Sermon 2120
Academic/Pietistic
Pastor Noel Anderson, First Presbyterian Church of Upland
Today we are at 5 and 11 on the clock—Academic spirituality and Pietistic spirituality. These two stand in the balance as differing forms of righteousness based on discipline. Both tend toward competitiveness, and both run the risk of Pharisaism. The human propensity toward pride and pomposity seems to be boundless, and we'll see how it can turn two good spiritualities bad, even as we celebrate the good in each.
Academic Spirituality
In the the Great Commission, the key verb rendered “making disciples,” means instruction. The key business of disciple-making is not a dozen different kinds of spiritual formation activities; it is instruction, book learning.
In the Jewish world, the study of Torah is central. In Jerusalem, near the Western Wall, there is a yeshiva where orthodox Jews study all day long. They memorize Scripture and the Talmud (Mishnah and Gemara). One man there shared with me a source of their intensity. He said, "When Messiah comes, will he find understanding? We are obliged to know the Law and meditate upon it."
Our text from Deuteronomy is the "Shema"—the essential prayer in Israel and still the basis of Jewish piety. Notice how much of it looks like study—hear, keep, recite, bind, fix, write—the basis of academic spirituality.
Jews and Christians have been called "people of the book" because our faith, unlike that of any other religion, is grounded in Scripture—particularly God's self-revelation proclaimed in writing.
Academic spirituality lives in the head, where understanding, wisdom, and intelligibility live. Fides Quarens Intellectum—faith seeks understanding, was given by Augustine and Anselm to remind the Church that when faith is authentic, it remains hungry to learn more.
We experience academic spirituality whenever we hunger for insight and new understanding. Our faith grows in studying Scripture. Who among us has not had the experience of reading a text or hearing it explained and had that marvelous "Aha!" of illumination? The lights go on, and we feel like we're looking at the world in a new way. Or we read a commentary that hits us just right, and we feel we have a better grip on the faith and a deeper understanding.
Academic spirituality can be transformational. How many stories have we heard about atheists reading Scripture to find ammunition against Christianity only to find themselves troubled into belief? How many thousands of anecdotes are there of someone's faith left hanging by a shred when they turned to the Bible for encouragement only to find they fell onto precisely what they needed to hear to deepen their faith?
In Christianity, academic spirituality has found its most significant development in theology. Theology is not merely a study but a unique activity of the Christian community. We approach Scripture prayerfully, yes, but also philosophically—with analysis, synthesis, and education. Christianity is the only "religion" to create its own skepticism. From the beginning, we have not only introduced a rigorous critique of our own ideas, thoughts, beliefs, and interpretations, but we have promoted and endorsed this self-criticism. Most religions work to build themselves up. From the beginning, Christianity thoughtfully seeks to keep itself lean, sloughing off heresies and personal elaborations in every century. Sorting out the chaff is a matter, not so much of heart but of the head. A correct knowledge of Scripture and the Apostles' faith is necessary for steering the Church through the rapids of human history.
WHERE ACADEMIC SPIRITUALITY GOES WRONG
Three things send academic spirituality sideways: pridefulness, isolation, and neglecting the heart. We know that spirituality which lives only in the head will soon prove inadequate. We know that the Ivory Tower can alienate people from relevance and that some people can be educated beyond their intelligence, proving themselves little use to the Church or the work of the kingdom.
The biblical model for academic spirituality would be the Scribes—the academics of the Temple—and they are usually spoken of as villains in the gospels. They were the intelligencia of their day, the professors and doctoral students deeply committed to knowing Scripture and the commentaries. We also know that academia—be it in the Jerusalem Temple or today's universities—tends toward competitiveness. King of the hill, dog-eat-dog, insiders, and outsiders is a hierarchy of accomplishment and competence. Hence, academic spirituality can become fiercely Pharisaical—holier than thou, pompous, superior, rigid, and inflexible. For all their pretended liberality, many universities resemble nothing so much as Medieval Catholicism—power-hungry and reserving to themselves the right to be the ones who may bless whatever else goes on in society.
In my experience, I have witnessed more pompous self-importance among certain college professors than I have seen anywhere except at Presbyterian General Assembly meetings. When academic spirituality is infected by pridefulness, it changes lovers of learning into lovers of self-importance.
