The Land of Pentecostals

A brief Interaction with Walter Brueggemann
by Dr. Dony K. Donev

Since I began studying Pentecostal history sometime ago, I have pondered the question of space and how we, Pentecostals, associate with it. Perhaps, on a larger scale, all Christian associate with space and location, but for Pentecostals it somehow becomes part of the identity of a given event, process or even person. This association is so strong that we simply cannot tell our history without it. And how is one even expected to tell Pentecostal history without places like the Bethel School of Healing, 214 Bonnie Brie Street and the Azusa Street Mission? Or how are we supposed to tell our story, to give our testimony of events significant and central for our spiritual life without a place and a location, which in most cases defines them all? For example, our salvation is connected the place where we were saved and sanctified; baptism with water or with fire from above; healing on the spot at a given prayer meeting, miracle service or church revival. And even eschatology, always undividable from the meeting in the clouds and the Heavenly city.

For Pentecostals, the Full Gospel teaching is a covenant theology because it ultimately subscribes to the quest for the Promised Land. But, I’ve never been able to pin point the reasoning behind this until reviewing anew Brueggemann’s study of “The Land” and comparing his ideas with Pentecostal history and praxis through the following quotes that will exchange perspectives with the questions stated above and hopefully stir further thinking.

p.5 “Space” means an arena of freedom without coercion or accountability, free of pressure and void of authority. …. But “place” is a very different matter. Place is space which has historical meanings, where some things have happened which are now remembered and which provide continuity across generations. Place is space in which important words have been exchanged, which have established identity, defined vocation, and envisioned destiny. Place is space in which vows have been exchanged, promises have been made, and demands have been issued. Place is indeed a protest against unpromising pursuit of space. It is a declaration that our humanness cannot be found in escape, detachment, absence of commitment, and undefined freedom.
Whereas pursuit of space may be a flight from history, a yearning for a place is a decision to enter history with an identifiable people in an identifiable pilgrimage.”

p. 11 “The very land that promised to create space for human joy and freedom became the very source of dehumanizing exploitation and oppression. Land was indeed a problem for Israel. Time after time, Israel saw the land of promise become the land of problem.”

p. 15 “….land theology in the Bible: presuming upon the land and being expelled from it; trusting toward a land not yet possessed, but empowered by anticipation of it.”

p. 27 “The action is in the land promised, not in the land possessed … So Jacob, bearer of the promise, is buried in Canaan under promise.”

p. 42 “Presence is for pursuit of the promise …. The new people, contrasted with the old, are promise-trusters, rooted in Moses, linked to the faith of Caleb, and identified as the vulnerable ones. His presence is evident in his intervention not to keep things going, but to bring life out of death, to call to himself promise-trusters in the midst of promise-doubters.”

p. 47 “Israel knew that in his speaking and Israel’s hearing was its life. That is why the first word in Israel’s life is “listen” (Deut. 6:4)! Israel lived by a people-creating word spoken by this people-creator (Deut. 8:3).”

p. 51 “Both rain and manna come from heaven, from outside the history of coercion and demand.”

p. 53 “Israel does not have many resources with which to resist the temptation. The chief one is memory. At the boundary [of Gilgal] Israel is urged to remember …. Remembering is an historic activity. To practice it is to affirm one’s historicity.”

p. 54 “Land can be a place for historical remembering, for action that affirms the abrasive historicity of our existence. But land can also be, as Deuteronomy saw so clearly, the enemy of memory, the destroyer of historical precariousness. The central temptation of the land for Israel is that Israel will cease to remember and settle for how it is and imagine not only that it was always so but it will always be so. Guaranteed security dulls the memory …. Israel’s central temptation is to forget and so cease to be a historical people, open either to the Lord of history or to his blessings yet to be given. Settled into an eternally guaranteed situation, one securely knows that one is indeed addressed by the voice of history who gives gifts and makes claims. And if one is not addressed, then one does not need to answer. And if one does not answer, then one is free not to care, not decide, not to hope and not to celebrate.”

p. 56 “The land will be avenged preciously because land is not given over to any human agent, but is a sign and function in covenant. Thus arrayed against the monarchy are both the traditionalism of Naboth and the purpose of Yahweh.”

p. 57 “Israel finds itself in history as one who had no right to exist. Slaves become an historical community. Sojourners become secured in land …. Non of it achieved, all of it given …. And the way to sustain gifted existence is to stay singularly with the gift-giver.”

And the following conclusions: as Pentecostals, we associate with places and location, we ultimately associate with land as part of our covenant theology, because:

1. In the land we place our own historical meaning, our part and role in history, as well as the spiritual heritage we have received and we give to a next generation; thus, place itself becomes not only where our history happens, but a defining part of our historical identity as a people.

2. Enduring the promise of a land not yet seen, but already received by faith, has indeed been the formative factor in any and all Pentecostal movements around the globe, as well as the initiative to restore the social order for peoples whose land has been taken away unfairly. We have even learned, that when the Promised Land becomes a land of problem, we must return to the promise in order to remain a movement after the move of the Holy Ghost and not merely a nominal denomination.

