Counting everything as loss...

A Biblical Defense (and Advocacy) of Single Ministers/Pastors

2012-01-30T07:30:00.000-06:00

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We’ve all read them:

Wanted: Lead Minister/Pastor to serve at All Things Church here in beautiful Redrum Hills, WV. Applicant must have at least an undergraduate degree in Bible from an in-house institution, though a Master of Divinity is preferred. Applicant must have 263 years experience in ministry and must also be married, have 2.3 kids, and hold to sound doctrine while able to communicate well. Job requirements include …

… I’ll stop right there, because the next part of the usual want ad leaves me just as concerned as the point of this post. However, I will say this: Please, elderships and search committees, read Acts 6:1-6! Other people can do things!

OK. Leaving that aside for now, I want to focus on that little phrase that sinks the heart of many of my brothers in Christ when looking for a local body to serve in. That phrase is brief, but it packs a punch. It reads, “must also be married”.

For the sake of all my single brothers out there, and as a gentle rebuke of the church-at-large, I want to say that this requirement cannot stand up to the test of Scripture regarding who can minister; particularly most effectively. A hard look at Paul’s instructions on the matter of marriage and service to God begs further reflection; and this reflection may help to serve the Body of Christ by granting access to leadership roles to the plethora of worthy men who just happen to not be married.

And as a note: I’m writing this as a married man, with 2.3 kids!

I would like to focus on Paul’s teaching regarding marriage that we find in his first letter to the Corinthians. In 1 Corinthians 7, Paul gives his (and the Lord’s) instructions pertaining to marriage, separation, re-marriage, etc. It is throughout this chapter that we can decipher how Paul views single-men ministers as advantageous to the Kingdom of God.

First, Paul tells the unmarried and the widows “that it is good for them to remain single as I am” (v.8). Now certainly what follows is just as important; that if the unmarried or widows cannot control their sexual desires, then they should marry instead of “burn with passion” (v.9). It is good to note here that v.9 shows us what Paul’s controlling authority in this entire section is: Holiness. God’s desire is that we are to be holy as He is holy; and here Paul is saying that it is good to remain single UNLESS one would become unholy by being sexually immoral outside the bounds of marriage (i.e. burn with passion and submit to it). We’ll come back to this point later.

So here we have an initial teaching by Paul: staying single, like he is, is better. It is not a command (v.6), but celibacy is a gift from God that some have (v.7; I’m also inclined to use Jesus’ somewhat strange teaching about eunuchs in Matt 19:10-12 here as well; i.e. “let the one who is able to receive this teaching, receive it”). Therefore, if one has the gift of celibacy, and they do not burn with passion, they can stay unmarried and Paul advocates such a position.

Moving on, there are four other times in chapter 7 where Paul points to his advocacy of singleness.

First, 7:28

But if you do marry, you have not sinned, and if a betrothed woman marries, she has not sinned. Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that.

Then, 7:32-35 (which is the key text as for Paul’s reasoning as to why singleness is better for ministers)

I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided. And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit. But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband. I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.

Then, 7:38

So then he who married his betrothed does well, and he who refrains from marriage will do even better.

And finally, 7:40 (concerning women who are single after husband dies, v.39)

Yet in my judgment she is happier if she remains as she is.

Here we have five different times in the same chapter that Paul advocates singleness above marriage. Again, the exception to this “rule” is if the single person cannot maintain their self-control and their urges are too strong. Then, due to holiness, Paul certainly wants single men and women to marry so that sexual activity can happen within the marriage bond.

Verses 32-35 are the key text, which Paul lays the groundwork for in v.8. He is single and he is as free as one can be for the work of the Lord. He goes where he wants when he wants (as led by God) and he is not anxious about “worldly” things. This is who he wants people to be for the sake of the Kingdom and the proclamation of the Gospel. Verses 32-35 say what every single married person who is reading it knows: that when married, our attention and anxieties turn to things other than the Lord. On the other hand Paul says the obvious: that if one is not married they can have “undivided devotion to the Lord.”

To bring this full circle now: how should this rather explicit teaching regarding marriage and singleness inform us regarding the hiring and sending out of ministers/pastors; particularly lead ministers/pastors? I would argue that if the single man has displayed holiness in his single life and he has proven to be a man of self-control regarding his sexual desires, that he should be at the TOP of the list to be hired or sent (barring any other objections or other skill sets missing that others may fill better). However, what we find today is that the single man will rarely, if ever, be hired as a lead minister/pastor, except for perhaps a youth group setting. Married men will always be preferred, but what I fear is that some married men who are being hired are much farther down the holiness scale than a single counterpart; yet Paul always promoted holiness above anything else.

I understand the desire to have a “family man” in the pulpit or as a leader in another capacity. For one, it is indeed written that, “it is not good for a man to be alone” (Gen 2:18). Also, the apostles (including Peter) and Jesus’ brothers were married (1 Cor 9:5) and there is something to be said for that. More so, congregations want somebody who is experienced in family life because that is where most people in our society are going in life (getting married, having kids) unless they are already; and so they will want the lead minister/pastor to be someone most people can relate to. However, we must come to grips with the fact that this factor was not the consideration of Paul in this letter. Consider Paul as a good case of singleness. Then of course there is Timothy, who Paul put in charge of the church in Ephesus. For all we know he was young and he was single; yet there he was, pastoring these churches and placing elders and deacons on top of that! And obviously, there was Jesus, who was perfect in every way, and single to boot.

In summary, I would simply like to encourage local churches to not automatically rule out hiring a single man as a lead minister or pastor. As Paul told the Corinthians, a single man who has displayed holiness in his celibacy is a better choice, for he will only be anxious about the things of the Lord, and not the things of the world. This can only be good for the Kingdom.

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Spurgeon: The Idols of One's Own Taste

2011-12-15T10:42:00.003-06:00

A little Spurgeon for today. O how true this is; rampant inside the church.

Man fashions for himself a god after his own liking; he makes to himself if not out of wood or stone, yet out of what he calls his own consciousness, or his cultured thought, a deity to his taste, who will not be too severe with his iniquities or deal out strict justice to the impenitent. He rejects God as he is, and elaborates other gods such as he thinks the Divine One ought to be, and he says concerning these works of his own imagination, 'These be thy gods, O Israel.' The Holy Spirit, however, when he illuminates their minds, leads us to see that Jehovah is God, and beside him there is none else. He teaches his people to know that the God of heaven and earth is the God of the Bible, a God whose attributes are completely balanced, mercy attended by justice, love accompanied by holiness, grace arrayed in truth, and power linked with tenderness. He is not a God who winks at sin, much less is pleased with it, as the gods of the heathen are supposed to be, but a God who cannot look upon iniquity, and will by no means spare the guilty.This is the great quarrel of the present day between the philosopher and the Christian. The philosopher says, 'Yes, a god if you will, but he must be of such a character as I now dogmatically set before you'; but the Christian replies, 'Our business is not to invent a god, but to obey the one Lord who is revealed in the Scriptures of truth.' The God of Holy Scripture is love, but he is also possessed of justice and severity; he is merciful and gracious, but he is also stern and terrible towards evil; therefore unregenerate hearts say, 'We cannot accept such a God as this,' and they call him cruel, and I know not what besides.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Heart-Knowledge of God," delivered December 6, 1874.

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Stopping Textual Abuse: Identifying "the least of these" in Matthew 25:31-46

2011-10-24T08:53:00.000-05:00

In the latest work from Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert (What is the Mission of the Church?), while promoting mission and justice, they expose some of the misapplied Scriptures often used by popular level missional and social justice types. One of those Scriptures often misapplied is "the least of these" text. (I use them as a guide for this post, but what follows is produced by me.) Today, we’ll deal with one of the favorite texts of social justice advocates: Matthew 25:31-46. More specifically, verses 40 and 45 are the key verses most often pointed to. They read:

25:40 - “And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, my brothers, you did it to me.”
25:45 - “Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.”

Jesus is telling a parable about the eternal judgment. He speaks of the Son of Man appearing in glory and separating people, like a shepherd separates sheep from goats (v.31-33). The King then tells the sheep to enter His Kingdom (v.34), that is, “eternal life” (v.46), and the goats are cursed and tossed into “the eternal fire” (v.41), that is, “eternal punishment” (v.46). The basis of this judgment is how people acted towards “the least of these” (v.40, v.45).

In v.35-39 and v.42-44 the people Jesus mentions as the “least of these” are those who are strangers, naked, sick, imprisoned, hungry, and thirsty. So isn’t this self-explanatory? Jesus is telling His audience in this text that the judgment to come will be based on how we treat all people in these conditions. We need to be all about social justice to all people everywhere and all the time!But while this is normally how the text is understood, (and I have no doubt it is mostly well intentioned; though perhaps agenda driven), the proper analysis of this text shows that Jesus is not talking about all people who are in these conditions (in the general sense), but about a more specific group of people who are in these conditions.

Before continuing, I want to concur with a statement from D.A. Carson when addressing this text: “I am loath to challenge [the usual interpretation] because it is always important for those who know and follow the living God to show their life in God in the realms of compassion, service, and self-abnegation.” However, “it is rather unlikely that that [all hurting people] are the focus of this parable.” (emphasis mine)

As much as social justice advocates want to define the phrase “the least of these” as all people everywhere who are oppressed or demoralized, Jesus does not define it that way and that is not the point of the parable. Verse 40 is the controlling authority for helping us see who the group of people Jesus is talking about are: “the least of these my brothers,” (or, for you 2011 NIV types, “my brothers and sisters”). Granted, v.45 does not include “my brothers” but it is clear Jesus is talking about the same group of people (it’s the same parable, the same audience, the same subject).

So who is a “brother” of Jesus? Jesus helps us understand whom His “brother” is in the same parable by the phrase that immediately follows “the least of these.” Whatever you did to them: “you did it to me” (v.40) or “you did not do it to me” (v.45). So whoever the brother is, s/he is directly connected to Jesus. Now we know that not all people are connected to Jesus, for only those who believe in Him are “in Him” or "in the vine." In as much as the rich are not automatically connected to Jesus, the poor are also not automatically connected to Jesus (though, Jesus’ compassion for them is clear, as should ours be). To take it a step further, Mark records Jesus as defining His brothers as “whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother” (Mark 3:35). Certainly, not believing in Jesus is contrary to the will of God. Carson makes an additional note on Acts 9:4. In it Jesus tells Saul that when Saul persecuted the Church, Saul was persecuting Him. So by extension, Jesus’ brothers and sisters are those in Him who do His will and are in His Church. There is also the multiple references to the brother in 1 John, where it is clear John is speaking about those who are in the faith. In the Matthew text, the clearest reference is to His disciples who were following Him and present during the telling of this parable, but in addition we can include all those who believe in Him and are following Him.

More convincingly, the word used for “least” in the Greek Matthew 25:40,45 text is the superlative μικροι (mikroi), and when we look at the other times forms of this word are used in Matthew, we see it references those who believe in Jesus/His disciples. Here are just two of those examples:

18:6 “whoever causes one of these little ones (μικροων, mikrone) who believe in me to sin…”
10:42 “whoever gives one of these little ones (μικροων, mikrone) even a cup of cold water because he is a disciple…”

Then going off of that second example is the parallel passage of 10:40-42 to 25:31-46. In both cases, Jesus is talking about his disciples who are traveling around preaching the Good News and who are in need of provision (food, drink, clothes, medicine, a place to sleep) and who may be in another land (thus, strangers) or are put in prison for their message. With all of this it is clear that Jesus is talking about a specific group of people in Matthew 25:31-46 and not everyone who is hungry, or sick, or in prison. “The least of these” text should not be used by social justice advocates to guilt others in the church into digging wells in Africa. As Carson writes, “There is overwhelming evidence that this expression does not refer to everyone who is suffering, but to Jesus’ followers who are suffering. The emphasis is not on generic compassion (as important as that is elsewhere), but on who has shown compassion to the followers of Jesus who are hungry, thirsty, unclothed, sick, or in prison.”

Indeed, there are plenty of other texts that could be used (and should be used!) to support benevolence ministries to the unbelieving poor and suffering (like Luke 6:27-31; Matthew 5:16; Matthew 7:12; Galatians 6:10; 1 Thessalonians 5:15, etc.) but Matthew 25:31-46 should not be one of them. In fact, the Matthew text should convict those who wish to help the unbeliever over that of a believer. As Paul writes in Galatians 6:10 “So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.” We, as believers, have a responsibility first to the Body of Christ, then to others.

So as we seek to serve others both inside and outside the church, let us not prove our cause with sloppy exegesis. We don’t need to!

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Forgiving 70 times 7 and the Atonement of Christ

2011-08-18T09:29:00.002-05:00

[This is part two of a two-part post (scroll down or click here for part one) dealing with the atonement and objections raised by others to the ideas of substitution and satisfaction.]

About five or so minutes into a 2006 interview, on the seemingly now defunct (as is everything else Emergent) “The Bleeding Purple Podcast”, Brian McLaren said the following to Emergent interviewer Leif Hansen:

The traditional understanding says that God asks of us something that God is incapable of Himself. God asks us to forgive people. But God is incapable of forgiving. God can’t forgive unless He punishes somebody in place of the person He was going to forgive. God doesn’t say things to you—Forgive your wife, and then go kick the dog to vent your anger. God asks you to actually forgive…. And there’s a certain sense that, a common understanding of the atonement presents a God who is incapable of forgiving. Unless He kicks somebody else.

To respond:

In Book 1, Chapter 12 of Why God Became Man, the same kind of point is brought up by Anslem’s conversationalist/literary counterpart Boso. Anselm then answers Boso.

Boso: When God teaches us to forgive those who sin against us, he seems to be being contradictory – in teaching us to do something which it is not fitting for him to do himself.

Anselm answers: There is no contradiction in this, because God is giving us this teaching in order that we should not presume to do something which belongs to God alone. For it belongs to no one to take vengeance, except to him who is Lord of all.

Two points to follow:

First, Anselm is correct in basing his answer on Biblical teaching. Deut 32:35, Heb 10:30, and Rom 12:19 all use this phrase (“vengeance is mine, I will repay” says the LORD). And the point of this saying is exactly what Anselm says it is. We don’t take matters into our own hands because it is God’s will and role to do it. We are told to forgive 70 times 7 because we are told to "leave it to the wrath of God" (Rom 12:19). He is judge and He will judge justly. The Jesus of the Scriptures will also be a part of this judgement (see 2 Thess 1:5-10). The cross was God's just judgment on those who have faith in Christ (see Rom 3:21-26).

Second, God didn’t kick just “somebody else.” He sent His own Son as a sacrifice. Jesus wasn’t some puppy dog that God kicked. Jesus was/is God. God did this in first-person. The cross was an action within the Godhead; within the Trinity. The God-Man hanging on the cross was not a third party. Likewise, the One ultimately inflicting the punishment was also not a third party. It was an act within the Trinity.

McLaren’s view, and those who hold it, is not only a case of ignorance and missing the point; it raises questions about Christology. Calling Jesus a third party brings serious questions regarding an overall view regarding who Christ is and therefore who God is.
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As a final note: Sometimes I can't tell if McLaren is sincere or if he is just stuck in the rebelling-against-my-white-upper-middle-class-past-evangelical-experience mindset which seems so prevalent in his writings. What is clear from his writings is that he despises the God of Scripture, (for example in a recent book calling a God who would send a flood “hardly worthy of belief, much less worship"). But because others who are sincere have this kind of question, I found it worth while to try to answer.

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The Reason and Necessity of Substitution And Satisfaction

2011-08-17T08:32:00.004-05:00

[This will be a two-part post (one today, one tomorrow) dealing with the atonement and objections raised by others to the ideas of substitution and satisfaction.]

People often question the teaching of substitutionary atonement; or they question that God’s wrath was satisfied upon Jesus at Calvary. Since these teachings are at the heart of the Gospel message (Rom 3:21-26), I wanted to address it, albeit narrowly and briefly.

In Book 1, Chapter 12, of Why God Became Man, Anselm of Canterbury brings up a question regarding this topic and he follows his own question with an answer. I find his line of reasoning compelling. I also thought it would be helpful to, in addition to including his words as it is written in translation, give my paraphrase parenthetically, in italics, and in simple English.

Let us now return to the main argument and see whether it is fitting for God to forgive sin out of mercy alone, without any restitution of the honor taken away from him. (Is it right for God to forgive sin solely based on His mercy and without any repayment?)

He then answers his own question:

To forgive a sin in this way is nothing other that to refrain from inflicting punishment. And if no satisfaction is given, the way to regulate sin correctly is none other than to punish it. If, therefore, it is not punished, it is forgiven without its having been regulated. (To not punish sin is to say sin is uncontrolled and not put in good order; i.e. never corrected.)

He continues:

But it is not fitting for God to allow anything in his kingdom to slip by unregulated. (God cannot allow anything not set right into his kingdom.)

Anselm then expands his answer. First:

There is another thing that follows, if a sin is forgiven without punishment: then the position of sinner and non-sinner before God will be similar – and this does not befit God. (If sin is not punished, there is no difference between a sinner and non-sinner.)

Also:

Consider this too. Everyone knows that the righteousness of mankind is subject to a law whereby it is rewarded by God with a recompense proportional to its magnitude. (Righteousness is measured against and is subject to a standard. God then rewards according to how it measures up to that standard.)

If, however, sin is neither paid for nor punished, it is subject to no law. (But if sin is simply forgiven with no punishment, then sin has no standard.)

Therefore, sinfulness is in a position of greater freedom…than righteousness-and this seems extremely unfitting. And the incongruity extends even further: it makes sinfulness resemble God. For, just as God is subject to no law, the same is the case with sinfulness. (If sin is not punished, and thus held to no standard, than sin is greater than righteousness, which is held to a standard. And since sin is then free, then sin is like God since God is not under any standard.)

I find Anselm's line of reasoning compelling. To add just a little, I refer again to Romans 3:21-26. Not only does not punishing sin fail the logic and reason test as we read above, it also fails the test of God's justice and righteousness. God put Jesus forward as a wrath removing sacrifice (propitiation) "to show God's righteousness" not only because "he had passed over former sins" but also "so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus." In other words, if God did not empty His wrath upon Jesus, God would have been unjust in justifying sinners (as in, simply by his mercy with no punishment). The only way God can justify sinners is by His holy recompense being paid by His Only Son. This isn't something Anselm made up. This isn't something I made up. This is the explanation given by God, through His Word, to us.

Another point to consider is this: Kingdom of God talk is everywhere these days. But as the Scriptures teach and as Anselm is right to point out, there is no Kingdom reality for anybody without propitiation.

In part 2 tomorrow, I will be using a certain author/speaker as an example of the objection to this understanding. I will briefly look at and rebuff the oft stated comment in objection to substitution/satisfaction/propitiation. It usually goes something like this: "If God tells us to forgive 70 times 7 then it makes no sense that His wrath had to be satisfied by anyone, let alone Jesus."

Response coming tomorrow.

[Note: All citations in this post are from page 284 of Anslem of Canterbury: The Major Works including Monologion, Proslogion, and Why God Became Man by Oxford Press].

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Doubt is Not a Virtue. Tertullian Speaks Today.

2011-08-08T10:43:00.000-05:00

It seems today that in many circles the exercise of doubt, ever-questioning, or never-concluding (in regards to faith, truth, God, Jesus, etc.), is a virtue. There are those who have proclaimed faith for decades that now blog or speak boldly about their own doubts and questions. They insult by way of feigned intellectual superiority anybody who does not share in their own doubts and questions. They urge others to share in their doubts and inconclusiveness, and proclaim that those who dare believe something as certain as those who lack an ability to think.

Regarding this, I now refer to one of the many readings for an upcoming class in grad school. In Tertullian’s Prescription Against the Heretics, he speaks on the topic of those who doubt – or those who claim faith yet are continuously seeking. What follows are snips.

In Chapter 9, he lays out his point regarding Christ and truth:

My first principle is this. Christ laid down one definite system of truth which the world must believe without qualification, and which we must seek precisely in order to believe it when we find it. Now you cannot search indefinitely for a single definite truth. You must seek until you find, and when you find, you must believe. Then you have simply to keep what you have come to believe, since you also believe that there is nothing else to believe, and therefore nothing else to seek, once you have found and believed what he taught who bids you seek nothing beyond what he taught.

In Chapter 10, Tertullian asks by what means will the continual seeking come to an end (using his own context):

But if we are bound to go on seeking as long as there is any possibility of finding, simply because so much has been taught by others as well, we shall be always seeking and never believing. What end will there be to seeking? What point of rest for belief? Where the fruition of finding? With Marcion? But Valentinius also propounds: “Seek, and ye shall find.” With Valentinius? But Apelles also will knock at my door with the same pronouncement, and Ebion and Simon and the whole row of them can find no other way to ingrate themselves with me and bring me over to their side. There will be no end as long as I meet everywhere with, “Seek, and ye shall find,” and I shall wish I had never begun to seek, if I never grasp what Christ taught, what should be sought, what must be believed.

In Chapter 11, he questions whether a continual seeker has ever found anything:

If I once believed what I ought to believe and now think I must seek something else afresh, presumably I am hoping that there is something else to be found. But should never have hoped that, unless I had either never believed, though I seemed to, or else had stopped believing. So in deserting my faith I am shown up as an apostate. Let me say once for all, no one seeks unless there is something he did not possess or something he has lost. The old woman in the parable had lost one of her ten pieces of silver, and so she began to seek it. When she found it, she stopped seeking. The neighbor had no bread, so he began to knock. When the door was opened and he was given the bread, he stopped knocking. The widow kept asking to be heard by the judge because she was not being granted an audience. When she was heard, she insisted no longer. So clear is it that there is an end to seeking and knocking and asking. For to him that asketh, it shall be given, it says, and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened, and by him that seeketh, it shall be found. I have no patience with the man who is always seeking, for he will never find. He is seeking where there will be no finding. I have no patience with the man who is always knocking, for the door will never be opened. He is knocking at an empty house. I have no patience with the man who is always asking, for he will never be heard. He is asking one who does not hear.

And in Chapter 14, Tertullian concerns himself with those who listen to and follow the endless seeker and doubter:

…what is the good of conferring with men who themselves profess that they are still seeking? If they are indeed still seeking, they have still found nothing certain. Whatever they hold is only provisional. Their continual searching shows up in their hesitation. And so when you, a seeker like them, look to men who are seekers themselves, the doubter to the doubters, the uncertain to the uncertain, then, blind yourself, for you will be led by the blind into the ditch (Matthew 15:14).

Or do they teach their real beliefs through their doubt?

But, in fact, it is only for the sake of deceiving us that they pretend to be still seeking. By first filling us with anxiety, they hope to commend their own views to us. The moment they get near us they begin to defend the very propositions, which, they had been saying, need investigation. We must be as quick to refute them, making them understand that it is not Christ we deny, but themselves.

And what of those who claim belief yet perpetually seek?

In that they are still seeking, they do not yet hold any conviction. In that they possess no convictions, they have not yet come to believe. In that they have not yet come to believe, they are not Christians.

An objection is raised. “They do hold convictions and believe, but assert the necessity of ‘seeking’ in order to defend their faith.” Yes, but before they defend it they deny it, confessing by their seeking that they have not yet believed. Not Christians even to themselves, how can they be to us? What sort of faith are they arguing when they come with deceit? What truth are they vindicating when they introduce it with a lie? Another objection. “They discuss and persuade on the basis of Scripture.” Naturally. From what other source than the literature of the faith could they talk about the things of the faith?

Tertullian introduces some interesting observations applicable for today. I’ve not understood the virtue of doubt, and do not believe that is what we are called to by Christ. It manifests itself in various ways. There are the typical debates over the virgin birth or resurrection. But there are others. Never are we exhorted by Jesus to doubt and endlessly question what all the Scriptures entail or what He claims. Nowhere does Jesus call us to doubt the Hebrew Scriptures, or to dismiss them as simply bits and pieces of a larger library. Never does Jesus tell us to doubt if the actions of God we read about were really from God.

As Jesus said to Peter: "O you of little faith, why did you doubt?" (Matthew 14:31)
and to Thomas: "Stop doubting, and believe." (John 20:27)
As James exhorted: "for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways." (James 1:7-8)

Yet as Jude tells us, "have mercy on those who doubt" (Jude 1:22)

In the end, we are told to “stand firm” and to persevere in the faith. We need to move beyond milk and eat some solid food. This moves us from walking by the flesh to walking by the Spirit. Jesus taught us to be strong, and we are exhorted not to be tossed to and fro by the waves of doubt or cultural current.

It's not cool to doubt; and it's not a virtue.

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“Even Barnabas!”

2011-07-05T16:59:00.000-05:00

During my series on Galatians here in Peterhead, I spent some time on this passage
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But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. ~Galatians 2:11-13 (ESV)

Even Barnabas.

It is an interesting addition to this story Paul is telling. Out of all the people that were present at this meal in Antioch, Paul mentions only two. The first, Cephas (that is, Peter); and the second, Barnabas. We can understand why he mentioned Peter's wrong, but what was the point of mentioning Barnabas? This is what I want to focus on in this post.

We all have people close to us. There are people or perhaps a single person who means so much to us and we know this person really well. These are people who have stood by us when others have left; people who have supported us when others have not; people who continue to love us even in our times of fault. Consider them as we look at this story.

From this text in Galatians, I want us to get a better understanding of Paul. I hope at the end of this we see Paul's deep sentiment that comes from his comment, “even Barnabas.”

Paul can’t believe it. Barnabas. Even Barnabas.

So what’s the point and emotion behind mentioning Barnabas? I don’t think Paul is just simply pointing out that Barnabas was in Antioch acting this way. I think Paul is expressing something much more than that, and here is my attempt at understanding what is under the surface of the comment: "even Barnabas."

Let us take a stroll through the book of Acts. We are introduced to Barnabas in chapter 4. In verses 32-35, Luke writes of the preaching of the apostles and the generosity of the early believers. People gave and the believers were sustained together. Then we read verses 36-37:

Thus Joseph, who was also called by the apostles Barnabas (which means son of encouragement), a Levite, a native of Cyprus, sold a field that belonged to him and brought the money and laid it at the apostles feet.

We now know who Barnabas is. He is a Levite and one who is called a “son of encouragement.” This is our introduction to Barnabas.

Now turning to chapter 9, we read the following in verses 26-27:

And when [Paul] had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who spoke to him, and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus.

So here we see first contact between Paul and Barnabas. Paul, who was persecuting believers in Jesus, had just been blinded and called by Jesus to preach the Gospel. Paul was well known to be a persecutor of the church, but now he was a voice for The Way. And Barnabas accepted him. Barnabas received him when all the others were scared or questioned his discipleship. Barnabas, I think, stuck his neck out for Paul in Jerusalem.

The son of encouragement. Imagine what Barnabas must have meant for Paul at this moment in his life.

Now turning to chapter 11 we have this from verses 19-26:

Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except Jews. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists also, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number who believed turned to the Lord. The report of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch. When he came and saw the grace of God, he was glad, and he exhorted them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast purpose, for he was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith. And a great many people were added to the Lord. So Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul, and when he had found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they met with the church and taught a great many people. And in Antioch the disciples were first called Christians.

