I live in a small town, where there is a church on nearly every corner, and most everyone claims to follow Yeshua (Jesus). Yeshua is well-known, in this part of the world, and, in this part of the world, if a person wants to be normal, he has to follow Him, or, at least, say he does. Consequently, it is often hard to tell the difference between a real Christian and a fake one.
In this part of the world, it is hard to tell a Christian from a non-Christian, because being a Christian is a cultural norm, and this cultural norm integrates itself into our individual paradigms, which gives us the ability to masquerade as a Christian.
The Apostle Paul said that we had to believe in our heart that Yeshua rose from the dead, and confess Him as Lord with our mouth in order to be a Christian.
How do we know if we have believed in our heart?
We have a paradigm shift when we believe in our heart.
A paradigm is an a priori (a previously held) commitment to a point-of-view (a worldview), which serves as a framework for interpreting the information that we encounter in life. We construct a paradigm (a context for interpreting information) at a very early age by integrating our experiences with the prevailing paradigm within our culture. This integration occurs, directly, through the transmittal of knowledge, and, indirectly, through how our culture defines and uses words.
A paradigm shift is a sudden change in the contextual framework that we use to interpret information. Since, we use our paradigm to interpret the information that other people transmit to us, via written or spoken words, the information that other people transmit to us about their paradigm, will not produce a paradigm shift in us. The only thing that will produce a paradigm shift is a “violent” encounter with truth. When our paradigm is exposed to a truth that shakes it violently, then we “experience” that truth, and it alters the framework of our interpretative context.
When a person is confronted with God’s law, and made to realize that he is an inmate in Satan’s kingdom, who is held captive by chains of sin, then he is ready to hear the Gospel of the Kingdom of God. When he hears the Gospel, the Holy Spirit confronts him with Truth. At this point, he has a choice to make. He must choose to harden his heart and reject Truth, or humble himself and embrace it.
If a person humbles himself and embraces the Truth, the Truth will shake his old paradigm down and build a new one. In the old paradigm, everything revolved around this person and what he wanted. In the new paradigm, everything revolves around Yeshua and what He wants. In short: The paradigm shift called repentance causes us to stop following our selfish desires, our plans, our lusts, the world and Satan, and start following Yeshua by pursuing His Will, righteousness and holiness.
When we accept the Truth that the Holy Spirit confronts us with, and bow our knee to King Yeshua, we repent. Without repentance, there is no remission of sin. Without repentance, there is no procession of kings. Without repentance, there is no change in kingdom citizenship. Without repentance, there is no salvation.
Repentance produces a change in direction. Before repentance, we pursued our will, that is, we pursued our lusts and the things of the world. After repentance, we pursue God’s Will, that is, we pursue righteousness and holiness.
When we realize that we are a sinner who is trapped in Satan’s kingdom and call upon King Yeshua to rescue us, He will save us. Then, when we confess our sins, that is, when we agree with Him and call our sin, sin, His grace washes us and empowers us to change and grow until we overcome that sin.
Do you see the common element in getting saved and overcoming the sin patterns of the past? It is recognizing sin, acknowledging sin, and confessing sin. God’s law highlights sin, so we can recognize it. If God says a thought pattern or a behavior is sin, we must agree with Him and call it sin, and seek His remedy for it.
This brings us to A.A.’s 1st Step: “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.”
If an unbeliever takes A.A.’s 1st step, is he any closer to a Holy God, who calls his behavior sin? No! Is the unbeliever any closer to realizing that he is trapped in the kingdom of Darkness and Satan is destroying him, and he needs to be saved? No!
What about the Christian who takes the 1st Step? When a Christian says that he is powerless over alcohol and his life is unmanageable, does the Lord cleanse his conscience and give him the grace to overcome alcohol and manage his life? No!
1 John 1:9 says that if we will confess our sin, Yeshua will forgive us and cleanse us of all unrighteousness. These Christians are not confessing their sins, that is, they are not agreeing with the Lord’s assessment of their behavior so that He can forgive them and give them the grace that they need to overcome their sin.
These people say they are powerless, and they cannot manage their life. Is it a sin to be powerless over something? No! Is it a sin to not be able to manage your life? No! There is no way that we can say that we are confessing our sins when we say that we are powerless, and that we can’t manage our life.
No, it is a sin to drink too much alcohol and get drunk. The powerlessness and the un-manageability are byproducts of the sin of drunkenness, they are not the sin that we need to confess.
God created us, and gave us a free will. Consequently, we are not powerless over alcohol, and we can manage our lives. At some point, however, we chose to exercise our free will by drinking too much alcohol in order to get drunk and escape from life, which is a sin. After we chose to sin, our body developed a chemical environment that compelled us, or pushed us towards drinking again, and as we did, we burnt patterns in our brain that created an obsession to drink again. When the compulsion and obsession matured, we were addicted to alcohol. Then, we were powerless over alcohol and, as a result, our life became unmanageable.
The problem is not alcohol, or powerlessness over alcohol, or the un-manageability of our life. The problem is not a mythical disease called addiction, or an allergy to alcohol. The root problem is sin. The root problem is disobeying God.
Some people may think that I am being too dogmatic about the precision of terminology. I am not. Words have meaning. The words that we use to quantify reality, shape our perceptions of that reality, and influence how we interact with it.
Terminology is important. The terminology that God uses to describe alcoholism is sin….the sin of drunkenness. God says that drunkards will not inherit His Kingdom because they continue in sin and refuse to repent. A lot is riding on terminology. So, we had better use the terminology that God uses to describe our behavior.
In the small town that I live in most of the people, who go to A.A., claim to be Christians. And, in fact, I have some Christian friends, who go to A.A. The issues that I have raised may not seem that important to these small-town people. The distinctions I have made may not seem like critical distinctions in their eyes because they have already experienced the paradigm shift of repentance.
For the people in my small town, the issues I have raised and the distinctions I have made, may not be critical, because, we have a church on every corner, and everyone is a Christian, or says they are. But what about the people in New York, Los Angeles, or Las Vegas? What about the people in India, Indonesia or Japan? These issues and distinctions are critical for these people, because Christianity is not their cultural norm, and their paradigm points them away from Yeshua.
The problem with A.A. is that it uses terminology that sounds biblical, until you examine the philosophy behind it. When you examine the philosophy behind A.A’s biblical language, A.A.’s theology comes into focus. The theology of A.A. goes along with the paradigm that the sinner uses to interpret information, in order to ensure that he is not offended. The theology of Christianity, however, brings the sinner into a violent confrontation with Truth that offends him in order to destroy his old paradigm and build a new one and rescue him from Satan’s kingdom.
The science, philosophy and theology that A.A. promotes points people away from God’s Kingdom. Thus, when an unbeliever takes A.A.’s 1st Step, he is one step closer to Hell. And when a Christian takes A.A.’s 1st Step, he is one step further from the abundant life that he is seeking. Oh sure, a person’s life may improve after he takes the 1st Step, but this does not mean that he has left Satan’s kingdom, or that he is any closer to doing so. It means that he is marshaling the power of his will to manage his life. It means that he has taken a Step in the wrong direction.
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