Logopneumatika

A Favorite Section of The Book of Church Order

2009-05-06T14:13:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know. The Presbyterian Book of Church Order has been prescribed as a cure for insomnia, but believe it or not, there are some sections in which the glorious light of the Gospel shines forth, piercing the otherwise dank, dense world of Latinate instructions on church polity.

One of those sections is found 6-1, a section devoted to Church Members. This section says,

The children of believers are, through the covenant and by right of birth, non-communing members of the church. Hence they are entitled to Baptism, and to the pastoral oversight, instruction and government of the church, with a view to their embracing Christ and this possessing personally benefits of the covenant.

I was reminded of the nuance here in a recent session meeting as we were picking apart some of the finer points of sacramentology in clarifying a pastoral issue. A few elders were claiming that non-communicant membership comes through baptism, while others were arguing (in line with the Book of Church Order) that a child's membership in the church is "by right of birth" primarily. The Book of Church Order settled this dispute for us quickly. It is the latter.

The point here is that children are members of the church through and because of their parents, a concept called "federal/covenantal headship." As Christ represents believers before the Father as their "head," so parents represent their children before the Father as their child's "head." Baptism is a gift and a grace children receive because of their birth-right, simply because God has chosen to use families as a vehicle of redemption. And it is the birth-right which makes them members of the church, not baptism itself. This is not to undermine or lessen the power of baptism, for in and through it we are further united to Christ in a myserious way, but only to say that when we speak of membership in the church for covenant children, they access it by their birth-right, not by baptism itself.

Logopneumatika, Arise and Come Forth!

2009-04-20T06:22:00.000-07:00

Yes, it has been months since my last post and for this, I won't apologize. I have been exceptionally busy this Spring, trying to balance being an Assistant Pastor (25 hrs/week), a Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) student at the VA Hospital in St. Louis (24 hrs/week), and, of course, a good husband. Needless to say, the ol' blog hasn't got much TLC in the mix.

I hope to change that as the CPE unit winds down and Summer approaches. So look for some new posts coming up. Next Fall, this hectic schedule should simplify as my efforts will become more singular. I found out last week that I have been awarded a one-year, full-time (paid!) residency in CPE at the VA Hospital in St. Louis. What does this mean for this lonely blog? Hopefully, the rearrangement of schedule will provide more time for reflection and construction of thought. I plan to use the blog for much of this "process education" (as CPE curriculum calls it).

Thanks for your patience. The Lord bless and keep you all.

Walk....No, RUN to Get this Book

2009-01-16T12:40:00.000-08:00

Richard John Neuhaus (1936-2009)

2009-01-08T13:29:00.000-08:00

Richard John Neuhaus died this morning of complications due to a cancer that was diagnosed over Thanksgiving of 2008. Neuhaus was a Roman Catholic priest, social critic, author and editor, most notably of the 1995 Evangelicals and Catholics Together as well as the magazine First Things.

Over the past five years, First Things has been my favorite magazine to read. Eclectic in nature, it always provides acute insight into the various political, moral, and theological outlooks at work in America. Neuhaus' editorial section "The Public Square" was always poignant and prosaic. He will be missed.

Justin Taylor has provided a helpful timeline of Neuhaus' life:

1936: Neuhaus was born and raised in Pembroke, Ottawa, Canada, one of eight children. His father, an American, was a Missouri Synod Lutheran minister.

1950: Neuhaus leaves home at the age of 14.

1960: Ordained as a Lutheran pastor, Neuhaus served in the 60s as pastor of St. John the Evangelist Lutheran Church, a largely black congregation in Brooklyn. He was a self-described "revolutionary," protesting the Vietnam War and advocating for other progressive causes.

1973: The Roe v. Wade decision causes Neuhaus to abandon his political liberalism activism in order to become a conservative.

1984: Co-founds and becomes the first director of the Rockford Institute’s Center on Religion and Society. Publishes his book, The Naked Public Square: Religion and Democracy in America.

1988: US News & World Report's survey lists him as as one of the 32 most influential intellectuals in America.

1990: 30 years after becoming a Lutheran pastor, Neuhaus converts to Catholicism at the age of 54. He was ordained as a priest a year later. (Here's a letter to Lutherans explaining his conversion, and here's an autobiographical essay he published in First Things, originally delivered at Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana.)

1990: Neuhaus founds First Things--an ecumenical journal, published by the Institute on Religion and Public Life, "whose purpose is to advance a religiously informed public philosophy for the ordering of society."

1994-1995: Neuhaus publishes the controversial document he co-edited with Chuck Colson entitled Evangelicals and Catholics Together.

2005: Time Magazine names Neuhaus one of the "25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America" (even though he is not an evangelical).

HT: Hunter Baker of the Facebook Group Readers of First Things (ROFTers)

Michael Horton on Joel Osteen

2008-12-19T05:19:00.000-08:00

From Michael Horton's new book Christless Christianity: The Alternative Gospel of the American Church:

"Osteen seems to think that we are basically good people and God has a very easy way for us to save ourselves--not from his judgment, but from our lack of success in life--with his help. 'God is keeping a record of every good deed you've ever done,' he says--as if this is good news. 'In your time of need, because of your generosity, God will move heaven and earth to make sure you are taken care of.'" (p. 70)

Horton goes on later to cast Osteen as a religious proponent of works-righteousness:

"Make no mistake about it, behind all of the smiles there is a thorough-going religion of works-righteousness: 'God's plan for each of our lives is that we continually rise to new levels. But how high we go in life, and how much of God's favour and blessing we experience, will be directly related to how well we follow his directions.'" (p. 86)

As the Ruin Falls by C.S. Lewis

2008-12-18T12:59:00.000-08:00

All this flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through;
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, reassurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love - a scholar's parrot may talk Greek -
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

-- from Poems (Harcourt Brace, 1964), pg. 109-110

Purpose-Driven Inauguration

2008-12-18T05:49:00.000-08:00

According to the Associated Press, Rev. Rick Warren of Saddleback Church in California has been invited to swear-in our president-elect, Barack Obama. Below is an excerpt from the AP's article (full article here):

Aretha Franklin will sing, the Rev. Rick Warren will pray and more than 11,000 U.S. troops will be watching over inauguration ceremonies in case of an attack during President-elect Barack Obama's swearing-in on Jan. 20.
But not everyone is pleased with the president-elect's selection of Rev. Warren.
Joe Solomnese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, sent a blistering letter to the president-elect, accusing him of delivering a "genuine blow" to the gay community in choosing the reverend to give the formal invocation at next month's inauguration.
"[W]e feel a deep level of disrespect when one of architects and promoters of an anti-gay agenda is given the prominence and the pulpit of your historic nomination," he wrote.
Andrew Sullivan wrote on the Atlantic Web site, "[It's] shrewd politics, but if anyone is under any illusion that Obama is interested in advancing gay equality, they should probably sober up now."
Liberal groups criticized the inclusion of Warren, whose "Purpose Driven Life" books and lectures have made his church among the largest in the country. People For the American Way President Kathryn Kolbert said Warren's support for California Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage, should have blocked his invitation.
"It's a huge mistake," said California gay rights activist Rick Jacobs, who chairs the state's Courage Campaign. "He's really the wrong person to lead the president into office."
Washington Blade editor, Kevin Naff, called the selection "Obama's first big mistake."

Weekends Off Institutes Reading Plan

2008-12-18T05:39:00.001-08:00

Last year, I created a reading plan for the 1559 edition of Calvin's Institutes which can be found here. Many of you have used this plan as a strategic way to approach what can be an intimidating text. I am glad to know that you have found the reading to be beneficial, more than you expected.

Through another reader I have been informed that foundationrt.org has put together a similar plan, but with weekends off. I believe this plan is the one that will be used by the gents over at Ref21 who will be "Blogging through the Institutes in 2009." I have used Scribd to post it below.

Calvins Institutes in 2009

Publish at Scribd or explore others:

Blogging Through Calvin's Institutes in 2009

2008-12-17T11:21:00.000-08:00

Over at Reformation21 blog, their editors and contributors will be blogging through Calvin's Institutes this coming year, something similar to what I've tried to do and will continue to do here. However, Ref21 plans to employ Ligon Duncan, Derek Thomas, Carl Trueman, and Sinclair Ferguson (among others) for this task. It will be very helpful to check with this blog from time to time to see what insights these Reformed scholars provide. Each day, one of the contributors will pen a 250-word reflection on some aspect of the work. You can subscribe via feed or email by clicking here.

Check out the first entry: Ligon Duncan on why you should read the Institutes in 2009 here.

Hat tip to Joe Dentici (RUF campus minister at UAB) for informing me.

Calvin on 1 John 4:8 - "God Is Love"

2008-12-16T15:12:00.000-08:00

From his Commentaries on the First Epistle of John:

"He [the Apostle John] takes as granted a general principle or truth, that God is love, that is, that his nature is to love men. The meaning of the Apostle is simply this, - that as God is the fountain of love, this effect flows from him, and is diffused wherever the knowledge of him comes."

Newsweek's "The Religious Case for Gay Marriage"

2008-12-16T09:42:00.001-08:00

Unless you've been under a rock, out of the country, or out of your mind, you're heard about Newsweek's provocative and controversial issue now on newsstands. First, editor John Meacham begins the issue with an editorial piece which sets the stage for the cover article. With ease he compares those who cite Scripture to prohibit gay marriage with the Devil and the Nazis. Lisa Miller then expounds her view in an article entitled "Our Mutual Joy" (read it here). She proposes a hermeneutic for reading the Bible that does not prohibit homosexuality or homosexual marriage. Her basic stance is that the Bible is not a manual for "doing" marriage and if it were, we'd all have to make radical changes to our marriages, hetero and homo.

Since the article is short and very well-written, I don't need to summarize it here. Read it for yourself. But what I do want to do is synthesize some of the orthodox Christian material that has been produced in response to the article.

It saddens me that so bright a woman in so influential a periodical would do so little actual unbiased research into the matter. Her presuppositions are so apparent that she is totally unwilling to engage any serious scholarship that would threaten her thesis. My lament throughout was, "Whither the footnotes?" Here are what others have said:

Robert Gagnon, author of The Bible and Homosexual Practice (the most thorough scholarship on the topic available) and professor of NT at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, responds with a 23-page rebuttal of Miller's thesis here. If you read nothing else, READ THIS!

A summary: "To arrive at her ideological objective Miller makes a number of bad moves. She overemphasizes discontinuity and underemphasizes continuity between marriage values in Scripture and our own values. She engages in a distorted form of analogical reasoning that elevates distant analogies over close analogies. She shows little or no understanding of the historical and literary contexts of the texts that she treats. She ignores just about every major argument against the positions that she espouses. And she extrapolates, from certain 'universal truths' in Scripture, conclusions that the scriptural authors would have found appalling and that bear little logical connection to the agenda that she seeks to promote."

Christianity Today calls Miller's article a "marginalization" of the mainstream Christian position on the matter. Read it in full here.

A summary: "All this would be infuriating and insulting if it weren't finally laughable and sad. It suggests one of three things.

It could mean that Meacham and Miller are simply ignorant of the nuanced and careful biblical arguments that religious conservatives have made. But this is doubtful, since as journalists of the topic, they have surely been immersed in the literature.

It could suggest they simply don't understand the subtleties of the biblical arguments. But this can't be, because they are clearly bright people in other respects.

Or it means they have found themselves hamstrung by the richer, nuanced, and thoughtful biblical defense of traditional marriage. And they find themselves utterly incapable of responding to it on its own terms."

Mark Hemingway of the National Review Online minces no words in his op. ed. here.

A summary: "So should I be surprised that Lisa Miller, Newsweek's religion reporter natch, can't even get through the first paragraph of her story without evincing an understanding of Christianity and its basic texts that is grossly oversimplified and distorted, filtered through an almost exclusively liberal political lens, not to mention catty and downright insulting?"

Al Mohler, president of Southern Theological Seminary and leader in the Southern Baptist Convention, provides a detailed response on his blog here.

A summary: "Newsweek could have offered its readers a careful and balanced review of the crucial issues related to this question. It chose another path -- and published this cover story. The magazine's readers and this controversial issue deserved better."

Carl Trueman, professor of church history at Westminster Theological Seminary, does likewise here. He is gracious in highlighting places where Miller has made strong points.

A summary: "The article does end on a note with which I wholeheartedly agree, however, at least on the surface. She quotes a pro-gay priest as saying `if Jesus were alive today, he would reach out especially to the gays and lesbians among us.' Amen, So he would. But not with the tawdry bauble of passing social acceptance; rather he would reach out with the love of the Father for those who are unlovely, offering them life in abundance, not through some intense but illicit orgasm; rather through the forgiveness and newness of life that comes from life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Even as the church must dismantle erroneous hermeneutics and defend the authority of scripture, so she must also reach out with the love of the gospel to the dirty, the immoral, the things that are not, with the light of the gospel. With what does the Christ of Ms Miller reach out? A piece of paper and the promise of a few years of companionship, perhaps some great sex, and then what?"

Mollie Ziegler-Hemingway over at GetReligion.com makes some poignant, albeit puncturing remarks here. Caveat lector.

A summary: "But if you are going to pretend that opposition to same-sex marriage is based Sola Scriptura, could we at least get our Scripture right?"

My 10 Favorite Books of 2008

2008-12-15T07:45:00.000-08:00

The wise Preacher once said, "Of making many books there is no end" (Ecc. 12:12). I know this to be true as virtually every spare inch of wall space in my home is host to an overflowing bookcase. And one glance at my Christmas list shows that the bibliophile in me is not satisfied. I love a good book.

In 2008, several rose to the top and separated themselves. Here are 10 (in no particular order):

1.The Reason for God by Tim Keller - A presuppositional, apologetic defense of the Christian faith for those with "postmodern" qualms. A great text for common Western world "defeaters" which support unbelief. This book was on the NYT Bestseller list for many weeks.

2. Home: A Novel by Marilynne Robinson - A synoptic sequel to her Pulitzer Prize winning Gilead, though written from the perspective of Glory Boughton, daughter of Robert Boughton (best friend of Gilead's protagonist John Ames) and sister of Jack Boughton, the prodigal. Equally as prosaic, chilling, sad, and glorious as Gilead.

3. The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis - This book is a classic and it had been high on my "must read" list for quite some time. I was glad to have read it. As always, Lewis gives us a unique perspective on heaven and hell not often respected in discussions on the matter.

4. The Road by Cormac McCarthy - Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, this apocalyptic novel gripped me in a way few novels ever have. I didn't have time to read it and yet I simply could not put it down. Look for a movie version coming out in 2009. But read the book first.

5. Solomon Among the Postmoderns by Peter Leithart - Using Ecclesiastes, Leithart shows how postmodern philosophy is "nothing new under the sun." Similar to what Francis Schaeffer does in Escape from Reason and He Is There and He Is Not Silent.

6. Silent Wounds: The Hidden Cost of War by Kuhlbars, Howden, & Daniels - These chaplains and clinicians study the holistic affects of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and propose that a vital component of the disorder is in the soul, a spiritual wound called Post-Traumatic Soul Disorder (PTSoulD). This part must be treated if healing and reintegration are ever to occur.

7. Ike: An American Hero by Michael Korda - A sympathetic, yet definitive biography of Dwight Eisenhower, the supreme commander of the Allied forces in WWII and later president of the United States. Korda's treatment is both highly detailed and anecdotal. The story of Ike's visit to the troops on the afternoon before D-Day is worth the lengthy read.

8. Sin and Salvation in Christ (Volume III of Reformed Dogmatics) by Herman Bavinck - No surprise here. The section on sin as a non-thing is absolutely critical in shaping a distinctively Augustinian/Reformed worldview. Also, Bavinck's exposition of the pactum salutis between God the Father and God the Son is as doxological as any theological article ever written.

9. The Future of Justification by John Piper - Few would deny that Piper is a pastor par excellence, but here he shows his prowess for highly scholarly work. He answers N.T. Wright's proposal for a new understanding on justification with balance and grace, appealing ultimately to the biblical literature. A textbook on how a Christian ought to make scholarly rebuttals toward another Christian.

10. Theology and the Philosophy of Science by Wolfhart Pannenber g - Have you ever wondered how theology fits with other disciplines of human knowledge? Is it unique or one among many? How should it function at a university level? Or more basically, what is theology? Pannenberg has done us all a service in writing a book which harnesses historical data and great foresight to answer these questions.

** Another work deserves mention and praise, even though it does not really fit this list. That is the English Standard Version Study Bible (ESVSB). Released in October, this has become my study Bible of choice and one of the best (if not the best) study Bibles ever produced.

The King and the Priest Are One

2008-12-11T09:10:00.000-08:00

The precious birth of the Lord Jesus Christ is full of joy and yet bitterness. The beauty of not just new life, but of Immanuel is haunted by foreshadows of the ultimate scandal: the crucifixion of God-with-us. We see in the Christmas story many such parallels. Here are three.

First, his transportation into Bethlehem and his transportation into Jerusalem were the same, that is, on a donkey. The humble, simple, laborious creature signifies peace, as opposed to the more valiant warhorses of the ancient world. On the one, he was yet unborn and kings were being rallied to come worship him. On the other, he was hailed as King of Israel with Hosanna in the highest only to be mocked with the same label a week later.

Second, his place of birth and his place of death were the same, that is, on the outside. There was no room in the inn proper, so his parents were forced to dwell with the beasts of the earth there in the manger. This was better than the alternative of giving birth in an alley, but a stark reminder of Mary and Joseph’s humble beginnings. Jesus too was ushered outside of Jerusalem proper to dwell with the cursed of the earth there on the cross. For some time, Jesus had known that there was no alternative to this fate and it was a public proclamation of Jesus’s humiliating end.

Third, his first and final gifts were the same, that is, ones fit for a King come to die. Those far-eastern nobles emerged from darkness, following a great light and bringing with them gold and incense as a sign of royalty as well as myrrh as a sign of death. The latter was a fragrant resin used for burial. After his work on the cross was finished and the Light of the world descended into the Darkness itself, two nobles served him once again, namely Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. They gave him a tomb which had never been used and embalmed him with myrrh and aloe (John 19:39). This was the custom of the day (John 19:40), but using 75 pounds worth was certainly not customary for a man born in barn. This extravagance reveals that even in his burial, his regality was recognized by those who knew him.

The King who reigns and the Priest who died are not two, but one, the one Lord Jesus Christ. In birth and in death, we see a rich tapestry of seemingly opposing themes woven together in Immanuel: riches and poverty, glory and humiliation, worship and scorn, joy and bitterness, Christmas and Good Friday.

Calvin's Commentaries for a Benjamin!

2008-12-10T11:55:00.000-08:00

Christian Book Distributors (CBD) is offering John Calvin's Commentaries for $99.99 (90% off suggested retail). The set is 22-volumes and is published by Baker. These are older translations which are also available online in digital format, but if you prefer books, it is totally worth the money.

HT: Justin Taylor

A Promising New Theologian You've Already Heard Of

2008-12-04T08:14:00.000-08:00

I think I've officially seen it all. My lovely wife just showed me a NY Post article which reveals that Jessica Simpson is headed back to school. What is her course of study? You guessed it, theology. She said:

"I've been contemplating taking a college course in religion. I love religion. I remember whenever the book 'The Da Vinci Code' came out, the Discovery Channel did this three-night piece on it that I TiVoed and then watched eight times."

I think you budding PhD students and scholars out there should finish your dissertations and writing projects ASAP. Gain tenure with due haste. Make your mark before this prospect steals your job.

For the entire article: THE FAITH OF TV

Pa Rum Pum Pum Pum

2008-12-02T11:47:00.000-08:00

My favorite.

