Article + Podcast

February 5, 2022February 10, 2022 Ryan A. French

The Anatomy of a Failure

During several formative years of my life, Bishop Douglas White ministered to my soul at camp meetings, conferences, and seminars. Time and time again, his stirring sermons send me running to an altar to touch God. His dynamic preaching ministry is in constant demand and has been for as long as I can remember. He has a way of preaching hard truths with love and urgency that compels you to respond. I’m grateful for his ministry. So, when I discovered his newest book, The Anatomy of a Failure: A Scriptural Survey of Why Sincere Souls Fail God, I purchased it faster than you can say “Visa.” Links to buy The Anatomy of a Failure are listed below. I suggest ordering several of them to give away.

Common Heartache

Every Apostolic reading this shares the familiar heartache of knowing friends and family members that have forfeited their salvation. And for those of us who genuinely believe what the Bible teaches about salvation and Hell, we agonize over the condition of their souls and the wasted earthly potential. We’ve all seen as White says:

A beautiful soul rushing back to a hideous condition. A victorious spirit tumbling back to a tortured existence. An honorable life stumbling to a dishonorable lifestyle. A blessed home collapsing into a cursed abode.

How does this happen? That’s the question White strives to answer in The Anatomy of a Failure. The book is a spiritual autopsy. A posthumous examination of dead souls that once thrived in the Spirit. More than that, however, White somberly reminds us that we too have the potential to fail God. This book equips us with defensive weapons and understanding that might be vital to finishing the race. Another byproduct of this book is the light it sheds on the process of backsliding. I finished reading The Anatomy of a Failure with a greater understanding of why good, and I mean “genuinely” good people, abandon Truth. My prayer is that by understanding backsliders better, I might assist them in finding restoration.

Losing Salvation is Possible

Grace is probably the most misunderstood, misconstrued, and misused doctrine in the Bible (I’ve written more about that here). It’s at least up there in the top five. With that in mind, White tackles that issue in the prologue titled The Fallacies of a Failing Soul. In what becomes the underlying text for the entire book, White cites Hebrews 12:14-15:

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God.

Because grace is often tragically misrepresented as a Divine blank check enabling us to sin freely without consequence, White doubles down on the meaning of Hebrews 12:14-15, saying, “God’s grace never fails – but people can fail.” And he continues:

Nobody will ever stand before God, look Him in the eye, and say that His grace was anything but glorious and forgiving. However, when an individual spurns the grace that God is offering and continues in his sinful lifestyle, it is he who is failing God’s miraculous grace. It is one of the fallacies of a failing soul to think otherwise.

Nobody will ever stand before God and say His grace was anything but glorious and forgiving. However, when an individual spurns the grace God is offering and continues in a sinful lifestyle, it is he who is failing God’s miraculous grace. -Doug White
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White moves on to address the most common objection to the reality that good people can fail the grace of God, “A loving God wouldn’t send anyone to Hell (I’ve written an in-depth study on the biblical doctrine of Hell here).” For me, White’s response was revelatory:

A loving God would not send anyone to Hell. But the moment a person dies, Jesus no longer sees him or her through the eyes of a loving God but through the eyes of a righteous judge that must judge every person by the same standard: Did they walk in obedience to God’s Word?

When a person dies, Jesus no longer sees through the eyes of a loving God but through the eyes of a righteous judge that must judge every person by the same standard: Did they walk in obedience to God’s Word? -Doug White
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Ultimately, when sheep refuse to follow God’s ways, they forfeit the benefits and protections of the Great Shepherd. White says it best, “Offering salvation is God’s task; maintaining salvation is our task.” Later he rephrases it like this, “A sinful nature and a saved nature cannot coexist in your life.” It’s important to remember that not every falling away from God is accompanied by a dramatic, loud exodus from the church. Of course, some do, and we remember those moments the best. But more often than not, people slip silently away from God while quietly justifying themselves and ultimately convincing themselves they’re just as saved as ever. That’s the fallacy of a failing soul.

When sheep refuse to follow God’s ways, they forfeit the benefits and protections of the Great Shepherd.
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Offering salvation is God’s task; maintaining salvation is our task. A sinful nature and a saved nature cannot coexist in your life. -Doug White
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Not every falling away from God is accompanied by a dramatic, loud exodus from the church. People slip silently away from God while quietly justifying themselves and ultimately convincing themselves they’re just as saved as ever.
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Four Main Reasons Good People Make Bad Mistakes

Bishop White identifies the initial source or the root of every backslider’s eventual failure. He insightfully leans on forty years of ministry to pinpoint four common trouble areas that fit into the anatomy of a body. The four bodily diseased areas that rip people away from the Body of Christ are feet, stomach, head, and heart. Learning to protect, heal, defend, and cultivate these areas is the key to successfully serving God for a lifetime.

Feet: The Instability of an Unsure Foundation

White reminds us that “the only hope we have of standing firm in living for God is determined by the quality of our foundation.” He makes a classic reference to the parable of the man who built his house on the rock compared to the man who built his life upon the sand (Luke 6:48-49). Everything else in our spiritual life is built on our initial foundation. This is perhaps the most crucial area to get right early on in the spiritual journey.

The only hope we have of standing firm in living for God is determined by the quality of our foundation. -Doug White
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Perhaps you’ve heard of the Millennium Tower located in downtown San Francisco. The luxury condominium cost a whopping 350 million dollars to build in early 2002. It’s a beautiful structure, made chiefly of elegant glass that towers high into the horizon, reflecting the radiant hues of the sun. Until 2015 everything went precisely as planned. The building became a status symbol of wealthy city living and garnered several awards. It became the residence of choice for affluent San Franciscans. But that all changed when residents began to report loud popping noises and large panes of glass started cracking unexpectedly. And worse, experts noticed the building was sinking and tilting drastically. So far, it has fallen nearly eighteen inches into the ground and tilted another fifteen inches to the northwest. All that lurching, turning, and twisting is breaking all kinds of things from the top of the structure to the bottom. Even after pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the effort, the renovations have done little to stop the problem. Groundwater loss from adjacent construction has been blamed for the issue by the tower’s developers, while geotechnical experts say the key is that its foundation is not rooted in bedrock. You see, where I’m going, it doesn’t matter how incredible the exterior looks if your spiritual foundation isn’t rooted in bedrock.

It doesn’t matter how incredible the exterior looks if your spiritual foundation isn’t rooted in bedrock.
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White points to three crucial materials that must form every spiritual foundation: The Bible, faithfulness, and integrity. He says:

Far too many individuals walking through those spiritual realms struggle with being ‘tossed to and fro,’ in and out of righteousness because their feet are not firmly planted on the sure foundation that is provided by God’s Word.

Too many individuals walking through spiritual realms struggle with being ‘tossed to and fro,’ in and out of righteousness because their feet are not firmly planted on the sure foundation that is provided by God’s Word. -Doug White
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In our podcast conversation, Bishop White made a profound statement, “The person in most danger of failing God in your church is the one who loves the music, loves the preaching, loves the worship, loves the fellowship but never settles doctrinal absolutes in their minds.” Without using the words, White spends a great deal of time pushing back against universalism and ecumenicalism, both of which are prevailing heresies of our age. While there might be room for disagreement on some biblical points, central salvific doctrines like the oneness of God, baptism in Jesus’ name, the necessity of the infilling of the Holy Ghost, holiness, and righteous living must become the bedrock of faith.

The person in most danger of failing God in your church is the one who loves the music, loves the preaching, loves the worship, loves the fellowship but never settles doctrinal absolutes in their minds. -Doug White
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The second element in the threefold mixture that forms a sure spiritual foundation is deep, abiding faithfulness. White describes it this way:

It is faithfulness that refuses to negotiate with sin or temptation or even emotional upheavals. Those who live on a sure, solid foundation are the individuals who choose daily to live a life of faithfulness to God: Faithful involvement with God’s kingdom. Faithful gathering together with the saints. Steadfast in our walk with God. Authentic in our representation of God to our world. Regardless of how much you claim to believe in biblical truth, this truth is rendered completely ineffective in your life if you don’t baptize it with faithfulness… Your belief in truth is null and void if you don’t act faithfully upon the principles of that truth.

Regardless of how much you claim to believe in biblical truth, truth is rendered completely ineffective in your life if you don’t baptize it with faithfulness. -Doug White
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The third and final element in the foundation mixture is unshakable integrity. White defines integrity as “having the ability to see yourself the way God sees you, not the way you would like to be seen.” A life of integrity is devoid of hypocrisy and infused with humility. I consider this to be White’s most impactful quote in the first chapter:

In most cases pertaining to spiritual stability, if you let your feet provide your direction, you won’t have to worry about problems your head could cause.

In most cases pertaining to spiritual stability, if you let your feet provide your direction, you won’t have to worry about problems your head could cause. -Doug White
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Stomach: The Pull of an Unholy Consumption

If you could only read one chapter of The Anatomy of a Failure for some strange reason, it should be this one. I consider unholy consumption to be the primary reason the average person falls prey to the enemy. Because our highly advanced, super technological culture allows for instant and nearly unlimited access to the consumption of carnal things, countless Christians develop a habitual taste for dainties that slowly pushes out their desire for holy things. Just like the eunuch thought Daniel would be weakened by abstaining from defiling foods from the king’s table, society views our restrictive lifestyle of purity as fanatical and unsustainable. But our separated lifestyle is the key to our power. Sadly, some have come to view it as a hindrance because they desire to fill their bellies with unrighteousness. Hungering and thirsting after righteousness includes separation from immodest appearance, fleshly vices, worldly entertainment, and unholy speech. White says:

Hungering and thirsting after righteousness includes separation from immodest appearance, fleshly vices, worldly entertainment, and unholy speech.
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While the story of Daniel is old, the principle it promotes is just as true today: The spiritual life of a child of God will either excel or decline depending on what their appetites are… If you fit into the category of someone who constantly struggles in your walk with God, I suggest you take an immediate inventory of what you are putting in your spiritual stomach. Such an inventory is necessary because allowing your spiritual man to exist in perpetual struggle eventually eliminates vital elements like joy, passion, zeal, and even a desire to continue serving God.

The spiritual life of a child of God will either excel or decline depending on what their appetites are. -Doug White
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What you consume will affect you spiritually just as surely as the physical things you consume will affect you physically. It’s also important to realize that it’s not just sinful things that can potentially harm you. But if consuming hobbies or benignly distracting things pull you away from faithfulness, you will eventually fail God. White gives a good measuring stick for measuring the quality of your consumption, “Anytime you start feeling a fondness for a former slavery, it is a sure sign of partaking in questionable consumption.”

It’s not just sinful things that can potentially harm you. But if consuming hobbies or benignly distracting things pull you away from faithfulness, you will eventually fail God.
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Anytime you start feeling a fondness for a former slavery, it is a sure sign of partaking in questionable consumption. -Doug White
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The conversation surrounding what is acceptable for Christians to consume and still be saved is always fraught with disagreement. At the core of this conversation is wisdom. It takes wisdom to know what is healthy, benign, and unhealthy for a Christian to ingest. Sadly, I’ve been around many conversations revolving around how much junk a Christian can devour and still be saved. White mirrors those questions, “How much poison can I consume and still stay alive? How much filth can I eat without getting sick? How much rottenness can I devour without suffering the consequences?” He continues, “Knowing the challenges every individual has to contend with to serve God with integrity, why would anybody challenge themselves further by deliberately empowering their flesh?”

There’s an old Indian story of a grandfather telling his grandson about two wolves that live inside us all. One wolf is good, loyal, pure, and full of integrity. The other wolf is violent, angry, evil, and dishonest. “Each day, these two wolves fight inside of me,” said the grandfather to his young grandson. Wide-eyed, the boy asked, “Which one will win?” “The one I feed,” replied the wise grandfather.

Head: The Hindrance of an Unbridled Mind

This issue is so important that the Bible speaks of our thoughts 138 times and refers to our minds 137 times. White emphasizes how the battle for our soul begins in the mind. And while temptation is not sin, a runaway thought can morph into an unholy intention if it isn’t taken into captivity and cast down. White puts it succinctly, “Sadly, over time those thoughts became temptations, which eventually developed intentions. Those intentions eventually found an occasion to sin.”

While temptation is not sin, a runaway thought can morph into an unholy intention if it isn’t taken into captivity and cast down.
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The old-timers used to say, “You can’t keep a bird from flying over your head, but you can keep it from settling in and building a nest there.” We can’t keep unholy thoughts from flying through our minds, but we can make sure they don’t make a home there. As White wisely states, “Your mind will either assist you or assassinate you.” Gaining the self-control needed to retrain your mind from dwelling on ungodly things is paramount to every believer. White says it best:

To stop the catastrophic loss of salvation, your unbridled mind is hurling you toward; you must become spiritually mature enough to turn off the flow valve of the deadly sewage of unholy thoughts.

Your mind will either assist you or assassinate you. Gaining the self-control needed to retrain your mind from dwelling on ungodly things is paramount to every believer. -Doug White
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Heart: The Delusion of Misplaced Passions

White comes out swinging in this chapter, “Our heart can either be our greatest advantage or our greatest adversary.” It’s eerily possible to be faithful, worship, praise, and go through the motions of godliness without engaging the heart thoroughly. White teaches that passion is the gauge for measuring spiritual heart health, “Passion is the tell-tale sign that our heart is involved; without passion, any work we do has ceased to be a matter of the heart.”

Our heart can either be our greatest advantage or our greatest adversary. It’s eerily possible to be faithful, worship, praise, and go through the motions of godliness without engaging the heart thoroughly.
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This chapter revealed something that had perplexed me for a long time: How can people seem to love God but not serve him passionately? White reminds us that we are commanded to love God with all our hearts in no uncertain terms. He says:

Any time this commandment is casually diminished by placing a greater passion on something else, we have become the victim of a divided heart. The obvious way to tell if an all-the-way-salvation has become a divided-heart situation is to compare your passion for God with your passion for other things.

And here is the revelation that greatly enhanced my understanding:

Most people who backslide don’t fall out of love with God; they just fall in love with something else, leaving a divided heart.

Most people who backslide don’t fall out of love with God; they just fall in love with something else, leaving a divided heart. -Doug White
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Conclusion & Summary

Pay prayerful attention, and you will find that everyone you have seen fail God fits into the four categories as defined by Bishop White:

They had spiritual feet that lacked a sure foundation, leaving them unstable and quick to fall.

They had a spiritual stomach that consistently fed on unholy things, leaving them weak and defenseless against the adversary.

They had a spiritual head that refused to restrain their unholy thoughts, allowing temptations to become sinful intentions, which led them to sin.

They had a spiritual heart that became careless, allowing them to misplace their passion in carnal things, deluding them with the idea that “selling-out” wasn’t as important as merely “claiming salvation.”

We are all susceptible to failing in these areas if we aren’t on guard. Awareness is half the battle. Viewing these anatomical areas invigorates my desire to put on the whole armor of God. Years ago, the Lord gave me a dream of thousands of Christians rushing into battle with incomplete armor. Some had everything but a helmet, while others had a sword. One by one, they fell to the enemy. In that graphic visual, the problem seemed so obvious. But Christians do this all the time, yet they feel safe because they have almost all the armor they need. They have an allusion of safety but lack the fullness of God’s necessary resources. I pray this is not so for you and for me too.

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

A relevant Apostolic Pentecostal resource that interacts with exciting guests and covers biblical topics of interest, ministry, Christian living, and practical insights hosted by Ryan French. This program is an extension of the popular blog Apostolic Voice (www.ryanafrench.com). Ryan is the Associate Pastor of Apostolic Tabernacle (www.aptabupc.com), a revivalistic United Pentecostal Church on the south side of Atlanta. Ryan’s greatest passion is helping people walk confidently in the Apostle’s doctrine and live a book of Acts life in the 21st century. Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/apostolicvoice/support

Sought after preacher, Bishop of Abundant Life of Silsbee, TX, and prolific author Doug White joins the program to discuss his latest book, The Anatomy of a Failure: A Scriptural Survey of Why Sincere Souls Fail God. Visit www.ryanafrench.com for an in-depth review of The Anatomy of a Failure. In this interview, Ryan explores with Bishop White the four areas (feet, stomach, heart, head) godly people leave vulnerable that can lead to spiritual failure and backsliding. If you’re wanting to safeguard your faith this is the episode for you. If you’re trying to understand or help a backslider you need to hear this program. Stick around to the end where the French Family tries Key Lime Kit Kat bars for a fun edition of Gross-Good-Great.

*The Anatomy of a Failure by Doug White link to buy, www.silsbee.org.

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Ep. 58 | Why Good People Fail God with Bishop Doug White and Key Lime Kit Kat Gross-Good-Great with the French Family

January 28, 2022

Ryan French

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Our God Is One with Dr. Talmadge French (Article + Podcast)

January 16, 2022January 18, 2022 Ryan A. French

Sweet Heat Skittles

My father, Dr. Talmadge French and I, just finished recording America and End Time Prophecy, the Oneness of God & Miracle Mission’s Moments for the podcast (linked below). You absolutely do not want to miss that episode. Dad recounted major miracles he’s witnessed and experienced from his missions trips around the world. We talk prophecy, rapture stuff, and think about where America fits into all of that. And dad gives an updated count of the number of oneness Pentecostal believers worldwide. We taste and rate Sweet Heat Skittles at the end. That was fun!

Our God Is One

We mentioned the release of his best-selling book Our God Is One: The Story of the Oneness Pentecostals in the Serbian language during that conversation. Dad originally released Our God Is One in 1999. It’s incredible to think that twenty-three years later, it’s impacting the Serbian work of God and has become an instrument to bring trinitarian churches into the oneness movement! Which inspired me to summarize Our God Is One in this format. Usually, I would include the link to purchase the book, but it’s been out of print for several months. Thankfully, it will be reprinted, rebranded, and updated in the near future. Our God Is One is a unique blending of oneness Pentecostal history, theology, methodology, and statistical analysis. This summary is not a replacement for the book itself but rather a complementarian, precursor, or refresher for those who have already read it. From this point forward, I will refer to dad as Dr. French for the sake of readability.

It’s All in Him!

Most apostolics are familiar with George Farrow’s classic song penned in 1920, “It’s All in Him.” It isn’t shocking to hear lyrics like that now, but there was a time at the turn of the twentieth century when lyrics like “For in Him Dwells All the Fullness of the Godhead and Lord of All is He” would have reeked of heresy to most Christians. Dr. French opens by quoting that and several other notable self-designated Jesus’ Name Pentecostal anthems. In those early days of the oneness movement, songs like that were an expression of separation and a brave exclamation of revelation. George Farrow and others differentiated themselves from their trinitarian counterparts with rhythms and rhymes.

Dr. French opens the book by quoting that great song in homage to those early oneness Pentecostal pioneers. Those first leaders couldn’t have imagined the phenomenal growth their movement would experience over the next one-hundred-plus years. In what Dr. French calls “those early, unassuming days of the movement,” their focus wasn’t on growth but correct doctrine and pleasing God.

