“For they have gone forth on behalf of “The Name,” accepting nothing from the pagans.” (3 John 7 NET)

There are various explanations for “The Name.” Some claim this was Johns avoidance of writing the Lords name (YHWH) out of reverence. Others have claimed this “Name” refers to a religious sect, or the disciples who followed John and his particular form of Christianity. Then more have stated this is an early name for Christianity as a whole, a kin to “the way”.

To be honest, I have no particular persuasion on this matter, but I do know what pagans are, and no its not what you think.

The word pagan most likely comes from the word pagus which literally means a “region delimited by markers”. In a sense, you could easily understand a pagan to be someone who is on the outside, or further, who ______ (lives, works, worships ect) according to their own ways.

The original Greek offers a more complete picture:

1. adapted to the genius or customs of a people, peculiar to a people, national
2. suited to the manners or language of foreigners, strange, foreign
3. in the NT savouring of the nature of pagans, alien to the worship of the true God, heathenish
4. of the pagan, the Gentile.

According to this understanding, pagans would include those who practice all manner of spiritual and or religious rites, who attempt to interact with the divine by the means of their own understanding, outside of doctrine. It also would include all of those who live and work according to their customs or traditions, who pay no mind to what the divine would demand or require, to live a healthy or successful life (again, outside of doctrine). Further yet, a Christian understanding like implied in this verse would include all of those with nominal monotheistic faith in one god as much as it would include all who hold to polytheistic faith in many gods.

This isn’t just stonehinge worshipers, witches, necromancers and vikings. Sure, they would all qualify as pagans, but so could the guy who does your taxes, or your kids teacher or your next door neighbor. It’s not about being evil, a pagan is the being outside of God.

In other words, its not entirely about what you do, but who you are.

A pagan, by their very nature, is outside of God. The don’t eat, work, live… or worship as God intends or has designed. They have made their own “markers” for what these things should entail. For the pagan, the in-all-be-all of eating is to satisfy the hunger of the flesh, instead of the Christian who should see food as a gift from God who provides, and thus an opportunity to gives thanks. Or, for the pagan, work is about success, either in financial reward or credibility, instead of a means to give God glory. Further, to live in the worldview of the pagan may be create or pursue their own pleasure or sustenance. For the Christian to live is to live in God, as Christ did, abiding and relying on God.

Many would say the most damning of pagan acts would be the most visceral, the arrogant attempt to sway or persuade a diety or god in some manner that benefits themselves or others. Perhaps your mind immediately turned to a pagan ritual of divination, or of cursing, or of sacrificing or ceremoniously performing rites for harvest or rain. Yes, these are pagans acts, but so is the manner in which the man who sells you deli meat at the grocery believes ‘if I am good enough, I will earn life after death’.

And now as we see more clearly in Christ, there is but one God and one mediator. Those who search for God in Islam, Hinduism, Taoism, Buddhism, Spiritualism, Humanism, Judaism and Catholicism, and or inside or outside any other ism – who deny the way the truth and the life – in grace alone, by faith alone, in christ alone, according to scripture alone, to the glory of God alone – some of which are my closest and dearest friends – they are pagans.

This verse is again, commending the “brothers” on how they have walked according to Truth, how their faith is being displayed by their works. They have gone forth, which implies they are on their mission, presumably proclaiming the Gospel, or “evangelizing” to the pagans, both Jew and Gentile.

We have done nothing to receive the grace, mercy and love of God. In fact, we deserve the opposite. Yet God freely gives. Likewise we should give the gospel freely. We should preach it as we go forth. Not as pagans do, to receive something in return either from God or our fellow man.

No, we should receive nothing from the pagans, as we freely give them everything we have, and of most importance: the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Go forth.

Peace be with you.