Tertius Blogspot

I Don't Have An Empty Love Cup Either

2009-03-22T13:52:00.000-07:00

Here is an excerpt from one of Dr. David Powlison's lectures at the Conference for Pastors.

He has great insight in the area of the theology of pastoral counseling, psychology, and the human heart.

I found myself sympathizing with him on core lusts. I believe mine are close to the same.

"The things that typically get called “needs” in our culture, we are on pretty good ground if we translate them “desires”, and if I get someone in trouble call them “lusts.” They are things people typically lust after They are the worldly desires. “I want you to love me.” “Fill my love cup.” “I want to be significant,….successful,…. accomplish something,…..think well of myself,…. more money,… better health, …a safe neighborhood,…life to be easy and comfortable,…..”

One of the interesting things about the way these need theologies tend to work, they are only plausible with a certain slice of humanity that is wired to that particular need, or lust. One of those things that has always struck me as I read Minirth Meier or Larry Crabb, and so forth, they camp out as if the core of the human heart is the desire to be loved, this need for love. These books have never rung my bells because my core lusts are not in those areas. My core lusts are in the areas of “I want an easy life.” I don’t care so much whether you love me, just don’t hassle me. So I don’t walk around with this love cup saying love me, love me, love me. It is more like just don’t bother me, I want peace and quiet. Now does that mean I have a peace and quiet cup and it is empty and I need to look to God to fill my peace and quiet cup? That is not so.

That is why these American pop psychologies, whether they are Christianized or not, are so implausible in other cultural contexts. Sadam Hussein does not have an empty love cup! He has an empty power cup. He wants power. That is another very typical human desire, that is worldly desire. Some people want power, love, accomplish something. That one too, I never wanted to accomplish anything.. I am a child of the 60’s. I was a hippie. I got burned out on achievement by 1969. I was not standing in line when God handed out the ambition genes. But I was standing in line for the other side of the hippie life which is manana, let me get high, feel good, etc.

Worldly desires, the human heart is tempted to be misread as masters, needs, drives, instincts, longings, and things that cannot be changed that are hard wired into our system. In fact, everyone in the major psychologies whether they are humanistic, hierarchy of needs, behavioral psychology, primary and secondary drives, psychodynamic psychology, conflicting instincts. They all view the fundamental desire structure of the human heart is a hard wired given. And that all subsequent counseling and interpretation of change is matter of working with the givens. They try whether or not to meet the needs, or bring insight into the instincts or re-pattern the drives. In the book of Titus, the mind of God, the redeemer, in fact the Holy Spirit rewires what we want. It is not true that the desires of the human heart cannot be changed. That is false. The very center of the structure of our message is the desires of the human heart can be changed. "

Dr. David Powlison
Notes from Lecture Part 2, January 30, 2001, at 18 minutes into message.
Bethlehem Conference for Pastors 2001
God, Psychology, and Christian Care for the Soul
http://www.desiringgod.org/ResourceLibrary/ConferenceMessages/ByConference/6/
http://www.desiringgod.org/
http://www.ccef.org/

Kenneth Bailey on Parables

2008-11-15T05:43:00.000-08:00

PARABLES: METHODOLOGY OF KENNETH BAILEY
by Jared Edwards

Introduction

Scholars throughout the church age have been on a quest to determine the proper methodology for interpreting the parables. Augustine interpreted the parables using alegory assigning symbols from the stories of the Christian faith to characters and objects. The method of modernity was to determine the single point of each parable to be a moral platitude or eschatalogical declaration. Postmodernity engages in the aesthetic, structural, and existential dimensions of the parables with the reader response methodology. Other scholars are currently taking a more synthetic approach to the interpretation of the parables and have reacted against the one dimensional way seeking to include the valid insights from each methodology and enjoying the multifaceted information extracted by each approach.

Kenneth Bailey’s Methodology Introduced

Kenneth Bailey’s approach of interpreting the parables is rather creative than other conservative scholars such as Blomberg who posits one, two, or three points to simple, and complex parables. Rather than seeing a set number of themes or points, Bailey advocates a synthetic literary-cultural approach and asserts that “each parable is like a great diamond that sheds light in a variety of directions. At the same time a white diamond cannot legitimately be examined through a blue lens and declared to be blue in color…rather the question for the interpreter becomes – what are the various aspects of truth that Jesus is creating for his first-century Jewish audience?”[1] He continues to state the parable is like a “theological cluster”… a cluster of grapes that forms a unit with its own integrity (and often beauty) and is yet made up of a number of grapes….even so a number of theological themes are often set forth in a single parable.”[2] Bailey’s entire method of interpreting the parables can be summarized in the following steps,

“First, determine the audience. Is Jesus talking to the scribes and Pharisees, to the crowds, or to his disciples?

Second, examine carefully the setting/interpretation provided by the evangelist or his source.

Third, identify the “play within a play” and look at the parable on these two levels.

Fourth, try to discern the cultural presuppositions of the story, keeping in mind that the people in them are Palestinian peasants.

Fifth, see if the parable will break down into a series of scenes, and see if themes within the different scenes repeat in any discernible pattern.

Six, try to discern what symbols the original audience would have instinctively identified in the parable.

Seventh, determine what single decision/response the original audience is pressed to make in the original telling of the parable.

Eighth, discern the cluster of theological motifs that the parable affirms and/or presupposes, and determine what the parable is saying about these motifs.”[3]

The scope of this paper is to examine the fourth and eighth steps and show how incorporating these into the interpretation will help bring out a fuller understanding the parables.

Bailey’s Literary-Cultural Approach

One of Bailey’s main concerns are how the concepts within relate to the metaphor or parable. Bailey aquires this concern from living and teaching New Testament in the traditional Middle Eastern culture for forty years.[4] Bailey states that the “Middle Eastern creators of meaning do not offer a concept and then illustrate with a metaphor or parable. For them the equation is reversed….the Middle Eastern mind creates meaning by use of simile, metaphor, proverb, parable, and dramatic action…..not illustrating a concept but is rather creating meaning by reference to something concrete.”[5] He supports his point by directing our attention to Isaiah who “begins with conceptual language and then breaks into metaphor as a form of language with a higher potential for creation of meaning.” Bailey indicates that “metaphor and concept appear together in the Biblical tradition, but the metaphor is primary.”[6] He supports his statement by quoting Sallie McFague TeSelle that the phrase “God’s love knows no bounds” does not tell us much and “what counts here is not extracting an abstract concept but precisely the opposite, delving into the details of the story itself, letting the metaphor do its job of revealing the new setting for ordinary life. It is the play of the radical images that does the job.”[7] Bailey warns us that “the condensation of the meaning of the metaphor into concept catches a part, but not all, of the metaphor. The metaphor speaks to us on a deeper level.”[8] He encourages the reader that “the metaphor combines a concrete base in the physical world that can be seen and touched and felt with an unseen spiritual reality. Thus the metaphor speaks to the whole person in a way that the concept does not.”[9]

Bailey’s method of extracting meaning from the parable is to discern the cultural presuppositions of the story keeping in mind the people engaged are Palestinian peasants. Bailey declares “the New Testament itself often does not give us enough scope to answer the cultural questions that the text requires us to answer. Yes, we do discover by a simple reading of the New Testament that Pharisees and sinners do not like each other. But no New Testament text describe the depth of feelings on the topic such as are on display in folio 49 from Pesahim in the Babylonian Talmud..”[10] His pursuit to capture the meaning is to study the extensive literature like that of the Jewish law including the Mishnah, the Talmud of Babylon, the Talmud of Jerusalem, the Tosephta, and the Sifras of Genesis and of Leviticus. He also believes the translations of the Old Testament into Aramaic, the Targumim to be helpful. Bailey does not have a problem with finding cultural context in the 3rd, 4th, or 5th centuries because he is convinced as Flusser writes “even if the rabbinic sources are later, they still preserve evidence of an earlier stage which gave birth to the New Testament concepts and motives…even if individual sages can be described as innovators, they still based their achievements upon the oral material which they received from their predecessors.”[11] Bailey also agrees with the distinguished Harvard authority on Judaism, George Foot Moore, whose research concludes that the relationship between the Gospels and the rabbinical sources are “the important instrument” for understanding each other. Bailey continues to explain that though economic, political, conceptual and legal change can happen rapidly, “cultural mores are the slowest to change. This is our concern.” He fills in his statement more fully by illustrating,

“To interpret the parables of Jesus, the interpreter (consciously or unconsciously) will inevitably make decisions about attitudes toward women, men , the family, the family structure, family loyalties and their requirements, children, architectural styles, agricultural methods, leaders, scholars, religious authorities, trades, craftsmen, servants, eating habits, money, loyalty to community, styles of humor, story-telling, methods of communication, use of metaphor, forms of argumentation, forms of reconciliation, attitudes towards time, towards governmental authority, what shocks at what level, reactions to social situations, reasons for anger, attitudes toward animals, emotional and cultural reactions to various colors, dress, sexual codes, the nature of personal and community honor and its importance, and many, many other things.”[12]

Bailey quotes Newbigin’s statement “it is obviously true that we have no way to understand the Bible except through the concepts and categories of thought with which our culture has equipped us through our whole intellectual formation from earliest childhood.”[13] Bailey summarizes his view well by concluding “if cultural condition of language, history, economics, politics, and military influence the way we do our reasoning, how much more does culture influence what we mean when we use metaphors and tell stories to create meaning!”[14] He is critical and disturbed when Western scholars continue to read into the text of the NT their own Western attitudes with little or no apparent awareness that their own “feelings and attitudes on these topics are not universals.”[15]

Bailey also introduces the significance of Arabic translations. He maintains that many first century Christians mother tongue were Arabic and “those whose first language was historically Aramaic, Syriac, Coptic, or Greek, who after the Muslim conquest gradually became Arabic speaking and who, in the process, recorded and translated their spiritual heritage into Arabic.”[16] Bailey notes that “the history of Arabic NT is the longest and perhaps the richest of any of the versions….because all translators stopped translating in all languages but one- Arabic. All during that 900-year period an amazing number of translations into Arabic from Greek, Syriac, Coptic, and Latin were produced.”[17] His goal here is simply to examine all these translations into Arabic and perceive how they interpreted the NT, and “how Semitic Christians living in the Semitic Middle East understood material originating in a Semitic cultural world.”[18]

Bailey’s Interpretation Prodigal Son Part 1

In the second verse of the parable of the prodigal son, the younger son said to his father, “Father, give me the share of the property that is coming to me (Lk 15:12).” Bailey states according to the culture of the day, the shock is in the statement the prodigal makes. In the Middle Eastern culture, to ask for the inheritance while the father is still alive is to wish him to be dead. A Middle Eastern father “is expected to refuse the boy and drive him out of the house with verbal if not physical blows.”[19] He quotes Middle Eastern commentator Ibn al-Tayyib in Tafsir II “this is an illegitimate request! The son has no right to make such a request. There is no evidence that such a gift was even possible under Jewish law. Granted, Abraham divided his inheritance among his sons while he was still alive. But he did this out of his own choosing to keep the family from splitting apart. But this son has made his request for his own physical pleasures.”

This is significant because the parable is showing how the father’s behavior is violating the traditional expectations of a typical Middle Eastern father.[20] While the prodigal is impatient for the father to die, the father acts against his normal Middle Eastern behavior, and instead of driving him out of his home, he graciously grants his son the request. The law is not broken according to Deut 21:17, but certainly the father’s heart is broken. This theologically demonstrates that humankind in their rebellion really wants God to be dead.[21] Bailey writes, “It is out of his rejection of his father’s love that the prodigal makes his request. It is out of the father’s costly love that he grants that same request.”[22]

It is critical to notice in the Jewish law of inheritance in the Mishnah the father cannot sell the goods that are to be his sons, and the son cannot sell them while they are in the father’s possession. If the father sells them, it is only sold until the father dies, and if the son sells them, the buyer has no claim on them until the father dies.[23] Imagine the difficulty this must have been for the prodigal to liquidate his inheritance and the impact it made on the father and the remaining family. This request had a significant consequence on the household since their inheritance was not in stocks, bonds, and savings, but in houses, animals, and land. The inheritance the prodigal garnished was as significant portion of the life of the family.[24] Sale of land, animals, and houses in the Middle East takes months and often years. The smallest transactions in the East have been noted to take days of bargaining.The prodigal must have sold indifferently, foolishly, and cheaply. The community at large is horrified. The prodigal is selling his own soul and insulting his father openly by making public what has happened between them. Bailey quotes that “slander in the whole town (Sir 26:5)” would be a terror worse than death.

Bailey mentions that the Midrash Rabbah, Ruth, and the Jerusalem Talmud records the community would have performed a ceremony called “qetsatsah,” a word in Aramaic signifying judgement. This ceremony is performed when a certain person is cut off from their inheritance. It generally occurs when someone sells their inheritance to a Gentile or marries a Gentile. The relatives would bring a jar of parched corn and nuts and break the jar in front of the community and declare them to be broken off from their inheritance. So when father allows his son to depart, he not only gives away his possessions but his very life and reputation.

Bailey continues to illustrate interesting cultural points about his journey in the far away country, reckless living, spending everything, the famine, hiring himself out, and experience with the pigs, but now I plan to skip down to the reconciliation of the son and the father.
Luke 15:17 states “but when he came to himself,” and Bailey writes the “traditional understanding of ‘he came to himself’ is ‘he repented.’”[25] He backs up his statement with the earlier parables of the lost sheep and lost coins where Jesus redefines repentance as “acceptance of being found.” Lost coins and lost sheep do not find themselves, rather the shepherd and the woman go at great effort and time to find the sheep and the coin. The prodigal comes to himself and realizes the position he gave up as a son. His humiliation is demonstrated in his statement “ I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants (Lk 15:18-19).” The father proclaims “for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found (Lk 15:24).” Bailey interprets repentance in Luke 15 is acceptance of being lost and now found. [26]

Bailey offers a significant interpretation by demonstrating the Arabic translations record “fashion out of me a craftsman” rather than “treat me as one of your hired servants” and “no longer worthy to be called your son” should be translated “I am not currently worthy.” Bailey explains the Old Syriac Peshitta word makil should be used. The meaning should be conveyed “I lost the money, therefore I am not now worthy to be called your son. But, give me a few years working as a skilled craftsman and I will be.”[27] The prodigal plans to earn the inheritance back and restore his status. He believes that it is now impossible to be reinstated as a son and he decides to become a paid craftsman and work for his wages to pay his father back. His coming to himself is to save his face before the family and the community.