The church in Jerusalem knew and trusted Barnabas enough to send him to Antioch to see what was going on there. Notice the description Luke gives of Barnabas. He “was glad.” He “exhorted” and encouraged the believers to remain steadfast in their faith in Christ. And look at verse 24. Barnabas was “a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and of faith.”

I, for one, wouldn’t mind that description being on my tombstone.

But I want us to notice something more here. When Barnabas went to Tarsus, he went and “look[ed] for Saul.” He “found him” and “brought him to Antioch.” Paul wasn’t an afterthought for Barnabas. These are action words. These are words of intent. Barnabas wanted to find Paul and so he did. He wanted to be with Paul. And then for a whole year in Antioch, “they met with the church and taught a great many people.”

They were Gospel partners and they were friends. And for Paul, think about what this might mean to him at this time? Perhaps his thoughts echo the passage:

“Barnabas looked for me. He found me. He brought me to Antioch. He didn’t have to do any of these things. But Barnabas wanted to be with me and he wanted to teach the Gospel with me.”

“Even as others reject me, Barnabas cares for me.”

Now turn to chapter 13 of Acts. Here we have the first missionary journey kicking off. The Holy Spirit declares that Barnabas and Paul are to depart “for the work to which I have called them” (v.2).

God. The Creator of all things has now declared: “This is my pair, which I will use for this purpose.” The community affirmed this calling and sent them off; and the Holy Spirit sent them out. And for Paul what does this mean?

“Now the Lord Almighty has decided, Barnabas is to be with me!”

It is appropriate to mention here that I take the position that Galatians was written sometime in year 48, just before the (so-called) Jerusalem Council we read about in Acts 15. Therefore, the churches in Galatia were planted during the first missionary journey (year 46-47). So, who planted the Galatian churches with Paul?

The son of encouragement. Barnabas.

Now turn to the end of Acts chapter 15. Immediately following the decision in Jerusalem, we read of the disagreement between Paul and Barnabas:

And after some days Paul said to Barnabas, "Let us return and visit the brothers in every city where we proclaimed the word of the Lord, and see how they are." Now Barnabas wanted to take with them John called Mark. But Paul thought best not to take with them one who had withdrawn from them in Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work. And there arose a sharp disagreement, so that they separated from each other. Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed away to Cyprus, but Paul chose Silas and departed, having been commended by the brothers to the grace of the Lord. And he went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches.

What I find interesting here is in this disagreement over John Mark; even though Paul and Barnabas end up separating over it, it is Barnabas, again, defending and siding with the underdog. Previously it was Paul, but now here Barnabas defends John Mark.

This is who Barnabas was. He never gave up on people. He was the encourager. He stuck by his brothers even when they made mistakes and others rejected them.

This is Barnabas.

Now returning to our text in Galatians, we have Paul making this comment “even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.”

Now consider that person or people I asked us to recall in our own lives. The ones who have stood by us when nobody else did. The ones who have encouraged us. The ones who we know well. The ones we rely on in our daily walk of life.

Now consider this situation in Antioch.

Can you feel Paul’s incredulity? “Even Barnabas was led astray! The man who first welcomed me! The man who defended me in the presence of the disciples of Jesus! The man who God chose to go with me on my first missionary journey! The man who planted these churches with me in Galatia! Barnabas is a man that the churches in Galatia know! Yes, this great man: Barnabas, my friend, my brother! Even HE was led astray by this action of Peter. No! No! Anybody but Barnabas!”

Can you feel that? Even Barnabas.
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A final point to make is that what this shows us in that even the best of us, like Barnabas, will still fall short. We will still sin; we will still falter in the face of opposition; we will still stumble at the fear of men.

But yet still, we are secure in Christ.

Yes, even Barnabas.

The Idolatry of "Nothing is Biblical"

2011-06-14T04:33:00.016-05:00

Being on the opposite side of the pond, I have been out of the blog-loop for a while. But yesterday, against my own advice, I logged on to some blogs just to see what was being discussed.

In one instance, I read some proclaiming that any attachment to the Scriptures was a false attachment. One blog entry had to do with labeling anything “biblical.” They dismissed this classification because, they say, one cannot claim anything from the Scriptures when it comes to any topic without adding interpretation. Therefore, nothing is really biblical. Some commentators added that any time someone begins speaking about “biblical-anything” they know not to listen to them because they know what is coming. Other commentators opined that this was true for theology as well. Nothing, in their minds, is biblical. Except, of course, what they find appropriate for their own sentimentalities of the enlightened 21st Century mind.

I agree that some can use such “biblical” language for nefarious reasons. I have witnessed that being done. But that is no reason to throw discernment out the window as to what is biblical. But it is this mindset of saying all things are subjective that allows people to shape idols in their own image. We might appeal to the Scriptures when it suits us, and dismiss the Scriptures as purely for a time and place when it doesn’t suit our own thinking. I am certain I have done this, only to be smacked upside the head when actually reading and submitting to the Scriptures.

One idol that I read about often is when some try to distance Jesus from the God we read about in the Scriptures. They read about the God of the Scriptures and really don’t like what they see. And so, they shape a Jesus into an idol of their own making. They claim to love this Jesus of the Scriptures. The inoffensive man of peace with flowing hair that blows in the wind that would never hurt a fly. “Ah yes,” they think, “this is a Jesus I can like.” “This is a God I can worship.” “Forget that garbage I read about in Joshua. I want the man with children on His knee.”

But as Francis Chan recently said, when one begins a statement with "I wouldn't believe in a God who..." they are submitting God to their own reasoning and morality. They have already started to form an idol. They know how God should be better and they don’t hesitate to let Him (and others) know what is proper. And so, they escape the testimony of the Word and cut down a tree. They throw half of it in the flames and carve the other into something they can feel comfortable worshiping. They carry it around in their pocket, blog about it, bring it to church, and sing to it.

And so I want to paint us a picture of the Jesus of the Scriptures we hear little about. A portion of the, shall I say, “biblical” Jesus. It is not a complete painting, but it is more than a few strokes of the brush. It will include the colors that are often left out.

Consider that Jesus was there when God ordered; indeed demanded, the slaughter of those who stood in the way of the Promised Land. This judgment of God against sin and for His People included the slaughter of women, children, and livestock.

Jesus was there. And Jesus saw that it was good. “No one is good but God alone,” Jesus says. And notice Jesus never, not once, distanced Himself from any actions God. In fact, Jesus wholeheartedly supports the actions of God. After all, He Is He. “I AM,” Jesus said.

This is the Jesus of Revelation 1 who is

clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest. The hairs of his head were white, like white wool, like snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire, his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength.

It is this Jesus, the difficult Jesus of the Scriptures, in the presence of whom John “fell at his feet as though dead” in response to this scene.

This is the Jesus of 2 Thessalonians 1 who will be,

revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes on that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be marveled at among all who have believed

This is the Jesus of Revelation 19 who has a robe splattered with the blood of His enemies, and

will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords.

People often speak of taking God out of the box. Too often we put Jesus into this same box. It is the Jesus of the enlightened Western, predominantly white, middle-class, and sentimental box of 21st Century emotional categories. What needs to be said to this classification of Christ is that perhaps, just perhaps, people don’t really like the Jesus of the Scriptures either. They will make excuse after excuse for the “God of the Old Testament” (a rather inconsiderate phrase; for God does not change) and try to distance Jesus from the Father. Yet Jesus says He comes from the Father; and He does all that the Father commands Him to do. “I and the Father are One,” Jesus said.

And so it comes down to perhaps that people really don’t like Jesus after all. This is the Jesus of Isaiah 55, who as a member of the Godhead, proclaims that His

thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

This is the Son of God, about whom we might proclaim,

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?’

Who has been His counselor? Try reading those blogs. They know better.

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I Killed the Lord

2011-04-22T19:44:00.000-05:00

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My sin was placed

Upon the Son

This is the price

Of victory won

The Father forsook Him

Not me did He smite

The power of justice

With Almighty might

Faith has been granted

I receive it in full

To His cross I cling

On my belly I pull

Like sheep before shearers

And slaughtered in my stead

The sheep that had nowhere

To lay His bloody head

I killed the Lord

According to God’s will

Little did I know

My heart He would fill

I am a murderer

A thief and a liar

In love with my sin

I walked in the mire

Crucify Him! Crucify Him!

I yelled with darkness

I spit in His face

Others joined me in the rest

This is Friday

A day of great sorrow

What awaits the world

The day after tomorrow
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The Most Dangerous Place to Raise Children

2011-03-28T09:14:00.001-05:00

Here is a brief 1-minute story about the most dangerous place to raise children. I heard this a while ago and the truth of it has stuck with me. The place will probably not be where you might expect it to be. It has everything to do with worldview.

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The Kimyals Recieve the Scriptures

2011-03-15T10:58:00.000-05:00

If this video doesn't lead to tears, praise, repentance, and worship; I'm not sure what would.

Here is the prayer of the pastor in the video:

O God, O God!
The plan which you had from the beginning regarding your Kimyals, which already existed in your Spirit!
The month that you had set, the day that you had set, has come to pass today!
O my Father, my Father!
The promise that you gave Simeon that he would see Jesus Christ and hold him in his arms before he died, I also have been waiting under the same promise, O God!
You looked at all the different languages and chose which ones will be put in your Word! You thought that we should see your Word in your language!
Today, the day you had chosen for this to be fulfilled, has come to pass!
O God, today you have placed your Word into my hands, just like you promised!
You have placed it here in our land!
And for all this, O God, I give you praise!

Further thoughts:
What blew me away through my tears as I watched this video is how trusting the Kimyals are in the sovereignty and freedom of God. When so many question it and make it a trivial matter, here these brothers and sisters are unashamed in proclaiming it.

Additionally, after I watched the video, I repented to God. I repented that I simply have not been this way toward the Word. Yes, I read it daily and I pray upon it, but its accessibility to me is something that is never questioned. I'm not sure I've ever rejoiced at my mere possession of it. Yet here we have a tribe of people who are receiving all of it in their language for the first time and rejoicing! O to have a heart like this! I pray to have a heart like this. God, give me a heart like this!

Along with that last paragraph, it also made me reflect on Amos 8. It is the chapter that immediately came to mind while watching the video, more specifically verses 11-13:

'Behold, the days are coming,' declares the Lord GOD, 'when I will send a famine on the land—not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD. They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the LORD, but they shall not find it. In that day the lovely virgins and the young men shall faint for thirst.'

This also led to my repentance. We take having possession of the Word for granted in this land and I doubt there is much reflection on ever not having it or hearing it spoken or preached. Yet we have the Kimyals rejoicing at their first complete copies in their language. Amen and Amen!

And [the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders] sang a new song, saying,
'Worthy are you to take the scroll
   and to open its seals,
for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God
   from every tribe and language and people and nation,
and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God,
   and they shall reign on the earth.' (Revelation 5:9-10)

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Mark Goodacre on the Four Women in Matthew's Genealogy

2011-03-08T14:39:00.000-06:00

Mark Goodacre is a New Testament scholar and Associate Professor of New Testament in the Religion department of Duke University. I listen to Goodacre's New Testament Podcast (NT Pod), and yesterday while on the treadmill I went back to listen to his very first episode on Matthew's genealogy (1:1-17). I found his take on the women in the genealogy rather interesting (admittedly, I've done zero study on Matthew's genealogy up to this point so this may not be new to everybody reading this).

Before getting to the women, Goodacre first points out how each group of 14 generations in the genealogy has a key figure. Of course, Abraham is first because he is the one from whom all nations will be blessed; and we see at the end of Matthew the Great Commission where Jesus, who is the fulfillment of that 'seed', commands the Gospel to go to all nations. The second figure is that of David who is of course, the King, and in Matthew Jesus is explicitly called the Son of David 9 times. The third group of names begins after the mention of the exile into Babylon, a dramatic point of Jewish history. Then, the genealogy ends with Jesus.

But inside the genealogy is the mentioning of four women: Tamar (v.3), Rahab (v.5), Ruth (v.5), and Bathsheba (v.6). Goodacre remarks how it was beyond the norm for women to be included in a genealogy of male names. So what is the deal with these four women? What, if anything, is a commonality with those four that we should take note of? What is Matthew communicating to the reader?

Though there are more, Goodacre reflects on just two theories taken by scholars that he finds interesting. Then he advocates for one of them:

Theory 1) All of the women are united by being in some way foreign, non-Israelite women. So Matthew was including them to show that in Jesus' own history was the promise already to the nations. Therefore Jesus would be seen as the Messiah not only to Jews but also to Gentiles.

Theory 2) All of them are united by some kind of unusual, out of wedlock sexual liaison. Tamar dressed as a prostitute and slept with her father-in-law Judah (see Genesis 38, particularly v.12-19). She birthed Perez and Zerah. Rahab was a prostitute (see Joshua 2 and 6). She birthed Boaz. Ruth had a, shall I say, interesting encounter with Boaz on the threshing floor (see all of Ruth, but particularly chapter 3). She birthed Obed (David's grandpa). Bathsheba, of course, is the women who King David committed adultery with (see 2 Samuel 11). She birthed Solomon.

Goodacre agrees with theory 2 for the following reasons: When Matthew comes to Bathsheba in the genealogy, he does not call her Bathsheba. Instead, he calls her Uriah's wife (see 1:6). This is interesting because Uriah, when mentioned in the Old Testament, is called Uriah the Hittite. So the foreign nature is tied to his Hittite connection. But Matthew does not mention the foreign nature of Uriah. Instead, he stresses the fact that this is someone else's wife ("Uriah's wife"); thus stressing the unusual sexual liaison that went on. Of course in her case, she was the women King David committed adultery with while she was married to Uriah.

So why does this matter? Why would Matthew want to stress the link with these women and their past? Goodacre proposes that Matthew could be doing this to lead the reader up to Matthew 1:18ff where Mary is pregnant out of wedlock. Is Matthew preparing the reader to encounter the story of Mary; that however strange it might sound there is some kind of likeness to her story in the Hebrew Bible? Goodacre thinks so.

I'm not sure where I stand, but this has piqued my interest and I look forward to further study and other theories.

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Interpreting Words About God: Part 5 of 5, "Limiting God is Bad Theology"

2011-02-04T07:00:00.000-06:00

Monday) "Test case: Genesis": Authorial use of anthropomorphic language.
Tuesday) "Bugs on a quarter": A very brief introduction for the following two days that will discuss Creator-creature relationship, the archetypal-ectypal distinction, and univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogous interpretation. We will explore the power of accommodative truth.
Wednesday) "The Creator-creature Distinction": The Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction.
Thursday) "Analogy Must Be the Rule": The argument advocating use of only analogous interpretation for ALL words attributed to what God does and about who He is.
Today) "Limiting God to creaturely Bounds is Bad Theology": A note to critics and some final comments.

Today, I will end this series for now with one last excerpt from the Michael Horton article (full reference on this post) and some final comments from me.

Those who are uncomfortable with this analogical approach frequently betray an autonomous view of knowledge. How can we know if the analogies fit? The assumption seems to be that unless one can stand outside of the analogy and its referent, one cannot compare the analogy for its success. Many conclude that if the predicate ‘good’ applied to both God and Sally does not mean exactly the same thing, then we are left in skepticism (equivocity). Either rationalism or irrationalism: that is the choice that an autonomous epistemology requires. But [an] analogical approach insists that, because Scripture is God’s own speech in human language, the analogies that God selects are appropriate whether we know the exact fit or not. We do not need that which we cannot possibly have—namely, archetypal knowledge. Because creaturely knowledge is inherently ectypal, it is essentially analogical. Univocal knowledge is reserved for the Creator and his archetypal theology. But if God authorizes the analogies, they must be accurate descriptions even though they do not provide univocal access to God’s being. Scripture is sufficient for the purposes God intended—to reconcile us to himself, not to satisfy our curiosity.

So as a final thought from me, as we read the Word the notion that we can get precise about God and make a one-to-one is not accurate. It limits God to creaturely bounds. The Word is revelatory in that we encounter God so that it transforms us not so much that we can figure Him all out.

Words like God ‘repented,’ or changed His mind, or ‘grieved’ or even 'love' and 'wrath' are “bugs on the quarter” language. It is language that shapes us and is authentic but it is not defining or precision language about God. We must not interpret univocally, for if we do we end up defining God in our image and miss the Transcendent God.

We must not use these words as the starting point that defines transcendence. It's really bad theology to do so. However, we can use the words to connect God to our experience in such a way that we are transformed by them as well as maintain that they still say something true about God.

If I can carve out some time, I am thinking of adding to this series with a post or two on the doctrine of God's impassibility which deals with this issue as well. But I do hope this series was edifying to those who read it and that it helps you have an appropriate and Transcendent-honoring interpretation of the Scriptures.

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Interpreting Words About God: Part 4 of 5, "Analogy Must Be the Rule"

2011-02-03T07:00:00.001-06:00

Monday) "Test case: Genesis": Authorial use of anthropomorphic language.
Tuesday) "Bugs on a quarter": A very brief introduction for the following two days that will discuss Creator-creature relationship, the archetypal-ectypal distinction, and univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogous interpretation. We will explore the power of accommodative truth.
Wednesday) "The Creator-creature Distinction": The Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction.
Today) "Analogy Must Be the Rule": The argument advocating use of only analogous interpretation for ALL words attributed to what God does and about who He is.
Friday) "An answer to the critics of analogy and closing remarks": That pretty much sums it up.

Today, I continue to relay more of Horton's article that I referenced last post. I believe this continues to build the case that analogous interpretation must be the rule when we read words in Scripture that speak about what God does and who He is.

When we assert certain predicates of God, based on God’s own self-revelation, we use them in one of three senses: univocally, analogically or equivocally. If we say that the predicate ‘gracious’ means exactly the same thing, whether in God or in a creature, we are using ‘gracious’ univocally. At the other end of the spectrum, if we say that by using that predicate we are ascribing something to God whose appropriateness is unknown to us, we are using it equivocally. If, however, God is said to be ‘gracious’ in a way that is both similar and dissimilar to creatures, we say it is analogical. For instance, when we acknowledge that God is a ‘person,’ do we really mean to say that he is a person in exactly the same sense as we are? When we follow Scripture in using male pronouns to refer to God, do we really believe that he is male? Unless we are willing to ascribe to God (in a univocal sense) all attributes of human personhood, predications must be analogical.

Human language cannot transcend its finitude, so when God reveals himself in human language, he draws on human analogies to lead us by the hand to himself. It is correct description, but not univocal description. As we [have argued], the univocal approach to such language almost always tends toward rationalism and the suspicion of the mystery inherent in the Creator-creature distinction. And equivocal approaches, such as those adopted in some forms of mysticism and in the wake of Kant, denying any certainty about the truth of our predications, tend toward skepticism under the guise of God’s mysterious incomprehensibility.

Thus, [we] do not use analogy as a fall-back strategy when [we] find something that does not fit the system. Rather, it is ... a necessary implication of the Creator-creature relationship as [we should] understand it. All of God’s self-revelation is analogical, not just some of it. ... Just as God comes down to us in the incarnation in order to save us who could not ascend to him, he meets us in Scripture by descending to our weakness. Thus, not only is God’s transcendence affirmed, but his radical immanence as well. Transcendence and immanence become inextricably bound up with the divine drama of redemption. Revelation no less than redemption is an act of condescension and grace.

Tomorrow I will end this series (for now) with one last excerpt from Horton's article that addresses those who are uncomfortable with the analogous approach. It will follow with some final comments from me.

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Interpreting Words About God: Part 3 of 5, "The Creator-creature Distinction"

2011-02-02T07:00:00.003-06:00

Monday) "Test case: Genesis": Authorial use of anthropomorphic language.
Tuesday) "Bugs on a quarter": A very brief introduction for the following two days that will discuss Creator-creature relationship, the archetypal-ectypal distinction, and univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogous interpretation. We will explore the power of accommodative truth.
Today) "The Creator-creature Distinction": The Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction.
Thursday) "Humbling ourselves before The Transcendent": The argument advocating use of only analogous interpretation for ALL words attributed to what God does and about who He is.
Friday) "An answer to the critics of analogy and closing remarks": That pretty much sums it up.

Continuing the series now, there is an article we read and discussed during the "Providence and Suffering" class with Dr. John Mark Hicks. It has been a huge influence on me. Here is a link to the article if you want to read it in full: Michael Horton, "Hellenistic or Hebrew?" Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 45 (June, 2002): 317-341 (pdf).

The article concerns itself with exegetical methods. I am leaving a big amount of great information out, and in respect of space I will only include some brief pieces from it that I found especially helpful when wrestling with the language used in the Scripture to describe God and what He does.

For today, we will explore the Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction (or, original and perfect understanding [how God understands] vs. understanding as reproduction or copy [how man understands]).

Note: Where I quote Horton it is indented. My comments start on the left side.

First, there is the Creator-created relationship.

[There] is the 'hidden-revealed' distinction. 'Truly you are a God who hides yourself. . .' (Isa 45:15). We are reminded in Deuteronomy, 'The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but those things which are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law' (Deut 29:29). God has his own independent intratrinitarian life apart from the creation, and this life is hidden from view and unknowable to creatures. Yet God has condescended not only to create and enter into a personal relationship with creatures, but to reveal his character in so far as it pleases him and benefits us. It does not benefit us to know the secret essence of God or probe the hiddenness of his Trinitarian life, but it does benefit us to know that God the Creator is also our Redeemer in Jesus Christ. (321)

As a result of these distinctions, [we must focus] on the dynamic outworking of God's redemptive plan in concrete history, tak- ing very seriously the twists and turns in the road—including God's re- sponses to human beings. But it does so without denying the clear biblical witness to the fact that God transcends these historical relationships. Transcendence and immanence are not antithetical categories for us, compelling us to choose one over the other. Neither Plato nor Aristotle, Kant nor Hegel, Kierkegaard nor Cobb gives us a biblical model for either transcendence or immanence. (321-322)

So there is a transcendent and immanent distinction. Creator and creature is an ontological distinction and it is a fundamental distinction. I believe we must uphold the Aseity of God (independence of God; what God is in Himself). Therefore God is beyond all physical and metaphysical descriptions.

As creatures, we participate in love, justice, holiness, and a host of negatives. But God doesn’t participate in the same way because God is an independent reality. However, God is love, God is Being, God is justice, God is the ground of all things. This reminds us that God’s relationship to the creation is one of grounding and sustaining and creating and not one where He participates ontologically alongside of creation itself. He is Holy Other. He is a Different Reality. He is the Ground of all ontology itself.

So maintaining that God is transcendent is not just saying He is simply higher or at a higher level; but that He is the ground of being; He is other than us. So the limitations and even descriptions of creaturehood do not apply to the Transcendent One.

Second, an epistemological correlary is:

the ‘archetypal-ectypal’ distinction. Although it had been a category in medieval system, Protestant dogmatics gave particular attention to this distinction and made it essential to their method. Just as God is not merely greater in degree ('supreme being'), but in a class by himself ('life in himself,' John 5:26), his knowledge of himself and everything else is not just quantitatively but qualitatively different from that of creatures. Theologians as diverse as Carl Henry and Langdon Gilkey have had trouble accepting this, claiming that it leads to irrationalism to say that God’s knowledge of an object and our knowledge of an object are never identical at any point. And yet affirmation of this distinction is essential if we are to maintain with Scripture that no one has ever known the mind of the Lord (Rom 11:34, where the context is predestination), that his thoughts are far above our thoughts (Isa 55:8), and that he is 'above' and we are 'below' (Eccl 5:2)—if, in other words, we are to truly affirm the Creator-creature distinction. (323)

Tomorrow we will continue to look at Horton's discussion in regards to the argument of analogous vs. equivocal vs. univocal interpretation of words about God.

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Interpreting Words About God: Part 2 of 5, Accommodative Truth

2011-02-01T07:00:00.011-06:00

Monday) "Test case: Genesis": Authorial use of anthropomorphic language.
Today) "Bugs on a quarter": A very brief introduction for the following two days that will discuss Creator-creature relationship, the archetypal-ectypal distinction, and univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogous interpretation. We will explore the power of accommodative truth.
Wednesday) "God is not man, man is not God": The Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction.
Thursday) "Humbling ourselves before The Transcendent": The argument advocating use of only analogous interpretation for ALL words attributed to what God does and about who He is.
Friday) "An answer to the critics of analogy and closing remarks": That pretty much sums it up.

Today I will write further on analogical language which I mentioned briefly in post number one. I will begin explaining how this relates to the terms that speak about God like "repent" or “regret” or even "love" and "wrath."

I believe it is essentially appropriate that we take an analogous approach to defining the terms rather than a univocal or equivical approach. While I will get to a lengthy discussion on this the next few days, today will be resigned to a brief summary:

1) An equivical approach to these terms about God dictates that the words as we understand them in immanence are nothing like what they actually mean in regards to transcendence (i.e. the Transcendent God). This faulty approach leads us to pure speculation and mysticism.
2) A univocal approach to these terms dictates that the words as we understand them in immanence mean the very same thing as they do for the transcendent God. This faulty approach leads us to be slaves of rationalism. This is also the most common way people interpret words about God and it leads to really bad theology.

Solution: The analogous approach. "Bugs on a quarter" language (I am indebted to Dr. John Mark Hicks for this terminology)

An analogous approach admits that the terms say something about God that we can relate to, but not in the same way as we would define it. It is truth but it is accommodative truth.

Here is an example:
It is like a parent who is a leading scientist telling his 3-year-old child to not pick up a quarter off the ground and suck on it because of a simple explanation like “it has bugs on it.” However, in reality it is because the quarter is covered with micro-bacteria that can cause sickness and a bunch of other complex scientific and health reasons. But the child won’t do it because s/he simply doesn’t want bugs in his/her mouth. This is a parent’s use of accommodative truth.

I believe that similarly, words about God “knowing," "deciding," "repenting," or "love," "wrath," "gracious," etc. are similar bugs on a quarter statements. The next three days will explain in greater detail.

So starting tomorrow and through Friday I will go a bit deeper in explaining how we read words attributed to God. We will explore the Creator-creature relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction (this means, original and perfect understanding [how God understands] vs. understanding as reproduction or copy [how man understands]).

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Interpreting Words About God: Part 1 of 5, "Test Case: Genesis"

2011-01-31T07:00:00.001-06:00

This begins a 5-day series on the following issue: What do we make of words in the Scriptures that describe how God acts? When it says He "repents" or "relents" or seems as though He changes His mind, what are we do make of it, particularly in light of Scriptures like Numbers 23:19, 1 Sam 15:19, Ezekiel 24:14, Malachi 3:6, James 1:17, etc.? This discussion also deals with words attributed to God like "love," "wrath," "gracious," "merciful," or any other word that describes Him and what He does. What are we to make of them? How are we to interpret them?

Here is how the following 5-days of posts will break down, starting with the first one today:

Today) "Test case: Genesis": Authorial use of anthropomorphic language.
Day 2) "Bugs on a quarter": A very brief introduction for the following two days that will discuss Creator-creature relationship, the archetypal-ectypal distinction, and univocal vs. equivocal vs. analogous interpretation. We will explore the power of accommodative truth.
Day 3) "God is not man, man is not God": The Creator-creature ontological relationship and the archetypal-ectypal distinction.
Day 4) "Humbling ourselves before The Transcendent": The argument advocating use of only analogous interpretation for ALL words attributed to what God does and about who He is.
Day 5) "An answer to the critics of analogy and closing remarks": That pretty much sums it up.

