HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, June 16, 2024 – Jesus is our gold standard. During his time on Earth in a human body, Jesus had the full measure of God’s Spirit, which means that everything Jesus said was God speaking through him. Jesus wasn’t God, but God spoke directly through him by his Holy Spirit. Having the full measure of God’s Spirit gave Jesus ultimate authority in everything he taught.

If Jesus is our gold standard, then everything else must be compared to Jesus. Moreover, what Jesus said in the New Testament takes precedence over whatever was said in the Old Testament, if what Jesus said conflicts with the Old Testament. So, for instance, it’s no longer hate and kill your enemies, it’s love and bless your enemies; it’s no longer get a bill of divorce, it’s divorce leads to adultery (so don’t do it); it’s no longer shun the lepers, it’s heal the lepers; it’s no longer gather riches to yourself, it’s give all your riches away.

I mention this as a preamble to a critically important teaching that is more, in fact, a fact, which is – we are followers of Jesus, not followers of his disciples. The New Testament covenant is with Jesus, not with Peter or with Paul or with any of our other brethren mentioned in scripture. Our allegiance is to Jesus, and Jesus has the final word if something he says conflicts with something someone else says in the Bible or elsewhere. Everything Jesus said was the word of God, which is why (spoiler alert!) Jesus is called the Word.

Paul famously had a lot to say as a follower of Jesus, and some of it has been recorded in the New Testament. But not everything Paul said and wrote was from God. He wasn’t Jesus; he was Paul, and as Paul, he didn’t have the full measure of God’s Spirit like Jesus had while on Earth, which means that sometimes Paul spoke or wrote amiss, as we all do (not having the full measure of God’s Spirit). Just because what Paul said or wrote is included in the New Testament doesn’t mean it’s correct. We need to be very careful to distinguish the words of Jesus from those of others. Jesus’ words we can take the bank; the words of others we need to carefully weigh against Jesus’ words to see if they balance, to see if they fit with what Jesus taught us.

One example is the spiritual fate of the genetic children of Israel. Paul was adamant that God continued to favour his genetically “chosen people” over everyone else and that they ultimately would triumph spiritually as a people, not as individuals, whereas Jesus (and Old Testament prophets like Isaiah) made it clear that genetics had nothing to do with salvation, and that the people formerly known as chosen were no more favoured by God than anyone else and had no more guaranteed claim to Paradise than anyone else. This is a thorny issue for many believers, but it shouldn’t be. Again, Jesus has the final word here, not Paul or anyone else.

Another example is Paul’s demoting of women to secondary status to men, especially when it came to roles of leadership and teaching in the Church. Paul tried to silence women’s voices, whereas Jesus amplified them. We know that Jesus amplified them because he was constantly defending his female followers and in so doing giving them a voice and teaching us that they needed to be heard as much as his male followers. In the Kingdom, there is no distinction between male and female or Jew and non-Jew or old and young. We are all the same in God’s eyes, endowed with his same Spirit (though to different measures).

To me, it is highly telling and symbolic that God chose Mary Magdalene as the first human to see Jesus after he rose and the first one to the bear the news of his resurrection. Unfortunately, many of the male followers dismissed her claims, only later to be sharply corrected by Jesus. Worldly Christianity may have evolved over the centuries as a male-centric belief system, but Jesus didn’t plant a male-centric belief system, not according to his recorded words and actions. Again, it’s to Jesus that we need to look for guidance, not to his followers, if what his followers say conflicts with what Jesus taught us.

Jesus is our gold standard for everything in life. We look to him to inform us through his words recorded in scripture and – just as importantly – we look to him in prayer, where we meet with him one-on-one in real time, which is a privilege promised to his born-again believers. If a teaching or a position doesn’t line up with what Jesus has said or shown us, we need to reject it. God has given us a Spirit of discernment for just such a reason, but it’s up to us to use it.

By all means, read the words of Paul and of other followers of Jesus, but remember that they aren’t infallible. There is much wisdom in them, but they aren’t infallible. Use the measure of the Holy Spirit that God’s given you to discern what is true and what is not, and weigh everything – EVERYTHING – against the Word.