Repentance in the view of the rabbis is confession, compensation, and sincerity in keeping the law previously broken.[28] Although this plan is difficult in itself of his father finding him work, the greatest difficulty is facing the community after squandering his inheritance to the Gentiles who raise pigs. The prodigal faces a possible qetsatsah ceremony of rejection. They will circle him with chants, taunts, throwing dried manure and garbage, and ultimately will cut him off from the people.

Bailey well describes the setting when the prodigal returns to the village. He explains that unlike the Western culture, everything that happens in the Middle Eastern culture is everyone’s business. These families are not in isolated individual dwellings. The average size of the ancient Middle Eastern town was about six acres and the streets are only as wide to allow a camel to pass. Rabbinic literature makes clear that everyone lived in the town, even the farmers. They would leave the town each day to work in their own fields and would only sleep in booths during harvest time to protect their crops. The traditional village was very crowded with socializing, business transactions, etc. This is the scene that the prodigal enters and must make his way to his father’s house. This is not a plantation in top of a hill in a rural area.[29] The prodigal believes the relationship between him and his father is that of a servant and a master of a broken law he can restore, while the compassionate father sees the relationship as that of a child in a broken relationship. This is the tension we must understand in reading “while he was still at a great distance, his father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell upon his neck and kissed him (Lk 15:20).”

Bailey depicts that the home is in the middle of the traditional village facing the narrow street.[30] The character of the compassionate father implies that he had been watching down this distant road for months or years, knowing his son will fail, hoping he would come home. The father’s plan is to reach his son before he reaches the village and is humiliated, taunted, and excommunicated. The traditional character of the Middle Eastern father is to exhibit anger and hostility to the boy who has humiliated his father before the whole village. A traditional Middle Eastern father must uphold the honor of the family, but the compassionate father acts contrary to the traditional attitude and shows compassion.

More than that, the father does something way out of character - he runs. Middle Eastern fathers do not run in public as young boys do. Bailey quotes Ben Sirach that “a man’s manner of walking tells you what he is (Sirach 19:30).” He brings up an interesting cultural point that “one of the main reasons why Middle Easterners of rank do not run is that traditionally they have all worn long robs…no one can run in a long rob without taking it in into his hands. When this occurs the legs are exposed which is considered humiliating.”[31] Bailey writes that the Arabic versions avoid the translation that the father ran. They translate “he went” or “presented himself” or “hurried”. For a thousand years a wide range of such phrases where employed to avoid the humiliating truth of the text.[32] What a brilliant illustration of redemption! The father takes upon himself the form of a servant, pulls up his robe and runs to greet his son before he reaches the village!

The compassionate acts of the father are not over. We would expect to see the prodigal son fall on his face at the feet of the father and explain his plan of becoming a craftsman to pay him back, but before he is able to do this the father falls upon his neck and kisses him. The Jewish crowd anticipates this as an echo from Jacob and Esau’s reuniting where Jacob falls before his feet and Esau falls on his neck and kisses him. The kiss on the hand is respect shown by a community to a priest. The Middle Eastern posture of restoring a broken relationship is to fall and kiss the fathers feet. Kissing his hands are not good enough. Rather the compassionate father is he who falls upon the neck of the prodigal and kisses his face.

The father quickly says to his servants “bring quickly the best rob, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and sandals on his feet (Lk 15:22).” The father does this in the open presence of the public because he is sending a message to the community that his son is accepted. After this display of affection and acceptance by the father, there is no possiblity of a qetsatsah ceremony. Bailey interestingly notes the prodigal could not ask the father to “fashion me a craftsman” because the father’s love had overwhelmed him. The prodigal’s view of repentance was transformed from a master slave retribution to a father son acceptance and restored relationship. Bailey describes the confession of “I am not worthy to be called your son” means “I am unworthy of this stunning public costly demonstration of unexpected love which has just unfolded before my eyes!”[33] The relationship is now transformed from a law based relationship to love based and true repentance is present with the broken heart of the prodigal because his eyes were opened to the true situation. The father quickly dresses his son. The prodigal does not even have time to take a shower. The servants quickly bring the best robe because the father does not want him to be seen in the rags anymore. The father has treated the son as if he have never left home and squandered away his inheritance.

The father continues the celebration by stating “and bring the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate, for this my son was dead and is alive, he was lost and is found. And they began to celebrate (Lk 15:23-24).” Jesus uses resurrection language in the parable even before the resurrection. The big banquet for a single family for fatted calf would feed possibly two hundred people. Bailey interestingly points out that “the father is not just expressing his personal joy, he is formally reconciling the prodigal to the entire family and village. For the sake of the father (after such a grand banquet), no one will stand aloof from the prodigal.”[34] The banquet by the father is a very unusual incident. The Old Testament demonstrates that butchering a calf signals a very special occasion and the lesser person always butchers the calf for someone higher in rank, and in no situation have the guests offended the hosts. Examples he uses to support his statement is when Abraham gives the calf to the three angelic guests (Gen 18:7), and when a calf is butched for Saul and his servants (1 Sam 28:24-35).

Bailey makes an theological assertion,

“in the process Jesus is making a statement about the meaning of his table fellowship with sinners. …The celebration is not in honor of the prodigal. When a great king hosts a banquet for his courtiers, the king is in the central figure at the banquet, not the courtiers….So here the banquet is in honor of the father and the reconciliation he has achieved at such great cost. The father gets congratulated. The son formally, but not warmly, accepted for the sake of what the father has done. The father is assuring this acceptance in the community…The banquet is a celebration of joy in honor of the father and his life-saving costly love.” [35]
Jesus is exalting himself communicating in the parable as someone beyond the compassion of a Middle Eastern father. The father in the story is celebrating the reconciliation with the prodigal son and the celebration is not so much about the prodigal’s return than the father’s compassion and acceptance of the son.

In Luke 15 Bailey argues that the father is showing compassion like a mother. The Middle Eastern father would “sit stern and aloof” in the house when the news of his son reached him, and the “mother of the house might throw caution to the wind, run down the road, and shower the boy with kisses. Mothers are like that (the village would say)….no traditional village father would act in such a publicly disgraceful manner, especially for such a son.”[36] Bailey states that the “single metaphor preserves the unity of God and the finest qualities of father and mother are built into that unity.”[37] Bailey’s theological discovery follows Isaiah 66:13 which illustrates “as a mother comforts her child, so I will comfort you; you shall be comforted in Jerusalem.”

Theological Motifs

The next aspect of Bailey’s interpretation in this paper is to discern the theological motifs and determine what the parable is saying about these motifs. In the parable of the prodigal son Kenneth Bailey determines that the theological cluster of the parable consists of eleven motifs: sin, freedom, repentance, grace, joy, fatherhood, sonship, Christology, family/community, atonement and eschatology. I will break down a few of these motifs.

Sin. The parable demonstrates two types of sin: the law breaker and law keeper. The younger brother sins breaking the law not fulfilling obligations to family and society. The older brother (contained in part 2)[38] sins by keeping the law. The sin of both comes from breaking the relationship with the father. Both brothers sin breaking the relationship with the father by viewing their familial relationship as a servant – slave, rather than loving father – son relationship. The only difference between the two is the older brother stays at home with his inheritance and the younger brother leaves with his inheritance.

Repentance. The parable exhibits two types of repentance in respect to the younger brother. At first, the younger brother’s view of repentance is earn the inheritance back by becoming a craftsman and restore it to the father. Jesus’ teaching of repentance in the passage is “accept the costly gift of being found as a son.”[39] After all the actions of the compassionate father, the younger brother accepts the costly gift of being found as a son.

Christology. The parable presents Christology in that the father takes upon himself the form of a servant by graciously granting his younger son his inheritance at all costs, embracing him back into the family, and reconciling the boy to himself and the community by throwing a banquet in celebration. The father demonstrates atonement and redemption by publicly restoring the boy’s sonship at all cost. Because of who the father is, the love offered, the atoning power is immeasurable. Bailey advocates “some of the deepest levels of the meaning of the cross are clearly exposed.”[40]

Eschatology. The parable manifests Eschatology declaring that the messianic banquet has begun and all who receive the father’s costly love are welcome in the banquet. “The table fellowship with Jesus is a proleptic celebration of the messianic banquet of the end times…. Luke (or his source) present the reader with the former parable where to eat bread in the kingdom of God finally means to accept table fellowship with Jesus….It is a joyous banquet that prefigures Holy Communion.”[41]

Assessment

Kenneth Bailey has made a tremendous contribution to scholarship with his cultural research in his variation of the litarary-cultural synthetic interpretation of parables. As demonstrated in the this paper, determining the Middle-Eastern social customs, mores, and values are critical in understanding the parables. The Western world of scholarship has been guilty of taking the extravagant metaphors and detailed stories told in the parables and condensing them down to a limited one, two, or three point message. We have also been guilty of reading our own cultural mores, customs, and traditions into the texts and spoiling the beauty and many times the meaning of the parables. Although I do not find myself agreeing with Bailey on every point theologically and I believe he goes a little too far conjecturing some of the conclusions from the culture, I believe we all can learn from the diligence and contribution he has dedicated to the cultural research in which these parables are conceived.

I agree with Bailey that there may not be a set number of points or concepts and “each parable is like a great diamond that sheds light in a variety of directions.” There are so many valuable discoveries we can glean from the parables if we interpret them exegetically, biblically, theologically, and culturally. On the other hand, I do believe it is right to say there are a set number of main points Jesus is conveying, and using a literary-cultural step defines the background to bring out the beauty and color of these main points. Incorporating the cultural synthetic exegetical method, we may be able to see clusters of other truths beautifully combined and intertwined with these main points and the cultural meaning will bring out the intensity, force, and depth of these main points.

WORKS CITED
Bailey, Kenneth E. Finding the Lost Cultural Keys to Luke 15. St. Louis: Concordia Publishing
House, 1992.

Bailey, Kenneth E. Jacob & the Prodigal: How Jesus Retold Israel’s Story. Dover’s
Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

Bailey, Kenneth E. Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to
the Parables in Luke. Combined Edition. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1983.

Bailey, Kenneth E. The Cross & the Prodigal: Luke 15 Through the Eyes of Middle Eastern
Peasants. Dover’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003.

[1] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost: Cultural Keys to Luke 15 (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1992), 50.
[2] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 50.
[3] Kenneth E. Bailey, Poet & Peasant and Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables in Luke. Combined Edition (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1983) xxii.
[4] Kenneth E. Bailey, The Cross & the Prodigal: Luke 15 Through the Eyes of Middle Eastern Peasants (Dover’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 11.
[5] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 16.
[6] Ibid., 18.
[7] Ibid., 18.
[8] Ibid., 19.
[9] Ibid., 19.
[10] Ibid., 33.
[11] Ibid., 31.
[12] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 32.
[13] Kenneth E. Bailey, Jacob & the Prodigal: How Jesus Retold Israel’s Story (Dover’s Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 37.
[14] Kenneth E. Bailey, Jacob & the Prodigal, 37.
[15] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 33.
[16] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 34.
[17] Ibid., 36.
[18] Ibid., 36.
[19] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 112. Bailey mentions in the Poet & Peasant page 162 that one case is contemporary life was that of a Syrian farm’s son who asked for his inheritance. The father drove him out of the house. The second was the story of a medical doctor whose son asked for the inheritance. The shock of the request brought on a heart attack.
[20] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 114.
[21] Kenneth E. Bailey, The Cross & the Prodigal, 42.
[22] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 116.
[23] Ibid., 117.
[24] Kenneth E. Bailey, The Cross & the Prodigal, 42.
[25] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 129.
[26] At this point, I would disagree with Bailey. The prodigal’s acceptance of being found was not when he came to himself, but rather after the reconciliation of the father. His true repentance is complete at the banquet when he relinquishes his idea of repentance “fashioning him out a craftsman” to accepting that he is a true son and being his son. Bailey might mean that the prodigal’s coming to himself is the beginning of repentance. With that statement, I would agree.
[27] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 135.
[28] Ibid., 138.
[29] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 140.
[30] Ibid., 143.
[31] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 144.
[32] Ibid., 146.
[33] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 153.
[34] Ibid., 155.
[35] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 156.
[36] Ibid., 159.
[37] Ibid., 159.
[38] The length of the paper would not be able to contain the second part of Bailey’s interpretation of the prodigal son.
[39] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 191.
[40] Kenneth E. Bailey, Finding the Lost, 192.
[41] Ibid., 192.

Live For Ease?

2008-10-09T10:09:00.000-07:00

We who pursue our indulgent desires and love luxury and ease should listen to the following story:

" There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried, and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. And he called out, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame.' But Abraham said, 'Child, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things, and Lazarus in like manner bad things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us.' And he said, 'Then I beg you, father, to send him to my father’s house— for I have five brothers—so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment.' But Abraham said, 'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.' And he said, 'No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' He said to him, 'If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.'"(Luke 16:19-31)

This rich man spent all his time clothing himself in the fine things of this world, enjoying every day splendour and luxury, living a life amidst gourmet delicacies, excess and overabundance, grandour, pomp, and vainglory. Does not this represent even the middle class American who pursues his career vigorously for a life of wealth and ease? How much more the upper class also. We are all rich in this country. Even if you barely paid your bills this month. How many pairs of shoes do you have? The man who is consumed in the desire for fine dress will steadily increase his bounty by multiple accessories and embellishments. This man will find himself indulging deeper into extravagant and well garnished feasts falling into greed and debauchery. The problem was that he was so indulgent and consumed in his own lust and desires that he neglected the care of the poor, forsaking the second greatest commandment “to love your neighbor as yourself.” He had the means of producing an impact with his abundant resources on those who suffer well beyond the good Samaritan. Even though we are not all this rich, does this not represent us all who spend all our time on individual success and pursuit saying we have no time be involved in the things of God? A man who is indulgent in his own desires with neglect of the distressed and miserable has no heart capable of faith and repentance required for the justification of the ungodly. This man has neglected God’s Word in unbelief and has no room for repentance.

He should have learned pity even from the dogs who showed mercy on Lazarus. “There can be no doubt that those dogs were guided by the secret purpose of God, to condemn that man by their example …. When strangers, or even brute animals, supply our place, by performing an office which ought rather to have been discharged by ourselves, let us conclude that there are so many witnesses and judges appointed by God, to make our criminality the more manifest (Calvin on Luke p. 185).”