Advent Listenings

2008-12-02T07:30:00.000-08:00

This Advent, I am remembering the miracle and mystery of the Incarnation by listening to a variety of Christmas music. Two recommendations I'd make:

Handel's Messiah
Performed by the Academy of Ancient Music and the Choir of Christ Church Cathedral at Oxford, Conducted by Christopher Hogwood

Sufjan Steven's Five Disc Songs for Christmas

I Need Africa More Than Africa Needs Me

2008-12-02T05:23:00.000-08:00

For the past few years, I have supported a ministry called Mocha Club. This organization provides Christian humanitarian aid and education to Africans. The name of this group comes from its statement that you can support them for $7 per month, the price of two mochas.

Below is a promotional video for Mocha Club's new campaign which I fully support and endorse (with my keyboard and my wallet). If you are interested in supporting Mocha Club, click here.

Advent Readings

2008-11-20T17:07:00.000-08:00

Click on the link below to download and/or print for your personal use.
Advent Readings (PDF)

Get your own at Scribd or explore others: Religion Christianity

Mark Discoll's Newest Book FREE Online

2008-11-17T09:35:00.000-08:00

Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, WA has just made available the full manuscript of his newest book: Porn Again Christians. It is subtitled A Frank Discussion on Pornography & Masturbation. For years, this subject has been unpreached and unpreach-able in the church due to the shame and stigma around "sex." Why this has been, I'm not quite sure because the Bible has a whole lot to say about our physical existence in general and our sexuality in particular.

Recently, a few brave men have recognized how much of an epidemic pornogrpahy truly is and have stepped out in preaching and teaching on the topic. Mark Driscoll is perhaps the most out-spoken of these (he certainly doesn't mince words!). You can access Discoll's book here or by clicking the picture below.

The Church of St. Arbucks

2008-11-13T07:01:00.000-08:00

What if Starbucks marketed like the Church? One thing's for sure: the drive-thru lines would be a lot shorter.

At least this Starbucks follows the biblical model for an exclusively male church officership. You know.....he-brews.

HT: Wayne Larson

The Transfiguration Pericope: A Comparison

2008-11-12T09:06:00.000-08:00

In preparation for a sermon this Sunday, I did a brief comparison of the Transfiguration account as recorded in Matthew, Mark, and Luke (collectively called 'the synoptics'). The respective texts are printed below with the analysis and a little quiz to follow! The first right answer wins a prize!

^ESVMatthew 17:1 And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves.² And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light.³ And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him.⁴ And Peter said to Jesus, "Lord, it is good that we are here. If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah."⁵ He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him."⁶ When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified.⁷ But Jesus came and touched them, saying, "Rise, and have no fear."⁸ And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.⁹ And as they were coming down the mountain, Jesus commanded them, "Tell no one the vision, until the Son of Man is raised from the dead."

^ESVMark 9:2 And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them,³ and his clothes became radiant, intensely white, as no one on earth could bleach them.⁴ And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, and they were talking with Jesus.⁵ And Peter said to Jesus, "Rabbi, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah."⁶ For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified.⁷ And a cloud overshadowed them, and a voice came out of the cloud, "This is my beloved Son; listen to him."⁸ And suddenly, looking around, they no longer saw anyone with them but Jesus only.⁹ And as they were coming down the mountain, he charged them to tell no one what they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from the dead.

^ESVLuke 9:28 Now about eight days after these sayings he took with him Peter and John and James and went up on the mountain to pray.²⁹ And as he was praying, the appearance of his face was altered, and his clothing became dazzling white.³⁰ And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah,³¹ who appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem.³² Now Peter and those who were with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him.³³ And as the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, "Master, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah"--not knowing what he said.³⁴³⁵ And a voice came out of the cloud, saying, "This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!"³⁶ And when the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. And they kept silent and told no one in those days anything of what they had seen. As he was saying these things, a cloud came and overshadowed them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud.

Comparison of details from the Transfiguration pericope

Context: All three follow Peter’s confession of Jesus as o` cristo.j and Jesus’s prediction of his own crucifixion. Matthew and Mark have it as six days following these events while Luke says it is eight.

Company: All three agree that with Jesus was Peter, James, and John.

The Change: Matthew and Mark use the verb metemorfw,qh (metamorphosized or transfigured) while Luke calls it e[teron (different or altered).

Jesus Conversant: All three agree that Jesus spoke with Moses and Elijah.

The Response: All three record Peter as suggesting they build three tents, one for each of the heavenly beings. Only Luke notes that the disciples were “heavy with sleep” while praying immediately before the transfiguration.

The Reason for the Response: Matthew gives no reason, but both Mark and Luke note that it was because Peter did not quite know what to say. Mark adds at this point that the disciples were terrified (e;kfoboi), a detail that Matthew and Luke include after the voice from the cloud (see below).

The Cloud: Drawing on the OT imagery of the Shekinah glory, Matthew and Mark agree that the cloud “overshadowed” (using a form of evpiskia,zw) the disciples. Luke adds a unique detail that the disciples actually entered the cloud.

The Father’s Speech: Matthew interestingly notes that Peter was cut-off by a voice from the cloud. Mark’s version is the shortest, “This is my beloved Son; listen to him.” Matthew similarly records this but adds, “with whom I am well pleased” between the two clauses. Luke’s version is slightly different, “This is my Son, my Chosen One; listen to him!”

The Disciples Fall Down: Matthew notes that the disciples went prostrate upon hearing God’s voice. Mark does not put it this way. From his perspective, the whole scene dissolved with the Father’s statement. Luke follows Mark.

Left with Only Jesus: All three agree that after this magnificent event, they saw Jesus only.

The Messianic Secret: Matthew and Mark record Jesus as commanding the disciples to keep the event a secret until he had risen from the dead. Luke notes that they told no one, but he does not highlight Jesus’s command.

The Quiz!

In listening to Sufjan Steven's musical rendition of this story, which account does he seem to follow (Matthew, Mark, or Luke)? Defend your answer and win a copy of the CD from which this track is drawn: Seven Swans!

New Video: Wild Sweet Orange - Either/Or

2008-11-06T11:34:00.001-08:00

One of Birmingham's newest and best bands has released a new video from their 2008 debut We Have Cause to Be Uneasy (Sony/BMG Music). Check it out via the link below (sorry, YouTube disabled embedding the video...).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llYmLr3mB-Y

Reformation Rap. Ya Dig?

2008-10-31T07:39:00.000-07:00

Today is Reformation Day, so we should find a way to honor Dr. Luther (probably with beery libations). However, the video below is not the way to do it. When it hit YouTube, I think God was sad. He might have even shed a tear in His beer (which He was having with Luther).

On Getting Old(er)

2008-10-29T11:11:00.000-07:00

I am now 28 years old. In a few months, I'll be 29. It is hard not to think that we take too long to grow up in our society. It takes us 18 years to acquire an elementary education. We require 4 more years to "major" in some broad field. For many, another two or three years might be occupied with a specialized degree of "mastery" or even a "doctorate." Add to this a few years of floundering about in extended adolescence and indecision and one finds oneself staring down thirty years without a whole lot to show for it.

I have been thinking this way a lot lately. Add to it the fact that three of my heroes never even saw their thirtieth birthday and it is easy to get depressed. These three are:

Henry Scougal (1650-1678) - The son of a British bishop, he wrote The Life of God in the Soul of Man as an explanation of the Christian faith. It was trumpeted by George Whitefield as one of the works which help convert him. One finds a clear portrait of grace in this book and Jonathan Edwards certainly borrowed from Scougal in his own vision of the divine. Scougal's famous asserton is, "The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love." He died of tuberculosis near his 28th birthday.

David Brainerd (1718-1747) - American Presbyterian missionary to the Native Americans in Pennsylvania and Delaware. His memory would be unknown to us were it not for the publication of his biography and Journal by Jonathan Edwards. One cannot help but feel humbled about how Brainerd's communion with God compelled him to "retire to the wood to pray" with extraordinary fervor. He too died of tuberculosis at 29.

Jim Elliot (1927-1956) - American missionary to Ecuador whose life and passion has been widely documented in his Journal and in the book by his wife Elisabeth, Through Gates of Splendor. In this book, he states, "God makes his ministers a flame of fire. Am I ignitable? God deliver me from the dread asbestos of 'other things.'" God answered that prayer and sent Elliot to the Auca Indians who would eventually kill he and his friends. This tribe would later be reached by the gospel of grace. A lasting epitaph of Elliot's life is also found in his Journal, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose."

Rather than getting despondent, their lives serve as a challenge to my own. It shows me that today ought to be my greatest concern for living out my calling. Making the most of today is far more important than pining over yesterday or betting on tomorrow. We are called to 'buy up the time, for the days are evil' (Eph. 5:16).

May the lives of these men challenge all of us 'twentysomethings' not to take for granted the days that are given to us. May we also labor toward the callings God has placed upon these lives of ours. May we redeem the time while we have it.

Initial Thoughts on the ESV Study Bible

2008-10-23T12:15:00.000-07:00

It's been almost two weeks since the ESV Study Bible (ESVSB) was made available to the public. Much hype and publicity surrounded its publication. John Piper called it "a dream come true." Jerry Bridges heralded it as "the finest study tool I have seen in fifty years of Bible teaching." For Mark Driscoll, it is "the most important resource that has been given to the emerging generation of Bible students and teachers." Philip Ryken noted that it is "the world's best and most complete single-volume resource for reading, studying, and teaching the Bible."

That's a lot of hype. But does it live up? Well, below are some of my first impressions.

Aesthetics: I bought the Natural Brown Tru-Tone edition because I don't prefer the stiffness of most genuine leather Bibles. The Tru-Tone is softer, suppler, and easier to hang on to when you're preaching. The ESVSB itself is rather large, however, which will detract one from carrying it around very long in the pulpit (you might need a wagon). Nonetheless, the Bible is very attractive, accented with the distinctive E-S-V stamp down the spine.

Layout: The ESVSB begins with a few standard prolegomenal issues such as contributors, translation notes, and explanations before launching into the OT. Five essays are given before Genesis is presented. These include a Theology of the Old Testament and a chronological overview of the OT. Before each section of the OT (Pentateuch, historical, poetry/wisdom, prophets), a corresponding essay is also provided. Between the OT and NT are twenty pages of "inter-testamental" resources on historical events therein. The NT follows a similar format to the OT with introductory essays and guides for reading each genre. The ESVSB closes with a litany of what appear to be excellent theological and practical articles on doctrine, ethics, hermeneutics, and church history as well as 15 color maps based on cutting-edge satellite imagery. The ESVSB did well in displaying excellence in its visual presentation. All the maps and illustrations are accurate and colorful, a welcomed change from previous study bibles.

Substance: The English Standard Version is a well-known translation in the evangelical world. My own denomination (PCA) uses almost no other version for public worship and preaching. So the ESVSB is a trustworthy text. I was glad that it opted for the words of Jesus in black, much like the Reformation Study Bible which is also popular. This is a theological conviction more than an aesthetic one because by keeping the text monochromatic, we maintain that Christ's words are received by the apostolic tradition rather than from his own pen.

I have made a broad survey of the footnotes and they appear to be solid. They are rooted in the ancient linguistic and cultural "soil" of the biblical world. They are not, however, so academic as to befuddle the average reader, but yet they are not so obvious as to bore the pastor. The contributing scholars did well to relay this information to Joe the Plumber....and Joe the Biden. The contributors are virtually all of Reformed leanings, but the footnotes and essays don't have an axe to grind (as we find in the Reformation Study Bible). They are balanced and sensitive to a variety of positions on a variety of topics.

So does the ESVSB live up to the aforementioned hype? I believe that it does. It is certainly my "go-to" study bible, even though it is hard to let go of my well-worn and well-marked New Oxford Annotated Study Bible (RSV). For those of you out there in the market, I'd recommend the ESVSB. It will enhance your reading of God's Word and give you deeper and more profound insights into its beauty and complexity. All in all, I give it an A+.

New Publication of Kuyper's Lectures on Calvinism

2008-10-20T06:10:00.000-07:00

For fifty years, Eerdmans has owned the exclusive rights to publish what I believe is the best explanation of the true essence of "Calvinism:" Abraham Kuyper's 1898 Stone Lectures at Princeton printed as Lectures on Calvinism. Now, Hendrickson has taken on the rights to publish this masterful text in their Hendrickson Christian Classics series. You can purchase this edition in an attractive hardcover here.

Review: John Frame's "Christ and Culture" in "The Doctrine of the Christian Life" (2008)

2008-10-15T11:25:00.000-07:00

Earlier, I previewed John Frame's recent offering (see here) in the field of ethics. It's sheer size prevents me from doing a thorough review in toto, but I would like to make a few comments about one section of particular interest to me: Christ and culture.

This section is the fifth of six. It is preceded by an introduction and sections on non-Christian ethics, Christian ethical methodology, and the Ten Commandments and is followed by a section on personal spiritual maturity. In this section, Frame has five chapters:

45. What Is Culture?
46. Christ and Culture
47. Christ and Our Culture
48. Christians in Our Culture
49. Culture in the Church

Obviously, he begins with definition (45) and a survey of the field hitherto (46), followed by his own study of the issue.

Frame traces the word "culture" from the Latin colere which refers to "the tilling of the ground in order to grow things" (854). The connotation here is that culture describes anything that humans work at to achieve, not only agriculturally, but artistically, politically, socially, etc.

One of the most important distinctions that Frame makes is between culture and creation. The two are not the same. He says, "Creation is what God makes; culture is what we make" (854). God created in six days and at the end of those six days, culture began. In fact, the "cultural mandate" placed upon Adam and Eve in Genesis 1:28 is a command to be culture makers. Frame suggests that Adam and Eve's work is to "turn creation into a culture, into a home for human society" (855). He closes with the idea that culture is valued by God, something that he truly desires because through culture humans reflect his image.

Frame also expounds the relationship between culture and religion, stating that culture is "religion externalized" (858). No culture is religiously neutral because by definition, a culture is held together by certain worldview aspects that are themselves "religious," even if they are thoroughly agnostic or atheistic.

Frame's section on Christ and culture (chapter 46) is little more than a representation of Niebuhr's five categories in his seminal Christ and Culture. Frame shows no awareness of George Marsden's critiques of Niebuhr's earlier work (see here), especially considering that Marsden wanted more categories and a more definite usage of "culture." I felt that acknowledgement of Marsden's qualms would have been appropriate.

John Frame unashamedly espouses the fifth paradigm of "Christ transforming culture," to be expected from a thoroughly Reformed thinker. He does, however, spend some time explaining the "Christ and culture in paradox" position which is popular among Lutherans and some Reformed. Frame admits that this view is "harder to understand and describe than the other views" (870), mainly because of its inconsistent dualism.

In chapter 47, Frame ventures into the issue of Christ and our culture, exploring ground similar to T.M. Moore in Culture Matters (reviewed here). He surveys the writings of others who've done that before him (Francis Schaeffer, Os Guinness, David Wells, Ken Myers, and Cornelius Van Til). Then, Frame takes much of that analysis and transfers it into his study of "our culture" in chapter 48. He examines the issues of whether Christians should join the 'cultural elite' in high art as well as whether Christians should engage pop art in music and film. Frame's refuses to make general pronouncements, but exercises a principle of Christian liberty. If one has interest in any or all of these media and one can encounter those media without sinning, then one should do so as a Christian living in the world without living for the world. As a side note, Frame gives 12 guidelines for film discussions on pages 900-902 which may facilitate that exercise.

Frame's final chapter is called "Culture in the Church" and it is based on the presupposition that "The church is itself part of culture, and culture is inseparable from the church...the church fools itself if it thinks it can operate apart from cultural influences" (903). He studies the controversies of the "worship wars" and actually makes some retractions from previous work he has done on the topic.

Frame once derided electric guitars for being unable to convey the concept of divine worship to an audience. These instruments, Frame used to think, were too deeply connected to modern rock music to be redeemed by the church. Since then, Frame has rejected this position and moved to a more inclusive one which can be summed up as follows: "There is no sound argument to the effect that Christian worship music should be in a particular style, or that some styles are forbidden to it...The Second Commandment excludes traditionalism as a principle of worship" (908). Frame should be praised for his honesty in making such a concession (and retraction).

These chapters of Frame's book are theologically sound and culturally relevant. They will not be a timeless contribtuion to the subject of Christ and culture, but they are very helpful in giving us a deeper understanding of the possible positions to take. Frame's entire analysis is peppered with a balance that his triperspectival method consistently yields. If you are well versed in readings on Christ and culture, you will find Frame's chapters elementary, but if you desire an introductary text, this one would be a good starting point.

Lewis on the Impossibility of a Perpetual Via Media

2008-10-15T08:05:00.000-07:00

One of the most ominous prospects of being consistently Protestant is having to take a stand on a plethora of issues, some important and some (sadly) trifling. Do we govern our church through the bishopric, the presbytery, or the congregational vote? And what is the connection between church local and Church universal? Do we use a confession for our theological foundation? If so, which one? If not, do we write our own? Do we baptize by immersion, pouring, or sprinkling? Do we include infants in that baptism? How often do we celebrate the Lord's Supper? Do we use real wine? What even happens in these sacraments? "Ahem, don't you mean ordinances?"

Personally, I don't find the detour (or 'return') to Rome to be a satisfying route toward theological coherence and so I struggle with tension of our lamentable diverse Protestantism. Many share in this tension. And it is tempting to look at theological extremes and attempt to find resolution in the via media, the middle way. The two extremes get canceled by each other, revealing a harmonious "center" that must be true. Or, as is spoken about it below, the two positions get "married" and become one flesh...a happy couple. The Hegelian impulse in this logic is strong as thesis and antithesis give way to a new synthesis.

You will find the via media evoked with dogmatic statements like "We must navigate between the Scylla of _____ and the Charybdis of _____" or "On the right, we see _____ and on the left we see _____. The truth is found in the center" From my own reading, I have seen this impulse in Donald Bloesch, Stanley Grenz, and others.

Forging new positions between two positions previously at an impasse may not, however, always be wise. It is based on a presupposition of truth and diplomacy that may bankrupt one's entire system of thought. C.S. Lewis, a great theological diplomat in his own right, has reminded us of this in the Preface to his The Great Divorce:

"Blake wrote the Marriage of Heaven and Hell. If I have written of their Divorce, this is not because I think myself a fit antagonist for so great a genius, nor even because I feel at all sure that I know what he meant. But in some sense or other the attempt to make that marriage is perennial. The attempt is based on the belief that reality never presents us with an absolutely unavoidable 'either-or'; that, granted skill and patience and (above all) time enough, some way of embracing both alternatives can always be found; that mere development or adjustment or refinement will somehow turn evil into good without our being called on for a final and total rejection of anything we should like to retain. This belief I take to be a disastrous error. You cannot take all luggage with you on all journeys..."

"We are not living in a world where all roads are radii of a circle and where all, if followed long enough, will therefore draw gradually nearer and finally meet at the centre: rather in a world where every road, after a few miles, forks into two, and each of those into two again, and at each fork you must make a decision. Even on the biological level life is not like a river but like a tree. It does not move towards unity but away from it and the creatures grow further apart as they increase in perfection. Good, as it ripens, becomes continually more different not only from evil but from other good. I do not think that all who choose wrong roads perish; but their rescue consists in being put back on the right road. A sum can be put right: but only by going back till you find the error and working it afresh from that point, never by simply going on. Evil can be undone, but it cannot 'develop' into good. Time does not heal it."

2,000 Hits!

2008-10-14T07:08:00.000-07:00

Sometime during the wee hours of the morning, logopneumatika rolled over the 2,000 hit mark. Being that this took months to achieve, a celebration is in order. The motivational poster from despair.com sums it up:

Plastic Jesus

2008-10-13T10:27:00.001-07:00

I watched this movie last night as many movie channels are honoring the life and work of Paul Newman. Cool Hand Luke is a classic not so much for the plot as for the enigmatic and inspiring characters, Luke being the foremost. In this film, Luke struggles with his relationship to God whom he repeatedly calls "Old Man." He desires authenticity and communication with the Father, being wary of mere religious superstition...as the song below suggests.

