Dr. Ray,
I know you are doing your best to be precise in this and I am thankful for your clarifications.
But let me add a little more to this to help it harmonize better. You stated:
However, if one knows and understands the other things about what time we live in and how this prophecy fits into the overall plan of God for mankind then you WOULD understand where I am coming from. I am not sayiing it is more important than salvation overall, but for this time it is. It is like having an overall plan, but certain things will become more important for a moment in time than the overall plan, even while you are carrying out the overall plan. That is what I am referring to is all. Let's say for example that you are shopping for a gift for someone and you suddenly realize you need the restroom. Finding a restroom suddenly becomes more important to you than finding the gift. It does not however supplant your plan for the gift, it just takes momentary priority to the plan of acquiring the gift.
Even in this we would still have to say that salvation is still the first and most important issue. Think of it this way. The Isa. text, and all texts that speak to a union of a man and woman, are part of the SECOND part of the law code which is to love your neighbor. All laws fit into one of the two categories as Christ said. Some laws are about loving God and some laws are about loving man.
But it is second in order of importance. Christ said that the GREATEST law was to love God first with one's heart and mind and soul. It is the
greatest law and no one can love God in a pure way without being righteous, in Christ, born again.
You are not far from being right in what you have perceived God to have impressed upon your heart. You are close to rightly understanding it. It is true that at this time in history God is highlighting this issue to bring it to the front for people to deal with this doctrine just like he has other truths in other portions of history. So your perceptive spirit has understood much of it. Yet there is still the reversal here.
Let me use your illustration. You use the store shopping illustration and the need to take a bathroom break. That is true if the store is
already safe. But it is
untrue if someone is in a store that is on
FIRE and is burning down.
Celibacy, monogamy, polygyny, or any combination of it does not, and can never in a pure Christian theology, take the first place doctrine position no matter when or where we are at in God's historical plan. It can be very important but never of FIRST importance of the THE most important.
If someone is in a store on fire that is what it is like for someone to be unsaved. Their soul, life, and existence is burning down as they dwindle away in sin. The first and most important issue is for that person to understand who Christ is for salvation. EVERYTHING else, with no exceptions, fall under the second order of the law code (love your neighbor) until they first learn how to love God through Christ. So if one were in a store and it is burning down the first and most urgent, vital, and essential issue is for that person NOT to take time to go to bathroom but to run for the exit and get out before he burns up in the fire. Even if the person were to urinate upon themselves that is still better to do in order to get out than to make it to the bathroom yet burn up and die.
Likewise, no person ought to make an earthly love union between a man and woman the most important issue, topic, or focus for anyone who is not yet saved as for that person they are burning up and the first and most vital issue is for that person to be saved. Once that takes place everything else then can be within the next order of business.
I share this not in any way to belabor the point here because as I said, you are 75 or 85% right on the impression the Spirit has given to you as this doctrine does seem to fit within the historical unfolding of God's providence in historical development of doctrines in Church history. But, there is the need to slightly reverse it to get the order right. Without that prioritization your presentation or word choice reverses the two greatest laws in the Bible.
Salvation is a first order issue in all cases with no exceptions whatsoever. That is the Evangelical position for those who place the Bible's revelation above all other ideas, impressions of the Spirit, or formulations of doctrine. Love for neighbor, as in a love union with a mate, is always within the second order of laws and must always take a
second seat to the first law if we truly are going to build a theology based upon the Bible as the Ultimate standard of truth. And thus all of our impressions of the Spirit, in an Evangelical Christian polygyny position, must place salvation in all cases as first order and then all else as second order and subject our impressions to that biblical textual basis and not allow our personal impressions the Spirit, which can and do occur, to get out of balance in regard to explicit statements of Scripture.
And again, I hope you do not take offense at this effort here to present the biblical order. On this end, and here in America, we see too many times men and women jump on to this doctrine and utterly destroy their lives. In many times those entering into this union are still unsaved and some are even coming out of liberal denominations where they never heard about the truth of the gospel in Christ. They are religious, moral, and seeking love. But some are getting this order out of place and failing to see that salvation is always, in every case, with no exceptions whatsoever the first order of importance. And thus we are seeing people make some bad mistakes by running past Christ in order to get to a mate when what needs to happen is for people to get to Christ first and then from that position of true love learn how to love their mate. I have been working with a few as of recent that are in just this very position. They are seeking to move toward a plural union but what they really need first and foremost is salvation in Christ.
And thus that is why I am stressing this position here and focusing on it. I am not stressing this or saying this to be nit picky or to try and rebuke you or to try and get into a useless or fruitless debate. As I said I think you are on target that within the second order of issues you are right that 75% to 85% of the emphasis in that realm is moving towards this doctrine becoming the focal point issue.
And no I do not think you are "whacko." You are really a good brother overall and what I am trying to do here is nudge you to just take one more step and refine your presentation so that it is more precise, and more stable upon Scripture's theological axioms, what many Evangelicals rightly call the theological triage of doctrinal order.
But, what I am stressing is that as Evangelicals, who believe in the full inspiration and ultimate authority of the Bible over all else, we must always with no exceptions keep the priority of doctrines in the order as Christ so spoke of them. The greatest law is to love God first (which requires salvation) and then to love our neighbor (which allows for polygyny).
Dr. Allen
