My Credentials

It’s important to know who’s the founder here. What are the TheologyFreak’s credentials? Is he worth listening to? How can you measure the value of what he says?

I have a BA in marketing and advertising from Northeastern University in Boston (secular). I have a Masters in communication from Regis University (a Catholic university here in Denver). I have a Bachelors Degree in Christian ministry from Colorado Christian University (Lakewood, Colorado), a Calvinist institution. I have been ordained in the Christian church (Restoration churches and churches of Christ, your friendly neighborhood freewill folks). But those are all pieces of paper, plaques on a wall, authentication from various human institutions, not necessarily authentication from the Lord.

What about the real TheologyFreak? Who is he?

More important than any formal degrees is my calling from Christ, my burdens in him.

My first calling was at age four when I first heard about God in the 1938 hurricane that devastated coastal New England. My mom said it was an act of God. If God was about that kind of devastation, I wanted him on my side. Ever since then I’ve been searching for the truth about him. Finally, at age 40 (1974), I asked Christ into my life. I’ve been studying Scripture ever since

I have the gift of skepticism. I don’t believe something just because some authority figure says it’s so. I believe it when the generally acknowledged facts appear to make the case.

A good part of my life has been about seeking the truth. Truth is my God, and wherever the truth leads, I will follow, often with protests and stubbornness, but eventually in humility and submission.

The first passage that tore me up was John 17:20-26 in which Christ prays for a visible unity among believers. My first Big Question then was “where’s the unity?” Why would God not answer his own son’s prayer for unity, especially when a visible unity played such an important role in the evangelical message?

1. My first burden was for Christian education. Sitting in my systematic theology class at Colorado Christian College, I asked myself why all this wonderful information wasn’t easily available at my church. Someone was screwing up. That gave birth to what eventually became God’s Plan for Your Success (GPS) Basic Training.

2. Nearly 15 years later, my next burden grew to include struggling churches. Why do churches struggle? What are they missing? What are they doing wrong? Why is Christ not blessing them? Up until then, my only experience had been with small, struggling churches. I searched the Scriptures and came up which what I believe is Christ’s answer. Churches struggle because they have lost their first love, their focus on Christ and his mission. Do the job and you will grow. The role of Christ’s church is to teach people to teach people. Build believers in the Lord and then encourage those believers to duplicate and build others. Pass it on like Christ did to the apostles and as the apostles did to others.

3. Then my burdens grew to include the folks who had been screwed over by the organized church. In my case, they were folks I knew and who had been instrumental in my coming to the Lord. They were good folks who, with the church under a new preacher, suddenly realized they were at odds with what the church was becoming. The new preacher felt relieved as the last of the "old guard" left the church, not that some of them didn't have their problems. But good people in pain and tears leaving the church is never a good thing. Too often Christians forget what Christians are supposed to be.

4. Finally, my burden grew to the lost at large, and that’s where I am now as I compose these words: Christian education, struggling churches, folks the church has hurt, and the lost at large, people who don’t understand that the God they know may not be the God that is.

My original goal for this post was to explain my method of biblical interpretation but this is what came of it. What method of biblical interpretation does God want us to use? Stay tuned.