Free Puritan Books

2008-10-10T06:31:00.000-07:00

A large collection of notable Puritan works have been uploaded over at PuritanWorks.com. They are in Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format for easy printing. Some of the most noteworthy include:

The Works of Richard Baxter (23 vols)
The Works of Thomas Boston (11 vols)
The Complete Works of Thomas Brooks (6 vols)
The Decades of Heinrich Bullinger ... not a Puritan, however
A respectable offering of Edwards' works
The Works of John Flavel - eat your heart out Brian Cosby
The Works of Thomas Manton (22 vols)
The Works of John Owen (21 vols)
The Works of Richard Sibbes (7 vols)
The Works of John Newton (6 vols)

You should head over to PuritanWorks.com and check out this collection.

HT: Martin Cameron, Librarian at Highland Theological College

Yet Another Reason to Shop Westminster Bookstore

2008-10-09T14:47:00.000-07:00

From Mark, manager of the Westminster Theological Seminary Bookstore:

Aware of the economically difficult times affecting us all, we have worked hard to rush a new money-saving economy shipping choice. All orders under $35 can now qualify for $3.00 US Postal Service Economy Shipping (3-21 days).

Customers may still choose UPS shipping for $7.50 (1-5 days) or Pick up at Store (next day, Philadelphia area only) for $2.00. Orders $35 or more automatically get UPS shipping for just $4.00.

Why no economy shipping for orders over $35? Frankly, we aren't quite willing to trust these larger orders to the U.S. Postal Service quite yet. We want to retain the excellent tracking and reliability of UPS for these higher value shipments.

I'm not paid to say this, but if you buy theological books without first checking with the folks at Westminster Bookstore, you are throwing your money away! Check 'em out at www.wtsbooks.com.

Bavinck on Presuppositional Science

2008-10-09T09:12:00.000-07:00

Many in the philosophical and scientific communities have flocked to the teachings of Michael Polanyi and Thomas Kuhn, two thinkers who (in their own ways) have tried to supplant positivism with an open and honest admission that all scientific investigation involves presuppositions (Polanyi called it 'tacit knowledge') of some kind. These two men have been showered with both praise and scorn since their respective ideas became part of the debate over the philosophy of science.

In light of this fame, it is interesting (and yet, not surprising) to find these ideas latent in the later philosophical writings of Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck. In his essay Christianity and Natural Science, Bavinck argues this very point, viz. that science is not presuppositionless. He says:

Natural sciences often go by the name of exact sciences, because in many instances and on a rather broad scale, they use experiments. However, one should remember that this has its limits and that natural science also cannot confine itself to observation and experiment. In both instances it cannot avoid thought, speculation, precisely because as a discipline it looks for the universal, the systematic, the logic in the phenomena; scientia non est singlarum (knowledge/science is not singular).

This entire article, found in his Essays on Religion, Science, and Society, is a masterful treatment of the origins and ends of modern science. If you struggle with the conflict between science and Christian faith, Bavinck's argument would be a helpful place to begin in seeing the fundamental faith commitments involved in both of the aforementioned spheres of knowledge.

The Importance of Being Well-Read and Well-Rounded

2008-10-01T09:33:00.000-07:00

Once during an ordination exam on the floor of the Iowa Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in America, I was asked which few books had shaped my view of the world (theological, political, and social). I answered the question with three or four definite titles.

I do wonder what would have happened if I'd have answered "All of 'em. Any of 'em that have been in front of me over all these years." One thing for sure: that answer would have been thoroughly insufficient. A simple question I have is this: why is this answer sufficient for a potential VP?

Bavinck Blog...Whoa

2008-09-30T19:00:00.000-07:00

Here it is. It looks like a promising blog from some prominent Bavinck scholars and enthusiasts. Be sure to add it to your blog feed.

To Use a Split-Infinitive or To Not Use a Split-Infinitive...

2008-09-30T18:55:00.001-07:00

There is no question. Don't do it. Say no to the peer pressure. Just say no.

Augustine in Poetry

2008-09-29T08:16:00.001-07:00

"Augustine's Confessions, 10.27.38"
by Timothy Murphy

Wrongly thinking that beauty lay without,
blindly I cast about.
How late did I begin
to realize your beauty lay within.
To one bereft of sight
you said Let there be light.
Thus to my deafened ear
you called, you cried! hoping that I might hear.
I thirsted, hungered, yearned.
You touched me, and I burned.
How late I came to you,
to beauty ever ancient, ever new.
How late I came to you.

found in FIRST THINGS, October 2008 (41).

Thank God for Your Break-able Heart

2008-09-26T06:08:00.001-07:00

Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation.

– C.S. Lewis

The Four Loves

John Frame's "The Doctrine of the Christian Life"

2008-09-24T11:20:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I received the newly published third volume of John Frame's A Theology of Lordship entitled "The Doctrine of the Christian Life." This offering follows Frame's previous works on epistemology ("The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God") and theology proper ("The Doctrine of God").
First, I was surprised by the sheer mass of this tome. It exceeds 1,000 pages and my bookcase quivered at the very sight of it. Shelves will be warped from this monster, but in looking at the table of contents, I was put at ease. Frame begins with an introduction to his topic: ethics (he even includes an ethical glossary for the beginner). Then, he surveys other "Non-Christian" ethical systems such as utilitarianism (Mill), deontological ethics (Kant), and existential ethics (Marx, Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, et al.).

Frame's survey of Christianity's ethical systems consumes the majority of his argument. After using his own triperspectival system of analysis (normative-situational-existential perspectives) to summarize distinctively Christian ethical grids, he spends some 500 pages unpacking the 10 Commandments and their implications for 21st Century Christian ethics. After this thorough treatment, a 50-page study of Christ and culture leads into the concluding section on growth in grace (look for an upcoming review of the section on Christ and culture).

Without having read the book, I will recommend it; Frame has not proven me wrong yet. He is in a unique position to teach us about ethics. Here we have the work of a seasoned theologian who has ventured into those deep waters. Frame's exploration in philosophy and theology pays off as he considers the necessary Schaefferian question of how should we then live? If you don't have a favorite textbook for ethics, this would be a good (albeit lengthy) place to begin.

Helpful Bavinck Website

2008-09-18T06:36:00.001-07:00

Eric Bristley, author of A Guide to the Writings of Herman Bavinck, has put together a website which serves as a companion to that book. It is definitely worth a perusal for those interested.

Suffering in Order to Conquer by Love

2008-09-18T06:36:00.000-07:00

"The love for those less fortunate is a beautiful thing—the love for those who suffer, for those who are poor, the sick, the failures, the unlovely. This is compassion, and it touches the heart of the world.

The love for the more fortunate is a rare thing—to love those who succeed where we fail, to rejoice without envy with those who rejoice, the love of the poor for the rich, of the black man for the white man. The world is always bewildered by its saints.

And then there is love for the enemy—love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world."

— Frederick Buechner in The Magnificent Defeat

Works of Jonathan Edwards for Free

2008-09-17T09:29:00.000-07:00

Many consider Jonathan Edwards to be the most influential philosophical mind that America has yet to produce. Yet, his corpus is much neglected by the church and secular academy. In fact, in many a high school classroom, sophomores read Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and are taught about the pessimism of New English Puritanism. Noteworthy has been John Piper's efforts to revitalize Edwards' public persona as a theologian par excellence whose vision of the glory of God is breathtaking and sweeping.

But perhaps more than Piper, Yale University has kept the Edwardsian legacy alive. For years, they have continued to publish The (complete) Works, allowing us to have full textual access to his prolific writings (Banner of Truth's two-volume edition is but a microcosm). These volumes, however, are nowhere near affordable. They range from $75-100 a piece (73 volumes in toto). In response to this, Yale has now made The Works of Jonathan Edwards available online at no cost! Yes, that's right: for free! Just click here to check it out.

On Drinking a Presbyterian

2008-09-16T18:38:00.000-07:00

In the summer of 2004, I learned a valuable theological lesson from none other than a New York City born-and-raised Irish Catholic priest: Father Mark (pronounced [Maahk]). He taught me the art of the Presbyterian. As I am currently imbibing and receiving the due benefits of this lesson, I thought I'd pass it along to you all out there. Being that our theology was born in some rather inhospitable climates (Geneva and Edinburgh), this little recipe might be nice to stash away as old man winter waltzes our way. It warms the body and the soul.

Ingredients for the perfect Presbyterian:

* 2 ounces single malt Scotch or Bourbon whiskey
* 2 to 4 ounces ginger ale

Instructions for the perfect Presbyterian:

Pour Scotch into a Collins glass, add 2 or 3 ice cubes, and top up with ginger ale (Canada Dry works well). Mix with a good piece of theology and be thankful. Amen.

"Participation" in the Lord's Supper

2008-09-15T06:41:00.000-07:00

One of the bases for the Reformed doctrine of the Lord’s Supper is found in 1 Corinthians 10:16. There, the Apostle Paul rhetorically asks the Corinthians:

The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?

The implicit answer to both of these questions is “Yes, the cup and the bread are a participation.” So what do we make of this “participation?”

The Greek word used here is koinwni,a (koinonia), one which frequently means “fellowship” in the NT. The NASB translates it as “sharing,” while the NIV and ESV opt for “participation.” Whatever rendering one chooses, Paul is clearly describing an intimate relationship or a “close bond” as Hauck’s article in the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (III.798) suggests. One should consult that article for support of what I will argue below

Therefore, I was surprised to see David Garland, in his commentary on 1 Corinthians, upstage how “participation” relates to “the unity among believers” (478) without unpacking the implications for an actual unity with Christ himself. He does note that "the Lord's Supper forges a unique relationship between believer and Christ," (477) but is silent on the nature of this relationship. Granted, a commentary is no place to expound detailed sacramentology, but this verse does demand that we exegete koinwni,a quite thoroughly.

Is Garland entering into an argumentum ad silentio by upholding his doctrine of mimesis (remembrance) through emphasizing "the church" as the object of koinwni,a? It's not clear from his commentary. But one thing is clear: that argument would be lacking anyhow. If Paul had only written 1 Cor 10:16b, then the mimesis position might be tenable, for we could associate “body of Christ” with the Church. But that is not all that Paul says. Verse 16a makes clear that in the Lord’s Supper, we do more (without doing less) than communing with each other. We also commune with Christ himself.

1 Corinthians 10:16a seems (to me, at least) to state quite clearly that the object of koinwni,a is “the blood of Christ,” meaning that in taking the Lord’s Supper, we “participate” in the blood of Christ. And this is more than just a feeling of “unity” among believers. It is an actual and experiential union with Christ by the Holy Spirit.

Lest one think that we are overemphasizing the participation aspect, we can look to what Paul says a little further in the pericope. In 1 Corinthians 10:20, he states:

I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons.

What is the point here? Well, Paul shows that “participation” does not merely mean a feeling of unity among those who partake of a meal. The pagans “participate with demons” in their pagan festivals and this does not mean that the pagans dine with the demons. Rather, they see the demons as their demiurges or gods with whom they are united through a sacrificial meal. That is what koinwni,a means in this context. It is more than just “unity among believers." It is union with the divine, in our case with God in Jesus Christ.

The Lord’s Supper, according to Scripture, is more than just a remembrance of Jesus Christ’s death. It is a participation in that death. And moreover, it is only by this very “sharing” that we could ever have any real koinwni,a with each other in the first place! We cannot expect to find “unity among believers” if we undermine the real sacramental unity we have with Christ Jesus in his Supper. Union with Christ is the means by which we achieve unity with each other and there is no better place we see this displayed than at his table where all of us come hungry and needing sustenance for weak faith. This very point led Calvin to say:

"For we must first of all be incorporated (so to speak) into Christ, in order that we may be united to each other. In addition to this, Paul is not disputing at present merely in reference to a mutual fellowship among men, but as to the spiritual union between Christ and believers, with the view of drawing from this, that it is an intolerable sacrilege for them to be polluted by fellowship with idols. From the connection of the passage, therefore, we may conclude, that the communion of the blood is that connection which we have with the blood of Christ, when he engrafts all of us together into his body, that he may live in us, and we in him" (Commentary on 1 Corinthians 10:16, emphasis added).

Tim Keller on Commissioning Female Deaconesses

2008-09-08T05:07:00.000-07:00

He writes for byFaith Magazine here.

Jeremiah 17:5-8 - What To Do in 'The Year of Drought'

2008-09-04T07:21:00.000-07:00

Thus says the LORD:

"Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength,
whose heart turns away from the LORD.
6 He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come.
He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land.
7 "Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD.
8 He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream,
and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit."

This passage of Scripture is cited in Jack Miller's Repentance and the 21st Century Man as an example of the consequences of self-trust. The activity of verse 5 leads to what Miller calls "the dryness of death."

I read this passage with unusual attentiveness because I have been experiencing a heavy dose of dryness for some time now. Prayer is difficult. Scriptural study and meditation seems like a chore and yields no sense of God's fatherly affection. There is dryness, but is it "the dryness of death?"

The prophet gives us a comparative picture of two trees. The first critical point is to see that both experience a dryness. Even the second tree, the lush green tree, endures a "year of drought" (Jer. 15:8). For the first tree or "shrub" (probably a juniper), this drought makes abundant life and growth nearly impossible. It must work very hard to access water. And its leaves and berries show the result of the struggle. They are coarse, dry, and tough.

For the second tree, however, it undergoes the same drought and yet "never ceases to bear fruit." It senses the heat of the summer and is not afraid. It leaves remain green. Its fruit is sweet and ripe.

The question behind this metaphor is why? Why does one tree succeed and the other fail? What makes one better at survival than the other? At first, my answer was that the juniper shrub has shallow roots and therefore cannot get to the water while the tree has better roots, but this assumption is wrong. In fact, the juniper is one of the most resiliant shrubs in Palestine. Its roots go deep down into earth to find even the smallest bit of water. The trees described here are actually less resiliant than the juniper.

The difference is in their planting, that is their proxmity to the life-source. The tree survives not because of its sheer will-power to overcome the drought, but rather because it is "planted by the water." It is close to the life-source. If it were not for this, death would be certain because it could never endure what the desert juniper could.

Does this conclusion surprise us? It shouldn't. Let us not forget that the metaphor serves to illustrate the main point of this passage: self-trust is suicide. Your trust must be in the Lord. Better yet, your trust must be the Lord. He has been the one who has planted you where you are. He has grafted you into the very body of Christ his Son and what is to make you think that you will perish there? He has begun the work and will complete it.

If you are in a "year of drought," be wary of legalism and self-reliance. Resist the urge to roll up your sleeves and send your roots down deeper. You might be diggining into the lifeless soil of the law. In fact, this is probably the case.

Also, monitor the way you think about the means of grace. Are they becoming acts that assist your efforts at self-justification or are they deepening your sense of need for grace and faith? If you use prayer and scriptural meditation as a barometer for "how you're doing," then beware, you are acting like the juniper! And you will bear the juniper's fruit: coarse, dry, and tough. But if these means of grace do what they intend to (leading to God's heart, the fount of grace itself), then you have no fear of the searing heat of dryness. It is not a "dryness of death," but merely a test of your faith in the one who has planted you.

Jeremiah 17:5-8 teaches us that the only difference between life and death is our proximity to the life-source. Believe the Gospel of free grace, die to all legal demands, spit in the face of your doubt, and bear fruit in your year of drought.

TWO New Books on/by Bavinck (UPDATE)

2008-09-03T19:13:00.000-07:00

Eric Bristley's new book Guide to the Writings of Herman Bavinck was released today. This promises to be a handy introduction for the student seeking an introductory-level survey of Bavinck's corpus. Plus, it is only $11. Not a bad deal at all.

From the Reformation Heritage Books (RHB) website:

"This guide provides English readers with a valuable resource for the study of the works of Herman Bavinck (1854–1921), a profound Christian thinker and one of the most important Reformed theologians at the turn of the twentieth century. It features an annotated bibliography of his writings, a concise biography showing the historical context of his publications, and a bibliography of secondary literature. It also includes an essay by John Bolt, “Bavinck Speaks English.”

In addition, RHB will be publishing Bavinck's Saved by Grace: The Holy Spirit's Work in Calling and Regeneration. As is typical with Bavinck's work, he provides us with a thorough historical study of Christian dogmatic pneumatology and soteriology before he proffers his own views for a fresh understanding of the Spirit's role and work. For those of you interested in the theology of Neo-Calvinism, Bavinck's work in this text stands alongside Abraham Kuyper's The Work of the Holy Spirit and provides an interesting comparison to their differing styles and approaches to theology. This volume in particular is edited by Dr. J. Mark Beach and is translated by Nelson Kloosterman. RHB will make it available for purchase on 18 September.

Jeremiah 17:9 - Footprints on Your Heart

2008-09-02T06:32:00.000-07:00

For years, I have looked at Jeremiah 17:9 as a proof-text for the Christian doctrine of "Original Sin." More specifically, it seems to support the Reformed concept of "Radical Depravity." Jeremiah 17:9 states this:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?

I so swiftly and easily apply this verse to the actions and attitudes of those who've shown no sign of receiving the healing found in the grace of Jesus Christ. But does it apply to me? And does it apply to you? Inasmuch as our "hearts" (the Hebrew leb means "inner man" or "mind" or "will") continue to resist daily repentance from idolatry, Jeremiah's statement does and will always apply to that recalcitrant part of us which the Apostle Paul called "flesh."

In this verse from Jeremiah, the word "deceitful" creates a vivid word-picture to make the prophet's point more emphatic. The Hebrew adjective 'aqob means "hilly" or "steep." One pictures a steep mountain whose slick walls could "deceive" a climber and lead him to his death. This adjective is a cognate of the word-group which gave Jacob his name: the heel-grabber, the deceiver. Earlier in the Genesis narrative, it is used in 3:15 to describe what Satan would do to the seed of man: he would strike at his heel. At its root, the word means to trick in order to bring to ruin.

Additionally, Jeremiah's adjective means "foot-tracked" as in Hosea 6:8 which says, "Gilead is a city full of evildoers; its streets are foot-tracked with blood!" Isn't this a powerful image? Our hearts and minds and wills are "foot-tracked" with the prints of our sin and self-centeredness. The blood is the result of our idolatry. Whether we have bowed down to career success, money, sex, relationships, child-rearing, or comfort, this pursuit has left a trail of bloody footprints. It shows where we've been and what we've done. There are no secrets with respect to the actions. Moreover, the vicious pursuit has wounded us. The blood is not only from the others that we've harmed, but it is comingled with our own blood. We evidence the struggle between flesh and "Spirit" (a Christian's new nature) by the visible and invisible physical and spiritual scars it has left upon us.

As tragic and harmful as our "deceitful" idolatry might be, we cannot forget Genesis 3:15 which promises to us that though the adversary will deceive us with a strike at the heel (Hebrew 'aqab), the Second Adam has dealt the decisive blow by crushing his head. With that victory, he has also conquered our own hearts. He has given us righteousness for our deceit. He has given us healing for our desperate sickness. But he has done this by his own blood. Those bloody footprints led not to the place of secretive sin, but to a place of public humiliation and scorn. There, righteous suffering produced atonement.

May his bloody footprints leave lasting and indelible footprints upon our hearts in a way that to bloody footprints of idolatrous deceit never can. May we follow those prints into the places He went in order to reach the people He reached, those who are just like us, except for His saving mercy and grace.