It is even those who are “wicked despisers of God, engrossed in pleasures of the flesh, and by mental intoxication, drown every feeling of piety,” despise the humble appearance of the Bible. So thoroughly infected is the mind of man with a depraved curiosity, that the greater part of men are always gaping afer new revelations (Calvin).” Despising the Scriptures as God’s sufficient revelation the rich man asked Abraham to allow Lazarus to appear to his family members and warn him. How was this man still engulfed in his lust for something other what God has appointed as means for repentance. Abraham stated, “'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.' And he said, 'No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' He said to him, 'If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.'" This is a convicting statement. How many of us are in neglect of God’s word and desire soemthing more for guidance than what he has clearly set forth the way of salvation. God has spoken in a book. Some of us have several copies on every shelf but they sit there and collect dust!

I encourage us all to open the Scriptures and allow it to search our hearts. Let it speak to our overindulgent desires we are all guilty of. Let us love our neighbors as ourselves providing aid for their needs. We should not confuse our act of charity will earn God’s favor. Only a humble, meek, pure heart toward God in faith will result in our salvation. We can never add to Christ’s work on the cross for the forgiveness of sins. We perform charity out of faith towards God, that which overflows in mercy towards others.

Weeds and Wheaties

2008-09-19T20:19:00.000-07:00

Do you like weeds in your yard? Do you like living in a world with evil people? What if although you are not one who is despised as a menace to society, are still not counted in with the righteous?

He put another parable before them, saying, "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also. And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, 'Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?' He said to them, 'An enemy has done this.' So the servants said to him, 'Then do you want us to go and gather them?' But he said, 'No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn (Mt 13:24-30).'"

Just as the weeds and the wheat grew together, sometimes indistinguishable, in the same field, so also the righteous and the wicked dwell together in the world until the end of the age. Professing Christians caught up in the cares and habits of this world represent the apparent confusion of the weed or wheat. They should take heed to this teaching lest their fruitless profession be equal to a scorched weed. The wicked should realize that although the Christian may appear less righteous, like categorizing the weed and wheat, the difference is apparent to God, and like the weed and wheat, both will be consigned to two different destinations. Like the weed, the wicked will be separated out, judged, and destroyed. Like the wheat, the righteous will be gathered together and brought into Christ’s kingdom.

The world is searching for the answer to world peace. Christ gives the answer in a single parable but no one accepts it. Ultimately, there will be no world peace until Christ has gathered all his wheat into one barn. The kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness is at war until the final day. We must live together with those who are in wicked rebellion against God until he sorts us out. Just as the farmer instructed his servants to leave the weeds in the field, so also we may not separate the righteous from the unrighteous, lest we root up the righteous with them. Christ is the only one with the two edge sword who is able to make the cut without damaging his people. Therefore we must dwell with them. We must spread the good news of the kingdom until the harvest has come.

Wanna Go To A Wedding?

2008-08-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

Is it too late to enter the kingdom of God? Do you think you have done too much evil to be forgiven? Do you think you have prepared enough to enter his kingdom when Christ comes again to judge the world? Do you think you would be ready if he came in the next 10 minutes? Read on.

"Then the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps. As the bridegroom was delayed, they all became drowsy and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, 'Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.' Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said to the wise, 'Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.' But the wise answered, saying, 'Since there will not be enough for us and for you, go rather to the dealers and buy for yourselves.' And while they were going to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, 'Lord, lord, open to us.' But he answered, 'Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.' Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.(MT 25:1-13)

When expectation of the second coming is near, Christ may delay longer than people realize. Like the arrival of the bridegroom, no one will know when Christ will return. How many people think that Christ is going to return in their lifetime or even this decade? It is not a bad thing to think that he is going to return soon and watch for him. That is exactly what he expects of us. But many will grow weary tired of waiting and ill prepared like the foolish virgins.

One who is a follower of Christ, must be extensively prepared like the wise virgins. Like the foolish virgins there will be many who are surprised at the cost of following Christ. This accompanies both true faith and true repentance leading to good works. Many will think that only believing there is a God, or believing Christ is the Son of God is enough. But these have never experienced saving faith, because their faith was a false belief, and did not lead to repentance and good works. Genuine belief will eventually result in action. Partial believers are like the foolish virgins who did believe in the bridegroom’s arrival, but were not fully prepared.

It may be too late for those who find themselves ill prepared, for the second coming is at hand, and they will stand before God without the requirements met to enter. Like the foolish virgins they did not prepare adequately and will discover a point of no return. What a terrible thing to hear the phrase, “I never knew you.” They were not allowed to come in even though they stood at the door willing. These virgins wanted to be at the wedding but did not want anything to do with the bridegroom. If they did they would have had oil for their lamps so they could see him. The virgins will represent all the people who want to go to heaven but do not want God any where around when they get there. They only want God for what he can give them.

Good news, today there is enough time to be prepared. God has set forth the requirements in his word to enter the kingdom. Open up the Bible and find out before it is too late…

"A Righteous Man" May Be In Worse Shape Than A Sinner

2008-07-06T16:30:00.000-07:00

Do you view yourself as a good person content in your standing as a person? Do you view yourself as someone who makes mistakes but is not as bad as certain people you see on the news? You have done some wrong things in your life but you have been pretty much clean all your life.

Or are you someone who feel like you have done more wickedness than you could have ever imagine doing, you are sick of your life, in total despair, and want to be delivered from your past ways never to see them again?

Read below to see why the latter is in a better position than the former.

And when he entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came up to him as he was teaching, and said, "By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?" Jesus answered them, "I also will ask you one question, and if you tell me the answer, then I also will tell you by what authority I do these things. The baptism of John, from where did it come? From heaven or from man?" And they discussed it among themselves, saying, "If we say, 'From heaven,' he will say to us, 'Why then did you not believe him?' But if we say, 'From man,' we are afraid of the crowd, for they all hold that John was a prophet." So they answered Jesus, "We do not know." And he said to them, "Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.

“What do you think? A man had two sons. And he went to the first and said, 'Son, go and work in the vineyard today.' And he answered, 'I will not,' but afterward he changed his mind and went. And he went to the other son and said the same. And he answered, 'I go, sir,' but did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?" They said, "The first." Jesus said to them, "Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him (Mt 21:28-32).

Like the father sending his sons to labor in the vineyard, God demands submission of all creation to his will. There are no exceptions. Atheists, Agnostics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, etc are all under obligation to submit to the will of Christ. There are not many ways to God but one through Christ. All men are going to be judged on the principle that only God defines man’s reconciliation to God not man. The elders and chief priests thought they were obeying the God of the Jews but they rejected his messiah. They wanted a messiah from their own definition not the one God gave them. These represent the people today who say that Jesus was a great person or teacher but not the only way to God. That will not do because he claimed to be God in the flesh. Either he is a lunatic, a liar, or Lord.

Like the son who said he would obey but disobeyed, many people say that they will obey but never do and suffer the eternal judgment of God. These are the self righteous individuals who think they are on the right track. They think they have their act together but are not ready to fully dedicate themselves to God as he has defined in his word. They think they will have time to repent before it is too late. Little do they know they are like the fool whose life was demanded of them that night. God determines the span of life, not us. Our life could be demanded of us at this moment. If this is you, repent while you can.

Like the son who changed his mind and obeyed, some initially rebel, but before it is too late, they repent and are forgiven. The self righteous individuals are at the bottom of the totem pole, not the criminals, thieves, prostitutes, scoundrels, swindlers, and murderers. It is the self righteous who say, “I keep the 10 commandments” or who say “I don’t do bad things such as these.” No, it is the people who beat their chest with their head down crying out to God saying, “have mercy on me a sinner” who will be the first in the kingdom of God. If you are of Adam, your heart is as evil as the criminal, thief, prostitute, and murderer. If you do not believe so, your sin remains and you are putting yourself above God in the judgment seat claiming what God says is not true about you.

We are all God’s servants whether you choose to be one or not. Did God not create you? We are either wicked servants or obedient servants. One obtaining eternal judgment the other eternal life. May God give us the grace to be the latter.

Forgiven Much?

2008-06-05T08:44:00.000-07:00

What would it be like hanging out with a prostitute, a drug addict, or an ex-convict? What would it be like serving Christ alongside someone who has wasted half their life, all worn out, 30 years old but looks like they are 60? They cannot keep a job because they are not all there mentally. They need help constantly paying for their rent, bills, groceries, and cannot afford to eat more than a meal at McDonalds. But you have been blessed and are reaping the consequences of your clean life and have an abundance of possessions. Your mental state is sharpened and trained by college and work experience. You are reaping exactly what you have sown with diligent pursuit of education and hard work. But you love your possessions more than Christ, while your brother or sister in the pathetic state they are in has laid all that he or she has at Christ’s feet.

Listen to the story:

One of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and took his place at the table. And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner." And Jesus answering said to him, "Simon, I have something to say to you." And he answered, "Say it, Teacher."

"A certain moneylender had two debtors. One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. When they could not pay, he cancelled the debt of both. Now which of them will love him more?" Simon answered, "The one, I suppose, for whom he cancelled the larger debt." And he said to him, "You have judged rightly." Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon, "Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little." And he said to her, "Your sins are forgiven." Then those who were at table with him began to say among themselves, "Who is this, who even forgives sins?" And he said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace (Lk 7:36-49)."

Just like the man owing only 50 denarii, those who take their salvation for granted not being aware of the infinite debt their percieved sins deserve should not despise those who have been redeemed from a more pathetic life of sin. Is this not true of most of us? Most of us grew up in the morality of this nation espousing “christian” values. Most of us were not delivered from prostitution, prison, drug addiction, etc. We basically had “clean” lives but were convicted of our transgressions of disobedience to parents, gossip, lying, cheating, excessive drinking, smoked a few joints, fornication, etc. These things that our society do not deem as so bad. It is we who profess to be saved by grace alone and profess to have been desperately wicked, do not really believe that confession deep down in our hearts. If so we would be more dedicated to Christ, than addicted to idleness. We still spend more time and thought on our jobs, movies, TV shows, sports, food, drink, vacations, clothes, praise of others, ease, etc, those gifts that God has given the world that we have turned to idols. We profess to be Christians but our lives have very little room for Christ. When it is time to serve, it is out of a heart of obligation and chore rather than joyful love and gratitude for what Christ has done and delivered us from. That is why we despise those who are redeemed from a more pathetic state. We tend to look at their love for Christ with jealously and challenge or judge their love as not being as real as it looks.

Like the debtor owing five hundred denarii, those who realize they have been forgiven much will respond in exuberant thankfulness and love for Christ. To get a rough estimate 500 denarii was a year and a half wage for a common man. Let’s say a common man makes $40,000 per year in Dallas. So we are comparing $60,000 of debt forgiven to $6,000. That is quite a difference: a college loan type debt to a credit card a little out of control. Is it not obvious that this person gives all of their energy, time, money, dedication over to Christ?

Like a creditor, God forgives both categories of sinners and allows them to begin again with a clean slate. Is it not marvelous grace that we can now take our eyes off of ourselves comparing the magnitude of our dedication to Christ? It is really not about our dedication and work anyway. It is about Christ’s work and love for us. We who were condemned even at conception being part of sinful humanity have been forgiven an infinite debt that even one sin deserves.

Let us search our hearts and spend all of our time looking outward of what Christ has done for us and how much he loves us. Then we will be able to repent of our lack of dedication and give all that we have to his service.

One Out of an Abundance

2008-05-04T07:43:00.000-07:00

It is encouraging to know that even though God is not like us, in many ways he is like us. We are created in his image so we share certain things that reflect his personality. Why do we judge others as if we are deserve more or anything at all? Why do we take credit for our good behavior or obedience and look down on others who we deem as immoral? Are we better than they? Why are we so selective in who we socialize with or show favoritism towards? Are we not all created in his image?

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, "This man receives sinners and eats with them."
So he told them this parable: "What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.' Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.

"Or what woman, having ten silver coins, if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, 'Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents(Lk 15:1-10)."

We should marvel at our gracious condescending God! The Jews would have balked that Jesus was identifying God with a shepherd or a woman in a parable, who were some of the most unappreciated in society. How great is his love and mercy identifying with us sinners, though God is abundant in his possessions, he will not allow one out of a trillion who belong to him perish from his hands.

Just as the shepherd and woman search diligently for their lost possessions, so God earnestly pursues to save lost sinners. Does this not encourage you that while you were his enemy and in rebellion, he is still on the pursuit to bring you to repentance? Does this not make you want to turn from your ways and embrace him? Does this not make you want to reconcile with those who you are at odds with and show them this kind of love that the father shows us?

Just as the discovery of the lost coin and sheep evoked great joy, so also the salvation of sinners is a reason for celebration. Well it is about time you got your act together! It is about time you learned those things you are doing will ruin your life! Look at him, he thinks he is so righteous, holier than thou, so heavenly minded no earthly good. What? This is not the right response to those who turn from their sin to God. How often do we despise the work of God in other people’s life? How often though they are still with flaws, still with sin, do we judge others who life and verbalize their profession of faith? Should we not have the attude of the shepherd and the woman who found their lost sheep and coin? Should we not celebrate God’s grace of the greatest miracle ever performed turning a wicked rebellious sinner into an obedient, redeemed, renewed, child of God?

Just as ninety nine sheep and nine coins seem to be a sufficient possession, we who are children of God should never be sufficient at this time in our number as to stop trying to seek the salvation of more. Redemptive history continues until the second coming when Christ appears to judge the world. We are not the judge or the one who determines God’s elect. How arrogant can that be? How slothful can we be to sit around and think that we only are God’s people? The people of God will not be complete until they number as the sand of the sea or the stars of the sky. We are called to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and our neighbor as ourselves. The outworking of that is the Great Commission making disciples, teaching, and urging the lost to repent and turn to God. We love God by spreading his love and word, and loving our neighbor by teaching them the good news of redemption.

May the Lord grant us the grace to make these truths real in our heart for good service.

Lesson for Two Types of People

2008-04-03T18:29:00.000-07:00

Are you tired of pursuing life for your own personal desires? Are you tired of going out and wasting your time, money, and energy seeking satisfaction in excessive drinking and shacking up? Have you discovered a point in your life where you perceive these things do not yield happiness and never will? When you wake up in the morning, do you feel like going back home where you are protected and taken care of, where life is fulfilling, all your needs are met, and there is lasting joy in your life?