In the early, unassuming days of the Oneness Pentecostal movement, their focus wasn’t on growth but correct doctrine and pleasing God. -Dr. Talmadge French
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Important Definitions

It would be challenging to follow Our God Is One or this article without clarifying definitions. Thankfully, Dr. French gives two helpful definitions right away. He defines Oneness Pentecostalism below:

Oneness Pentecostalism is that theologically distinctive branch of the Pentecostal movement which emphasizes what it views as the Scriptural formula for water baptism – baptism ‘in the name of Jesus’ – and the absolute, indivisible ‘Oneness’ of God revealed in the full Deity of Jesus Christ. It emerged within the context of the fervor of restorationism and “back to the Bible” literalism at the turn of the century. Classical Pentecostalism’s argumentation for a return to “the Bible” regarding speaking with tongues and spiritual gifts was simply applied to the issues of baptism and the Godhead.

Notice the term Dr. French used in the above quote, “Classical Pentecostalism.” For some, that might not be a familiar term, so he goes on to explain further:

Oneness Pentecostals have usually been categorized as ‘classical’ Pentecostals, referring not only to their roots in the early movement but their shared belief in the essentiality of tongues as the “initial evidence” of the Spirit baptism.

Doctrinal Distinctives

The explosive growth of the oneness movement is intrinsically linked with its doctrinal distinctives. Dr. French gives a succinct overview of classical oneness theology:

In its rejection of the classical conception of the Trinity, it embraced, in actuality, a highly Christocentric, simultaneous modalism of the Father, Son, and Spirit, in which Jesus is God. Jesus is the Yahweh of the Old Testament, the one and only God in totality, incarnate in the New Testament. The ‘Oneness of God’ is an all-encompassing Jesus-centrism in which Father, Son, and Spirit are not conceived as separate, distinct ‘persons’ within the Godhead, but rather as ‘modes’ or ‘manifestations’ of God.

The explosive growth of the oneness movement is intrinsically linked with its doctrinal distinctives.
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The Oneness of God is an all-encompassing Jesus-centrism in which Father, Son, and Spirit are not conceived as separate, distinct persons within the Godhead, but rather as modes or manifestations of God. -Dr. Talmadge French
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Not unlike the theological constructs of early Jewish Christianity, Oneness theology link the Shema, “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is One,” with the most primitive of the kerygmatic confessions of the early church – “Jesus is Lord.” That is, Jesus is the one and only Lord, the ‘totality’ of the Godhead, incarnate. Thus, He is not a part, or a second part, or second person, but God in totality, manifest in human form as the unique God-man. “Father” and “Son” are viewed simply as incarnational terms necessary for the discussion of God in His dual nature, God and man. Likewise, “Holy Spirit” is the distinguishing expression for “Christ in,” God indwelling, the believer at and after Pentecost, in the unique manner made possible only by the reality of the resurrection.

Not unlike the theological constructs of early Jewish Christianity, Oneness theology link the Shema: Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is One, with the most primitive of the kerygmatic confessions of the early church – Jesus is Lord. -Dr. Talmadge French
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Oneness Roots

Interestingly, Dr. French clarifies an often-asked question: Are oneness Pentecostal evangelical? And the answer to that is “yes.” The oneness movement is rooted in a passion for Jesus Christ, Scripture, life-changing new birth experiences, and evangelism. But that doesn’t mean mainstream Evangelicalism embraces the oneness movement. Dr. French mentions J.I. Packer, who referred to Pentecostalism as Evangelicalism’s “half-sister.” Sadly, that kind of pejorative, and worse, is historically typical. But oneness Pentecostalism traces its roots back to the holiness and restorationist movements of the nineteenth century, which, as Dr. French points out, “is sometimes referred to as ‘radical’ Evangelicalism.”

At its onset, the oneness movement was shunned, ostracized, criticized, and belittled by Evangelicals and classical trinitarian Pentecostals. The oneness movement’s explicit rejection of Trinitarian doctrine combined with its strong holiness underpinnings has made it a target for charges of cultism, bigotry, and heresy. And while Dr. French acknowledges that the oneness movement has become more widely accepted, “mainstream” Christianity still views it derisively. Especially in light of Evangelicalism’s rapid drift away from moral absolutes, biblical inerrancy, and godly living. This creates what Dr. French calls the “dilemma and paradox” of the oneness movement. He boils it down in this statement:

Their (the oneness movement’s) distinctive theological identity is, at one and the same time, both rooted in Pentecostal-Evangelicalism, and yet at enormous tension with it.

Though rooted in the holiness movement and budding trinitarian Pentecostalism, the oneness movement is best described as restorationism. Dr. French describes it this way:

Oneness Pentecostalism, within a dozen years of the rise of Pentecostalism, was birthed in a rekindling of restorationist fervor which swept through the entire movement, vigorously promoting a return to the New Testament baptismal formula and understanding of the Godhead.

Oneness Pentecostalism was birthed in a rekindling of restorationist fervor which swept through the entire movement, vigorously promoting a return to the New Testament baptismal formula and understanding of the Godhead. -Dr. Talmadge French
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Pentecost In My Soul

Few things capture the essence of oneness theology as accurately and concisely as the songs birthed in those early days. To illustrate this, Dr. French highlights the famous Black Holiness songwriter Thoro Harris who, after converting to Pentecostalism, penned “Pentecost In My Soul” in 1914. He wrote many beloved Pentecostal hymns such as “Jesus Only” and “All That Thrills My Soul Is Jesus.” Those songs and many others encapsulate the highly Christocentric pietism that made the oneness movement radically distinct from its counterparts. And it was enormously successful. But that doesn’t mean it was easy, Dr. French notes:

Pentecostals were struggling with an inevitable clash with historic Christianity, the heritage of the Protestant Reformation, and their own spiritual identity. Central to this struggle was the conviction that the historic church, largely apostatized, required restoration to primitive Christian faith.

To be sure, there was some disagreement about what primitive Christianity was in practice and theology. However, Pentecostals genuinely believed they were experiencing a ‘latter day’ restoration. And they viewed the Reformation as a steppingstone towards restorationism. Dr. French summarizes those early views this way:

Pentecostalism, in this way, perceived the period from the Reformation forward as restoration, from Luther’s sola scriptura to Wesley’s holiness to Seymour’s Azusa revival. Oneness adherents have also identified elements within the Radical Reformation, especially Michael Servetus and the immersion and anti-Trinitarianism of the Anabaptists, as evidence of glimmers of restoration.

Pentecostalism, perceived the period from the Reformation forward as restoration, from Luther’s sola scriptura to Wesley’s holiness to Seymour’s Azusa revival. Dr. Talmadge French
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Fundamentalist Influences

It would be incorrect to say that Pentecostalism is rooted in Fundamentalism. However, it is substantially influenced by it. Dr. French is quick to mention there is “considerable” debate about “the extent and precise nature of Fundamentalism’s influence upon Pentecostalism.” He clarifies the distinctions and the influences, stating:

Fundamentalism, like Pentecostalism, embraced premillennialism, dispensationalism, and the verbally inerrant inspiration of Scripture. At the turn of the century, as Pentecostalism was emerging, Fundamentalism was the point conservative force opposing the higher critics and the modernist attacks on the miracles of the Bible. Although these were issues with which Pentecostalism readily identified, it was tenuous indeed, for Fundamentalism opposed with equal rigor Pentecostalism’s belief in modern miracles and tongues.

Regardless, Pentecostalism often utilized Fundamentalist arguments to further the points they agreed with. And even found Fundamentalist writers who openly favored oneness doctrinal positions.

Higher Life Influences

In 1875, the Keswick movement formed a holiness group that emphasized “higher life” and promoted “experiential holiness.” Dr. French states:

Important themes included enduement with power and the infilling of the Spirit, stressed by such leaders as R.A. Torrey and D.L. Moody. Yet it rejected the phenomenon of emerging Pentecostalism.

If I understand correctly, it seems John Wesley’s Methodism, including its holiness beliefs and emphasis on Spirit baptism, greatly influenced the Keswick movement, which influenced the early Oneness Pentecostals. Dr. French says it like this:

As did their forerunners in the holiness movement, the Pentecostals emphasized holiness, enthusiastically and with restorationist zeal, as separation from sin and worldliness. And, due perhaps to the intensity of the restorationist motif as the dominant influence within Oneness Pentecostalism, the emphasis upon strict standards of holiness remains a prominent feature of the movement. Apart from the issue of the means of sanctification, holiness was considered a restored, essential element in the life of a believer. “A holiness preacher?” wrote D.C.O. Opperman, “God has no other kind. Might as well say `wet water’ as to say `holiness preacher.’”

As did their forerunners in the holiness movement, the Pentecostals emphasized holiness, enthusiastically and with restorationist zeal, as separation from sin and worldliness. -Dr. Talmadge French
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Holiness was considered a restored, essential element in the life of a believer. A holiness preacher? wrote D.C.O. Opperman, God has no other kind. Might as well say wet water as to say holiness preacher.
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The Predominant Impulse of Oneness Pentecostalism

Indeed, all of the above-mentioned theological strands converged at the dawning of the twentieth century to form the oneness movement. Even early healing movements helped weave conditions for Oneness Pentecostalism to emerge successfully. But Dr. French views restorationism as “the dominant and overarching influence amidst other significant streams which intermingled in important ways.” Unique to Oneness Pentecostalism was a predominant restorationist impulse that viewed the entire New Testament through the lens of the book of Acts. In doing so, they made the book of Acts accounts typical experiences for all believers.

The Founding of Pentecostalism

In addition to the “latter rain” metaphor, Pentecostal founders like Howard Goss referred to the movement as “the winds of God.” They spoke of tongues as falling “suddenly from Heaven.” And although glossolalia had occurred among earlier holiness movements sporadically, it was Charles Fox Parham that, as Dr. French says, “provided the spark which ignited Pentecostalism as a distinctive movement by theologically linking `tongues’ with the baptism of the Spirit.” Parham was the first to articulate that tongues were the evidence of Spirit baptism. Although he still considered tongues a “second work of grace.” Dr. French describes the early oneness movements preferences regarding their identity:

Interestingly, Oneness Pentecostals tended to self-identify most readily with Parham’s original designation for the movement, “Apostolic,” even more so than the term “Pentecostal.” “Pentecostal” related mostly to the experience of Spirit baptism, whereas “Apostolic” was a more direct identification with the restoration of the doctrine, faith, and experience of the New Testament witness of the apostles.

Early Pentecostal Controversies

Like every movement, the early Pentecostal movement was plagued with controversies and fraught with disagreements. Dr. French describes debates that surrounded the issue of sanctification:

William H. Durham, a Baptist minister from Chicago who experienced tongues at Azusa in 1907, opposed the commonly accepted holiness view of sanctification as a separate, second crisis experience, or a “second work of grace” distinct from salvation. Instead, Durham espoused a view that posited the work of sanctification in the single experience of conversion, not subsequent to conversion. This view was predicated on the sufficiency of Calvary to ascribe sanctification to the believer at the time of conversion but experienced as a spiritual process throughout life. Durham referred to this as the “finished work of Calvary” view of sanctification.

But the sanctification issue paled in comparison to the Oneness controversy. Dr. French summarizes the debate saying:

At issue in the Oneness controversy was the centrality of the name of Jesus in baptism, the soteriological significance of Spirit baptism, and the nature of the unity of the Godhead. The Oneness issue was commonly referred to as the “new issue” by its opponents, not for its novelty, but to distinguish the issue from the recent controversy over salvation.

The early Pentecostal movement prayed in the name of Jesus, claimed healing in Jesus’ name, sang Christocentric songs, and “largely ignored” the precision of Trinitarian faith. So, it shouldn’t have been all that shocking that many would eventually desire to be baptized in Jesus’ name. Dr. French quotes Charles F. Parham on this subject:

We were waiting upon God that we might know the Scriptural teaching of water baptism. Finally, the Spirit of God said: “We are buried by baptism into His death.” …Then how quickly we recognized the fact that we could not be buried by baptism in the name of the Father and in the name of the Holy Ghost because it stood for nothing as they never died or were resurrected.

The Spark That Lit the Flame

A Pentecostal camp meeting called the World-Wide Apostolic Camp Meeting took place in April of 1913. It was a much-anticipated meeting lauded as a great unifier. Yet, in actuality, it was the initial spark that lit the flame of the oneness movement, eventually separating it from Trinitarian Pentecostalism altogether. Canadian minister R.E. McAlister wasn’t the main speaker or even on the program. McAlister simply gave a short sermon as they were preparing for a baptismal service “in a pool near the big tent.” Dr. French describes the intense and pivotal moment this way:

In a cursory defense of single immersion, McAlister noted that apostolic baptism was administered as a single immersion in a single name, Jesus Christ. “The words Father, Son, and Holy Ghost were never used in Christian baptism.”

History records an “audible shudder” swept the preachers at the mention that the name Jesus was used exclusively in apostolic baptism. Of course, they tried to stop and sensor him, but the inspired words had already been spoken. The impact of that little sermon was far more significant than McAlister could have ever dreamed. Dr. French states:

The implications concerning Jesus’ name baptism raised at Arroyo Seco fueled the theological flame within many who attended. John G. Sharpe, a young minister, was so moved that, after praying and reading the Bible all night, he ran through the camp the following morning shouting that he’d received a “revelation” of the power of Jesus’ name. Frank J. Ewart, G.T. Haywood, Harry Morse, John G. Schaepe, R.J. Scott, George Studd, R.E. McAlister, Andrew D. Urshan, Homer L. Faulkner, and Frank Denny… would soon enthusiastically embrace baptism in the name of Jesus as the exclusive apostolic formula.

In Conclusion

Our God Is One goes on in far more detail concerning various splits among Pentecostal groups, eventually forming oneness groups like the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World and the United Pentecostal Church International, and many others. He recounts the stories of now-infamous pastors who were hepatized in Jesus’ name and branded as heretics by their peers. Many of those pastors went on to rebaptize entire congregations in Jesus’ name as revival swept the world. But Dr. French is most acclaimed for his unparalleled documentation of modern Oneness Pentecostalism worldwide. In 1999, it was staggering when Dr. French provided careful documentation of twenty million Oneness Pentecostals. He updates the number on the podcast episode below, but you’ll have to listen for yourself to hear that.

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Ryan sits down with his father, Dr. Talmadge French, to discuss miraculous missions moments from Dr. French’s world travels: The Serbian Healing, Ethiopian Miracles, The Communist Airport Miracle, The Citadel Hotel, and The Tibetan Monk. Dr. French reveals the current documented numbers of oneness apostolics worldwide. Also, they discuss the role of America in End Time Prophecy: Are we getting close to the rapture? Do any prophecies need to be fulfilled first? What is Mystery Babylon? Stick around to the end for a Dr. French edition of Gross-Good-Great featuring sweet heat flavored skittles.

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Ep. 57 | America and End Time Prophecy, the Oneness of God & Miracle Mission's Moments with Dr. Talmadge French

January 16, 2022

Ryan French

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The Artificial Face (Cosmetics, Make-Up, Body Modification & The Great Cover-Up) – Podcast

November 6, 2021November 6, 2021 Ryan A. French

Timothy Hadden joins the podcast. He pastors a church he started in the heart of downtown Portland called Antioch Northwest (antiochnorthwest.com). He’s also the curator of an excellent blog called Search of Kings (searchofkings.com). Rev. Hadden holds a degree in addictions counseling from the School of Behavior Sciences at Liberty University and is a certified addictions counselor with Oregon and with the NAADAC, which is the National Association of Addiction Professionals. He stays active in the Apostolic thought community. I consider him to be one of the deep apostolic thinkers of our time. Also, be sure to check out his podcast called Renovate with T.C. Hadden. He’s authored an Expository Commentary on the book of Exodus aptly titled EXODUS, which you can find on Amazon.com. Today we are going to discuss his latest searchofkings.com article called The Rise of the Artificial Face. This compelling title speaks to the issue of cosmetics and artificiality within the Church and modern culture as a whole. In this long-form discussion, we cover topics like church planting, evangelism, transgendersim, pedophilia, addictions, unknown dangers of marijuana, the objectification and sexualization of women, unrealistic expectations of beauty, self-esteem, the role of social media in depression and suicide, the rising suicide rates among women, and loving the way God made us. You don’t want to miss this episode.

Ep. 49 | The Artificial Face (Cosmetics, Make-Up, Body Modification & The Great Cover-Up) with Timothy Hadden – Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Your Questions Answered (Article + Podcast)

October 13, 2021October 27, 2021 Ryan A. French

Initially, I started this blog specifically to answer questions I repeatedly received from people in my church and community. This format was just an easy way for me to answer a lot of people at the same time. I know, I know, that’s a very introverted thing to do. Also, it probably demonstrates my conversational laziness as well. I knew, too, that the questions being asked were pretty common questions in other church settings as well, which turned out to be truer than I realized at the time.

Often people will write with a question and begin by apologizing for being a bother. I always try to respond by assuring them that there is no such thing as a stupid question. And, if pastors can’t or won’t answer the difficult questions, they aren’t fulfilling their God-given leadership role (2 Timothy 4:2). There is a sentiment floating around asserting that we shouldn’t respond to questions asked in the spirit of entrapment. That is to say, a question designed to back someone into a corner and elicit a response that can be misconstrued or used against the answerer. I sympathize to a certain degree with that mindset. However, it’s worth noting that Jesus still responded to the Pharisees when they poised their poisonous questions.

Regardless, if we’re not careful, we will fall into the trap of viewing every questioner as bad intentioned when they are just uninformed or misinformed. Even the first apostolic sermon on salvation was preached in response to a question (Acts 2:37-38). Many years ago, I was influenced by the book by Conrad Gempf called Jesus Asked. That little book opened my eyes to something that should have been obvious to me as a prolific reader of the Gospels. Jesus avidly employed the Socratic method of answering questions with a question. Jesus rebuked with questions (Luke 8:25, Mark 8:21), provoked deeper thought with questions (Mark 11:28, Mark 12:16), and asked rhetorical questions (Matthew 21:31, Mark 8:19). It’s nearly impossible to find a passage where Jesus interacted with people that He did not ask a question or a series of questions. That illumination forever impacted my thinking on preaching, teaching, and engaging in thought with others.

I believe Jesus utilized questions for several reasons: One, it forced the other person to think and engage. Two, it introduced new lines of thought and brought clarity to issues. Three, it was more approachable than domineering. Four, it put the questioner on the defensive rather than the offensive. Five, it took Him out of the faulty framework of preconceived ideas contained within the original question. Six, it invited people to find Truth in answering His question rather than simply believing a declaration. There is a time for declaration, and Jesus made plenty of bold declarations (John 14:6, John 10:7). Still, there is also a time to ask questions and invite others to find the answers with us, which has always been the philosophy of Apostolic Voice.

That was a ridiculously long way of saying keep the questions coming. Sometimes your questions send me on a journey of discovery. Some questions are humbling because they show me how little I know about the Bible. In a recent podcast (click here to listen), I thoroughly enjoyed tackling some great questions from you folks. I’m posting that Q&A in written form for those who prefer reading over listening. Or for those who might want to easily reference back to this article in the future. No names are mentioned because I wouldn’t want to risk embarrassing anyone.

Q1: How should we feel about going to church when a threat or danger is at hand?

Before jumping into a biblical discussion of this topic, allow me to begin by pointing out the obvious: There is always a certain level of danger when we physically gather for worship. I know this question is likely referring to COVID-19. I think it helps if we put a few things into perspective. Here’s some simple math, 38,000 people tragically die in car accidents each year in the United States. Meaning, just driving to church has some inherent risks. Sadly, 28,000 people die of the common flu each year in the United States. Also, I think we have to weigh the physical and spiritual risks of not attending church.

