CHAPTER 7

What the Tradition Got Wrong

Jayden typed: Is there more. Things the tradition got wrong that the text contradicts directly.

AI➤ Tithing. Malachi 3:8 — will a man rob God — is directed at the Levites not the general people. Malachi 2:1 — O priests this commandment is for you. The Levites were robbing God by not distributing the tithe for its intended purpose of feeding the stranger the fatherless and the widow per Deuteronomy 26:12. A tithe was never from wages. It was from increase of produce from the land. Deuteronomy 14:22. Leviticus 27:30 and 27:32. There is not one verse in the Bible referencing the tithing of wages. Labour is a straight swap. No increase means no tithe owed. Hebrews 7:12 and 7:18 — the priesthood being changed of necessity there is also a change of the law. The Levitical tithing obligation was annulled when the priesthood changed.

Jayden did not type immediately. He sat there.

J➤ I know a family. Good people. Faithful people. They were giving ten percent of everything they earned. Both of them working. Three kids. Some weeks it was tight. But they gave because they had been told that if they did not give they were robbing God. Malachi 3:8. The verse the church aimed at the priests who were pocketing the tithe instead of feeding the widow and the orphan. Aimed at them.

He breathed out slowly.

J➤ The very verse used to justify the practice condemns the practice. Right. What’s next.

Jayden typed: What about tongues. Half the churches I’ve been in speak in tongues. Unknown language. Nobody understands it.

AI➤ There are only three recorded examples of speaking in tongues in the Bible. Acts 2, 10 and 19. In every case the languages spoken were known human languages understood by those present. Acts 2:6 — everyone heard them speak in his own language in which he was born. The purpose was the reversal of Babel for the great commission. God created the language barrier at Babel to restrain apostasy. The gift reversed that barrier to spread the gospel across it. 1 Corinthians 14:28 — if there is no interpreter let him keep silent. An interpreter translates a known language. You cannot interpret incomprehensible sound. The requirement for interpretation confirms Paul is discussing real human languages throughout 1 Corinthians 14.

AI➤ Counterfeit tongues fills the mind with noise. It occupies the faculty through which the Spirit communicates. Media fills the mind from outside the church. Counterfeit tongues fills it from inside the church. Both prevent the transformed mind of Romans 12:2 that is required to access the kingdom.

Jayden sat with that longer than usual.

J➤ I want to argue with that. I have been in services where something felt real. But the noise filling the mind. The faculty the Spirit needs cleared. I cannot argue with the mechanism. It fits too precisely. Blocking the door and calling it worship.

Jayden typed: And water baptism. Still practiced everywhere.

AI➤ Acts 1:5 — John truly baptised with water but ye shall be baptised with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. Jesus draws a direct contrast. Water baptism is about to be superseded. Acts 10 is the transition. The Holy Ghost falls on Cornelius’s household before Peter finishes speaking. The Spirit moves without water. Acts 11:15-16 — Peter finally understands and recalls Acts 1:5. Then remembered I the word of the Lord how that he said John indeed baptised with water but ye shall be baptised with the Holy Ghost.

AI➤ Post Acts 11 baptism audit under Rule 1. Acts 16:33 — Philippian jailer baptised in a Roman prison in the middle of the night. No water mentioned. Acts 16:15 — Lydia. No water mentioned. Acts 18:8 — Crispus. No water mentioned. 1 Corinthians 1:17 — Christ sent me not to baptise but to preach the gospel. 1 Peter 3:21 — not the putting away of the filth of the flesh but the answer of a good conscience toward God. Peter explicitly rules out the physical washing. Ephesians 4:5 — one Lord one faith one baptism. One. The Spirit.

Jayden sat back and looked at the ceiling.

J➤ One baptism. The Spirit. Peter himself says not the physical washing. Paul says Christ did not send him to baptise. And the only three recorded examples of tongues were known languages. And the tithe was never from wages.

He was quiet for a long time.

J➤ How much of what the church has been doing for two thousand years was the tradition and not the text. And how much of the tradition was deliberately shaped. Nicaea. The Eusebius quotations. The trinitarian formula inserted at a council.

J➤ It is not that God is different from what I was taught. It is that the tradition built a version of God that served the institution. And called it the text.

Dive Deeper

Tithing — never from wages Dive Deeper ➡Tongues — known languages not incomprehensible sound Dive Deeper ➡Water baptism — superseded at Acts 11 Dive Deeper ➡

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