Much of this series comes from materials and thoughts from discussions in a class I had with John Mark Hicks in the summer of 2010, "Providence and Suffering". It is probably my favorite class that I have taken thus far in the M.Div program at HUGSR (and it was an elective!).

And one final note before I begin. This is in no way a comprehensive argument and I have cut quite a bit out of what could be said. Even so, it takes all five posts to make the case as I have decided to and some questions that could be asked early may be answered later in the week.

Now for Day 1: Authorial use of anthropomorphic language. Test case: Genesis

I want to begin by affirming that, of course, we must take into account authorial intent for the books of the Bible, and Genesis is the perfect example for the series this week. It is clear that up against the Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) religions that the writer wanted to show that this God that they worshiped was One who was active and relational with His creation and His people. Therefore, relational terms and phrases are used to show this difference between YHWH and the pagan gods. Because of this, I propose that they do not define who God is on a one-to-one basis in regards to attributes. Let me begin with a couple examples:

Example 1: Gen 22:12. God says, “now I know”

Now first we must define what we think about God’s Omniscience:
1)”presentism”, fully comprehends only what is current;
2)”traditional”, all of past, present, future;
3)”self-limitation”, knows past, present, future except in human decision

Presentism says God did not know until Abraham actually acted. Traditional says it is anthropomorphic language and can’t be read literally. Analogy (which I will get to later), then, is very important here. The language in Genesis is definitely communicating something, but the point of the story is not about God’s own understanding but a point about Abraham’s faith. The traditionalist would argue that this is analogous language framed by the narrative itself for Abraham’s benefit. Presentist would say that no, God learns something here that He did not know before. This is the awful habit of open-theists.

But the appropriate question is: What is the narrative perspective in Genesis? What is the view we are given of God’s engagement with creation in Genesis?

Genesis pictures God as under the horizon of the narrative. The way He is operating is as a participant within the narrative itself. Tower of Babel and walking in the garden with Adam are other instances of language of God living in the narrative; the picture of God as interacting at our level. So the language of the narrative is used to communicate that.

Another example: Gen 18:20-21. God going down to take a look to see Sodom and Gomorrah, “then I will know.”

If the narrative is consistently doing this with language, it seems to be a narrative technique that is not intended to say who our God is (He moves around in limited special ways in order to know stuff and He has to relate to humans in such a way to learn their hearts). To do so would be an over-reading of the text to say God didn’t know. It is a narrative technique and so absolutizing that language in a philosophical framework (presentism) is not appropriate.

The technique is to show God’s relationship with those people; not to limit the transcendent God; but to show that He has entered and is participating in the narrative. By theological analogy God connects with us and therefore He is engaged with the narrative but the narrative doesn’t limit Him. The words used are not precise about God in His transcendence.

To be continued: Tomorrow, Day 2: "Bugs on a quarter". I will give a brief overview of what will follow on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Those posts will support this post's view with foundational and necessary interpretive considerations for words attribute to God's actions and attributes.

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My Adventures With a "52-year Deist" (with commentary!)

2011-01-21T07:30:00.003-06:00

Perhaps you already know that I have a Twitter account (@sheetsjr). The adventure I am about to unfold before you started last Sunday, January 16. I was simply (and I believe appropriately) frustrated after hearing another sermon that never once mentioned the Gospel or Jesus, yet the preacher gave an invitation to come to Christ at the end. So I tweeted:

@sheetsjr: "Preachers, if you don't preach the Gospel, don't give an invitation. Conversions to moralistic deism or behavior modification are worthless."

Now for those not familiar with Twitter there is tab option that allows you to see if anyone has tweeted your name (in my case, @sheetsjr). So on Tuesday, the 18th, I clicked just to see if anyone had lately and found this waiting for me, which was posted on the 16th: (I'm removing the actual Twitter name)

@----------: "Which of the four gospels should preachers preach, they are all different, and contradict each other."

Hmm, I thought to myself. I don't 'follow' this person on Twitter nor does he follow me. So he must have found my comment by using word search for "deism" and found my tweet. Then I thought, "and this is a rather simplistic and sweeping statement." So I responded with such a comment:

@sheetsjr: "All four. I question your sweeping and rather simplistic premise concerning them."

To which the self-proclaimed (it says this on his profile) "old fart and a deist for 52 years" replied:

@----------: "All four do contradict each other in regard to the supposed resurrection story. Read and compare them."

OK. So he wants to talk about the resurrection (remember that). And in my thinking I want to point him to the empty tomb, since that is the only Christian doctrine of importance in this immediate story. For example, there is not a doctrine of "who got to the tomb first" that the Christian faith depends on. But there is a doctrine of the empty tomb which is of central importance. So that is the direction I went and I tried to do it logically and rationally (which is what deists claim to promote):

@sheetsjr: "Tell me, if 5 people saw a car accident and gave 5 varying accounts to the cops; does that negate that there was a car accident?"

Apparently this was too much for this deist to handle. He replied, in rapid succession:

@----------: "that is the oldest ploy. How many angles were at the tomb and where were they stationed?"
@----------: "tell me how many people were present when the empty tomb as discovered? What time of day was it?"
@----------: "Tell me who carried the cross that Jesus was supposed to be nailed to? How many of the thieves believed in him."
@----------: "Your accident defense is totally ridiculous, useless, and void. Wake up and smell the roses."
@----------: "It would negate it if all reported a different time of day, make of car, or who was driving."

Now this is Twitter. One only gets 140 characters to say something. I could have a discussion on each of those questions, but I wanted to stay on his original point, which was concerning the resurrection account in all four Gospels. So I tried to stay on topic as well as eek a little more Gospel into the point:

@sheetsjr "You're dodging and becoming unhinged. What Christian doctrine is threatened? The tomb was empty. The Messiah defeated death."

Apparently, this is the line that foaming at the mouth commences for deists. Just say the word "Messiah." Again, in rapid succession (and no I have not edited the wording or spelling at all):

@----------: "Now you aentered another bucket of worms Jesus never fullfiled the signs of the Messiah may i suggest you read your bible."
@----------: "You are like so many others, you deny what is before yours eyes, and try to rationalize the errors to match your beliefs."
@----------: "Be gone now I have no time to waste on you."

Hmm. That last line threw me. Wasn't it him who started this "discussion" with me out of nowhere on Sunday? And yet he has "no time to waste" on me. Anyway, I wasn't going to reply until I thought of another example concerning eye witness accounts and the truth of an occurrence in history. So I wanted to give it a shot. I'm stubborn like that sometimes. And again, I'm still staying on my case for the resurrection story which is what he originally brought up. So I ask again using a relatively contemporary example:

@sheetsjr: "Answer: According to witnesses, how many shots were fired at Dealey Plaza? Then answer: Was Kennedy assassinated?"

Of course, as anybody who has seen the plethora of History channel specials on the Kennedy assassination would know, the answer to the first question is, "Well, some said 3, some said 4, some said 5... and even with the police radio recording it is hard to tell due to echo and all the other noise. Also, nobody is even sure for certain from what direction the shots came." And the answer to the second question is simply, "Yes."

But this was too much for the deist. He replied (and warning, the unhinged becomes a tad vulgar; I have removed the actual words used):

@----------: "Who gives a ****, you donot answer any question posed to you. A typical Christian EVADE now **** off."

I had many things to say in response and a few verses in mind (1 Cor 1:18, 1 Cor 2:14, 2 Tim 3:7) but it was obvious he was not interested in any type of serious conversation. He was completely unhinged. He wanted to make his point, plug his ears, and move on.

And so be it, for at this point I believed this is what Jesus was talking about during the Sermon on the Mount when He said this: “Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you" (Matthew 7:6). And I found what the ESV Study Bible note says on this to be appropriate:

Pearls symbolize the great value of the message of the kingdom of heaven. Believers are to be merciful, forgiving, and slow to judge, yet they should wisely discern the true character of people and not indefinitely continue proclaiming the gospel to those who adamantly reject it, so that they can move on and proclaim the gospel to others.

So there you have it. My Twitter adventures with... well... swine.

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Robert Letham on Jesus' Equality as God

2011-01-13T08:00:00.002-06:00

In reading The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship by Robert Letham for my Seminar in Theology: The Trinity class, I come across quite a bit of good stuff. In chapter two Letham explores Jesus’ equality and identity with God. I would like to quote a chunk of it here for your edification.

First, Jesus asserts his identity in the face of opposition from the Jewish leaders. In John 5:16-47, they try to kill him for breaking the Sabbath and for calling God his Father, thereby making himself equal with God. Jesus denies the charge of blasphemy, citing in his support the plurality of witnesses required by Jewish law – John the Baptist, the works given to Jesus by the Father, the Father himself, and the Scriptures all testify to the truth of his testimony. His claim to be equal with God is true, not false. He then turns the tables on his accusers, charging them with failure to believe Moses’ testimony concerning him (vv. 45-47).

In John 8:58, Jesus tells his accusers, “Before Abraham was, I am.” For his audience, his claim to have lived prior to Abraham is monstrous. Later, they charge him with blasphemy for identifying himself with God, when he says that both he and the Father grant eternal life and preserve his disciples from perishing, for he and the Father are one (John 10:25-39). His opponents threaten to exact the penalty for blasphemy, death by stoning. However, Jesus denies that he is blaspheming, not by withdrawing his claim as false, but by reinforcing it as true (vv. 34-39).

In keeping with this, in John 14:1 Jesus coordinates himself with God as the object of faith – “Believe in God; believe also in me.” It is not certain in the original Greek whether he uses imperatives or indicatives here, for pisteuete could be either, but this does not affect the point. The context favors two imperatives, but in either case Jesus regards himself as equal with God as the proper object of his disciples’ faith. Along the same lines, John refers to him as “God” in John 1:18 at the start of his gospel, and has Thomas confessing him as “my Lord and my God” in John 20:28 at the end – like frames closing a picture. (41)

So, did Jesus claim to be God? Yes. YHWH in the flesh. Fully God, fully man. The Incarnate Christ. Amen!

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Spring Semester 2011 M.Div Book Reading List

2011-01-10T09:18:00.000-06:00

Here is my reading list (just the books, not the plethora of articles) as I begin the Spring semester of 2011 for the M.Div:

For Dr. Powell's "Seminar on Theology: The Trinity"

The Holy Trinity: In Scripture, History, Theology, and Worship - Robert Letham
The Trinity - Karl Rahner
The Trinity and the Kingdom - Jurgen Moltman
17 other scholar articles and book chapters

For Dr. Black's "New Testament Greek Exegesis"

Linguistics & Biblical Interpretation - Peter Cotterell and Max Turner
A Handbook of New Testament Exegesis - Craig L. Blomberg with Jennifer Foutz Markley
1 Peter (New Testament Guides) - David G. Horrell
Interpreting the New Testament: Essays on Methods and Issues - David Alan Black and David S. Dockery
Other articles on textual criticism, genre, context, lexicoraphy, grammar, cultural backgrounds and anthropology, theological contexts, gospel research, ahistorical approaches, and hermeneutical strategies

For Dr. Oster's "New Testament Survey" (this is a leveling course since I didn't have Bible in undergrad)

Acts, in Tyndale New Testament Commentaries - I. Howard Marshall
The Theology of the Letter to the Hebrews - Barnabas Lindars
Matthew as Story - Jack Dean Kinsbury
Also Dr. Oster's small "Galatians" commentary in The Transforming Word as well as M. M. Thompson's "Gospel of John" in Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels.

For Dr. Bland's "Congregational Ministry"

Leading the Congregation: Caring for Yourself While Serving the People - Norman Shawchuck and Roger Heuser
The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything - Stephen M. R. Covey and Rebecca R. Merrill
God's Potters: Pastoral Leadership and the Shaping of Congregations - Jackson W. Carroll
Accompany Them with Singing: The Christian Funeral - Thomas G. Long
18 other articles and book chapters

Well, guess I should get started!

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What Was That "One Thing” The Rich Ruler Still Lacked?

2010-12-29T08:47:00.000-06:00

Luke 18:18-30, otherwise known as the story of the rich ruler, is a favorite passage of many, particularly those who tend to focus on the social justice aspect of Jesus’ teachings. While I have no beef with the social justice aspect of Jesus’ teachings, I do not believe that is the point of this passage of Scripture.

First, we must always consider what is going on around the passage one is discussing. Scripture passages are not written in a vacuum and the author most likely has a point He is developing with surrounding verses, passages, and stories. So instead of just picking up the story at v.18, I want to refer to the previous 3 verses (v.15-17) to begin.

In Luke 18:15-17, infants are brought to Jesus and He tells the people that to receive the Kingdom of God one must be like an infant/child. I will not spend more time discussing my interpretation of the “let the children come to me” passages (and their parallels of Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15 in light of John 3:3,5). In short, my interpretation of the infants and children is that Jesus is using them as an analogy to say that a person must be born again/made anew/regenerated from above, in order to receive the Kingdom of God. See my post explaining this interpretation by clicking here.

After understanding the previous point we now read of the rich ruler. Following the lesson about the infants/children, the rich ruler asked Jesus, v.18 “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” So here, following the lesson on entering the Kingdom of God, the rich ruler is asking Jesus a similar question. He wants in to that Kingdom. He wants eternal life. He wants to know how to get it, how to receive it.

Jesus responds by talking to Him about the 10 Commandments, to which the rich ruler responds, “All these I have kept from my youth” (v.21).

Now I find it interesting here that Jesus does not argue this rather boastful response. Who has kept all the Law? But Jesus does not argue the ruler’s claim. Instead He accepts the answer and then tells the ruler that there is still one thing he lacks which will enable Him to inherit eternal life, to enter the Kingdom of God. (Remember the ruler’s original question. Now consider Jesus’ response. Even after the man claims to have followed the commandments his entire life, Jesus says there is still one thing He lacks in order for him to inherit eternal life.)

Now at this point most people I have heard focus completely on Jesus’ command to the ruler to sell his goods and give his money to the poor. But I do not believe this is a main point of the passage. It is secondary to the primary point; namely, the rest of Jesus’ command. “Come, follow me” (v.22). I do not negate in the slightest the importance of this command to the man to leave what he has to the poor; I just don’t think that is the main point of what Jesus is saying. It is secondary to what the man “lacks.” And what the ruler “lacks” is the point of what Jesus is saying.

So what is the “one thing” the ruler lacks? Consider the word, “lack” and what it means. We know “lack” to mean “to be absent or missing, as something needed.” And the Greek term λείπω means, “to be destitute of,” “to be wanting,” or, “to lack.” So Jesus is telling the ruler that there is something that he does not have. The ruler is left wanting and in need of something. It is not so much what he has to do (for he has already kept the law from his youth) as much as it is what he doesn’t HAVE. It is this that makes me believe that the rich ruler selling his goods and giving to the poor is NOT what he “lacks” though it may be a barrier to what he lacks (this is a very important distinction). The statement just would not make sense if Jesus were telling him that what he lacked was selling his goods and giving to the poor. The rich ruler NEEDS something to inherit eternal life. He needs to possess something. He needs something that he does not yet have. And this is why the rest of the command from Jesus is so important.

So what does the man lack? Jesus says, “Come, follow me.”

The “one thing” the rich ruler still lacks… is Jesus. And if we now bring it back to v.17 and Jesus telling those around Him that they needed to receive the Kingdom by being made anew (like children), by being born again from above, it is clear to see that here Jesus is telling the rich ruler that He must be made anew in order to inherit eternal life. And the only way to be made anew is to have Jesus.

Therefore Jesus says to the ruler, “You still lack one thing. And that one thing… is Me.”

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In the next blog post I will continue this interpretation into the following verses, v.23-30. Even though the focus is on riches (and things that inhibit one from obtaining eternal life), I believe that point is still secondary to the main point of the passage. I will also explain why I think this distinction is important.

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Guest Post: When "Community" Becomes Idolatry

2010-12-06T08:27:00.000-06:00

This is a very first for this blog: a post from a guest. Someone handed me a note yesterday that read the following:

Because we no longer live in community (in our society), we've made the church's primary function to 'be community.' No doubt, we need Christian community, but that CANNOT be all church is! We are sacrificing:
   Reverence
   Holiness
   Sanctification
               Theology
For introverts, when 'church' is so focused on community (one w/another), 'church' is not a welcoming place. When 'church' is focused on community, Christ gets left behind. He's the great friend/guy/lover everyone sings about, but no one we know.

When "community" becomes idolatry.

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The Sovereignty of God: May We Never Become Too Comfortable

2010-11-17T09:36:00.002-06:00

Sometimes you run across passages and verses that blow up the neatly packaged image of God (Father/Son/Spirit). Below you will read about God: sending lying, harmful, and even evil spirits; deceiving prophets; making people believe falsehoods. It will then be followed with some Scriptural reflection on His Sovereignty. May we never become too comfortable.

And while reading, remember: "I and the Father are one." ~Jesus (John 10:30)

1 Kings 22:19-23
"And Micaiah said, 'Therefore hear the word of the Lord: I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing beside him on his right hand and on his left; and the Lord said, ‘Who will entice Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?’ And one said one thing, and another said another. Then a spirit came forward and stood before the Lord, saying, ‘I will entice him.’ And the Lord said to him, ‘By what means?’ And he said, ‘I will go out, and will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ And he said, ‘You are to entice him, and you shall succeed; go out and do so.’ Now therefore behold, the Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; the Lord has declared disaster for you.'”

1 Samuel 16:14
"Now the Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul, and a harmful spirit from the Lord tormented him."

1 Samuel 18:10
"The next day a harmful spirit from God rushed upon Saul, and he raved within his house while David was playing the lyre, as he did day by day. Saul had his spear in his hand."

1 Samuel 19:9
"Then a harmful spirit from the Lord came upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his spear in his hand. And David was playing the lyre."

Judges 9:23
"And God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the leaders of Shechem, and the leaders of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech"

Ezekiel 14:9
"And if the prophet is deceived and speaks a word, I, the Lord, have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand against him and will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel."

2 Thessalonians 2:11-12
"Therefore God sends them a strong delusion, so that they may believe what is false, in order that all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness."
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Now some reflection on His Sovereignty:

"Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases." (Psalm 115:3)

"Whatever the Lord pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps." (Psalm 135:6)

"Does disaster come to a city, unless the LORD has done it?" (Amos 3:6)

"I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things." (Isaiah 45:7)

"Who has spoken and it came to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that good and bad come?" (Lamentations 3:37-38)

"remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,'" (Isaiah 46:9-10)

"I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted." (Job 42:2)

"for his dominion is an everlasting dominion, and his kingdom endures from generation to generation; "all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and he does according to his will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand or say to him, 'What have you done?'" (Daniel 4:34-35)

"What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means! For he says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.' So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy ... So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills ... You will say to me then, 'Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?' But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, 'Why have you made me like this?' Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?" (Romans 9:14-16,18-21)

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD." (Isaiah 55:8)

"The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the LORD." (Proverbs 16:1)

"The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps." (Proverbs 16:9)

"Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand." (Proverbs 19:21)

"I know, O LORD, that the way of man is not in himself, that it is not in man who walks to direct his steps." (Jeremiah 10:23)

"The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law." (Deuteronomy 29:29)

"Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! 'For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?' ^'Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?' For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen." (Romans 11:33-36)

Amen, indeed!

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David Lipscomb on Imputed Righteousness

2010-11-01T09:09:00.000-05:00

I am currently writing a paper for a class on 'Restoration History' and the topic I chose concerns the legacy of grace in the Restoration tradition. With this comes the Restoration's historical view on the doctrine of justification and with that, imputed righteousness. I was very pleased to find the following:

“Even when man’s heart is purified by faith, and his affections all reach out toward God and seek conformity to him and his life, this conformity to the life of God is imperfect. His practice of the righteousness of God falls far short of the divine standard. The flesh is weak, and the low of sin reigns in our members; so that we fall short of the prefect standard of divine righteousness; but if we trust God implicitly and faithfully try to do his will, he knoweth our frame, knows that we are but dust, knows our weakness; and as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pities our infirmities and weaknesses, and imputes to such the righteousness of Jesus Christ. So Jesus stands as our justification and our righteousness, and our life is hid with Christ in God.”

Source: David Lipscomb, “God’s Righteousness Saves,” Gospel Advocate 38 (October 29, 1896): 692. (emphasis mine)

Amen.
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What Makes Love and Obedience to God Valuable?

2010-10-13T09:02:00.000-05:00

[A brief note before I begin. This post really does have to do with the value of love and obedience and not so much on the theological debate of free will. However, since, as you will read, some define the value of love and obedience upon a doctrine of free will, it will be mentioned. But again, this really has to do with what makes love and obedience valuable and even genuine.]

I hear it all the time and I heard it in class again this week during a discussion on free will and loving God. It was assumed that we are “free” to choose God in our natural capacity. This argument comes from an unsaid, inherent, foundational implication that if one has a choice, then that one is also free to make that choice. In the case of love, I have been given a choice as a fallen being to love God or to not love God and therefore I must be free to make that choice and have the natural ability, therefore, to love God.

Off the bat, we can recognize this as a common fallacy called a non-sequitur. What I mean by that is that there is an implied connection between the premise of “I have a choice” and the conclusion that because I have a choice that therefore “I am free.” But what we actually have is not an implied connection between the premise and conclusion but an actual disconnect. In other words, having a choice does not by implication mean that I am free to make that choice apart from an external force, an inclination of some kind, or enslavement to a master or ruler (thus, not really “free”).

The way the argument of free will and loving God usually goes is like this:
“God desires, even commands, for me to love Him.”
And the common conclusion is thus: “If my love for God is given to me and does not arise from my autonomous self, then it isn’t love at all. Therefore, I must be free to choose to love God according to my own free, natural, autonomous choosing.”
And of course we have the always popular: “We’re not robots.”

Oh if I had a nickel…

But first, who made this definition of love; that love is only love if it is done freely? I’m not saying it is or it isn’t (yet), I’m simply asking the question. The word “love” is simply defined for this post as “a profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person or thing.” The Scriptures command us to love God and God wants us to love Him. But where people go wrong is that they add the word “genuine” – which is defined here as “not counterfeit; authentic; real.” So love, to some, is only “love” if it is “genuine.” Notwithstanding the fact that gifted love could also be "genuine," the previous sentence is yet another fallacy. It redefines a word to make it something it isn’t; at least not in the biblical text. Additionally, it implies a motive of God that is not found in Scripture.

But I want to question the premise altogether. Whether we are talking about loving God or obedience to God, the premise that the only “genuine” love or obedience is found from some kind of autonomous free exercise is a false premise. In the context of the obedience of non-human parts of creation for example; is not God in complete control over the winds and the seas and the stars? Yet in Scripture we are told that they obey His voice. Is creation’s obedience, then, not genuine?

For humans (and more to the point) if God overcomes my natural will and grants me a heart that loves Him when my natural heart of stone did not, is my love any less genuine or valuable?

What I propose is that what makes love and obedience great things (i.e. what gives them their value) is not that “free” creatures bring them about (which is what free will advocates would say by using “genuine”). Instead, the beauty, goodness, and value of love and obedience are that these “states of mind” of a person who exercises them correspond to God’s “state of mind.” They fit our God-given nature which was made in the image of God, but has been destroyed by sin and destined for union with God in Christ for those who believe. Thus, entering these “states of mind” by grace and at the instigation of external stimuli (i.e. by God’s doing and not autonomously within ourselves) is a good thing because dwelling in them is the better thing. The insistence upon some idea of being autonomously free brings zero value to love and obedience, yet it seems that is where most people place all the value. I believe that misses the entire point of love and obedience.

The value of obedience and love are inherent within themselves and do not need the presupposition of a free actor to exercise them in order to be valuable (or even “genuine”). They are good and valuable because they are good and valuable; as I said above, “dwelling in them is the better thing." It is a good thing to love and obey God even if that love and nature of obedience is given to me outside my own instigation.

Again, while this post is more about the merits of love and obedience in and of themselves, it does bring up a theological (and relational) question: As one who believes that I never by my own fallen natural will chose to love Jesus and that my love for Him (faith) was a gift from God, given to me by His own choosing according to His own will; are those who believe that only “genuine” (by their definition) love comes through autonomously choosing to love willing to tell me that my love for God is not “genuine”?

Seems to me they would be forced to do just that. Quickly followed, of course, by calling me a robot.

I do believe my heart to love God was given to me by Him (i.e. Ezek 36:26-27). It was a gift and it IS a gift to love Him; and therein lies its intrinsic value.

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A. W. Tozer on The Self-Sufficiency of God

2010-09-21T08:46:00.001-05:00

From Chapter 6, "The Self-Sufficiency of God" in The Knowledge of the Holy.

Almighty God, just because He is almighty, needs no support. The picture of a nervous, ingratiating God fawning over men to win their favor is not a pleasant one; yet if we look at the popular conception of God, that is precisely what we see. Twentieth century Christianity has put God on charity. So lofty is our opinion of ourselves that we find it quite easy, not to say enjoyable, to believe that we are necessary to God. But the truth is that God is not greater for our being, nor would He be less if we did not exist. That we do exist is altogether of God’s free determination, not by our desert nor by divine necessity.

Probably the hardest thought of all for our natural egotism to entertain is that God does not need our help. We commonly represent Him as a busy, eager, somewhat frustrated Father hurrying about seeking help to carry out His benevolent plan to bring peace and salvation to the world...

...Too many missionary appeals are based upon this fancied frustration of Almighty God. An effective speaker can easily excite pity in his hearers, not only for the heathen but for the God who has tried so hard and so long to save them and has failed for want of support. I fear that thousands of young persons enter Christian service from no higher motive than to help deliver God from the embarrassing situation His love has gotten Him into and His limited abilities seem unable to get Him out of. Add to this a certain degree of commendable idealism and a fair amount of compassion for the underprivileged, and you have the true drive behind much Christian activity today

Here is the prayer Tozer offers:

Teach us, O God, that nothing is necessary to Thee. Were anything necessary to Thee that thing would be the measure of Thine imperfection; and how could we worship one who is imperfect? If nothing is necessary to Thee, then no one is necessary, and if no one, then not we. Thou dost seek us though Thou does not need us. We seek Thee because we need Thee, for in Thee we live and move and have our being. Amen.

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Reinterpreting Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17 in light of John 3:3,5

2010-09-07T09:05:00.000-05:00

[Note: I just completed a paper on John 3:5, particularly dealing with what "of water and spirit" means in that verse. In my research I ran across more than a few interesting things; some having to do with the topic and some that chased rabbits down holes. For the next few blog entries I will explore some of these issues.]

This entry will look at reinterpreting Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17 in light of John 3:3 and 3:5.

First, the verses in both English and Greek:

Matthew 18:3
“Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
Ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, ἐὰν μὴ στραφῆτε kαὶ γένησθε ὡς τὰ παιδία, οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθητε εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν.

Mark 10:15 and Luke 18:17 (they are exactly the same)
“Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it.”
ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν, ὃς ἂν μὴ δέξηται τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ ὡς παιδίον, οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθῃ εἰς αὐτήν.

John 3:3
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”
Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν, οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ.