3. As humans, we localize the omnipresence of God to the place of our experience with God – the place where God has become personal for us. And this is the place, where we dare say, we have received the promise of God. Although His promise may not yet be visible in reality, having come from our experience with God, it creates a reality which is much more real than the present reality. In that sense, the very act of receiving the promise that comes from outside of history and through hearing the voice of God, recreates our reality and future.

4. Main, among other temptations for us, is the temptation to forget the land, the place of promise and meeting with God – where we come from, where we have been and where we are going. Just as Israel, this act of forgetting denotes our ceasing from being a historical people.

5. And just like Israel did, Pentecostals find themselves without the right to exist. Yet, the association with the land, and not merely any land but the Land of Promise, gives us not only a right of existence, but also an identity which no one, not even us, can change or redefine, except the Giver of the Promise. And this is the function of the covenant and the association of our personal experience with God to a place, a location, a spot in history where our lives were once and for all changed for eternity.

9/11 REVERSAL: Prophetic Restoration of a Nation and the Glory of God

In 1994, as a prophetic warning to the nation some seven years before the 9/11 attacks, Dr. David Franklin wrote “A Call to Righteousness: Impending Judgment.” Drawing conclusions from Ezekiel’s chapter 12 desolation, destruction, dispersion, despair and prophetic hope in chapter 14, he warns that:

(1)   When a nation persists in violence, the Sovereign Lord confronts and holds responsible
(2)   When a nation forgets God, He allows for times of repentance
(3)   If repentance is ignored, God will expose and execute judgment on an unfaithful nation.

The book continues with a call for international righteousness (p. 10) and a critique of the debt-free myth proclaiming a time of economic shift (p. 11-12). Remember, this warning was written two decades before anyone in America had mentioned foreclosure, crises or global economic crises. But my favorite chapter still is the interpretation of Ezekiel’s vision of the departure of the Glory of God (p. 20-21).

I read this book back in 1999 and frankly had forgotten about it until 2011 when, at a young ministers training camp in the mountains of Bulgaria, we experienced what we consider the most genuine appearance of the Glory of God in our whole ministry. We wrote about it then and presented our observation at the 2012 Missions Conference at the Good Shepherd Church of God inPahokee,FL. The four points of our observation carry a tremendous prophetic resemblance to what Dr. David Franklin had proclaimed in his book 18 years ago:

(1) Every time God renews His covenant with His people, He shows His presence.

(2) We know that God is present in the covenant, because He shows His glory. It happened to Moses and his generation. And it also happened to Solomon several hundred years later.

(3) When a generation looses the vision of the Glory of God, God begins renewing His covenant again with a new generation.

(4) God is not satisfied with a people who know the signs and the blessings of the covenant. He rests not until He is revealed as the God of the covenant.

 

First Day of School in Bulgaria

Never Forget

The 50/20 Principle Reexamined

At the final resolution of the Biblical story of Joseph, Genesis 50:20 states “you intended to harm me, but God intended it for good.” This statement of God’s faithfulness to complete a vision He had given, is called the 50/20 principle.

Recently, I came by an internet article on the 50/20 principle. In its development, the author brought a series of exclusive facts from the life of Joseph, showing the application of the 50/20 principle in an almost-vendetta-like context. The principle was then used in an ecclesial context where it was pointed out to the reader that it will work regardless of the circumstances and with very little concern of context and intent. Such conclusion was unacceptable regardless of if it was based on a personal experience or a limited understanding of the Spirit of the Bible.

These thoughts bid me to return again to the Genesis text and to reexamine the 50/20 principle in light of the present reading. Fortunately, the 50/20 principle is much more than a vendetta against people in the church that has done us wrong. It is a principle for reconciliation and unity within the family of God. Looking closely into the Biblical text one must notice that the 50/20 principle exists only in a particular context clearly described by the author of Genesis. This context consists of two other principle, which I will call the 50/19 and 50/21 principles. The following five conclusions then could be made by reading Genesis 50:19-21 and considering the context of the 50/20 principle:

1. Corporative Application: The 50/20 principle is not about one person alone. In other words, it was not God’s personal vendetta on Joseph’s behalf to bring Jacob’s sons before him in humility. God had a much higher plan. He intended to preserve the Hebrew nation in Egypt in the seasons of famine until the time of the Exodus. For this very reason Joseph had to suffer and what his brothers did was an undividable part from the plan God had for his life. Similarly, Christ suffered on our behalf and His suffering and crucifixion was the very plan of God for our redemption. Yes, suffering is bad, but it is redemptive and God uses it to bring us closer to him. Once we recognize this Biblical truth, we will never have to vindictively ask God to punish the ones who do wrong against us.

2. Context Application: The 50/20 principle cannot exist without the 50/19 and the 50/21 principles regardless of the interpretation which is applied to the text. The 50/20 principle was simple meant to exist that way – together with 50/19 and 50/21 and never separate from them.

3. Pre-text Application: The pre-text application is included in the 50/19 principle (Genesis 50:19). The 50/19 principle is an “against-control” principle. It requires that we let go and let God. The 50/20 principle can be applied only after the 50/19 principle has been put in action. In other words, we cannot attempt to control the situation and expect God to protect us. He will only do so, after we admit that it is not our battle and it is not in our power alone to bring His plan for our lives to reality.