Are you a person who continues to strive and strive for achievement but see others who do not measure up to your accomplishments or do not work to your standards? Are you a person who sets standards for yourself and you see yourself judging others by those standards and even yourself when you do not meet those standards get stressed out and depressed? Are you a person who sees others get benefits, blessings, and live a life of joy and they have not accomplished the same, or live according to the same high standards you have set?

This following story is for you.

"There was a man who had two sons. And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.' And he divided his property between them. Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.

"But when he came to himself, he said, 'How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants."' And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate.

"Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.' But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, 'Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!' And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.'"

Just as the younger rebellious son, however wicked we are, while we have life, we always have the opportunity to confess our sins to God and turn to him in contrition. This is good news for some and dangerous for others. If you were able to answer those first questions with yes, you are tired, there is room for repentance in your life. If you feel that hearing this message you can say, “I will just live it up and clean up my life later when I feel like it” may not have room for repentance now or maybe never. Turn now while you have the desire. God may be opening your eyes and drawing you to himself. Can you not see how gracious he is?

Just as the father embraced his son and gave him a feast, God is gracious and merciful to at great lengths to reconcile us to himself and give us everything he has no matter how wicked we have been. That is correct, every child of his is an heir of the kingdom, and much more even God himself.

Just as the older brother should not have despised his younger brother’s reconciliation and reinstatement as an heir, so also we who think we are living slavishly to God should not be angered that God would extend his grace even to the most undeserving. Don’t you see that everything you are and have is by the grace of God? Every gift and talent was given to you. You did not create or earn it. Why also do you think you can earn his favor by your good works? You need to repent of both your good and bad works, and turn to God in repentance. You have not trusted in him alone but also yourself. That is why you continue to strive and strive with no joy in your life.

This is not just you. It is all of us. This is me. I find myself pursuing my pleasures in excess and also setting standards for myself and judging others by them. I find myself repenting of these very things daily.

Moreover, you probably recognize the story. It is called the parable of the prodigal son taught by Jesus in the first century. I encourage you to open your Bible to Luke 15 and read more about what God has to say about us and who he is in all of his grace and wisdom.

George Muller (1805-1898) A Man of Faith

2008-03-04T08:05:00.000-08:00

George Muller is a good example of faith. He ran an orphanage and cared for over 10,000 orphans in his life time. He believed God would maintain the orphanages and never asked for money. Although it is Biblical to ask for money according to 2 Corinthians, God honored his conviction. Muller's faith that his prayers for money would be answered was rooted in the sovereignty of God. When faced with a crisis in having the means to pay a bill he would say, “How the means are to come, I know not; but I know that God is almighty, that the hearts of all are in His hands, and that, if He pleaseth to influence persons, they will send help.”That is the root of his confidence: God is almighty, the hearts of all men are in his hands, and when God chooses to influence their hearts they will give."

Muller knew that God used means. In fact, he loved to say, “Work with all your might; but trust not in the least in your work.” That is a good balanced understanding of the sovereignty of God and human responsibility.

Passion for the Lost of John Paton (1824-1907)

2008-02-04T07:57:00.000-08:00

John Paton a missionary to the New Hebredes Islands had the right attitude when God calls us to missions.

He already had a successful ministry in Scotland and one of the elders Mr. Dickson exploded when he heard of his calling, "The cannibals! You will be eaten by cannibals!" Williams and Harris were missionaries who were killed and eaten by cannibals shortly after they arrive on the Island.

But to this Paton responded:

"Mr. Dickson, you are advanced in years now, and your own prospect is soon to be laid in the grave, there to be eaten by worms; I confess to you, that if I can but live and die serving and honoring the Lord Jesus, it will make no difference to me whether I am eaten by Cannibals or by worms; and in the Great Day my Resurrection body will rise as fair as yours in the likeness of our risen Redeemer. "

Surely he did not get eaten but months after he arrived he buried his sick wife and new born child with his bare hands. He did not end his pursuit of the Cannibals but saw the whole Island turn to Christ over the period of about 15 years.

Loving Your Neighbor As Yourself

2008-01-13T13:51:00.000-08:00

C.S. Lewis' lecture "Weight of Glory" has one of the best illustrations, encouragements, and motivations for loving your neighbor as yourself. The Scriptures declare that among these neighbors include believers and unbelievers of Jesus Christ.

Differing from Lewis, I believe we are neither mortal or immortal. We are creatures created in the image of God, and only God is immortal. Humans are ammortal. The subject of the human race being ammortal is a topic of discussion for another time. The conclusion of the weight of glory stands as a brilliant observation from the creative mind of C.S. Lewis.

"It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously—no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden. "

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)
Weight of Glory (June 8, 1942)

William Tyndale (1494 – 1536)

2007-12-21T05:41:00.000-08:00

John Piper made a brilliant observation when studying the life of William Tyndale a few years ago.

He wrote the key to William Tyndale's success in his historical achievement of translating the Scriptures in the context of persecution is:

1. We must die to the notion that we do not have to think hard or work hard to achieve spiritual goals.

2. And we must die to the notion that our thinking and our working is decisive in achieving spiritual goals.

This is so true and of great significance to keep these two in balance as sides of the same coin.

The spirit of our day does not agree with this. It is very anti-intellectual. But we also need to remember that working hard and giving ourselves to the study of Scripture and good books does not necessary achieve the spiritual goals in and of themselves. Many believe "I just need to read more books!"

Christ's Work as Root, Fruit, and Brute

2007-11-15T06:00:00.000-08:00

A man who was a minister when Sinclair Ferguson was as student use to speak of these three things about the work of Christ. Sinclair mentioned this in one of his sermons:

"Christ gives us deliverance from the bondage to sin, deliverance from the guilt of sin, and the deliverance from the power of Satan, as the root, the fruit, and the brute."

1. He delivers us from the root of the dominion of sin that binds our lives. That is the bondage to sin, the root.

2. He delivers us from the condemnation of sin. That is the guilt of sin, the fruit. He gives us forgiveness that we may live (however imperfectly we may live) with free and full hearts.

3. He delivers us from the dark and sinister powers. That is the deliverance from the power of Satan, the brute. He does this all because we have come to fullness of life in Him in whom all the fullness of the Godhead dwells.

God's Revelation In Nature

2007-10-15T21:34:00.000-07:00

Reformed theology does not restrict this special revelation to the person of Christ as it is delineated in certain sections of Scripture, say, in the Synoptic Gospels or only in the Sermon on the Mount. The whole of revelation, summed up in Scripture, is a special revelation that comes to us in Christ. Christ is the center and content of that whole special revelation, which starts in paradise and is completed in the Apocalypse. Now special revelation has recognized and valued general revelation, has even taken it over and, as it were, assimilated it. And this is always what the Christian does, in special revelation, and from there to look upon nature and history. And now they discovere there as well the traces of the God whom they learned to know in Christ as their Father. Precisely as Christians, by faith, they see the revelation of God in nature much better and more clearly than before. The carnal person does not understand God’s speech in nature and history. He or she searches the entire universe without finding God. But Christians, equipped with the spectacles of Scripture, see God in everything and every thing in God. For that reason we find in Scripture a kind of nature poetry and view of history such as is found nowhere else. With the Christian confession, accordingly, Christians find themselves at home also in the world. They are not strangers there and see the God who rules creation as none other than the one they address as Father in Christ. As a result of this general revelation, they feel at home in the world; it is God’s fatherly hand from which they receive all things also in the context of nature.

In that general revelation, moreover, Christians have a firm foundation on which they can meet all non-Christians. They have a common basis with non-Christians. As a result of their Christian faith, they may find themselves in an isolated position; they may not be able to prove their religious convictions to others; still, in general revelation they have a point of contact with all those who bear the name “human.” Just as a classic preparatory education forms a common foundation for all people of learning, so general revelation unites all people despite their religious differences. Subjectively, in the life of believers, the knowledge of God from nature comes after the knowledge derived from Scripture. We are all born in a certain concrete religion. Only the eye of faith sees objectively nature is antecedent to grace; general revelation precedes special revelation. Grace presupposes nature. To deny that natural religion and natural theology are sufficient and have an autonomous existence of their own is not in any way to do an injustice to the fact that from the creation, from natural and history, from the human heart and conscience, there comes divine speech to every human. No one escapes the power of general revelation. Religion belongs to the essence of a human. The idea of existence of God, the spiritual independence and eternal destiny of the world, the moral world order and its ultimate triumph – all these are problems that never cease to engage the human mind. Metaphysical need cannot be suppressed. Philosophy perennially seeks to satisfy that need. It is general revelation that keeps that need alive. It keeps human beings from degrading themselves into animals. It binds them to a supersensible image and can only find rest in God. General revelation preserves humankind in order that it can be found and healed by Christ and until it is. To that extent natural theology used to be correctly denominated a “preamble of faith,” a divine preparation and education for Christianity. General revelation is the foundation on which special revelation builds itself up.

Finally, the rich significance of general revelation comes out in the fact that it keeps nature and grace, creation and re-creation, the world of reality and the world of values, inseparably connected. Without general revelation, special revelation loses its connectedness with the whole of cosmic existence and life. The link that unites the kingdom of nature and the kingdom of heaven then disappears. Those who, along with critical philosophy, deny general revelation exerts themselves in vain when via the way of practical reason or of the imagination they try to recover what they have lost. They have then lost a support for their faith. In that case the religious life exists in detachment from and alongside of ordinary human existence. The image of God then becomes a “superadded gift”. As in the case of the Socinians, religion becomes alien to human nature. Christianity become a sectarian phenomenon and is robbed of its catholicity. In a word, grace is then opposed to nature. In that case it is consistent, along with the ethical moderns, to assume a radical break between the power of the good and the power of nature. Ethos and nature are then totally separated. The world of reality and the world of values have nothing to do with each others. In that scenario we at the bottom face a revival of Parsism or Manichaeism. By contrast, general revelation maintains the unity of nature and grace, of the world and the kingdom of God, of the natural order and the moral order, of creation and re-creation, of nature and ethos, of virtue and happiness, of holiness and blessedness, and in all these things the unity of divine being. It is one and the same God who in general revelation does not leave himself without a witness to anyone and who in special revelation makes himself known as a God of grace. Hence general and special revelation interact with each other. “God first sent forth nature as a teacher, intending also to send prophecy next, and that you, a disciple of nature, might more easily believe prophecy” (Tertullian). Nature precedes grace; grace perfects nature. Reason is perfected by faith, faith presupposes nature.

Herman Bavinck (1854-1921)
Reformed Dogmatics, Vol 1
pg. 321-322

Theology of Aesthetics

2007-09-30T14:25:00.000-07:00

Dr. David McWilliams made a wonderful point in study one day regarding music, worship, etc. Developing a theology of aesthetics should be done and could help us out tremendously in a day when there are so many differing opinions on how to do worship.

He said in study as we took notes:

Someone needs to work out a theology of aesthetics - what is and what is not beautiful. Is beauty purely subjective? I do not think so. We worship God in the beauty of his holiness. We should be able to recognize beauty. Could not the character of God define beauty? Liturgy should reflect that beauty. Our liturgy should be shaped by a recognition that worship is covenant renewal. The truth that Scripture indicates covenant renewal in liturgy is what separates the reformed community from revivalist approaches to worship.

There are some things that are axiomatic when you come to worship. It is axiomatic that you adore him. Worship is dialogue. It is axiomatic at the call to worship that comes from God, that we respond with adoration. It is also axiomatic that when we have come to do all, that we confess our sins. And then God speaks to us through the assurance of pardon. In preaching, he speaks to us. In giving our offerings, we respond to him. So worship is dialogue. When that basic principle is forgotten and we inform our worship with what people want rather than what is required of us when we come into the presence of God, then worship goes awry and it is not definable in terms of biblical worship. So there two things: aesthetics, and the idea of covenant renewal and dialogue.

The third thing is connection with the past. I am appalled with the church and especially Presbyterians who have had idea of covenant continuity are unconcerned with what our fathers have thought about worship. I am not saying that we christinate the past. It does not have to look exactly like it did in Geneva. But we need to be informed by that past. And our children need to know that there is continuity in our worship and the worship that has gone before us, especially in the reformed churches.

Baby boomers, and early gen x’s have virtually ruined worship. One of the things I see in my own congregation; those who are about 21 years old; when they are exposed to God honoring worship they do not want this other approach. They are sick of the fluff and they want content and substance. That is very encouraging to me and that is the opposite of my generation. So someone needs to work out an ongoing and thorough going theology of aesthetics.

What makes something beautiful? We can look at the plastic arts and we see something applicable to music, liturgy, and other forms of art. Look at a building and you say there is something wrong with that building. It lacks harmony and complexity. Consider the things you study in music theory. I refuse to believe that a deliquesce in an art museum planked by a cross in urine is equally art and beautiful. The junkyard in Geneva and the lake Geneva are not equally beautiful. I cannot believe that in aesthetics there is much subjectivity. I believe there is much objectivity in beauty. There are many examples in the created order. Look at the geometric shapes we find in nature.

The Outward Man is Wasting Away

2007-08-21T19:54:00.000-07:00

1 Cor 4:16
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer man is wasting away, our inner man is being renewed day by day.

"The outward man, some properly and ignorantly confound with the old man, for widely different from this is the old man, of which we have spoken in Romans 6:6. Chrysostom, too, and others restrict it entirely to the body; but it is a mistake, for the Apostle intended to comprehend, under this term, everything that relates to the present life. As he here sets before us two men, so you must place before your view two kinds of life – the earthly and the heavenly. The outward man is the maintenance of the earthly life, which consists not merely in the flower of one’s age (1 Cor 7:36), and in good health, but also in riches hours, friendships, and other resources. Hence, according as we suffer a diminution or loss of these blessings, which are requisite for keeping up the condition of the present life, is our outward man in that proportion corrupted. For as we are too much taken up with the present life, so long as everything goes on to our mind, the Lord, on that account, by taking away from us, by little and little, the things that we are engrossed with, calls us back to mediated on a better life. Thus, therefore, it is necessary, that the condition of the present life should decay, in order that the inward man may be in a flourishing state; because, in proportion as the earthy life declines, does the heavenly life advance, at least in believers. For in the reprobate, too, the outward man decays, but without anything to compensate for it. In the sons of God, on the other hand, a decay of this nature is the beginning, and, as it were, the cause of production. He says that this takes place daily, because God continually stirs us up to such mediation. Would that this were deeply settled in our minds, that we might uninterruptedly make progress amidst the decay of the outward man!"