John 3:5
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.”
Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἐξ ὕδατος kαὶ πνεύματος, οὐ δύναται εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ.

In doing research for a paper on John 3:5, I read an article by Barnabas Lindars (“John and the Synoptic Gospels: A Test Case” New Testament Studies 27 (1981), 287-294.) where he proposes that the above verses were from a single oral tradition of Jesus sayings. (This is not too hard to imagine.) After some investigating of all four, Lindars then reconstructs the verse as John the Evangelist may have received it: αμεν λεγω υμιν, εαν με τις γενηται ανωθεν ης παιδιον ου δυναται εισελθειν εισ την Βασιλειαν του θεου. (“Truly I say to you, if anyone is not born again/from above as a child he is not able to enter into the Kingdom of God”). [This is also with the understanding that John 3:3, 3:5 are parallels in that “born again/from above” in v.3 is equal to being born “of water and spirit” in v.5. Of course, v.5 speaks about entering the Kingdom of God and v.3 speaks only of seeing the Kingdom of God which is a whole other issue not to be discussed at this time.]

Usually we interpret Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17 in regards to humility or childlike faith and trust. In the context of Matthew 18:3, that interpretation could work as 18:4 follows 18:3 by speaking about humility. But notice when Jesus (in the Matthew text) speaks about humility like a child in 18:4 He is speaking about who is the greatest in heaven while in 18:3 (as in Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17 and John 3:5) Jesus is speaking about entering the Kingdom of God. These are two different things (who is the greatest vs. how one enters).

Therefore, in looking at all four verses we have the qualification to “enter the Kingdom of God” as “turn and become like a child,” “receive [it] like a child,” and “born again/from above;” “from water and spirit”. We can now understand where Lindars gets his reconstruction of oral tradition. Being born from above/from water and spirit is being as a child.

So how should we look at Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17 in light of this? Perhaps what Jesus is saying to his audience in the Synoptics is exactly what He is saying to Nicodemus in the Gospel of John. Lindars writes,

that 'become like children' does not mean 'become childlike' but to become comparable to children is to be in the same situation as children – that is, to be born again; both phrases representing radical renewal. … The metaphor of becoming a child certainly refers to spiritual regeneration, and the source of regeneration is to be found, not in man as he is by nature, but in God. (292)

Lindars writes that to Jesus, the manner in which this renewal is achieved is what is important. The renewal happens through sovereign spiritual cleansing (i.e. ‘water and Spirit’, John 3:5).

He continues that "John asserts that the true agent of this cleansing and this heavenly instruction is Jesus himself” and not the natural flesh or the Law. “[Jesus] cannot be the agent of the birth from God unless he himself comes from God.” Therefore, “the idea of derivation ‘from above’ is the fundamental concept, which is applicable to the spiritual renewal of the believer … and to Jesus as the effective agent of renewal both now and in the coming age.” (291)

As Leon Morris writes in his commentary on John (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995): “The main thrust of the words surely has to do with the divine remaking.” Furthermore,

“It is the perennial heresy of the human race to think that by our own efforts we can fit ourselves for the Kingdom of God.” – “These solemn words forever exclude the possibility of salvation by human merit. Our nature is so gripped by sin that an activity of the very Spirit of God is a necessity if we are to be associate with God’s Kingdom.” (194)

More on the sovereignty aspect in another post, but for now, I think we have good warrant to take a second look at the interpretations of Matthew 18:3 and Mark 10:15/Luke 18:17; and what it means to be “like a child.” Jesus uses the children for an analogy of regeneration. He is not saying they already are in the Kingdom, for "that which is born of the flesh is flesh" (John 3:6) and "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable" (1 Cor 15:50); but they are symbolic of being reborn, of being fresh, of being anew.

Perhaps being "like a child" then, is to be regenerated. It is to be born again. It is to be born from above in Christ by the power of God.

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Jesus Christ: Creation, Wisdom, and Dualism in the Prologue of John

2010-08-02T23:53:00.025-05:00

I recently completed a course on the Gospel According to John by Dr. Allen Black. We spent quite a bit of time on John 1:1-18 (otherwise known as the prologue of John). It is a magnificent piece of Truth; a poetic song of glory.

There are many themes one can look at and a combination of some that struck me I will write about very briefly here: Creation, Wisdom, and the use of dualism. Each of these separately beg books and articles to be written (and they have been), but what follows is to draw attention to some links between all three.

First, when you read the Gospel According to John you will notice quite a few dualisms. For example: life/death, light/darkness, belief/unbelief, etc. You will see these words (and other dualisms) used hundreds of times. Can’t miss them. Keep that in mind.

Next, when you read the prologue in John you immediately notice a creation motif in v.1-5:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

We see this in the creation accounts in Genesis:
“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness” (Genesis 1:1,3-5).

God, with a Word, created the heavens and the earth. And God spoke and light appeared, breaking into the darkness. In John we have the link of Jesus in creation in v.1-5 (as seen above). All things were made through Jesus, and without Jesus nothing was made. We also see this in v.9-10: “The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him.” And we have the Word of God, who we learn in John 1:14 is Jesus: “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

(As an added note, we also find the link of creation and word in Psalm 33:6, "By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and by the breath of his mouth all their host.")

So we see the creation motif and the beginnings of the dualism of light/darkness, life/death as well. But what of Wisdom?

Enter Proverbs 8 with all three of creation, wisdom, and dualism.

Specifically in Proverbs 8:22-36, speaking of Wisdom and creation, we see parallels with the prologue of John. I will not cite it entirely here, and I urge you to read it. Wisdom was at creation, “before the beginning of the earth” (v.23); “When he established the heavens, I was there” (v.27); “I was beside him, like a master workman, and I was daily his delight” (v.30). Wisdom speaks more and says, “And now, O sons, listen to me: blessed are those who keep my ways” (v.32).

Then Proverbs 8 ends with v.35-36, with a familiar dualism:

For whoever finds me finds life
and obtains favor from the Lord,
but he who fails to find me injures himself;
all who hate me love death.

Jesus is the Word. Jesus was at creation. Through Jesus creation happened. With a Word, God created. Wisdom was at creation. Through Wisdom creation happened. Jesus is Light. Light shined into darkness. Jesus is the light of men. In Jesus is life. Whoever finds Wisdom finds life. Whoever hates Wisdom loves death. Whoever hates Jesus by denying His grace and who He is, will perish.

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The Romans 3:21-26 Solution to the Proverbs 17:15 Problem

2010-07-28T20:47:00.005-05:00

The Romans 3:21-26 Solution to the Proverbs 17:15 Problem

Proverbs 17:15 reads, "He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous are both alike an abomination to the LORD."

This is not good news. I am a wicked person. You are a wicked person. We are all, “by nature objects of wrath, like the rest of mankind” (Eph 2:3). The wicked cannot be justified and the righteous cannot be condemned without doing something that is abominable to YHWH. This is not good news!

But wait. What about Jesus? As He was talking to the chief priests and the elders of his day (the most “righteous”) He said the following, “’Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you’” (Matt 21:31). Whoa, whoa, whoa. Justifying prostitutes? Condemning the elders? Proverbs 17:15 says this is an abomination!

And again Jesus said, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:17). This is outrageous! He calls the wicked into His presence and rejects the righteous!

And another time Jesus told a story about two men. One was a righteous Pharisee who did not practice extortion, was not unjust, or an adulterer. He even tithed! The other man was a despicable sinner. Probably one who, because of his profession, practiced extortion and injustice! Yet Jesus says the most contemptible thing! “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other” (Luke 18:14).

OK, I have had it! Clearly Jesus is talking abominations! To Him, the righteous are condemned and the wicked are justified. This is beyond excuse!

But wait.

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus (Rom 3:21-26).

Jesus does not overturn or ignore Proverbs 17:15. Instead, Jesus fulfills Proverbs 17:15. The wicked are not justified without condemnation. Jesus became the condemnation and curse (Gal 3:13) so that, as the text above says, those who were wicked could be justified through faith alone, by grace alone, in Christ alone. God was proved just and righteous, not by simply approving, accepting, and “passing over” wickedness; but by condemning it. “By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8:3).

Jesus was “smitten by God, and afflicted…wounded for our transgressions…crushed for our iniquities…upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.” Indeed, “the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” “It was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief.” In order that many wicked people would be accounted righteous, He bore their iniquities. Jesus “was numbered with the transgressors…and he bore the sin of many” (Isa 53:4-12).

Without the truth of Romans 3:21-26, God’s forgiveness would be found to be an abomination to Himself. Yet God, “to show his righteousness,” put Jesus “forward as a propitiation by his blood.”

“Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him” (John 3:36).

In love,
Jesus was punished.
Jesus was condemned.
Jesus was smitten by God.
Jesus was the wrath removing sacrifice for the wickedness that was upon Him.
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).

Therefore by faith,
Jesus is our death.
Jesus is our life.
Jesus is our righteousness.
Jesus is our justification.
Jesus is our resurrection.
Jesus is our joy.

Jesus is the grace of God, so that all who believe in Him alone may rest eternally. There is no other.

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Matt Chandler on the Gospel: Jesus Wants the Jacked-up Rose

2010-07-21T10:14:00.005-05:00

Here is a really good 4-minute illustration...

"For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Cor 5:21).

"but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom 5:8).

You can listen to or watch (as well as download) Matt's entire message "Shepherds and Unregenerate Sheep" here.

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Ever Wonder About Mark 13?

2010-07-18T23:43:00.011-05:00

The Gospel of Mark was most likely the first Gospel authored. It is a fast-paced witness to the life and death of the Messiah, and is rich with many unique aspects to discuss. This entry will address one of those: Mark 13.

When one reads Mark 13 it is hard not to ask some questions after reading about the stones of the temple, wars, earthquakes, the abomination that causes desolation, the coming of the Son of Man, the day and hour, etc. Is it talking about AD70 or the second coming of Christ? I am not one who gets caught up on end-times debates, but I also resist the temptation to ignore these texts completely. After all, it is the Word and it is the way God has chosen to reveal certain things.

There are four major interpretations below. (I will also include a theologian that champions each, with a link to the source where their interpretation is written). Here goes:

1) That Jesus conditionally prophesied that the destruction of Jerusalem would be followed by the second coming, both occurring within a generation of his prophecy (but the conditions were not met).
This model is promoted by Robert Gundry.

2) That all of v.5-31, including everything through the statement "this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened," refers to the destruction of Jerusalem (or before) and the discussion of the second coming does not begin until v.32.
This model is promoted by R.T. France.

3) That v.5-23 refer to the destruction of Jerusalem (or before), v.24-27 refer to the second coming, v.28-31 refer to the destruction of Jerusalem (or before), and v.32-37 refer to the second coming. This makes an A-B-A-B pattern to the chapter.
This model is promoted by William Lane.

4) That v.5-23 refer to the general characteristics of all of the last days (from Jesus’ resurrection to his second coming); that within this section v.14-19 refer specifically to the destruction of Jerusalem; that v.24-27 refer to the second coming, v.28-31 refer to the destruction of Jerusalem and to some occurrences of all the characteristic features of the last days (described in v.5-13 and 20-23), and v.32-37 refer to the second coming.
This view might be represented as follows:
a) v.5-13, 20-23 = Characteristic features of the last days (i.e., the period between Jesus' resurrection and his return).
b) v.14-19 = The destruction of Jerusalem, a major event within the last days
c) v.24-27 = The second coming.
d) v.28-31 = A time reference referring to v.5-23, the destruction of Jerusalem and some occurrences of each of the characteristic features that would occur repetitively throughout the last days.
e) v.32-37 = A time reference referring to v.24-27, the second coming.
This model is promoted by D.A. Carson.

My Conclusion: I lean toward William Lane's interpretation (#3). The biggest hangup for me are v.24-27, particularly v.26-27 which is so obviously referring to the second coming. This leads me to the conclusion that any interpretation that includes v.24-27 as referring to AD70 and the destruction of Jerusalem is incorrect (thus eliminating option #1 and #2). Carson’s could work, but I still tend to agree with the simpler #3 and the A-B-A-B pattern.

I hope this helps shed some light on Mark 13 (and the Gospel in general!).

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Which Do You Value More? Creation Redemption or Christ?

2010-07-06T21:39:00.007-05:00

Here is a good 3-minute head check for all of us who look forward to the completion of redemption:

We may seek the redemption of the new heavens, a new earth, and a perfectly restored existence. But is that our desire? Is that our end? Is that our goal? Or is Jesus?

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Does ‘draw’ in John 12:32 Interpret the ‘draw’ of John 6:44? Not if Context Matters.

2010-07-05T22:07:00.011-05:00

First, here are the verses (both said by Jesus):
“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:44, ESV).
“And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (John 12:32, ESV).

Those who hold to a non-deterministic view of salvation would point to 12:32 to prove that God draws all people. Then with that understanding they read 12:32 back to 6:44 and explain that sure, nobody can come to God unless He draws them, but God draws all people without individual specificity. Therefore, God has done the drawing and it is up to the free-will of man to decide or not decide (autonomously) to believe.

Unfortunately for those who hold to such an interpretation this view disregards the context of both verses. D.A. Carson explains the context very well in his commentary on the Gospel of John (Pillar).

[T]he scope and efficacy of the drawing in the two places [6:44 and 12:32] are quite different. [In 6:44] the focus is on those individuals whom the Father gives to the Son, whom the son infallibly preserves and raises up at the last day. [In 12:32] ‘all men’ reminds the reader of what triggered these statements, viz. the arrival of the Greeks [see 12:20ff for context of v.44], and means ‘all people without distinction, Jews and Gentiles alike’, not all individuals without exception. … This is the implicit answer to the Greeks: the hour has come for him to die and be exalted, and in the wake of that passion/glorification they will be able to approach him as freely as do the children of the old covenant (444).

In regards to 6:44’s context, recognize that the verse is the negative equivalent to v.37a (“All that the Father gives me will come to me”). Again, Carson:

The combination of v.37a and v.44 prove that this ‘drawing’ activity of the Father cannot be reduced to what theologians sometimes call ‘prevenient grace’ dispensed to every individual, for this ‘drawing’ is selective, or else the negative note in v.44 is meaningless (293).

Simply put, contextually, one cannot use ‘draw’ in 12:32 to interpret 6:44. The latter being individually deterministic, the former being broader distinction of people groups.

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No Ambiguity in John: Jesus is YHWH

2010-07-02T00:36:00.013-05:00

This is an excerpt from Marianne Meye Thompsons’s “The God of the Gospel of John” that I am reading for my upcoming ‘Gospel of John’ course in July. After a pretty intense analysis of all the ways God is referred to in the Old and New Testaments she writes,

Thus it behooves the reader not only to pay close attention to the narrative of the Gospel, but also to be reminded how much of the understanding of ‘deity’ implied the exercise of certain prerogatives and entailed certain activities appropriate to God. These activities include particularly God’s creation and sovereign rule of the world. Hence, even when the word ‘god’ is used with reference to some figure other than the one Most High God, it is typically because of the power and authority delegated to that individual. The argument of the Fourth Gospel is that the distinctive divine prerogatives of creation and sovereignty have been delegated to and are being exercised by Jesus, that the conferring of these prerogatives upon Jesus rests on the relationship of the Father and the Son, and that therefore the Son may be known as ‘God.’ John makes his argument for the identity of Jesus, and simultaneously for the identity of God, by attributing to Jesus alone powers that are not routinely granted to any other agent or mediator figure. By concentrating these functions uniquely to Jesus, John thus denies the exercise of these prerogatives to other mediator figures. By making Jesus not only the one who exercises these prerogatives, such as the power to give life and to judge, but who also has them ‘in himself’ (5:25-26), John places Jesus in a different category from all other figures who might be thought worthy or capable of exercising similar prerogatives. Consequently, John also maintains the imperative of honoring the Son even as one honors the Father (5:23).

That section stood out to me as very compelling. And it is interesting to see how the certain specific prerogatives regarded as only belong to YHWH throughout the Old Testament are also delegated to Jesus throughout the rest of the testimony of Scripture (example: Col 1:15-17).

As Thompson also makes clear, Jesus as YHWH is an echo throughout the Gospel of John. It is a consistent drumbeat the reader cannot escape or deny. And as you read the text, it becomes very clear then why Jesus' enemies wanted to kill Him, as it even tells the very reason two different times:

"This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God" (John 5:18).

"The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them, 'I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?' The Jews answered him, 'It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God'" (John 10:32-33).

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Few Reflections from Day 1 of Providence and Suffering

2010-06-07T23:05:00.003-05:00

I am currently in a summer intensive course called “Providence and Suffering” taught by John Mark Hicks. As you can imagine with 8 hours of class per day there is a lot that we go over and discuss and it would be very hard for me to be comprehensive so I'm not going to even try. Due to this, I’m just going to touch on a thought here and there. Admittedly much of what follows is not necessarily written well; more like thoughts pieced together. Day one was very rewarding and I have just a few reflections.

First reflection: Reosseau, Hegel, Marx, and the social gospel of classic liberalism.
1) Reosseau believed that we create evil so we can also reverse the problem. He was a deist (there is a God but He is inactive) who believed that a good educational psychology could handle the reversal of evils. Like many theodicies, Reosseau’s defends God by pushing Him out of the world. God becomes disengaged and it is up to man to fix evils.

2) Hegel believed that the world is becoming more and more what it “ought” to be. The “is” and the “ought” are coming closer together and time passes and therefore we should accept the world as it is and understand it is in this process.

3) Marx believed that to lead to the Hegelian world (where “is” and “ought” are together) we must overthrow leaders through revolution. We need to transform the world as opposed to endure the world. There is no transcendence, only immanence. God is something the powers that be gave the people so that the people would endure suffering as opposed to transform it. Human autonomy will achieve the “is” and “ought” combination.

Needless to say, these three share a very optimistic view of man; that man could transform on its own; that man could find a way to bring the “is” and “ought” together. What brings these three men into agreement with the social gospel of classic liberalism is the Hegelian ritualism construct; that the immanent is superior to the transcendent. Therefore in Christian terms, the “already but not yet” reality of the Kingdom of God is a direct parallel with the “is” and “ought” of philosophy.

We see this in these days with those who downplay the transcendent and mainly focus on the immanent; that it is us that will usher in the Kingdom of God by fighting for the oppressed, feeding the poor, and other social gospel pursuits. The downside to this is that it downplays sin and the parousia. It places the immanent as the ultimate end and that we (man) are the key to the Kingdom come. Why this is a detriment to the message of the Gospel is that it lies to people. It tells them that man has the capacity, on its own, to usher in the Kingdom of God. This is a lie because it presumes a goodness of man that man does not possess without Jesus; without God changing the heart (as if freeing from physical oppression had anything to do with the Gospel anyway). Why this is important is that if we free the oppressed and flip the ruling authority, the oppressed will simply become the oppressors because there was no change of heart, only position. This is a fact of fallen humanity and a dubious endeavor. It is a mission filled with pride, not faith.

Second reflection: How much Kant got right.
Kant understood the middle of the extremes of Leibniz (virtue equals happiness)/de Sade(virtue does not equal happiness). This is in no way a comprehensive view of either. But what I really wanted to touch on here is his dead on view of the transcendent and the immanent. The transcendent is the noumena, the immanent is what we exist in (things as they appear to us). We as people are not privy to the divine perception, which sees things as they really are (God). The human perception (how we see things) is fallible. Kant wants us to have a limit of knowledge and make room for faith. The wish to find out the transcendent is overstepping our bounds. We do not know what is hidden enough; we do not see it enough.

Faith tends towards Leibniz, experience toward de Sade. There is always a gap between the “ought” and the “is” and that is OK and a good thing because if they went together, virtue would lose its moral gravitas (it would pay to be good if virtue always equaled happiness) which would also make virtue a selfish act tied to reward. However, virtue must be an end not a means. Without the problem of evil virtue is impossible. Authentic faith is a faith that lives in the midst of chaos.

Other thoughts from the day:
-We experience wonder in the moments when we see the world as it “ought” to be – an experience so deep that the “ought” melts away. The disappearance of the “ought” in such moments leads some thinkers to describe them as the experience of Being free from human demands and categories. (We would say, that is God experience, the experience of goodness). In the phenomena we have these experiences that yearn for the transcendent. Gives us hope for it.

-Tapping in to that healthiness of yearning is where we tap in to others. It is healthy to be uncertain, ignorant, not-knowing, not have it all figured out; and there is value to that; and that value accentuates faith. More about trust that resolution. The standpoint of theodicy must be humility and trust. Rationalism moves God out of the world.

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Does Jesus Affirm the Teaching of Selective Love? A Case Study.

2010-06-02T00:22:00.021-05:00

When talking theology, some people have said to me that some of my views concerning God cannot be seen in Jesus (who is God). This same objection perhaps happens with this week’s topic of God’s “two loves;” that is, God’s overarching love for creation and all created beings, and then God’s special love for His own, chosen, elect people. In this case, I propose that Jesus has special love for His sheep that is not like His general love for the world.

Let me set this up before going to a specific case study. In John 17 Jesus is praying and in verse 9 He says the following, “I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.” This is a special prayer that Jesus is praying for His own, His sheep, those whom the Father gave Him out of the world. Jesus is not praying this prayer for the world; that is, all others who are not His sheep. This is a very important point in understanding the complete picture of the love of God the Scriptures give us.

Case Study: Peter and Judas

-Peter-
“’Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers’” (Luke 22:31-32)

In the face of the man who will deny Him, Jesus tells Peter that He will allow Satan to have him for a time and purpose, but that He (Jesus) will pray for him (Peter) that his faith will not completely fall. Then Jesus points to the success of that prayer. “When you have turned again…” The prayer of Jesus is powerful and it is perfect; never failing.

This is a special love Jesus has for His sheep. It is this same intercessory love that all believers have in heaven today. Jesus is praying for His sheep and they will not ultimately fall. Ever. Jesus does not fail and His Words are mighty. Oh what a gift of grace the special, electing love of God is!

-Judas-

And as they were eating, he said, ‘Truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me.’ And they were very sorrowful and began to say to him one after another, ‘Is it I, Lord?’ He answered, ‘He who has dipped his hand in the dish with me will betray me. The Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.’ Judas, who would betray him, answered, ‘Is it I, Rabbi?’ He said to him, ‘You have said so’ (Matthew 26:21-25).

Here is a clear passage where Jesus knows full well that Judas will betray Him. This is not that different from Peter’s example. But does Jesus pray for Judas? He does not. Instead we have the following:

While he was still speaking, Judas came, one of the twelve, and with him a great crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests and the elders of the people. Now the betrayer had given them a sign, saying, ‘The one I will kiss is the man; seize him.’ And he came up to Jesus at once and said, ‘Greetings, Rabbi!’ And he kissed him. Jesus said to him, ‘Friend, do what you came to do.’ Then they came up and laid hands on Jesus and seized him (Matthew 26:47-50).

Instead of a prayer for Judas, Jesus says in a way, “stop playing games, Judas, just do it.”

Conclusion:
Remember in Peter’s example Jesus told Peter of His coming betrayal, allowed Satan to sift, yet prayed for Him to return. Peter returned. With Judas, Jesus made known His knowledge of the coming betrayal of Judas, allowed it to take place, but did not pray for Judas to return.

Why? Judas was not one of Jesus’ sheep. Jesus did not have that special love for Judas like He had for Peter. All Jesus had to do was pray for Judas, and He would be in heaven with Him today. But he is not. He killed himself in shame. This is the power and authority of Jesus in his particular and intercessory love for His sheep.

It is a particular and special love and if you believe and trust and abide in Him today, know that you are greatly loved; that Jesus is praying for you; and you will not fall. Ever.

"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:27-28).

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Free Will Theism’s Not So Complete Picture of God’s Love

2010-05-30T22:15:00.026-05:00

[This post contains excerpts from Perspectives on the Doctrine of God: 4 Views where Paul Helm (Classical Calvinism), Bruce Ware (Modified Calvinism), Roger Olson (Classical Arminianism), and John Sanders (Open Theism) debate various issues connected to the Doctrine of God. This post deals with Bruce Ware's response to Roger Olson's chapter where Olson promotes and defends free will theism.]

Before I get to the main reason for this post I want to echo Ware’s statement concerning the Arminian view of God and free will of man. He accurately states that the Arminian view of God and free will of man is more palatable to latent intuition and the North American value system. Therefore, it is not hard for most in the west to agree with free will theism, regardless of the complete testimony of the Scriptures. But what the doctrine of sola Scriptura must uphold (and Classical Arminians supposedly do claim sola Scriptura) is that all parts and teachings of the Bible must be included when discussing an issue or doctrine regardless of whether or not they side with with cultural sensibilities and beliefs.

And this leads to the following concerning God’s love. Can God love some more than others? Olson, in defending the Arminian view, says that one important factor in defending God’s character is promoting the fact that God loves all people equally (and therefore, does not choose particular people but allows free creatures to decide). Olson writes that free will theism arises,

not so much from a desire to elevate free will as from a desire to do justice to God’s character as loving kindness-not only toward a portion of humanity (or even creation) but toward all (John 3:16-17). Libertarian free will is not an idol erected to exalt humanity; it is rather a necessary protection of God’s goodness. (154)

Olson proposes that if God chooses who would and would not be saved then He would not be good. God desires all people to be saved and thus loves all people equally.

But is this how the Bible describes the love of God? Is the love of God placed in such a box of “equality”? Ware responds:

Yes, there truly and biblically is a sense in which God loves all people in the entire world equally, and Olson is correct, in my judgment, to cite John 3:16 in support of this notion. But a far richer and more prevalent conception of God’s love throughout Scripture is his particular and selective love for his own people, his elect (see Eph 1:4-5; 5:25-27 [and I would add 2:4-5]). Though this category of particular and selective love is stronger in Scripture than its presentation of God’s universal and impartial love, defenses of free will theism usually fail to acknowledge and incorporate this teaching in their presentations. (193)

Ware then provides biblical evidence of this particular and special love that God has for His own people. First, after citing Isaiah 43:3-4 which reads, “For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior. I give Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in exchange for you. Because you are precious in my eyes, and honored, and I love you, I give men in return for you, peoples in exchange for your life,” Ware writes,

In what is clearly a reference to the exodus from Egypt, God draws the lesson from this event that it was his particular love for Israel that led him to deliver them by means of bringing death to the Egyptians. And when one considers afresh just how the exodus from Egypt took place, it is clear that this account from Isaiah gets it exactly right. After all, was it necessary for God to bring death to the firstborn in every Egyptian household in order to deliver his people? Of course not, yet it is clear from back in Exodus 4:21-23 that God intended from the outset to deliver Israel only through and not apart from the death of the firstborn in Egypt. No doubt a major part of the reason for this was to demonstrate his grace on Israel. Although the Israelites were as guilty as the Egyptians before God (see Ezek 20:4-10), yet God favored these guilty Israelites, his own people, by providing a means by which the angel of death would ‘pass over’ their homes through the shed blood of the lambs, thus sparing what otherwise would be the shed blood of their own firstborn children and livestock. So, although Israel deserved the same death brought to the homes in Egypt, God loved Israel and so spared them, while he executed his just wrath against Egypt. Could equal judgment have been given to both, or equal mercy be shown to both? Yes, but what God wanted Israel to learn was his special love for them. As Isaiah 43 puts it, because Israel was precious in God’s sight and because he loved them, he gave other people in their place and exchange for their lives.(194)

Ware ends with this:

While this may be difficult for our cultural sensibilities, and while it conflicts directly with the free will conceptions of who God must be and how God must act, the teaching of the Bible here is not unclear. A model of God that does not account both for his general and universal love for all along with his stronger and deeper particular and selective love for his chosen people simply is not dealing rightly with Scripture. (194)

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The heavens declare the glory of God...