Some Common Sense Observations

I’m not qualified enough to emphatically argue the suicidal impact of the shutdowns, but I have the common sense to know it’s been substantial. People have been alienated from friends, sequestered away from family, blocked from healthy social interaction, kept from education, hindered from church attendance (and church socialization). We’ve all been fed a steady diet of fear, politicized, marginalized, and handcuffed by despair with seemingly no end in sight. You can’t tell me all that hasn’t harmed people in ways we can’t even fathom right now. Books and studies will look back over these things and tell countless stories of tragedy. My heart breaks for children who endured 2020-2021 (and maybe 2022) during their most formative years. They will deal with neuroses and developmental disorders that go far beyond the ordinary. On the other end of the spectrum, elders who are certainly the most vulnerable to COVID-19 among us have suffered tremendous emotional pain and loneliness in their twilight years as we have tried our best to protect them. It’s truly sad.

The Long-Term Fallout of Fear

I’ve written about spiritual problems and solutions related to COVID-19 in the past (A Christian Manuel For Navigating Uncertain Times, Unmasked – Cogent Covid Thoughts). However, we are only just now seeing the overwhelming negative spiritual impacts of our churches being severely impaired and restricted for over a year and a half. An alarming 7% of past churchgoers claim they will not be resuming in-person services again even once the pandemic is over.[iii] That stat is probably higher because many who will not return to church aren’t willing to talk about it with pollsters. And the falling church attendance is minor compared to the spiritual devastation many people have experienced due to increased carnality and lack of accountability. Countless churches are reeling from that reality. Not to mention how the media has demonized worship or the social stigma of churches being labeled super-spreaders.

What Does the Bible Say?

Before jumping straight to “forsake not the assembling of ourselves together” (Hebrews 10:25), let’s go a few verses back and examine the context of that often-quoted verse. Remember, Paul (the writer of Hebrews, in my opinion) was no stranger to danger. He was beaten, stoned to death, imprisoned, and shipwrecked (2 Corinthians 11:21-33). The First Church met under threat of death, persecution, imprisonment, and more. So, Paul did not write from the Western standpoint of one who has never genuinely suffered for the Gospel or to gather. Hebrews 10:22-23 are admonishments to remain pure (holy), faithful, hopeful, unwavering, and uncompromising. Hebrews 10:24 is a call to think carefully about how we can encourage one another to do all of the above, love our fellow Christians, and do good deeds. All of that was Paul’s way of leading up to the importance of Hebrews 10:25, which is a familiar verse to most churchgoers.

So, when Paul said, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the Day approaching (Hebrews 10:25).” He emphasized the universal human need for the people of God to gather regularly if they are to remain strong in faith, love, and works. Paul (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit) had already considered the intrinsic dangers of gathering in that apostolic command. Yet, he gave no caveats or wiggle room for the Church to use as convenient excuses. In fact, he doubles down by denouncing those who had already forsaken assembly and encouraging the future church to gather more often as the rapture draws closer.

To drive the point home, Paul continues in Hebrews 10:26-29 with a grave warning about sinful Christians and backsliding. Christians who willfully sin after receiving the knowledge of Truth have no further sacrifice for their atonement (Hebrews 10:26). They can live with terrifying anticipation of the fiery judgment of God because they become adversaries of God even while calling themselves believers (Hebrews 10:27). If people were put to death for breaking the law of Moses, shouldn’t we expect far more significant punishment for disrespecting the blood of Jesus, trampling the son of God, and insulted God’s grace (Hebrews 10:28-29)? These four verses aren’t randomly placed after Paul’s apostolic command to gather. They are a continuation of that discussion. Because gathering together is one of the most important and effective resources God has given to keep us from sin and backsliding.

Gathering together is one of the most important and effective resources God has given to keep us from sin and backsliding.
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Full Transparency

To be fully transparent, I do believe in being careful and using wisdom. I’ve lost friends and loved ones during this pandemic. My church has experienced heartbreaking COVID-19 related deaths. My father almost died when he contracted COVID-19, and it turned into COVID-pneumonia. My church has socially distanced, rearranged seating, canceled Sunday School for over a year (to protect the elderly teachers), worn masks, sanitized the building, provided sanitizer to saints, launched a live stream, and canceled many services to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 during peak outbreaks. We’ve made hard calls and tried to use as much wisdom as humanly possible. But we also realize that fear cannot become hysteria, and our church is an essential service. Indefinite shutdowns are not an option, and any shutdown is the last resort.

Practical Considerations

There might be times when you should miss a church service. It should be a tough call on your part. Once missing church becomes easy, you’re in a downward spiral. If you have a fever or feel like you’re contagious to others, you should feel excused to stay home. Do your best to stay connected to that service remotely, either through technology or word of mouth. And remain accountable to your pastor or other saints (depending on your church’s protocol). Refuse to be that person who misses church and expects everyone else to call you. If you are a grown adult, you should keep yourself accountable to peers and leadership. If you are especially vulnerable (age, preexisting conditions, compromised immune system) and your church hasn’t canceled services, consult your leadership about it. Take extra precautions when you attend, wear a mask, keep a distance from others (wave hands, don’t shake hands), and ask to be temporarily excused from church responsibilities that might cause too much direct contact with people. Trust that your pastor is making godly decisions to keep you physically and spiritually safe.

There might be times when you should miss a church service. It should be a tough call on your part. Once missing church becomes easy, you’re in a downward spiral.
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Refuse to be that person who misses church and expects everyone else to call you. If you are a grown adult, you should keep yourself accountable to peers and leadership.
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If you have enough faith to go to the grocery store, you have enough faith to go to church. If you have enough faith to go to work, you have enough faith to go to church. If you feel comfortable being around people outside of the church, you should go to church. It really is that simple. The Church is an essential service for your soul. And if you are responsible for children, you should be factoring their spiritual well-being into your decision-making process too. Wisdom and caution are good things, but fear and hysteria are contrary to the Christian life.

If you have enough faith to go to the grocery store, you have enough faith to go to church. If you have enough faith to go to work, you have enough faith to go to church.
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Wisdom and caution are good things, but fear and hysteria are contrary to the Christian life.
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Power, Love & Sound Mind

In 2 Timothy 1:2-7, Paul charged Timothy to have peace (inner calm and spiritual well-being). Then, Paul praised the faithfulness of his godly mother and grandmother (2 Timothy 1:5). He reminded Timothy to keep the gift of God stirred up inside of him, which he had already received by the laying on of hands (2 Timothy 1:6). Then, Paul launched into a verse that we often quote, and you’ll quickly recognize it even though I’m citing the Amplified version: For God did not give us a spirit of timidity or cowardice or fear, but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of sound judgment and personal discipline [abilities that result in a calm, well-balanced mind and self-control] (2 Timothy 1:7). Notice the entire context of Christian power, love, and soundness of mind involve things connected to gathering as the body of Christ. If we want power, love, and stability of mind, we must not forsake assembling together.

The entire context of Christian power, love, and soundness of mind involve things connected to gathering as the body of Christ. If we want power, love, and stability of mind, we must not forsake assembling together.
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Q2: What age is appropriate for an apostolic to start dating?

My daughter Julia Lynn is fourteen, and she is lovely, talented, brilliant, sweet, introverted, kind, and godly. Needless to say, I have strong opinions and emotions related to this topic (you’ve been warned). Also, I’ve written an in-depth article on apostolic dating called 6 Dating Standards for Apostolic Singles. So, I’ll resist the temptation to repeat all of that here. If dating questions are relevant to you or someone you love, I recommend thoroughly reading that article. However, I did not specifically address this question in 6 Dating Standards for Apostolic Singles, probably because I had older singles in mind at the time. Still, this is a very relevant and essential question to answer. It’s a question that should be taken seriously and not frivolously.

Real Life Dating Principles

Let me lay some framework around my answer. The Bible clearly states that we should abstain from sex outside the marriage covenant (Hebrews 13:4). I also know that human nature makes that incredibly difficult, especially in our current culture, unless we have careful guard rails in place (1 Corinthians 7:2). Keeping that in mind, I do not support long engagements or dating for years on end. Also, I do not believe an apostolic should marry outside the faith. And I don’t endorse casual dating. I think all dating should be to find a godly person, marry that person, and serve the Lord together. Meaning, the moment you realize someone isn’t marriage material, that relationship should end. Never date just to cure loneliness, fit in, kill time, fulfill lustful desires, or any other reason outside of sincerely looking for a person to love for a lifetime in holy matrimony.

All dating should be to find a godly person, marry that person, and serve the Lord together. Meaning, the moment you realize someone isn’t marriage material, that relationship should end.
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Never date just to cure loneliness, fit in, kill time, fulfill lustful desires, or any other reason outside of sincerely looking for a person to love for a lifetime in holy matrimony.
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The Answer… Kinda

Because of everything stated above, I feel that it is unwise to date before seventeen. For most people, even seventeen is probably far too young to begin dating. Why? Because you shouldn’t date unless you are mature enough to realistically get married within a year or year and a half (at the latest) of dating an individual. Most people are simply not spiritually or emotionally mature enough to get married by eighteen or nineteen. You would be an extremely rare exception to the rule if you are that person. Furthermore, you can’t be the one to decide if you are mature enough to be dating. You must allow elders, parents, church leaders, and godly friends to make that assessment for you (and with you).

A Few Quick Guard Rails

Before you reach an age where you could realistically think about getting married, all your relationships should be kept on the friendship level, at arm’s length, and never exclusive. You certainly shouldn’t be spending time alone with friends of the opposite sex or engaging in long intimate conversations via phone, text, or social media. That’s basically the definition of dating, whether you call it dating or not. This answer is probably a little frustrating, but I don’t think there is a one size fits all age where everyone should start dating. Seventeen at the absolute earliest and probably early twenties is a good average timeframe to begin dating safely. But even then, I default back to an earlier dating guard rail, never date just to date or to cure loneliness. Only date an individual if you see real marriage potential in that person and have the approval of godly mentors around you. Never date secretly or without consulting godly elder mentors (not just your best friends and peers).

Love God First & Foremost

Again, if you’re interested in a more in-depth conversation about dating, follow this link (6 Dating Standards for Apostolic Singles). Don’t be that flaky, wishy-washy, needy person who can’t live without a dating relationship. Learn to love yourself and be happy with who you are before you start the long, complex process of loving someone else. Keep God first, and He will give you the desires of your heart (Psalm 37:4).

5 Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. 6 In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
Proverbs 3:5-6

Q3: I’m sitting with a dying friend suffering with stage 4 lung cancer. I would like topics on learning to trust Jesus and faith.

First, let me say to you, and everyone suffering from similar pain, that I’m so sorry for your situation. I know the heartbreak and helpless feelings are difficult to endure. And we can be forgiven for wondering how and why awful things like this happen. The feelings of our infirmities touch God, and He draws close to those with broken hearts (Hebrews 4:15, Psalm 34:18). Sometimes the hurt numbs us to the presence of the Lord. Allow the Lord to draw close to you and give you the peace that only He can provide.

The feelings of our infirmities touch God, and He draws close to those with broken hearts (Hebrews 4:15, Psalm 34:18).
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Encouragement from Mother

My mother has written and spoken about this subject beautifully from her suffering and fiery trials. I encourage you to read her article called Praising the Lord in All Things and listen to her talk about it in this conversation called Talking with Mom (Rebecca French) About Pain, Sickness, Parenting, Faith, Ministry, Pastor’s Wives, and People with Special Needs. She has a unique perspective and special anointing that ministers to the hurting. I know her words will help you and anyone suffering or watching helplessly while a loved one suffers. Know that you’re not alone, and ultimately peace always comes while we wait on the Lord.

Four Simple Strategies for the Brokenhearted

I could write a lengthy essay about how the rain falls on the just and the unjust. Or I could wax eloquent about how sin ushered pain and suffering into the human condition. And I could write philosophically about how God is good even when we don’t understand His plan. But I know none of those things will help you right now. But I do know a few simple things that have helped me through similar situations.

One, turn your pain into prayer. Tell God every hurt, disappointment, frustration, sadness, and ask Him all the difficult questions. He hears, cares, and answers when you call out to Him in desperation. When the pain is deep, don’t turn to anything other than God for relief. Two, keep connected to prayerful friends who will encourage you and pray for you. Our flesh wants to withdraw when hurting but resist that urge and stay (or get) closely connected to godly people. Three, find an encouraging Bible verse (if you don’t already have a favorite one) and quote it to yourself all the time. Write it down and read it. Write it over and over again. Put it on sticky notes all-around your house and car. Make it your screen saver on your phone. Let it penetrate past your mind and settle down in your soul. Four, don’t miss church. Again, it’s tempting to pull away when we’re hurting, but skipping church is like unplugging ourselves from the power source we desperately need. Bring your pain to the altar and anoint Jesus’ feet with your tears.

Turn your pain into prayer. Tell God every hurt, disappointment, frustration, sadness, and ask Him all the difficult questions. He hears, cares, and answers when you call out to Him in desperation.
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Skipping church is like unplugging ourselves from the power source we desperately need. Bring your pain to the altar and anoint Jesus’ feet with your tears.
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Q4: How many books will be opened on Judgment day? I only remember the Lambs Book of life. But as I have been reading, it says books. What are the books that will be opened?

Two passages of Scripture mention a plurality of books that will be opened on the Day of Judgment. The prophet Daniel described an apocalyptic vision (waking thoughts) and wrote, “the judgment was set, and the books were opened (Daniel 7:10)”. He was alluding to a courtroom scene where everything was rightfully placed, the court was called to attention, and the books were opened. In this particular context, the books shown are books of judgment. The book of Revelation seems to be referencing the same future apocalyptic scene where there will be a great white throne of judgment (Revelation 20:11-15). If these two passages are describing the same future event, John the Revelator (the writer of Revelation) received more details in his vision:

12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. 13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. 14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. 15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:12-15).

The Book of Life & Books of Judgment

There are at least three books described in this vision. The names of all believers are listed in the book of life (Revelation 20:12). The “earth dwellers” names are not in the book of life (Revelation 13:8; 17:8). The first set of books mentioned appear to be the same books Daniel saw in his vision (Daniel 7:10). But John saw an additional book of life, and God revealed that anyone whose name is not in that book would be cast into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:15). That will be the final eternal sentencing by God upon each individual human.

According to What They Had Done

The lives of all who did not obey the Gospel and live according to God’s eternal Word will be completely exposed before God. Every selfish and defiant act and ungodly thought will be called into account. Even the secret sins, which it seemed no one knew about, will be brought to light and judged (Luke 8:17, Romans 2:16). All will be judged individually for their works according to God’s standards and principles, with consideration for motives and opportunities (Luke 12:47–48), which indicates differences in the sentencing and degree of punishment but not in the duration. The torment of the lake of fire is unquenchable. It will last forever (for a detailed examination of what the Bible teaches about Hell, consider reading What About Hell? – Everything You Need to Know).

It appears to me that the names written in the book of life will not be judged by what they had done. Instead, they will be judged by what Jesus had done for them. However, the names listed in the judgment books (we have no idea how many books there will be) will be adjudicated based on their works. And because all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, that will be an unwinnable case for them (Romans 3:23). Furthermore, it appears that hell will bring forth the dead who are unsaved before the final judgment (Revelation 20:13). Meaning, the Day of Judgment will be more of a formality than an actual legal proceeding. The unsaved will have already tasted Hell, and the saved will have already experienced a sample of Heaven’s splendor.

The names written in the book of life will not be judged by what they had done. Instead, they will be judged by what Jesus had done for them.
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A Final Possibility

Some scholars speculate that one of the judgment books mentioned might be the Bible itself. In my opinion, it would make sense for one book to be a record of every individual’s earthly conduct contrasted to God’s divine law recorded in Scripture. If God judges us according to our deeds, the standard of judgment will also be present, which is the Word of God. I have no problem accepting that as a possibility. All speculation aside, I just know my name needs to be in the book of life.

Q5: In Genesis 6:1-4, are the “sons of God” fallen angels, and did they marry and reproduce with the women of the earth? If not, what is the explanation of those chapters?

Genesis 6:1-4 is one of the most highly debated topics among saints and theologians alike. I’ll give my humble opinion on the subject as best I can. There are two (some would argue four) possible answers to your question. First (and most plausibly), the “sons of God” mentioned in Genesis 6:1-4 refer to the godly “sons of Seth” marrying the heathen daughters of Cain. God’s covenant people are often referred to in the Bible as “God’s sons” (Exodus 4:22, Deuteronomy 14:1, Romans 8:14). This view would explain why God eventually forbade the Israelites from marrying Canaanite women (Exodus 34:16, Deuteronomy 7:3).

Most plausibly, the “sons of God” mentioned in Genesis 6:1-4 refer to the godly “sons of Seth” marrying the heathen daughters of Cain.
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Demonic Offspring

However, it is a widespread opinion that the “sons of God” mentioned in Genesis were fallen angels marrying mortal women and producing giants. Although, you should know the word Nephilim or giants could mean giants in the sense of their fame, strength, or renown and does not necessarily refer to actual giants in the sense of height. There is some credence given to this idea in Peter’s epistles and the epistle of Jude (Jude 6, 2 Peter 2:4). I don’t believe this view to be accurate. Proponents of this view still leave us with more questions than answers.

Final Possibility

It would be far more plausible, in my opinion, to say demon-possessed men married and produced wicked offspring rather than believing literal angelic (spiritual beings) married and had half-human half-demon offspring. As best we can tell from Scripture, actual angels (or demons) are incapable of doing such a thing. Otherwise, Satan and all the fallen angels would most certainly be doing just that regularly trying to wreak havoc in this world. They do not, and that alone is enough to convince me that such a thing is impossible.

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Ryan explains The Narcissism of Knowing from ryanafrench.com. And in a new segment, Ryan answers five questions from readers and listeners: One, how should we feel about going to church when there is danger or a threat at hand? Two, what age is appropriate for an apostolic to start dating? Three, I am sitting with a dying friend with stage four lung cancer. I want a topic on learning to trust Jesus and faith. Four, How many books will be open on Judgment day? I only remember the Lambs Book of life. But as I have been reading, it says books. What are the books that will be open? I was reading Daniel chapter seven. Five, in Genesis six, are the “sons of God” fallen angels, and did they marry and reproduce with the women of the earth? If not, what is the explanation of those chapters? I know God’s angels are spiritual and are unable to reproduce. The lovely Taylor French (Ryan’s wife) joins the fun for another adventure of Gross-Good-Great featuring Krispy Kreme flavored Jelly Bellies. Finally, Ryan unveils his newest poem called The Glittering Edge of Truth.

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Ep. 46 | The Narcissism of Knowing, Your Questions Answered, Krispy Kreme Jelly Bellies with Taylor, and a New Poem

October 9, 2021

Ryan French

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Don’t Settle for an iTunes version of the Gospel (Article + Podcast)

October 1, 2021October 1, 2021 Ryan A. French

My kids inherited my deep love for music. But, unfortunately, they’re also picky and opinionated about the music we listen to regularly (also something they inherited from me). So, my iron-fisted reign over the music played in the car is being overthrown a little more each day. Complicating things further, my kids aren’t in total unity about which songs are “super great.” So, when they both like a particular singer, a tiny shred of heavenly peace fills our daily commutes.