4. Unity Application: The 50/20 principle is about forgiveness – not vengeance. God applies it in our lives only when we are ready to forgive and reconcile with others. Holding grudges and desiring or attempting personal vengeance only disables the 50/20 principle.

5. Post-text Application: The post-text application is included in the 50/21 principle (Genesis 50:21). It clearly shows that the 50/20 principle is about keeping forgiveness between the people thus bringing continuous (not momentous) unity in the community.

In conclusion, the 50/20 principle has nothing to do with the ego and everything to do with the ego-sacrifice. It is not that through this principle God brings revenge for our pain and suffering, but He uses them to bring His corporative plan for the whole ecclesial community into reality. Once having realized that, we will look at the wrong doing of others and at our personal suffering in a different way. And perhaps, we will look at the suffering of others cause by us in a different way as well …

The Forgotten Etowah Revival

By 1907 Church of God overseer AJ Tomlinson was well aware of the Etowah outpowering going on in parallel with the Azusa Revival. He also used the Etowah L&N many times during his travels. But chose Cleveland (on the famous Copper Road route), because Cleveland had not seen revival just yet. And this was about to change soon…

Bradley County, Cleveland, Tennessee was the western terminus of the Copper Road where copper ore from Ducktown and Copperhill was brought by wagons to the East Tennessee & Georgia RR. It was completed to Cleveland from Dalton, Georgia in 1851. In 1905 the Southern Railway hired New York architect Don Barber to design what became known as “Terminal Station” of the Chattanooga Choo-Choo, which in parallel to the Etowah L&N Depot began construction in 1907 and opened in 1909. So, no, the choice Tomlinson made was not obvious at all, neither it was based on the train line per se. He did not want to compete with the Etowah and Chattanooga revivals, and settled for Cleveland instead…

The Forgotten Etowah Revival

It started with the Old-Line Railroad quickly built in 1890 as part of a project to link Knoxville, TN to Marietta, GA by rail. Just a few short years afterwards, a distinctive feature was built as part of the line, the Hiwassee Loop, a circle of track that was built around Bald Mountain. The story told that when the workers came down from the mountain to build the L&N line and depot to connect the Hiwassee River Rail Loop, there wasn’t much to do except work. On the weekend, many of them flooded the old Methodist church across from today’s Etowah‘s chamber of commerce, mainly to look for women (as old timers plainly put it). А holiness preacher was carrying on a revival there, many were convicted under the power of the Holy Spirit and got saved.

Those were the years of ongoing holiness revivals across Appalachia. Out West, the Pentecostal revival at Azusa was already brewing. Much like the rest of the holiness outpourings, the Etowah revival swept through the area. Not just workers, but the local population was touched as well. The upper room at “Blue Front” built by J.C. Williams built in 1906, where revival meetings were held, became the starting point of at least five local congregations.
At the same time, the Church of God movement was gaining speed on the other side of the mountain. Murphy, Tellico Plains and Reliance all became sites of the first holiness Spirit outpourings. In just a short amount of time, the Church of God grew and moved down the trainline to Cleveland, TN. Interestingly enough, most of the trainline was built along old confederate routes, which followed the Trail of Tears.

 

The Tellico Blockhouse was the starting point for the Old Federal Road, which connected Knoxville to Cherokee settlements in Georgia.  The route ran from Niles Ferry on the Little Tennessee River near the present-day U.S. Highway 411 Bridge, southward into Georgia. Starting from the Niles Ferry Crossing of the Little Tennessee River, near the U.S. Highway 411 bridge, the road went straight to a point about two miles east of the present town of Madisonville, Tennessee. This location is 20 some miles north of the Tellico Plains area that marks the site of the beginning of the Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee). The road continued southward via the Federal Trail connecting to the North Old Tellico Highway past the present site of Coltharp School, intersected Tennessee Highway 68 for a short distance and passed the site of the Nonaberg Church.  East of Englewood, Tennessee it continued on the east side of McMinn Central High School and crossed Highway 411 near the railroad overpass.  Along the west side of Etowah, the road continued near Cog Hill and the Hiwassee River near the mouth of Conasauga Creek where there was a ferry near the site of the John Hildebrand Mill.  From the ferry on the Hiwassee River the road ran through the site of the present Benton, Tennessee courthouse.  It continued on Welcome Valley Road and then crossed the Ocoee River at the Hildebrand Landing. From this point the road ran south and crossed U.S. Highway 64 where once stood the River Hills Church of God (Ocoee Church of God).

Revival Continues

In 2023, over a dozen of churches from the greater Conasauga, Reliance, Ocoee, Old Fort, Benton, and Delano communities along with the two oldest Polk County congregations at Cookson Creek and Friendship Baptist, joined piece by piece the original revival vision God has given to many ministers for this area of East Tennessee. While a few saw it as a spiritual connection with the brief spark of the Lee University student revival earlier in the year, most were convinced it was the restoration movement of the original Appalachian/Cherokee holiness outpouring, which took place among L&N Depot and Hiwassee River Rail Loop workers in the old Methodist church at the “Blue Front” across from Etowah‘s chamber of commerce. In 2023, the Polk Co. Revival began in September and carried on well through the fall until Thanksgiving. This year, even more churches in the area are praying again for a fresh outpouring of the Spirit expecting another revival to sweep the hearts of many in the area where no more than a century ago, the Early Revival Rain fell in abundance.

