What does this mean?
Standard is the norm, the everyday, how a certain community or group behaves overall.
So a majority standard is how most of a community or group behaves, since not all people or groups act exactly the same, but the majority of them fit within the frame work of the norm or standard.
Example: The majority of citizens of a country act daily in a general manner.
Why I say this was due to something I was reading the other day which mentioned how the Jewish nation was like during the time that Jesus walked upon this earth two thousand years ago.
Ever since E.P. Sanders coined the term “covenantal nomism” in his work “Paul and the Palestinian Judaism,” people have been conflicting on his point due to other groups that did not show this “nomism.”
So you can understand where I am coming from I will try and explain a bit. Covenantal nomism is the belief of many of the Jewish people in this time period that believed they were guaranteed a ticket to heaven due to the fact that they were of the tribe of Israel. All they need do was to honor the laws to a degree set up within the Torah.
However not all thought this. Those that were of the Pharisees and the Sadducees had their own view, but they were not within the majority, they were the minority. Those that lived their everyday life and sought after just making it day to day were the majority and they for the most part lived with a covenantal nomist mentality.
This is what has caused a great debate amongst several scholars for decades.
Elsewhere I was presented with a way to look at the seven letters to the seven churches from Jesus Christ in Revelation. The view stated there was this. That at this time in any Christian religious group that is in existence at this time you will find within them each element of the seven letters. If you wish to go further in this please look at my articles on the seven letters. (The Seven Churches (Part 1); The Seven Churches (Part 2) – The letter to Ephesus; The Seven Churches (Part 3) – The letter to Smyrna; The Seven Churches (Part 4) – The letter to Pergamum; The Seven Churches (Part 5) – The letter to Thyatira; The Seven Churches (Part 6) – The letter to Sardis; The Seven Churches (Part 7) – The letter to Philadelphia; The Seven Churches (Part 8) – The letter to Laodicea)
But here was the key element that stuck out in that study. As I mentioned you can find each of the elements of the seven churches existing contiguously today, but the majority standard of each church within the letters is linear throughout the centuries. The first church is how the majority of people within Christendom were living in the time and it changes to another letter as time continues till we finally get to the seventh church which shows how the majority standard in that letter is present in today’s culture.
What I find amazing is that the Jewish people at the time of Christ living in their covenantal nomism and how the majority of those that profess to be Christian today are suffering from the same problem. Today the majority belief that faith alone will guarantee their entrance into heaven as long as they go to church now and then. However the rest of the time they live day to day within the world and care more for it. This makes today’s Christian majority standard to be lukewarm.
Now we all know that not all are lukewarm. There are minority communities within the Body of Christ that live their lives other ways. Who within these minorities is living the way God truly seek them to be is beyond my understanding to fully know. What I do know for sure is that God is not pleased with the majority standard. So much so that He makes it clear through His Son letter to Laodicea that living a lukewarm live was worse than denying God outright and those that live lukewarm lives are “spit” out of Christ’s mouth, meaning cast out of the Body of Christ.
This also means that since there are no more letters after the seventh one and the majority standard is lukewarmness then the soon return of Jesus Christ is near for what follows the letters is the Great Tribulation.