Recently, we accidentally discovered Matthew West, a Christian solo artist. His lyrics are godly, and the kids are wild about it. Julia loves Becoming Me, and Talmadge thinks Amen is the anthem of the ages. After about a week straight of playing the “Anthem of the Ages” and the “Sweetest Song Ever Penned,” I couldn’t take it anymore. It turns out you can have too much of a good thing. So today, I gathered the kiddos around my outdated iPhone, fired up the iTunes store, and started sifting through all the Matthew West songs available. Fifteen dollars bought us all a little much-needed peace and sanity.

For those that don’t know, when you’re searching for music on the iTunes store, it allows you to listen to short clips of the songs before making a purchase. This had my kids up in arms. They reasoned that people couldn’t possibly decide if they liked a song in just a few seconds, which is kinda true. Their recommendation was to buy every song, but Matthew West has a big musical portfolio, and that was out of the question. So, we settled for doing our best to sort out which songs we truly enjoyed with limited information.

This whole process conjured up all kinds of happy memories from my childhood. Memories I happily shared with my kids. They were shocked to hear that you couldn’t buy one song at a time in the good old days and store them on your phone. They gasped at the concept of having to buy an entire CD and needed a detailed explanation of the word cassette tape. But, on the other hand, my eyes probably shined with joy telling stories of running into the Family Christian Store to buy the newest Steven Curtis Chapman album and listening to the entire thing from beginning to end. Not only would I listen to every word of every song, I’d open that slipcover and read all the lyrics, credits, and thank you’s too. Yep. Those are some of my favorite childhood memories.

Those days are long gone. The only album I’ve purchased in full in the last several years is this one – and you should too. People typically buy one song per album. Usually, it’s a song they heard on the radio. Anyone with any musical taste knows the radio hit is rarely the best song on the album (I told you I was musically opinionated). We miss so much great music in the age of iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, and whatever the other newfangled digital platform is ascending nowadays. We bypass wonderful songs because the little five-second clip doesn’t do it justice. We ignore songs because they’re not on the local Christian radio charts. Charts that increasingly seem to only have about five songs in rotation.

I may be pining for the old days now, but in reality, I love the convenience of not carrying 300 CDs around in my car. Also, it’s nice having all my music available at the touch of a button. Music is much cheaper when you aren’t forced to buy the entire album. In other words, there’s no going back now. And musically speaking, maybe that’s fine.

Every cultural revolution and technological advancement have unintended (or at least corresponding) sociological consequences. For example, many people approach the Bible like an iTunes playlist. They get little biblical snippets here and there, mostly from easily accessible digital sources. They’re familiar with the top ten Bible verses but rarely know the context or framework of their favorite scriptures. Their theology and understanding of the Gospel are based on sound clips and abbreviated versions that sound great but lack depth and richness. This is evidenced by nationwide lagging attendance during midweek Bible study services and further demonstrated by Christians who lack transformation and basic biblical knowledge. Unbelievers see and hear the lack of mainstream Christianity’s depth and want nothing to do with that slick, naive, cheap, polished brand of empty believe-ism.

Every cultural revolution and technological advancement have unintended (or at least corresponding) sociological consequences.
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Unbelievers see and hear the lack of mainstream Christianity’s depth and want nothing to do with that slick, naive, cheap, polished brand of empty believe-ism.
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It’s not possible to pick and choose the “highlights” or the “best of” moments of the Bible and leave the rest out. Jesus put it this way: “Man shall not live by bread alone but by every word the proceeds out of the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4).” Many churches are filled with sincere unsaved people who have not truly obeyed God’s Word because they unwittingly settled for an iTunes version of the Gospel. And the world is full of people who have rejected the iTunes version of the Gospel because they quickly recognized it as inconsistent, indefensible, and unsatisfying. You see, cheapening the Gospel doesn’t make it more palatable. It actually renders it worthless to the world. A little fly in the perfume gives the whole bottle a rotten smell (Ecclesiastes 10:1).

It’s not possible to pick and choose the “highlights” or the “best of” moments of the Bible and leave the rest out.
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Many churches are filled with sincere unsaved people who have not truly obeyed God’s Word because they unwittingly settled for an iTunes version of the Gospel.
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The saving power of the Gospel is more than mental assent, a moment of sincere belief, or an ecstatic emotional experience. The Gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Before you can even enter into the plan of salvation, you must believe that God exists and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him (Hebrews 11:6). Many people believe in the idea of God but reject Jesus. But to embrace the Gospel, we first must believe that Jesus Christ is both Lord and Savior (Acts 16:31, John 3:18, John 4:42).

The saving power of the Gospel is more than mental assent, a moment of sincere belief, or an ecstatic emotional experience. The Gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.
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The heart of the Gospel is the teaching that we must undergo our own spiritual death, burial, and resurrection just as Jesus did physically (Romans 6:3-8, Galatians 2:20, Colossians 2:12-13). There is one recorded instance in the Bible where bystanders clearly asked a question about salvation (Acts 2:37). Peter gives the most concise biblical answer in the following verse, and everyone in the early Church followed that apostolic foundation for salvation. Next, the apostle Peter preached: “…repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost (Acts 2:38).” That precise formula is the only way to be birthed (John 3:3, 1 Peter 1:23) into the Kingdom of God.

The heart of the Gospel is the teaching that we must undergo our own spiritual death, burial, and resurrection just as Jesus did physically (Romans 6:3-8, Galatians 2:20, Colossians 2:12-13).
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There is one recorded instance in the Bible where bystanders clearly asked a question about salvation (Acts 2:37). Peter gives the most concise biblical answer in the following verse…
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Essentially, repentance is our spiritual death (Galatians 5:24, Romans 6:11, Galatians 2:20, 1 Peter 2:24, Romans 6:6), baptism in Jesus’ name is our spiritual burial (Romans 6:3-4, Colossians 2:12-13), and the infilling of the Holy Ghost is our spiritual resurrection (Romans 6:5, Colossians 3:1, Romans 8:8-14). Furthermore, the infilling of the Holy Ghost is first evidenced by supernaturally speaking in unknown (previously unlearned) tongues (languages) just as they did in the book of Acts (Mark 16:17, Acts 2:4, Acts 10:46, Acts 19:6) and every time from then on. And, baptism is only salvific when done in the name of Jesus (Acts 4:12, Colossians 3:17, Acts 2:38, Acts 22:16, Galatians 3:27, Acts 10:48, Romans 6:3).

Baptism is only salvific when done in the name of Jesus (Acts 4:12, Colossians 3:17, Acts 2:38, Acts 22:16, Galatians 3:27, Acts 10:48, Romans 6:3).
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After we are obedient to the fullness of the Gospel, all the old sinful things pass away, and we become a new creation in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:17). We walk in agreement with the Spirit (Galatians 5:16). Meaning, God not only saves us from our past sin, but He also empowers us with His own Spirit to live righteously (2 Peter 1:3-4). The extra good news of the Gospel is that God doesn’t just save us and leave us the same: He saves us, changes us, dwells within us, and continues to strengthen us daily. Now that’s excellent news, and we’ve only scratched the surface of what it means to be transformed by the power of God.

After we are obedient to the fullness of the Gospel, all the old sinful things pass away, and we become a new creation in Christ Jesus (2 Corinthians 5:17).
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We walk in agreement with the Spirit (Galatians 5:16). Meaning, God not only saves us from our past sin, but He also empowers us with His own Spirit to live righteously (2 Peter 1:3-4).
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I know that isn’t the slick version of the Gospel many people have seen on TV or heard on the radio. It doesn’t fit nicely on a bumper sticker. God didn’t design the Gospel to blend in with our overly commercialized culture. No. The Gospel is timeless, changeless, and sacred. So please don’t settle for an iTunes version of the Gospel that doesn’t save or satisfy.

Podcast Featuring the Above Article

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Ryan exposes easy-believism from his www.ryanafrench.com article titles Don’t Settle For an iTunes Version of the Gospel. Then, Julia and Talmadge French join the fun for an extended segment of Gross-Good-Great, where they take their job very seriously of rating Jelly Belly Gummies, Skittles Gummies, and Caramel Apple Chews.

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Ep. 45 | The iTunes Gospel & Salvation, Gross-Good-Great with Julia and Talmadge (Jelly Belly Gummies, Skittles Gummies, Caramel Apple Chews)

Oneness Theology, Church History & Where the Church Is Right Now – Podcast Transcript with Dr. Talmadge French

May 13, 2021May 13, 2021 Ryan A. French

Below is the podcast transcript (episode 22) of a candid conversation between me and my dad, Dr. Talmadge French, author of the best-selling books Our God Is One, and G.T. Heywood: Early Interracial Oneness Pentecostalism. This is probably one of the best discussions you will ever hear about church history, the oneness of God in Church History, The Burning of Michael Servetus by John Calvin, baptism in Jesus’ name, and the Existence of Truth during the Dark Ages. If you’d like to listen to the entire podcast conversation I’ve attached it to the end of this article.

Ryan French: [00:01:44] You are my dad and you’re the premier Apostolic Pentecostal oneness historian, probably in the world, and I have a unique and rare opportunity to be able to just drag you in here kicking and screaming to talk about church history. And so I’m really excited about it and I hope we’ll do it fairly regularly. But what I wanted to do today is kind of backtrack from where most people want to start, which is the turn of the last century. And we’ll get to that. But there’s kind of that long gap of church history, certainly for us as Pentecostals that we don’t discuss as often, maybe as other traditions or denominations do. And certainly, the Dark Ages. Which brings me to the very first topic that I wanted to have you weigh in on. And it’s also a question that I receive a lot from people through the website and at www.ryanafrench.com. And it’s basically this question and I’m going to ask it to you the way people ask it to me. Do you believe the Church and by the church, I mean full truth, people filled with the Holy Ghost, baptized in Jesus’ name? Do you believe the Church existed throughout the Dark Ages and somewhere up until the outpourings of the Holy Ghost at the turn of the last century… Basically from the Book of Acts until today? Do you believe that a remnant somewhere, even if it might have been just a small group, do you believe it existed?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:03:45] Ok, well, that’s the question that every apostolic is interested in, because and it’s not just apostolics, but every Christian group has to believe or hope that their faith is a Bible faith, whether you can prove a direct line all the way back or not. Right. And of course, Pentecostals are like all restorationists. They believe that Pentecost and speaking in tongues is biblical. Therefore, our experience is biblical. So what happened during those intervening years and so on? And then secondarily, you have the issue of like for me, I was Trinitarian, but came to an understanding of oneness, belief, like millions of people have. And so I wanted to know, how did my faith line up with the apostles? That is what I’m saying, actually, apostolic. And if so, what happened to it? Yeah. So the short answer for me is, yes, the church has always existed. But what’s really important is, I mean, that’s important to be able to say, OK, my faith goes all the way back. But how do I know that and how does it work itself out? And the truth of the matter is that church history itself is extremely complex because of the way we interpret church history, there was a great deal of things going on all the way back to the time of the apostles. So I’ve spent a better part of my faith, especially since I’ve been apostolic looking at the historical record, trying to understand what people were saying and what actually occurred back there. And I would… I’d summarize it like this so we can maybe go to the next step. But that the fact of the matter is, for a very long time, the apostolic faith was definitely being preached in the early church. But there came a time when it began to evolve into something else so that after about the time of Sebelius, around two eighty-five roughly right in there, it started to be less and less where the truth was one hundred percent believed in all the churches. There came to be what I call an attack of intellectualism on the church, especially Greek intellectualism. And there was also a movement which was pretty well connected to Greek intellectualism. It was called Gnosticism; it was a movement that believed they were super-spiritual. And these things have always been what they’ve been throughout church history, but when that began to take effect, then the Greek mind, the intellectual mind began to try to square everything with Greek, with Philo and the Greek intellectualism. And the Church began to become more diverse so that you would have these really super smart guys out there at the periphery of the Church that were saying, well, Jesus is not actually the one God, he’s in the one God. And you begin somewhere in there around two hundred. And later, the beginnings of what we would think of as a trinitarian way of thinking or a binatarian way of thinking. And eventually, by the time you get to the councils in three, twenty-five, and so on, you’ve got full-blown Trinitarianism or debates about Trinitarianism and who Jesus was. And was he God or was he just in the Godhead? Well, these are things that the Bible doesn’t even address because they’re not biblical, but they’ve become pretty powerful by the time you get to the councils, and by the time the Catholic Church is an issue which is around 500, you’ve got I mean, just think about how long America’s been here, in about five hundred years of Christianity. That’s a lot of time. And by the end of it, you have Truth, and you have error all throughout Christianity

Ryan French: [00:08:18] Would you say it’s kind of a merging of the secular and the sacred or maybe a merging of secular philosophy in the same way and even throw government in there?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:08:31] Right. Because when you get to the time of Constantine in three hundred in the Council of Nicaea, there wouldn’t have been a Nicaea had there not been a Constantine who had converted to Christianity. But many, many scholars will tell you that Constantine was not much of a Christian, but yet he had the greatest impact on Christianity. And so, I would…

Ryan French: [00:08:55] Can we pause for the low information. I, I know we have a lot of wonderful listeners out there who may not know who Constantine is. Could you just give a brief description?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:09:07] He became the emperor of Rome. The Roman emperor.

Ryan French: [00:09:11] So was that roughly around three hundred?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:09:14] Let’s just say around three…

Ryan French: [00:09:15] Around three hundred. By then, the Church was in full swing…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:09:20] …and when he became a Christian, then the Roman Empire became Christian whether they were Christian or not. Right. Right. So, it was a whole new era.

Ryan French: [00:09:30] So in a lot of ways. You had kind of the advent of the Christians in name only.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:09:35] Well, it was definitely Christian in name only. But see, a lot of Christians today have a struggle with that because they want to believe that all of this error that’s going on in Christianity and the diversity of Christianity was just part and parcel of it. They don’t want to believe that at the very beginning there was a pristine Church that held to a pristine doctrine. So how do you explain in the Bible them baptizing in Jesus name and three hundred years later, they’re advocating for Trinity baptism? How do you explain that? Well, you go to Matthew chapter 19 and try to prove that’s the real baptism and they can’t do it. So, but of…

Ryan French: [00:10:16] …wouldn’t we as apostolics, point to Jesus himself who warned that there would be wolves that would come in and there would be false doctrines and false Christ of all kinds?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:10:29] And Paul himself said it was happening right under his nose

Ryan French: [00:10:33] Right in the beginning, Judaizers…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:10:34] But those errors, of course, weren’t Trinitarian, you don’t see anything remotely Trinitarian until close to two hundred, certainly, I’ve had a lot of Trinitarians say to me, well, oh my goodness. Well, if it could happen if Trinitarianism evolved by two hundred, it could have been one hundred years earlier as if the one hundred years doesn’t make a difference. Look at America right now, how quickly it’s gone from one type of country almost into socialism or bordering on it. We’re literally battling right now for the soul of America all within twenty-five years. So, think of that.

Ryan French: [00:11:16] Amazing how in one or two decades the whole world can change.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:11:19] And if you add a century to it, so in a century you could have a church, for example, a Pentecostal group could start off as holiness and one hundred years later, not even know what holiness is.

Ryan French: [00:11:33] Not even resemble what they began as…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:11:35] I was a part of a Pentecostal group that was strict holiness. And then within twenty-five years, they dropped it and moved on to something else. And today they don’t even know if they’re Pentecostal.

Ryan French: [00:11:46] I was listening to a podcast the other day. I can’t remember his name. The podcast is called Apologia and they’re Trinitarians. I think they consider themselves Southern Baptists of some kind. And he was really attacking… Actually, the podcast, for the most part, they’re pretty interesting. But out of nowhere, he started attacking what he called Modalists. But of course, he’s talking about oneness people and he wasn’t attacking us because I think he was looking at a kind of a charismatic, non-denominational, kind of wishy-washy group. They’re not really oneness, but they’re not really Trinitarian either. They’re just kind of a “whatever” kind of a deal. And it was so interesting because he had spent the beginning of the episode talking about Sola Scriptura and the inerrancy of Scripture, which, of course, I was on board with that. It sounded like something I would say that we’ve got to hold… we’ve got to pull all of our doctrines out and hold everything up to the light of Scripture, which is language that I identify with. But then when he started attacking modalism or the oneness and basically rebuking this group very strongly for basically rejecting what he called the Triune God or the Triune Godhead, he never used the word Trinity, which I thought was interesting. He always used the word triune. Instead of appealing to Scripture, he never once appealed to Scripture to do that, he appealed to church history. And I thought, how interesting, you just spent your forty-five minutes basically saying we’ve got to hold all of our beliefs up to the Word of God. But then when you’re defending your triune belief in the Godhead and a triune baptism and all of this, instead of going back to Sola Scriptura, you’re going to church history and stopping there and you’re not even going all the way back in church history. You’re going…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:14:00] Well, it’s really enlightening that you’re hearing this podcast and they’re doing this because that’s exactly what goes on with Trinitarian thought. Now, that doesn’t mean that Trinitarian scholars don’t think they can prove the trinity in the Bible. They basically think that they’re proving the trinity in the Bible through a series of hints. Like how can you have a Son if there’s not a Father? And so, everything’s through hints. There’s no direct teaching about it.

Ryan French: [00:14:39] You’ve got the dove and Jesus and the voice…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:14:42] I’ve often said this, and this is the way most oneness people think. If the Bible meant to teach a trinity, it would say there is a trinity. Now, then you would have the problem that Moses did not believe in a trinity, and the God of the Old Testament then and the revealed God of the New Testament would be very different. So they would say, well, the Son came. This is Trinitarian logic. So the Son came, was born, and came to earth and that proved there was a trinity before. So the logic of Trinitarianism theologically is not rooted in the Bible. It’s rooted in what the church accepted over three hundred years. And so, they have several issues with it, of course. But let’s go back to this group then that says, well, we’re going to condemn oneness people because of church history. That’s basically what they’re doing. They’re saying that we have to trust the church. So, whatever the church said in three hundred or five hundred, no matter that it became Catholic…

Ryan French: [00:15:46] I was just going to say, why aren’t we all Catholic then?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:15:48] Well, we would be if we followed that logic. But they’re not following logic. The only thing they’re following logically in that period is the doctrine of the Trinity. They don’t believe much else about it. And of course, the Catholic Church had lots of issues that even to this day are so far from Scripture. And oneness people are simply saying the trinity is not found in Scripture, therefore we don’t embrace it.