As Pentecostals historically…

As Pentecostals historically (and as a movement)

We have been looking for power when we should have been seeking after His presence

We have been looking for gifts and signs and wonders, when we should have been looking for fruits of the Spirit and of character

We have been looking for preachers and prophets to follow, when we should have been looking for God’s presence to abide in

We have been looking for prophetic words and utterance, when we should have been taking more time in personal prayer

We have been growing, when we should have been going

And going when we should have been learning in the Spirit

We have been looking for more ways to build, when we should have been looking for more ways to move and go

We have been looking for ways to influence the world, instead of looking to be uninfluenced by God

And in our desire to be leaders and influencers, we have forgotten how to be led by God

And for a long time as a movement, we have existed at the borderline, at the verge and at the danger of gaining our rightful place in human history, but loosing our royal position in the GLORY of GOD

BUT ONE THING WE DID GET RIGHT: The Baptism with the Holy Ghost  (watch the full message)

Read also: Last Days Great REVIVAL

20 recent Pentecostal articles in light of the upcoming Pentecostal Sunday celebration:

1. The Forgotten Azusa Street Mission: The Place where the First Pentecostals Met
2. Diamonds in the Rough-N-Ready Pentecostal Series (Complete)
3. 95th anniversary of the Pentecostal movement in Bulgaria
4. Toward a Pentecostal Solution to the Refugee Crises in the European Union
5. Historical and Doctrinal Formation of Holiness Teachings and Praxis among Bulgarian Pentecostals
6. Pacifism as a Social Stand for Holiness among Early Bulgarian Pentecostals
7. The Practice of Corporate Holiness within the Communion Service of Bulgarian Pentecostals
8. Sanctification and Personal Holiness among Early Bulgarian Pentecostals
9. First Pentecostal Missionaries to Bulgaria (1920)
10. Historical and Doctrinal Formation of Holiness Teachings and Praxis among Bulgarian Pentecostals
11. The Everlasting Gospel: The Significance of Eschatology in the Development of Pentecostal Thought
12. Online Pentecostal Academic Journals
13. What made us Pentecostal?
14. Pentecostalism and Post-Modern Social Transformation
15. Obama, Marxism and Pentecostal Identity
16. Why I Decided to Publish Pentecostal Primitivism?
17. Historic Pentecostal Revival Tour in Bulgaria Continues
18. The Land of Pentecostals
19. Pentecostal Theological Seminary Address
20. A Truly Pentecostal Water Baptism

30 years ago in Chicago

I left Chicago on this day 30 years ago (July 30, 1995). The Bulgarian church that day held service at 1 PM with 64 Bulgarians and many other internationals in attendance. Bulgarian students from the neighboring Indiana and Wisconsin attended as well. There was even a Bulgarian family from Alaska.

It was a Sunday. I left Chicago to preach in Beloit, WI that night and then left for Washington, D.C. the following morning. While driving north with quite the speed my Carolina blue Grand National began filling with white smoke. At first, I thought the air conditioner was on its last leg in the hot Chicago summer of 1995, but the air remained strong and cold. The cloud proceeded and it was so sensible that I had to slow down and basically stop on the side of the road. In my 35 years of ministry, I have only seen this one more time – in 2011 when the Glory of God descended over a youth camp we were preaching in the Bulgarian mountains. I did finally preach in Beloit and made it to D.C. the next day, but the vision of the cloud remained with me for the next 30 years.

Meanwhile, the word of mouth had spread and the Bulgarian church in Chicago was growing among the Bulgarian diaspora. On October 7, 1995, I was able to visit the church in Chicago again and present it to the National Overseer of the Bulgarian Church of God, Pastor Pavel Ignatov who visited the Bulgarian congregation in Chicago for the first time. By that time, it has become evident that the initial structuring for growth was giving more than expected results. The church became not only the first officially registered Bulgarian Pentecostal congregation in the United States, but also an important social and educational center able to minister to the 100,000 Bulgarians that live in the Great Lake region today.

Called to another mission, I left Chicago on July 30, 1995. The church bulletin upon my departure under Farewell and Appreciation read: “Today we are saying thank you to Dony for a job well done this past summer. He has served our church faithfully, and has been a tremendous blessing to Narragansett Ministries. Immediately following worship this morning, there is a dinner in Dony’s honor in the fellowship hall. And everyone is invited to attend.” Quiescently, while writing this next book for the 30th anniversary of the Bulgarian Church in Chicago, I was able to find this last bulletin in a box with several dozen letters I had sent weekly to my parents in Bulgaria. Surprising even to myself, those letters contain pictures, documents, dates, growth charts and progression predictions that are surprising even to me today. I remember spending countless nights in prayer, contemplating and strategizing over the new Bulgarian church plant, but I had forgotten all this was carefully documented as a case study.

