3/22/2026 Sunday
Sunday School at GCC on the Spiritual Radicals & Rationalists during the Reformation is an interesting one. We touched on names: Spiritualists: Hans Denck (Lutheran -> Spiritualist -> recanted to join the Swiss Reformed Church but may still be wolf in sheep's clothing), Sebastian Franck, Casper Schwenckfeld (still active today mainly in Pennsylvania). Rationalists: Michael Servetus, Laelius & Faustus Socinus (rejected Trinity and substitutionary atonement - Jesus was just an example, promoted work-righteousness, fled from Italy persecution to Transylvania and called their belief Unitarian). So they are essentially emotional-centered and rational-centered cults, respectively. And here's Google Gemini's result for Bible verses (it's wrong to say they rejected the Bible) they would have used for each's central ideology:
1. Verses on "Spirit and Truth"
The Spiritualist teacher Sebastian Franck specifically argued that the visible church had ceased to exist (Against teachings of Matthew 16:18) and that the true Church "only exists in spirit and in truth".
- Likely Verse: John 4:24 — "God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." Application: Franck used this concept to claim that even non-Christians, such as Muslims and pagans, were part of a universal spiritual church because they were in communion with "the one spirit" rather than a physical organization.
2. Verses Supporting the "Inner Word"
Hans Denck and other Spiritualists taught the doctrine of the "inner word," (against the written Word) believing that the voice of God speaks directly into the individual's heart.
- Likely Verse: Jeremiah 31:33 — "I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts."
- Application: This supported their belief that inward conviction and "spiritual communication" were the ultimate authorities, even over Scripture.
3. Verses on the Indwelling of Christ
Caspar Schwenckfeld, described as the most intellectual of the group, rejected physical elements like baptism and communion, emphasizing instead the "indwelling of Christ" as the only important element. Christ is this "wholly other."
- Likely Verse: Colossians 1:27 — "...which is Christ in you, the hope of glory."
- Application: Schwenckfeld argued that Christians only have contact with Christ in an "abstract spiritual way," making physical church membership and ordinances irrelevant.
4. Verses on Universal Salvation
Because they prioritized their own "inner movement" over objective theological structures like justification by faith, some Spiritualists like Denck moved toward universalism.
- Likely Verse: 1 Corinthians 15:22 — "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive."
- Application: Denck used his internal revelations to teach the universal salvation of all beings, notoriously including even Satan
Pastor Jeff Jou's sermon at Crossroads on Psalm 3 was no boring matter to me for I memorized this chapter.
First it was just the internet, www, then we have google, and now AI. These are just advances of tools to improve ourselves. Time and time again, we have people fearing it because they do not learn to improve themselves but merely want to rely on their convenient tools more and more. So the fear is warranted, no wonder. Using Google Gemini, a competitor of ChatGPT, I shorten the time for tasks I would do on exhaustive google searches for researches in theology, literature, virtually any knowledge. For lectures, meetings, Granola is amazing at it. And the summaries these AI platforms come up with are virtually identical to human ability.
I have noticed that there are many useful quotes and witty lines these AI could come up with to make understanding clearer. I'm almost certain that the AI got these clever remarks from some human somewhere, and if so, I suppose citation is going to be a problem, we don't want to just keep citing "quote is from Perplexity, DeepSeek, etc." Nevertheless, I should certainly copy these smart lines that the AI comes up with from Sunday School classes, Bible studies, etc.
This morning while on the way to church, Nadia and I also argued over the choice of words used for a fan's "obsession of" vs. "dedication for" her idol. An argument that gone even worst at night. Which was gradually resolved the next day. I believe that this semantic should not be taken too seriously, as one could say "The sinner dedicated his large portion of her time for his idol" or "I'm obsessed with God's word." Many do not understand the idea of a neutral stance of a concept/word. Some words/concepts do not need the quality of good or bad. It's just like Bob asking the pastor yesterday in Men's Group: "How much of that inquisitiveness do you think is God's design as opposed to sinful nature?" But when argument gets heated, it is wise to seek peace and go with what they want to believe: that obsession must always be bad, dedication is for good things only, inquisitiveness must be divided into good and bad, etc.
I believe my methodology in argument was flawed. Nadia was trying to look up the words in the car while I was driving, I unwittingly stopped her doing so when I said that these semantics are relative and subjective to the interpreter in literary context, concluding that whatever she found may not easily help the discussion, I was driving so I thought I could speak fast. I should have played along and waited for her to search those words online, which is an act that I always promote in principle. Slow to speak means think first, think more, take time to pause, especially when driving.