Ryan French: [00:16:18] This guy went so far as to say, and I’m not even mentioning his name because it’s not worth it to me, but I’m just wanting to think through the logic of how… I view him, I guess, as maybe a stand-in or a type of that group’s way of thinking. He was basically saying that if you’re not Trinitarian and again, I thought it was fascinating he never used the word Trinitarian or Trinity, but if you don’t believe in the triune Godhead, you’re not a Christian. You’re a cult of Christianity. In fairness to him, I’m actually thankful that he believes what he believes and that he’ll fight for it because I feel much the same way. But in reverse, I feel like, for example, I look at the Catholic Church in some ways as a Christian cult as well, at least theologically. I don’t mean that everyone in the Catholic Church is a cult, but at least the leadership of it. But then there’s also this secondary growing movement. That. Other generations have not seen like my generation is seeing, and that is a middle group that says, well, it doesn’t matter if you’re trinitarian or oneness. Because what people will say and I know you’ve heard this, that it’s all, it’s just semantics. It’s just semantics. So that’s why you have a lot of people, and we’re really rabbit trailing, but this is a great discussion. You have a lot of people who will say, how we’ll all kind of meet in the middle and we will baptize people and we’ll say in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, whose name is Jesus, and then they feel like they’re covering all their bases. And they’ll say, well, when you speak of the Trinity, we’re actually oneness. But then you have groups like this guy at Apologia who considers that to be heresy, and then you have groups like us on the complete other end of the spectrum. How do we start to combat? What I think of as the growing trend towards this kind of middle ground wishy-washy it doesn’t matter?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:18:42] That is exactly the most important question because what you’re really describing is the state of the Christian church today. You have Christianity, let’s call it Orthodox thinking. All right. The fellow you’re describing, whoever he is, is typical of people that are trying to hold on to Orthodoxy. Now he would be opposed to Catholicism. I’m just guessing. And so, in most of its varieties. But yet what he means by Orthodox thinking is there has to be something that roots, that roots the church and that’s Trinitarianism. Now, the fact of the matter is, though, that Christianity has moved away from that. They’re no longer looking at trinity. Christian liberalism is no longer worried about the trinity. This has been going on for a very long time. We’re talking seventeen hundreds all the way to now. So, we’re talking a very long time where Christians have begun to quit… For example, the deity of Jesus will this fellow you’re talking about is going to fight for the deity of Jesus. So really what we’re

Ryan French: [00:19:58] Really common ground there, which is interesting…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:19:59] We have common ground.

Ryan French: [00:20:01] It’s weird because we wind up almost having common ground with people who are very opposed to some of our beliefs…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:20:06] His starting point is the trinity. You either start with the trinity or you’re nothing. That’s what he says. Right. Liberalism has no starting point whatsoever. It’s what we think of it as sort of the squishy middle. All right. Now, Catholics are very Orthodox. They are basically unchanged now. There’s lots of troubles in the Catholic Church, but they’re basically unchanged. They’re still holding to the idea of the pope and the universal nature of Catholicism and the trinity. They’ve altered almost nothing regarding the trinity, even though many Catholic scholars have come along and wondered about the possibility of modal thinking and so on.

Ryan French: [00:20:51] And there’s even been outpourings of the Holy Ghost in the Catholic Church, is that correct? I don’t mean in the church as a whole, but in individual churches and…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:20:59] Absolutely, there’s been a major outpouring in all denominations and people have accepted speaking in tongues. It’s somewhat fading at the moment.

Ryan French: [00:21:24] Let me tell you about Anchor, it’s the easiest way to make a podcast, and best of all, it’s absolutely free to get started. There are creation tools that allow you to record and edit your podcast right from your phone or computer. Anchor will distribute your podcasts for you so it can be heard on Spotify, Apple, and all the other platforms as well. It’s important because it’s hard to get a podcast started. I’ve tried in the past. It’s hard to get it off the ground. It can be very complicated. Anchor does a great job of making it user-friendly and kind of keeping things in one place for you, which just helps you organize your thoughts. And as you get better and better at it, Anchor is just a great central location for you to have all your workflow. It’s everything you need to make a podcast in one place. If you’ve been thinking about podcasting at all, download their free Anchor app. Just go to Anchor.fm to get started. You can also find their app on Apple and Android devices.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:22:48] What we’re seeing then is that there’s what liberalism has become, and what the oneness movement has become, and this is what this fellow is reacting to. The oneness movement, if you look at various groups that have diverged from Trinitarian thinking, you could think of the squishy middle and the liberals as diverging from Trinitarian thinking. But it’s not wholesale abandonment of Trinitarianism. But so you look at the groups out there that say, I just don’t think the Trinity is the right answer. Well, the largest group of those are oneness people because we’re talking somewhere between 30 and 50 million living believers right now that stand strong for oneness theology. All right. And so these folks are trying to hold on to a complete one hundred percent trinity is the answer. Well, the Catholic Church does it and they’re doing it. And we might call him the orthodox conservative element, they are doing it.

Ryan French: [00:23:50] Is there anybody else who holds on? And I know there is. But we could just for people who might be thinking with us in this discussion, aside from the Catholic Church, aside from maybe the Southern Baptists, are the Presbyterians still holding on to Trinitarianism?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:24:07] They’re split on the issue; Lutherans are split over lots of issues. So, you have a lot of liberals who would talk about the trinity, but they don’t believe in the Trinity in the way that we would think of as Orthodox. Right. They’re not quite sure of, for example, the deity of Christ is extremely squishy in the middle…

Ryan French: [00:24:35] Can you explain to people who may not understand what you mean by the deity of Christ…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:24:39] That Jesus is actually God…

Ryan French: [00:24:40] So maybe mention a popular, I’ll use the word heresy or false doctrine, that people are falling into about the deity of Jesus, that he was not God…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:25:04] Liberal Christians like, you know, it goes all the way back to the seventeen hundreds of people like Schleiermacher who thought that you could never be certain that Jesus was Divine. He wasn’t necessarily Divine. What he did was from God. So, the heresy would be what conservatives today would refer to as the Fatherhood of God, that God was just the Father. The Son was not Divine. So, you would end up with one God, but Jesus wasn’t part of a Godhead.

Ryan French: [00:25:40] What would you call that doctrine?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:25:42] Well, I call it liberalism or theologically, it was this idea of the Fatherhood of God.

Ryan French: [00:25:48] Now how is that different from Divine Flesh?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:25:53] Oh, totally. Yeah. There’s no relationship. Divine Flesh is that Jesus was not only God but that his flesh was Divine. His flesh was not his actual flesh. It was not an actual flesh. It was Divine something. Yes. Which is which is heresy!

Ryan French: [00:26:08] Which denies the humanity…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:26:10] It sacrifices the real humanity of Christ. So that’s a totally different error which is not just something that we see in Pentecostalism, it’s something that you see all the way back to the time of Luther. This idea that there was for example, that all comes from the idea that the Catholics said you could eat the actual flesh, the Eucharist, that when you take the Eucharist, you put it into your mouth, it becomes flesh. So, in that came all kinds of error, which, of course, is one of the problems with Catholic thinking, just one of the things. But you see, the fellow you’re talking about is attempting to hold on to the absolute trinity of God, whether the Bible ever taught it or not, because what they’re going to do is extrapolate it back. Now, in other words, say, even though the Bible doesn’t explicitly teach it, it’s there and that’s what they believe, though they never said it. Now, that’s, of course, rather crazy to say they believe something they never said they believed and never even used the word trinity.

Ryan French: [00:27:12] Yeah, I was going to say… So, this is kind of how our relationship for those that don’t know, I’m very privileged to serve with Dad, going on nine years now, here on the south side of Atlanta. The way we work in our church is, dad’s the genius and I’m always kind of the everyday weird word guy, but speaking of the word weird to use completely nontheological terminology, don’t you think? I don’t mean this in an ugly, disrespectful way. Just logically, isn’t it weird to go to church history? To pull the doctrine of the Trinity, but then ignore church history to leave the Catholic Church and then try to go back to the Bible? Just logically, isn’t that flawed? It’s flawed in so many ways…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:28:17] So one way to think of it, if we could not get too complex, is that they look back into church history and try to find the trinity. And of course, it did develop in the hundreds and hundreds of years so that you ended up with basically just one church that was Catholic. Now, that doesn’t mean there was just one church because we started up this discussion asking the question, did the oneness movement go all the way back? And I said, well, the answer is yes, it does go all the way back. But the question is, how does it do that?

Ryan French: [00:28:54] Well, and my answer is always that this movement goes all the way back to the Old Testament. Right. But you know that that’s a simplistic answer.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:29:02] So what oneness people need to be doing is finding out how it went all the way back, because you’re not going to have the enemies of the oneness of God looking for answers for how the oneness was embraced. I’m quite convinced by church history that there were tons of oneness people. And I see…

Ryan French: [00:29:25] Yes. OK, so we’re going to jump into that in just a second. But I keep feeling the need to backtrack for people who aren’t… I know we have people who have these kinds of discussions and read these kinds of things all the time, but I know there are some wonderful people out there and maybe this is the first time they’ve really used some of these terms. So, let me go all the way back to kind of the beginning. And you used the word restorationist. Can you just give a brief definition of what a restorationist is? OK, and you know, we’re restorationist.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:29:57] Many Christians that are not Pentecostal are restorationists and almost all Pentecostals are restorationists. A restorationist is someone who views Christian faith as something that they lost.

Ryan French: [00:30:17] Martin Luther for example?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:30:18] Well, Lutherans are not, strictly speaking, restorationists, but there were many restorationists…

Ryan French: [00:30:27] But Martin Luther himself was…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:30:28] Martin Luther saw himself as restoring to the church what he viewed as Catholicism’s having lost. So, you end up with Lutheranism now, Lutherans themselves did not view themselves as strict restorationists. And like Pentecostals do, Pentecostals view themselves as restorationists because people were not baptizing correctly. Well, let’s say, for example. The Catholic Church baptizes infants, yes, so do Methodists, so do lots of people, but restorationist-minded people say we have to go back to the Bible to find our answer. Or oneness Pentecostals say that not only for the way you baptize but people speaking in tongues. Well, did speaking in tongues stop? No. But did the church as a whole stop preaching, speaking in tongues? Obviously, they did. Certainly, was not practiced in the era of the Catholic dominance and so on, and so now does that mean nobody was speaking in tongues? No, I suspect a lot of people were speaking in tongues, but it was not something you got away with because Catholicism basically choked it up. There was a whole lot of rooting out people that didn’t believe what they wanted you to believe.

Ryan French: [00:31:51] That tags perfectly with where I wanted to go next, which is kind of a twofold question. I wanted you to maybe introduce Michael Servetus to people who maybe have never heard of him before. You might give some information they don’t know. But also tagging into that, at what point did the Catholic Church become militant in the sense that they forced you to believe with the sword? You’ve got the Crusades and you’ve got the Catholic Church burning people at the stake. I often tell people, well, of course, in history, if you’re oneness and if you were speaking in tongues you were probably going underground because otherwise you might get burned at the stake. Or you might have your tongue cut out. So, when did that start? When did the church become violent, which to me is evil, of course? Can you imagine if the Church was trying to be militant today how we’d be…?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:32:59] You know, it’s interesting because the group that you were describing at the beginning that is trying to hold on to strict Trinitarianism and condemning oneness people would probably say that when Calvin burned Servetus at the stake that that was OK because how dare him deny something that Calvin believed was 100% theologically correct.

Ryan French: [00:33:27] So for people who don’t know John Calvin…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:33:30] Was a reformer of Protestantism who had Servetus because he was oneness had him burned at the stake.

Ryan French: [00:33:39] So what time are we talking about here?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:33:41] That was in the fifteen hundreds.

Ryan French: [00:33:45] So you’re about a thousand five hundred or so…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:33:49] So we’re talking five hundred years ago. So, think of it. The Church involved in five hundred years at the beginning from an Apostolic Bible group. By 500 years later you have basically them talking about is Mary the mother of God and is there a pope that rules the church? None of that’s in the Bible. And yet that’s where the church is. Trinitarianism is pretty rampant in Christianity by then.

Ryan French: [00:34:15] John Calvin, even today, you have Calvinism and probably, I think, one of the most dangerous, deadly false doctrines that still permeates a lot of. Quote unquote, Christian thinking is what I call once saved, always saved, or the doctrine of eternal security, where no matter what you do, you can’t be plucked from the hand of God. You can be an adulterer. But if you’ve said your prayer and all that, then you’re saved. Or you’ve got some people who are Divinely destined for Hell and some people are Divinely destined for Heaven because God chose… All of this is Calvinism or finds its roots in Calvinism. And so, you have this massive segment of Christianity that puts Calvin on this huge pedestal. And yet he was a murderer. In my mind. I consider him wicked. Are you willing to say? We’ve talked about this, but are you willing to say that Calvin was a wicked maniac. And I know he was a genius in a certain sense, but…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:35:15] Oh, I don’t think anyone that burns people alive, is anything short of a wicked person. OK, so but to what I was referring to a moment ago, I’ve been very outspoken that Calvin’s behavior was unbelievable. And he was no. It turns out that here he was one of the most outspoken critics of Catholicism in the fifteen hundreds, and yet he used the same tactics. That was to kill the people he opposed, kill the opposition. Now, I had a professor because I’m oneness, but I haven’t always been and had a professor at a Christian university that I attended told me that you have to expect you’re going to be burned alive if you oppose theological thinking. And I said, so you’re saying that killing Christians is OK? And he said, no, no, I’m not saying that. I’m trying to say you have to understand that we have to forgive Calvin. I said, no, I cannot forgive Calvin. Nobody can forgive Calvin. But God. He murdered a man for no reason. So in other words, using that was the Catholic notion. And by the same token, Catholics forgive their past for killing, who knows how many thousands of people. I mean, in horrific ways, just think of the Inquisition. But to simplify this, though, what actually occurred. So you got 500 years of the early church where there was things happening, where the faith and speaking in tongues and baptism in Jesus’ name was becoming a minority and people were pushing it back. I call it the Dark Ages and I don’t get this from oneness people. I get this from conservatives who now are nervous about using the term the Dark Ages, where they begin to move into a period of time where one group began to take control of Christianity and everybody like you couldn’t, for example, at the time of the Reformation, which was fifteen hundreds and the hundred years or two-hundred years before that, you could be executed for owning a Bible. Yes, for printing a Bible, because the Catholic Church said nobody could control the Bible but them.

Ryan French: [00:37:41] Amazing stories of people who got a Tindale Bible and go hide in their closet to be able to read and…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:37:48] So a lot of people were really moving back into what I’m thinking of as a New Dark Age and have been for a very long time. It’s probably the era just before the coming of the Lord. But what actually occurred is that in that era where, for example, you could be executed and were executed by either a Catholic or a Protestant if you immerse people. If you just took a person out and baptized them in a river and buried them and they found out about it and got caught. You could be executed.

Ryan French: [00:38:31] So and then in modern history, I don’t think it’s as bad now as it was. But, you know, theologically speaking, there was a time where you were culturally burned at the stake or intellectually burned at the stake, you were blacklisted, you were boycotted. If you deviated from at least trinitarian orthodoxy, it’s always amazing to me how you have all these denominations, the Baptists, the Catholics, and of course, the Baptists have all kinds of variations of denominations, the Methodists, the Lutherans…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:39:06] And the Church of God…

Ryan French: [00:39:07] You have all of these and they’re all united by trinitarianism. And if you walk in that orthodoxy, it’s like you’re OK, no matter what else you do. I’ve always thought that was strange and very telling… It’s one of the major doctrines that they have that is non-biblical and totally historical in context. And yet that’s what unites them. And then they put everyone else in this camp of being anti orthodoxy when in reality we’re really the orthodox ones… I want to just say something before we go back. You were talking about people being burned at the stake just for owning a Bible in the Dark Ages, where all of this time in church history, where the Catholic Church controlled the narrative of Scripture because only, they had access to the Bible. So, you were having to completely trust a priest and the pope and his emissaries to tell you what the Bible said via their interpretation. And, of course, we know now that the Catholic Church has moved far beyond the Bible and the pope can speak for God as God, and his word becomes in their way of thinking, just as an errant as the word of God. So that creates all kinds of problems. And so, you have all of these years where people were hungry. This is a whole nother discussion. I’d love to have about men like Tyndale, who you mentioned, and Wycliff, who I mean, they gave their lives to be able to translate the word of God into a language that the commoner could read and understand without having to know Latin or Greek or Hebrew. And they did all of this knowing that they were going to be persecuted and probably killed at some point. And then they distributed these precious Bibles to people, often handwritten, and people were secretly getting them. I mean, some of these stories that I’ve read where I mean, it just makes you weep when people get a Bible and they’re having to hide it, they’re trying to read it for themselves. And so, you have this kind of this imposed dark age of spiritual ignorance where people, God bless them, they’re walking in darkness. But it was really the blind leading the blind. And the blind had no access to light because the Scripture was being completely controlled. But today, I think this is the point I wanted to get at. As you said, it’s like we’re going back to that. But this is different today. It’s like we have a self-imposed dark age where people have more access to the Bible than ever in the history of the world. I mean, even as I’m old enough now to remember a time when if you wanted to read the Bible. You were going to have to go to the bookstore and purchase a Bible for yourself. And if you wanted one that was going to last you were going to have to spend a good deal of money. But now people via smartphones, which it just seems like smartphones, have been with us since the beginning of time, but they haven’t. It’s a fairly recent phenomenon. And the Internet and computers, you can go to Bible Gateway right now and you can read the Bible online day or night, completely free, any translation you want, even horrific ones. But you have access to it. And yet statistics tell us that people are reading the Bible less and less and less. So, it’s almost as if we have this overwhelming access to it and now people are indifferent to it. It’s not that there’s a class of people above us keeping us from the Word of God, it’s that people are keeping themselves.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:43:42] Ok. Well, let’s go back to something we were talking about, and that is what does a man like Michael Servetus represent? Because the initial question has been do I believe that the oneness, Apostolic Pentecostal faith of repenting, and baptizing in the name of Jesus, receiving the Holy Spirit, and living holy, did that go all the way back to the early church? All those centuries, so Servetus represents a person. Who not only died for the very message that I’m preaching right now, but he represents an entire generation of people that believed because even though church history is difficult to trace, because, you know, the victors wipe out a great deal of the writings and..?

Ryan French: [00:44:50] Yeah, they get to write the history.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:44:52] And plus, if you know your children are going to die, if they find out who you are and where you are, you keep that a secret. So, you have these, you know, evidences. So, I’m going to give just a quick answer now that we’re in the context of Michael Servetus, who died brutally, by the way, I mean, of course, you couldn’t be burned at the stake without it being brutal, but the entire episode was brutal. It was a man that at the age of fourteen knew seven languages, I mean, he is one of the most brilliant men of the Reformation.

Ryan French: [00:45:25] …and not just the theologian.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:45:27] And he had gone to Calvin because he wanted so desperately to talk to him about the need to get back to Scripture. And they executed him. So, all of the people that held to oneness views throughout the centuries, we cannot excavate all of their writings even though we know about lots of them, but we don’t know what all of them believe because they’re lost to history.

Ryan French: [00:46:04] They’re not in the iCloud.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:46:05] And yet, if you say that to someone who’s the victor, who says, well, I’m a trinitarian and I am, bless God, it goes all the way back. And you said, well, you have killed all of our people. How are we supposed to be able to then mount a historical defense? We don’t have the ability to dig out their graves and find all their writings. But we know they were there because when we trace the evidence, we can find the group that he came from and why he held the oneness view goes all the way back to his childhood. And it’s difficult to do, but it can be done. We know that in, for example, that in Spain, where he was born, there was a group there baptizing in Jesus’ name all the way back. So, and what that did for me was it didn’t just demonstrate that Servetus believed in the oneness of God, but that he applied it to his understanding of baptism, in other words, he didn’t baptize in a trinity formula because he came from a group that didn’t baptize in the trinity formula and that this is the way you almost have to do history. Throughout the entire period.

Ryan French: [00:47:17] Servetus was a genius. Yes. Don’t you think some of Calvin’s venom towards Servetus was jealousy not just theologically rooted?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:47:30] There’s no doubt it was jealousy. There was a whole lot of jealousy. Yeah, Calvin as a man, not as a scholar, had a lot of faults. And one of them was this. I mean, he’s the great scourge on Calvin was the burning of a Protestant. He was burned. He became the martyr that shocked the world. There’s not a long history of Protestants burning one another. Right. But Servetus who was oneness is the one that they that basically…

Ryan French: [00:48:07] Is Servetus the only individual that we know of that Calvin burned or did… Was that common practice for him to have people executed?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:48:15] No, it was not common practice for him to execute people.