The church congregation presented me with a plaque that represented my efforts and work in Chicago, which I have also kept until now. Because this plaque represents the prayers and the vision of many who are continuing the work today, establishing and leading Bulgarian churches around the world to providing pastoral care for many who have left the homeland in search for a better life. To these ministers goes my personal token of appreciation and thanks, “Well done thou good and faithful!” For me personally today a quarter of a century later, this plaque represents one very simply thing – I never betrayed my dreams. And in my book, this is well done…

How a Small Ocoee Flower Shares a Big Story

by Kathryn DONEV

With VBS season upon us, we are always looking for inventive ways of sharing the Gospel with our little ones. We are internally motivated by the Biblical mandate of Proverbs 22:6.  When we start children off on the way they should go, even when they are old they will not turn from it. So this summer let us shift focus from the Corona Virus to the Corona Filaments of a small plant that tells a big story.

When Spanish Christian missionaries arrived in the jungle of Brazil in the 16th century, they discovered a plant with such beauty and distinctiveness unlike any they had seen before. These explores were encouraged feeling it was a good sign for their mission.  After closely observing the structure of the plant’s bloom, they called it the passion flower because to them it symbolized the passion or death of Christ.

This exotic flower (Passiflora Incarnata) grows wild in South America and the southern United States as well. Beginning around June is when you first see the vine emerge from the grown after laying dominate all winter. It is the official state wildflower of Tennessee and is sometimes know as the maypop (term given by the Powhatan Indians), wild apricot, Holy Trinity flower and the ocoee. The Cherokee were the ones to referred to the passion vine as “u-wa-go-hi” or “ocoee”. The root “oco” refers to the plant and “ee” describes location. The word “ocoee” literally means the apricot vine place. The passion flower was considered to be the most beautiful of all flowers among the Cherokee and to this day it is a revered piece of their heritage.

Here’s how a small flower turned to be the center stage of the story of Christ’s ultimate sacrifice.

The passion flower is a strong plant that is resistant to pulling and bending as was Christ who endured the horrific pain of a crucifixion. The radial corona filaments of the flower represent the woven crown of thorns which mocked Christ’s claim of authority.  This corona rests upon a cup-shaped structure that reminds of the cup of suffering and the Last Supper. The spiraled tendons of the plant are symbols of the lashes Christ endured and  the flower’s trailing tendrils are like the whips.  The central flower column receptacle is symbolic of the pillar of Christ’s scourging. The three stigmas are symbols of the nails used in the crucifixion as well as the Holy Trinity. The five anthers remind us of the five piercing wounds Christ suffered.  Together the five petals and five sepals refer to the ten disciples who did not betray or deny Jesus. The palmate leaves depict the hands of His persecutors or the Holy lance that pierced Christ’s side.  The fragrance of the flower helps us recall the spices used in the burial cloth for the body of Christ. The purple color is symbolic of royalty, the white is for purity.  The shape of its fruit is symbolic of the world that Christ saved through his suffering. Finally, because the passion flower is a vine it points to Heaven and will compete with surrounding trees to see the light.  

Pentecostal Theology of Freedom for the Postcommunist Era

 “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith
Christ hath made us free” for “if the Son therefore
shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed”

 

This paper is intended as a part of larger research entitled Theology of the Persecuted Church. It focuses on they way freedom is understood by the underground church and its successor, the postcommunist church after the fall of the Communist regime. In this sense, the research presents the theological view of freedom from the time of postmodern transition in Eastern Europe in retrospect with the times of underground worship and in dialogue with the major modern theologians. The main purpose is to construct an authentic view of freedom in the major areas of the life and ministry of the postcommunist Pentecostal church.

Postcommunist Europe

On his first official visit to West Germany in May 1989, Mikhail Gorbachev informed Chancellor Kohl that the Brezhnev doctrine had been abandoned and Moscow was no longer willing to use force to prevent democratic transformation of its satellite states. At 6:53 p.m. on November 9, 1989, a member of the new East German government gave a press conference to inform that the new East German travel law would be implemented immediately. At the East Berlin Bornholmer Strasse, the people demanded to open the border. At 10:30 p.m. the border was opened.[1] That meant the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War.

The unification of one Germany brought the clash of two political extremes within one nation. It brought together two Europes kept apart for half-a-century, a dynamic which introduced the continent to a new set of opportunities among which was the vision for a unified Europe and its realization.

A new set of dilemmas was introduced as well. Among all economical, political, social, cultural and simply human points of diversity, religion remained central for the process through which the European Union was emerging. The official “United in Diversity” (reminding of the American E Pluribus Unum) claimed unification, without mentioning God. The new European constitution announced that Europe draws “inspiration from the cultural, religious and humanist inheritance of Europe.”[2]

For us who lived in the last days of Communist Bulgarian, the fall of the wall was a miracle which the world witnessed. Coming out from the severe Communist persecution and surrounded by the Balkan religious wars, suddenly the country of Bulgaria experienced a time of liberation which gave the start of spiritual revival mobilizing Bulgarian Protestants. In the midst of extreme poverty, due to prolonged economical crisis, this revival became an answer for many. It also provided a sense of liberation, but not in the Western political understanding of democracy and freedom, but rather liberation toward the realization of the Kingdom, a world much higher, much better and in way more realistic than any human ideality. The liberation from sin then turns not only into a social movement, but as a theological conception it provides an alternative to the existing culture thus becoming a reaction against the surrounding context and proposing a new theological model and a new paradigm for life itself based on substantive faith and belief.