(2 Corinthians 4:16, Calvin Commentaries, pg. 212)

Enourmous Churches

2007-07-31T06:07:00.000-07:00

Sinclair Ferguson said in his current Revelation series in the sermon titled "Sardis: The Church with False Reputation (Rev 3:1-6)" (this not a direct quote but how I remember hearing it on the way to work):

"Church history has indicated that many enormous churches in the nation is not a sign of the spiritual health of the country, but of its spiritual decay and death. Many times the size of the church is inversely proportional to its spiritual condition."

This might seem obvious to many who are associated to a "six flags over Jesus" Baptist church, but he is speaking to a decent size reformed congregation who are sound in doctrine and ecclesiology.

It makes me think of people that are thin skinned and the moment they get in the midst of accountability, they get offended one way or another, and decide to go down the street to the "bigger McDonalds" where they can hide and reap of the benefits of the church without having to contribute and be held accountable.

You can hear his sermons here:
http://www.firstprescola.com/Media/Audio/audio.asp

Man: The Image of God

2007-06-29T07:40:00.000-07:00

"So the whole human being is image and likeness of God, in soul and body, in all human faculties, powers, and gifts. Nothing in humanity is excluded from God's image; it stretches as far as our humanity does and constitutes our humanness. The human is not the divine self but is nevertheless a finite creaturely impression of the divine. All that is in God-his spiritual essence, his virtues and perfections, his immanent self-distinctions, his self communication and self-revelation in creation - finds its admittedly finite and limited analogy and likeness in humanity. There is a profound truth in the Kabbalah's idea that God, who is the Infinite in himself, manifests himself in the ten sefiroth, or attributes, and that these together make up the Adam Cadmon [human being]. Among creatures human nature is the supreme and most perfect revelation of God. And it is that [revelation] not just in terms of its pneumatic side, but equally in terms of its somatic side; it is that precisely as human, that is, as psychic, nature. In the teaching of Scripture God and the world, spirit and matter, are not opposites. There is nothing despicable or sinful in matter. The visible world is as much as beautiful and lush revelation of God as the spiritual. He displays his virtues as much in the former as in the latter. All creatures are embodiments of divine thoughts, and all of them display the footsteps or vestiges of God. But all these vestiges, distributed side by side in the spiritual as well as the material world, are recapitulated in man and so organically connected and highly enhanced that they clearly constituted the image and likeness of God. The whole world raises itself upward, culminates and completes itself, and achieves its unity, its goal, and its crown in humanity. In order to be in the image of God, therefore, man had to be a recapitulation of the whole nature. The Jews used to say that God had collected the dust for the human body from all the lands of the earth. Though the image is strange, a true and beautiful thought is expressed in it. As spirit, man is akin to the angels and soars to the invisible world; but he is at the same time a citizen of the visible world and connected with all physical creatures. There is not a single element in the human body that does not also occur in nature around him. Thus man forms a unity of the material and spiritual world, a mirror of a universe, a connecting link, compendium, the epitome of all of nature, a microcosm, and, precisely on that account, also the image and likeness of God, his son and heir, a micro-divine-being (mikrotheos). He is the prophet who explains God and proclaims his excellencies; he is the priest who consecrates himself with all that is created to God as a holy offering; he is the king who guides and governs all things in justice and rectitude. And in all this he points to the One who in a still higher and richer sense is the revelation and image of God. To him who is the only begotten of the Father, and the firstborn of all creatures. Adam, the son of God, was a type of Christ."

Herman Bavinck (1854-1921)
The Image of God: Human Nature pg. 562
Reformed Dogmatics, Vol. 2.

Union With Christ

2007-05-05T10:42:00.000-07:00

We see that our whole salvation and all its parts are comprehended in Christ [Acts 4:12]. We should therefore take care not to derive the least portion of it from anywhere else. If we seek salvation, we are taught by the very name of Jesus that it is “of him” [1 Corinthians 1:30].

If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit, they will be found in his anointing. If we seek strength, it lies in his dominion; if purity, in his conception; if gentleness, it appears in his birth. For by his birth he was made like us in all respects [Hebrews 2:17] that he might learn to feel our pain [cf. Hebrews 5:2].

If we seek redemption, it lies in his passion; if acquittal, in his condemnation; if remission of the curse, in his cross [Galatians 3:13]; if satisfaction, in his sacrifice; if purification, in his blood; if reconciliation, in his descent into hell; if mortification of the flesh, in his tomb; if newness of life, in his resurrection; if immortality, in the same; if inheritance of the Heavenly Kingdom, in his entrance into heaven; if protection, if security, if abundant supply of all blessings, in his Kingdom; if untroubled expectation of judgment, in the power given to him to judge.

In short, since rich store of every kind of good abounds in him, let us drink our fill from this fountain, and from no other. Some men, not content with him alone, are borne hither and thither from one hope to another; even if they concern themselves chiefly with him, they nevertheless stray from the right way in turning some part of their thinking in another direction. Yet such distrust cannot creep in where men have once for all truly known the abundance of his blessings.

Calvin's Institutes II.xxvi.19

Complete Atonement

2007-05-05T10:12:00.000-07:00

“Complete atonement Thou hast made, And to the utmost farthing paid Whate'er Thy people owed: Nor can His wrath on me take place, If sheltered in Thy righteousness, And sprinkled with Thy blood. If Thou hast my discharge procured, And freely in my room endured The whole of wrath divine: Payment God cannot twice demand, First at my wounded Surety's hand, And then again at mine.”

– Augustus Toplady

Christian Assurance

2007-05-03T08:12:00.000-07:00

Again some more wonderful notes on Christian Assurance taken from Dr. David McWilliams. These truths are essential for a balanced understanding of election and predestination and the ground of assurance for a Christian. Election is not meant to cause pastoral problems. Election is given to strenghten the believers security in Christ and assurance of faith.

Calvin is the primary example of Christocentric approach to divine election. It is not raised as a speculative question in ways calculated to produce pastoral problems. Calvin following Paul, that election is the necessary prerequisite of the believer’s assurance. Election is not preached to cause problems in assurance, but the grant assurance. Not to gaze into his decree. "Looking Directly Into the Decree" in "Instruction in Faith" in 1537 pg. 37. "Looking directly into the decree in order to affirm the certainty of our salvation can only worry us with a miserable distress and perturbation. The believer must look to Christ in whom he has been chosen, not to the decree."

"Accordingly, those whom God has appointed as his sons, are said to have been chosen not in themselves, but in Christ (Eph 1:4), for unless he could love them in him, he could not honor them with his inheritance, with the inheritance of his kingdom, if they have not previously become partakers of him. But if we have been chosen in him, we shall not find assurance of our election in ourselves; and not even in God the Father, if we conceive him as severed from his Son. Christ, then, is the mirror wherein we must, and without self-deception may, contemplate our own election. For since it is into his body the Father has destined those to be engrafted whom he has willed from eternity to be his own, that he may hold as sons all whom he acknowledges to be among his members, we have a sufficiently clear and firm testimony that we have been enscribed in the book of life (Rev 21:27) if we are in communion with Christ. " Calvin, Institutes III: xxiv: 5, p. 970.

You can find this in his sermons on Ephesians in harmonious form. This kind of stuff is replete in Calvin.

CALVIN AND ASSURANCE OF FAITH
There is significance of this in the Lord’s supper in assurance. In Calvin, God’s assurance takes palpable form. It is a sensible sign and seal. It appeals to the senses. You can see, hear, touch, taste, smell. It is a strong emphasis in Calvin in assurance.

We can never mount up to the blinding eye of God’s decree and peer into his counsel. It is going to perturb our minds. People are going to be agitated if they are elect or not. People lose themselves in morbid introspection. They are constantly concerned with the marks of a Christian. We have very little energy to be Christians. It consumes a person, every waking moment they are worrying "Am I elect or not. If I am elect, then I am going to have the marks." Then they start looking for the marks. But then they do not find the marks to be indelible or deep enough or they find one day to have the mark and the next day they do not.

Calvin helps us understand especially with the emphasis of the preaching of the gospel, word and sacrament. That the gospel is outside of us. And that does not mean that it does not transform us. Another place in book III he says that if the gospel remains outside of us then we are not saved. He means to emphasize that the gospel is for me. It is objective. There is the objective nature of the gospel where we turn people. The gospel does not change, but I change. I am fickle, fail, there is not a day where I do not come short of God’s majesty. Calvin says "Who looking within himself does not find reason for damnation?" Do you? But Christ is the mirror in whom we find our election. We do not find it within. We find it in Him.

Example. Look there is decree in eternity past. And there is this great wall that has been built here. There is no way we can see over the wall in the divine decree. But if we look to Christ, we look to him in faith, we trust him, we receive word and sacrament, we receive God’s promise to us. You see the whole emphasis is on the promise. We receive the promise by faith. It is as if Christ is the mirror, and we can see what is back here behind the wall. Christ is himself in fact the beloved of the Father. And that we have always been loved by the Father. We can only know this, says Calvin, by faith in Christ, we can never, ever get there by trying to peer into the secret counsel of God.

So when you do take a book by Loraine Boettner "Reformed Doctrine of Predestination" which is filled with some good stuff, yet there is no emphasis of union with Christ in the whole book. Do you wonder why pastorally people are going to be confused? There focus is following the peer into the decree. Even in terms of their personal piety, it is going to be determined by putting the decree at the center of their lives. We are never called to do that. We are called to put Christ at the center of our lives.

How do you make your calling and election sure? It is interesting to read Calvin on those passages that call you to examine yourself. You do not do it by looking for the marks of a Christian. You do it by renewing your faith in Christ. Granted the Holy Spirit changes me. But if I try to find the assurance in the change. The change is never perfect, never deep enough, there is never enough. Not for the mentality that develop. That mentality wants assurance, but that assurance is not going to be found in my fickleness. Even in the work of Christ in me, sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker, sometimes more apparent, sometimes less apparent. Yes we make our calling and election sure, but we do it by faith in Christ. Our Christian life flows out of faith in Christ. The marks will be there, but my focus will not be on the marks, but on Christ from whom the marks flow.

The marks of a Christian, Calvin would say are a buttress of assurance, but not the grounds of assurance. They cannot be the ground of assurance. I can now see I am not where I was when I first came to faith in Christ. There is a difference of saying that and making it the ground of your assurance. The ground of your assurance can be no other than the ground of your salvation. The ground is Christ alone.

This growth in piety can be what hinders me the most in seeing my assurance. I am lost once again in my self. I am curved in on myself (curreta se). If I am curved in on myself, I see myself growing in grace, but oh man, maybe I am not assured because I am so self focused. Am I proud? Am I trusting in myself? You see it is a never ending cycle.

Now Calvin does have a place for the presumptuous and he deals with that extensively. But it is different. We are talking about a different pastoral problem. A person who is presumptuous is a person who is not looking to Christ. He is a person who is curved in upon himself as well.
You see if you preach through election and your people grab onto it, and it is not centered in Christ and the gospel, election becomes a threat. Anything is a threat if it is severed from Christ.
What can happen in pietism is different than that. It is a concept of my personal growth in grace and my personal life in the Lord that is so focused upon qualities. The word and sacrament that comes from the Lord will produces these things in my life, and I am thankful to see them, but constantly looking at my life for these qualities and the depths of these qualities in such a way that your focus is not on Christ any longer but on yourself. Read Calvin on these passages.
What I am telling you is a genuine problem, and if you know anything about pietism in the history of the church you know that it is a problem. And if you pastor people, you know it is a problem where people can lose themselves in this.

The problem for pastors is they tend to look at other people and not see growth. Our concern is that they are not believers. One thing we need to always keep in mind when we pastor people is that their growth in grace could be imperceptible to us, but a quantum leap in God’s eyes.
What Calvin is saying is it allows you to examine your life appropriately .What is the Lord’s Supper? It is the Reformed altar call. What happens in churches is Sunday by Sunday people keep coming forward for the altar call. What is the true altar call? It is the Lord’s Supper. That is where we prepare our hearts to frequently come and receive the promise of grace. What happens when I prepare my heart for the Lord’s Supper that is going to come weekly or regularly. I examine my life, but in the context of grace, who Christ is, and what the promise of the gospel is.

The question is, is Christ the one whom I am relying. Yeah, the grace I have in my life is not perfect, but I am in union with Christ and there is his merit. Let’s face it, every Christian virtue can be counterfeited by the devil, except for perseverance. This cannot be a GROUND of my assurance, only Christ can.

Problems of assurance of faith, in real believers, generally stem from a faulty theology.
Someone can could play fast and loose with kingdom ethics and still come to the table. Or someone can have a hypocritical heart and still come to the table. It is important that we examine our heart. We should be concerned with our own personal piety. The operative word is GROUND.

Sin Has Made Men As the Beasts

2007-04-21T10:11:00.000-07:00

"Sin has degraded man and made him a beast. It is true, he has the shape of a man, but alas! he is degenerated into a bestial and beastly nature. It is would be better to be a beast than to be like a beast, living and dying like one. It would be better to be Balaam's ass than such an ass as Balaam himself was...But to set this degeneration and degradation of man by sin before you more clearly and fully, I shall deal with it under three headings: a) Sin has made man like a beast, b) like the worst of beasts, c) worse than the beasts."

Ralph Venning
Puritan 1669
"Sinfulness of Sin"

Particular Redemption Argued from Substitutionary Atonement

2007-04-20T09:10:00.000-07:00

The Father imposed His wrath due unto, and the Son underwent punishment for, either:

1. All the sins of all men.
2. All the sins of some men, or
3. Some of the sins of all men.

In which case it may be said:
That if the last be true, all men have some sins to answer for, and so, none are saved.
That if the second be true, then Christ, in their stead suffered for all the sins of all the elect in the whole world, and this is the truth.

But if the first be the case, why are not all men free from the punishment due unto their sins?

You answer, "Because of unbelief."

I ask, Is this unbelief a sin, or is it not? If it be, then Christ suffered the punishment due unto it, or He did not. If He did, why must that hinder them more than their other sins for which He died? If He did not, He did not die for all their sins!"