Ryan French: [00:48:20] You mentioned…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:48:21] So I want to say this, since we’re right there, that it’s difficult to understand why a trinitarian would be so opposed to oneness thinking because modalism espouses 100 percent the Father, Son, and the Spirit. Absolutely. And as one God, totally not in a trinitarian sense, but absolutely one God. Jesus is Divine. Jesus is God. The Holy Spirit is God. And they’re all one, actually one. And yet they’re so opposed to it that the hatred for it would literally lead a man to burn another man at the stake. I find it. I mean, to…

Ryan French: [00:49:07] To me, I’m just going to make a very controversial statement, maybe not to us, but to many Christians, it’s demonic. It’s rooted in a demonic…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:49:19] Well, you mean to kill someone?

Ryan French: [00:49:22] Well, trinitarian itself is, well, demonically inspired. I mean, when you have a group of people perverting the word of God and then turning into a movement that’s murdering people. To me, that is evidence of it being a demonically inspired theology. And for that to be the hill that, quote-unquote, Christians would be willing to kill people on. Throughout history and then today, for people to be willing to intellectually and culturally kill people to use extreme language…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:50:04] It’s extreme to burn someone at the stake. And then you also have the context that now after the oneness movement has been around here for over 100 years now. So today the trend is what liberalism is doing to say, I don’t believe in all that holiness and baptism in Jesus’ name and moralism, but I accept that they’re genuine Christians. That’s the trend. Yeah. So, your friend, the fellow you were listening to, he’s in the minority because today…

Ryan French: [00:50:41] He’s rejecting that…

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:50:43] He’s rejecting that trend that says, hey, I can accept because the Pentecostal church today, the oneness movement within it is massive. And even Trinitarian Pentecostals are more and more embraced. For example, I’m involved because I have a Ph.D. and I’m involved in lots of things in Pentecostalism. I’m involved with Trinitarians that I totally oppose their theological stance. And yet I’m in academic societies with them trying to get the oneness message in my beliefs and my writings out there. And they’re willing to allow that by not burning me at the stake,

Ryan French: [00:51:26] Not anymore.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:51:27] They’re not anymore that’s the trend. Now, that doesn’t mean there are tons of people that hold to a Trinitarianism. I guess we’d have to wait till the Lord comes to figure out what’s in people’s hearts. But the sad thing is that Calvin didn’t wait, he just went ahead and burned, burned oneness people. That’s what he did.

Ryan French: [00:51:49] Maybe we have someone listening who and I’m sure we do or will maybe they are trinitarians or maybe they’re not sure. And. They’re trying to think through, and I’ve had many sincere people, many sincere, good Christians who when I say this may take it in a condescending way and I don’t mean to be condescending, but what I think of as low information Christians, they don’t really know anything about church history. It’s amazing how many people you meet now. They don’t know anything about church history. They really don’t know their Bible. They might know like for God so loved the world. They might know, John, 3:16 or something like that, but they don’t really know Scripture. And so, they’re trying to very simplistically and sincerely, which, by the way, you know, if you will approach God simplistically and sincerely and you’re truly doing that with a heart to seek after God. You know, I believe the Bible says Jesus himself said seek and you shall find knock on the door, it will open. So that’s a beautiful thing. I’m not criticizing that. But maybe someone’s asking themselves and I even know apostolics who ask themselves this question, what is the difference theologically, and how does it affect our salvation? I always come back to baptism, but if I’m a trinitarian, or if I’m oneness, what does it matter to God? Why would God care how I view it, and I know that’s a big, broad, crazy, strange question loaded with minefields, but what does it matter? That’s really what the middle is asking. What does it matter? Does it ultimately matter if you’re trinitarian or if you’re oneness or…?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:53:35] It must matter. Let’s keep it in the context of our conversation right there. If it mattered enough to a trinitarian to kill a man who didn’t believe it. Then there is an enormous difference in my mind, having been a Trinitarian. And of course, I know a whole lot of oneness people who were trinitarian and there’s lots of them, they get a lot of flak because trinitarians believe that, as you said a moment ago, that if you think that Jesus is God but is not a second person in the Godhead, then you’re not even going to Heaven. That’s how strong they are now, I believe that trinitarianism and oneness doctrine are the same as light and darkness, because trinitarianism is not a biblical message when you say that Jesus is not God himself, but he’s part of God himself. That’s not a biblical message. Jesus is the Alpha and Omega. He’s the totality. He’s not part of the Godhead. He is the Godhead. So in my mind, trinitarianism was the godhead of a Christianity that had lost its way. The oneness doctrine is the godhead of the apostles, so it makes all the difference now, which is why we call ourselves apostolic.

Ryan French: [00:55:06] And so they change baptism. From Jesus’ name baptism to trinity baptism. But that in itself is heresy beyond… This is where I always go, right? Because it’s the easiest one to go to. The greatest flaw or the greatest evil of trinitarianism. Is that it now becomes a changing of the mode, the salvific mode of baptism, where now you are baptizing people in titles instead of in the name and we know that the name is really where the efficacy of baptism comes into play. It’s not the water. It can’t be the water. The Bible tells us that over and over again we’re supposed to be baptized in water. But it’s the calling of the name that is where the power comes from. So, you have trinitarianism that now affects the way you’re baptized, that directly impacts your salvation. And then also in the way that you prayed, because I talked to people all the time who are trinitarian and they’ll say or I’ve talked to people who used to be trinitarian and now they’re oneness and they say, I don’t know how to pray because should I be praying to the Father? Should I be praying to the Son? Should I be praying to the Holy Ghost? So now you’re not fulfilling Scripture and saying whatever you do in word or deed, do it all in the name of Jesus. It affects all of it in a strange way.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:56:48] I agree. So, we’re deep here, we’re tiptoeing into church history, but we’re currently in a very deep theological question when we are thinking about how trinitarian thought and oneness thought are different. But that’s precisely what the church, the church was dealing with, going all the way back. What we’ve done is we’ve pulled ourselves for a moment out of just a theological intellectual conversation into a real practical world. How does this theology practically affect individuals and the tragedy of any false doctrine, just like any error, whether it’s religious or not? Error, always falsehood always has practical, real-world implications that wind up hurting everyday human beings who are seeking after God. This is the great tragedy of error and false doctrine. Of course, Jesus warned us this would happen. I’m always amazed when people act shocked that this could happen because it was so clear he couldn’t have possibly been clearer. You’re going to be persecuted. I think as Americans, though, we’re just so spoiled because we’ve had such a long history of freedom, although I think that’s in jeopardy. We may not get to enjoy that, at least not the way we have for much longer. At the rate, we’re going. What’s on the horizon? Only God knows. Only God’s plan is good. The rest of it is looking darker and darker as we go.

Ryan French: [00:58:57] Quickly. And I know we’ve gone close to an hour here, and I appreciate your time. I really do. We’ve already talked about Michael Servetus. I mean, we could just spend an hour introducing Servetus to people. And I feel bad saying what we’ve said without clarifying more for people. My hope is maybe this will spark people’s interest and some people will go dig deeper.

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:59:22] Yes.

Ryan French: [00:59:23] Sebelius as well, a different era. But in church history, we do know of some oneness or at least medalists who were speaking of these things. Can you mention just some of the common ones that we know of aside from Sebelius, and give just like the quick bullet point information about who those people, those people might be?

Dr. Talmadge French: [00:59:47] Well, there are dozens of oneness… What scholars sometimes call modalists. And the word modalists means that instead of there being multiple persons of God, there is God acting in different modes. So you call that modalism and the trend in modern theology is to think of God in modes. And so Carlebach, for example, spoke of modalism and favorably, but he, of course, still maintained they believed in the trinity. But so all the way back through church history.

Ryan French: [01:00:28] Is it correct to call ourselves modalists? Are we?

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:00:31] Well, I’ve always said there’s nothing wrong with it, but sometimes people are uncomfortable, especially current leaders in the modern oneness movement. I think most oneness people are uncomfortable with that because they don’t know where it came from or they think it came from the enemy or something. The fact of the matter is, modalism is a way of describing anyone who holds to a godhead in which the Father, Son, and the Spirit are in some way modal. And Oneness beliefs hold that Jesus and the Father were just modal differences, that the way in which God revealed himself in the Son was not a different person than the God who revealed himself in the Spirit. That’s what oneness is. So, to me, that modalism is fine. It’s just that some oneness people today are worried that there are forms of modalism we disagree with. So, I don’t have a problem with it. But, you know, that’s just the way it is. And so, for trinitarians to say modalists is helpful because they then realize you’re talking about church history, they typically think of them as modes because the term oneness is a fairly recent term. It’s a term that came to be very popular among former trinitarians that had become modalists and their view of who Jesus was. They saw it as a revelation a Divine revelation that Jesus was the Father in his human form, in the mode of humanity and therefore the son was not another person. It was the Father revealing himself. And this is exactly what Servetus taught. It’s exactly what Sebelius thought.

Ryan French: [01:02:24] Is it overly simplistic theologically, because I always go to the overly simplistic, but is it overly simplistic theologically for me and many others who have done it? To use the analogy that I’m a father and a son. Because people say, how can you be the father and son and I often say to people, I’m a father and a son. I could be multiple things at once but that doesn’t make me multiple people. But in the end, I have a legal name that must be used legally.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:02:57] And we can see that we’re moving now again into a very deeply theological way of understanding, which is important. It’s absolutely essential, but it’s difficult for some people, like, for example, trying to understand trinitarianism, you cannot comprehend. It’s not hard because you would have a father and a son who are both internal and they’re both God, they’re both gods within a God. That’s simply illogical. How can you be? And they’re going how can you…

Ryan French: [01:03:24] Right. How in the world can you both be all-powerful? Right.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:03:28] So but the same is true here when we’re talking about trying to explain modalism. Does it mean that I was a father, and I was a son? And of course, it is true of God. God was both Father and Son. How did that occur? Well, at the same time that he was a Father. He also became the Son. He didn’t quit being the Father when he became the Son. So, any modalism that held to that view I’ve just described. And so, this becomes deeply theological, rather because…

Ryan French: [01:04:03] He overshadows Mary.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:04:05] That’s right. The Father and the Spirit. So, the Spirit is the Father’s spirit. The Son is the Father’s humanity, you see. So, God becomes the Son. God is working in the Spirit. They’re not separate persons as though…

Ryan French: [01:04:22] Well, and even with Jesus you have this kind of interchangeable language where I come from my Father, but then I’m sending it. So even Jesus was kind of using interchangeable language that to me if I was trinitarian, would be extremely confusing because how could Jesus be sending his Spirit? You know, how is that even possible if they’re not the same thing?

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:04:45] So what we’re doing is we’re explaining how the oneness view differs from the trinitarian view. And so when oneness people view, Jesus, they view Jesus as being the revelation of the Father. He is the Father in his human form. He came to earth in Jesus Christ. So, yes. So, when says, for example, we’ll just give one example that this is very important to oneness theology, that Jesus said it’s not my work I’m doing. Yeah, I’m doing the works of the Father. All right. So it’s trinitarianism that can’t account for that. Now they claim they can because they say the Son laid down his deity or something like that.

Ryan French: [01:05:31] Almost every intellectually honest trinitarian that I’ve ever talked to or heard. At some point will get to a place where they say, I believe in the trinity, but it’s inexplicable. I believe in it, but it’s a great mystery that we’ll never fully understand. It’s the great mystery. How does the average trinitarian deal with Jesus saying something like, you know, Philip, if you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father?

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:06:00] Right now, my contention is they can’t. Now they will appear to be answering it, they’ll give answers. But, you know, you can give answers that aren’t answers. And that’s what trinitarians have to do when you get to the point where you’re talking about the biblical Jesus. He is not saying I’m another person from the Father. He’s not saying that. But they would then argue they said the opposite. How could you be the same person? This is where trinitarian. But when you’re not going back to John 14, where Jesus said, if you’ve seen me, well, you know, that’s not the question you ask. You didn’t ask that one you ask. Yeah, you did. If you’ve seen me, you’ve seen that his response was, if you’ve seen me, how can you ask me?

Ryan French: [01:06:45] Right.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:06:50] So a trinitarian would have to go back to John 10, four chapters earlier where Jesus said, I and the Father are one. And then they would have to argue that one there doesn’t mean one.

Ryan French: [01:07:02] I was just going to say, how could you even go to John…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:07:08] They have to attempt to build a multiple-person God. That’s still one God, which of course, that in itself is illogical.

Ryan French: [01:07:17] Yes, it’s illogical. Now, this brings me to something I wanted to mention and define for people. We’ve used the word modalist, but then there’s another word people use for oneness people. Apostolic monotheism or monotheistic. So just simple mono meaning one and theistic meaning God. In the Old Testament, one of the great defining characteristics of the Old Testament and the great separator that God gave for the Israelites was the fact that they were a monotheistic people. Israel, the Lord, our God is one in a world at the time where Egypt, they’re worshipping thousands of gods and they have a god for everything. The sun, the moon, the stars, the grass, the bugs. And then you have all of these other pagan nations that are worshipping multiple gods. And then and then God commands. He says, you know, there’s no other God before me. Thou shalt have no other God before me. Do Trinitarians? Now, I’ll just put my belief out there, no matter how offensive it might be, I believe that trinitarians, if you follow their doctrine logically, are polytheists, meaning that they do believe whether they claim it or not, because most of them don’t, but they do essentially wind up worshipping three gods, which to me is an absolute affront to God himself in the sense that God over and over and over commands us to…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:08:56] Yes.

Ryan French: [01:08:57] …understand that there is one God and that we’re to serve him alone. And when you separate him into three persons or beings now, you have done exactly what God essentially in my mind, what Satan did was he came in and he was able to convolute, quote unquote, Christianity to the point that now you have idolatry in the church.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:09:17] Right.

Ryan French: [01:09:19] But the idol that winds up being worshipped is supposedly the true God. But I know that most trinitarians would not. Am I correct in saying most trinitarians would never claim to be polytheistic? Is that correct? Absolutely. No one would claim not to be monotheistic.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:09:37] They do claim to be. And they and technically they are monotheists now, OK, because they say…

Ryan French: [01:09:43] How?

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:09:44] The reason they can claim it is that they make every effort from Nicaea till now to say that the trinity itself is one God, but existing somehow mysteriously beyond any human comprehension is that the three that are let’s call them the three divines that are in their right persons? Because let’s just not say persons for now that they’re still. It’s so mysterious. It’s incomprehensible. And of course, what they’re actually doing is having to be oneness. They have to start out being oneness. Yeah. In order to end up with three separate persons and they have to go back where they think they have to end up with three separate persons because there was a Father, Son, and a Spirit.

Ryan French: [01:10:37] So this takes me back and I keep coming to this because it’s so incomprehensible to me. So, if you’re claiming to be monotheistic.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:10:46] Right.

Ryan French: [01:10:48] Because most times when you pin them down, they want to say, well, there’s one God. I mean, I hear this all the time. You can hear it in music, in Christian music, popular Christian music written by trinitarians, where you can have a song written by a trinitarian called One God. I mean, there is one right now. It’s a great song. And I often ask myself, how can they write a song like that and then reject oneness. So why if they’re doing that why would you go to John Calvin for example, if he’s starting with and saying I’m monotheistic, why in the world would he attack someone and be angry towards someone who is monotheistic in every sense of the word? Does that make sense?

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:11:38] It makes sense to me. It’s complicated to the average person. We’re sitting here trying to explain why a deeply theological basically leader of one of the largest movements in Christianity murdered another Christian. That’s what we’re trying to explain.

Ryan French: [01:11:56] So that’s impossible. Let’s come to now let’s come to the present.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:12:00] All right.

Ryan French: [01:12:02] The unnamed guy that I can’t think of his name on the podcast, Apologia. How could he spend so much time and people like him? Why would they find it in their hearts so necessary to condemn truly monotheistic people? When yet he himself claims to be monotheistic, how does that jive and are you able to…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:12:27] This is becoming I mean, very, very few people today take the position. I mean, fewer and fewer. He might could name millions, but very few people today look at oneness people and say you’re damned to hell. It’s not like it was…

Ryan French: [01:12:44] Because of your belief, not like it was at the turn of the last century.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:12:47] Things have changed so drastically. And they would consider that unfortunate because we ought to be condemned. We ought to do just what Calvin did. And this gentleman has to be careful because what he’s wrestling with is and it’s a fear of other monotheists that that upholds. Now, if you are violating Jesus himself and saying he’s not God, then you would have the basis on which to begin to condemn, truly condemn someone. But he believes that his trinitarian understanding of the oneness of God, of the one God blessed, that is so true that my denying it or not believing or accepting it, by the way, there’s tons and tons of trinitarians who do not believe the concepts of the trinity in their minds. They can’t accept that. They somehow just believe that it’s just one God. They cannot make this three person distinction that trinitarians want you to do so among their own people. They do it. More and more, but…

Ryan French: [01:13:55] Which is why I think if you’re not a theologian, someone’s listening who’s not a theologian or philosopher, you’re just, you know, a good person who loves the Lord. We have to try and help these individuals.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:14:03] Yes.

Ryan French: [01:14:07] When I say average, I don’t mean that in the sense that, I mean they may be very above average, but I mean average in the sense of their understanding and exposure to the Bible and theology. We have to help them understand there are real life spiritual consequences when you embrace the false doctrine of the trinity.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:14:18] Yes.

Ryan French: [01:14:20] …and we have to try to show why that is in the sense of baptism, in the sense of how you pray, in the sense of how you’re viewing God and does God care how you view him? Well, of course, he does, because the vast majority of the Bible is God very clearly saying to people, it matters what you believe about me and it matters how you worship me. It matters how you serve me. God doesn’t have the kind of the universal philosophical mindset that the world has embraced today where everything’s fine as long as you’re sincere, as long as you’re…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:15:05] Well, basically the modern cultural mindset is it doesn’t matter at all what anybody believes, even conservative Christians today, among some of them, there is this notion that, well, in the end, it’s just all going to be just fine. But the consequences for believing that, look where we are in a culture, the culture is completely anti-Christian. America today is in dire straits.

Ryan French: [01:15:31] Yeah. And the question is, did the church begin that or did the world have it and it trickled into the church in a kind of ecumenical universalistic way of thinking, but that’s almost…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:15:43] Like the chicken…

Ryan French: [01:15:44] Yeah. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? It’s really almost impossible to know.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:15:49] Almost impossible.

Ryan French: [01:15:51] It’s tempting. I think for oneness people, you know, the oneness movement and the tongue talking movement and we won’t even throw holiness in. That’s a whole nother deal. But historically, and when I say historically, I don’t mean going back to Servetus. I mean since the turn of the last century we were very persecuted, lots of persecution, physical persecution, but…

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:16:18] Right.

Ryan French: [01:16:20] …even greater was the cultural persecution, the rejection, the being cast out from society, being marginalized. When you talk to the elders and there’s still elders today who are right here in our church, we have to Sister Cole, whose father founded Tupelo Children’s Mansion, and the stories of him being taken out and beaten within an inch of his life and the scars on his back and all of the things that people went through, the horrific things that we can’t even imagine. And as horrible as that was, and none of us would want to experience that, in many ways, it galvanized the movement. The church is always, I mean, even when you go back to the New Testament, the Church has always galvanized and grown in persecution. And the Church seems to always struggle in times of ease. I think it’s one of the reasons why you see, for example, this summer, we’ll talk about it hopefully soon. You know, your research on the oneness movement in China, you were shocked when you were writing and studying for the book Our God is One, which was first your thesis for your master’s at Wheaton College. And you studied how the preachers and the pastors, how they were I mean, unbelievable physical persecution, not just being thrown in jail. I mean, to be thrown in jail would have almost been a mercy. But the things that they went through beyond just being thrown in jail, the horrific physical things that happened to them in China, and even today, there’s persecution there.

