I'm doing a little light reading this morning, from Ignatius' (he was a student of the apostle, John) letter to the Magnesians (I have no idea who they were, but I wonder if they invented Milk of...nah). If you're a follower of Christ and have never read the writings of the early church fathers, maybe you should consider doing so. I always thought of them as the fathers of the Roman Catholic Church, and since I am not catholic, I never considered reading them. But guess what...if they are RCC fathers, they are mine, too, since we all came from the same root.
Anyway, I was reading a few minutes ago and came across this:
Now it becomes you also not to treat your bishop too familiarly on account of his youth, but to yield him all reverence, having respect to the power of God the Father, as I have known even holy presbyters do, not judging rashly, from the manifest youthful appearance [of their bishop], but as being themselves prudent in God, submitting to him, or rather not to him, but to the Father of Jesus Christ, the bishop of us all. It is therefore fitting that you should, after no hypocritical fashion, obey [your bishop], in honour of Him who has willed us [so to do], since he that does not so deceives not [by such conduct] the bishop that is visible, but seeks to mock Him that is invisible. And all such conduct has reference not to man, but to God, who knows all secrets.
It goes on to talk about Daniel, Solomon, Josiah, Timothy, etc, who were all young, but very wise and godly.
The bottom line is that if we argue with, complain against, our pastor (they said bishop), then it isn't him we do that with, but God Himself. He is the true authority and He tells us to respect our authority(ies) on the earth, and in so doing, we respect Him. And the warning here is in the context of a young pastor, because Ignatius, and Paul, knew that youth doesn't always get respect.
This strikes me today simply because we do have a young pastor, and I can see how it would be easy to treat him "too familiarly" and forget he is answerable to God for this body of believers, and that he is in charge. A good word for me this morning.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
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Friday, May 27, 2011
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