Ah… the Lord smiles when he sees the likes of you and Devon wrestling to understand his mysteries. He must truly enjoy it, and that thought brings me great peace.

Can you imagine witnessing God’s voice proclaiming “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!” ??? How wonderful for the apostles to have heard it!

I have to believe God wants us to know Him with certainty.

You make a good point about the insufficiency of conveying the truth only in a written way. The epistles clearly say that God gave some the gift to teach.

Please pray for us Protestants!

You raise good questions.

It’s not clear to me that the very same authority that Jesus gave to the apostles was transferred in its entirety to the men they ordained. Or even that the essence of that authority was transferred.

What is God’s promise when it comes to the ordained successors of the apostles, and how do we know what that promise is?

There are no biblical proof-text verses that explain the exact nature of the authority the Apostles were given by Jesus, nor whether and to what degree that authority was transmitted to others, nor exactly how this transmittal was to be done, nor upon what conditions that authority could be revoked.

That being said, we have much biblical evidence that the Apostles received some kind of authority from Christ, as we see when he tells them he gives them authority to bind and loose, cure the sick, cast out demons, forgive sins, preach in his name, etc. Further, we see how they understood this authority in Acts 15 in the Council of Jerusalem, the precedent for all Ecumenical Councils.

We also read about Paul laying hands on Timothy, and this action certainly seems to be authorizing Timothy to act with authority over his church(es) as well.

From history, we read the Christians writings in the 100s and learn that the early Church had bishops which were to be obeyed (St. Ignatius of Antioch) and the importance of these bishops having succession from the Apostles (St. Irenaeus). This evidence increases in the 3rd and 4th centuries with many other early Christian writings being extant.

Without this authority, it immediately becomes questionable whether those men deemed “heretics” by the Church’s leaders were indeed really heretics–maybe the Ebionites, Marcionites, Novatians, and Sabellians really had more of the truth than the “orthodox” bishops of the Church. How would we know? This is the argument made by many people today, including Bart Ehrmann, the Jesus Seminar, and several others.

Also, how do we know that what “the Church” decided was true in these first centuries really was true? That would include the canon of Scripture. Without authority being given in a known and orderly way, we suddenly run into all manner of problem with how we can have any certainty at all in what the Christian Faith is, who Jesus was, etc.

When I say that I’m “skeptical”, I’m saying that I haven’t seen a clear rationale presented. I would like to understand the conclusion. I can’t with good conscience believe it just because someone suggests it or because it feels right.

I can see the need that if we are to know the truth about the gospel, then God has to transmit it in some way. I’m just not convinced that infallibility transmitted through apostolic succession is the only way that we can know the essential truths God wants us to know.

Well, I would say that there could be a hundred ways for God to transmit “the essential truths” of the Gospel. He could just shout it out from Heaven every five years such that everyone could hear and know them. He could send angels to tell people individually. But the question really is: What is the way that God himself decided to transmit his truth to us?

I would also say that it is a bit inaccurate to say that “infallibility is transmitted through Apostolic Succession” though they do go hand-in-hand because one without the other wouldn’t preserve God’s truth from error. Authority is transmitted through succession of already-authorized bishops, ultimately reaching back to the source of authority: Christ and the Apostles he chose and ordained. It is also the case that Christ has protected the authorized leaders of his Church from error (as a group, meeting in Councils, etc.) and the bishop of Rome in particular from error when proclaiming teachings on faith and morals to the universal Church. The Called to Communion guys addressed this relation between Apostolic Succession and infallibility in this comment: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/11/solo-scriptura-sola-scriptura-and-the-question-of-interpretive-authority/#comment-4674

Protestantism would say that God preserved his truth by having the “essentials” recorded in the Bible, and people can read the Bible and learn the truth; that is the way God did it, and the Holy Spirit helps people interpret it correctly. In practice, we see that this way doesn’t work well, with Protestant churches differing on almost every aspect of the Faith (even the Trinity). God could have done it this way, but it doesn’t seem like he would. For example, most people couldn’t even read for the first 1600 years of his Church’s existence. Why would he only preserve his truth in a form (the Bible) that lay people couldn’t even access except through literate leaders?

Gotta run–let me know what you think!

Freddy, thanks for your comment–I hadn’t even thought of the replacing of Judas at the beginning of Acts.

I would recommend moderating the tone of the last part of your comment when talking with Protestants as it comes across pretty harshly. (A Catholic priest at a parish I was once a member of drove a Mercedes, too.)

That being said, I look forward to your insights and comments on the blog.

What is God’s promise when it comes to the ordained successors of the apostles, and how do we know what that promise is?

When I say that I’m “skeptical”, I’m saying that I haven’t seen a clear rationale presented. I would like to understand the conclusion. I can’t with good conscience believe it just because someone suggests it or because it feels right.

I can see the need that if we are to know the truth about the gospel, then God has to transmit it in some way. I’m just not convinced that infallibility transmitted through apostolic succession is the only way that we can know the essential truths God wants us to know.

Sue, your comment made me laugh! I will post an update about Adele soon–promise!

Jonathan, your position is the other one that many Protestants believe: You could grant from history that this material succession occurred, but did God’s authority transmit from one to another?

I would first ask: Do you believe Christ gave his authority to the Apostles?

If yes, then do you believe that the successors of the Apostles via the laying on of hands (e.g. Paul -> Timothy as recorded in the Bible) received that divine authority or did God not transmit it?

If yes, then when and with which successor of the Apostles did God stop this transmittal and remove his divine authority from all of them?

I think those are the first questions to ask yourself. If you think that divine authority was revoked due to unfaithfulness of one or more bishops, how does that avoid Donatism?