John Owen
Death of Death....
Works of Owen
Vol 10, pg. 173-174

Kenosis

2007-03-16T07:56:00.000-07:00

Here are some good notes from Dr. David McWilliams on the Kenosis Theory. Kenosis is the greek word in Philippians 2:6, where some translations show "but he emptied himself." Is Christ laying aside his divine attributes such as omnipresence, omniscience, etc when we became incarnate?

Where we were last time is making basic observations, then moving on. We reviewed that the kenosis theory:

1. Threatens the immutability of God. For a period of time Christ must cease to be God, cease to rule the world (not every kenoticist would claim to hold to aspects of this view), this is the logical implication as well as the overt position of some kenoticists.

2. It rules out the incarnation in any meaningful way. "The Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us." In the Kenosis theory there can be no coming of God into the world. If there is no possibility for the unity of the divine and human, then God must of ceased to be God to become man. He resumed deity at the end of the process, but the exaltation of Christ must be seen as deification. So ultimately in the kenosis theory, man is divinized.

IN ORTHODOX INCARNATION THEOLOGY, THERE HAS NEVER BEEN SUBRACTION, ONLY ADDITION.

The Son did not cease to be what he has always been, but he became who he had not been. This is a profound mystery, but whatever conclusions we come to, it is only sound and orthodox, appropriate in light of the biblical data, to insist that the incarnation involves no subtraction, only addition. The ancient formula is continuing to be what he was, he took what he was not.

3. DM Baillie, whose work God was in Christ, is very peculiar work in some ways, because its influence in modern theological thinking in ways that are harmful, and yet at the same time he is not altogether with us but not altogether against us. It contains some very rich incarnational thought. He gives a very brief readable critique of the kenosis theory.

He quotes the telling question of William Temple "what was happening to the rest of the universe during the period of our Lord’s earthly life? To say that Jesus from his infant cradle was exercising providential care over it all is certainly monstrous but to deny this and to say that the creative Word was so self-emptied as to have no being except in the infant Jesus is to assert that for a certain period the world was let loose from the control of the creative Word." That is taken from Christos Veritos from William Temple.

There was no vacancy in the Trinity during our Lord’s earthly ministry.

The kenosis theory gives us a theophany in which he who was formerly God changed himself temporarily into man or exchanged his divinity for his humanity. If Jesus was God successively there is no room for the permanence of the manhood of Christ who being the eternal Son of God became man.

John 1:14 – The Logos is co-ordinate with God and is pre-existent and yet is still the divine logos who tabernacled among us.

Philipians 2:1-11
1So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,[a] 6who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant,[b] being born in the likeness of men. 8And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

The textual evidence for Philippians 2 is limited to its context.
"But emptied himself" is the traditional translation of the passage. But the text is clear that he continues to be in the form of God. where uJpavrcwn is a participle used in the NT for continuation. Acts 2:30, Lk 16:14, Acts 3:2, 1 Cor 11:7, 2 Cor 12:6, Gal 1:14.

Referencing the use of the participle. Christ is and continues to be in the form of God. Therefore, he did not cease to be God when he became man.

The question then becomes the meaning of , "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped." Read the article by RW Hoover Harvard Theological Review and he argues that Christ did not "regard equality with God as something to be used for his own advantage." Romans 15:3. He already possessed equality but he did not exploit that equality. The article focuses on the word "a thing to be ceased or apprised." He did not count equality with God "as something to take advantage of." Or more idiomatically "as something to be used for his own advantage." This article has been influential on modern translations.

And the context favors this translation. This is what the Philippians are to do themselves. They are to avoid self-conceit in the service of others. He took upon himself in the form of a servant. Reference the suffering servant of Jehovah in Isaiah 53. This tells us how he emptied himself. Not by ceasing to be what he always was, but by becoming what he previously was not.
CFD Moule makes an interesting suggestion. The Manhood of Jesus in the New Testament. It is an argument where there is no grammatical support but is based on ideas in the NT common to what we read in Philippians 2. I am eager for you to hear this for your own growth in grace as Moule’s suggestion. He suggests "we should read precisely because he was in the form of God, he recognized equality with God as a matter not of getting but of giving."

John’s gospel the preface to the washing of the disciples feet, we read that Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power and that he had come from God and was returning to God. So he disrobed and humbly washed his disciples feet. Then consider the link between the two. And Paul was certainly familiar with John. Foot washing was a task of slaves and Jesus took a form of a servant in John 13. "The conclusion to which this leaves us is that the very impulse to serve lies at the heart of deity." Moule’s comments are astounding and provocative and they should lead us to worshipful meditation.

Moule claims that "Philippians 2 is not a passage to prove kenoticism. But rather it has come to be interpreted as a statement or assertion in pictorial language about the supreme humility of one whose preexistent divine dignity enhances the greatness of his condescension."

"I am inclined to join the minority of interpreters who go still further and identify rather than contrast, the condescension with the dignity, thus underlining a divine paradox which stands every human scale of values on its head. Whereas ordinary human valuation reckons that Godlikeness means having our own way getting what we want, Jesus saw Godlikeness as giving and spending oneself out. Precisely because he was in the form of God, he considered equality with God as a matter not of getting but of giving."

In other words, the human limitations of Jesus are seen as a positive expression of his deity rather than a curtailment of his deity. I hope you are applying this to your own heart and life and see its value in ministering, preaching, teaching, counseling, etc.

The context tells that Christ did not focus attention on his equality with God so that he refrained from self humiliation. It was his inalienable possession. It was so his, that he did not need to be preoccupied with it so he considered the needs of others. Which as sons and daughters of the living God they are to do with one and another. Remember this Christological section is given for pastoral purposes.

Abandonment of the attributes is not the issue or the question. It has been misread and applied. Freedom of absorption of what is already his and thoughtfulness to others is the context of what it means to empty himself, not of attributes. That was never the case. But because he is God. Because equality with God was inalienable his there was no need for self preoccupation, he can give freely.

If this is correct, this self-giving is of God’s essence, this is who he is. When you read volume 2 of John Owen in Communion with God. And it is grounded in the Trinity, and the love they have for one another, this comes to expression in the church Jesus Christ. Through the incarnation of the Lord and his atonement. This can be in the pattern that we are to follow.

Incarnation was a historical reality, then the self-giving of the Son and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the pattern of our living. It is very remarkable.

Illustration. Two men occupy high positions. They are both mayors in a community. Adjoining communities. There is some natural disaster. The one mayor thinks because he holds his high position, for him to condescend to take off his coat and tie, roll up his sleeves and get out there to take away debris, would be beneath the dignity of his office. The other mayor thinks that because I hold the position of mayor, I take off my coat, tie, and roll up my sleeves and clear away debris. Which of them represents the true dignity of his position? The first or the second? Why?

This illustration is not original with me. You can find the BT65.L428 pg 54. These are copies of his student’s notes of John Murray. Murray says, "take two men who occupy positions of dignity of honor in society and they occupy them equally. One is so preoccupied with his position with his dignified station that he will not deign to any humble meaningful service for the service of others. He thinks his position would be prejudice and degraded by some humble service such as helping the poor and indigent, not just with money but in a practical way. Then the other with high station is merciful pitiable humble so he stoops to the position of the humblest service in behalf of others. In performing this service, did he abandon the position of dignity the station of honor, not in the least degree. The more secure was his dignified position, the more freely he might perform this service. This is the thought in Philippians 2:6. Christ did not regard his position of Glory with such absorbing jealousy and anxiety that he refrained from humiliation. He went down to the lowest depths of humiliation. The lowest depths conceivable. It is just the contrast of the dignity of his divine station and this that sets for the incomparable character of his humiliation."

It seems best to regard the word kenovw as a figure. The RSV, KJV, renders it "he made himself of no reputation" or "of no account". It is often used in this way Ro 4:14, 1 Cor 1:17, 9:15, 2 Cor 9:3. The preponderant use is figurative and not literal, therefore no one can insist that term in Philippians 2 cannot be figurative. The figurative use fits the context. The modal clauses that follow "he emptied himself, but taking the form of servant, being in the likeness of men." The modal clauses that follow define for us the meaning of the term. Kenosis is not divestiture but assumption. It is not subtraction but addition. It is not divestiture but assumption of the form of a servant being in the likeness of men. Warfield says "you cannot empty by taking." ??
He is urging them to care, to become a body, and unselfish themselves. He points to Christ as an example. Mark 10:45 "son of man came not to be served but to serve…."

Luther spoke of Godhood hidden. This profound incognito. The impossibility. The impenetrable impossibility of recognition. "For the contrast between God and isolated human being is the greatest possible contrast. It is infinitely qualitative. This is his will, his free will so it is incognito maintained by his omnipotence.

Calvin in his commentary of Philippians 2 "Christ indeed could not divest himself of the Godhead, but he kept it concealed for a time that it would not be seen under the weakness of the flesh, hence he laid aside his glory in the view of men, not by lessening it but by concealing it. So the deity was concealed while actually there. Concealed but veiled." I hope you relate this to your NT classes when you talk about the messianic secret. There is a close connection.
How does the omniscience of Christ as truly God relate to his ignorance as truly man and mediator? We must do justice to the truly God and truly man distinction. One theologian has distinguished between ignorance and nescience. Christ was nescient but not ignorant. And this is just an attempt to get at this. By nescience he meant the limitations of a human as a finite creature by ignorance he meant moral culpability of not knowing what one should know.
Donald McLeod stated that Christ had to serve in the limits of finitude. So in the end it is mystery. Bring about appropriate harmony how these apparent contradictions relate in your preaching, teaching and ministering. You embrace the apparent antimonies because God is God and you are not and we do this when we deal with the data of revelation.

Krupsis – hiddenness, veiledness. Illustration. How is it that he is omniscient yet there is this hiddenness that he does not know the day or the hour of his own return. It is that kind of mystery that has led kenoticists to assume that he gave up omniscience. Here is the best I can do…Illustration. All Illustrations will fail at some point. Christian Liberty. A Christian is free to do this or that. But he is also free to not exercise his liberty. The liberty that is his right by grace, not naturally. If we liken it to Christian liberty that he is free to do this or that but he may or may not exercise is liberty, so Christ the Son has freedom to contain that knowledge, his omniscience, but he chooses in a manner much like the Christian, who does not use his freedom not to make use of it.

Supralapsarianism or Infralapsarianism?

2007-02-04T07:52:00.000-08:00

For those who are wondering, you can be neither: supra nor infra. McWilliams quotes Bavinck and Dabney that the debate should have never taken place. The reason why is that there are no succession of moments in thought in the mind of God. He knows everything exhaustively eternally. There is a creator creature distinction. Creatures think temporally in terms of causality and purpose. God knows everything in one moment harmonically. He does not have to think I am going to elect, create then permit the fall. It is all one decree in the mind of God.

Here are a few quotes

Dabney “It should never had arisen because the starting point, the view that the ultimate end must be first in eternal purpose could only be relevant to a finite mind. Since God’s mind admits no succession of moments, (Bavinck - since all things are eternally present in his consciousness - Doctrine of God p 393.), God’s decree is a unified single conception all parts of the decree are equally present and all are equally primary to his mind.”

Bavinck “because of the limiting character of our reasoning powers we proceed from the one to the other viewpoint, that is teleology and causality, succession of moments, this disharmony does not exist in the mind of God. He sees the whole and surveys all things in their relations. There is a rich all sided reciprocity. The history of the universe can never be made to fit into a little scheme of logic.”

Supra’s weakness and dangers. 1) Creation becomes merely a means to an end. 2) undermines the concept of common grace. All benevolence is for the elect, the good given to the reprobate for one reason only, to further damn them. There can be no free offer of the gospel. When Gods rain to just and unjust, compassion to human beings because they are human beings. It is not because it is to further damn them only. That is not what we get when we read the sermon on the mount. It is multifarious, but not merely to damn them. This is a pastoral problem. 3) predestination is an abstract doctrine that is cut adrift from the cross. It is not uncommon among supras to find theologians that God chose by means of the cross but he could have chosen otherwise by divine fiat, he could have forgiven sins. 4) it tends to make man a non-entity. He becomes an abstraction. It dehistorisizes him.

Infra’s weakness and dangers. 1) it can fail to harmonize the relationships between creation and election. It can view sin and creation independent of redemption. The greatest problem is that it is a speculative matter.

Christian and Secular Education

2007-01-15T14:23:00.000-08:00

Here is a good article concerning secular education by R.C. Sproul. It has good home school vs. public school for children implications.

Read and enjoy...

Does Christian Education Compromise Excellence?
By R. C. SproulAlliance Council Member

Recently a Christian educator remarked to me, “The modern student faces the alternatives of a Christian education or a good education.”

Though on the surface the remark seems bathed in cynicism, it was actually delivered in a tone of profound alarm. The speaker is committed to the enterprise of Christian education, but is concerned that in an effort to maintain a spiritual purity unblemished by the world, much of Christian education may be compromising the goal of academic excellence.

In fact, some have recently announced that Christian education, to be authentically Christian, must be antithetical to secular education. The accent is on antithesis rather than synthesis. These people suggest that synthesis is a type of syncretism, by which secular perspectives are so blended in with Christianity that what is uniquely Christian is necessarily obscured, then eclipsed.

But the difference between synthesis and syncretism are actually quite vast. Synthesis rests on the premise that there are two sources of divine revelation: the special revelation of Scripture and the general revelation of nature.

Though historic Protestantism emphatically rejects the dual source theory of the Roman Catholic Church, by which both Scripture and tradition provide special revelation, Protestantism has almost universally affirmed two sources of revelation, special and general.

That simply means not all of God’s revelation is confined to the Bible. We do not add the decrees of church councils to the Bible, but we recognize that the heavens as well as Scriptures display the glory of God.

Thomas Aquinas, though often maligned by contemporary evangelicals, is usually the one credited with defining the “classical synthesis” between nature and grace. Aquinas declared that there are certain truths we can find only in Scripture. We cannot discover the plan of redemption in a physics laboratory.

However, Aquinas maintained that there are other truths that can be discovered only outside the Bible. The Bible gives us no information about the circulatory system of the human body nor the details regarding photosynthesis. This information is gleaned from a study of nature. A full education includes both a study of the Bible and a study of nature—also affirmed by John Calvin, who called nature a “theater” of divine revelation.