 

Freedom of Will

Even when approached theologically, in the Eastern European postcommunist context today, the term freedom of will carries a strong political nuance. For many Eastern European Protestants, freedom characterizes the struggle against the communism regime and the divine motivation to endure it as a calling of faith for the individual and the community.

The years before communist era were characterized with opposition against the historical monopoly of the Eastern Orthodox Church. In this context, the protestant movement in Bulgaria also struggled against spiritual dominion defending the cause of religious freedom and the right of each individual and community to believe and express beliefs.

The hundred years of Bulgarian Protestantism have been accompanied with constant struggle against oppression of conscience and will thus creating a general acceptance of free human will. This has coincided with the theology of the largest and fastest growing Evangelical movements in Bulgaria. In this context, even evangelical churches, like the Baptists, have grown to accept and practice the doctrine of free will.

Based on the political, socioeconomic and purely ecclesial factors, in postcommunist Eastern Europe, the Calvinistic paradigm of predestination and election as practiced in a Western sense are not successful. This is based partially on their new doctrinal presence within the Bulgarian reality and their untested effectiveness through under persecution. It is also natural that they are often qualified in parallel with political and religious oppression, and therefore rejected as divine attributes or actions. If human regimes are oppressive through limiting freedom and consciences, how is God to identify with such regimes and practice the same type of “horrible decree?” On the contrary, in Eastern European Protestant theology, God is seen as a Liberator of human consciences and a desire for freedom.

By no means, is this tension to be confused with a denial of the total authority of God. God remains the electing God in Jesus Christ, but how?[3] Is it through a “horrible decree” or through a personal life-changing experience defined by the Bible? Is it through an oppressive act of lawful but unconditional predetermination which God by His nature is omnipotent to implement, or through an act of supernatural transformation of humanity through divine self-sacrifice?  And does this election barricade every possible human choice? No, as it is obvious in the denial of Peter; but also as seen in his restoration, that every choice of human will is answered by God through unconditional divine love.

Therefore, we experience “the secret of predestination to blessedness,” not in a cause and effect paradigm as Augustine and the Reformers, but rather through preserving its significance by experiencing the love of God.[4] Thus, the human will is freed by the love of God to receive salvation for eternity. The human freedom then is not ignored or oppressed, but on the contrary it is “placed in the context of cosmic drama” where the real bondage is not the one by God, but the one by sin which oppresses the human will and distances it to death. The Gospel, however, proclaims the victory of Christ over these oppressors thus liberating human will to its initial creation state as a gift from God.[5] This theology comes from a concrete experience of God in real life, and the quest to serve and follow God. As theology shows that the truth about God and the truth about ourselves always go together, the experience of God is a constant tension and a dynamic process, rather than blind servanthood to rigid principles that can never fully encompass the divine will. And through this experience of liberation of the human will in order that one may be free to choose salvation through Christ, God establishes His “testament of freedom.”[6]

Freedom from Oppression

As God liberates humanity from sin, He liberates it from sin’s moral and social consequences. Thus, forgiveness of sin presupposes not only the quest for sanctification and perfection after the image of God, but also the struggle against oppression and establishment of social balance. As the above shows, the postcommunist revival in Eastern Europe cannot be explored apart from the contextual political and socioeconomic dynamics. The reason for this is that the Spirit with value before God is a social spirit that makes the expression of the divine liberation the very purpose of the existence of the church.[7]  The practice of this expression challenges the relationship between theology and practice as it questions theology’s epistemological and praxis relationship to the oppressed with whom Christ is crucified.[8]

As in such context, theology is challenged to identify with action, the church must choose between contextualizing and enforcing theology. To choose contextualization is to attempt to relate it to the existing culture thus creating a state of relativism. Such approach is observed in some Asian and Black theology. The danger is to go beyond the boundary pass which theology ceases being theology in action and becomes simply a nominal religious culture. In Eastern Europe, such approach has been long-practiced by the Eastern Orthodox and has unquestionably resulted in nominal religion. The nominality of its expression has been a factor preventing the experience of God, thus denouncing the very reason for the church’s existence. Attempts to restore the Eastern Orthodox “symphony” between church and state have altered the existence of the independent synods which claim the succession of the same historical religious institution.

The second direction, to move toward enforcement of theology after the paradigm proposed by Liberation theology, is quiet a dangerous approach often resulting in armed conflicts. Keeping in mind the historical tension on the Balkans and Bulgaria’s success in undergoing the postcommunist transition without an armed civil conflict, this approach is virtually inapplicable. Therefore, an alternative must be proposed before history itself become oppression.

In this context, a move toward a theology of freedom seems most reasonable. It must purpose to prevent political and socioeconomic oppressions which are already present in various legal and illegal forms in Bulgaria. Such paradigm must also be concerned with intrachurch oppressive tensions which are present both among and within religious denominations, striving especially against such oppressive modes that come from the desire of an oppressed mentality to oppress others.

Such working model of social transformation is presented in Paul’s Epistle to Philemon. An older interpretation of the book explains that Onesimus, a runaway slave, meets Paul in prison, becomes a Christian and is sent by Paul back to his master. A more cotemporary interpretation claims that Onesimus is a slave sent by Philemon to help care for Paul in prison where he converts to Christianity and desires to stay with Paul as a missionary associate.