Labeling and Naming: Suffering for Tolkein's Sake

2008-08-28T10:46:00.000-07:00

The other day I gave a ride to a friend (or should I say an acquaintance?). In order for him to sit in the passenger seat I had to move my well-worn, dog-eared copy of Tolkein's The Fellowship of the Ring, volume I of the famous Lord of the Rings trilogy. I received the three-volume set as a gift in junior high school and it is one of my most valued (though not valuable) sets as a self-confessed bibliophile.

This acquaintance, ignorant to Tolkein's brilliance and relevance, laughed and stated that he hadn't pegged me for a "sci-fi nerd." Now, let's be honest here. I am a nerd...a huge nerd. That's not news to me or any of you who know me. But what he meant by the label was the Dragon Slayer, RPG, Dwight K. Schrute stereotype. I can live with the association (slightly resenting it) but what was sad was how quickly he labeled the unfamiliar. He had seen the movies but thought only the type above would ever actually read the books (or [gasp!] read them more than once). I have done the very same thing, but this occasion made me stop and ask: Why do we label in this way? I think we do it to shrink whatever is being labelled down to size and thereby gain our dominance over it. By labeling it, we think we can remove ourself from its influence and potential for truth.

Children's fiction author Madeline L'Engle has put it better than I ever could:

"It seems that more than ever the compulsion today is to identify, to reduce someone to what is on the label. To identify is to control, to limit. To love is to call by name, and so open the wide gates of creativity. But we forget names, and turn to labels; there are many familiar ones today, such as:

Fairy tales are not real and should be outgrown.

Christians are people who are not strong enough to do it alone.

Chopin is only a romantic.

El Greco must have had astigmatism to account for his elongated people.

All Victorian poets had TB.

Roman Catholics are not Christians.

Protestants cannot understand Holy Communion.

People who write for children are second-class and cannot write for adults.

And the list could go on and on and on.

If we are pigeon-holed and labeled we are un-named."

Whatever your profession and whatever your sphere of influence, you and I would do well to resist our urge to label things which we do not grasp. Let us be the image of God and do what both God and Adam did: name, show love, and create space for creativity.

Incarnation and Contextualization

2008-08-27T05:38:00.001-07:00

One of the core values of the church which I serve is "loving adaptability." Does that phrase make sense? It may not. Originally, we called the core value "contextualization," but soon realized that most people don't know the meaning of the word, thereby making us hypocrites if we continued to use a word unknown to many people.

"Loving adaptability" or "contextualization" is a commitment to use language and thought-forms common to the culture we serve. We resist slipping out of a common tongue and into "Christianeze." We refuse to intentionally use words that are not part of our local vocabulary. Thus, we describe words like "justification," "sanctification," and "glorification" without actually using those words (or at least not very often). In this way, we show that a) we understand the concepts ourselves and b) we desire that others would understand them.

On a brief side note, this may sound to some like the "seeker sensitive" movement of years past, but it isn't. What's the difference? The seeker sensitive approach sought to make the message of Jesus acceptable to the unchurched person. The "contextualized" approach seeks to make the message accessible, recognizing that the message of sin and grace is never acceptable apart from faith granted by the Holy Spirit. It seeks to keep the content intact while adapting the form to its culture. The seeker sensitive movement changed both content and form.

We are wholly committed to this idea because the triune God is committed to it. He spoke in one language and not another because that language would be understood by his audience. YHWH is not an Arabic-exclusive revelator as the Muslims suggest. Rather, he speaks in ways intelligible to people. Also, he becomes what he wants say. He is enfleshed in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. He learns a language (Aramaic, Hebrew, and perhaps Greek), learns a trade (carpentry or masonry), has a certain shoe size, is a certain height, and so on. And all of these are consistent with his audience, namely humanity. To save humanity, God had to become human.

In his song "Take to the World," artist Derek Webb has poignantly said, "And like the Three-in-One, know you must become what you want to save." This is "loving adaptability" in a nut-shell. We become what we want to save. We become as the unchurched to win the unchurched. We incarnate the message of grace. God did this; we ought to as well.

Machen's Gauntlet.....On Sale!

2008-08-19T09:21:00.000-07:00

In 1923, J. Gresham Machen was fighting to maintain Princeton Theological Seminary's connection with her Reformed, Anglo-Scottish Presbyterian roots via the Westminster Confession, biblical inerrancy, and the legacy of Archibald Alexander, Charles Hodge and B.B. Warfield. His efforts would ultimately fail, leading he and others to flee those hallowed halls for Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia.

Now, for $6.50, you can own a copy of Machen's manifesto against the Liberalism that "infected" Princeton at that time, Christianity and Liberalism. As the title suggest, Machen believes Liberalism to be an non-Christian movement based on non-Christian principles making it thereby something non-Christian. It is a must read, whether you agree with Machen or not.

Westminster Seminary's bookstore is offering this deal through 15 September. Order more than $35 worth and the shipping is only $4. What a deal!

The Irony of Independence: PTSD & Fireworks

2008-07-04T08:54:00.000-07:00

First of all, I apologize for my recent drought of blog posts. For the last month, I have been fulfilling my commitments as a reservist Air Force chaplain. Those responsibilities have kept me out of the rarefied air of the blogosphere.

And on that note, I have had the privilege to counsel a Marine who recently retired from his service in the Corps. He did one tour in Desert Storm and three tours in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He did what was asked of him, earned a Purple Heart when his convoy was attacked by insurgents, and has the scars to show for it. But that is the least of his problems. His deepest wounds are in his soul. The doctors and the VA can do little for this and so he comes to my office.

We have talked and prayed and wept together concerning what he has seen and done. He wonders if God has forsaken him. He wonders how he will be judged by his Maker.

Healing has already taken place from this hellish thing called Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). But he has a long way to go. The nightmares and tremors are entirely too vivid. He is still hyper-vigilant even in completely tranquil situations. Sounds and shadows haunt him daily.

He is worried about this evening when our nation gathers to remember its freedom because it is our custom to shoot off fireworks. We do this to remember how we gained freedom from King George: the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air. Ironically, these fireworks sound like guns and mortars. A string of blackcats is virtually indistinguishable from "AWF": Automatic Weapon Fire. A whistler resembles the hum and bang of an "RPG": Rocket Propelled Grenade. These noises take a warfighter back to a place he does not want to go. So this retired Marine will have to seclude himself from his family's gathering in fear of his reaction to the crash, boom, and bang. What is supposed to be a night of celebrating freedom will become for him a night of slavery to a dark, quiet room. That is the irony of our independence.

Bruce McCormack on WTS & Peter Enns

2008-05-23T09:39:00.001-07:00

Princeton Seminary's Bruce McCormack reflects on the report from Westminster Theological Seminary which justified the suspension of professor Peter Enns for his "incarnational model" of Scripture. His thesis: the christology of this report is not historically Reformed, but rather Lutheran or even Eastern Orthodox. Read it here.

New Book: A Theological Guide to Calvin's Institutes

2008-05-14T13:11:00.000-07:00

Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing has released A Theological Guide to Calvin's Institutes: Essays and Analysis. This collection of essays on Calvin's Institutes is in celebration of the 500th anniversary of his birth. The description is as follows:

Capturing both the best of elite scholarship, as well as exhibiting a firm understanding of and passion for Calvin's own work, these essays by twenty elite Calvin scholars who appreciate the abiding value of Calvin's Institutes provide definitive and section-by-section commentary on Calvin's magnum opus. Capturing both the best of elite scholarship, as well as exhibiting a firm understanding of and passion for Calvin's own work, these essays provide definitive commentary from Calvin scholars who seek to elucidate his work and display its abiding value. This long-needed work serves as the natural companion to Calvin's The Institutes of the Christian Religion for classes, students, pastors, and others for years to come.

Props to Justin Taylor for tipping us all off to this new work.

Institutes III.2.36 - Heart Over Head

2008-05-14T06:45:00.000-07:00

One of the most popular misconceptions about John Calvin is that he is a cold, unfeeling, cerebral theologian who disregards human affections and over-analyzes God's will. Herman Bavinck disproves this thesis in his famous 1898 speech "De Algemeene Genade" ("Common Grace"). More recently, Marilynne Robinson, director of the Writer's Workshop at the University of Iowa and winner of the Pulitzer, has done the same. In her introduction to Death of Adam: Essays on Modern Thought, she accuses German historian Max Weber with making the idea widespread. Herself an avowed fan of Calvin, she shows that Calvin's entire system is typified by a deep desire for personal and communal pietas or "piety." It was Weber who thought that Calvin and his followers were joyless and ascetic, a practical outgrowth of their "heady" theology. But this, Robinson argues, is simply not true to the facts of the matter.

In the Institutes, Calvin never emphasizes head over heart. In fact, both are vital to a lively Christianity. The head is the realm of the Word and the heart is the realm of the Holy Spirit. Being that Calvin's conception of faith and life is logopneumatic, it is not surprising to see both head and heart playing essential roles in Christian epistemology.

The head is the processing center for knowledge. It is the door. But it necessarily leads into the place where the knowledge can be of benefit. This place is the heart. Calvin says:

For the Word of God is not received by faith if it flits about in the top of the brain, but when it takes root in the depth of the heart that it may be an invincible defense to withstand and drive of all the stratagems of temptation (II.2.36).

The head is the door and the heart is the room. While we must use the door to enter the room, the door is not the place where we dwell. The truth of the gospel - gracious election, justification, sanctification, and glorification - is meant for our hearts. We find these ideas in the Word and believe in them continually by the work of the Holy Spirit who "seal[s] up in our hearts those very promises" (II.2.36).

Institutes III.2.6 - Faith as a Logopneumatic Syllogism

2008-04-25T06:38:00.000-07:00

In book III, Calvin is leading us through the means by which we receive the grace of Christ. It is clear that the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, is the central character in this operation. Some have thought Calvinism to be void of pnuematology, a doctrine of the Holy Spirit. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, Calvin has been called (somewhere...) a theologian of the Holy Spirit.

In III.1.3, Calvin exegetes some of the scriptural titles of the Holy Spirit, including "spirit of adoption," "the guarantee and seal," "life," "water," "oil/anointing," "spring," and "hand of God." In the following section, however, he gives us his thesis statement: "But faith is the principal work of the Holy Spirit." The reason we believe is because in some way, the Holy Spirit has allowed this by giving (i.e. - the means by which) us the gift of faith (Eph. 2:8-9).

This faith has a sure and certain object, namely Jesus Christ himself. Jesus is received "clothed with his gospel" (III.2.6) which according to Calvin is not only the message, but also the written account of that message (see his citation of John 20:31). In both the living and written forms, we have the Word. Calvin adds, "we must be reminded that there is a permanent relationship between faith and the Word. [God] could not separate one from the other any more than we could separate the rays from the sun from which they come" (III.2.6).

So in the first two chapters of book III, we have a logopneumatic syllogism which is as follows:

1) If faith is the principal work of the Spirit (pneuma),
2) And faith is in permanent relationship with the Word (logos)

then,

3) Faith is properly logopneumatic, a relationship and act of Word and Spirit.

When we believe in the Christ of the gospel, the living Word presented to us in the written Word, we can be sure that the Spirit is accomplishing a thoroughly triune task within us. The Father's perfect will is being achieved by his logopneumatic servants: the Word and the Spirit.

Another Review of McGowan's "Divine Spiration"

2008-04-23T08:38:00.000-07:00

Martin Downes reviews the book as the lead story over at Reformation21...found here.

Thanks to Brian Cosby for the heads up!

Institutes II.16.8 -12 - The Descent Into Hell

2008-04-19T08:23:00.000-07:00

To many Protestants reared in a non-creedal tradition, a recital of the Apostle's Creed often produces two theological questions:

1) What does it mean that Jesus "descended into hell"?

and

2) I'm not Catholic, so why am I confessing faith in the "holy catholic church"?

For the second question, begin by looking up the word "catholic" in an etymological dictionary and then come to realize that you can be catholic without being Roman, orthodox without being Byzantine, and protestant without having to define yourself by what you aren't.

For the first question, let's turn our attention to this section of Calvin's Institutes and see how he explains the matter. As is typical, he begins with a brief historical survey to set the stage for his view. Calvin rightly notes that the earliest versions of the Old Roman Creed (a prototype of the Apostle's Creed) did not include this phrase, though it was a universal belief in among the church fathers. However, this universal belief of Christ's descent did have varied interpretations.

The first view is that "he descended into hell" is simply another way of saying that Jesus was buried. Those who hold this view see "hell" as being synonymous with "the grave." But Calvin discounts this opinion because a creed, which prides itself on being succinct, would not needlessly repeat "he was buried" and "he descended into hell" if they meant the same thing.

The second view, held by Aquinas and others who followed him, is that Christ descended to the place where the souls of the OT believers were being held. There, Jesus proclaimed his victory and freed them. The concept of "Limbo" was created to describe this holding tank, though Calvin calls it "nothing but a story" (II.16.9). As a side note, this view was the most prevalent interpretation in the pre-Reformation era, one that Calvin countered in his first writing as a Protestant (the 1534 Psychopannychia or "On Soul Sleep").

The third view, Calvin's own view, is that Christ's descent into hell is a further explanation of his suffering and death. The "hell" that Christ descended into was the "hell" of being the object of God's wrath and judgment. The "hell" is the cross. When the cry of dereliction was issued from Christ's mouth, it was a cry from the pit of hell itself. Calvin calls this view "a surer explanation" (II.16.10) and says "surely no more terrible abyss can be conceived than to feel yourself forsaken and estranged from God; and when you call upon him, not be heard. It is as if God himself has plotted your ruin" (II.16.11).

Christ experienced this hell of being cursed and ignored by God. But by the confession of our mighty Creed, we can be certain that because of his descent, we need not fear the same. In his own way and by his own will, the Father has promised to bless and hear those who seek the face of his Son.

Hast Thou not bid me seek Thy face,
And shall I seek in vain?
And can the ear of sovereign grace,
Be deaf when I complain?
No, still the ear of sovereign grace,
Attends the mourner's prayer
Oh may I ever find access,
To breathe my sorrows there.

Two Reviews of McGowan's "The Divine Spiration of Scripture"

2008-04-17T13:10:00.000-07:00

Richard de Witt reviews the book for Banner of Truth here and Iain Campbell does the same on his blog here.

De Witt sums up his thoughts:

1. We must acknowledge Dr. McGowan's desire to cast additional light upon an issue of the greatest possible consequence, not only in Great Britain, Europe, and North America, but all around the world.

2. It must also be said, however, that in most respects his effort is not successful. The Divine Spiration of Scripture exhibits wide reading and acquaintance with a broad range of contemporary thought on the topic he treats. One observes at the same time that many of the writers with whom he is in serious discussion, though professedly evangelical, have abandoned a conviction firmly held by the great majority of Christians from the beginning. I do not presume to pass judgment on the sincerity of anyone's faith, but I have the responsibility to register profound concern. James Orr and G. C. Berkouwer did their work as the doctrinal collapse of the churches they served was becoming increasingly apparent. Orr's mediating position did nothing to deliver the United Free Church of Scotland from the devastation wrought by A. B. Davidson, William Robertson Smith, Marcus Dods, James Denney, and others. Berkouwer, though much of what he gave us can be valued, in his teaching on Scripture did not and could not help the Reformed Churches of the Netherlands resist the tidal wave of a new theology which destroyed their once firm witness. For what conceivable reason should we be inclined to follow them?

3. That Dr. McGowan's intentions are worthy I do not doubt; but he would have served us better by forthrightly resisting the redefinition of 'infallibility' which is now so frequently to be found in evangelical writers. Each generation has its own battles to fight. McGowan's book reminds us that the struggles which appear to be waged on new ground are really very far from that. The same issues constantly recur, in new dress and with fresh intensity, as though now — at long last and in the light of ideas hitherto undisclosed — the truth of the matter has been discovered. From The Divine Spiration of Scripture we may draw a solemn warning. It is, I suppose, in the nature of the case that good men succumb to the yearning for intellectual respectability and acceptance. I am certainly very far from casting aspersions on scholarship. The church deserves and the church must have ministers and leaders as learned as the circumstances allow. But that learning is always to be governed by obedience to the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures. When the theological enterprise falls prey to worldly philosophy or some sort of what is considered to be 'new knowledge', the consequences are inevitably disastrous.

Iain Campbell concludes likewise:

I grant that Professor McGowan’s book is at once challenging, thought-provoking, unsettling and disturbing. But if it comes down to a contest between Warfield on inerrancy and McGowan on authenticity, the dead theologian wins every time.

I have yet to read the book, but if any of you have read it and care to comment, that would be much appreciated.

Institutes II.15.1 - What's In A Name?

2008-04-15T06:03:00.000-07:00

Calvin begins chapter 15 by citing something Augustine mentions in Enchiridion. There, the good bishop reminds us that while heretics may use the word "Christ," the meaning behind that term is not in agreement with the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. Calvin goes on to say, "For if we diligently consider the things that pertain to Christ, we will find Christ among the heretics in name only, not in reality." That is why Calvin goes on to define the Christ as the prophet, priest, and king, an ancient Christological model dating back to Eusebius.

This idea was profoundly true for Augustine and Calvin. It is profoundly true today. Semantic legerdemain (a great word!) continues to occur in the theological and religious arena. The words "God" and "Jesus Christ" have no meaning in themselves. They must have a historico-biblical correspondence in Scripture and the creeds. Otherwise, they may represent virtually innumerable concepts that would otherwise be rejected if the words themselves were not comfortable to us. In my opinion, the popularity of Mormonism is due to this phenomenon. People hear the words "God" and "Jesus Christ" and assume that Mormonism is just another Christian denomination. A deeper look proves this assertion to be untrue.

In our era, Francis Schaeffer made the same observation as Augustine and Calvin:

We must stress that the answer can never lie in the word "God"; that will never do. Modern men are trying to find answers just in the word God, in god words. This is true of the new theology, the hippie cult, and some of the "Jesus people" of a few years ago. But the answer is not in the use of the word, but in its content: what God has told us concerning Himself, as being the infinite-personal God and the true Trinity (He Is There and He Is Not Silent in The Complete Works, I.303-304).

We must beware of hearing the words "Jesus Christ" or "God" and assuming they refer to the faith handed down through Scripture and the creeds. This is not the case; it has never been the case as Augustine and Calvin prove.

Today, one look at the Christology of the "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints" (or Mormons) will tell you that you it is very possible to use the name without referring to the reality. The same could be said for the neo-Arian Jehovah's Witnesses. Caveat lector...reader beware! When these names are used, ask, "What's in a name?" The answers may shock you.

Paedocommunion and 1 Corinthians 11

2008-04-14T14:04:00.000-07:00

Daniel Kirk explains it here.

Keller's "The Reason for God" On Sale

2008-04-14T08:23:00.001-07:00

Tim Keller's The Reason for God (Dutton, 2008) has been on the NYT's "Best Seller List" for seven weeks and has remained in the top 10 for most of its time there. Westminster Seminary Bookstore is calling it "the most accessible and effective case for Christian faith available today."

Thus, they are offering the book at a reduced rate ($13.72 - see here) so that you can buy one for yourself (if you don't already have it) and buy one for a friend.

Institutes II.15 - The Threefold Office of Christ

2008-04-14T07:32:00.000-07:00

In preparation for book II, chapter 15, below is a lecture on the threefold office of Christ which I delivered at Hope Presbyterian Church (PCA) in November of 2006. It is introductory level but may prove useful to some of you have not thought of Jesus in these terms before.

I. The Christ/Messiah

From Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion, II.15.1-2 (1559)

The office enjoined upon Christ by the Father consists of three parts. For he was given to be prophet, king, and priest . . . Now it is to be noted that the title “Christ” pertains to these three offices: for we know that under the law prophets as well as priests and kings were anointed with holy oil.