Aquinas spoke of the articulus mixtus, or “mixed articles” of truth, which are revealed both by Scripture and by nature. For example, the existence of God. Far from separating nature and grace, Aquinas attempted to show their ultimate unity. He distinguished them, but he refused to separate them.

The concern of the classical synthesis was to uphold the thesis of the unity of truth. All truth is God’s truth, and all genuine truth “meets at the top.” That is why Augustine urged his students to “learn as much as possible about as many things as possible.”

Of course, there does exist an undeniably severe antithesis between secularism and Christianity. But this antithesis should not provoke Christians to reject all knowledge acquired in the secular world, even if it’s acquired and taught by atheists.

Right beliefs and scientific truth do not necessarily always go together. There is no such thing as a neutral education. Every education curriculum has a controlling worldview behind it and through it. We either interpret nature from a perspective of its being from God and under God, or we do not. This is an irresistible either/or proposition. Here the antithesis is real and crucial.

But just as there is a pivotal difference between synthesis and syncretism, so is there a crucial difference between antithesis and isolation. A valid synthesis exists when we integrate what can be known from Scripture with what can be known from nature, for both are of God. But the controlling perspective of how to view nature must be rooted in God-centeredness. As Newton said, in our study of nature we should seek to “think God’s thoughts after him.”

If Christianity is true it has nothing to fear from truth. Hence the danger of pushing antithesis too far: it could lead us to surrender the truths of nature to the pagans. But authentic Christian education should be the avant-garde of the scientific exploration. The task of science began with God’s command to Adam and Eve to name the animals. In simple terms, this was the first example of biological taxonomy—the classification of the species. In this primitive procedure science began with discrimination. To discriminate requires noting both differences and similarities among things. It’s the heart of scientific inquiry.

Authentic Christian education, indeed authentic education of any sort, is discriminatory. In this light it must be synthetic, because it draws from all sources that God provides for truth. We dare not accept a false dilemma between Christian education and good education. If it is not good it cannot be Christian in the fullest sense.

This article was previously published in Eternity Magazine in September 1987.

Example Dialogue with a Skeptic

2006-12-03T19:06:00.000-08:00

The following is an example of a dialogue with a Skeptic using the presuppositional method. I received this from an apologetics handout from Dr. Edgar. I don't know the author to give credit to the source.

Legend: B - the believer; U - the unbeliever.

U - So, you’re a Christian? Well, how do you explain 9-11?

B - I’m not sure I can explain it. But I can try instead to show you a little about God’s nature, and that might at least put things in perspective.

U - There may be a God, but he is far away, and certainly does not care about mortal men. In fact, if God exists, he can’t be both good and powerful at the same time. He may even be a cruel being, judging by the evidence.

B - What evidence do you mean?

U - Well, read the newspaper. Millions of people go to bed hungry, and millions starve. Not to mention the two world wars and the concentration camps.

B - What is the connection you are making between God and these atrocities? Are you blaming him for them?

U - Well, it seems rather obvious that if God created the world, then he is responsible for evil. He could have avoided it if he had wanted to.

B - That is a connection Christians are not willing to make: creation and evil. At least in the simplest form. Of course, God is ultimately in control of everything, and all things are in his plan, but that does not make him the author of evil.

U - You are talking nonsense. If God is the creator, then everything we see is due to his authorship.

B - Christians believe that God is not like a computer programer, nor does he make everything happen in a simple causal manner.

U - How could it be otherwise? What other kind of causality is there besides simple causality?

B - I don't know if I can find adequate language to say what non-simple causality might be, but I could present an example from Scripture that might illuminate the issue. You will remember that when one of Jesus' closest friends, Lazarus, was dead, he came to the tomb and wept. The Greek word is stronger, it means "groaned" or "was furious within himself". Now Jesus was about to raise Lazarus from the dead, but he still was furious at the loss. Yet he was not furious at the Father, with whom he is one. He was angry at evil and death, not at the creation, nor did be blame God for having made the world.

U - Well, it is very moving for Jesus to weep over death, but he still should have made the connection to the ultimate cause of everything. I’m sorry, but if it is here, then God is responsible.

B - Yes, I grant that in some way he was responsible for everything, since he decrees whatsoever comes to pass. But if he were the author of it in the way you and I understand authorship, he would neither have wept over Lazarus, nor troubled himself to suffer immeasurable evil and die on a cross.

U - This seems to me one of the weaknesses of Christianity. It is true that Jesus was very sensitive, and knew a great deal about suffering, but why does this do any good at all? He may be a great example of endurance, but beyond giving inspiration, he certainly gave no real hope to people in far more difficult places than himself. Look at the Jews at Auschwitz. What good was Jesus to them? In fact Christians have been among the chief persecutors of the Jews.

B - I am glad you raised that issue. First of all it is crucial to say that Christians have had blind spots and sinful behavior as much as anybody. At times they indeed have persecuted Jews and other minority groups as well. It does have to be asked whether the Nazis who sent the Jews to the camps were Christians at all, whatever denomination they might belong to by birth. Hitler's world-view was one of paganism, bordering on the demonic, with no resemblance whatsoever to biblical Christianity.

U - I thought the church taught that the Jews were persecuted because they were being punished by God for rejecting Christ.

B - We can’t rule out every connection between human suffering and rejecting the gospel. Jesus often railed against the Jews for rejecting their heritage. But the Bible nowhere teaches either special credit or special guilt of one kind of person. In fact it tells me that all people, Jews and Gentiles both are capable of great cruelty. And the New Testament authors make it clear that both Jews and Gentiles put Christ to death. At the same time, I will admit that Christians are particularly shameful when they show antisemitism or racism. In fact, I believe that rejecting the Jews is ultimately to reject Christ. For Christ was a Jew!

U - This is very helpful, but I still don't see how a good God could allow such atrocities.

B - I see that you do have a standard for good. Where did you get it from?

U - Oh, it's just what I have come to believe. Everybody has the same view.

B - Not the Nazis.

U - Well then it comes from practicality. Good is what enables the most people to be happy.

B - Why most people, why not everybody?

U - Because nothing ever works out perfectly. There is necessary evil.

B - Who gets to decide what is happiness for the majority of people, what is necessary evil, and who the victims will be?

U - I don't know. I guess we do the best we can, and try to make laws and customs that are fair and just.

B - You see that your view doesn't get you very far. Again, if the Nazis, coming from one of the most supposedly advanced civilization, did the "best they could", according to their standards, and it led to atrocities, what are we saying about right and wrong?

U - Well then what is the good? Surely it is not a God who allows evil.

B - If you are going to exclude God by your prejudgment, we can't find out much about the possibility of God, can we? Let us suppose there is a God, and that besides being all-powerful he is also just and holy. And let us suppose furthermore that he created the world good, and that evil only came into the world because of the deliberate revolt of human beings against the plan of God. In this case, the world is now abnormal, though it was once good, and the horrible suffering we see all around us is not simply a fixture. It occurs because we are out of synch, we’re trying to run our own universe, with no real loyalty to the Creator. In the Scriptures, suffering and death are called the wages of sin.

U - Why would God create such a world, a world where things could go so wrong?

B - I don't know, except to say that if he is holy, and he is good, and so his motives are beyond question. But the problem is not really there. It is in the question, why did we decide to take a perfectly good place, and corrupt it, trying to do better than God?

U - If that is what really happened, then I guess I don’t know.

B - But that is not all there is to the story. That God also loved the world and formulated the most extraordinary plan to save it: sending Christ, the second person of the Trinity, to bear all the weight and guilt of sin in the place of men who deserve the condemnation, so that they could be free.

U - It sounds odd, and it’s hard to believe, since there is precious little evidence of any real change; for we are still in a mess.

B - I admit that it is "odd", in fact the Bible calls it folly. But it is a peculiar kind of folly. The scheme did work, but it is accomplished in stages. First in a radical way, in principle. Second, after the spread of the message, in a final and total way. Theologians sometimes call this already-not-yet.

U - But why such a strange answer? Why didn’t God just stop the world and bring it quickly to a close?

B - I don't know all the reasons. One of them is that only his plan would allow Christ to be fully human, as well as God. He needed to enter into history, reaching every generation, and not just wave a magic wand. Another reason may be that it makes people more open to the gospel. Sort of “Christian subversion.” When a narcotics agent wants to capture a ring of dealers he pretends to be one of them. Jesus went all the way in this, he "became sin" and turned evil on its head.

U - Well, you’ve made me think about it. I’m not yet convinced, but I think I understand your position a little better.

B - You may want to study the person of Christ in the Scriptures. That has a way of putting it all in perspective.

Example Dialogue with an Atheist

2006-11-03T18:54:00.000-08:00

The following is an example of a dialogue with an atheist using the presuppositional method. I received this from an apologetics handout from Dr. Edgar. I don't know the author to give credit to the source.

Legend: B - the believer; U - the unbeliever.

B - I Understand you are an atheist. Are you open to discussion? I would like to convince you that Christianity is true, that God exists, and that the hope of mankind is in Christ.

U - I appreciate your sincerity, and am glad to discuss it. But I am convinced God does not exist. I realize lots of people believe in a god. But according to science what they are really doing is projecting their need.

B - How do you mean?

U - Here’s why people need to believe in God. The world is a fearful place. It is full of threats. To compensate, we tend to look for explanations. One of the most common is to personalize the universe. If we can only imagine a person behind all those threats, then there is an explanation for earthquakes, for suffering, and for large areas of life that are otherwise mysterious.

B - This is one plausible explanation for religion, I grant, but does it prove that in fact that is the way religion came into existence?

U - As science advances, it explains more and more of the world without God. Christians say he is invisible and you can’t measure his presence. Isn’t it easier to admit failure at finding God and go on with things we can verify? Belief in God may be a comforting illusion. Unfortunately this belief has done a good deal of harm, because it has kept people from progressing in knowledge. Sure, the world is a rough place, but isn't it better to live without illusions?

B - If belief in God is an illusion, how do you know that all beliefs, including your belief in science, are not illusions as well?

U - No, that is quite different. Science is founded on empirical proofs, not faith. We’re eventually going to explain everything in the world by different laws we can identify. As Freud once said, even the human psyche is subject to the same laws as the movement of the planets and the soap bubble.

B - How do you know empirical measurements are not influenced by experimenter bias?

U - Because they deal with objective facts.

B - What is the framework within which you can be sure the facts you study are objectively perceived?

U - You don't need to put facts into a framework, they just are.

B - Do you believe everything that claims to be scientific?

U - Well, no, of course not.

B - So how would you tell a real fact from an illusion?

U - Because scientific measurement is reliable.

B - Do scientists ever make mistakes?

U - Sure, but at least they are moving in the right direction.

B - How do you know for sure?

U - Because I trust the judgment of the scientific community.

B - So, it’s faith that gets you there after all.

U - I don’t like the way you’re using the word faith. I’m dealing with facts alone.

B - Well, then, how do you know that a fact won't appear which will falsify all the rest of the interpretation of the facts which you engage in?

U - I guess I don't know that for sure, but I know that my method is much more likely to be true than the hypothesis of religion.

B - On what basis do you know that?

U - On the same scientific basis we have been talking about.

B - But I thought we just established that you could not know for sure that your interpretation is valid.

U - OK, I don't know it for sure, but isn't it much more likely, highly probable, compared to the far-fetched religion hypothesis?

B - Again, we must ask, likely on what basis? Probability won't get us very far, because to establish the rules of possible outcome, one would already have to determine what the chances are of one view or the other coming out on top. Surely you don't believe that something is true or false because it is likely?

U - I don't think we can do any better than that.

B - We can, but only if we have an adequate starting point. Suppose there is a God, one who is all-knowing, and who created the world. If this God existed and had revealed himself, then we would have an adequate basis for certainty, without having to depend on likelihood or on the empirical method.

U - I don't like the idea, because it seems obvious to me that people have used God to give them assurance where there was no warrant for assurance. God is a crutch.

B - Perhaps he is a crutch. Is it wrong to believe in a supreme being just because he may be someone to lean on?

U - Of course it is wrong. God is so obviously an invention for the convenience of human beings.

B - Are you so sure that because something is convenient it is necessarily untrue?

U - No, I guess the convenience or inconvenience of something is not a criterion for truth.

B - Then you are willing to suppose that if there were a God who was all-knowing and was the creator, we would have a basis for knowing with certainty, while not exhausting reality?

U - Yes, but that is a big if. I know that it is impossible.

B - Not impossible on my basis, but impossible on yours, which you have just admitted is not so air-tight as you had supposed.

U - Perhaps, but I still cannot agree that so many people can believe in a supreme being and yet be healthy, modern persons.

B - Perhaps the really unhealthy thing is not to believe. How do you know that so many people don't believe in God because he is really there. That would be a more likely explanation, on your basis of likelihood, than the other way around.

U - I think I see what you are doing. You are saying that on my basis, I have no more right to be sure anything is objectively true than the people I am accusing of projecting a need for God.

B - Actually, I am going further than that and saying that on your basis you have no right to any certainty at all about anything.

U - But I am a scientist, I deal with objective facts all the time. Surely I can know things for sure in the area of science.

B - Only if you presuppose an ultimate criterion, one who can really have objectivity, and tell us about what is true and real. Otherwise, you are doomed to total relativity. Francis Schaeffer once said the atheist cannot even know for sure whether when he comes home at night, that he is taking his wife into his arms. Real facts are up for grabs.

U - That is absurd. I don't even have to think about that kind of thing. I just know when my wife is in my arms.

B - Only because you have borrowed from the Christian world-view, and because you are inconsistent with your presuppositions of scientific reliability. It's a leap of faith, a crutch!

U - Well if you are so sure of yourself, how do you get your certainty?

B - Because God has revealed himself in the Scriptures, by miracles and verbal revelations, and supremely in Jesus-Christ.

Checklist for Presuppositionalism

2006-10-25T10:08:00.000-07:00

Greg Bahnsen in his lecture series "Seminary Apologetics" gives a very helpful practical method of doing presuppositional apologetics. Many of you have read so many books about it - Van Til, Bahnsen, other articles, but are left thinking, ok, "now how do I actually do this?" "I know the theory, what does this look like practically?" Of all the limited reading I have done on the subject - approximately 3 or so years, I have not seen anything as helpful as this. So I am inserting it in my blogg. If you come across something else as helpful, let me know. I would love to see it.