Regardless of the interpretation of the story plot, the epistle carefully presents a more in-depth set of problems that deal with persecution, imperialism, slavery, mastership, classes, ownership, imprisonment and above all justice. It further makes a more aggressive mood and places the church, represented in the text not merely by masses, but by the very divine appointment of apostolic authority.

The theme of imprisonment as a direct result of persecution is clearly present through the epistle’s plot and more specifically verses 1, 9, 13 where Paul uses the expression “prisoner of Christ” to describe his present status. The expression “prisoner of Christ” carries a sense of belongingness making the phrase different than the sometimes rendered “prisoner for Christ.” While the latter wrong rendering moves the focus toward the purpose of Paul’s imprisonment, the Greek genitive in the phrase “prisoner of Christ” denotes ownership. Although imprisoned in a Roman prison and kept by a Roman guard, Paul denies the Roman Empire ownership of himself, thus claming that he is owned by Christ alone. This is also a denial of the Roman citizenship that has led to this oppressive state of persecution and the recognition of a citizenship in the divine reality of liberation.

Paul’s negation goes a step further, proposing that while the Roman Empire may be authoritative in the temporal context, by no means it is authoritative in the spiritual eternal reality. Having established the temporality of Rome and the eternity of God, Paul denies to the Roman Empire the right to pronounce judgment over social injustice and to establish social status or world order, proposing that no one but the Christian church is the agent divinely designed and supernaturally equipped for these functions. The social injustice of persecution and wrongful imprisonment, the social tensions between classes, the problems within the church and every dilemma presented in the epistle are to be judged by no one but God through his elect. The reality of the situation is that the church is experiencing severe persecuting because the Roman Empire is denying the church social space. Paul, however, denies the reality of such oppressive human system and claims that the church is the one that must deny social space for oppressive structures as the Roman Empire.

The text calls for revolution; not merely, a revolution in the physical violent sense, but a revolution of the mind where human existence and mentality are liberated through Biblical paradigm combined with divine supernatural power to participate in a new spiritual social reality where justice is set by the standard of God. Such a move calls for a new paradigm and for a theology of freedom which creates an anti-culture and an alternative culture to the existing oppressive system. Such idea challenges the church with the claim that Christianity is and should be a scandal and an offence to the world, and not merely a religion but the belief that “Jesus is the most hazardous of all hazards.”[9]

Feast of Freedom or the Bulgarian Easter

Amidst political and socioeconomic crises since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Bulgaria has experienced a rebirth of Bulgarian spirituality. Many observers have referred to this restoration process as the rebirth of the Bulgarian Easter, and even which historically has been connected with the unity and power of the Bulgarian nation.

Bulgaria accepted a Christian country in 864 AD under the reign of Kniaz Boris I. A millennium later, in the middle of the 19th century, Bulgaria found itself occupied by the Ottoman Empire and religiously restricted by the Greek Orthodox Patriarchy which dictated the religious expression of the Bulgarian church.

On April 3, 1860, during Easter Sunday service in Constantinople, the Bulgarian bishop Illarion of Makriopol expressed the will of the Bulgarian people by solemnly proclaiming the separation of the Bulgarian church from the patriarchal in Constantinople. The day commemorating the Resurrection of Jesus Christ coincided with the resuscitation of the Bulgarian people. Although, the struggle continued for another decade, under the influence of Russia, Turkey was forced to legally recognize the independence of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. In 1870 a firman of the sultan decreed the establishment of an autonomous Bulgarian church institution.

The connection between the historical Bulgarian Easter and the contemporary rebirth of Bulgarian spirituality has been used in many aspects of the Bulgarian politics and culture at the beginning of the 21^st century. As part of the Eastern Church, Bulgarian orthodox theology pays much more attention to the resurrection rather than to the birth of Christ thus placing its eschatological hope in a future experience rather then a past one. Such dynamic is natural, as the acceptance of Christianity in Bulgaria purposes to bring hope in national politics and communal life. Thus, in an almost historical tradition, the Bulgarian Easter represents the Bulgarian eschatological hope for a supernatural national revival. It also communicates with the sense of liberation from political, economical and religious oppression and a longing for the freedom to live life.

The Bulgarian Easter then provides an alternative to the present moment of tension and straggle in the crucifixion. Similar to Moltmann’s view of the resurrection of Christ, the Bulgarian hope foresees the resurrection of the Bulgarian nation as a divine act of protest against oppression and injustice and as recognition of God’s passion for life.[10] Thus, the resurrection is an alternative not only to the present world, but also to the reality of eternal death.

Death is therefore seen not only as an agent of eternity, but also as an agent of fear, suffering and oppression in the present reality which affects life in all its economical, political, social and even religious aspects. As death diminishes the value of life, the liberating power from Easter often remains ignored. But in order for the church to continue being a church, it must speak as a witness of the resurrection which is impossible without participating in God’s divine liberation which recreates the word to its original state of creation. Thus, the hope of Easter means rebirth of the living hope.

The resurrection hope is an influential factor which directs the life dynamics of the church beyond its walls. Being liberated from sin, the believer desires the liberation of others and claims the right to serve. But true Biblical servanthood cannot exist and therefore does not tolerate oppression, thus becoming a social transformation factor in the midst of oppressive cultures. The resurrected church rebels against the destruction of life and the denial of the right of very human to live. But different than other human systems, the church does not feed off its resistance against oppression. Its source of power is the eschatological hope for the full restoration of life and its eternal continuation in eternity.

