I Refuse to Sign the Confession

On May 27, 1831 a young minister from the Church of Scotland was put on trial for heresy because he refused to sign the Westminster Confession of Faith, which had become the church's chief statement on orthodox or correct belief.  

Why did he refuse to sign it?

There are a few reasons, but the biggest one was the confession's insistence that people are born "wholly defiled" in their body and soul and "wholly inclined to all evil."  

In other words, people are born bad.

Scott refused to believe this was true and (instead) believed that when Jesus became human God wasn't just coming alongside humanity, but was actually taking up residence within humanity so that the Divine and flesh became one.

And so.

If humanity is defiled and evil, Scott wondered ... why would God become part of it?  Right?  Why would God live in such evil flesh?  And so sin, he said, doesn't define who we are from the get-go, but impacts or effects or infiltrates our Divinity so that we, in a sense, over time forget who we are and forget who God has created us to be.  

Jesus came to solve that problem - not a sin problem, but a memory problem.

One of the things that was brought up in Scott's trial was that his ideas were "novelties and imaginations", that rather than stick to the book and toe the line and believe what he was told to believe that he would instead use his imagination to imagine a God who was bigger than those beliefs, bigger than those boxes, and unable to be maintained by a theological line or boundary.  

For the church, you see, it was believed (and still is, in many ways) that nothing new could be thought of in regards to faith.  Truth was fixed, final, cemented into place ... it was a decree or sorts that could be swung like an authoritative club to keep people in line.

For Scott, though, truth was not fixed.  Instead, it was meant to be expanded and evolved and further understood.  In fact, a lot of the students and people who followed Scott and his teachings said that the main reason they were drawn to him was because of the "boldness of his imagination."

Friends.

May we be bold with our imaginations regarding God and spiritual things.

That's what the What If Project is about, really.  It's about daring to wonder and daring to ask, "WHAT IF there are wayS of thinking about God and faith and the Bible and Jesus and ALL THE THINGS that are way, way, way different than what our traditions have handed us?"

What if there is no hell?

What if God isn't a man?

What if Jesus didn't die for our sins?

What if the Bible isn't inerrant?

What if God doesn't care if you're gay?

What if God makes people gay?

What if God is gay?!

What if God is genderless?

What if God is all genders?

What if God doesn't care what you believe?

What if demons aren't lurking around every corner?

What if sex before marriage isn't evil?

... What if?  The project is about using our imagination to not just break down boxes, but to live as if there are no boxes.  It's about refusing to toe the line, refusing to "sign the confession", refusing to be boxed in and enclosed in someone else's theological closet.  

Yes - may you use your God-given, holy, good, and Spirit-filled imagination today to imagine a bigger God who has planted a Divine spark deep within your heart to empower you to live a life of love and grace and inclusion that will help create a better world.  

Much love,

(For more on Alexander John Scott, read chapter 5 of John Philip Newell's, "Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul")

Glenn Siepert