2010-05-24T23:24:00.002-05:00

... and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. - Psalm 19:1

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The Problem with Free Will in the Problem of Evil

2010-05-18T23:31:00.032-05:00

This summer I am taking a graduate course taught by John Mark Hicks called “Providence and Suffering.” One of the books we are to read before June 7 is Susan Neiman’s “Evil in Modern Thought: An Alternative History of Philosophy.” It is about 330 pages and it traces the philosophical approach to evil from Leibnez and Pope, to Rousseau, to Kant, to Hegel and Marx, to Bayle, Voltaire, Hume, Sade, Nietzsche, Freud, and on to Camus, Arendt, and Rawls. This is a book I would never pick up off a shelf; but I read it all and learned quite a bit. It was highly interesting and engaging. I must say that Neiman did a good job of keeping a reader who usually wouldn’t read about philosophy engaged to the end.

One section (p116-128) is on Pierre Bayle’s Dictionary, (which Neiman calls the “most read book of the 18th century and the arsenal of the Enlightenment”) (119) where Bayle writes that there are three truths. 1) Evil exists; 2) God is benevolent; 3) God is omnipotent. In the words of Neiman, Bayle thought, “maul and move them as you will, they cannot be held in union. One of them has to go” (119). Because he could not get rid of any of them (since the first is very apparent and the latter two cannot be done away with without heresy), he rejected reason and adopted the gnostic, syncretic, dualistic religion of Manichaeism as the most reasonable explanation.

While I too reject reason (in favor of faith) particularly in regards to the hidden ways of God, I do not agree with Bayle’s adopted conclusion to the problem (Manichaeism). However, I think his response to the argument of free will that follows is very good and lends itself to the theological discussions we have in these days. Many place an exorbitant amount of idolized value on the fallacious notion of autonomous free will in order to preserve, as far as I can tell, some sort of control, or more frequently, a view of how God should be. Only a loving God, I hear and read often, would allow His creatures to exercise themselves freely outside of His own influence. “We’re not automatons!” is a common fruitless and imperceptive retort. In regards to the topic at hand, the “free will defense” also supposedly saves God from the problem of evil.

But does it?

Hardly. In fact, it causes even more problems.

The problem is set up with this thought on free will and evil:

God doesn’t will moral evil, but He has to permit it, for it’s a necessary condition of the greatest gift He ever gave us. God gave us respect, and the chance to become worthy of it. In giving us free will, He gave us something ennobling. We are not beasts or machines but beings made in His image. To be real freedom, it must be freedom to err. And we did. (121)

This is a retort, so says Bayle (through Neiman), that “seeks to evade retorts of any common sense” (121).

Those who say that God permitted sin because he could not have prevented it without destroying the free will that he had given to man, and which was the best present he made to them, expose themselves greatly. The reason they give is lovely. It has a je ne sais quoi, an indefinable something, that is dazzling. It has grandeur. But in the end it can be opposed by arguments more easily opposed by all men, and based more on common sense and ideas of order (from Bayle, Dictionary) (121, emphasis original).

Neiman adds the following:

The free will defense works with both flattery and pathos. It plays with our desire to appear in God’s image, along with our need to find meaning in the world. But if it was meant to preserve the belief in God’s goodness, Bayle thought the free will defense begs every question. Once common sense steps back from its own vanity, its response is quite simple. Next to gifts like these, the Trojan horse looks benign (121-122).

And here is Bayle’s classic analogy:

There is no good mother who, having given her daughters permission to go to a dance, would not revoke that permission if she were assured that they would succumb to temptations and lost their virginity there. And any mother who, knowing for sure that this would come to pass, allowed them to go to the dance … would at the very least, bring upon herself the just charge that she loved neither her daughters nor chastity (from Bayle, Dictionary) (122).

A little clarification is due here. While I maintain a theology that the Sovereign God according to His own counsel and will would and does indeed direct such things to happen, I also maintain that it is because God has a good plan in it that serves His good and hidden will. However, those who are proponents of autonomous free will would maintain the above story but would say it is because of the God-given "respect" of free will that God allows it to happen. Therefore they value free will above any good foreordained or mysterious plan of God and thus bring the charge that God neither loves the person nor the virtue. This is the price that is paid for such a theology based on reason and autonomous free will.

And therefore, as one who would uphold the belief that that the Sovereign God according to His own counsel and will would and does indeed direct such things to happen for foreordained and mysterious good purposes, I say to those who promote the theology where free will reigns supreme, “You think my God is cruel? Take a good look at yours.” He sacrifices his own goodness and love on the altar of the Trojan horse of the true sovereign: autonomous free will.

And there we have the problem with free will in the problem of evil. One must sacrifice the second truth (God is benevolent) in order to uphold reason and man-centered theology.

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A Small Children's Catechism for the Sheets Home

2010-05-12T19:41:00.012-05:00

I found this somewhere and I don't quite remember where. If you Google it you will find plenty of websites with it and I can't figure out the original source. Anyway, it is what is being used in our house for our almost-4-year-old-son and 2 year old daughter. It is such a joy watching and listening to both of them answering these questions and expanding on them. They will even approach us and ask us to ask them the questions. These are good and basic facts that we expand on (teachable moments) so that it is more than just repeating information; but helping them understand why and how these things are true. [Note: We may tweak a few of the questions, like in #20 add, "and separation from God," and in #32 add, "and punishment").]

Small Children's Catechism

1. Who made you? God
2. What else did God make? God made all things.
3. Why did God make all things? For His own glory.
4. Why do things work as they do? God has so decreed it.
5. How do we learn about God? God reveals Himself.
6. Where does God reveal Himself? In His word and in nature.
7. What does God reveal in nature? His character, law, and wrath.
8. What more is revealed in His Word? God's mercy toward His people.
9. Where is God's Word today? The Bible is God's Word.
10. How many Gods are there? There is one true God.
11. How many persons are in the Godhead? Three.
12. Who are these persons? Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
13. Where is God? He is everywhere.
14. How long has God existed? He has always been.
15. How is man unique? He bears God's image.
16. Who was the first man? Adam.
17. What was Adam like at creation? He was good.
18. Did Adam remain good? No, he sinned.
19. What is sin? Disobedience to God's law.
20. What is the penalty for sin? Death. [and separation from God]
21. What came of Adam's sin? Death came to all men.
22. Why did Adam's sin affect all men? We all sinned in Adam.
23. Must all men die for sin? No, God elected some to life.
24. How may we be saved from sin and death? Only through Jesus Christ.
25. Who is Jesus Christ? He is God's Son.
26. Did Jesus ever sin? No, only He is righteous.
27. What did Jesus do for His people? He conquered death.
28. How did He do this? He died, then rose again.
29. What else did Christ conquer? All his enemies.
30. Are His enemies powerful? They have come to nothing.
31. What did He give to His people? His own righteousness.
32. What did He take from His people? Their sin. [and punishment]
33. How is Christ's work brought to His people? By the Holy Spirit.
34. What does the Holy Spirit do? He gives faith.
35. What is faith? Resting on Christ for salvation.
36. How do we recognize true faith? It yields good works.
37. Who are Christ's people? They make up His church.
38. What are the traits of His church? The Word, discipline, and sacraments.
39. How is the Word a trait of His church? All God's Word is preached.
40. How is discipline a trait of His church? God's people are protected.
41. What are sacraments? Signs and seals of God's covenant.
42. What sacraments are there? Baptism and the Lord's supper.
43. Who is Head of the Church? Jesus Christ.
44. What offices has Christ appointed? Overseers and deacons.
45. Is His Church perfect? It is being perfected.
46. When will it be perfect? At the resurrection.
47. What happens at the resurrection? Christ judges all men's deeds.
48. What of those He deems righteous? They dwell with Him forever.
49. What of those He condemns? They perish forever.
50. How does this judgment affect Christ? It magnifies His glory.

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Consider the Calling of God's Great Love (w/short video)

2010-05-11T19:34:00.010-05:00

"For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, 'Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.'" (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—" (Ephesians 2:4-5)

Courtesy: Desiring God

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[Official Review] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor by W. Robert Godfrey

2010-05-09T20:48:00.014-05:00

[Note: Links to each of the 13-parts of the inaugural Blogging Through a Book series follows this review]

W. Robert Godfrey. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2009. 207 pp. $15.99

Last year, 2009, was the five hundredth anniversary of the birth of John Calvin. While many have labeled themselves as “Calvinists” and the recent upsurge of the “Young, Restless, Reformed” movement carry the same banner, few have pursued study of Calvin beyond His theology. W. Robert Godfrey’s John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor is a welcome addition to the flurry of publications that hit the presses in 2009 due to the unique approach that seeks to integrate Calvin’s life and thought when so many works tend to separate the two. The book seeks to educate readers on the person John Calvin, “whose personality was positive and not negative and grim;” the latter of which is often a focus in the negative stereotypes.

Godfrey, president of Westminster Seminary California; professor of Church History; and minister in the United Reformed Churches, writes that Calvin “was above all else a pastor who had a passion for the gospel of Christ” (9). The book therefore, “aims at communicating Calvin’s passion and faith through extensive quotations from his works so that the force and eloquence of his language can be experienced by the reader” (9).

Pilgrim and Pastor has eleven chapters divided into two sections aptly named “Pilgrim” and “Pastor”. The first four chapters fall under the “Pilgrim” section and take up about a quarter of the book’s pages. They deal with the first twenty-eight years of Calvin’s life starting from his birth, continuing through his upbringing and education, and into his first ministry in Geneva, which includes two political/religious exiles. But before the early years of Calvin are given a word, Godfrey sets the table in chapter 1 by jumping ahead to July 10, 1539 when Calvin was thirty years old with only twenty-five more years to live. That year he completed his first commentary (Romans) and published his first major revision of his Institutes. But what gives this year prominence is his treatise "Reply to Sadoleto," which scholars depict as "one of the most powerful defenses of the Reformation” (14). To Godfrey, Calvin’s ‘Reply’ “is the most important as an introduction into the life and thought of Calvin” (14). In the ‘Reply’ Calvin defends the Reformation against a bishop/cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, Jacopo Sadoleto, who tried to turn Geneva against the Reformers and back to the Rome. Calvin's 'Reply' is bedrock if one is to understand Calvin as pilgrim and pastor in the midst of the century in which he lived. It shows Calvin's commitment to the glory of God, justification in Christ alone, the Scriptures, and the role of the Holy Spirit. These are themes echoed throughout his entire life.

In chapters 2-4 (23-56), Godfrey jumps back in time and gives the reader a glimpse into the personal life of Calvin that many people are unaware of. Godfrey brings to light Calvin’s familial, educational, theological, and other personal relationships. He also points out Calvin’s moods, sins, strengths and weaknesses that those who study Calvin’s theology would usually never consider. And just as it is with all people, Calvin’s upbringing and the circumstances of life he lived through helped form him into the pastor and theologian he became. This section of the book made me thirsty for more of the earlier personal experiences of Calvin. However, Godfrey notes that Calvin had much “reticence to speak or write much about his personal life” (24), and what we can reconstruct directly from Calvin must come from his other writings. For Godfrey, the “Reply to Sadoleto” reveals “a remarkable personal quality that reveals a great deal about him” (14). Later, Godfrey finds clues to Calvin’s conversion story from Roman Catholicism to the Reformation movement from a section out of Calvin’s Commentary on the Psalms. It is this type of attention from Godfrey that makes Pilgrim and Pastor such a unique volume for both scholar and layman. He closes the first section with the following reflection: “Calvin's first exile - from France to Geneva - came to an end with another exile - this time from Geneva. He was twenty-eight years old and apparently a pastoral failure. After less than twenty-one months he was rejected as a pastor” (42).

The second section, “Pastor,” begins with Calvin’s return to Geneva. Once there, Godfrey unpacks several of the primary areas where Calvin focused and made the most impact. The inner-church struggles and the constant battle against Roman Catholic dogma are interwoven throughout this section. With chapters dedicated to Calvin’s development and implementation of the proper practice of worship (69-86); the priority of and debate over the sacraments (87-112); particular doctrines (113-128); and the life of Christians in the city (129-138), Godfrey explores the key areas in what ended up being a successful, though costly and turbulent, Reformation in Geneva and other parts of Europe. A particularly compelling chapter on the doctrine of predestination was both enlightening and unapologetic. Godfrey rightly begins that chapter with, “Today if anything is remembered about John Calvin, it is that he taught the doctrine of predestination” (113). Godfrey then strategically quotes Calvin while adding commentary on both sides of the issue to explain the debate (that has yet to cease!). To the same issue, later in chapter 10 (the longest and most personal chapter in the book, “Calvin as Pastoral Counselor”), Godfrey helps to clarify that while the doctrine of predestination is the main doctrine people think of when they think of Calvin, in reality, Calvin’s single chapter on prayer in the Institutes has more words dedicated to prayer than predestination does in the entire work; "a fact that should surely cause some to reconsider easy stereotypes of Calvin's religion” (146). Also in chapter 10, Godfrey writes that Calvin wrote over 1200 letters during his ministry. He was burdened by the duty to write letters but did so anyway. Godfrey describes at length examples of Calvin's letters to: 1) The sick and grieving (147-148); 2) Those with theological questions (148-151); 3) The persecuted (151-157); 4) The five prisoners of Lyons (157-161); 5) The troubled churches (161-166). This section of the book with lengthy excerpts from actual letters written by Calvin gets the reader into the heart of the often-misunderstood pastor.

There is much more that could be written but in closing, Godfrey’s Pilgrim and Pastor does well in exploring Calvin’s life through clear and substantive chapters showing the development and exercising of his gifts as a theological genius, natural leader, and controversy maker. While one wouldn’t necessarily classify controversy-making as a gift, what is clear is that for Calvin it stemmed through his convictions in and loyalty to God, the Word, the Church, and the Gospel; as opposed to controversy stemming from ill manner or carnally reckless behavior. Godfrey’s descriptions of the occurrences that led to Calvin’s first leadership roles to his first two exiles make one want to turn the pages for more; and the second section is extremely valuable in understanding the pain, dedication, and success that accompanies a life-long ministry. A big plus in this book is how Godfrey continuously reflects on how Calvin’s theology and the occurrences in his life felt to and were reflected through Calvin on the personal level. For these and other reasons, Godfrey’s Pilgrim and Pastor is a must-read for theologians and laymen. Speaking as one who was not raised in the Reformed tradition (Stone-Campbell/Restoration Movement) this book helps to better understand the man behind all the controversy. In addition, it helps one see through the misinformation and ridicule (while not hiding the warts) that burdens the name, life, theology, and legacy of the pilgrim and pastor who helped change Christianity and the world forever: John Calvin.
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Additional notes on the author:
Dr. W. Robert Godfrey, author of John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor, is President of Westminster Seminary California, a professor of Church History, and a minister in the United Reformed Churches. He has spoken at many conferences including those sponsored by the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization, the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology, and Ligonier Ministries. He has written articles for Archive for Reformation History, Sixteenth-Century Journal, and Westminster Theological Journal; and has authored four other books including An Unexpected Journey: Discovering Reformed Christianity (P&R, 2004), God’s Pattern for Creation: A Covenantal Reading of Genesis 1 (P&R, 2003), Reformation Sketches: Insights into Luther, Calvin, and the Confessions (P&R, 2003), and Pleasing God In Our Worship (Crossway, 1999).
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Here are links to each of the 13-part inaugural Blogging Through a Book series:
Introduction : The Importance of Calvin
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion: The Unmarked Grave
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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Conclusion

2010-05-06T09:47:00.011-05:00

Here is entry number thirteen (the final entry) in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction : The Importance of Calvin
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion: The Unmarked Grave

Conclusion: The Unmarked Grave (193-199)
Godfrey brings Pilgrim and Pastor to a close, beginning with an explanation of Calvin's health. In summary, it was poor. The intensity of his life burdened itself upon his body as he suffered from malaria-like fevers, tuberculosis, ulcerated veins, kidney stones, and hemorrhoids. Much of this suffering was reflected in his letters and even his commentaries. (In his life he published a commentary for all the New Testament books except 2-3 John and Revelation; and his Old Testament literature was just as extensive.) He was always under pressure to write and preach. All this work and the intense life we have seen in the previous chapters led to his death at the age of 54. In his last years he suffered from gout and arthritis; and while his friends and fellow ministers urged him to stop working he replied, "What! Would you have the Lord find me idle?" Calvin even dictated his final commentary (on Joshua) from his deathbed. (193-195)

Godfrey quotes from the Institutes Calvin's thoughts on the struggles of being a Christian:

The pious heart, therefore, perceives a division in itself, being partly affected with delight, through a knowledge of God's goodness, partly distressed with sorrow, through a sense of its own calamity; partly relying on the promise of the gospel; partly trembling at the evidence of its own iniquity; partly exulting at the expectation of life; partly alarmed by the fear of death ... For the invariable issue of this contest is that faith at length overcomes those difficulties, from which, while it is encompassed with them, it appears to be in danger. (195; from Institutes, III, 2, 18, altered)

Godfrey quotes Calvin's last testament at length. It is intensely Gospel-focused and worth a read. [O to die in this way!] Calvin was also able to write to and receive a visit from Farel (now 75), who as we read in ch.3, convinced an exiled Calvin to minister first in Geneva 26-years earlier. Calvin's health went quickly, and on May 27 at 8pm in 1564 he drew his last breath. The city lamented his death; for to them he was a comforting pastor. He was buried in an unmarked grave at his own request. (195-199)

... we may patiently pass through this life in afflictions, hunger, cold, contempt, reproaches, and other disagreeable circumstances, contented with this single assurance, that our King will never desert us, but will give what we need, until having finished our warfare, we shall be called to the triumph. (199; from Institutes, II, 15, 4, altered)

Coming Monday: An Official Review of John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor
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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.11 Calvin and the Institutes

2010-05-05T09:57:00.014-05:00

Here is entry number twelve in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 11: Calvin and the Institutes (167-192)
In this final chapter of Pilgrim and Pastor, Godfrey takes a look at two features of Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion: 1) The knowledge of God derived from the Scriptures; 2) The work of Christ to redeem his people. The final edition was published in 1559, 23 years after the first edition when Calvin was just 26 years old. His goal was the education of the student of the Bible and after a significant expansion and proper ordering of its contents, Calvin thought he had accomplished the best that he could. Here Godfrey very helpfully breaks down the Institutes by percentages, topics, and chapters. (167-169)

[What follows are brief summaries of the two features Godfrey focuses on. There is much more in this chapter than my summary will entail, including lengthy quotations from the Institutes.]

1) The knowledge of God derived from the Scriptures.
Though they both valued the Scriptures, Calvin (and the other reformers) differed from the medieval church. The latter did not believe the Scriptures could be understood apart from the church authorities (that is, popes, bishops, councils, etc.) and while they took great care in copying the Bible by hand, they rarely opened it to the people. The leader of the Reformation, Martin Luther, believed the Bible was the ultimate authority (not the church's teachings) and that the Scriptures were perspicuous, that is, the saving truths within could be understood by anybody. (169-170)

Calvin agreed and so began his Institutes with the famous line, "True and substantial wisdom principally consists of two parts, the knowledge of God and the knowledge of ourselves." These two "knowings" could be understood by all people from the Scriptures. Knowing God was necessary for happiness and upright living; and all men no matter how barbarous could know God, for the sense of His divine nature is in them and in nature. However, because of sin man left to itself will never understand God; thus it takes God revealing Himself for true knowledge to be had. Otherwise, any claims knowledge are deceitful inventions. Therefore, the Word of God is required for true knowledge. The Scriptures came from God and the words in them are true. The Spirit then impresses on the people this knowledge. The Bible, therefore, over all other instruction, must be the authority for the church and the people for the knowledge of God. The Word linked many aspects of the believer like faith, hope, assurance, the work of the Spirit, and eternal life. The medieval traditions distracted and burdened this chain. The Bible was the authority, not man. The Roman Church's claim that God had ordained there to be authoritative interpreters (i.e. Pope, bishops, etc.) was not found in Scripture. That, and Calvin considered it an insult to presume God needed interpreters. All saving knowledge about God can be understood by anybody from the Bible. Where the Bible is difficult to understand, differences in interpretation must take the path of further study and not submission to a pope or bishop. Calvin's reliance upon the Holy Spirit is important to this entire discussion. The Holy Spirit will guide believers to the knowledge of God through the Scriptures. Only the Spirit can illuminate blind people (which all men are by nature) to the Scriptures and the preached word. The mind of man can see the authority of the Bible rationally, but the foundation of believing it as Truth is the unique work of the Spirit. Calvin dismissed any claim of external authority of the claims of an infallible church or revelation from an individual. (170-182)

In all his work Calvin urges Christians to grow in grace by growing in their knowledge of the Bible: 'So far, then, as each of us shall desire to make progress in the knowledge of Christ, it will be necessary that Scripture shall be the subject of our diligent and constant meditation.' (187)

2) The work of Christ to redeem his people. "The Scriptures make God known, especially God in Christ as the redeemer of sinners." The essential point for knowledge is Christ as center to the Scriptures and to what we proclaim. Only in Christ can anybody know the Father; and it is the same now as it was in the Old Testament, when the fathers set their eyes on Him. Knowledge and salvation is only in Christ. Christ is: the great and final Prophet who teaches and fulfills the perfect and final doctrine of God unto salvation; the true King (now and eternal) who rules over His people, protects His people, and supplies the Holy Spirit, and; the true Priest who paid for the sins of His people perfectly and makes them acceptable to God. Calvin also predates later Reformed theology in his statements on the perfect and active obedience of Christ as a critical part of justification (imputed righteousness). (187-191)

Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion is undoubtedly a great work of theology and a demonstration that Calvin is one of the great theologians in the history of the church. But even more the Institutes demonstrate that Calvin is always the pastor stressing the essential elements of true religion. The knowledge of God and the work of Christ are foundational to all that he preached and taught. (192)

Tomorrow: Conclusion, The Unmarked Grave

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.10 Calvin as Pastoral Counselor

2010-05-04T09:12:00.019-05:00

Here is entry number eleven in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 10: Calvin as Pastoral Counselor (139-166)
Calvin was a counselor in his theology, writings, and sermons. What was especially important to him was his belief in the Providential care of God to His people. This combined with predestination early in the Institutes, but was later separated so that predestination would be better related to the matters of salvation. But in the doctrine of providence, Calvin saw an essential truth for all Christians. With life as precarious as it is in so many ways, how is a believer not to be frightened or dismayed? God's sovereign and providential care. Nothing in all creation happens apart from God's secret counsel; down to a drop of rain in a certain time and place. A noted objection to this belief is the reality of evil. But Calvin insists that while God is sovereign over evil, he is not the author of it. "God does not create evil, but by his action and governance he causes it to manifest itself, and he overcomes it." (141) Calvin also stressed that God cares especially for His people; particularly. And while God was in control and working all things for the sake of Christ and the good of His own; His people were supposed to remain diligent in all matters of life. "Real Calvinists have never been fatalists or passive in their living." (139-142)

Calvin found much to do with providence in the Psalms. Godfrey comments how Calvin's commentary is five-volumes long and that he would only break from his regular New Testament sermon on Sunday mornings to preach Psalms. He felt attachment to them and to their emotions, and thought all Christians would and should benefit from them. Fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities and more; "An Anatomy of all the Parts of the Soul" was in the Psalms. Most importantly was that of expressing oneself during a life of suffering for the cross. (142-143)

Godfrey addresses and describes with explanations and quotes from Calvin five themes about providence in Calvin's writings on the Psalms: 1) God is the active governor of the world and its affairs; 2) This power should lead all to honor Him as God; 3) His governorship always acts out in love for His children; 4) Assurance in this providence gives believers confidence and a mature faith; 5) Understanding of this providence will lead believers to frequent and genuine prayer. This last one being a great importance for Calvin. His full chapter on prayer in the Institutes (Book III, Chapter 20) has more words than the topic of predestination do in all the Institutes; "a fact that should surely cause some to reconsider easy stereotypes of Calvin's religion." (142-146)

For the Christian, knowing the Psalms will teach that particularly in events of suffering, s/he must submit to the knowledge of the providence of God and take comfort that, "the bitterest afflictions of this life can be sweet when Christians know that they come from God, serve his purposes, and ultimately contribute to their good." (146)

The next lengthy section of this chapter on 'Calvin as Pastoral Counselor' deals with Calvin and his letter writing. Godfrey writes that Calvin wrote over 1200 letters during his ministry. He was burdened by the duty to write letters but did so anyway. Godfrey describes at length examples of Calvin's letters to: 1) The sick and grieving (147-148); 2) Those with theological questions (148-151); 3) The persecuted (151-157); 4) The five prisoners of Lyons (157-161); 5) The troubled churches (161-166). This section of the book with lengthy excerpts from actual letters written by Calvin gets the reader into the heart of the often misunderstood pastor.

Again, I cannot do this section justice and would encourage the reader of this abridgment to buy the book and read it in its entirety; but I will point to a few points of interest from this section. One is in his response to the daughter of King Louis XII of France, Renee of France, the Duchess of Ferrara. She was a supporter of the Reformation but became distraught when some Reformed ministers attacked her son-in-law (who persecuted the Reformed church) with words from the Psalms. She wrote to Calvin that these Psalms should not be used by Christians. Calvin replied and said if you say that about the Psalms what is to stop one from saying that of the whole Old Testament. However, while we must not rid ourselves of those particular Psalms, we must also persevere to loving people unto repentance. Christians need not judge; but pray for and love others. (148-151)

[Editor's note: The letters to the persecuted and more narrowly the five prisoners of Lyons are very humbling. We, in America, have no idea what life under persecution is or would be like. We get all bent out of shape when the 10 Commandments are removed from the lawn of a courthouse; while in the 1500s the governments that were still Roman Catholic were jailing and killing reformers. Just how many so-called Christians in America would stand under such things?]

Tomorrow: Chapter 11, Calvin and the Institutes

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.9 The Church, the City, and the Schools

2010-05-03T21:06:00.033-05:00

Here is entry number ten in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 9: The Church, the City, and the Schools (129-137)
Sometimes it is hard for us in 21st-century America to read about Calvin or his works in light of the life of the day. As we have seen in previous chapters, church and state in the 1500s were inextricably linked. All parts of social life would be affected by a change within the church, and vice-versa. As Godfrey writes, "Calvin lived in a time when a secular state and a variety of Christian denominations were unthinkable." (129) Therefore, when the Reformation came to a city like Geneva, the society would see change with it. In this brief chapter, Godfrey describes the cultural aspects of the Reformation in Geneva.