Ryan French: [01:17:58] And yet the church, the oneness apostolic Church, the revival that has been mostly underground, that has just exploded in that nation. You see that repeated in different places around the world where there’s this great massive movement and outpouring of the Holy Ghost and in nations where there’s great persecution. And then you come to America, where we’re really fairly stagnant right now. And I think a lot of that is because of the ease. So, there’s a danger. I’ve spent a lot of time drawing you into a conversation about why do the hard-core trinitarians reject the modalists and or the monotheists. But really, in some ways, I would rather deal with them. Because at least we can have a discussion where we all believe things then the squishy middle, because the squishy middle, the danger of that, we’re and we get comfortable with the squishy middle or I don’t. But many apostolics do because they’re nice to us. Does that make sense? They’re nice to us. Of course, we’re nice to them, but they’re nice to us in the sense that they might say, well, you know, you’re saved. You know, you’re fine. And, you know, I am, too, of course. And there’s really not a major difference. You know, what you believe is great, and what they believe is great. And let’s all just be in this together. Well, that’s very dangerous.

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:19:32] Pulled into the idea that everybody’s just fine is the temptation.

Ryan French: [01:19:38] It is very appealing to the church in this, especially for people who want to avoid persecution at all costs. Or preserve their ease or their assets. We might could say preserve their financial gain,

Dr. Talmadge French: [01:20:01] It reminds me, where it just seems to insert itself in your discussion here, that the last days of Revelation were described to be to ease. Where they simply say, I have need of nothing. And whenever you’re in that area of time, there are always tremendous dangers. And you’re describing.

Ryan French: [01:20:26] Yeah. And I think that I do believe that’s exactly what we are seeing.

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Dad (Dr. Talmadge French) joins the program to talk about the oneness of God, the burning of Michael Servetus by John Calvin, the irony of trinitarianism, and early church history. We also toss around the often asked question of whether or not a remnant of full Gospel believers has always existed in history since Acts chapter two until right now. BONUS: A Mother’s Day-inspired sermon clip ends the program so don’t leave too soon. As always, you can keep up with this program and the popular Apostolic Voice blog at www.ryanafrench.com.

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Ep. 22 | Dad Joins the Program – Special Guest Dr. Talmadge French

May 8, 2021

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Buried Alive (The Gospel According to the Bible) – Article + Podcast

April 18, 2021February 16, 2022 Ryan A. French

The fear of being buried alive has been around for centuries. But it was especially prevalent during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The famed horror poet Edgar Allen Poe wrote nightmarishly about fantastical scenarios of people being buried alive on several occasions. The societal fear of premature burial became so prolific it eventually led to the invention of the safety coffin, an odd contraption with a string leading up from the coffin to a tiny bell placed near the gravestone. The idea being, if someone found themselves buried alive, they would ring the bell and hope someone would hear them and dig up their prematurely buried body. The safety coffin has been reinvented many times over the centuries. Even today, high-tech versions of the safety coffin are available for exorbitant prices.

Pulse Check Please

Interestingly, and debatably, several modern expressions are derivatives of the safety coffin era. For example, out of concern that someone buried alive might ring a bell in the middle of the night, a new shift was added to church graveyards called the “graveyard shift.” We also get expressions like “dead ringer” and “saved by the bell” from that historical period. Thankfully, modern medicine has done much to eliminate people’s fears of being buried alive. Regardless, some people still have irrational fears of waking up in a coffin underneath an immovable mountain of dirt. Admittedly, I get the shivers and chills if I let my imagination run wild. It’s difficult to imagine anything more horrifying than realizing you have been buried alive and there’s nothing you can do about it. Let’s just say I want my gravedigger to check and double-check my pulse before they plop me in the ground. Why? Because burying living things is barbaric, cruel, and torturous. On the other hand, burying dead things is humane, kind, and decent.

Repentance Check Please

If you are baptized without properly repenting, it is equivalent to being spiritually buried alive. Yes! It really is that dramatic and problematic. If you are baptized without repentance, you’re just getting wet. It does absolutely nothing for you in terms of salvation. We should make sure the sinful nature has been crucified to death with repentance before stirring the waters of baptism. Check for a pulse before burial because to be buried alive creates all kinds of spiritual problems. Pastors, we aren’t doing anyone any favors rushing them to baptism if they aren’t dead.

If you are baptized without properly repenting, it is equivalent to being spiritually buried alive. Yes! It really is that dramatic and problematic. If you are baptized without repentance, you’re just getting wet.
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We should make sure the sinful nature has been crucified to death with repentance before stirring the waters of baptism. Check for a pulse before burial because to be buried alive creates all kinds of spiritual problems.
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God Doesn’t Resurrect Living Things

I’ve noticed a trend in my church (and other churches as well). It’s pretty easy to convince people they need to be baptized. However, it’s difficult convincing people they need to repent and receive the Holy Ghost. I think there are several reasons for this, and one of them is the traditional and cultural acceptance of water baptism. But it goes deeper than just culture; baptism is the easiest part of the salvation process. Think about it. Only you can repent of your sins. No one else can repent for you, and it’s a painful, bloody, messy, tearful, gut-wrenching process when you face your wretchedness head-on. Our flesh doesn’t die easily, and many people avoid genuine repentance altogether. Which sadly keeps them from ever receiving the Holy Ghost (unless they repent at a later time). Meaning they just stay buried alive and are never resurrected because God doesn’t resurrect living things. God only resurrects crucified hearts that are ready for a new life.

Only you can repent of your sins. No one else can repent for you, and it’s a painful, bloody, messy, tearful, gut-wrenching process when you face your wretchedness head-on.
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God only resurrects crucified hearts that are ready for a new life.
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The Easy Part of the Gospel

Furthermore, the infilling of the Holy Ghost is something that only God can do for us. The Holy Ghost is our spiritual resurrection. The stone over our tomb rumbles and rolls away as we go from death to new life in Christ. The Spirit of God fills our empty hearts with power, presence, and purpose. We surrender and believe we will receive it by faith, but ultimately, we don’t fill ourselves with the Holy Spirit. That can be a little intimidating for people because it requires faith and trust in the unseen and the unknown. Most people have not previously surrendered to God in that way, and they aren’t exactly sure how to do it.

The infilling of the Holy Ghost is something that only God can do for us. The Holy Ghost is our spiritual resurrection. The stone over our tomb rumbles and rolls away as we go from death to new life in Christ.
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The Spirit of God fills our empty hearts with power, presence, and purpose.
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We surrender and believe, but we don’t fill ourselves with the Holy Spirit. That’s intimidating for people because it requires faith in the unseen. People haven’t surrendered to God in that way, and they aren’t sure how to do it.
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On the other hand, baptism is simple because it’s the one thing someone else can do for you. All you have to do is let someone put you under the water in Jesus’ name. However, we could do with some old-fashioned fear of being spiritually buried alive. Let’s not rush people to premature burials that will leave them traumatized and unchanged. Otherwise, we are guilty of giving false comforts of pseudo salvation to people who haven’t been crucified with Christ and died to sin. Baptism is powerful and life-changing when done biblically, but it can do more harm than good when done incorrectly.

Let’s not rush people to premature burials (baptisms) that will leave them traumatized and unchanged. Otherwise, we are guilty of giving false comforts of pseudo salvation to people who haven’t been crucified with Christ and died to sin.
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Baptism is powerful and life-changing when done biblically, but it can do more harm than good when done incorrectly.
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The Gospel Graphic

I created this simple graphic to explain how to be saved according to the Bible. Unfortunately, many people will tell you how to be saved according to tradition or opinion but what they describe isn’t even close to what the Bible teaches. I think we are often guilty of trying to oversimplify the Gospel so people can understand and accept it easily. We should try to keep it as simple as the Bible presents it, but we must be careful not to bypass vitally important elements of the process. And it is a process. You can’t be saved in fifteen seconds or less. Anyone who tells you differently is skipping lots of essential things. For example, two things must happen before you can repent of your sin: One, you must have faith that God is and that He is a rewarder of people who diligently seek Him. Two, you must realize you are bound by sin and unworthy of God’s grace. If you don’t have faith that Jesus lived, died, was buried, and resurrected for your sin, nothing else matters. The entire salvation process begins and ends with faith. If you think you are basically a good person that doesn’t need saving all that badly, the whole process will be meaningless to you because you won’t repent properly, and you won’t receive the Holy Spirit.

Unfortunately, many people will tell you how to be saved according to tradition or opinion but what they describe isn’t even close to what the Bible teaches.
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We are often guilty of trying to oversimplify the Gospel so people can understand and accept it easily. We should try to keep it as simple as the Bible presents it, but we must not bypass vitally important elements of the process.
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Two things must happen before you can repent of your sin: One, you must have faith that God is and that He is a rewarder of people who diligently seek Him. Two, you must realize you are bound by sin and unworthy of God’s grace.
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If you think you are basically a good person that doesn’t need saving all that badly, the whole process of salvation will be meaningless to you because you won’t repent properly, and you won’t receive the Holy Spirit.
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Sin is a Bigger Deal Than You Might Think

We all tend to view ourselves as kinder, nicer, more well-meaning, sincere, and good than we actually are. Also, our day’s prevailing philosophy believes that sincerity is like an ultimate golden ticket to Heaven. The rule of emotion and feelings has toppled the worship of reason and logic. Essentially, this is humanism (self-worship): I think myself to be good; therefore, I must be good. But what if evil feels good to us? Historically millions of wrongs have been sincerely committed by people who believed they were righteous. Even scarier, what if good things feel wrong to us? This happens all the time, faithfulness and self-sacrifice are demanding things, and our feelings deceptively convince us that selfishness is virtuous. Of course, none of this takes God by surprise. The Bible warned against the danger of trusting our hearts (feelings, emotions) centuries ago. Humanity’s egoistical affinity towards looking inwards rather than upwards to God is one of many prevailing flaws ingrained in the sinful human condition.

We all tend to view ourselves as kinder, nicer, more well-meaning, sincere, and good than we actually are. Also, our day’s prevailing philosophy believes that sincerity is like an ultimate golden ticket to Heaven.
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The rule of emotion and feelings has toppled the worship of reason and logic. Essentially, this is humanism (self-worship): I think myself to be good; therefore, I must be good.
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Humanity’s egoistical affinity towards looking inwards rather than upwards to God is one of many prevailing flaws ingrained in the sinful human condition.
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Centuries of humanistic philosophy and false religion have resulted in a general indifference towards sin. Oh, sure, most people consider murder or senseless violence sinful or immoral. Dusty unused Bible’s demonstrate that people aren’t consulting Scripture to define sin and illuminate right living. Most sin is viewed like a speed limit, just a good suggestion, and it can be broken just as long as you don’t go too far above it. Plus, we keep changing the speed limits (sin limits) to fit our feelings all the time. Meaning, most people don’t care about the limits God originally put into place at all. They’re speeding along through life without a care and feeling comfortably self-righteous. Meanwhile, God is grieved, and His nail-scarred hands reach for us lovingly.

Centuries of humanistic philosophy and false religion have resulted in a general indifference towards sin.
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Most sin is viewed like a speed limit, just a good suggestion, and it can be broken just as long as you don’t go too far above it. Plus, we keep changing the speed limits (sin limits) to fit our feelings all the time.
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Most people don’t care about the limits God originally put into place. They’re speeding through life without a care and feeling comfortably self-righteous. Meanwhile, God is grieved, and His nail-scarred hands reach for us lovingly.
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Sin is the focal point of the Gospel. Our frail, fallen, finite, sinful human condition required a sacrifice. Since no human born of Adam’s lineage could ever be a perfect sacrifice, God robed Himself in flesh and overshadowed a virgin named Mary. She miraculously conceived the Messiah (God with us) named Jesus. Because Jesus had no earthly father, the Bible refers to Him as the son of God. It is biblically false and theologically inaccurate to consider Jesus to be a preexisting, eternal, coequal, separate being from God the Father. Jesus was the human manifestation of the Father. Jesus answered Phillip’s request to see the Father by saying, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you?” (John 14:9, NLT). Our sin, no matter how mild it may seem to our carnal minds, nailed Jesus to the cross. Failure to take our sinfulness seriously is an insult to the suffering of Jesus. Failure to die to our sin is a blatant disregard of the significance of Calvary.

Sin is the focal point of the Gospel. Our frail, fallen, finite, sinful human condition required a sacrifice. Since no human born of Adam’s lineage could ever be a perfect sacrifice, God robed Himself in flesh.
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Because Jesus had no earthly father, the Bible refers to Him as the son of God. It is biblically false and theologically inaccurate to consider Jesus to be a preexisting, eternal, coequal, separate being from God the Father.
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Jesus was the human manifestation of the Father. Jesus answered Phillip’s request to see the Father by saying, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you?” (John 14:9, NLT).
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Our sin, no matter how mild it may seem to our minds, nailed Jesus to the cross. Failure to take our sin seriously is an insult to the suffering of Jesus. Failure to die to our sin is a blatant disregard of the significance of Calvary.
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Your Tomb Should Be Empty Too

Suppose you boil down every page of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. In that case, it’s the story of sin separating us from a loving, intimate relationship with God and God’s love finding a way to draw us out of sin back into a relationship with Him. You see, God’s holy perfection isn’t compatible with our sinful imperfections. Therefore, God made a way for us with His blood to be washed clean and sanctified (made holy). Once you are dead and buried, you’re ready for resurrection. The only reason we know who Jesus is today is because of His resurrection. It’s beautiful that Jesus died for us, but, miraculously, He conquered death for us. Jesus didn’t die for you to die with Him and stay buried. God wants to breathe His Spirit into your lifeless spiritual body and raise you up with the power to be a new person. His tomb is empty, and yours should be too. If you’ve been buried in baptism but haven’t received the Holy Ghost speaking in other tongues, it’s the spiritual equivalent of staying stuck in your tomb. There’s a great song by the Christian group Cain called Rise Up (Lazarus) that says:

Can't you hear the voice of Jesus calling us
Out from the grave like Lazarus
Rise up (like Lazarus) rise up, rise up
Out from the grave like Lazarus
He's calling us to walk out of the dark
He's giving us new resurrected hearts

What a powerful anthem reminding us that Jesus is calling us to resurrection power. There’s no reason to stay dead when Jesus is offering us new life. The new life Jesus offers is wonderful, powerful, abundant, eternal, joyful, purposeful, hopeful, and supernatural. Once you have been filled with the Holy Ghost, you have the ability (power, authority, desire) to walk in the Spirit and not the flesh. Meaning you no longer have to be a slave to sin. It’s not just that you are freed from the penalty of sin, but you can overcome sin. Old chains of sin and temptation can be broken, and you can access liberty in the Spirit.

If you boil down every page of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation; it’s the story of sin separating us from a loving, intimate relationship with God and God’s love finding a way to draw us out of sin back into a relationship with Him.
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Jesus didn’t die for you to die with Him and stay buried. God wants to breathe His Spirit into your lifeless spiritual body and raise you up with the power to be a new person. His tomb is empty, and yours should be too.
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If you’ve been buried in baptism but haven’t received the Holy Ghost speaking in other tongues, it’s the spiritual equivalent of staying stuck in your tomb.
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There’s no reason to stay dead when Jesus is offering us new life. The new life Jesus offers is wonderful, powerful, abundant, eternal, joyful, purposeful, hopeful, and supernatural.
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Differing Definitions (Freedom & Bondage)

One of the oddest issues facing our culture is the mishandling of words. Even among “Christians,” we frequently use the same words, but our definitions differ. Two perfect examples are the words “freedom” and “bondage.” Many self-professing “Christians” have accused me of living in bondage because I live a biblical, holy, separated, consecrated, Spirit-led lifestyle. As the Bible teaches, I believe that God saved me from my past sin and calls me to walk in holiness. That doesn’t mean I’ve obtained perfection. He’s definitely still working on me, but it does mean I’m actively walking away from bondage rather than living in bondage to sin. This is what the Bible means when it refers to freedom and liberty. However, many Christians ignore the Bible and redefine freedom from sin as the freedom to sin freely without consequences. In other words, according to their way of thinking, the cross gives them the liberty to keep sinning. Do you see the disparity? We have completely opposite and opposing views of biblical freedom and bondage. Problematically, Christians of all stripes can use the same language but mean totally different things. Therefore, it’s vitally important to narrow down and lock in our definitions. Otherwise, we run the risk of saying things without honest communication taking place. “Grace” and “mercy” are two other words people often misuse, misunderstand, and misdefine (but that’s another subject for another day).

Many Christians ignore the Bible and redefine freedom from sin as the freedom to sin freely without consequences. In other words, according to their way of thinking, the cross gives them the liberty to keep sinning.
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Christians of all stripes can use the same language but mean totally different things. It’s vitally important to narrow down and lock in definitions. Otherwise, we run the risk of saying things without honest communication taking place.
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The Gospel According to the Bible

Thankfully, God knew defining definitions and homing in on the correct meaning of words would be difficult. Human dishonesty and forgetfulness constantly rearrange connotations. This is precisely the reason God preserved His Word for us in written form. God charges us with the responsibility to rightly (correctly) divide (accurately handling and skillfully teaching) the Word of Truth (2 Timothy 2:15). Therefore, any information regarding how to be saved from sin and eternal judgment can only come from the Divinely inspired Word of the Lord. Anything else is less reliable than a thirty-day weather forecast. Most Christians agree with the premise that the Gospel must be obeyed according to the Bible. However, many Christians mysteriously misinterpret, add non-biblical elements of tradition, insert opinions, or overlook inconvenient sections of Scripture, diluting the Gospel into something ineffectual. The early New Testament Church certainly would not have recognized most modern gyrations of the “Gospel” presented in churches claiming to be Christian.

Human dishonesty and forgetfulness constantly rearrange connotations. This is precisely the reason God preserved His Word for us in written form.
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Many Christians mysteriously misinterpret, add non-biblical elements of tradition, insert opinions, or overlook inconvenient sections of Scripture, diluting the Gospel into something ineffectual.
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The early New Testament Church certainly would not have recognized most modern gyrations of the “Gospel” presented in churches claiming to be Christian.
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The Gospel Summarized: A Beginning with No End

Salvation begins by acknowledging you need a savior and that Jesus is the only risen Savior (John 3:16, John 1:12, Romans 10:9, Romans 3:23). You must have faith in God and believe that His Word is accurate (Hebrews 11:6, Ephesians 2:8-9, Ephesians 6:16, 1 Corinthians 2:5). Not only are we sinners, but we were born under the grip and curse of human sin (Romans 5:12, Romans 7:14, Psalm 51:5). You must respond to the sorrow you feel over your sin by repenting before God. Repentance is more than “I’m sorry.” Repentance means to turn around and go the other direction. In other words, repentance is the determination and decision to stop sinning (Romans 6:6, Acts 2:38, Acts 3:19, Acts 17:30).