To than unfortunate distortion, Jesus says in Matthew 23: 13:
"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven. For you do not go in yourselves, and when others are going in, you stop them."
Clearly, intelligence is not everything.
It is possible to have eyes yet not see and ears yet not hear. Without the essential ingredient of faith, any study can default to the blind leading the blind.
ACADEMIC SPIRITUALITY IN JESUS
Do we see the academic spirituality in Jesus? Yes. At 12, he was in the Temple, astounding the rabbis with his insights. That Jesus even bothered to sit in with them and ask questions or be questioned exhibits the academic spirituality. At its best, academic spirituality is communal, which only happens when shared by several people rather than in isolation.
Elsewhere, it isn't easy to find because Jesus did not need to be taught or learn from any human being. His knowledge and insight were divine and direct from the Holy Spirit.
For us as well, our best academic spirituality involves our humble submission before the Holy Spirit, asking and trusting the Spirit to teach us and guide us into all truth. It is right and good that we should be constant students ever-eager to have our faith more fully and completely informed by Scripture.
We practice academic spirituality when we:
- discipline ourselves in the study of God's Word.
- discipline ourselves in the study of God's world.
- seek the joy of learning and teaching.
There is a clear difference between talking about God and talking to Him. There is no way to grow in faith or rightly learn things of the faith without first couching our study in prayer and faithful submission to God's Word. And there are great rewards—great joy and growth—in the discoveries that come with the Spirit's teaching.
PIETISTIC SPIRITUALITY
Whereas academic spirituality concerns the head, pietistic spirituality concerns the heart. The keyword is devotion. The same text that serves for the academic spirituality can do for the pietistic spirituality as well:
Deut. 6:5: You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.
It is the first and greatest commandment. It is also the heart of pietistic spirituality, getting the whole heart, soul, mind, and strength into the business of loving God.
In the West, pietistic spirituality received a major kick-start from John and Charles Wesley, George Whitfield, and others who would spark evangelical revival in England and the United States. And it is here pietistic spirituality overlaps with evangelical spirituality, for here was the first time the word evangelical was applied to a person as a specific Christian identity.
A good picture of pietistic spirituality comes from the "Holy Club" of Oxford—of which the Wesleys and Whitefield were leaders.
THE HOLY CLUB
The name Holy Club was given to the group in mockery of their emphasis on devotions. It was the first sign of what later became Methodism. Begun by the Wesleys at Oxford in 1729, the Holy Club members fasted until 3 PM on Wednesdays and Fridays, received Holy Communion once each week, studied and discussed the Greek New Testament and the Classics each evening in a member's room, visited prisoners and the sick, and systematically brought all their lives under strict review. It is this systematic review that became their "method." "Methodism" was also a name given in derision by other thinkers at Oxford.
The "method" consisted of 22 questions:
1. Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?
2. Am I honest in all my acts and words, or do I exaggerate?
3. Do I confidentially pass on to others what has been said to me in confidence?
4. Can I be trusted?
5. Am I a slave to dress, friends, work, or habits?
6. Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying?
7. Did the Bible live in me today?
8. Do I give the Bible time to speak to me every day?
9. Am I enjoying prayer?
10. When did I last speak to someone else of my faith?
11. Do I pray about the money I spend?
12. Do I get to bed on time and get up on time?
13. Do I disobey God in anything?
14. Do I insist upon doing something about which my conscience is uneasy?
15. Am I defeated in any part of my life?
16. Am I jealous, impure, critical, irritable, touchy, or distrustful?
17. How do I spend my spare time?
18. Am I proud?
19. Do I thank God that I am not as other people, especially as the Pharisees who despised the Publican?
20. Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize, hold a resentment toward, or disregard? If so, what am I doing about it?
21. Do I grumble or complain constantly?
22. Is Christ real to me?
WHERE PIETISM GOES WRONG
Pietism can go wrong very quickly, turning a person from the humble Publican into the sanctimonious Pharisee. It happens in three ways:
- when it goes PUBLIC.
- when it becomes PROUD.
- when it becomes a CODE.