The Heidelberg Catechism (1563)

Q31: Why is Jesus called “Christ,” that is, Anointed?
A31: Because he is ordained of God the Father, and anointed with the Holy Ghost, to be our chief Prophet and Teacher, who fully reveals to us the secret counsel and will of God concerning our redemption; and our only High Priest, who by the one sacrifice of his body has redeemed us, and ever lives to make intercession for us with the Father; and our eternal King, who governs us by his Word and Spirit, and defends and preserves us in the redemption obtained for us.

A. Meaning

Both the Hebrew term Mashiach and the Greek term Christos mean “Anointed One.” The ceremony of anointing is used in the Bible to set apart a person or an item (such as a shield) for the work of the Lord. There are many figures in the OT referred to as “anointed ones,” for example King David (Ps. 89:20), the prophet Isaiah (Is. 61:1-2), and the priest Aaron (Lev. 8:12).

B. The Three Strands of OT Messianic Thought

If you would have asked 10 Jewish people in the time of Jesus’ birth about the Messiah, most likely you would have gotten 11 different responses. However, from these responses, three general ideas would emerge:

1) A King like David – This would have been the most natural association in using the word “Messiah.”

2) The “Son of Man” from Daniel – alluding to Daniel 7:13-14, the “Son of Man” figure is one who would come and go in power and authority and be given a kingdom by subduing all competing forces under his feet.

3) The “Suffering Servant” in Isaiah – Though far less common than the kingly aspect, this illusive personage was connected with the one who would suffer for Israel and purge her from her iniquity.

C. John’s Employment of this OT Image for His Sketch of the Messianic Mediator

The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647)

Q23: What offices does Christ execute as our Redeemer?
A23: Christ, as our Redeemer, executes the offices of a Prophet, of a Priest, and of a King, both in his estate of humiliation and exaltation.

1) Jesus as Prophet – The “Son of Man” as one who speaks not with his own authority, but with the very authority of God, because he is the Word and he is God.
2) Jesus as Priest – The “Suffering Servant” as the one who would be both the Great High Priest who intercedes for his people and offers a sacrifice in their behalf and the very sacrifice itself as the Lamb of God who takes away their sin.
3) Jesus as King – Jesus is the Davidic ruler who inaugurates a covenant in his blood and establishes a kingdom to spread the power of his name to all the earth.

II. The Prophet

A. The Work of the OT Prophets

1) The Passive Work - Receiving the Word of God – this aspect often came in dreams, visions, or verbal communication from God. A true prophet never spoke out of his or her own opinion or authority, but only what was communicated by God.
2) The Active Work - Speaking the Word of God – this aspect often involved telling people what they did not want to hear. The “calling card” of the true prophet was his dictum, “Thus saith the Lord…” This formula signaled to the audience that what followed was not a device of man, but a message from Yahweh Himself. In Jeremiah 14:13, Jeremiah laments the message of the false prophets who give the Israelites a false sense of security and affirmed their sin against God. The Lord’s response is that He neither sent them nor spoke to them. They speak their own opinions, not the word of the Lord. Delivering the word of the Lord involved two types of speech:

i. Forth Telling – This aspect involves the exposure of Israel’s sin and rebellion and the declaration of God’s anger at belittling His law. Often, forth telling involves a call for the people to repent. This was the primary type of speech issued by a true prophet.
ii. Foretelling – To heighten the sense of urgency in forth telling, God would often give His prophets a glimpse of future events (judgment, destruction, exile) that awaited a stiff-necked people. While most people think of the idea of prophecy purely in this sense, we must realize that the prophets of the Bible only predicted the future in the context of their forth telling.

B. The Work of Jesus as Our Prophet (John 4:19, 44; 8:26-28; 18:37)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647)

Q24: How does Christ execute the office of a Prophet?
A24: Christ executes the office of a Prophet, in revealing to us by his Word and Spirit, the will of God for our salvation.

1) The Passive Work – He is the Word of God – Before Jesus was an incarnate human, John tells us that He was the Word by which God spoke all things into existence. In this sense, we do not have to be concerned with Jesus speaking a message delivered from his Father, because from all eternity, he is the Word of God and he cannot betray himself.
2) The Active Work – He speaks the Word of God – Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptizer signals a passing of the prophetic torch and the beginning of his active prophetic ministry as he is gifted with the Spirit (Word and Spirit coming together in a person!). His ministry involved much foretelling and forth telling, Mark 13 being a perfect example: Jesus’ prophetic role was vindicated not only in his death and resurrection, but in the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, AD 70.

III. The Priest

A. The Work of OT Priests

The OT priesthood was an order established by God for the sake of mediation, so that the people could have a representative with access and privilege to go before God. The priests had to maintain a status of being “clean” before God, which meant that they could not come in contact with death or defilement because they had to come close to a God who was both “living” (as opposed to dead) and “holy” (as opposed to profane). The work of the priests, as outlined in the Pentateuch, was to:

1) Offer gifts and sacrifices for sins of both himself and the community
2) Intercede for those whom he represented – Lev. 16
3) Teach the people
4) Pronounce the blessings of the LORD upon the people – Numbers 6

B. The Work of Jesus as Our Priest (John 1:29; 17:1-26; 19:16-30)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647)

Q25: How does Christ execute the office of a Priest?
A25: Christ executes the office of a Priest, in his once offering up of himself a sacrifice to satisfy divine justice, and reconcile us to God [in] making continual intercession for us.

1) Obedience – Like the priests of old, Jesus maintained a status of being “clean,” but not according to conventional standards. His cleanness was internal rather than external. It came by living a sinless and perfect life, actually fulfilling the command under the covenant of life made with Adam in the Garden of Eden. Mark 5 is a perfect example of how this internal v. external cleanness played itself out in his earthly ministry (healing the demoniac, the bleeding woman, and Jairus’ dead daughter).
2) Substitutionary Sacrifice – The picture of Jesus’ priestly work in the Gospel extends not only to his access and privilege to offer a sacrifice, but to his being the sacrifice itself (the Lamb of God). He is the one who, although innocent, bore the punishment for the guilty, so that the guilty might be declared innocent (2 Cor. 5:21). This sacrifice is efficacious once-for-all time because of his access to the heavenly tabernacle, where he presented the perfect offering of himself.
3) Redemption – Redemption carries with it the idea of “buying back.” As a result of this priestly work in his life and in his death, he mediated for us by interposing his blood as legal tender in the economy of God’s redemption. Throughout the Gospels, his blood is described as a “ransom” (Matt. 20:28) to free those who have been kidnapped by Satan.
4) Reconciliation - Through his death on the cross, Christ has made us who were enemies of God friends of God and sons of God. The Biblical model is not that only one side is reconciled (us to God), but that both sides are reconciled to one another. God initiates this actions, performing 100% of the work of reconciliation and then requires us to devote 100% of ourselves to following him with. This is not a 50/50 deal. Reconciliation in the gospel is 100/100.
5) Prayer – When the catechism speaks of “continual intercession,” one way of looking at this is through Jesus’ continual prayer for us, his Church (John 17). Christ’s work on the cross was only the beginning and establishment of your relationship. It continues even now. He lives at the right hand of God to constantly intercede for you. His wounds plead for God’s mercy and the Father is glad to show you mercy in light of that. His prayers plead for God’s blessing and the Father is glad to bless you in Christ.

V. The King

A. The Work of OT Kings

Monarchy, not democracy was the form of government used in the ancient world. Every ancient Near-Eastern dynasty was ruled as such. The work necessary to procure a successful reign as king was quite was clear: make a covenant with the people and establish a legitimate kingdom. The Lord ruled over Israel in a different way. He desired a theocracy, which meant there would be no king but him. However, eventually the people desired an earthly vice-regent and the Lord granted their request, anointing and seating Saul on the throne (apx. 1040 BC). The work of a successful Israelite king was similarly clear:

1) Covenant – The means by which God established this people was through a covenant given to Abraham. This covenant was further developed as the people made their way into the Promised Land of Canaan through the Law given to Moses on Mount Sinai. An Israelite king was supposed to enforce this Law not only though legislation and foreign policy, but through personal example. He was supposed to ensure that the people knew who the Lord was, what he had done, and how they ought to rightly worship him in light of these things.
2) Kingdom – The covenant blessings of God promised to Abraham included a kingdom, not only through the land itself, but through the formation of a people. The work of a faithful vice-regent was to oversee the conquest and/or defense of the Promised Land. It was to deal fairly with the Israelite people and lead them in the expansion of God’s kingdom throughout the world. Tragically, few of the earthly kings ever lived up to this standard. By and large, their presence led the people away from God’s covenant and kingdom into idolatry and intermarriage. By the eighth century before Christ, God was already promising a once-and-final king who would faithfully administer God’s covenant and kingdom forever (Isaiah 9:6-7).

B. The Work of Jesus Our King (John 1:49; 12:13-15; 18:36-37; 19:1-21)

The Westminster Shorter Catechism (1647)

Q26: How does Christ execute the office of a King?
A26: Christ executes the office of a King, in subduing us to himself, in ruling us and defending us, and [in] restraining and conquering all his and our enemies.

1) An Eternal King – In John’s prologue (1:1-14), he depicts the Word as being a co-agent of creation and dwelling with the Father. When he becomes flesh (1:14), his glory (i.e. heaviness) was seen by all. Paul too is not hesitant in ascribing eternal kingship to Jesus (Col. 1:15-20 & Phil. 2:6-11). In this way Jesus rules over the Kingdom of his Power, which is creation. Since he made all things and in him all things hold together, he is eternally king over all creation and creatures.

2) An Incarnate King – Jesus would have been hesitant to stand up and publicly proclaim himself as king. This proclamation would have been radically misinterpreted by anyone who did not understand the exact nature of his kingship. The thing to realize is that Jesus’ incarnate kingship is a spiritual kingship. When Nathaniel proclaimed him “King of Israel” (John 1:49) and when he was heralded as such at the triumphal entry into Jerusalem (John 12:13), these people misunderstood. They wanted Jesus to take his supernatural powers and use them to achieve a physical victory. When he was arrested, beaten, and then mocked by the Romans soldiers who made fun of his kingship, they too expected his kingship to be manifested physically by the exertion of military force. Jesus Christ’s spiritual kingship was manifested most gloriously on the cross and this scandal was vindicated at the resurrection. This king came to achieve a victory, but not a victory over a political nation and not the use of force. He came to defeat sin and death through love. In this way, he rules over the Kingdom of His Grace which is the Church. Since he became flesh and died and was resurrected, he has purchased the rights to this people, which is called his “bride” in the closing chapters of Revelation. By our baptism, we are engrafted into this body and made beneficiaries of the blessings which come with belonging to it.

3) A New Covenant - At the Last Supper, Jesus inaugurated the “New Covenant” in his blood. This new covenant was foreseen by Jeremiah (Jer. 31:31 f.) and Ezekiel (Ezek. 36:26 f.) as being the covenant by which God would fulfill the conditions of all other covenants. This covenant is what we enter into when we are “saved” by the blood of Christ. It is important for us to see that Jesus’ “New Covenant” does not stand in contrast to the Old Testament, because throughout the OT, God was gracious in continually relating to his people via covenantal categories. The contrast is not between OT and NT; the contrast is between the covenant of grace and the covenant of life/works. We must rely on the former because we are incapable of fulfilling the obligations of the latter. By partaking in Holy Communion, we receive the benefits of union with Christ in his death and resurrected life as the Holy Spirit mysteriously supports and sustains our faith in and through this sacrament.

Institutes II.12.6 - The Form of Angels?

2008-04-10T06:12:00.001-07:00

In today's reading from Calvin's Institutes (II.12.4-7), I came across a most puzzling statement. He says: "If we believe in Christ, we shall take on the form of angels [Matt. 22:30] when we are received into heaven, and this will be our final happiness" (II.12.6).

When I read this, I had to stop and ask, "Is this correct?" It made me uneasy because it is clearly not what Scripture teaches. Yes, this is a popular concept of the heavenly blessedness, namely that when we die, we become angelic infants who spend our eternity wearing diapers, sitting on clouds, and playing harps. The Italian Renaissance painter Raphael did little to rid us of this concept as he rendered his angels in the form of humans.

Has Calvin fallen prey to this common, yet thoroughly unbiblical notion? No, he has not. When we turn to his commentary on the passage cited in the previous quotation from the Institutes, we get a better explanation. There he states:

"He [Matthew] does not mean that the children of God will be, in all respects, like the angels, but only so far as they shall be free from every infirmity of the present life; thus affirming that they will no longer be exposed to the wants of a frail and perishing life" (Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists, vol. II, pg. 51).

This statement clarifies what Calvin means by the phrase "the form of angels." He means that we shall be eternal and blessed, not that we will actually become angels. Angels and humans are two entirely different classes of creatures. When we humans die, our souls go to be with God, but they do so as human souls. At the resurrection, our souls will be rejoined to a resurrected body, but even then, it will be a resurrected human body. It will be recognizably human as Christ's resurrected body (the first-fruits of our resurrection) was recognizably human. The curse of the fall is not being human, but being fleshly (Greek sarx). Death rids us of our flesh, not our humanity. God's intention in redeeming humanity is not to make us less human, but like the Second Adam, to make us more human. In this respect, we will never be like angels.

Institutes II.10-11 - The Two Testaments

2008-04-08T07:37:00.000-07:00

For the last week, we have been reading two critical chapters in the Institutes, those dealing with the continuity and discontinuity between the Old and New Testaments. This discussion was critical in the sixth and sixteenth centuries of church history; it is still critical today. One's interpretation of a biblical text will be radically affected by one's views of this relationship. Much of the difference between Presbyterians, Baptists, and pre-millenial dispensationalists can be traced back to basic views on the relationship between the Testaments. It has implications for our soteriology, sacramentology, and ecclesiology. Calvin's survey is worthy of a closer look.

Calvin begins by studying the similarities in chapter 10 of book II. He says summarily, "The covenant made with all the patriarchs is so much like ours in substance and reality that the two are actually one and the same. Yet, they differ in the mode of dispensation (administratio)" (II.10.2). So, there is one covenant and at least two "administrations" (I prefer this translation).

To prove his point, Calvin makes the same argument as the author of Hebrews 11, showing how the faith of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, etc. was placed firmly in the promise of a Messiah. The promise is first found in Genesis 3:15, before the dust of Adam's fall had even settled. The promises become more clear and more bold throughout the rest of the history of Israel (an ideas called "organic progressive revelation" per Geerhardus Vos).

Calvin sums up toward the end of chapter 10, "The Old Testament fathers (1) had Christ as pledge of their covenant, and (2) out in him all trust of future blessedness" (II.10.23). So when the Old Testament belivers desired to follow the law, when they sacrificed for their transgressions thereof, or when they worshiped in the Tabernacle or Temple, they were looking forward to the promised Christ of God, who was himself foreshadowed in the aforementioned ceremonies.

Calvin shifts gears in chapter 11 by highlighting the differences. It is clear to us that the New Testament (especially the epistles) have a different focus and thrust than much of the Old Testament histories and prophetic/wisdom texts. Calvin too recognizes this: "I freely admit the differences in Scripture, to which attention is called, but in such a way as not to detract from its established unity" (II.11.1). The unity is the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth. But again, the difference is found in "the manner of dispensation (modum administrationis)" (II.11.1).

Specifically, according to Calvin, the difference between the Old and New Testaments is four-fold.

First, the Old Testament involved a more earthly representation of the heavenly benefits. The benefits have always been heavenly, but in the Old, there was more earthly representation. This is why we see more theophanies and more prophecy in the Old than the New. This is why the Israelites received more sacramental rites than we. This was the significance of Canaan (see II.11.2). They did not yet have the physical Christ to place faith in and thus, God accommodated for that by an earthly inheritance meant to "mirror" the heavenly one.

Second, the Old Testament reveals in "shadow" (umbra) what the New Testament reveals in "substance" (corpore). Calvin says of the sacrificial system, "Its sole function was to be an introduction to the better hope that is manifested in the gospel" (II.11.4). This also is true of all ceremonial aspects of the Old as they were fulfilled by the life, death, and resurrection of the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth.

Third, the Old Testament is "literal" while the New is "spiritual." This requires some explanation, so Calvin unpacks the idea in II.11.8 where he contrasts letter and spirit, death and life, condemnation and righteousness. The Old Testament (as a self-contained unit) could only deliver the former, while the New supplements and brings the latter. The New enlivens the letter and makes it a spiritual letter (dare I say...logopneumatika). With Christ placed at the center of all Scripture, we hear words of death and condemnation, but know and believe that "there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1).

Fourth and finally, the Old only ever leads us to bondage while the New can deliver us into freedom, liberty, and sonship. The self-righteousness that humans derive from morality and religion cannot bring freedom because of our incapability to obey perfectly, but through Jesus' perfect fulfillment of that law, we have his record and even better, we have him. By this possession via the Holy Spirit, we cry "Abba! Father!" (Romans 8:15).

There is much more to say about how "the gospel" or New Testament is found in the Old and how the Old is now used by those under the New (see chapter 2 of T.H.L. Parker's book Calvin's Old Testament Commentaries for a thorough study). For now, let us see that Calvin takes great pains to describe the monolithic covenant grace of God to fallen humanity. This covenant of grace was always and everywhere based upon a Christ. At the right time, this Christ came to us and for us. We who live in the time following his coming should rejoice in the clarity of God's revelation in him. It is no longer shadow or image, but a person, the light of the world, Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God for his Christ, his Son!

Paul Helm on Calvin's "Big Idea"

2008-04-01T05:59:00.000-07:00

At the invitation of principal Andrew McGowan, Paul Helm recently delivered the annual John Murray Lecture at Highland Theological College in Scotland. He recounts the historical attempts to find a central dogma in Calvin's theology and suggests one of his own.

The lecture is posted here and well worth the read.

Peter Enns To Be Suspended from Westminster Theological Seminary

2008-03-27T18:17:00.000-07:00

This news was made public today at Sibboleth. The following letter was drafted by a committee which met to study the issue:

March 27, 2008

Thank you very much for your prayers for the special meeting of the Board of Trustees that was held on March 26 to address the disunity of the faculty regarding the theological issues related to Dr. Peter Enns' book, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament. After a full day of deliberation, the Board of Trustees took the following action by decisive vote:

"That for the good of the Seminary (Faculty Manual II.4.C.4) Professor Peter Enns be suspended at the close of this school year, that is May 23, 2008 (Constitution Article III, Section 15), and that the Institutional Personnel Committee (IPC) recommend the appropriate process for the Board to consider whether Professor Enns should be terminated from his employment at the Seminary. Further that the IPC present their recommendations to the Board at its meeting in May 2008."

In order to provide the entire Westminster community with a more complete understanding of the Board's decision and to offer an opportunity for questions and dialogue, the Chairman and Secretary of the Board will join the President on campus for a special chapel on Tuesday, April 1 at 10:30 am. Students and staff are encouraged to attend and participate. Following that special chapel, they will hold a separate meeting with the faculty.

Our concern is to honor the Lord Jesus Christ and assure a faithful witness for Westminster for years to come. To that end, please pray for everyone involved during the next two months.

Jack White
Chairman of the Board

Institutes II.8.33-34 - The Sabbath and the Shadow Rite

2008-03-26T06:09:00.000-07:00

In a previous post, we looked at Calvin's method of interpreting the law in contrast to someone like Luther. Rather than holding a law-gospel dichotomy, Calvin opts for what we could call a law-gospel-law schema. Here, the law does have application to the Christian, but obedience unto it is an act of love and freedom, rather than slavish servitude.

We see an outworking of this interpretation in his exegesis of the Ten Commandments, namely the Fourth. Calvin believes the Sabbath command to exist for the purpose of rest (both physical and spiritual) and meditation (both private and corporate) on the words and works of the Lord.