Repentance is more than “I’m sorry.” Repentance means to turn around and go the other direction. In other words, repentance is the determination and decision to stop sinning.
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Once you have repented of your sin, you are spiritually and symbolically dead and ready for burial (water baptism in Jesus’ name) [Acts 2:38, Mark 16:16, Acts 22:16, Romans 6:4, Colossians 2:12, Acts 2:41]. Again, it’s vital to be buried (baptized) exactly as the Bible commands. The word baptism literally means to be “immersed” in something. Just like we wouldn’t sprinkle dirt on a dead body and say burial was complete, we wouldn’t splash water on a dead sinner and call them buried either. Recently, I saw a video of a man being baptized standing in a kiddie pool. The pastor poured a bottle of water over the poor man’s head and pronounced him baptized. If it weren’t so tragic, it would be utterly hilarious.

The word baptism literally means to be immersed in something. Just like we wouldn’t sprinkle dirt on a dead body and say burial was complete, we wouldn’t splash water on a dead sinner and call them buried either.
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Because there is so much misinformation surrounding baptism, we need to make three things very clear: One, as already mentioned, you must correctly repent before baptism. Two, you must be wholly immersed (submerged, buried, covered, plunged) in water for the remission (washing away) of your sin. By the way, this is why babies cannot and should not be baptized because a baby can’t understand the Gospel and repent properly. Three, and this one is probably the most important and most debated subject concerning baptism, the person baptizing you must baptize you calling on the name of Jesus (Acts 2:38, Acts 4:12, Acts 10:48, Acts 22:16, Galatians 3:27). To clarify further, the person baptizing you must not call out the “titles” Father, Son, or Holy Ghost (or any other name or title) because the titles don’t have the saving authority of the name of Jesus. The cleansing power of baptism comes primarily from invoking the name that is above every other name, the name of Jesus. If you have been baptized in a way that is not biblical, you should consider being rebaptized correctly immediately (Acts 19:1-5).

The cleansing power of baptism comes primarily from invoking the Name that is above every other name, the name of Jesus. If you’ve been baptized any other way, you should consider being rebaptized correctly immediately (Acts 19:1-5).
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Once you have died and been buried, you are ready to be resurrected (filled with the Holy Ghost). Here’s a little secret, if the Holy Spirit doesn’t resurrect you, eventually, your old flesh will come back to life. In fact, even after you are resurrected, your flesh will keep trying to come back to life (we’ll talk about that next). Without the Holy Ghost, you can’t access newness of life, and you are not a new person in Christ Jesus. Remember, everything about salvation must be done according to the Bible. And, according to the Bible, everyone who receives the Holy Ghost for the very first time will supernaturally speak in tongues (in a language they do not know or understand). Of course, there are many other continuing evidences that a person has been filled with God’s Spirit (Galatians 5:22) but speaking in other tongues is the very first evidence God requires (Acts 2:4, Acts 2:38, Acts 10:44-46, Acts 19:6, Mark 16:17, 1 Corinthians 14:2, Acts 19:1-7).

According to the Bible, everyone who receives the Holy Ghost for the very first time will supernaturally speak in tongues (in a language they do not know or understand).
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There are many other evidences a person has been filled with God’s Spirit (Galatians 5:22) but speaking in other tongues is the very first evidence God requires (Acts 2:4, Acts 10:44-46, Acts 19:6, Mark 16:17, 1 Corinthians 14:2, Acts 19:1-7).
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Once you have been resurrected (filled with the Spirit), you are like a newborn baby in the family of God. That’s why we often call it being born again (John 3:3, 1 Peter 1:3). At this point, your life is just beginning. It’s an exciting, abundant, wild, scary, adventurous, joyful, powerful, overcoming life walking in the Spirit. Everything changes once you have been filled with the Spirit. God will rearrange you from the inside out. The Bible calls this process of becoming holy like the Lord sanctification. The Holy Spirit will convict, correct, purify, strengthen, empower, and encourage you daily. No area of your life is off-limits to the Spirit. There is nothing the Spirit isn’t allowed to change, rearrange, or eject from your life. Furthermore, there are countless things the Spirit will add to your life that you could not have otherwise. This ongoing process of walking in the Spirit is never-ending. The Gospel is a process with a beginning and no end. It’s a complete restart, do-over, new beginning, lifelong relationship with God. Count the cost in advance because living for God will cost you everything you have, but it will give you more than you could ever imagine. The Gospel isn’t just a checklist you complete and then forget about as you move through life unchanged. No. The Gospel is radically refining, totally transforming, and Divinely disrupting. Walking in the Spirit will take you through the valley of the shadow of death and to mountain peaks of triumph. Life in the Spirit is never boring. And the afterlife benefits are without compare.

Everything changes once you have been filled with the Spirit. God will rearrange you from the inside out. The Bible calls this process of becoming holy like the Lord sanctification.
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The Holy Spirit will convict, correct, purify, strengthen, empower, and encourage you daily. No area of your life is off-limits to the Spirit. There is nothing the Spirit isn’t allowed to add, change, rearrange, or eject from your life.
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The Gospel is a process with a beginning and no end. It’s a complete restart, do-over, new beginning, lifelong relationship with God. Count the cost in advance because living for God will cost you everything you have, but it will give you more than you could ever imagine.
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The Gospel is radically refining, totally transforming, and Divinely disrupting. Life in the Spirit is never boring. And the afterlife benefits are without compare.
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Apostolic Voice | Ep. 21 – Buried Alive

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

Ryan explains how baptism without repentance is like being buried alive from the www.ryanafrench.com article Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible.Ryan explains why definitions matter and how differing definitions cause people to miscommunicate the Gospel. Most importantly, Ryan explains the Gospel plan of salvation according to the Bible without the lenses of opinion, tradition, or dishonesty. Don’t miss the powerful poetic rendition of PFR’s classic song FIGHT.

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Ep. 21 | Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible – PFR Fight

April 17, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 21 | Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible – PFR Fight

April 17, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 21 | Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible – PFR Fight

April 17, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 21 | Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible – PFR Fight

April 17, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 21 | Buried Alive – The Gospel According to the Bible – PFR Fight

April 17, 2021

Ryan French

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Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021March 28, 2021 Ryan A. French

Two mass shootings have rocked the nation in the past month alone. One of them occurred right here in the Atlanta area that I love and call home. This isn’t a news story, it’s not my intention to give details or sensationalize the killings. Understandably, America always waits with bated breath for any details that might clarify the reasons behind a shooter’s sickening actions. Sadly, knowing a killer’s motivations (regardless of what they are) will be of no solace to those who have lost a loved one to senseless killing. Justifiably, the watching world craves some level of understanding going forward. One thing is sure, nothing discovered will produce any satisfying revelations. By assessing motives, we desperately hope to discover an inoculation from individual acts of evil. Although new laws may or may not make certain types of despicable inclinations more challenging to accomplish – laws do nothing to address the pervasive evil contained within the human heart.

Although new laws may or may not make certain types of despicable inclinations more challenging to accomplish – laws do nothing to address the pervasive evil contained within the human heart.
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Pure Evil Can’t Be Intimidated

Undoubtedly, consequences (legal and otherwise) intimidate many people into submission. However, threatened social consequences are only preemptively impactful to a certain point. Obviously, suicide bombers can’t be intimidated by the loss of life over their actions. They give their lives willingly in the service of evil. Neither can a suicidal killer with hatred in his heart be thwarted by any punitive measures. A homicidal heart will find a way to commit murder regardless of the actions civil society takes. Please don’t misunderstand; we should take preventative measures when and where possible. It would be ludicrous for polite society to conclude that because rape can’t be totally eradicated, we shouldn’t make every effort humanly possible to prevent and punish rape. Indeed, the same goes for murder, whether it be mass murder or homicide in general.

Mass Shootings: A Modern Problem

Mass killings are a relatively new social manifestation of evil. While every society from the beginning of time (going all the way back to the biblical account of Genesis) has suffered the scourge of violence and homicidal hatred, the particularly heinous rise of senseless mass murder is a distinctively modern problem. Since the dawn of so-called civilization, governments and power-hungry tyrants have slaughtered more innocents than historians can count. But otherwise, average individuals killing innocent people they don’t even know (or barely know) en masse is terrifyingly unique. The level of hatred required for this nightmarish breed of viciousness defies comprehension. Modern psychology views the origin of evil as a biological byproduct rather than an outside force that impacts us biologically. Therefore, it only addresses the symptoms and remains incapable of correctly diagnosing the primary disease.

Modern psychology views the origin of evil as a biological byproduct rather than an outside force that impacts us biologically. Therefore, it only addresses the symptoms and remains incapable of correctly diagnosing the primary disease.
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The Origin of Evil

Evil is evil, and while individuals are responsible for their own actions, evil does not originate in the human psyche. It is always easier to relegate every depraved human action down to mental illness or madness. While mental illness is undoubtedly a real problem, not all (or even most) mentally ill individuals commit horrific crimes. Just calling a killer mentally ill doesn’t explain away their actions or substantively address why one mentally ill person kills and another does not. We instinctively want to categorize evil as insanity because it is too emotionally painful to imagine a sane person methodically killing dozens of people he’s never even met.

Just calling a killer mentally ill doesn’t explain away their actions or substantively address why one mentally ill person kills and another does not.
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We instinctively want to categorize evil as insanity because it is too emotionally painful to imagine a sane person methodically killing dozens of people he’s never even met.
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Out of the Shadows

Mass shootings push the fallen nature of humankind out from the shadows into the harsh light of day. The naked evil and wicked capacity of the human heart causes us to blink and squint. We can’t look directly at it without excruciating pain. It’s not that evil things aren’t happening all around us every day – we just fail or refuse to notice them. Like the prophets of old, those who do notice and comment are labeled depressing, downers, boorish, buzz killers, alarmists, catastrophists, or some other condescending pejorative. But large-scale, in-your-face evil can’t be ignored, denied, or minimized. So, we hunger for the elusive why behind the “madness.” Some point the finger of blame at God in these circumstances (here’s a great article on the origins of evil). But ultimately, evil is satanic in origin and embedded in the human condition. Therefore, human methodologies alone – no matter how well-intentioned – will never eradicate evil from the human heart.

Mass shootings push the fallen nature of humankind out from the shadows into the harsh light of day. The naked evil and wicked capacity of the human heart causes us to blink and squint.
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It’s not that evil things aren’t happening all around us every day – we just fail or refuse to notice them.
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Like prophets of old, those who notice evil are labeled depressing, downers, buzz killers, alarmists, or some other condescending pejorative. But large-scale, in-your-face evil can’t be ignored, denied, or minimized.
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Evil is satanic in origin and embedded in the human condition. Therefore, human methodologies alone – no matter how well-intentioned – will never eradicate evil from the human heart.
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Because the fallen nature of humankind is vulnerable and consistently capable of awful behavior, Jesus instructed us to pray, “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil… (Matthew 6:13).” I’ve often marveled at those who assert that God is not good while simultaneously claiming that humans are intrinsically good. I’m not sure you can read about events like mass shootings and believe in the innate goodness of humanity. Facing the depravity of the human condition head-on is depressing and hard to grasp. The human heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). C.H. Spurgeon wrote:

“As the salt flavors, every drop in the Atlantic so does sin affect every atom of our nature. It is so sadly there, so abundantly there, that if you cannot detect it, you are deceived.” He added: “The venom of sin is in the very fountain of our being; it has poisoned our heart. It is in the very marrow of our bones and is as natural to us as anything that belongs to us.”

I’ve often marveled at those who assert that God is not good while claiming that humans are intrinsically good. I’m not sure you can read about mass shootings and believe in the innate goodness of humanity.
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The Bad News and the Good News

We inherited that sinful nature from the lineage of Adam (Romans 5:12). You can’t truly fathom the goodness of the Gospel until you grasp the depravity of the human condition. The Good News begins with bad news: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). Thankfully, the Gospel story begins with condemnation but ends with redemption. In the weeks and months ahead, I have decided to write, podcast, preach and teach about the Gospel. If you’re reading this and you feel hopeless, please know there is hope. If you’re reading this and you know someone who feels hopeless, please tell them about Jesus. Tell them how God wants to forgive their sins and fill them with His Spirit (Acts 2:38). Tell them how the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead can raise them above the hopelessness of sin (Romans 8:11). We can push back against the darkness by reaching one heart at a time with the truth of the Gospel. It’s the only hope for the human condition.

You can’t truly fathom the goodness of the Gospel until you grasp the depravity of the human condition. The Good News begins with bad news.
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Thankfully, the Gospel story begins with condemnation but ends with redemption.
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We can push back against the darkness by reaching one heart at a time with the truth of the Gospel. It’s the only hope for the human condition.
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Podcast

Apostolic Voice with Ryan French

WARNING PARENTS: Some subject matter might be too mature for children. Ryan talks about the recent spike of mass killings and focuses on shooting and spa killings in the Atlanta area (Ryan’s hometown). This brings up questions of gun control, legislating morality, the origin of evil, how to handle evil, and the depravity of the human heart. Finally, Ryan responds to an article by David French (no relation to the host) about the Atlanta Spa Shooting and the Evangelical Purity Culture. All this can be found in the new article at www.ryanafrench.com called Mass Killings and the Question of Evil.

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Search Episodes

Ep. 20 | Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 20 | Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 20 | Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 20 | Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021

Ryan French

Ep. 20 | Mass Killings and the Question of Evil

March 27, 2021

Ryan French

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Link to the David French Article Mentioned in the Podcast

Why the Atlanta Massacre Triggered a Conversation About Purity Culture (The problem with purity culture is not Christianity. The problem is that its extremes are not Christian at all.) by David French, The Dispatch

A Few Pertinent Introductions

The Mixing of Metaphorical Certitudes

A Lot of Mixing & Matching

A Royal Priesthood of Believers

Similarities Between Old and New Testament Priests

Must Be Born into Priestly Privilege

How to Be Born Again

Must Be Ordained into the Priesthood

Must Be Anointed for the Priesthood

Must Be Cleansed for the Priesthood

Must be Appropriately Clothed for the Priesthood

God Defines Nakedness

The Morality and Righteousness of Modesty

Carnal Garments

Defiled Garments

Keep Your Clothes On

Priesthood is Held to Strict Standards of Obedience

Messengers Calling the Lost to Repentance

Access to God Through the Offering of Sacrifices

The Body as a Spiritual Sacrifice

The Sacrifice of Praise

The Selfless Sacrifice of Love

The Sacrifice of Evangelism

The Sacrifice of Prayer

The Perversion of the Priesthood & Invention of the Trinity

Incredibly Amazing Priestly Privilege

In Conclusion

Related posts:

God’s Clear Command in Leviticus 19:28

Wisdom & Cultural Associations

Modesty & Vanity

Health Concerns

Permanent Life Impact

The Body Is God’s Temple, Not Ours

Associations with the Occult, Death & Paganism

The Divine Tattoo (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

Jesus’ Cosmic Thigh Tattoo (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

The Forbidden Haircut (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

This is the New Testament (Common Questions & Objections Answered)

[1]Charles Caldwell Ryrie, eds. The Ryrie Study Bible. Expanded, Accordance electronic ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1995), paragraph 2041.

[2]Albert Barnes, Barnes’ Notes on the Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006), paragraph 4789.

[3]Glen S. Martin, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, ed. Max Anders, vol. 2 of Holman Old Testament Commentary. Accordance electronic ed. (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 2002), 224.

[4]John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 134.

[5]John H. Walton and Craig S. Keener, eds. NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016), paragraph 2017.

[6]Lane T. Dennis and Wayne Grudem, eds. The ESV Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2008), paragraph 2740.

[7]TDNT (Abridged), s.v. “στίγμα,” 1086.

[8] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[9] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[10] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[11] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[12] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[13] Kristin A Broussard & Helen C Harton, Tattoo or taboo? Tattoo stigma and negative attitudes toward tattooed individuals, The Journal of Social Psychology, 2018.

[14] Note: One thing that makes this research paper interesting is its extensive references to previous areas of research on the subject.

[15] Think Before You Ink: Tattoo Health Risks, http://www.penmedicine.org, Penn Medicine, July 17, 2018, https://www.pennmedicine.org/updates/blogs/health-and-wellness/2018/july/tattoo-health-risks

[16] 5 Dangerous Health Risks of Tattoos, www.news24.com, News 24, May 4, 2018, https://www.news24.com/health24/medical/skin/about-skin/5-dangerous-health-risks-of-tattoos-20180504

[17] Tattoo Removal: 14 Things I Wish I Had Known Before Getting It, www.glamour.com, Glamour, Lauren Chan, September 7, 2022, https://www.glamour.com/story/tattoo-removal-cost-what-is-it-like

[18] Tattoo Removal: 14 Things I Wish I Had Known Before Getting It, www.glamour.com, Glamour, Lauren Chan, September 7, 2022, https://www.glamour.com/story/tattoo-removal-cost-what-is-it-like

[19] Tattoos: Pagan Demonism, Shamanism, Baal Worship & Occult Mysticism, www.5ptsalt.wordpress.com, 5 Pt. Salt, Joel Taylor, October 29, 2011, https://5ptsalt.wordpress.com/2011/10/29/tattoos-pagan-demonism-shamanism-baal-worship-occult-mysticism/

[20] Steve Gilbert, The Tattoo History Source Book, (Juno Books, 2001).

[21] Amy Krakow, Total Tattoo Book, (Grand Central Publishing, 1994).

[22] Wilfrid Dyson Hambly, The History of Tattooing, (Dover Publications, 2009).

[23] 7 Major Tattoo Trends You’re About to See Everywhere, www.bustle.com, Bustle, Carolyn Steber, February 2022, https://www.bustle.com/style/tattoo-trends-2022

[24] 7 Major Tattoo Trends You’re About to See Everywhere, www.bustle.com, Bustle, Carolyn Steber, February 2022, https://www.bustle.com/style/tattoo-trends-2022

[25] Strong’s Hebrew Concordance, 2710. חָקַק (chaqaq), www.biblehub.com, Bible Hub, https://biblehub.com/hebrew/2710.htm

[26]John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 130.

[27] Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible, (Thomas Nelson), 2003.

Related posts:

The Anatomy of a Failure

Common Heartache

Losing Salvation is Possible

Four Main Reasons Good People Make Bad Mistakes

Feet: The Instability of an Unsure Foundation

Stomach: The Pull of an Unholy Consumption

Head: The Hindrance of an Unbridled Mind

Heart: The Delusion of Misplaced Passions

Conclusion & Summary

Related posts:

Sweet Heat Skittles

Our God Is One

It’s All in Him!

^[1]Charles Caldwell Ryrie, eds. The Ryrie Study Bible. Expanded, Accordance electronic ed. (Chicago: Moody Press, 1995), paragraph 2041.

^[2]Albert Barnes, Barnes’ Notes on the Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006), paragraph 4789.

^[3]Glen S. Martin, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, ed. Max Anders, vol. 2 of Holman Old Testament Commentary. Accordance electronic ed. (Nashville: B & H Publishing Group, 2002), 224.

^[4]John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews, and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, Accordance electronic ed. (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 134.

^[5]John H. Walton and Craig S. Keener, eds. NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016), paragraph 2017.

^[6]Lane T. Dennis and Wayne Grudem, eds. The ESV Study Bible. Accordance electronic ed. (Wheaton: Crossway Bibles, 2008), paragraph 2740.

^[7]TDNT (Abridged), s.v. “στίγμα,” 1086.