Santa Claus Theology and Church Decision Making [Outgoing Links]

Outgoing Links is a series in which we share interesting articles about the church. Please follow the links in the title to see the original site. Be sure to leave comments below with your thoughts.

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Not A Santa Claus Faith

Jon Elliff asks how to go about looking for a good church, starting with a hard-but-important issue from the beginning: healthy theology.

Their theology should be reasonable: a line of logic from the testimony of the Bible to what they believe. There should be an attempt at sound logic in the small group, the sermon, and the statement of faith. And though we find paradoxes in the Bible (God is three in one), this is no justification for unreasonable, unsubstantiated beliefs (there are three Gods)...

Unfortunately, many churches play on a false notion of “faith” and peddle bad theology. Believing in Christ is akin to believing in Santa Claus, “I just know....I dont know how I know, I just know that I know that I know.” Under that illogical emotion, they sell this false “faith” and manipulate the listeners in to giving to supporting their causes. However, a church that thinks will call upon God-ordained reason to develop a robust theology. It should be a theology that makes sense, and though it cannot be perfect or totally explicative of an infinite God, it should be reasonable.

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Christ's Headship in the Church: The Neglected First Principle of Decision-Making

This article is an illuminating look at the meeting of the mundane and the spiritual in elders' meetings. While we might be tempted to either over- or underspiritualize the governing of a church, Jim Elliff (note: not the same Elliff, though they're related!) points out that even the most practical decisions should be made with reference to Christ as the head of the church, not the elders or the congregation. Submitting to his authority in an active conscious way helps clarify many decisions.

I may seem naïve and overly simplistic when I say that Christ is the Head of the church and that this one fact, properly understood, will do more to clear up confusion over decision-making in the church than any other consideration.

From this truth we are able to deduce that elders and members have one goal in decision-making—to find out what the Head of the church wills for His church. I don’t think most church leaders think this way. Starting from themselves they attempt to arrive at what would be the most pragmatic course of action, disregarding a conscious pursuit of Christ’s will in the decision process.