The real question becomes: how does the Fourth Commandment apply to Christians? Answering this question gets really interesting within the Reformed tradition. Many know Calvin to be the unabashed father of most who consider themselves properly "Reformed," but his teaching on the matter has not been followed by a large portion of the said party.

So what does Calvin teach and how does that agree/conflict with his followers?

Calvin teaches that "the ceremonial part" of Fourth Commandment was "abolished" (II.8.31) with the Incarnation of Jesus Christ because the Sabbath was a shadow of his coming and therefore made obsolete at his appearance. Christian churches worship him on Sunday to remember and revere his resurrection. Calvin calls this practice "a remedy needed to keep order in the church" (II.8.33). In closing, he says in section 34:

In order to prevent religion from either perishing or declining among us, we should diligently frequent the sacred meetings, and make use of those external aids which can promote the worship of God.

It is clear from our reading that a) the Jewish Sabbath is no longer applicable to Christians and b) Christian worship on Sunday (i.e. the Lord's Day) is right and proper. However (and here's the rub), Calvinists of the English-Puritan stock have made a syllogism and reasoned that c) the Lord's Day is therefore the Sabbath. This is the very teaching of the Westminster Confession of Faith, 21.7 (McNeill's footnote on page 399 incorrectly refers to 21.8 at this point).

In my ordination exams, I took exception to this statement in the WCF because I think it is a non sequitur. And the scriptural "proof texts" provided for the Assembly's reasoning (Gen. 2:2-3; 1 Cor. 16:1; Acts 20:7; Rev. 1:10) are completely unconvincing to my mind. In addition, no other Reformed confession (e.g. Belgic, Gallic, Helvetic) goes so far as to complete the syllogism and say that in the New Covenant, Sabbath = Sunday. Likewise, the German, French, Dutch, and Swiss Reformed traditions and practices have diverged from the Westminster Assembly.

So what saith Calvin on the issue of the Sabbath being on Sunday? Well, let's have a look. He mentions the issue in section 34, noting that the correlation made by the English Puritans and the WCF was also done by the ancients. But Calvin reminds us "not to cling to the shadow rite." Said another way, do not forget that the Sabbath was rendered obsolete. As a result, Calvin would not "condemn churches that have other solemn days for their meetings." He could conceive of churches meeting on Tuesday or Friday, so long as order was maintained and worship was upheld.

Interestingly, Calvin adds:

Vanish the trifles of the false prophets, who in former centuries infected the people with a Jewish opinion . . . This is merely changing the day as a reproach to the Jews, while keeping in mind the same sanctity of the day . . . For those of them who cling to their constitutions surpass the Jews three time over in crass and carnal Sabbatarian superstition.

Is Calvin here speaking to the English Puritans and the WCF? I am not willing to unequivocally say that he is, although his second sentence ("changing the day") sounds very eerily similar to WCF 21.7 ("changed into the first day"). But for those who are of that persuasion, one must always be on guard of clinging to the shadow rite and giving in to Sabbatarian superstition. We must seek to honor the resurrected Christ on Sunday and every other day, seeing in him our righteousness and glory. He fulfilled the law for us; let us be wary of erecting a new law and trying to rebuild what he tore down.

Good Friday: A King and a Whore

2008-03-21T08:06:00.000-07:00

Mantegna's The Crucifixion (1459)

"There they crucified him, with two others, one on either side, and Jesus between them. Pilate also wrote a title and put it on the cross; it read, 'Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews.'"

-- John 19:18-19

"God has never ceased to lead by cords of love this people which to his face has behaved like a whore."

-- Karl Barth

Three Quotes on the Nature/Task of Theology

2008-03-19T10:14:00.000-07:00

"The time when people could be told everything by means of words, whether theological or pious, is over."

-- Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison

"Because white theologians are well fed and speak for a people who control the means of production . . . they spend more time debating the relation between the Jesus of history and the Christ of faith than probing the depths of Jesus' command to feed the poor."

-- James Cone, Theology Encounters Revolution

"What makes the theologian is living -better, dying and being condemned- certainly not understanding, reading and speculating."

-- Martin Luther, Operationes in Psalmos

Any thoughts?

T.S. Eliot on Good Friday

2008-03-19T06:44:00.002-07:00

From East Coker, lines 136-171 (1943)

In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstasy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
You must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where your are is where you are not.

The wounded surgeon plies the steel
That questions the distempered part;
Beneath the bleeding hands we feel
The sharp compassion of the healer's art
Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.

Our only health is the disease
If we obey the dying nurse
Whose constant care is not to please
But to remind of our, and Adam's curse,
And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.

The whole earth is our hospital
Endowed by the ruined millionaire,
Wherein, if we do well, we shall
Die of the absolute paternal care
That will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.

The chill ascends from feet to knees,
The fever sings in mental wires.
If to be warmed, then I must freeze
And quake in frigid purgatorial fires
Of which the flame is roses, and the smoke is briars.

The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood -
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.

Institutes II.7.1-13 - The Second...Third Use of the Law

2008-03-17T10:28:00.000-07:00

John Calvin's use of the concept of "law" has received as much scholarly attention as any other aspect of his system. So my intention here is not to rehash the findings of dusty old PhD theses. Rather, from our readings in this section of the Institutes, let's recount what we find and make a brief historical comparison.

Calvin provides his own definition in II.7.1, "I understand by the word 'law' not only the Ten Commandments, which set forth a godly and and righteous rule of living, but the form of the religion handed down by God through Moses."

John McNeill, editor of the Westminster edition, gives us a helpful footnote explaining how Calvin in fact has three uses for the law (see fn. 1 on pg. 348):

1) The whole religion of Moses
2) The special revelation of the "moral law" to the chosen people in the Ten Commandments and Jesus' own summary of the law
3) The various bodies of civil, judicial, and ceremonial statues (see IV.20.12-16; Calvin does not mention this aspect here)

McNeill adds that of these three, the moral law is the most important for Calvin (in bold above). Thus, we are not surprised when he explains this moral law more fully in II.7.6-13. Within this smaller "moral law" category of the broader threefold concept of law from above, Calvin makes another threefold distinction. "Moral law," he says, "consists of three parts":

1) The Warning/Informing/Convicting/Condemning Function (II.7.6)
2) The Restraining Function (II.7.10)
3) The Sanctifying Function (II.7.12-13)

This last part of the moral law, let's call it the "second-third" use of the law, is the one I'd like to look at more closely (also in bold above).

It is well-known that Martin Luther maintain a strong dichotomy between law and gospel in his theology. Due to his historical situation, he fought legalism so ardently that he could not find room for law in the realm of redemption. According to Luther, law is what damned and gospel is what saved. When gospel appeared, the law was forever dead. Thus, Luther placed a strong (some would say "singular") emphasis on the act of justification by which God declared the law fulfilled by faith alone in the gospel of grace alone. Luther expounds the idea in an excursus found in his Commentary on Galatians 3:19. He proposes the two uses which mirror 1) and 2) from Calvin's explanation of the moral law above. But Luther is silent about 3), that is "The Sanctifying Function."

This observation is further evidenced by the writings of Philip Melachthon, Luther's prized pupil. In his 1521 edition of Loci communes, Melanchthon's theology of the law mirrors Luther. But by the 1535 edition, his explanation is identical to Calvin's with not two, but three uses of the moral law.

I believe Melanchthon aligned himself with Calvin (over Luther) because Calvin's model makes more sense of the whole of the Christian life. Yes, justification is absolutely essential to the Protestant doctrine of salvation. Calvin would emphasize this as strongly as Luther. But he would add that we also have the promise of sanctification. At regeneration, God's work is not done. Rather, it has just begun as he molds us into the image of his holy Son. Fulfilling the command to be holy as God is holy is not merely forensic. It has some actualization to it.

Whereas Luther saw law and gospel as dichotomous, Calvin's schema is more law-gospel-law. Let me explain. This means that the law does condemn/convict us, but in the gospel of Jesus Christ we are told of grace, pardon, and perfect righteousness imputed to us by faith. Calvin and Luther are in exact agreement up to this point. Then, Calvin would add, with the gift of the Holy Spirit, the new law is written upon our hearts and we are enabled to obey the law which previously condemned us. This obedience is now done in the context of sonship. This is the obedience of faith of which Paul speaks.

Here, Luther and Calvin differ greatly. The former saw legalism as the great sin and stressed justification as the center of the Christian life. The latter saw idolatry as the great sin and stressed God-like holiness as the center of the Christian life. This holiness was only achieved by a linear and unilateral divine of work of justification and then sanctification. For this reason, the moral law, according to Calvin, has three uses, not just two.

As we look at the historical outworking of this theology, we do see a marked difference. It is no coincidence that the Puritans (both Dutch and English) were Calvinists, not Lutherans. Their view of holiness was based on Calvin's "second-third" use of the law. It is this aspect (whether used or abused) that allows for a robust view of "holiness" in the Christian life. But that brings us to an even more controversial question: What is holiness and what does it look like? But that question is for another post entirely.

Sinclair Ferguson on How to Read the Bible

2008-03-15T08:26:00.001-07:00

In the summer of 2002, I was between college and seminary. Having only been a Christian for about 18 months, I was still very much trying to figure out what "the Gospel" was. While working at Look-Up Lodge, a Christian summer camp in South Carolina, I dedicated myself to spend that summer trying to understand Paul's Epistle to the Romans. I purchased an exhaustive concordance for my NASB and my first two commentaries during that time, one by Martin Luther and the other by John Stott. I still have the notes I took and cherish the very elementary, but life-changning insights that God gave me that summer.

Thus, it brought a smile to my face to see Sinclair Ferguson say this, reflecting on a similar time when he was 18:

“We ought not to read the Bible randomly, nor should one just read the Bible consecutively. It was reading something of Luther that helped me see this when he spoke of reading Romans as the ‘key’ to the Scriptures. I didn’t really know what that meant but I thought, if Romans is the key to the Scriptures, I need to get Romans into my soul. And so I remember going out and bought two commentaries on Romans. One was Robert Haldane’s commentary and the other was Professor (John) Murray’s… I gave myself unremittingly to trying to get Romans into my soul, not to master it so much as to be mastered by it. And to do the same with John’s Gospel, understanding that John’s Gospel in a sense very much functioned Christologically the same way that Romans functioned dogmatically, or didactically, or redemptive-historically; that there were whole streams of biblical revelation that were flowing here in a glorious confluence and that you could see them whole here. And looking back and I can see that I was a little bit like a squirrel gathering nuts for the winter and I don’t know how diminished my ministry would have been if that principle had never dawned on me. And I am permanently grateful for having learned that."

For the full context of this quote, go to the iTunes store and find the RTS "Seminar Series" entitled "Preaching the Word: Reflections at 60." The podcast is available for free.

Truly First Things: Bow Ties!

2008-03-14T10:45:00.001-07:00

Many of you who know me and have ever seen me in more formal attire might know how close this First Things article is to my heart. I, with Peters, thoroughly enjoy "the genuine jollity of seersucker or tweeds any day." Seriously, it reflects a distinct air of civility and doesn't accidentally get dipped into your soup like its more popular and more lengthy cousin. If you can tie one, you might as well wear one.

Origen, Augustine, and the Four Gospels

2008-03-14T06:18:00.000-07:00

Michael Bird of Highland Theological College has an insightful blog entry here about Origen and Augstine's theology of harmonization in the face of apparent contradictions between the four canonical gospels.

Four Models for Studying Church History

2008-03-13T12:46:00.001-07:00

Of the various disciplines which constitute Christian academics (NT, OT, systematic theology, practical theology, etc.), the field of church history is the most extensive. Its literature is the most sweeping (truly catholic!) and it networks with virtually every other discipline. A scholar who is a church historian is a person who wears many hats....and reads many books in many languages.

But not everyone interprets this voluminous literature in the same way. John Henry Newman once quipped that to be a student of church history is to cease being a Protestant. He opted for the Roman way. Philip Schaff studied the fathers with as much rigor as Newman and yet retained his German Reformed convictions until his death. In our own day, Jaroslav Pelikan served the Lutheran Church for many years, but at age 75 was received into the Orthodox Church of America. His studies in the development of dogma (best here) certainly precipitated the change. Being a Protestant more in line with Schaff than Newman or Pelikan, I must ask, "What of church history?"

Below are four models or interpretative grids for reading church history, drawn from Gerhard Ebeling's The Study of Theology:

1) The Classical Catholic Conception of Church History - Typified in Eusebius of Caesarea’s Eccelsiasitical History, this model sees the church as a supernatural reality in the world and history. Unbroken continuity through a correspondent unbroken apostolic succession is asserted as the church stands against the onslaught of Satan and his culprits. As much as the church actually exists in history, in its essence it is still withdrawn from and stands above all historical change. Staticity is elemental to this view. The only arena in which the church engages the history of ideas is by heretics who challenge her authority.

2) The Classical Protestant Conception of Church History - Often, the Protestant interest in church history has been governed by polemics. The point of studying the annals of church history was to demonstrate the deep cleft between the origin and the further history of the church. As opposed to the Catholic concept above, discontinuity was often intentionally sought out. This discontinuity focused upon the multiplicity of theologies in the early church (pace a monolithic view of tradition) and the alleged waywardness of medieval dogmatics and praxis. But like the Catholic version, a dualism is asserted, though not between church and heretic, but between true church and false church.

3) The Pietistic Conception of the Church - Seeking to undermine the aforementioned two, this third model called itself “unbiased” (meaning “unconfessional”) as in the case of Gottfried Arnold’s book An Unbiased History of Churches and Heresy from the Beginning of the New Testament until 1688. The first two centuries of Christian history are seen as positive, but with councils and creeds, the accusation of secularization is made. The corruption is traced back much earlier than the Protestant model above with the point of departure being the formulation of orthodox doctrine and the institution of the official church. Interestingly, this is the view espoused by Chuck Smith, founder of Calvary Chapel whose book I have reviewed/critiqued here.

4) The Idealistic Conception of Church History - Represented by F.C. Baur, this approach is more optimistic, seeing “history” as progress or movement whereby the church evolved from simple to complex, infantile to mature. The Hegelian employment of thesis-antithesis-synthesis in the development of dogma is to be noted. A heretical thesis is necessary to achieve an orthodoxical antithesis which moves toward synthetic growth. Bauer argued that this movement began christologically in the first six centuries and then progressed ecclesiologically in the medieval period. However, during the Reformation, the process was undone by first questioning papal authority in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and then dissolving creedal dogmas in the historical-critical era of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

So what of church history? That's a good question....which leads to another: which model do you use?

Eliot Spitzer and the "Fall from Grace"

2008-03-13T06:00:00.000-07:00

As this story of NY Governor Eliot Spitzer has unfolded, it has been interesting to observe the way in which news media portrays the fallout. He has lost his job and he may go to prison. Also, his marriage and family may dissolve as well. Spitzer's public, political life is effectually over. Time and again, the debacle has been called a "fall from grace."

Can I confess that this phrase befuddles me? What is it supposed to mean? Sure, I understand that it is common idiom and we need not try to exegete idiom (for example, try explaining the Hebraism 'the camel through the eye of a needle'). But this phrase had to come from somewhere. What does it mean?

When it is used in the sense above, it usually means that a person who was hitherto upright and hard-working did something wrong to merit public dissatisfaction, reproach, or scorn. Through their own faults, they "fell" from Position A (the state of grace?) to Position B (the state of non-grace?). Therein we have the phrase "fall from grace."

In the biblical and historic Christian usage of this word, "grace" is necessary only after the fall from Position A to B. In fact, "grace" is not truly operative in Position A because there, merit is based upon obedience to God's command. In theology, Position A is called the status integritatis or the state of righteousness. Human beings were created in this state. When Adam sinned, as our covenantal and representative head, he fell from Position A to Position B. Like Spitzer, he lost his "job" in the Garden and his marriage began to unravel. The work he would do afterward would not be easy or sexy. Rather, he had to sweat and toil for every penny's worth.

But Adam's fall was not a "fall from grace." It was a fall from righteousness and life, but not from grace. If anything, it was a fall into grace, as Genesis 3:15 begins to promise immediately after his transgression. He was promised a Redeemer who would represent Adam as Adam had represented us. Now, Position B is the state in which we all presently find ourselves: you, me, and yes, Eliot Spitzer.

Our daily "falls" (i.e. sins) are not falls from grace, but falls into grace. When we fall, we land on the grace of God. But we only have assurance of this grace because of Jesus Christ, whose death and resurrection we celebrate in 10 days. The Apostle Paul once said:

God made him who knew no sin to become sin on our behalf, in order that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

What Paul means here is that on the cross, Jesus - who was perfectly righteous and lived a 'Position A' life - moved into Position B and became sin. He became the fall Incarnate. By his torn flesh and spilled blood, he paid for all the unrighteousness of Adam and his race. Therefore, the justice of God has been satisfied by the love of God. That is why he is called the "just and the justifier" (Rom. 3:26). Also, the status integretatis has been restored. The broken creation is being healed and repaired in preparation for the new creation. No longer does the condemnation of Position B apply to Christians because in Christ, we have the status of being in Position A. At the final judgment, we will be justified (as we are now justified) with the declaration of that status.

In short, seeing sin, no matter how horrific or public, as a "fall from grace" is just down right bad theology. It smacks of Pelagianism (see here), but doesn't even get that right. Our sin is always worse than we imagine it to be, but God's love is always greater than we could hope it to be. In the Redeemer, these falls are not falls from grace, but falls into grace because the righteousness of life has been fulfilled in the death of Jesus Christ.

Institutes II.5.5 - Opera Dei et Logopneumatika

2008-03-11T07:35:00.000-07:00

In chapter 5.1-5 of book II, Calvin has begun to refute some of the historical claims which endorse self-determinism through free will (libero arbitrio). Interestingly, he treats these before moving on to the Scriptural defense of free will put forth by the same (found in 5.6-11).

He examines four of their claims against the historic claims of Augustinianism. After the final objection - the claim that exhortations and commands are meaningless without the free will to obey or disobey - Calvin examines the role of these exhortations in God's plan of redemption. Here, he says:

We must consider their especial value for believers, in whom (as the Lord does all things through his Spirit) he does not neglect the instrument of his Word but makes effective use of it.

In the works of God (opera Dei), we find a two-fold approach: he works through his Spirit and by his Word. Thus, the work of God is always Triune, whether that aspect is explicit or not. Calvin goes on to clarify himself in this regard:

If anyone wants a clearer answer, here it is: God works in his elect in two ways: within, through his Spirit; without, through his Word.

The Reformed tradition has been beholden to Calvin's paradigm at this point. In speaking of revelation, those who are most precise have maintained an objective, external communication (cognoscendi externum) found in the Word living and written as well as an experiential, internal (congnoscendi internum) communication given by the Holy Spirit. Both are essential to divine revelation.

Sadly, when we truncate the delicate balance of Word and Spirit (which I call Logopneumatika) we find error on all sides. We slide into a cold, scholastic 'fundamentalism' on one side (Word-only emphasis) or a virtually meaningless, individualistic 'mysticism' or 'charismaticism' on the other side (Spirit-only emphasis). Word and Spirit are wed. Word and Spirit are one. Information and transformation come through both.

A few final thoughts are in order.

First, the Holy Spirit has always pointed us away from himself and back to the other members of the Godhead. That is part of his inter-trinitarian (or "ontological") ministry. Thus, the experimental and internal communication given to the elect is always governed by the Word himself. Christ's Gospel is perfect and cannot be added to or taken away from by new and contradictory 'revelation.' We must be wary of anyone who claims to have received a 'word' from the Spirit that impugns the Word because these two are one.