Moral life was important to Calvin and other ministers in Geneva. The church with the city counsel addressed drinking, dancing, and sexual immorality. Penalties varied on account of the offense; but the most serious of punishments were not from the church but from the city. Some of these penalties included beheading for the most serious offenses of heresy. Again, these were not penalties handed down by the church (or Calvin); though the church did not object. Some of the populace that were opposed to such actions, made life hard for the ministers, including Calvin. He was ridiculed and disrupted during sermons. But Calvin knew that true conformity to a true Christian life would not happen on this earth as it is now, writing that somewhere between 1 and 10 percent of Genevans were true Christians. (129-132)

From 1541 to 1546, Calvin's political and religious support was comfortable. But from 1547 to 1553 there was a bit more tension. The most intense objection to Calvin came in 1553 from Michael Servetus who was already a known opponent to Calvin from 20 years earlier. Servetus denied the Trinity and the divinity and eternal Sonship of Jesus. He escaped being punished for these views by publishing anonymously and Calvin tried numerous times to meet with him to lead him away from the heresy. This latter effort failed and after publishing a direct attack on the Institutes he was arrested in Geneva and put on trial. While the Genevan government wanted to embarrass Calvin, they could not agree in favor with Servetus and after dragging out the trial, he was sentenced to death by burning at the stake (even while Calvin begged the city for the less-painful death of beheading). Calvin urged Servetus to reject the heresy up to the final hours, but Servetus, even in his final breath, denied the eternal reality of Jesus. (132-134)

Needless to say this event has plagued the historicity of the man John Calvin. But again, this is because we are looking from a 21st-century world; where heresy is hardly punished (at all) and even accepted in many churches. However, this was 16th-century Europe, and Godfrey notes that none of Europe would have objected to the sentencing of heretics like Servetus. In fact, Geneva was one of cities with fewest executions. But still, Calvin's legacy is tarred by these events from then and to this day. But, "if 1553 was the low point for Calvin politically in Geneva, 1555 was the high point," with an overwhelmingly successful election for supporters of Cavlin. For the next 9-years Calvin's influence and success increased as religious refugees who supported Calvin fled to Geneva. (134-135)

Next comes the discussion of the schools in Geneva. As we noted from ch.4, Bucer's leadership influenced Calvin and in the Genevan schools is where this influence saw tangible action. Early curriculum focused on reading, writing and French, Latin, and Greek. Ministerial education required doctors of Old and New Testaments. Calvin initiated the Academy of Geneva, a university focused on the education of ministers for church and civil government. He and Beza from Lausanne helped teach to get the school off the ground. Godfrey writes that those who obtained the degree that of it as their death certificate: "become first preachers and then martyrs in France." Professors in Geneva were required to be confessional and students had to swear a lengthy oath on doctrine. This educational progress in Geneva had a troubled start, with uneducated and low-paid ministers, but by the late 1550s, ministers were well qualified. (135-137)

Tomorrow: Chapter 10, Calvin as Pastoral Counselor

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.8 The Church and Predestination

2010-05-02T20:53:00.038-05:00

Here is entry number nine in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 8: The Church and Predestination (113-127)
[Editor's note: I love the doctrine of predestination/election. For me, it is the clear teaching of Scripture, upholds God's sovereign grace, discredits man's role in salvation, and reveals even greater glory and the perfect work of Jesus (just to name a few). This chapter was difficult for me to abridge because it is so good and I knew I would not do it justice (Godfrey's arguments are good and the numerous quotes from Calvin help reveal his often misunderstood teaching). So, consider this just another reason to go ahead and buy the book and read it for yourself!]

Godfrey begins this chapter with the following

Today if anything is remembered about John Calvin, it is that he taught the doctrine of predestination ... [and,] for many predestination is a cold and gloomy doctrine, leading only to fear and fatalism. But for Calvin and those who followed him predestination was a vital and comforting doctrine. (113)

The controversy over this doctrine came to a head in 1551 in Geneva when Jerome Bolsec (former monk, doctor of theology and friendly acquaintance of Calvin's) rose up at a Congregational meeting (see ch.5) to oppose Farel who preached on predestination. Calvin stood up in the back and defended the doctrine extemporaneously. Bolsec continued his attacks on Calvin until eventually the Genevan government put him in prison for calling Calvin a false interpreter of the Scripture. Calvin then wanted other cities of the Reformation to respond in regards to the doctrine of election. Though he received some support, most responses were weak in support of the doctrine. (113-115)

[What is easy to see and hear in 2010 is that the doctrine of predestination is often corrupted and not appropriately understood. It was the same in the 1550s.] In citing Deuteronomy 29:29, Calvin argued that it was human curiosity into the hidden things of God that made the doctrine of predestination dangerous. The opposing position (that of Bolsec) stated that God only predestined that those who believe would be saved. Calvin did not disagree with this, yet said it lacked the entirety of the biblical instruction on the doctrine, namely why some believe and some don't. Calvin dismissed the teaching of autonomous free will because of the doctrine of sin and the biblical teaching that fallen man resists God. (one example: Romans 3:10-11) (115-116)

Bolsec's views undermine the work of Christ, reducing him from being a real and complete Savior to being only a potential savior ... [His] religion is man-centered: God has done all he can to save, but the ultimate decision on salvation rests with the human response. For Calvin, such religion takes away the glory of salvation away from God and trivializes the work of Christ. (116-117)

As Godfrey continues to describe, Bolsec was not the only opponent to Calvin in regards to this doctrine. Others showed up in Geneva and caused so much dissension that Calvin offered his resignation in 1553. The city council declined Calvin's resignation because they realized they could not do without his mind and abilities. (117-118)

It should be noted that this doctrine is barely referenced in all the Institutes and not one question in the 1545 Catechism addresses it. However, it was important to Calvin because of the teachings on grace in salvation with no role of man in that gift. Additionally, for Calvin the doctrine was useful for the security of believers. Election gives the believer comfort to know that no matter what confronts him or her, s/he is kept by Christ. This is an "unavoidable and profitable" teaching in Scripture. Calvin also dismissed the claim that election voided all human experience; for God acts through man in all of history. Additionally, God uses human means to further His purposes, such as preaching to gather the elect (while maintaining that it is an act of the Holy Spirit that makes the preaching effective). (118-121)

Calvin taught double-predestination: that is, "election to eternal life and reprobation to damnation - because Paul taught it to show how God's mercy and his justice glorified God." (122) It was not for man to look for the reason(s) why God chooses to save some men from damnation by grace and leave others in their sins. Man should love the hidden things of God, not over-analyze them. What is clearly taught in Scripture is that unbelief is consistently shown as God working His eternal purposes and not that God has failed to save some (see Jesus' teaching in John 6, and Paul's teaching in Romans 9). (121-123)

Calvin's commitment to this doctrine rested in one thing: the centrality of Christ ("only in Christ will Christians know their salvation and therefore their election"). Godfrey breaks this down into three parts and gives brief quotes from Calvin to describe them: 1) Christ is the foundational evidence of election; 2) Christ preserves His own; 3) Christ has done all the work to save the elect. (123-124)

Godfrey brings this chapter to a close discussing the later-developed reformed theological position on the doctrine of predestination and covenant. Adam had a covenant of works where he was then disobedient, thus suffering death. All men are born into this disobedience. God then provided Christ and the saving of men through a covenant of grace. What we lost in Adam, we gain in Christ. This is a brief but interesting section where Godfrey quotes Calvin to show that this later development of this theology has root in his teaching and in the teaching of Scripture. (124-126)

For Calvin, predestination explains the origin of salvation in the eternal will of God. Election removes all human boasting and gives all glory to God in salvation. The covenant helps explain God's action in history, shows how the history of redemption unfolds in the Bible, and underscores the importance of the institutions of the covenant of grace as the ways in which God accomplishes his purposes for his elect. Predestination as the foundation of salvation and the church is essential to confident assurance for Christians of God's blessing in their lives. (126-127)

And finally a good word of advice: For those who wish to seek knowledge concerning election, they must do so through the Word of God and not external teachings. (127)

Tomorrow: Chapter 9, The Church, The City, and The Schools

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.7 The Church and the Sacraments

2010-04-29T22:11:00.028-05:00

Here is entry number eight in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 7: The Church and the Sacraments (87-111)
"For Calvin, the doctrine and proper use of the sacraments was one of the most important issues of the Reformation." (87) So begins Godfrey in chapter 7 of Pilgrim and Pastor. Fifteen percent of Calvin's Institutes and the Genevan Catechism is dedicated to the issue of sacraments. His goal was to stay faithful to the Word in regards to these issues and not slide into the extremes of superstition or lackadaisical practice. He rejected the practices of the medieval church in regards to the Lord's Supper, which turned that particular sacrament into a recreation of Old Testament Israel (separation of the alter from the people), and held the doctrine of transubstantiation (the bread and wine actually become Christ's body and blood). These two factors were abhorrent to Calvin and others because the act of the Lord's Supper became a sacrifice of the priest that was repeated at every communion and this infringed on the complete and finished work of Christ, which was once-for-all. However, the views on this within the Reformation movement varied, as Luther believed in the real presence while Zwingli promoted the memorial and symbolic importance. (87-90)

Godfrey writes that one has to view the Genevan Catechism to get a hold of what Calvin believed about the sacraments. Of importance of Calvin was the growth of a Christian; and a part of that growth was in the taking of the Lord's Supper, which nourished, strengthened, and furthered the hearts, minds, and souls of believers. It was a sign of the promise in Christ of reconciliation with God and the indwelling of Him. He directed some of his writing in opposition to Rome, particularly in teaching against the sacrificial practice. To Calvin, Christ was in heaven and the believer was with Him. There was no biblical warrant to confine Christ in the substances of the bread or the wine. Additionally, only true Christians could partake (a faithful and repentant believer who lived love and was free of hatred). The Lord's Supper was but one of two sacraments Calvin insisted that the Bible taught; the other being baptism. Baptism was when a person became a member of the church and had their sins pardoned and a new life was received; symbolic of the promises of the Gospel. Faith, repentance, confidence, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit preceded the practice. Interestingly, Calvin believed in infant baptism and that faith and repentance could be shown and expressed later in life from a person who was previously baptized as an infant. He saw baptism as the parallel with circumcision and that people of the New Covenant should not be deprived of the promises of God that transforms into a blessing when received by faith. (90-94)

With the divisions within the Reformation in regards to these issues (mentioned at the end of the first paragraph above), unity was another focus of Calvin. He sought to unify Lutherans and Zwinglians in regards to the Lord's Supper. He was a lot more successful with the latter than the former. Calvin and the Zwinglians signed the Zurich Consensus in 1549, which affirmed like attitudes regarding the Lord's Supper. One was the importance of not only the divine act sof Christ and His accomplishments, but also the incarnational acts of Christ. Against the Lutherans they agreed that no power was in the act of the Lord's Supper itself; "for it was God alone who acts in his Spirit." Additionally, this efficacy of the Supper was only for the elect. A primary disagreement against the Lutherans was also agreed on: Christ is not in the bread, but was in heaven, and that the words used by Christ at the initial Supper ("this is my body/blood") was an analogy and not a physical manifestation. It seemed to Calvin and the Zwinglians that the Lutherans simply did not understand the implications of the ascension (Christ's physical body of the flesh dwelling in heaven). (94-99)

What is recognized here is the continued disagreement with the Reformed movement and the Lutherans. Though Calvin tried many times to affirm the common ground they held, the issue of the Lord's Supper remained as the major dividing line between the two. (99-100)

Calvin spends the fourth book of the Institutes discussing the external means by which God draws Christians into fellowship. Godfrey goes into greater detail here that I will pass by; except to say Calvin shows the harmful defects of the practices of the Roman Church; particularly in the practice of the sacraments. The "gross superstitions" undermined the centrality of Christ and allowed men to make idols out of physical objects rather than God. (101-102)

Godfrey spends the next nine pages (102-110) going further into Calvin's belief for infant baptism and the continued polemic against Rome and the Lord's Supper. It expands what has been summarized above and it is well worth the read, particularly the infant baptism argument and the many issues involved with that practice (which he affirmed).

In conclusion, "Calvin throughout his life gave a great deal of attention to the sacraments because they were so important to him ... [and] the truth of the sacraments is fundamentally simple." In the sacraments, Christ is unique and central to the believer's hunger, seeking, contemplation, and learning. (110-111)

Coming up on Monday: Chapter 8, The Church and Predestination

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.6 The Church and Worship

2010-04-28T20:36:00.050-05:00

Here is entry number seven in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 6: The Church and Worship (69-86)
Calvin led public worship and understood that role to be one of primary importance since public worship was the time when most Christians experienced and grew in knowledge about God. He saw the minister as the leader of worship and speaker for both God (through His Word) to the people and the people (in prayers and supplications) to God. With the Bible as his source, the church fathers as his helpful guides, and the heavy influence of Bucer in Strassburg (see ch.4), Calvin led while developing liturgies and encouraging the development of the song book for the city (all Psalms in metrical form to be sung a cappella; more on that later). In the "Practice of Worship" section of this chapter, Godfrey begins by pointing out that Calvin was very particular in wanting to "purify" the church he led by taking steps such as removing all the crosses inside the church, stopping any "human inventions" practiced, and following the worship orders of the ancient church. A regular Sunday morning worship looked like the following: (69-72)

Liturgy of the Word
Call to worship: Psalm 124:8
Confession of sins
Prayer for pardon
Singing of a Psalm
Prayer for illumination
Scripture reading
Sermon
Liturgy of the Upper Room
Collection of offerings
Prayers of intercession and a long paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer
Singing of the Apostles Creed (while Lord's Supper is prepared)
Words of Institution
Instruction and Exhortation
Communion (while a Psalm is sung or Scripture read)
Prayer of thanksgiving
Benediction (Numbers 6:24-26)

Geneva practiced a quarterly Communion but Calvin requested weekly practice (which the government rejected). He allowed for some freedom in the prayers and believed the people were active in worship by listening, commiting their hearts/minds to God, and singing a cappella (a simplification of what was the norm of the day). He thought song was equal with prayer and therefore the regulation of what was sung was important: thus, the metrical Psalms. Calvin did not agree with instrumental accompaniment which he saw as just another corruption introduced by the Roman Catholic Church. He interpreted 1 Cor 14:13 to include instruments as a tongue that was not understandable and therefore not permitted in the simplicity of the New Covenant. But Godfrey notes here that "Calvin's statements show that his criticism of instruments was primarily directed against any role for musical instruments independent of accompanying congregational singing, but in practice he did eliminate instruments completely from worship." (72-75).

Calvin understood the emotional impact of singing, even citing Plato on this issue in his writings. Therefore, the Genevan Psalter was composed so that the emotions sung and experienced were reflections of the emotions of the particular Psalm; giving the opportunity for the congregation to share in "a remarkable range of emotion." (76)

Godfrey now directs the chapter to Calvin's "Theology of Worship." "Remarkably," Godfrey writes, "Calvin put proper worship ahead of the doctrine of salvation in his list of the two most important elements of biblical Christianity," noting that the first four commandments tell of worship. (77) In his "Reply to Sadoleto" (see ch.1) Calvin wrote that "preposterous and perverse worship of God" was the most hazardous to salvation. Indeed, Calvin saw the purpose of salvation as a restoration of fellowship between God and His people and that this was expressed through worship; therefore proper worship was an act of obedience (an obedience that was broken in Gen 3). Thus came the regulative principle, where only what God's Word explicitly commanded is permitted, trumping man's "sincerity and fervor" in and for other practices (aka, idolatry). To Calvin, worship itself was an end and not an entertainment or even educational practice to be determined with pragmatical considerations. Man's inventions and contrivances not expressly consented to in the Bible were aimed at pleasing himself and not aimed at pleasing God. To Calvin, God finds such things "loathsome and nauseating." (77-80)

From Calvin's writings, Godfrey then outlines "several foundational theological principles" for Calvin in regards to worship. 1) The Centrality of the Word of God. It is read, preached, sung and seen. Through it people meet God. 2) Simplicity. This did not mean an absence of organization or order but "the removal of physical symbolism and ceremonies that were not instituted in the Bible." The "childish props" of the Old Testament were no longer to be practiced. 3) Spiritual Ascent. Worship places the worshiper into heaven, where we are in Christ and where the mysterious communion is engaged. Godfrey summarizes that "False worship, especially idolatrous worship, panders to human weakness and tries to force God to descend to earth when his will is for the Christian to ascend to heaven." (83) 4) Reverence. Fear of God leading to the full range of emotions to be expressed by the worshiper who practiced self-control, civility, and dignity, in that expression (see Psa 2:11 and Heb 12:28). Finally, to Calvin, worship must flow from the heart to be truly faithful and obedient. (80-85)

Calvin set the bar for worship in Reformed churches for centuries. His motivations stemmed from his theology which took very seriously the doctrine of sin. Therefore, any human behavior in worship outside of biblical direction was suspicious. Additionally, he could not separate the doctrine of grace from the sovereignty of God over worship; and this was best expressed in the what has come to be known as the regulative principle. (86)

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I must comment here on a couple of issues (a capella singing, weekly communion, and the regulative principle). It is interesting to note that the tradition of which I am a part (Restoration/Stone-Campbell Movement, Churches of Christ) adopted Calvin's practices. Of course, Alexander Campbell was born in Ireland to a dad who was a Presbyterian preacher (Thomas Campbell), so the roots of our movement have direct ties to the earliest of Reformers. While I applaud (though may not fully agree, as of today) this type of connection, it is my desire to see Reformation theology take hold in the Restoration movement. It is time to theologically Reform the Restoration.

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Tomorrow: Chapter 7, The Church and the Sacraments

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.5 The Call Back to Geneva

2010-04-27T23:59:00.025-05:00

Final are done. Back to regularly scheduled programming. Here is entry number six in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 5: The Call Back to Geneva (57-67)
This chapter begins the "Pastor" portion of Godfrey's Pilgrim and Pastor. So far we have shared in Calvin's upbringing, his early and late education, and eventful "pilgrim" ministerial and personal life. See the above table of contents for previous blogging-throughs of those chapters. But now, back to Geneva.

"While Calvin was prospering in Strassburg, the church situation in Geneva had deteriorated." (57). The citizens of Geneva realized the error of the government in exiling Calvin and Farel (see ch.3) and in late 1540 (Calvin is 31-years old at this point) apparently the pressure from the populace was enough that the government invited Calvin to return. He balked. But Farel, while exiled, was able (yet again) to convince him to return. (Calvin, as it has become apparent, trusted the word of friends over his own internal experiences). A year later, he was back in Geneva and his first sermon preached started from where he left off when exiled (3-years earlier). (57-58)

Calvin also picked up where he left off in regards to the church order of the city (with the same hot issue of excommunication at the forefront); which he resubmitted to the Genevan government. Through some compromise both parties affirmed the order. The ministry in Geneva took off with Calvin in charge.

Ministers preached every Sunday morning and afternoon as well as preaching early every workday morning. Ministers catechized the children every Sunday at noon. On Fridays the ministers and others who wished to attend met weekly in a gathering called the Congregation to hear a sermon from a minister and discuss the preaching. They also met as the Venerable Company of Pastors to discuss and decide matters of doctrine. (59)

Moral issues along with aid to the poor were also central to ministry life in Geneva. Of particular importance to Calvin was the catechizing of the children of the city (Godfrey quotes particulars of the catechism in this section). Black Death struck Geneva in 1542 and against Calvin's wishes, the government of Geneva forbade him to visit the sick. By this time Calvin,

preached eight or nine times every two weeks - twice on Sunday and each weekday morning every other week. His preaching was expository through books of the Bible. He usually preached on three or four verses of the New Testament and ten to twelve verses of the Old Testament ... His sermons were usually thirty minutes long ... [and] he preached without notes directly from the Greek and Hebrew text of the Bible. (61-62, emphasis mine)

He also wrote extensively (publishing more than one commentary a year) and his sermons were copied, published, and distributed. In the next several pages, Godfrey compares the material between Calvin's commentaries and sermons to show how the former focused on exegesis and the latter on application. It is a very interesting comparison to read and takes up the majority of the chapter. (62-66)

An important note from Godfrey here is that though Calvin focused on application for his sermons, they were not filled with "clever stories or illustrations; rather [the application] was expressed in his use of forceful verbs and metaphors with the aim of communicating effectively." (67) This inspires me.

Calvin believed in educated ministers, particularly in the faculties of Greek, Hebrew, and theology. He wrote that if he has not edified people unto salvation that he was a "sacrilege, profaning God's Word."

For God will have his people edified ... when we come together in the name of God, it is not to hear merry songs and to be fed with wind, that is vain and unprofitable curiosity, but to receive spiritual nourishment. (67, cited from John Calvin, The Mystery of Godliness and Other Sermons)

Tomorrow: Chapter 6, The Church and Worship

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A Day Off (But Stay Tuned) & Some John Piper

2010-04-27T08:30:00.005-05:00

Today is my last day of finals. I was up until 3am studying. The "Blogging Through a Book" series had to take a back seat for a day. However, I will be back tomorrow and catch the series up by posting on Friday. But for now, a little 2 minute video from John Piper on Jesus, the Old Testament, and discipleship. I love how this man brings it; God has blessed me beyond belief through his service:

Courtesy: DesiringGod

Till tomorrow... Lord willing

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.4 Exiled in Strassburg

2010-04-25T11:06:00.036-05:00

Welcome back. Here is entry number five in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 4: Exiled in Strassburg (43-53)
It's as if Calvin's near two-year stint in Geneva was a pause in his original plan for the purpose of learning and experience. Indeed, this is how God works sometimes. But now here Calvin is, in Strassburg, hoping to settle down and quietly pursue scholarship like he wanted to do originally when he left France. God: "not so much."

Martin Bucer, a first generation reformer who heard Luther speak in the early days of the movement, was seeking to reconcile (for the cause of unity) the Lutheran movement in Germany and the Reformed movement in Switzerland. He saw Calvin as a key person for this pursuit; and like God had used Farel before him, God used Bucer to put the fear and providence of God in the heart of Calvin. Thus, Calvin agreed to minister in Strassburg. Calvin learned a lot from Bucer about church order, leadership, and the Reformed educational system, which Calvin would later implement back in Geneva. (43-44)

His life there was demanding. In his first year he had so little income that he had to take in boarders. The congregation was considered small, with about four hundred members. He preached about four times a week and in addition to his pastoral work found time to write and study. (44)

[And it is here that Godfrey focuses on some aspects of Calvin's humanity: his moods and his heart. First, Pierre Caroli, who while in Geneva had accused Calvin of being an Arian after Calvin denied to sign the Nicene Creed, came to Strassburg after re-joining the Reformation (he had joined once, but then returned to the Roman Catholic Church, only to return back yet again). Bucer wanted a reconciliation contract between Caroli and Calvin in Strassburg. Calvin was enraged at Bucer (and let him know it) because no where in the contract was the blame put on Caroli. This is a reflection of Calvin's character that Calvin was aware of and Godfrey speculates that even though Calvin's words against this theological opponents were as critical as others', "perhaps his struggle with his temper made him particularly careful in his writing." Also while in Strassburg Calvin married a woman who seemed to fit his checklist, (modest, agreeable, unostentatious, thrifty, patient, caring): Idolette de Bure. While marriage in those days was more for social and financial reasons, Calvin shows his heart for her when after she dies (9-years after they married) he writes to friends how he was sorrowful and "overwhelmed with grief." These are but glimpses into the man John Calvin that Godfrey gives us in Pilgrim and Pastor. (44-45)]

Since Bucer was involved in the effort of uniting the church, he enlisted Calvin to attend a series of meetings called by Emperor Charles V to discuss theology. During these meetings, Calvin became close with Luther's right-hand man Philipp Melanchthon. Throughout these meetings, the Roman Catholics (of which the Emperor was), to Calvin's amazement, conceded very much to the Protestant position on justification. However when it came to the Lord's Supper (transubstantiation) the conference found no concessions on either side; even though Bucer and Melanchthon tried (much to Calvin's dismay). To Calvin, agreement with Rome was doubtful. As Godfrey writes, "unity based on fundamental compromise of the truth is worse than useless; it is a betrayal of the gospel." (48-50)

Godfrey takes the rest of this chapter (50-53) to describe Calvin's scholarly exploits in Strassburg including the first revision of his Institutes, his "Reply to Sadoleto," and his first commentary on Romans. The latter of these three works was clear and brief and thus "was an amazing success." It is no surprise that Romans was the first commentary for Calvin as it was/is the central epistle to Reformation theology and to the whole of Scripture. In writing such a concise commentary (only 250 pages) his method was to focus his commentaries on the biblical text while he was able to delve into greater theological reflections in the Institutes. Of all 16th century theologians, "Calvin remains the most admired and most consulted...for a young man he wrote with great maturity and insight into the text." (51-52)

Calvin did not see Romans as a book of mysteries of theological complexities so difficult and arcane that the young preacher should avoid it. Rather he saw it - as indeed he saw all Scripture - as a clear revelation of the truth of God. Indeed, in Romans he found a particularly clear and specific presentation of the work of Christ, the gospel, and the character of faith in justification and sanctification. (53)

Tomorrow: Chapter 5, The Call Back to Geneva

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.3 Calvin's First Ministry in Geneva

2010-04-21T21:15:00.024-05:00

Here is entry number four in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 3: Calvin's First Ministry in Geneva (35-42)
After fleeing from France for fear of arrest, Calvin's goal was to reach Strassburg (which in the mid-1530s was a part of the Holy Roman Empire) to settle down and study/write for the cause of the Reformation. (35)

God had other ideas.

On his way to his desired destination he spent a night in a certain city: Geneva, Switzerland; a city which in their then recent history had been undergoing political and religious turmoil (Godfrey summarizes these events clearly and concisely); and it is during this chaotic time the Reformation entered. One "fiery preacher" in Geneva, William Farel, led the call of reform before Calvin even arrived and it was he who swayed numerous citizens for the cause. (36)

Due to the governing structure of the day, power was shared by civil magistrates, an executive committee, and a General Assembly who elected the two former bodies. Important decisions were determined by this government, including which religion the city would adhere to. After a public debate in 1535 between Roman Catholics and supporters of reform, the government not only professed Protestantism, but also outlawed Roman Catholicism. And who walks in to Geneva only months after these rulings? John Calvin. (36-37)

Farel knew of Calvin's Institutes and immediately sought to bring him on board in Geneva. Calvin declined but after Farel persisted, he stayed; if for nothing more than the fear and providence of God. Calvin immediately took on a teaching role and soon was ministering full time. Not even a full-year into his stay, the two men drafted a church order which not only required education for citizens in sound doctrine, but also banishment of anybody who refused the Reformed confession. Here Godfrey writes, "the Reformers were not content with implicit faith; they required explicit faith, that is, faith with content understood and accepted." (37-39)

The government would agree on those matters; however, two points of contention stood in the way of the church and the Genevan government: 1) church discipline (excommuniation) and 2) certain church practices (Communion bread, baptismal font, bridal ware, and what we would call the celebration of Christian Holidays). The beef in both of these matters was just who had the power to regulate them. Calvin and other ministers believed that deciding these matters belonged under the authority of the ministers of the church (under the authority of the Word of God); while the government believed they had the authority. Neither side would budge. Then finally the dispute came to a head when after the government of Geneva 1) required use of unleavened bread for the Communion during Easter in 1538 and 2) refused to excommunicate anyone from participating; the minister's responded by refusing to administer Communion at all. Immediately, both Farel and Calvin were banished from Geneva, less than 2 years after the latter had first arrived. (39-42)

Calvin's first exile - from France to Geneva - came to an end with another exile - this time from Geneva. He was twenty-eight years old and apparently a pastoral failure. After less than twenty-one months he was rejected as a pastor. (42)

Tomorrow: Chapter 4, Exiled in Strassburg

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.2 The Young Calvin

2010-04-20T16:04:00.024-05:00

Here is entry number three in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book" series.