A final question must be raised about the pessimistic character of such hope, as traditional evangelical eschatology in Bulgaria has been premillennial and due to its Pentecostal majority clearly pretribulation. Such eschatological views, at large, have been considered to be pessimistic and escapist in nature due to their strong focus on the future. Yet, such determinative presupposition seems inaccurate and much limited in its observation when applied within the postcommunist context where Protestant churches have been greatly involved in the struggle against oppressive regimes and constraining politics even to the point of martyrdom.

It is then natural, that in the underground context of persecution it is unthinkable for the church to identify with the regime in anyway. Actually, such identification is vied by the believers as spiritual treason and cooperation with authority is viewed as backsliding. By no means, however, is such a premillennial eschatological view in this context pessimistic for the church. Neither does the church remain unconcerned with the present reality. On the contrary, through its very act of negation of the right of an oppressive system to dictate reality, the church establishes an alternative culture which is the Kingdom of God. Thus in the midst of persecution and oppression, the church remains in its Biblical boundaries as an agent of the Kingdom of God by providing eschatological hope.

Yes, this eschatological view is escapist, as it promotes eternal separation from the oppressive reality. What other alternative can a persecuted and underground church find to survive and relate to the Biblical image of the ecclesia and at the same time it is clearly concerned with the transformation of the present world as shown above? For while its pessimism concerns the oppressive system of the world, its optimism declares the church as an already-reality in which freedom of sin, death and oppression and eternity with God is celebrated. Therefore, the church itself remains an optimistic reality and optimistic eschatological hope. For, without this hope the tension of life toward future and even life it self will vanish.[11] Without hope for the beyond, we remain in the now for eternity.

Epilogue

Due to its relational and reactional role to historical process, Eastern European postcommunist theology is a new historical and theological event. Yet, as theology of freedom, it relates to other theological approaches internationally. This similarity is enforced by the approaching postmodern era which the Bulgarian nation seems unprepared to understand. In such context, the church and its theology become the agents providing answers to social tensions.

Postcommunist theology provides a point of departure from the oppressive system of the communist regime toward a new social and ecclesial alternative. Such dynamic is by no means new to the Protestant movement in Bulgaria, which has dealt successfully with these same issues even in more severe context of underground existence and persecution. Therefore, the church has proved its commitment to identify with the oppressed through addressing and engaging its experience through the experience of God and its adequate and substantive theological interpretation. Such approach provides an alternative to oppressive system and structures, unquestionably critiques their tools and methods, and rebukes the agents who represent and practice them, thus denying them place in history.

A further concern for developing strategies for social transformation is also strongly present including education, law, politics and economics. These dynamics employ Christians in a common task and motivate the church for further development and implementation in order to connect theology with practice and thus to fulfill the divine calling for church’s role in the processes of restoration of justice and social transformation, both now and eschatologically.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bibliography

Anderson, David E. “European Union Debate on Religion in Constitution Continues”

May 26, 2004.

 

Barth, Karl (tr. E.C. Hoskyns), The Epistle to the Romans (Oxford: Oxford University

Press: n/a).

 

Ford, David F. ed., The Modern Theologians (Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 1997).

 

Geffrey B. Kelly & F. Burton Nelson, A Testament to Freedom: The Essential Writings

of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (San Francisco: Harper Publishing House, 1995).

 

Green, Clifford. Karl Barth: Theologian of Freedom (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989).

 

Grentz, Stanley J. Theology for the Community of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans

Publishing Company, 1994).

 

Johnson, Ed. Associated Press, June 19, 2004.

 

Moltmann, Jürgen. The Power of the Powerless, (Norwich: SCM Press Ltd., 1983).

 

Taylor, Mark K. Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries (London: Collins, 1987).

 

[1] The Fall of the Berlin Wall,  http://www.dailysoft.com/berlinwall/history/fall-of-berlinwall.htm June 29, 2004; also Jeremy Isaacs and Taylor Downing, The Cold War, Thomas Fleming, The Berlin Wall and Wolfgang Schneider, Leipziger Demotagebuch.

[2] Ed Johnson, Associated Press, June 19, 2004 and David E. Anderson, “European Union Debate on Religion in Constitution Continues” May 26, 2004.

[3] Clifford Green, Karl Barth: Theologian of Freedom (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1989), 184.

[4] Karl Barth, (tr. E.C. Hoskyns), The Epistle to the Romans (Oxford: Oxford University Press: n/a),  324.

[5] Stanley J. Grentz, Theology for the Community of God (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1994), 437.

[6] Geffrey B. Kelly & F. Burton Nelson, A Testament to Freedom: The Essential Writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (San Francisco: Harper Publishing House, 1995).

[7] Green, 106.

[8] David F. Ford, ed., The Modern Theologians (Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 1997), 369.

[9] Barth, 99.

[10] Jürgen Moltmann, The Power of the Powerless, (Norwich: SCM Press Ltd., 1983).

[11] Mark K. Taylor, Paul Tillich: Theologian of the Boundaries (London: Collins, 1987), 325.

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