Second, understanding and knowing the Word is contingent upon the illumination of the Holy Spirit. He brings us all truth because he is himself 'the Spirit of truth' (John 16:13). One cannot expect a non-Christian to understand, obey, or conform to Scripture, because they do not have the Holy Spirit. Their architectonic structures of knowledge are different, some would even say "antithetical." What is necessary for them is the reviving grace of God. We must be wary of expecting non-Christians to live the Christian life when they cannot understand what it is and in fact do not have the power to live it. The grace of God in the Gospel always precedes the authority of God for those living under the Gospel. We must remember this as we work and walk alongside those without a "logopneumatic" life.

As Francis Schaeffer frequently said, "Love is our final apologetic." This is the first and last offering we have for the world. And yet, this love (like Word and Spirit) is wed to truth. In living with and loving non-Christians, we must realize that we draw our knowledge from different sources, so there will be different ethical, moral, and theological presuppositions at work. In love, we must have patience. In truth, we must show the inherent falsity of non- Christian presuppositions.

As we do this, we can expect to have much in common with a non-Christian. Why? Because both of us are made in the image of God and for that reason alone, we are very much alike. We laugh at a good joke, we cry at the death of a loved one, we recognize the beauty of a sunset and a lover's face, we are revived by a hot shower or a cold drink, we fell good about honest dealings, we are afraid of being alone. All of this we share as God-image-bearing creatures, made by God's Word and Spirit, redeemed by God's Word and Spirit.

Greek NT Widget on Your Blog

2008-03-08T06:37:00.000-08:00

Go to The Resurgence Greek Project and copy the HTML into your blog for this nifty little Greek NT daily reading. Mine is on the right hand navigation bar below the archive.

Now this is how to impress your friends and influence people. Ahhh.....

Review: "Culture Matters" by T.M. Moore

2008-03-06T08:04:00.000-08:00

Books exploring the relationship of Christ to culture are not new. In the past 2,000 years, Christians have found themselves in a variety of cultures and thus, understanding that culture so that the Gospel message can be "translated" into its cultural forms is of foremost importance.

In 1951, H. Richard Niebuhr's Christ and Culture set a new standard for all books that would attempt such an exploration. There, he set forth five paradigms or models for understanding the different ways in which Christians have related to their surrounding culture. His last category (which he subtly suggests as being the best) is called "Christ transforming culture." He calls these people "conversionists" because they seek to take culture and redeem it for Christ's kingdom. It is this paradigm, "Christ transforming culture," that is typical of Reformed theology.

A recent book in this category is T.M. Moore's Culture Matters: A Call for Consensus on Christian Cultural Engagement (172 pp; Baker, 2007). Moore is dean of the Centurion Program of the Wilberforce Forum and principal of The Fellowship of Ailbe. He is a scholar of Celtic Christianity.

To begin, the book's title has a double meaning. "Matters" means both (1) as a verb, that culture is important and (2) as a noun, the issues or business with which culture deals.

Moore opens by stating, "Culture plays a powerful role in human life. We cannot live without it, yet we are often confused about how to regard it, or what to do with it" (11). This is certainly the case among American evangelical Christians. Moore then offers six different contemporary Christian approaches to culture. They are:

1) Cultural Indifference - he believes this to be "the vast majority" of Christians
2) Cultural Aversion - The idea being "culture is bad."
3) Cultural Trivialization - Aptly subtitled the "Christian bookstore culture"
4) Cultural Accommodation - Pluralistic and non-judgmental of cultural expression
5) Cultural Separation - Sectarianism or the "Christian ghetto" mentality
6) Cultural Triumphalism - A political Christianity which "rocks the vote"

Moore believes that none of these has provided us with a proper understanding of "culture matters," as he calls them. Like Niebuhr, Moore concentrates on historical examples to guide his suggestions for our present and future relationship to culture. And not only this, but after the historical examination, he compares that example to a "Contemporary Exemplar" of the same principle at work today. This correlation is one of the major strengths of the book which we turn to now.

First, Moore briefly looks at Jesus and his own relationship to the Judeo-Greco-Roman culture in which he lived (19-21). He engaged this culture through its artifacts (coins, clothing, tools), conventions (language, holy days, instructional methods), and institutions (kingdoms, marriage, civil and religious authorities). He then states, "For Jesus, culture was inevitable and inescapable, just as it is for all of us. Culture consists of the artifacts, institutions, and conventions by which people define, sustain, and enrich their lives" (20).

Then, he examines Augustine and his relationship to his own Roman culture. Augustine's The City of God was written after the sack of Rome as a response to the claim that when Rome died, Christianity died with it. No, says Augustine, there are two cities: the city of man and the city of God. This epic is perhaps the first Christian work on Christ and culture. Moore examines the nature of Augustine's apology and correlates it to the magazine First Things, an ecumenical magazine, edited by Richard John Neuhaus, which examines the many facets of contemporary American religion, culture, and public life.

In his second chapter, Moore studies Celtic Christianity as an example of artistic excellence that was maintained despite the "dark ages" in Europe from the fifth to eighth centuries. I was virtually ignorant of this movement and found the section to be very informative. Moore argues that through the art of these Christians, the "pure form, floral and faunal representationalism, and biblical and hagiographical iconography . . . is expressed within an impressive range of media" (46). His "Contemporary Exemplar" is guitarist Phil Keaggy who himself has been able to mimic the Celtic Christians in taking the pure form of guitar and expressing it in a variety of ways atypical of the "four-chord" rut in which Christian music (especially the "Praise and Worship" sort) is stuck.

The third chapter looks at John Calvin, a religious and cultural reformer par excellence. More than anything, Moore directs his attention at the educational program in Geneva. Not only was Calvin a theologian, but he was also a gifted pedagogue. Many of his works that we have are but transcripted lectures from the classroom. Moore echoes Calvin scholar Bernard Cottret who said, "Pedagogy was the key to the Calvinist enterprise," by depicting for us Calvin's educational philosophy of glorifying God by teaching all subjects in a holistic fashion. A modern version of Calvin's model is Moore's own Breakpoint Centurions and "The Truth Project" from Focus on the Family. These two missions seek to revolutionize education so that it is seen in God-glorifying, holistic terms rather than the fragmented academy of present-day America.

After Calvin, Moore makes a logical move in chapter four to the Dutch theologian and statesman Abraham Kuyper. If the criticism be made that the previous people did not brush up against the secularism or skepticism of our modern era and therefore had the luxury of embracing culture, that criticism would be silenced by Kuyper's example. The Holland that he grew up in was not dissimilar to our own. While many professed Christians have risen to power in church and state, Moore reminds us that "few Christian leaders, however, demonstrate as much in the way of cultural experience or achievement as Abraham Kuyper" (93). This experience and achievement came by way of being a scholar, pastor, journalist, politician, educator, and devotional author. He maintained throughout his career that culture matters. It matters to God and thus must matter to Christians. Culture "has the potential to make an important contribution to the work of God's kingdom" (103). Charles Colson, much to his honor, is singled out as being a 21st century Kuyperian.

The fifth chapter features the work of modern Lithuanian-born Polish-American poet Czeslaw Milosz. Moore singles out Milosz's work for its covert Christian themes, but more importantly, for his attempt to redeem a genre that has become increasingly esoteric and aimed at the illuminati. Moore says, "Such poetry heralds a worldview of elitism, subjectivism, sensuality, and the trivialization of the truth" (121). Part of redeeming poetry is redeeming not only the content, but the form as well. Milosz's attempts are an amplification of a clear voice calling out a hopeful message. The "Contemporary Exemplar" for this section is singer/songwriter David Wilcox. Being that Wilcox is one of my favorite artists and a man I have personally heralded as the greatest songwriter to have ever lived (yes, greater than Dylan), I was excited to see this correlation. Wilcox is worthy of such.

Moore closes his book with a few brief suggestions on how a Christian ought to go about engaging the culture in which s/he lives. Here, he returns to the Niebuhr text referenced earlier, but suggests that even since 1951, much has changed. The relationship between Christ and culture must constantly be reevaluated.

All in all, I found this book to be valuable for its insights. The historical aspects were thorough, perhaps too thorough for some. The "Contemporary Exemplars" were the strength of this text, in my opinion. It means that in ten years, Culture Matters will be in need of revision, but for now, it serves as a great small-group study or leisurely reading for any Christian who is serious about redeeming culture.

My main criticism of this book was that for all the emphases on the visual and auditory arts, there was no representation of of allowance for these in the book's format. A CD sampler of Keaggy and Wilcox would have been a nice supplement. Paste Magazine is a good example of what I am suggesting. Also, pictures of Celtic Christian art would have added a much needed pictorial dynamic. The only art in the entire book was on the front cover. I realize the added expense in manufacturing and publication, but it seems virtually necessary in a book of this nature, if the conviction is sincere that culture matters.

In my circle, it has become sophisticated to talk about "culture," "art," and "beauty," but the fact remains that so few of us actually do any of this. It is easy to talk about art and much more difficult to go view fine art. It is easy to pay lip-service to a musician and much more difficult to listen to that musician with intentional ears. Moore would do us all a service to make his suggested forms of cultural expression more readily available for the reader.

This shortcoming in no way renders the book unprofitable or unusable. I'd unequivocally recommend it.

Institutes II.3.5 - On Free Will

2008-03-06T06:49:00.000-08:00

Calvin's discussion of free will is tied into the issue of nature. He considers these two ideas together. Sadly, when the topic is discussed among Christians, the same association is not made. We argue back and forth, I believe, because this nuance is ignored. It does help to shed some light on Calvin's position and so it is worth a closer look.

Calvin grants that all humans do have a will. In the fall, humanity "was not deprived of will, but of soundness of will" (II.3.5). You and I make choices everyday, regardless of whether we place faith in Christ, Allah, Krishna, the Easter Bunny, or Ben Bernanke. The issue is not whether we are able to choose, but what motivates and will be the outcome of those choices. That is what Calvin means by the following aphorism:

"Simply to will is of man; to will ill, of a corrupt nature; to will well, of grace."

Do you see the connection between the will and the nature in this sentence? The will of man is controlled by his nature. For example, can you hold your breath for a month? No, because your nature demands that your organs and muscles need oxygen to survive. Can you levitate? No, because the law of gravity demands that all things on earth be pulled toward its center at a rate of 32 ft/sec squared.

Thus, our nature controls the action of our will. Even in the examples above, our will is not free. We cannot choose to hold your breath for a month or choose to hover and amuse our friends. So it is with the human will to choose God's grace. Our natural state is such (called "corrupt" in Eph. 4:22 or "dead" in Eph. 2:1-5) that choosing life is not consistent with the laws that govern it. A dead man doesn't choose anything because his nature dictates his volition. Calvin makes ample reference to Romans 3 to support his claims in II.3.2.

What is required is a new nature. We need new life. Not surprisingly, this is the picture of redemption we are given in Scripture (see Eph. 2:5 and 2 Cor. 5:17 for glowing examples). It is called "regeneration" for a reason: "re-" means "again" and "-generation" means "to make alive." By God's grace, we are made alive again, a new creation. We are given a new nature with a whole host of new options available to us. We can choose to love and to give and to serve and all of these actions are now consistent with our nature as sons and daughters of God. We can live in a way that honors God because it is based upon the love that he has shown us in Christ Jesus (see II.3.7 for more).

As he rose from the grave and received new life, so (in him) are we given new life and the promise of a resurrection likened to his very own.

Then all my servile works were done,
A righteousness to raise
Now, freely chosen in the Son,
I freely choose His ways.

Evgeny Kissin: God's Gift of a Child Prodigy

2008-03-03T13:51:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow, my literature review is due to my doctoral supervisor and so, I have spending exorbitant amounts of time writing. To help me focus, I listen to Mozart, Beethoven, or Chopin. For the last week, I have had Evgeny Kissin's 1984 Moscow Concert on repeat. Are you familiar with this piece?

The recital is Chopin's Piano Concertos 1 & 2, performed with the Moscow State Philharmonic under Dmitri Kitaenko. Who is this pianist? At the time, Evgeny Kissin was but twelve years old, a true child prodigy whose skill is nothing less than an abnormal gift of God.

Critic Edith Eisler says of Kissin's performance, "Any experienced veteran could be proud of it; that a boy of 12 should possess the necessary technique, the musical understanding and maturity, and the sustained concentration, is almost beyond belief. Reveling in his own limitless virtuosity, Kissin seems to be playing with--as well as on--the piano with elfin grace and delicacy; yet his command of the keyboard--his warm, singing, powerful, varied tone--are only tools for expressing his spontaneous response to the music."

I would echo Eisler's sentiments, but remind her that this ability is a gift. No human normally hums Bach at 11 months old. Kissin's virtuosity is limitless but not because of "elfin grace." Rather, it is limitless because the Giver of all grace is Himself limitless. If you've not heard this pianist and his famous recital, track it down and indulge in its skill, emotion, and beauty. And thank God for him and his gift.

Bavinck's Best Monographs.....Translated and Published!

2008-02-29T18:37:00.000-08:00

In June, the Dutch Translation Society will again bless all of us with a new book to follow the final volume of Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics. This time, it will be an anthology of Bavinck's articles and speeches from various occasions throughout his career. The offering is called "Essays on Religion, Science, and Society." A detailed table of contents is not yet available, but it promises to be well worth the price of admission.

"I have long admired Bavinck as a major systematic theologian, but in these essays I discovered a Bavinck I never knew. He moves easily--and brilliantly--through adolescent psychology, conceptions of the unconscious, Islam, social contract theory, evolutionary thought, philology, and aesthetics, to name only a few of a broad set of topics. Here an amazing nineteenth-century Calvinist mind addresses with much wisdom a twenty-first-century intellectual agenda!"--Richard J. Mouw, president and professor of Christian philosophy, Fuller Theological Seminary

Institutes II.2.11 - Humility, Humility, Humility

2008-02-27T06:13:00.000-08:00

Hot on the heels of Calvin's refutation of "free will," he stops to state that humility (humilitatem) is the essence of the Christian religion. A sober understanding of our own depravity must lead to humility, not despair or even deeper selfishness.

Francis Schaeffer often talked about this in the difference between "guilt feelings" and real moral guilt. We are all prone to feel guilty after doing something wrong and for many, we punish ourselves by holding on to the guilt as a form of self-atonement. Others have called this "working up 'good guilt' in ourselves." However, real moral guilt (i.e. knowing the holiness of God and our lack thereof) is different because while we may feel it (via the Holy Spirit), it is not a feeling. It exists and we know it exists whether we feel it or not. Even when we are obedient, we are aware of our real moral guilt because the holiness of God and the sinfulness of man will never meet this side of glory. But in the midst of that awareness, we cling to Christ and his cross.

"Guilt feelings" only lead to deeper pride and self-centeredness because the focus is always on us. Real moral guilt leads us to trust in God's grace and as a result, we are humbled. This humility is "the foundation of our philosophy," as Calvin quotes John Chrysostom as saying. Without it, there is no Gospel.

For more on the topic of humility, see Andrew Murray's little book Humility or the chapter "The Great Sin" in C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity.

Kuyper & Bavinck on Scripture: Two New Books

2008-02-27T05:26:00.000-08:00

The ever-growing popularity of Bavinck's theology in the English-speaking world has brought about a deluge of writings on and around "Neo-Calvinism." One particular topic of interest has been the view of Scripture espoused by Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck, what is often called an "organic view." Rogers and McKim created a buzz over this particularity in the late 1970s, (ab)using the organic view to justify a neo-orthodoxy/neo-evangelical agenda. Now, it seems that scholarly attention is returning to these thinkers without the agenda in tow.

I would recommend these two books which have just recently been published, both seeking to explain in detail the "ins and outs" of this organic view, albeit from a slightly different vantage point:

1) Richard Gaffin's "God's Word in Servant Form: Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck and the Doctrine of Scripture" (P&R, 2008)

and

2) Andrew T.B. McGowan "The Divine Spiration of Scripture" (Apollos, 2007).

Peter Brown on Pelagianism

2008-02-26T07:22:00.000-08:00

Our daily reading from Calvin's Institutes (II.2.5-9) is all about free will, a major topic of contention in the history of Christian theology. Calvin understands that he is not in complete agreement with the Church Fathers, though Augustine is a consistent ally. Of these Fathers, Calvin highlights their ambiguity with regard to the subject of free will, "At one time these writers teach that man, despoiled of the powers of free will, takes refuge in grace alone (solam gratiam). At another time they provide, or seem to provide, him with his own armor" (II.2.9).

The early church was not forced to specify its beliefs on this matter until the fifth century AD with the appearance of Pelgaius and his disciple Caelestius, two men whom Augustine fiercely opposed. Who were these men and what did they teach? Below is a summary by Peter Brown, a most able biographer of Augustine of Hippo. The synthesis was provided by Dr. David Noe of the Calvin College classics department (thanks Dave!). According to Brown, Pelagianism looks like this:

Basic tenets of Pelagianism

A. Key Proof Text: Matthew 5.48 "It is better to give than to receive."

B. “…the harsh firm message of Pelagius came as a deliverance. He would offer the individual absolute certainty through absolute obedience.” (Brown, 347)

C. “To [Augustine] it seemed that the new claims made by the Pelagians, that they could achieve a church ‘without spot or blemish’, merely continued the assertion of the Donatists, that only they belonged to just such a church. He was in no mood to tolerate the coteries of ‘perfect’ Christians, that had sprung up in Sicily and elsewhere under Pelagian influence.” (348-9)

D. “The Pelagians, with their optimistic views on human nature, seemed to Augustine to blur the distinction between the Catholic church and the good pagans; but they did so only in order to establish an icy Puritanism as the sole law of the Christian community.” (351)

E. Sin is imitation.

F. Pelagius traveled on to Palestine, while Caelestius tried to have himself made a presbyter in Carthage. But this plan was frustrated by the deacon Paulinus of Milan, who submitted to the bishop, Aurelius, a memorial in which six theses of Caelestius -- perhaps literal extracts from his lost work “Contra traducem peccati” -- were branded as heretical. These theses ran as follows:

1. Even if Adam had not sinned, he would have died.

2. Adam’s sin harmed only himself, not the human race.

3. Children just born are in the same state as Adam before his fall.

4. The whole human race neither dies through Adam’s sin or death, nor rises again through the resurrection of Christ.

5. The (Mosaic Law) is as good a guide to heaven as the Gospel.

6. Even before the advent of Christ there were men who were without sin.

With this background, I hope Calvin's words and thoughts are more historically grounded. His allegiance to Augustine is very strong at this point and thus, knowing what Augustine was arguing against makes more sense of Calvin's ideas a millennium later.

Institutes II.1.8-11 - Forgive me Father for I Poked a Badger with a Spoon

2008-02-23T18:11:00.000-08:00

Comedian Eddie Izzard, in his stand-up routine “Dressed to Kill,” asked what an original sin was. He wondered if it wasn’t something like poking a badger with a spoon. This quip still makes me laugh because it shows how far English has evolved from its Latinate roots.

This evolution is especially important when we study a text and a corresponding theology written during a Latinate era. In this section of Calvin’s Institutes before us today, we have to define two Latin words which have produced two theological terms widely misunderstood: “original” (as in “original sin”) and “total” (as in “total depravity”).

First is the word “original.” Calvin seeks himself to define the term in II.1.8. The Latin originale means not “inventive” or “creative” (as Izzard thought), but “initial, that which relates to origin.” So original sin (peccatum originale) is a sin which was initially committed and which relates to our origin. Obviously, Adam and Eve are the “origin” of original sin.

Calvin defines it as “a hereditary depravity and corruption of our nature, diffused into all parts of the soul, which first makes us liable to God’s wrath, then also brings forth in us those works which Scripture calls ‘the works of the flesh’ [Gal. 5:19]” (II.1.8). Since Adam and Eve committed this sin and serve as the “origin” of the human race, their sin has been transmitted to the rest because of their representative headship.