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 2: The Young Calvin (23-33)
In this chapter, Godfrey describes Calvin’s family life and early theological development.

On July 10, 1509 in a small agricultural city of Noyon, France, Calvin was born. His father Gerard dealt with legal and financial issues with the church and his mother Jeanne who was “a reputed beauty,” died when Calvin was 5. Calvin had three brothers who made it past infancy (others died). Little is known about his family life but he was close with his siblings, who later joined him in exile in Geneva. By the time Calvin was 11 he was already well educated and working for a church. He befriended nobility, pleasing his father, who was dedicated to the furthering of John’s career. With all this, “nothing about Calvin’s youth was unusual.” He knew Latin and French and studied grammar, logic, and rhetoric in pursuit of priesthood. But at 17 his father pushed him into law where Calvin ate up the learning style of the Renaissance until about the age of 22. In that year, 1531, Calvin’s dad died, excommunicated from the church due to shady financial dealings. (23-27)

During his studies, Calvin became a master in Latin, Greek and Hebrew; and he became an admirer of Erasmus who authored works on church fathers like Jerome and Augustine. He too studied ancient Greek and Latin works and in 1532 published a commentary on Seneca’s De Clementia. Godfrey writes, “Here was the critical preparation for the great commentaries on the books of the Bible that he would later write.” (27)

Nobody knows when Calvin converted to Luther's Reformation but many believe it was in his early 20s. However, Calvin “was long stubbornly committed to the old church and clearly resisted leaving it.” (29)

Part of the “sudden conversion” to the Reformation for Calvin and for his peers was the intellectual and spiritual power of the argument. Godfrey also speculates from the ‘Reply’ that Calvin’s conscience about his own sin influenced his conversion as well as his view on the authority of the church vs. the authority of the Scriptures. Then after one Sunday morning in 1534, Calvin fled out of France with other reforming leaders after the Affair of the Placards, which called for reform of the church. (29-30)

From 1534 to 1536 Calvin spent time in Italy and Switzerland where he began work on his Institutes; a small, six-chapter book which he completed in August 1535 (the final version was five times the length and was published in 1559). This initial work taught the basics of the Reformation in opposition to Rome. Godfrey quotes Calvin here, where he shows the focus on the continued themes of importance we have seen already: The centrality of Christ, the authority of the Scriptures, justification, the sacraments, and faith. (30-33)

Calvin wrote this book not long after his conversion (one to five years), when he was only 26 years-old. His theology already was quite mature. He had a remarkable ability to balance and synthesize the material with which he was working. His potential as a profound theologian was clear… (33)

Tomorrow: Chapter 3, Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva

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[BTB] John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Ch.1 Calvin in Strassburg

2010-04-19T15:25:00.049-05:00

Here is entry number two in this inaugural "Blogging Through a Book."

Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Chapter 1: Calvin in Strassburg (pgs 14-22)
This chapter jumps ahead a little bit. As you can see above, chapter 2 begins at Calvin's youth then proceeds in life-order through chapter 5. Since chapters 2-5 tells the story of how he ended up in and out of Geneva and Strassburg, I won't give that part away.

On July 10, 1539, Calvin was thirty years old with only twenty-five more years to live. That year he completed his first commentary (Romans) and published his first major revision of his Institutes. But what gives this year prominence is his treatise "Reply to Sadoleto," which scholars depict as "one of the most powerful defenses of the Reformation;" and it is what the first chapter of Godfrey's Pilgrim and Pastor focuses on.

Jacopo Sadoleto was a bishop and cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who wrote to the church in Geneva, urging them to return to Rome and abandon the Reformation. After the Genevan authorities pleaded with Calvin to respond, he did.

Calvin's 'Reply to Sadoleto' is important for more than its brilliant defense of Reformed Christianity. It is also a window into Calvin's soul. Calvin was usually very reticent to write much about himself, but in this work there is a remarkable personal quality that reveals a great deal about him. pg.14

Sadoleto's letter to Geneva included several things including personal attacks, where he said the reformers only desired fame and fortune; the typical 'only Rome has the truth, certainty and salvation' argument; along with rhetorical prayers from imagined peoples. Calvin replied in like rhetorical fashion, denied the attacks, and instead argued the glory of God as his primary concern; as opposed to Rome, which valued salvation (through the Roman Church) as primary. (15-16)

The doctrine of justification was a central issue to the Reformation and so it was also an important part of Calvin's 'Reply.' Only when a sinner is convinced of his horrific state before God (completely lost) can one be humbled enough to die to self and groan for God. Then and only then could men acknowledge and adopt the work of Christ (the mercy of God) as the way of complete salvation. The sinful state of men was put on Jesus at the cross; the benefits of the work of Jesus were imputed onto men; and this was all achieved by Christ alone, through faith alone. (16-18)

With insightful explanations throughout this chapter, Godfrey notes and describes how Calvin reflected perhaps his own struggle in life by his doctrinal stance and through the rhetorical strategy in the 'Reply.' It seems as though Calvin's own experience led him to the Reformation.

In the 'Reply,' Calvin also challenged Rome's authority on doctrine. Obviously, Sadoleto claimed the authority of the Roman Church in these matters while Calvin argued for Scripture alone. To Calvin, Rome could not assume authority over the Word of God; rather, the Word of God should rule over all the church. True community and peace could only be found in uniting around the Scriptures. While Calvin recognized that people could misconstrue the Word, this did not mean the authority of the Word itself was dubious. (19-21)

Lastly, Calvin argued for the importance of the Holy Spirit in each of these matters. Sadoleto argued for a separation of the Spirit form the Word while Calvin replied by promoting the essential role of the Spirit in the church, the revealing of the truth of the Word, and in the understanding of the believer. (21-22)

The church needed reform.

Calvin's 'Reply' is a bedrock if one is to understand Calvin as pilgrim and pastor in the midst of the century in which he lived. It also reveals, as Godfrey points out, some personal insights into Calvin that are not all that common. The 'Reply' shows Calvin's commitment to the glory of God, justification in Christ alone, the Scriptures, and the role of the Holy Spirit; and these essentials gave him and should give us in the same way a certainty away from anxiety. We all should share in this faith that was

that full and firm assurance commended by Paul, which leaves no room for doubt, and does not hesitate and waver among human arguments about which party to join. Rather in maintains its consistancy though the whole world oppose it. -pg.22, quoting the 'Reply.'

Tomorrow: Chapter 2, The Young Calvin

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BTB: John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor - Introduction

2010-04-18T22:46:00.022-05:00

This is going to be my first attempt at blogging through a book (BTB). I’m doing it for a number of reasons: 1) increased discipline in writing 2) practice in developing brief summaries 3) keep me going through a book with no stoppages (except for the days I will not be blogging like Fri/Sat/Sun) and 4) for future reference on books.

The first book that I will blog through is:
Godfrey, W. Robert. John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor. Wheaton, IL.: Crossway, 2009. 207pgs.

The author, Godfrey (PhD, Stanford), is president of Westminster Seminary California and a professor of church history with research interest in the Reformation. Pilgrim and Pastor has 11 chapters as well as an Introduction, a Conclusion, and a General Index. I will blog through everything but the General Index (that would probably be a bit pointless), which makes 13 blog entries (unless I combine two chapters here and there). Since the Introduction is so short, I will begin today. I may add my thoughts here and there for each entry and I may finish with an official review when I’m done; we’ll see.

Here are the topics of the upcoming entries. As I proceed I will bold the section(s)/chapter(s) addressed in that entry.

Introduction
1) Calvin in Strassburg
2) The Young Calvin
3) Calvin’s First Ministry in Geneva
4) Exiled in Strassburg
5) The Call Back to Geneva
6) The Church and Worship
7) The Church and the Sacraments
8) The Church and Predestination
9) The Church, the City, and the Schools
10) Calvin as Pastoral Counselor
11) Calvin and the Institutes
Conclusion

Introduction: The Importance of Calvin
John Calvin (1509-1564) turned 500 on July 10, 2009. He is the principle theologian of Reformed Theology, which has had millions of adherents all over the world in every generation and today continues to influence pastors, theologians and scholars. One only has to recognize the Young, Restless, Reformed movement sweeping the nation in these days to understand his continuing impact. Many love him and many hate him, but in his day he was a pilgrim and a pastor who had a passion for the gospel of Christ, which led to his influence in reforming the church of his day; a church ruled by Rome.

This book is an introduction to the life and thought of John Calvin. It aims at communicating Calvin’s passion and faith through extensive quotations from his works so that something of the force and eloquence of his language can be experience by the reader. He moved millions not through the power of his personality but through the power of his biblical ideas and words. This book focuses on the essential Calvin, a man who lived out his Christian faith as a pilgrim and a pastor. pg9

Tomorrow: Chapter 1, Calvin in Strassburg

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What Jesus, by means of a Kamikaze Bird, Teaches about Divine Sovereignty and Security

2010-04-04T23:54:00.014-05:00

My son and I witnessed a bird fly into a window, fall to the ground, and die. It’s a true story. We were each about 20 feet away from the incident. But as bad as it sounds (“thump”), it actually turned into a perfect teaching moment for me to have with my almost 4-year-old son.

The lesson? Watching a bird fly into a window and drop to the ground dead reflects the security we have in the Sovereign God through Jesus the Messiah in proclaiming His Name.

Now, how do I get security from God by witnessing a kamikaze (“divine wind”) bird? Here is the text, followed by the brief explanation:

“Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.” Matthew 10:28-33

Those 6 verses come on the heels of Jesus sending out the Twelve; and he tells them, “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves” (v.16). He instructs them that to speak about sin, the need for repentance, Christ and the Kingdom, etc., will not make many friends. To the contrary, “they will deliver you over to courts and flog you…and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles” (v.17-18). After all, “If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household” (v.25b).

Jesus is saying plainly: For My sake, you will be hated. The world that is at enmity with The Father will not like the message I send you with. But do not fear men; fear God alone (v.28). This is the God, Jesus says, who has the power to destroy both body and soul into hell and who has Sovereign control over the life and death (and even the flight path) of what we would consider to be rather insignificant, like a sparrow. And this same God has Sovereign control over your own life and death but thinks of you as deeply more precious.

Lesson 1: It was not chance or randomness that killed that bird. The reason that bird flew into that window and dropped dead is because God willed it to. Not one sparrow will fall to the ground apart from the will of God. This is the teaching of Jesus and all of Scripture.

Lesson 2: You, my son, are more precious than a sparrow. Know this then; that He has Sovereign power over your life and your death, and you are profoundly more precious than a sparrow.

Lesson 3: This does not mean you will not die, or suffer hardship or pain or sorrow. It does not mean that your life will be easy or not end as quickly as the sparrow’s. What it does mean is that you can be assured that no matter what comes across your path of life, God is there and He is working. We may not understand it completely or even partly; but “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

Lesson 4: Therefore, my son, acknowledge Christ before men (v.32a) and know that when you do, even in the face of violence, or hatred, or anger, or the loss of friends, or those you love, or whatever it may be; know that Jesus will acknowledge you before The Father (v.32b). He is your reward. And “the one who endures to the end will be saved” (v.22b).

This is everlasting and Sovereign security, my dear son. That “even though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we will fear no evil, for He is with us; His rod and His staff, they comfort us. He prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies; He anoints our head with oil; our cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow us all the days of our life, and we shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever” (Psalm 23:4-6, pronouns changed).

God is working His eternal decree and no matter where He puts you to fulfill it, know that He who knitted you together in your mother’s womb has “written, every one of them, the days that were formed for [you], when as yet there was none of them” (Psalm 139:13-16). And this same God who has the count of every hair on your head, will be yours if you stand firm with Him. And one day, you will see His glory, just as He prayed (John 17:24).

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John 3:16 - What Does It Really Say?

2010-03-17T08:28:00.001-05:00

John 3:16 is a glorious verse for certain. Yet it is a verse that has been used and abused by many well-meaning people who unfortunately use this text to support man-centered traditions in the process. This should end with some humility (in submitting to and letting the text say what it says regardless of what we want it to say) and a little bit of education.

First, here are a few common English translations of John 3:16:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (English Standard Version).

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (King James Version).

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (New International Version).

Next, here is the original version of John 3:16 in Greek: [absent accent or breathing marks (I need a better Greek font)]

Ουτως γαρ ηγαπησεν ο θεος τον κοσμον, ωστε τον υιον τον μονογενη εδωκεν, ιναπας ο πιστευων εις αυτον μη αποληται αλλ' εχη ζωην αιωνιον (UBS Greek New Testament, 4th edition).

Now, unfortunately this verse is commonly used to say what it does not say. How many times have we heard the word “whosoever” stressed to mean that all people have the ability to come to faith (that is, believe)?

Lesson: That is not what this text is saying. Nowhere does it even imply that all men are capable of believing. Nor does it say anything as to how that faith happened. What it does mean is exactly what it says: that whoever believes in Jesus will have eternal life. Let me explain:

First, the English “whosoever” or “whoever” is not a direct translation and this is where some confusion arises. The Greek phrase πας ο πιστευων (pas ha pisteuon) needs to be understood for what it is. The word πας (pas) is modifying the singular present active participle πιστευων (pisteuon).
The word πας means “each” or “every”. The word πιστευοων means, “believing,” and since it has an article in front of it, it literally means “who believing.” So the phrase πας ο πιστευων means “each one who believing” or “every one who believing.” In other words, “every individual who believes…”

That is it. The text says nothing concerning who has the ability to believe or how belief happens; only that those who believe “have eternal life” or “have life everlasting/unending” (εχη ζωην αιωνιον). It is very simple. The text has nothing to do with the ability of anybody to believe or how any individual come to believe, but it has everything to do with the assurance of salvation for those who do believe: they will have eternal life. Those who do not believe, will perish.

Now if we look at the 6 other times πας ο πιστευων is used in the New Testament (John 3:15, 3:16, 12:46, Acts 13:39, Romans 10:11, 1 John 5:1) we see the same thing and nowhere does it ever refer to a “whosoever” sense as it has mistakenly and commonly made out to be.

Now, if you'll allow me a little translation-of-meaning moment, let me offer a translation that would give an accurate meaning of the text:

For God loved the world that those individuals who believe in His unique Son, whom He gave, will never be lost, but will live with Him forever.

So I end with a simple request: Can we please stop the abuse of John 3:16? Let it be glorious for its intended meaning; that by Sovereign Grace, every person who believes in Jesus the Christ will have eternal life.

Sweet, blessed assurance.

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The Postmodern Genius of Theology

2010-03-13T18:12:00.012-06:00

I’ve heard the following phrase or something like it numerous times. It’s pretty hip with the postmodern crowd and Rob Bell cookie cutters out there and it goes something like this:

“In all the New Testament, ‘Christian’ is only mentioned 2 times while ‘disciple’ is mentioned 30 times. It’s more important to be called a disciple than to be called a Christian.” (again, or something like that)

Well now this is just genius. I never knew that the amount of times a word is mentioned in Scripture relates to importance and/or appropriate labels. Go figure.

So to test this brilliant revelation of what is worthy, let’s try this out with a few more words, shall we? [Note: I’m using the ESV for totals.]

1) The word ‘love’ is used exactly 0 times in Acts. Therefore, love is not important at all to the early church. I mean zero times… screw love!
2) The word ‘up’ is used 2056 times in the Bible while ‘down’ is used only 1267 times. Therefore, the increased use of anti-depressants is thoroughly biblical.
3) The word ‘day’ is used 1609 times in the Bible while ‘night’ is only mentioned 307 times. Therefore, it’s a good thing we sleep at night because its pretty darn worthless in comparison; and I always knew naps were sinful!
4) The word ‘man’ is mentioned 2105 times in the Bible while ‘Jesus’ is only mentioned 966 times. Therefore, man is at least(!) twice as important as Jesus. Maybe I’ve been too hard on man-centered theology lately…
5) The word ‘right’ is used 404 times in the Bible while ‘left’ is used only 370. So next time you’re lost and are not sure which way to turn, now you know, by just a slim margin, what God wants you to do: turn right.
6) The ‘moon’ (59 times) is a bit more important than all other ‘stars’ (51 times) but they don’t hold a combined candle to the ‘sun’ (153 times)!
7) I have now learned that we need almost twice as many ‘feet’ (243) to even be in the same league as our ‘hands’ (453). Isaiah was such an idiot!

This is so exciting! True spirituality and theology unleashed! [Note: I had to stop at seven examples because it is used 329 more times than eight (373 to 44!).]

So whoever came up with the intelligent idea to take the amount of times a word is mentioned to relate to value of any kind, I thank you. You are a freakin’ genius. I can think of no other phrase to use for you; and if I write a book about you I will be sure to use “freakin’ genius” more than any other phrase to describe you so nobody will get confused as to what I really think about you.

The ‘world’ will not be the same thanks to this effort; and since it’s only used 256 times, it needs all the help it can get from ‘you’ (14,354)!

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Two-Wills of God vs. Boasting of Men

2010-03-10T09:07:00.024-06:00

“Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?’ ‘Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?’ For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” (Romans 11:33-36).

"The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law” (Deuteronomy 29:29).

What to think about texts like these?

The doctrine of the two wills of God is based upon a biblical case. There is God’s revealed will (or, perceptive will) and His hidden will (or, will of decree). This understanding is, to me, a humble and God-glorifying way to understand (by not understanding) things that happen in how the Scriptures describe them.

The opposing view of the two-wills argument, that there is only one will of God that we humans [apparently] have complete knowledge of as revealed in Scripture is a view, I believe, based on human tradition, man-centeredness, and a faulty assumption of knowledge.

There are two (among many) significant stories in the Bible, one in the Old Testament and one in the New Testament, that testify to the biblical truth of the two-wills of God. It just so happens they are two of the most significant stories in the Word of God (one being THE most significant story).

Story 1) In Genesis, Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers. This is certainly a sinful action by Joseph’s brothers. The perceptive will of God certainly has let man know that selling your own brother into slavery then lying about it to your father is a sinful act; an act against the conscious and an act against God. With that being the case, let us see how the Scriptures describe the sinful actions of this story:

“So Joseph said to his brothers, ‘Come near to me, please.’ And they came near. And he said, ‘I am your brother, Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God’” (Genesis 45:4-8a).

“As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20).

So here we have in its glorious truth, an example of the two wills of God. It is against God’s perceptive will and therefore a sin that a brother sell a brother into slavery; yet the Scripture is very plain to tell us that God had in his hidden decree that Joseph be sold into slavery “to bring it about that many people should be kept alive”. God didn’t just fix something man did. God decreed (“meant”) that something take place for His own purposes and that He would be glorified. Needless to say that act led to the defining act of God in the Old Testament, freeing Israel from Egypt. How did they get to Egypt in the first place? The Joseph story. And it set up the Exodus, God’s greatest act. It was God from start to finish.

How do those who believe that all of God’s will has been made known to us respond to this story? Did God just act because of what man did? Is He simply a reactionary God to the autonomous actions of sovereign man? Did God then take this event and think, “Oh, I’ll free them from Egypt now and it will be a perfect foreshadowing to the Messiah!”?

Story 2) Jesus Christ crucified. The most defining act in all of human and cosmic history. Certainly, murdering the Son of God was the most sinful of all acts. We know, by the perceptive will that murder is sinful, an act against God. And now, it’s a sin against God’s Own Son (a big no no). With that being the case, let us see how the Scriptures describe the most sinful act of all human history:

“for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place” (Acts 4:27-28).

God predestined Jesus to be murdered by specific people at a specific time.

“and all who dwell on earth will worship [the beast], everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain” (Revelation 13:8).

Before the foundation of the world there was a “book of life of the Lamb who was slain.” Jesus was crucified, according to God’s hidden will, from before the foundation of the world.

How do those who believe that all of God’s will has been made known to us respond to this story? Did God just act because of what man did? Is He simply a reactionary God to the autonomous actions of sovereign man? Did God then take this event and think, “Oh, this is how I’ll save sinners!”?

Let me add a third brief story) Read Isaiah 10:5-12. God sends Assyria as a "rod of [His] anger" to destroy Israel. Then God punishes Assyria for their arrogant and boastful hearts in their destroying of Israel. God sent Assyria, then punished Assyria for their arrogant actions.

In all of these examples, God is Sovereign AND men are responsible for their actions. There is no escaping texts like these.

Why the denial of the two-wills of God? The doctrine of Salvation:
It seems to me the denial of the doctrine of the two wills of God is a traditional attempt to retain some sort of control over one’s own life. It more often comes from those who will claim that since God desires all men to be saved, that man has the autonomous free-will ability to make themselves saved. However, nowhere do statements like that ever assume upon the one to whom the desire is made (i.e. man) the ability to carry it out. Nowhere. Some people just cannot stand the fact that God is Creator and that man is created; and that God can do with His creation what He wants according to the counsel of His own will to the praise of His glorious grace. He does not have to meet some kind of human standard of law and justice (you know, 'cause we're so good at that!); but His own standard of law and justice (which is perfect, holy, and good). There is no law or justice or righteousness outside of Himself.
Additionally, the Bible is clear that we do not know God’s will of decree; how He has ordained things to be (such as, who will be saved and who won’t). "’I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy” (Romans 9:15-16).

We obey Him because we trust Him and because He has a revealed will that all men be saved, we preach freely to all men. However, it does not mean all men will be saved. That is not up to us (or any man). That is up to the Creator God ("Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!" Revelation 7:10) who makes people born again according to His own will and purpose. "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit" (John 3:8).

I won't get too deep into addressing the arguments of "autonomous" free will, as there is no such thing when the Bible clearly describes man corrupted from birth as a slave to sin, a slave of the flesh, an enemy of God. “You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires” (John 8:44). We are born with this nature in the flesh. And "Those who are in the flesh cannot please God" (Romans 8:8). Which is why we must be born again "not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God" (John 1:13) And there is no "autonomy" when bought by the blood of Jesus and thankfully and graciously made a servant of the Most High God; where we die to ourselves and live as Christ. One can believe they have all the "control" they want, but it is a fool's errand and won’t come from the Scriptures. Where it will come from is man’s traditions.

“You will say to me then, ‘Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?’ But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, ‘Why have you made me like this?’ Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?” (Romans 9:19-24).

I’ll close with James, the brother of The Lord Jesus, who speaks of the will of God in a very interesting way, and tells us that we know not what the Lord has willed; only that we ought to submit to it. Because “for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’ As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil” (James 4:13-16).

So let us not be arrogant. Let us embrace the doctrine of the two-wills of God, submit to Him, praise His Sovereignty, and glorify Him in our lives in Christ Jesus. After all, "you are not your own, for you were bought with a price" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).

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A Reality Check Concerning My Generation

2010-03-01T14:16:00.009-06:00

[What follows is a comment meant for a blog entry by Mike Cope concerning "Bailing Out of Church" My comment became too long as I typed it. So I wanted to be respectful of "comment etiquette" by not hijacking the comment section with a lengthy reply. However, I have linked to this entry in his comment section. So, if you want to read what spurred this on, check out the blog entry linked to above and read the comment section to see the flow of the conversation that was taking place. The endless praise of the millennials, I feel, needed a reality check.]

With that, here is my reply.

Having just turned 30, I can testify to a few things.

“Jesus said to them, ‘Is this not the reason you are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God?’” – Mark 12:24

This generation is one of, if not the most biblically illiterate generations. We talk about Facebook and Twitter and blogs and texting (all of which I take part in); yet how much time is spent in the Word? As one man recently said, Facebook and Twitter will testify, in the end, to how much we lied regarding not having time to read the Word.

New marketing schemes, which Barna promotes every 10 years or so, are not the answer; and neither is reading unorthodox gibberish from wolves like McLaren. The fact that the latter is promoted is exemplar of the biblically illiterate point.

That literature is mighty popular with those disgruntled with the church, rebellious against spiritual authority, and intrigued by suspicious doctrine; but it is nothing new or groundbreaking. Thankfully that ship is sinking (as it does every 100-years or so) and even the McKnights of the world are finally cutting connections there.

Secondly, we are one of the most selfish of generations and we worship idols; namely, ourselves. And we have a guilt complex. White-middle class America is all about "me". We are coddled from birth on up; so why are we so surprised it is this way with the current feelings about the church? I understand some have been hurt in many ways; and this is unfortunate and a product of our sinful nature. But to then turn that into "why I don't like the church" simply exposes the selfish culture we live in. So we have these discussions about church and what it “feels” like to "me". We were not created to “feel worthy” about ourselves or to get our felt needs met and self-esteem boosted. We were created for one paramount reason: to worship God in all we do.

Then on the social level, we cloud our desires in feel-good discussions about social justice and all that comes with that; even saying we're all about the Kingdom of God! Yet we are ignorant of the Gospel and the Kingdom of God; and really only pursue fanciful Utopian-ideals backed up with worldly political dogma because it makes us feel better about ourselves.

The Kingdom of God has turned into a hall of mirrors.

We need to get back to the historical Gospel and the preaching and understanding of the historical Gospel. The problem is many are ashamed of the Gospel because it rubs them and others the wrong way. Therefore we have a god of love without justice and holiness. Sin is downplayed and the reality of hell is dismissed as myth. We decapitate the power of God at the expense of humbling ourselves to the Creator and the fact that He does ordain things like evil and suffering to happen (though we cannot explain it). We go to great lengths to explain anyway anything offensive about Jesus (same God in the OT by the way) and we turn Him into our boyfriend. But the Biblical Gospel and the Jesus of the Bible is brutal to the flesh/natural man. Why then are we so amazed that a generation and world that is neck-deep into fleshly things is opposed this Gospel that demands humility, the smashing of idols, and an attitude of suffering?

So we have preachers and churches today that peddle a gospel that is watered down into nice fluffy teddy bears and therapeutic moral deism. Or, they turn it into legalistic "Kingdom of God" language which is nothing more than "what works you must do" for God; not realizing the basis of your life and the Kingdom is not about what righteous works you do but it is about what The Righteous Christ has already done for your unrighteous sinful self. Then we bear the fruit of such freedom. But far too many professed believers today are just so scared of being offended or offending others with the Gospel. Therefore, golden-calves abound.

In addressing these issues, Kevin DeYoung suggests the following in a series “The Next Generation”. He proposes to Grab Them With Passion, Win Them With Love, Hold Them With Holiness, Challenge Them With Truth, and Amaze Them With God.

And the churches that are exploding in growth, particularly with the 20-30ish crowd, have leaders who are not ashamed of the Gospel and firm biblical doctrine; and this is where the difference is. Reformed thoughts and doctrine is exploding in this age-group; so much so even Time Magazine took notice in the March 2009 issue where the "New Calvinism" is the #3 idea changing the world

What we see here is a re-energized love for the Supremacy of God; the Magnification/Glorification of Christ; the Authority of Scripture; Loving to learn and hold fast to firm doctrine; Caring/knowledge of social ills and injustice; Desire to reach people groups with the Gospel.