These are all deadly and among the worst stains on Christianity and the Church.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus spells it out:
"Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven." Matthew 6:1
When pietism goes public, it goes bad. Jesus makes it clear that our piety and good works are meant for God's eyes alone. That becomes difficult—perhaps impossible—if you create a Holy Club and a piety code.
Also, once piety is practiced, we start to notice how well we practice it and how poorly some of our brothers and sisters practice it. It isn't long before the number one deadly sin creeps in, and we are secretly praying: "Lord, thank you for helping me live above the norm. I fast twice a week, I tithe, I pray three times a day,”etc.
It is no wonder the world perceives Christian devotion as self-serving and sanctimonious. Self-righteousness is perhaps the most significant open wound of our Christian witness. Pride ruins every good thing it touches.
Thirdly, once piety becomes our mutual agreement (of which we are very proud), it becomes a new code. "We Methodists/Presbyterians/Catholics shall covenant together to live by a certain rule by which we shall more completely honor God." Good intentions, yes, but the path the Hell nonetheless. Our little codes are our idolatries, and they are practically impossible to escape.
Every worldly institution—every denomination—has its rule, its order, its code. Those codes may be well-intentioned to help us collectively better follow Jesus, but we inevitably come to serve the code rather than Jesus Himself. I hardly need to point a finger elsewhere because we Presbyterians are as bad as any.
"That's not the Presbyterian way!" I have said many, many times.
"It's not in the Book of Order!" Again, I have played my role as enforcer of the denominational code, again and again. It is part of my Pharisaism, but I take no pride in it. I endure it as a necessary evil in the world of fallen people and even more fallen institutions.
Where do we see pietistic spirituality done rightly? With Christ, of course.
Jesus devoted himself in prayer, usually off by himself, Scripture records. He fasted 40 days and fought temptation in the wilderness. He washes the Disciples' feet, demanding that they allow Him to serve them. Beyond these, only one image matters: the cross. It is the perfect picture of love, devotion, and commitment to God.
Our pietism is rightly not our own at all. We do not—and we must not depend—upon our own attempts to reach up and get right with God. We must resist the temptation to put our hands on the wheel and steer our well-intentioned course of righteousness. This is Christian idolatry. We should rather empty ourselves of ourselves and depend entirely on Christ's piety which works on our behalf. It's not about us; it's not up to us. It's all about Christ; it's all about Him.
We can and should practice pietistic spirituality. We do so whenever we:
- empty ourselves before Christ.
- seek greater commitment in following Him.
- devote our entire heart and life to Him.
Finally, just a note about each. As regards academic spirituality, we know that knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. Love can correct our academic trajectory better than anything else. The love of God and our neighbors is the most excellent foundation for our studies.
And I didn't even mention the very best part of pietistic spirituality, which is music. The Wesleys wrote many hymns. They were singers and put their whole hearts into worship. Music in worship is God's gift to the human heart, and it is there to soften us up enough that we might further humble ourselves and receive the Word of God.
Lastly, the best examples of pietistic spirituality done right that you and I will see with our own two eyes lives in many of our homes and walks on four legs (Sorry, cat owners; I'm talking about our dogs. Yeah, we have a cat, but they're no match for the devotion of a dog). When I'm at home, and my dog is on my lap looking up into my eyes thinking that I am the greatest thing in the cosmos, I believe that is how I should be devoted to God—endlessly and without limits. It’s funny and oddly just that our endeavor to become more Christlike should begin by taking lessons from our dogs, but that’s how it works: the way up is the way down, and the path to life is the cross of death.
†
Following Up:
- Read through the 22 questions of The Holy Club and either share or journal how you “measure up” in pietistic spirituality.
- Commit yourself here and now to reading something excellent to grow your understanding of the faith.
Among recommendations: - Anything by C.S. Lewis.
- Anything by Frederick Buechner.
- Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
- Letters from Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
- The Cure by Lynch, McNicol, and Thrall.
- Anything by N.T. Wright.
- Anything by Henri Nouwen.
- Any Church history subject.
- Knowing God by J.I. Packer.
- Confronting Christianity by Rebecca McLaughlin.
- Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton.
- The Confessions of St. Augustine.
Your Pastor is always willing to recommend more!