This brings us the second word: “total.” In section 8, Calvin notes that original sin is “diffused into all parts (omnes partes)” and that human perversion is present in “every part (omnibus partibus) of our nature.” In section 9, he states that “all parts of the soul were possessed by sin after Adam” so that “the whole man (totum hominem) is overwhelmed” by sin. The Latinate idea behind these explanations is totus, so that when we translate Calvin’s idea into English, we deem it “total depravity.”

However, this translation is now obsolete because when we hear the English “total,” we often think “absolute” when the word really means “entire.” Total depravity, as Calvin expressed it, is not absolute depravity. Humans are certainly not as sinful as they could be. What he meant was entire depravity, that is that the affects of the fall extend to all parts of the human: mind, body, soul, and will. There is no part of the human that has remained immune from original sin. So when God acts to redeem us, he must redeem all parts of us. We are dead in our sins and trespasses without a faculty free of sinful corruption. Because of original sin, we are totally depraved.

Today, these two concepts are railed against because they seem pessimistic and inhumane. In reality, they are the roots of the glory of divine grace. If we do not see our miserable estate through this lens, God’s love will never come into the necessarily sharp focus that we see in the Christian Scriptures. So put down the spoon, leave the badger alone, and study Latin instead.

Institutes I.2 - Knowledge and Piety

2008-01-03T05:56:00.000-08:00

Following chapter 1 of book I, Calvin moves into his exposition of the knowledge of God. He treats this subject first not because it is first in order in the human mind, but simply because it is "the order of right teaching" (1.1.3).

He first says that God is not known "where there is no religion or piety" (1.2.1). Not yet speaking of the Christian religion per se, Calvin examines the type of knowledge found in non-Christian history and religion. This is a "general" or "natural" type of divine knowledge.

This last word in the previous citation, the Latin pietas, summarizes much of Calvin's understanding of what typifies natural, but nonetheless true knowledge of God. What is pietas? The editor's footnote states, "It is a favorite emphasis in Calvin that pietas, piety, in which reverence and love of God are joined, is prerequisite to any true knowledge of God." Calvin himself goes on to define his term:

I call "piety" that reverence joined with love of God which the knowledge of his benefits induces.

Calvin is not concerned with abstraction or pontificating on the being of God in the manner of the ancient Greeks. He is concerned with the nature of God. The question for him is not "What is God?" but "What is his nature?" (see 1.2.2). He is concerned with the God who acts or who reveals. Thus, piety is a "reverence joined with love" based in "the knowledge of his benefits." God's beneficence is contingent upon his action, his revelation.

Contrary to the idea that the God of Reformed theology is this idle and grim deity, an "absentee landlord" of sorts, Calvin paints a picture of a God who acts. "He is there and he is not silent," as Francis Schaeffer (himself a Reformed theologian) would say. Even apart from the special revelation we receive in Christ, in creation we can see the handiwork of a "busy God." In the shifting seasons, in weather systems, and in creatures who give birth and die we see a God of action. He is always on the move: preserving, overseeing, doing.

Knowledge of this God results in a reverence and awe of a God who does not sit still. The fruit of this knowledge is called "piety."

Institutes I.1 - Knowledge and Sin

2008-01-02T08:04:00.000-08:00

In the reading for today, Calvin begins his work with a statement about the nature of human knowledge, a field called "epistemology:"

Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But, while joined by many bonds, which one precedes and brings forth the other is not easy to discern.

Here, Calvin sets out a two-fold model for human wisdom: knowing God and knowing ourselves. And it is not clear which comes first. With this thesis stated, Calvin moves to describe why humans think about God at all. It is part of our nature, he says, built into us because we ourselves were built by him. Our finitude and sin forces us to recognize how fallible we truly are, but this recognition also "compels us to look upward...to contemplate the good things of God" (1.1.1).

Since it is not clear which knowledge precedes the other, we can also conclude that reflecting upon the goodness and purity of God ought to motivate an honest survey of our own moral fiber. According to Calvin, we all have inherited a "depravity and corruption" (1.1.1) from Adam.

Being that this perspective on sin is relatively unique to the Reformed faith, it may benefit us to expound what Calvin says and does not say here. The memorable (and in my opinion, unhelpful) acrostic TULIP begins with "T" for "total depravity." Many people have understood this to mean that Calvin taught a doctrine of absolute depravity, which he did not. Humans are not as sinful as they could be. All of us restrain ourselves from doing sinful things that we could do. What Calvin teaches is that the sinful corruption extends to all parts of the human being. That is what is meant by "total." The human mind, heart, and will have all been adversely (but not absolutely) affected by the fall.

Many who would reject this teaching would point to charitable acts or magnanimous thoughts that have proven this doctrine wrong. Most of us see ourselves as "good people" compared to the murderer, the rapist, the adulterer, the tax-evader, or the shoplifter. "Humans cannot be that sinful," it is often said in response to "total depravity." The truth is, they are right. And Calvin would agree.

Most of us do follow human laws, especially the "big ones." Most of us are upright citizens. Most of us are moral. This obedience and order, Calvin would say, is a direct influence of the Holy Spirit upon society (an influence later deemed "common grace"). The problem here is, however, that we are making the wrong kind of comparison. Or better yet, we are not making a complete comparison. We are comparing ourselves with other humans and truncating the epistemological thesis that begins his work.

We must also compare ourselves to Almighty God. Compared to him, are we upright? Are we moral? Are we good? The answer here is no. Calvin says:

As long as we do not look beyond the earth, being quite content with our own righteousness, wisdom, and virtue, we flatter ourselves most sweetly, and fancy ourselves all but demigods. Suppose we but once begin to raise our thoughts to God, and to ponder his nature, and how completely perfect are his righteousness, wisdom, and power -- the straightedge to which we must be shaped. Then, what masquerading earlier as righteousness was pleasing in us will soon grow filthy in its consummate wickedness. What wonderfully impressed us under the name of wisdom will stink in its very foolishness.

If all wisdom is composed of the knowledge of God and of humans, we must be aware of both "straightedges." We must not confine ourselves to one or the other exculsively, but under the Lordship of the Incarnate Christ, our thoughts and our very lives are directed at a kingdom which exists in both.

Why Read Calvin's Institutes?

2008-01-01T08:38:00.000-08:00

On this first day of 2008, several readers of this blog have agreed to read Calvin's Institutes in one year using the guide I have prepared here. As we embark, I'd like to examine why we do this. Some would say, "The Bible ought to be the only book you devote yourself to reading every day." I would answer "Yes, but..."

Many Protestants today claim to adhere to this doctrine of "Sola Scriptura," a Latin phrase meaning "the Scripture alone" with the sense being that Scripture alone has the highest authority for the life of the Church, above any private interpreter, school, confession, council, or Pope.

In actuality, most evangelical Protestants have fooled themselves into believing in "Solo Scriptura," a Latin phrase which would mean "the Scripture only" with the sense being that only Scripture is an authority for the life of the Church.

Did you catch the difference?

The tragic fact is that the nuance between these two ideas has been lost and the latter has replaced the former. In light of this, even more tragic is the fact that "Solo Scriptura" is impossible. The Bible could never be the only authority in the Church because it is a text that requires interpretation and application. It has no built-in manual for this. It, in fact, does not stand on its own in some vacuum, but begs to enter our world and govern it as the highest (but not only) authority.

So we read Calvin's Institutes because we believe in "Sola Scriptura." We believe that by reading him, we will gain a better understanding of what Scripture itself actually says. It does not distract our reading of the word, but enriches our reading of the word. And not surprisingly, this was Calvin's intention all along as our reading for January 1 tells us:

It has been my purpose in this labor to prepare and instruct candidates in sacred theology for the reading of the divine Word, in order that they may be able both to have easy access to it and to advance in it without stumbling. For I believe I have so embraced the sum of religion in all its parts, and have arranged it in such an order, that if anyone rightly grasps it, it will not be difficult for him to determine what he ought especially to seek in Scripture, and to what end he ought to relate its contents.

Calvin goes on to say that once we have been so instructed and enlightened, we too have a duty:

Perhaps the duty of those who have received from God fuller light than others is to help simple folk at this point, and as it were to lend them a hand, in order to guide them and help them find the sum of what God meant to teach us in his Word.

May we all read theology, any theology, for this purpose and no other.

Answer: Who Said This

2007-12-18T05:29:00.000-08:00

Thanks to all those who chimed in. No one managed to name the person who said these words:

For me, yes, “Jesus is the way” indeed. Jesus is an archetype, the perfect man and divine at the same time. Indeed, we all need to be “more like Christ” as in reality, we all have the spark of divinity within all of us. I have found that becoming like Christ is not something that suddenly happens after converting in a church or saying a sinner’s prayer, this is evident. Rather we become “like-Christ” as we trod The Path, awakening to more and more light. Jesus didn’t say “pray the sinners prayer” but rather “he that believeth on me shall have everlasting life.” How do I “have faith in Christ”? Well, by believing in the mystery and archetype of the Christ, knowing that humanity is not without hope and that the Divine Plan will indeed be fulfilled.

The answer? Sadly, it was not Bavinck, Barth, Pullman or even C.S. Lewis. My guess would have been Friedrich Schleiermacher and I too would have been wrong.

The person who said this was Matthew Murray. Who is Matthew Murray? He is no relation to the pietist Andrew or the Presbyterian John, though he did come from a Christian home. Matthew Murray is the teen who killed four people in two separate shootings in Colorado last week, one in a training school for missionaries and another at New Life Church. In the end, he took his own life too, bringing the tragic death toll up to five.

In various online chat forums, he described his upbringing in evangelical Pentecostalism and how he rebelled against it, "We had bible memory, hymn singing, and prayer for at least the first two hours of the day growing up all the way till age 18. I don’t think it worked at keeping me in their system though."

In the end, his confession above means very little, for theology is ethics and vice-versa. One cannot really know that "humanity is not without hope" and then walk into a church or a school and kill five people, yourself included. In this young man's mind, there was a disconnect somewhere.

Today, this reminds me that my language about King Jesus must be consistent with my life under King Jesus. If it is not, then reflection and genuflection are in order.

Question: Who Said This?

2007-12-17T06:36:00.000-08:00

A little Monday morning quiz for all you budding theologians and historians out there: who said this? Guesses are welcomed.

For me, yes, “Jesus is the way” indeed. Jesus is an archetype, the perfect man and divine at the same time. Indeed, we all need to be “more like Christ” as in reality, we all have the spark of divinity within all of us. I have found that becoming like Christ is not something that suddenly happens after converting in a church or saying a sinner’s prayer, this is evident. Rather we become “like-Christ” as we trod The Path, awakening to more and more light. Jesus didn’t say “pray the sinners prayer” but rather “he that believeth on me shall have everlasting life.” How do I “have faith in Christ”? Well, by believing in the mystery and archetype of the Christ, knowing that humanity is not without hope and that the Divine Plan will indeed be fulfilled.

There will be fame and notoriety for the winner.

So What Is "Neo-Calvinism"?

2007-12-10T14:36:00.000-08:00

In the past few weeks of research, I have come across two especially poignant summaries of the defining characteristics of "Neo-Calvinism," a Dutch doctrinal renaissance of Reformed theology. The first comes from Richard Mouw of Fuller Seminary in California and second from Jan Veenhof of the Free University of Amsterdam, founded by Abraham Kuyper himself who most consider the originator of the movement. Though these summaries come from the same periodical, we have here two distinct voices, one American and the other Dutch.

Perspective #1 - Richard Mouw in "Dutch Calvinist Philosophical Influences in North America," Calvin Theological Journal 24: 93-120.

Mouw sees Neo-Calvinism as being embodied in three basic emphases which it shares with Calvinism, though in all three there is significant expansion:

1) An Emphasis on Divine Sovereignty - the TULIP acrostic of Calvinism is indicative of this, but often it is applied solely on the individual level. Neo-Calvinism, however, carried this leitmotif “beyond the soterioloigcal context” by emphasizing “the larger arena in which those redeemed sinners are incorporated into a salvific community whose calling it is in the divine economy to show forth the sovereign rule of God in all spheres of human life” (98). Thus, Neo-Calvinism stressed that common grace is not merely a gift given to individuals, but mainly a social outworking of God to curtail evil and enable progress in art, education, and law.

2) An Emphasis on Human Sin - Calvinism has always maintained a strong (and unpopular) view of human depravity, but Neo-Calvinism moved to the distinctly noetic effects of that depravity. While the epistemological consequences of sin have always been part of the Reformed understanding, “the Neo-Calvinists have made epistemology a subject of systematic investigation out of a genuine desire to gain clarification concerning the relationship between ‘the fallen mind’ and ‘the redeemed mind’” (98). This emphasis created the Kuyperian "Antithesis," wherein he stated that regenerate thinking (which he called "science" [Dutch: Wissenschaft]) and unregenerate thinking were two separate kinds of thinking/sciences (dwee Wissenschaften). One was antithetical to the other because both are informed by respective regenerate or unregenerate presuppositions that are incompatible with one another.

3) An Emphasis on Divine Law - Calvinists have always insisted that the moral code found in the Old Testament has some formative influence upon that of the New. Thus, the basic ethical “continuity” of the Bible has been upheld, even though ceremonial and civil uses of divine legislation have been made obsolete. Neo-Calvinism adds that “divine laws do not make their first appearance in Exodus or Deuteronomy. They are the very means by which God creates and sustains the cosmos” (99). Kuyper called these “ordinances” which eventually gave rise to the philosophical system called de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee (rough translation: “The Philosophy of a Law-Idea”). In this system, the law (de wet) is “the basic mode of God’s relationship to creation” and in this law “God always speaks and acts lawfully; his words and deeds always take legislative form” (100). This system makes reality as we experience it a place ripe with order and beauty and depth. It is a place that welcomes “rational inquiry” (100) found in philosophical pursuit and discourse. This view of law and the consequential emphasis on philosophy, adds Mouw, is not found in theological traditions that see an inherent dichotomy between law and gospel (as in Lutheranism, Anabaptism, and dispensationalism), but only in those that value law in both creation and redemption (as in Roman Catholicism and Calvinism) (101).

Perspective #2 - Jan Veenhof in "A History of Theology and Spirituality in the Dutch Reformed Churches (Gereformeerde Kerken), 1892-1992," Calvin Theological Journal 28:266-297.

Veenhof 's sketch of Neo-Calvinism similarly incorporates three emphases:

1) A Renewal of Reformed Theology - Neo-Calvinism sought to use the most current trends of theological and philosophical thought to recast historic sixteenth and seventeenth century theology into the nineteenth and twentieth. They were confessional without subscribing to confessionalism. Likewise, they re-employed the Psalter as the guide for worship in their churches, a practice long out of favor at that time (267). By these two forces, the doctrines of sin and grace and redemption were brought back to the fore in worship through Word and Sacrament. This renewal also manifested itself outside of the church, in the academy. Neo-Calvinism engaged in a thorough defense of the Reformed faith against the skepticism and pantheism of German, French, and Dutch modernism. Here, the Antithesis was used to philosophically deconstruct the inconsistency of a non-Christian worldview against the unified, organic structure of a Christian and Reformed one.

2) An Intense Reflection on the Inspiration and Authority of Scripture - It is interesting that Mouw would fail to mention this point. For some reason, it was not important to him. Not so with Dr. Veenhof. Armed with the concept of “organic inspiration,” Neo-Calvinism sought to overcome the notion of “mechanical dictation” without conceding divine authorship as high criticism had done. It created for itself a middle ground that made both critical and respectful inquiry possible. Neo-Calvinism, more than any other theological movement, relies on the incarnation of Christ as a modelic representation for what Scripture is, a fully human and fully divine product.

3) An Emphasis on Common Grace - Veenhof says, “Common grace retards the effects of sin and provides the believer a foundation, in order to work in the areas of culture and society” (272). It was this point that enabled Neo-Calvinism to view the creation (schepping) as “a significant point of orientation in Reformed thought and action” (272). As mentioned above, the Dutch Neo-Calvinists gave this doctrine cosmic (as opposed to individual) import. Both Kuyper and Bavinck produced works on common grace, a subject which had received only cursory attention theretofore. Neo-Calvinism found in this doctrine the justification for cultural involvement and engagement unlike the sectarianism of Pietism or Puritanism, both being significant groups within a broader Calvinistic history.

Hopefully these these two perspectives on Neo-Calvinism enrich your own. I'd be interested know how many of you are familiar with the distinctives and/or similarities of Dutch "Neo-Calvinism" within the broader tradition of Reformed theology.

Advent and Shalom

2007-12-09T06:21:00.000-08:00

This week in the Advent season is the week of "peace." The meaning of this biblical term often alludes us because "peace" in the Bible is not the same concept that we encapsulate in the English word "peace." The Hebrew word shalom formulates the biblical concept of "peace."

I was reading Cornelius Plantinga's book Not the Way It's Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin and came across the following quote about shalom on pages 9-10. I think this is the best summary I've read on the idea:

The prophets knew how many ways human life can go wrong because they knew how many ways human life can go right. (You need the concept of a wall on a plumb to tell when one is off.). These prophets kept dreaming of a time when God would put things right again.
They dreamed of a new age in which human crookedness would be straightened out, rough places made plain. The foolish would be made wise and the wise, humble. They dreamed of a time when the deserts would flower, the mountains would run with wine, weeping would cease and people could go to sleep without weapons on their laps. People would work in peace and work to fruitful effect. Lambs could lie down with lions. All nature would be fruitful, benign, and filled with wonder upon wonder; all humans would be knit together in brotherhood and sisterhood; and all nature and all humans would look to God, walk with God, lean toward God and delight in God. Shouts of joy and recognition would well up from valleys and seas, from women in streets and from men on ships.
The webbing together of God, humans, and all creation in justice, fulfillment, and delight is what the Hebrew prophets call shalom. We call it peace but it means far more than mere peace of mind or a cease-fire between enemies. In the Bible, shalom means universal flourishing, wholeness and delight – a rich state of affairs in which natural needs ar satisfied and natural gifts fruitfully employed, a state of affairs that inspires joyful wonder as its Creator and Savior opens doors and welcomes the creatures in whom he delights. Shalom, in other words, is the way things ought to be.

This Film Will Be Controversial

2007-12-07T10:55:00.000-08:00

http://www.expelledthemovie.com

It comes out in February. It ought to cause quite a stir.

This Album Rocks

2007-12-05T12:18:00.001-08:00

Come Christmas, I can never stop listening to this album. Plus, the movie itself, even if it isn't about a Red Ryder BB Gun or the typical Griswald family debacle, teaches the Gospel.

Out of Print Books Online @ Google Books

2007-12-04T10:52:00.000-08:00

The second most difficult part about collecting my research materials is trying to track down books that are out-of-print. Finding unpublished dissertations is much easier than finding out-of-print books. The only part more difficult is sifting through a mass of secondary literature in two languages in which I am not [yet] proficient (i.e. - Dutch and German).

Google has partnered with a consortium of libraries and donors to alleviate this common problem in scholarship of all sorts. They have made entire libraries of public domain and out-of-print books available through their search engine. Some books are full-texts and others are partial texts, depending on copyrights. Either way, it proves immensely helpful. Check it out here.

For example, the full texts of Charles Hodge's Systematic Theology, The Way of Life, What Is Darwinism?, The Constitutional History of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America as well as his commentaries on Romans, Ephesians, 1-2 Corinthians and the biography written by his son A.A. Hodge, The Life of Charles Hodge, are all available at Google Books. So are Bavinck's The Philosophy of Revelation and Calvin and Common Grace. Not too shabby.

A Good Article on Herman Bavinck

2007-12-04T10:46:00.000-08:00

Ron Gleason writes about Bavinck's concept of "The Science of Holy Divinity" in the newest edition of the online magazine Reformation21. Read it here.

Also, for those interested, Gleason wrote a great two-part biography on Bavinck in the same magazine available here and here.