The churches of Christ would do well to join in this kind of passion for God.

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Jesus is the True and Better...

2010-02-28T20:44:00.003-06:00

The "Kingdom of God" as The New Legalism

2010-02-21T20:51:00.024-06:00

I have recently had more and more people answering my question of "what is the Gospel" with the answer "The Kingdom of God". They speak about the renewing of the world around efforts of social justice and what we need to do to assist in this renewal. While that’s all well and good, in a way, it still missed the primary message of the Gospel as I know it. In their answer, Jesus has little part (except that of a wonderful teacher and example) and the topics of sin and hell are often shoved off to the side in the "Kingdom of God" definition.

So a couple of days ago I came across a talk by Pastor Tim Keller (author of such well-known books such as The Reason for God, The Prodigal God, and Counterfeit Gods). The 2007 presentation out of 1 Peter 1 and 2 is titled “What is Gospel-Centered Ministry?”. In it he goes over 7 features of the Gospel. The Gospel is historical, doxological, christological, personal and individual, cultural, the basis for worldview, and wonderful. In the fourth section, at about minute 39 through to about minute 50 or so, he nails the feeling I have been feeling and digs a bit deeper into the answers given on what the Gospel is. He hits the nail on the head in regards to how we need to view the Gospel, and then how we are to live in the world today. What follows is a loose transcript of the segment of the presentation done by yours truly that describes the issue at hand and why two extremes can have it wrong. Most importantly, he nails the Gospel and calls what all the new talk about the Kingdom of God can end up being: a new form of legalism.

-Loose Transcript Begin-

To understand grace you must first understand the debt. And second is the magnitude of the provision. There are people who do understand how bad they are, how flawed they are or how short they fall. But they are not convinced of the magnitude and sufficiency and freeness and fullness of the provision. They may only believe that Jesus died the death s/he should have died; but they don’t believe Jesus also lived the life we should have lived. If you only believe Jesus died the death you should have died; that is He died for our sins and paid our penalty; that leaves you on your own. It clears the deck and puts you in a right relationship with God but you must stay in that relationship with a pretty good life. And therefore in a certain sense you are still maintaining your salvation by works and there is no joy in that. There is no life transforming joy in that. There is no identity transforming or shifting behavior joy in that.

But if you realize He lived the life you should have lived as well as died the death you should have died, then not only were your sins put on Him but his perfect righteousness and record was put on you as well. So there is no condemnation and there can’t be a condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. Therefore, when you understand both of those things suddenly there is an explosion. There will be an explosion; there is an explosion.

See now what we have today is people who say, “I see easy believism and we have people who don’t understand the size of the debt. And they say, ‘sure here is my born-again card’ and their life doesn’t change a bit.” And then you also see Pharisees; those who are under the burden of guilt and as a result are withdrawn and hostile and moralistic and legalistic. And we have these two groups of people (which the evangelical world is filled with).

So you have the people who don’t understand the provision and so they are Pharisees, legalist, moralists; and you have people who don’t understand the debt and the size of the payment and magnitude of their situation. Why? Why on the one hand the easy-believism? And on the other hand why the moralism?

Because they don’t understand the Gospel; the old-Gospel; the historic Gospel. The Gospel of salvation by grace alone through faith alone through the work of Jesus Christ alone; double imputation; substitutionary atonement. They just don’t get it.

So, they say, “What’s the solution to the easy believism? Why don’t we see these people over here living lives they ought to live? And then why do we see those people over there culturally withdrawn being really negative and narrow?” The solution, they say, is “Let’s change the Gospel.”

We see this everywhere. The Gospel is no longer you’re saved by the blood atonement of Jesus Christ, appeasing the wrath of God; they are saying the Gospel is just the Kingdom. To them the Gospel is God renewing the world and He’s going to reweave the world in peace and justice and now you need to join this community and be agents of peace and justice; you need to change your life; you need to be a disciple; it’s both faith and obedience; that’s what connects you to God.

Now I can’t imagine, with that Gospel, anybody’s ever going to write a hymn, “My chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose, went forth, and followed thee.” It’s not going to happen.

That form of [Kingdom of God] Gospel is actually another kind of legalism.

But here’s the problem: The Gospel IS individualistic. It is. It does say, “you’re an individual sinner, you’ve opposed a holy God, you’ve personally offended Him, here’s the provision for that.”

-Loose Transcript End-

Keller does go on to explain that we’re not just a bunch of individual forgiven people, and that we do form a community of not just tourists on earth, and also not a bunch of citizens, but a community of people who do good deeds and are persecuted. This takes engagement along with being different. It is a balance. We need to seek the well-being of the city while at the same time tell people they are under the wrath of God and are going to hell. We are a counter-culture that engages the culture and endures persecution. It’s a hard balance but it is what we are called to do. We usually have people on one side or the other. But we need to be willing to be praised AND to be punched in the mouth. We can’t withdrawal and we can’t be completely drawn in.

Again, you can watch the whole talk here. The section I start at in this blog begins at minute 39.

A Boundless Faith?

2010-01-24T23:08:00.010-06:00

In the latest 9Marks E-Journal, Carl Trueman writes an article titled "The Real Scandal of the Evangelical Mind". In it is this paragraph which summarizes well my thoughts as of late.

[I]f a movement does not understand what it is, then it cannot make any really satisfactory determination on who belongs and who does not. The boundaries of a movement are ultimately revealed by the person who comes closest to belonging but who nonetheless does not. Arius is a good early church example. As high and exalted as was his view of Christ, he could still only regard Christ as a creature and not fully God. The boundary was drawn and he was outside of it. Combine the problems of defining evangelical identity with the current cultural penchant for not excluding anybody and you have a heady recipe for total disaster. Say nice things about Jesus, have a warm feeling in your heart when somebody lights a candle, and be kind to your grandmother and—hey presto!—you belong; you too can be an evangelical. Thus we have deniers of penal substitution, of any meaningful notion of biblical authority, of the uniqueness of Christ for salvation, of justification by grace through faith, of the particularity of salvation. No matter: just stress that Jesus was a jolly good bloke, mouth a few orthodox sounding phrases, speak with a bit of engaging passion, and you too can get a membership pass and a speaking gig.

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Worthy is the Lamb who was slain...

2010-01-24T22:10:00.004-06:00

I'm not sure how one cannot fall prostrate with this song.

WWJD? Are you sure you want to know? Five case studies.

2010-01-17T22:33:00.026-06:00

What Would Jesus Do? (Or if I were emotionally hip I would simply call it WWJD and wear a cool little bracelet.)

This is a phrase I really can’t stand. It comes in second far behind “A loving God wouldn’t [fill in the blank]”. Both develop into something where we do nothing but shape Jesus/God into our own image. Basically whatever little box we’ve put God into; whatever we can stomach determines each. Anything outside of that, we’re not too fond of.

Now the WWJD question is a problem because one, it presupposes it’s the right question to ask and two, it implies that we know what He would do. But alas, in our new-age-emotionally-ruled-Jesus-is-my-boyfriend-meek-and-mild-American-Christianity (NAERJIMBMAMAC), this is the question we ask nowadays.

So to test the theory that we can figure what Jesus would do in a situation and therefore apply it to our lives, let’s look at just five instances and ask ourselves, “What Would Jesus Do?”

1) Suppose a non-Jewish woman comes up to Jesus and says, “Have mercy on me, my daughter is oppressed by a demon!”

WWJD? The bracelet says that He would get right on that now wouldn’t He!

Here is what Jesus actually did.
First, He ignored her. Then, he told her that she was not His concern, and that He came for other people. Then, he called her a dog (linguistically, a “little dog”). I picture one of those annoying little yappers we run across every now and then in the park that we just feel like kicking. (Matthew 15:21-28)

Nice huh?

[Note: The humorous attempts from interpreters to turn this “dog” phrase into a term of endearment is a case study of trying to save Jesus from Jesus/God from God. Or more to the point of this post, trying to keep the made-in-my-own-image-WWJD Jesus alive.]

2) Suppose a leper comes up to Jesus and says, “If you will, you can make me clean.”

WWJD? The bracelet says that He would speak in soft tones and comfort and heal the man, wouldn’t He?

Here is what Jesus actually did. (By the way, like with all the biblical text, this is where knowing the Greek matters in translation).
First, he got angry (οργισθεις). Then, He healed the man. Then, he growled/snorted (εμβριμεσαμενος) at the man to get out of His face (εξεβαλεν). Finishing it off with a “Oh, but before you go, be sure to rub it in to the priest that I have power and they don’t. Ok, now you can go.” (Mark 1:40-44)

Nice huh?

3) Suppose Jesus comes across a demon-possessed man who lived amongst the tombs. The demon inside the man proceeds to defend itself by calling out the Name of Jesus and pleading not to be cast out of the area.

WWJD? The bracelet says that He would cast out the demons from the area and destroy them; thus freeing the man and the area from them.

Here is what Jesus actually did.
He obliges to the demon’s request to not be cast out of the area but into a herd of 2,000 pigs. Having no concern for the owner(s) of the herd’s livelihood or what that would mean to the village’s (which includes poor people) economy, Jesus casts the demons into the pigs and watches as the entire heard kills itself by running down a bank and drowning in the sea. Then He left with no apology to the herders; only telling the now right-headed man to tell others what He (Jesus) just did for Him. (Mark 5:1-20)

Nice huh?

4) Suppose Satan approaches Jesus and says, “I demand to sift/tempt/test Peter and your closest disciples!”

WWJD? The bracelet says He would tell Satan to buzz off and to leave His people alone.

Here is what Jesus actually did.
He let Satan do just what He desired to do. Kind of reminds me of Job when God, after seeing Satan roaming around the earth says (out of the blue), “Hey Satan, go down and destroy Job’s life in any way you want, just don’t kill Him.” (Luke 22:32-34; Job 1:6-12, 2:1-6)

Nice huh?

5) Suppose a follower of Jesus, after Jesus tells him that He will die, shows heartfelt concern and in defense of Jesus says, "No way, this shall not happen!"

WWJD? The bracelet says He would calm down His friend and gently tell Him how much his care means to Him.

Here is what Jesus actually did.
He called His friend Satan and told him to get out of His way. (Matthew 16:21-23)

Nice huh?

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There are plenty of these.

So instead of asking, “What would Jesus do?” thus forming what Stephen Prothero calls, “an astonishingly malleable Jesus—an American Jesus buffeted here and there by the shifting winds of the nation’s social and cultural preoccupations,” why don’t we ask, “What does the Bible say?” and read what He did do. ‘Cause I’m sorry, neither the new-age-emotionally-ruled-Jesus-is-my-boyfriend-meek-and-mild-created-in-my-palatable-image Jesus nor your bracelet will tell you.

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D.A. Carson: Must I Learn How to Interpret the Bible?

2010-01-11T21:34:00.005-06:00

"Ironically, there are still some people who think that there is something slightly sleazy about interpretation. Without being crass enough to say so, they secretly harbor the opinion that what others offer are interpretations, but what they offer is just what the Bible says...The fact of the matter is that every time we find something in the Bible (whether it is there or not!), we have interpreted the Bible. There are good interpretations and there are bad interpretations, but there is no escape from interpretation...What follows in this article is not a comprehensive key to answering all difficult interpretive questions, but some preliminary guidelines to sorting such matters out."

1) As conscientiously as possible, seek the balance of Scripture, and avoid succumbing to historical and theological disjunctions.

2) Recognize that the antithetical nature of certain parts of the Bible, not least some of Jesus' preaching, is a rhetorical device, not an absolute. The context must decide where this is the case.

3) Be cautious about absolutizing what is said or commanded only once.

4) Carefully examine the biblical rationale for any saying or command.

5) Carefully observe that the formal universality of proverbs and of proverbial sayings is only rarely an absolute universality. If proverbs are treated as statutes or case law, major interpretive and pastoral errors will inevitably ensue.

6) The application of some themes and subjects must be handled with special care, not only because of their intrinsic complexity, but also because of essential shifts in social structures between Biblical times and our own day.

To read Carson's fleshing out of these six guidelines, read the whole article here.
...

6 Chapters of Genesis, Matthew, Ezra, Acts

2010-01-06T23:32:00.011-06:00

Here are some things that struck me so far as we are reading. This is not by any means comprehensive or groundbreaking, but just some quick points and random thoughts concerning some of the readings we’ve had in the first 6 chapters of Genesis, Matthew, Ezra, and Acts.

GENESIS
1:1 “In the beginning God created…”
That’s all I need to know. He created all things, with a purpose and plan to display His Name, glory, power, and grace.
3:4 “But the serpent said…”
The serpent appeals to Eve’s pride. Pride: the foundation of all sins
3:12-13 “But, but, but… s/he did it!”
Adam blamed Eve. Eve blames the serpent. All three get a Godly smack down. The world has never been the same.
4:23-24 “Lamech said to his wives…”
The line of Cain get’s worse and worse. The depravity we all share; even through Seth.
6:5 “The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”
So much for the notion of “good” people, huh? In the face of a Holy God, we are repugnant creatures. Even “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment … [because] our iniquities, like the wind, take us away” (Isaiah 64:6)
6:8 – Noah is saved by grace alone… same line here used for Moses

MATTHEW
1:1-17 “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham…”
I’m actually looking forward to preaching on this text one day. In the line of Christ we have adulterers, prostitutes, and outsiders (Gentiles) in amongst great and small. Jesus, the Son of God… welcome to your (earthly) heritage which you have decreed. I love how God works! He can save them all. He can save me and you too.
1:23 “behold, the virgin…”
Some like to question the interpretation of that Hebrew word (‘almah) to claim it does not mean ‘virgin.’ Well, you do that you call Mary a liar, Luke a liar, the text a liar, Jesus as born in the flesh as we are (thus not of the Spirit so a sinner by nature), and you become a heretic. Still want to play that game?
3:7-12 “But when [John the Baptist] saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them…”
Something that struck me this time reading it is one major theme: judgment is coming (Jesus). Repent, turn, and bear fruit, or you burn. Hey, I didn’t say it, John (and Jesus) did.
3:16-17 “And when Jesus was baptized…”
Here we have the Trinity all at once. The Godhead. Father. Son. Holy Spirit. Affirmed.
4:1-11 Jesus tempted…
It is amazing that Jesus uses nothing but Scripture to combat Satan and His lies. Still think the Bible is not important? Lesson learned.
4:18-22 Jesus chooses
God has a mission and He knows whom He wants. By grace.
5:1 “his disciples came to him…”
The Sermon on the Mount is directed to the twelve, not the crowds. Think about that… (forthcoming post)
5:21-48 “you have heard it said…”
Some try and call the Sermon on the Mount the Gospel. Sorry, but what Jesus says here is NOT good news. (again, more on that in a later post)
6:9 “Our Father in heaven…”
Notice the first thing Jesus says to pray. Before anything else: “hallowed be your name.” Jesus makes clear the most important thing in all creation is that God get’s the glory. God is God-centered. We should be too.
6:19-24 “Do not lay up for yourselves…”
This has ruled our lives lately. Leaving comfort, money, benefits, housing… leading to 6:25-34. He is faithful and turns all for good for those who love Him.

EZRA
1:1 “the LORD stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia…”
Again, I love how God works. He uses a pagan king for His own purposes and glory. “he removes kings and sets up kings…the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will” (Daniel 2:21, 4:17). It’s like Cyrus is possessed when you read on…
1:3, 5 “Whoever is among you of all his people…everyone whose spirit God had stirred to go up to rebuild…”
This is interesting. First, Cyrus recognizes God has a people. Second, it seems only those who God chooses are the ones who return. God is working here. He is in Sovereign control. Nothing is taking place that He is not working.
2 (all of it) “Now these were the people of the province who came up out of the captivity of those exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried captive to Babylonia…”
This chapter is great, even though it’s a bunch of names and numbers. What it shows is how important it was to be a People of God. They took great care to number all of those who could prove their ancestry. Even when others wanted to go with them (v.59-63) that could not prove their ancestry were determined unclean until further notice. It meant something to be God’s people. Oh that we have that same spirit today!
3:12 “But many…wept aloud…”
This struck me. While many were praising and singing the foundation of the new Temple, the older folk who had seen and known the former Temple were distraught over this new building. The former glory was still gone to them…
6:11 This is our favorite quote so far. After Darius the king was asked to search the records to find out if Cyrus had really ordered the rebuilding of the Temple, he finds evidence affirming the decree and issues His own edict that building should continue. Then, he adds this line… “Also I make a decree that if anyone alters this edict, a beam shall be pulled out of his house, and he shall be impaled on it, and his house shall be made a dunghill.” In other words, don’t mess with King Darius.

ACTS
1:5 “but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit…”
Oh what a wonderful word! The Lord promises Himself to His people. Co-heirs we become as we are born-again by the Spirit of God. By grace alone. Through faith alone.
1:11 “This Jesus…will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”
Oh the thought! One day. Let us be ready.
2:14-36 “But Peter…addressed them”
I love Peter. This sermon and those that follow are gold… better than gold. The focus: God making Jesus Lord. And he doesn’t mince words. He cuts his audience deeply. Oh the boldness of these men!
2:39 “For the promise is for…”
Sovereign election made oh so clear here. To whom are the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit for? “everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” If one is called, they receive it. Period. This is God’s plan, not ours.
2:36 “day by day attending the temple…”
Affirmation of corporate gatherings mixed in with home gatherings. Take note.
3:6 “But Peter said…”
Peter met the lame beggar with the Power of God, not just a hand out. Take note.
3:11-26 “Peter addressed the people…”
Another bold sermon by Peter. It is so enlightening to see the content of these messages. No social gospel here. No prosperity gospel here. Only true Gospel: Christ and Him crucified (and he used Scripture!)
4:8-12 “Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them…”
Yet another bold sermon by Peter. Even more hard hitting than before and again, Gospel centered. Key phrase for all pluralists and weak-kneed/noodle-spined Christians out there: “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (v.12)
4:13,29,31 “boldness…boldness…boldness”
I’m catching a trend. They say their boldness and were “astonished”(v.13). They pray that the preaching continues with all “boldness”(v.29). They in fact “continued to speak the word of God with boldness”(v.31). Lesson: Not bold? Don’t preach. Period.
4:32-37 “not a needy person among them…”
Who are we talking about here? Believers. Are we neglecting brothers and sisters in Christ for the sake of non-believers? That is not what is going on here. Take note.
5:29 “We must obey God rather than men”
Let me add… we must fear God rather than men.
5:41 “Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.”
I love this verse. Is our faith like that? Will we rejoice when/if we suffer for His Name? Or will we cower behind silence or invisibility. Be hated for Jesus’ sake.
5:42 “And every day…”
Again affirming corporate meetings as well as house gatherings. What were they doing? “they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ”. What are we doing in our meetings and gatherings?
6:2 “It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables.”
I think a future post is coming on this one too. The twelve affirm, without a doubt, that preaching and teaching is a gift that is not to be tampered with by other duties that other people with certain gifts should be performing. It also affirms the importance of that gift being exercised. To those out there who question the purpose of preaching/teaching, take notice. “But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word” (v.4) In other words, stop making your preacher/teacher/pastor do the bulletin and run the children’s program.
6:5 “And what they said pleased the whole gathering…”
The family of God affirmed the previous point. Let us echo.
6:15 “saw his face was like the face of an angel.”
I only point this one out to mention something my wife brought up. We know that Saul (later, Paul) was a student of Gamaliel. Gamaliel speaks in 5:35-39 and then we have this comment about Stephens’ face. Could Saul be there at both times and thus is the one informing Luke (the writer of Acts) of these instances?

Done for now. Grace be with you –
Jr

The Sheets & The Word

2010-01-04T21:46:00.014-06:00

My family has taken up the M’Cheyne Bible reading plan this year. It will have us going through the Old Testament once, the Psalms twice, and the New Testament twice. If you want to see the reading schedule, click here. Or, you can download the pdf of the reading schedule here.

I have been intrigued by the M’Cheyne plan for a couple years so decided to make this the one for us this year. My intrigue is due to two factors. One is that each of the four readings per day is a full chapter and the second is where the four readings begin. The reading plan starts at what I would call “four beginnings”: 1)Genesis/Creation; 2)Matthew/Jesus Incarnate; 3)Ezra/Rebuilding of the Temple after exile; 4)Acts/The Church. So each day has 4 chapters of reading.

So far we have been able to get into a rhythm for our days. The plan is set up for family devotions and private devotions. The first two readings for the day (starting in Genesis 1 and Matthew 1) are for the family devotions while the second two readings for the day (starting in Ezra 1 and Acts 1) are for the private devotions. In our family we do the first part of the family devotions (starting in Genesis 1) after lunch, before the kids’ naptime. We then do the second part of the family devotions (starting in Matthew 1) before we put the kids to bed for the night. After the kids go to bed, Daisha (my wife) and I sit and read the other two readings (starting in Ezra and Acts) and discuss them. We swap reading each one out loud (meaning, I’ll read the Ezra chapter one day while she reads the Acts chapter, then I’ll read the Acts chapter and she’ll read the Ezra chapter the next day).

We review before we begin all of the readings to keep us all up to date on where we’ve been. This has been great with the kids, as it has enabled us to see what they have heard and grasped during our family devotions. It allows us to fill in some gaps, answer any more questions, or clear up any misunderstandings. [Note: our son is 3 ½ and our daughter is 23 months]

The schedule has worked out well so far even after I have started classes at the grad school. Since we live on campus I am able to come in for lunch and do the family reading with the kids before their naptime.

I pray that our family is blessed with this time with God and His Word that He has given us. I pray also that perhaps our way of doing things can bless you individually or as a family. If it helps, I will be posting each day's reading every morning via my Twitter and Facebook (search: Jr Sheets) accounts.

I also hope to post some thoughts on the first few chapters soon. And may this never happen.

Grace to you -

Response-to-Comment Post

2009-12-30T21:03:00.008-06:00

Below is a response to a comment left by a person yesterday on my post "Nothing Can Pluck Me From His Hand (well, except me?)" from April 13, 2009. The Supreme Dictator of Comment Length told me my comment in response was too long (though Word disagreed, confirming my view that Microsoft is not as powerful as people think!) so I made it into a post. I hope that is OK, Ashley!

So, if you are interested in the whole story, go back to that post; read it; then read her comment that follows below that post; then return here for my response. Here goes...

Ashley: Thanks for your comment. I think we agree on most and I think that I responded in the post to some of the questions you asked here. However, I can be unclear at times (I’m working on that) so to try and clarify I absolutely affirm the following: All have sinned. No work can earn saving grace. No work can remove saving grace (the point of the post).

As for me, I sin every single day of my life. I would never claim to be without sin. A daily prayer of mine echoes the tax-collector in Jesus' parable in Luke 18:9-13 who prays only "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" This man, Jesus says, went home justified. I am a sinner yesterday, today, and tomorrow and I too have specific thorns in my flesh that I battle daily.

You are correct that nobody can know the heart of a man or woman who makes a confession of faith. This is a certainty, for only God knows. I have no knowledge of who the elect are and who the elect are not. Our purpose is not to pick and choose, but to “testify to the Gospel of the grace of God” in Jesus Christ. I am confident you agree with me on that but I wanted to clarify my position.

However in regards to perseverance, 1 John 2:19 says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.” Those who die in unbelief, no matter what their lips have said in the past, are not, nor were ever born-again. That is what John says here. “they were not of us” because they did not “continue with us.” This is opposite of saying they were born-again, then became un-born-again (lost their salvation). If one says that a person was saved then lost their salvation they are not only taking part in judgment but that would be false because Jesus says it is an impossibility. True saints will persevere until the end.

Consider what it would mean if someone was saved, then unsaved. That would mean that Jesus’ blood wasn’t enough to save them (though, it was at one point I guess?). That would mean that Jesus in fact, did NOT die for all of that person’s sins. I believe that Jesus died for all of my sins for the rest of my life. There is not a sin I can commit that would make me lose my salvation. If, however, I ever one day in the future denied Christ as Lord in word/deed, then me confessing Him as Lord today is a lie and I am a liar and I am not saved nor was I ever saved.

I believe the point about Jesus taking away the sin of "the world" is where the difference is for us. Do the Scriptures say that Jesus died for every single human being to ever have lived, living today, or that will live? I do not believe it does. But if it did, then my view of Christ’s completed work at the Cross would mean that every single person in all of human history would have salvation; and we know from Christ’s own words that will not be the case. [note: His death was certainly capable of and powerful enough to save every single person to have ever lived and that will live, but that wasn't its purpose.]

When the text says "of the world" in regards to sin being paid for, it is stating that salvation is now open for not only the Jews but also for the Gentiles. "The world" means all types of peoples (i.e. not only Jews). God, through Jesus, was showing Himself as not only for the Jews, but also for all peoples. Thus we have Paul in Ephesians 2 speaking about the "dividing wall of hostility" being broken down between Jew and Gentile in Jesus Christ. This is his whole point. The Gentiles had just as much a right to Jesus/God as the Jews did. By grace, through faith.

I do not believe "the sins of the world" can mean the sins of every single human being. If it did, the atonement (the Cross) was a massive failure because then one would need to say that Jesus died for every person but yet failed to save every person.

I believe the atonement is much more than just an offer of salvation. It is the purchasing of a people (the Bride) through Jesus’ blood. It isn’t willy nilly. It is certain. It is God from start to finish. It is truly “by grace you have been saved.”

Thanks for commenting. I am encouraged by honest discussion and I love your heart and passion. Feel free to respond more!

Grace to you

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Debate on Biblical Interpretation

2009-12-20T22:45:00.016-06:00

Here is David A. DeSilva's take on the biblical interpretation debate from the preface to his An Introduction to the New Testament: Contexts, Methods & Ministry Formation, (Intervarsity, 2004).

So what of the devotional vs. academic study of Scripture debate?

These two approaches and their results are often posed antagonistically against one another. There are critical scholars who devalue the devotional reading of Scripture and the quest to hear the voice of the living God in it. There are others who dismiss the academic study of these texts as inconsequential, since the Spirit is “all they need” to interpret the Scriptures. The former re- duce the witness of Scripture to a basic, workable, rational morality that does not interfere with the modern agenda. The latter privilege their potentially idiosyncratic and erroneous readings and applications with divine authority. As the reader will quickly discern, I find neither position and neither result acceptable.

Both kinds of inquiry can and should work together in the community of faith. The academic study of the Scriptures can be used by people of faith as a means to allow the text to speak its own word on its own terms. But this avenue of inquiry is also best pursued prayerfully and in connection with the God who continues to speak through these texts. With these spiritual disci- plines, the fruits of academic study are brought back into the conversation with God and with other Christians about what God would say to God’s people today through these texts. The criti- cal study of the New Testament acknowledges the distance between the modern reader—in his or her cultural, political, theological and economic setting—from the author and immediate readers of a New Testament text. The devotional use of the New Testament presumes the immediacy and accessibility of the Word for the worshiper. Pursuing both avenues of inquiry, allowing neither to overwhelm the other, bringing the results of each into vigorous interaction with the other, puts the Christian leader on the surest ground, enjoying the riches of both while being less liable to the limitations of either. (p.19-20)

[You may read the whole preface via pdf here]

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