Important note - all of this is in the context of Christian love. With the power of this method, we can be like a monkey with a switchblade. We as Peter said should do it "in gentleness and respect (1 Pet 3)" because God is the one who revealed the truth to us. We did not discover and accept out of our own merits or because we are smarter. Hopefully, this will be useful to help unbelievers consider the truth of Christianity by removing the unargued philosophic presumptions in a loving God glorifying manner. We need to imitate God who "wishes all men would come to repentance (2 Pet 3)." Enjoy!!

1. Identify unbeliever's prejudicial conjectures - Look for arbitrariness and inconsistency. Some think they can believe what they want, but when it comes to apologetics they are seeking to be rational to find the objective truth. For example, someone making the statement that the Bible must be corrupted because of all the copying of the manuscripts over so many centuries, passed over so many countries, and now there are so many translations with variations. If you press him further, you will find out that he is resting on so many assumptions he is unable to justify. You will usually find out what under girds this statement is prejudicial conjecture and that the unbeliever really has not done his research and is repeating what he has heard. He does this because he does not like the Christian God, not because he has valid evidence. You have to press him to support his conjectures to see if he really has done his research on it.

2. Identify unargued philosophical bias - Everyone has their presuppositions. We are not against having presuppositions, but against those which are unargued for in nature. Presupposed autonomy can be found in the argument and not realizing they are already begging the question by assuming as philosophical baggage an unargued point of view philosophically.
Philosophical precommitments of the critic are taken for granted. They need to be argued for and supported. For example, "We all know people cannot walk on water." You point out the philosophical assumption and ask them how they know that. "We know people cannot walk on water?" "Explain that to me." "How do you know miracles are impossible?" "Nature operates in a law like fashion. According to ordinary experience, it will not be predicable." "Isn't that the point of miracles, they are extraordinary?"

The unbeliever is trying to suck you into their worldview. He needs to be challenged for its rational foundation. "To say that miracles do not exist, that is an a lot to know." "You know a lot, you are claiming more than you should." If he holds to the finite nature of thinking, can he make the universal statement? He cannot in his own worldview. Someone who is in touch with God can make that claim. Someone who created and controls a world in a law like fashion and told us this, we can have this as a premise. He has presupposed a metaphysic that will not allow things to happen in his worldview that is a part of Christianity. This is to beg the question philosophically. They never argue for the presuppositions in their thinking. They are hostile and antithetical to the Christian worldview.

3. Identify dialectical tensions in the philosophy of the unbeliever - Identify inconsistencies and incoherence of this worldview of the philosophical unargued bias. For example, "All knowledge is perceptual in nature." That cannot be verified by perception. It is self refuting. What they say about reality cannot be known by their epistemology. We have microscopes but we have not perceived electrons, just traces, but we do talk about sub atomic particles which cannot be perceived. "All the world operates this way." " You have observed all the world at all times?" All you can say is in your experience you have never observed a miracle, that does not say that others have not. His worldview forbids him to reason from particular premise and to make a universal statement. Start offering up the philosophical problems. How do you account for free will? Depriving man of purposeful choice? What happens if they do not have free will in their system? Free will is not just a departure from uniformity but a purposeful departure from uniformity. He cannot account for free will then he cannot give ethical advice. "Live for pleasure" becomes his opinion. What if someone says, "kill the weak." How can he refute that given his commitment to a deterministic universe? Given that metaphysic of atoms falling from space why should we debate at all if the atoms are going to determine what we are going to say? We also do not have the freedom to debate if everything follows the laws of physics, biology, and chemistry, that determines the means and the result. How does he know there is no afterlife? These ethical claims reduce to subjective choices that are incoherent.

4. Identify the failure of the unbeliever to provide the preconditions of intelligibility. What are the preconditions of intelligability for us to do science, reasoning, etc? What needs to be possible for these to happen? Place yourself on his worldview and show that it is incoherent as a worldview, then place him on your worldview and show that it is the only on that can give the preconditions of intelligiblity. The Christian view can give the preconditions for science, logic, moral absolutes, human freedom and dignity. Their atheism cannot give an account for objective rationality in man's thinking, freedom, and moral absolutes.

1. Give considerations of two sets of presuppositions - which is the indirect argument.
2. Give illustrations of the faultiness of the unbeliever's worldview with respect to the unbelievers preconditions of intelligibility.

3 basic kinds of worldviews
1. materialistic monistic - the atheist who believes "matter in motion."
2. dualism - material and immaterial universe
3. religious version of philosophy - Pseudo-christian (Jehovah's Witness, Mormonism, 7th Day Adventist, etc.)

Questions for the materialist -
1. Why be rational? If there is no mind, there is no object reasoning.

2. What is the origin of life? I believe life comes from non-life. Biology spontaneous generation cannot be true in his materialistic worldview. The atheist will say I want one exception. "I want one exception to my universal rule." That is what Plato did. "Give me one exception and I can support my claims with mythology." If there is one exception to my universal rule, then it is not a universal rule.

3. Why think in terms of scientific inference? How can you hold to the uniform of nature in a chance universe? All human reason presupposes uniformity. Without uniformity, we could not learn anything. The laws of physics on Monday could be different than the laws of physics on Wednesday. He is presupposing uniformity and cannot account for it given his metaphysic.

4. Why think in general principles? Every one works with classes when reasoning. We do not merely experience each encounter one by one. When we study about ducks, when we look at each particular kind of duck. We have idea of "duckness" when examining each one and comparing universal to particular. If materialism is true, then the experience of one is not like the other. There has to be classes and similarities. Is similarity a particular thing? We also do not encounter classes, laws of logic, and general principles. We encounter that which is perceptive in character. Classes are descriptive, but both are immaterial. Have you ever observed duckness? No, you observe particular ducks. Duckness is inferred and assumed. The atheist is using universals, classes and laws of logic to operate and he cannot account for them in his worldview.

5. Why be moral? In his worldview everything is in flux, what happens happens, there are no absolutes. There are no prescriptions, just descriptions of moment to moment. If there are no prescriptions, there are no ethics. There is no human freedom or dignity where people choose what is right wrong or noble. "What is is." "You can choose laws?" "I thought everything works by laws of chemistry, physics, and biology." "How can you get upset of what Hitler did, if we just choose?" In your worldview there is no obligation to be like you and to care for the weak.

2. Dualism

How do you bring those two together, material and immaterial? How does the laws of logic and the material world go together? Where did the matter come from? Where did the laws come from? Are they both eternal? How did they ever get together? Did matter want to get married to ideas? Does matter have a personality? Ideas and logic brought them together, but they are abstract and not personal at all. Plato said there is a personal demiurge brought them together. There has to be something personal bringing them together. How can you have something with conflicting attributes together in one realm? Matter is particular, ideas are universal, matter is contingent, ideas and laws are universal and necessary. How is that which is universal and necessary somehow in fruitful contact with that which is particular and contingent? Back to Plato who said "I do not know, grant me one exception, all I want is to appeal to mythology once and I can explain everything else."

The only other thing to do is to say that one is more basic than the other. If that is the case, which one is more basic? The laws grew out of the materials? Well, we are back to materialism. How did one give rise to the other? Plato could not account for the soul and the ideas. All he could do is tell a story of mythology.

Conclusions
1. Materialism destroys the preconditions of rationality.

2. The preconditions of rationality are not saved under dualism because it is arbitrary and incoherent.

3. The only other option if you are not going to be a Christian is to have a religious worldview. Then the question becomes by what authority should we do this? If the religion has no claim of authority, it becomes just his arbitrary opinion. We have support for why we believe the Bible has ultimate authority. We do not arbitrarily choose Jesus over Confucius.

Remember we are comparing entire worldviews. We do not do piece meal arguments although we only talk about one thing at a time. We have the whole Christian worldview in mind as we argue point by point. They are all connected. There is no such thing as "brute facts." Facts are connected to the worldview.

All religions can fall under this category:
1. Transcendent mysticism - Hinduism. All is illusion. All is one. This one destroys rationality.
The Hindu claims to deny logic. He as to affirm that which he is denying. You have to presuppose logic to deny logic. If you deny logic you cannot draw distinctions. You cannot deny Christianity, because there is no distinction between the two in his worldview. All is one, remember? Suffering and evil are illusion. Reality transcends our reality and experience. You have to escape to Nirvana says the Buddhist. If all is one and there are no distinctions, how can you escape to Nirvana? In your worldview we are in Nirvana and not at the same time. Point out the internal conflicts within his system.

2. Immanent moralism - This life religions. They are moralistic, lifestyle religions. Be kind, be pure, follow Confucius, Buddha, etc. Why should I? What authority? These result in arbitrary authority, and prejudicial conjecture.

3. Biblical counterfeits - Muslim, Mormonism, Judaism. They affirm the Bible, so you deal with these biblically. They say the Bible is their authority while holding to other authorities that conflict the Bible. Which one is it? Why do you affirm the Bible and hold to things that conflict the Bible?

a. Unitarian counterfeits
b. polytheistic counterfeits
c. pseudo messianic counterfeits

The unbelieving system must explain simultaneous these things.

1. How do you know what you are claiming? What is your theory of knowledge? Require an answer for this over and over again. This is the key question. "How do you know…?" "How do you know…?" "How do you know…?" Because apologetics is about a reason for the hope that is in us.
2. How do you account for logic?
3. How do you account for the demand for rationality?
4. How do you account for scientific inference or the uniformity of nature?
5. Why do you believe in abstract concepts and general principles?
6. Why do you believe in prescriptions and moral absolutes in your worldview?
7. Why do you believe in mental freedom? How do you know the mind is not a weed growing subject to the laws of biology? Why do you believe in freedom to make decisions and consider evidences?
8. Why do you believe in freewill? A body controlled by free will? How does the uniformity of nature and the free will exist?
9. What are your reasons for human dignity? Why? How can you account for it?
10. What is the human uniqueness from animals in your worldview?
11. What is individuality?
12. What is the origin of life?
13. Explain why there is particularity and diversity of experience?
14. What are our limitations and why? Why are we not always able to be logical and moral. Why do we continually fall short of our moral and logical standards? Mistakes, errors of human mind, and sins of human morality? What is the problem? Why do men do not live up to these moral absolutes?
15. Redemption? How do we recover from these limitations and errors of intellectual or moral sort? Every worldview has to account for them or say that we are never going to get beyond them or that we do not have limitations.

These are the preconditions of intelligibility. Every worldview is going to have to solve all these at the same time given their entire worldview without inconsistencies.
This is not just theism. We are standing on our whole worldview. A God who has revealed himself. We are not offering piece meal arguments. My worldview does not destroy logic, does yours?

The last step is to set forth the Christian worldview as the context for our arguments, and preconditions of intelligibility. If the main method is comparison, you have to get something out there to compare it to. Do not assume they have the Christian worldview right, they have it muddled. Tell the old story. I found this book….Jesus wrote me a letter.

Show how the Christian worldview gives the preconditions of intelligibility.

Show how the Christian worldview can account for all the things listed above and limitations and redemption.

Thou Shalt Not Steal

2006-09-01T09:18:00.000-07:00

This is a wonderful quote from Douma's book on the Ten Commandments. I really enjoyed reading this book. Douma demonstrates how the Ten Commandments are relevant to the ethical situations we face in the 21st century. After exegeting each commandment, he examines certain case studies of situations we would face today and the way in which the commandment would require or forbid certain actions concerning that situation.

Here is an interesting quote on the eight commandment "thou shalt not steal" and our dealing with money.

"For the greedy person, the tightwad, and the miser, money has become the goal rather than a means. Saving is a good practice, but it must be a means toward a good end. We can lay something aside and save it for a collection, as Paul recommended to the Corinthians (1 Cor 16:1-2). We can save a reserve for a time when our children are older, for a rainy day, or for old age. But laying up treasures on earth, so that money becomes the god Mammon (Matt. 6:19-24), is a form of stealing.

Not without good reason, Abraham Kuyper once made a comparison, in terms of the religion of Mammon, between the miser, who would be the mystic, and the squanderer, who would be the pietist in this religion. Just as the pietist likes to walk around showing off his faith, so the squanderer likes to brag that Mammon chose him to be his servant, his choir boy, or priest. He loves to parade before others in the full splendor of his priestly status, richly clad and adorned. He donates lavishly; counting and keeping track of his assets are beneath his dignity. The prospect that God will someday require of him an accounting never occurs to him."

The Ten Commandments
J. Douma
pg. 294-295

John The Baptist Exalts Christ One Last Time

2006-08-01T05:35:00.000-07:00

John 3:22-36

22 After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. 23 John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized 24 (for John had not yet been put in prison).

25 Now a discussion arose between some of John's disciples and a Jew over purification. 26 And they came to John and said to him, "Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness--look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him." 27 John answered, "A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven. 28 You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, 'I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.' 29 The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom's voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. 30 He must increase, but I must decrease."

31 He who comes from above is above all. He who is of the earth belongs to the earth and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one receives his testimony. 33 Whoever receives his testimony sets his seal to this, that God is true. 34 For he whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. 35 The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. 36 Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

This is a wonderful passage where John receives his chance to exalt Christ one last time. John exalted him in his call of Israel to repentance before Christ's baptism and now one last time before he gets arrested and thrown into prison. John the Baptist was appointed by God as the last old covenant prophet. Jesus spoke of him as the greatest that has ever lived since then (Mt 11:11), but he is to Jesus as a friend of the bridegroom is to the bridegroom. John's sole purpose was to "prepare the way of the Lord (Isa 40:3)." We know that He who prepared the path, is not greater than the one to whom it is prepared for.

John preaches "He must increase, but I must decrease!" John moves out of the way so that the person that all the law and the prophets spoke about may be central and exalted. The law and the prophets move to the background, they move into the casted shadow so that the substance may be seen clearly. The law and the prophets are still there until heaven and earth pass away (Mt 5:18), but the very thing that the law and the prophets testified of stands as the focal point.

Christ is the only man who lived on this earth that has come from above and is above all. All other men were sons of Adam from the earth. Those who are of the earth speak and think in a earthly manner. They do not receive or see the things of God. Christ bears witness of his heavenly kingdom and His Father and no one receives His testimony. They do not receive the testimony because they are of the earth, they love darkness rather than light, and they have not been born from above so that they may see the kingdom of God (Jn 3).

But the one who has received Christ's testimony set their seal, their authorization, approval, or in other words they would place their life and all their possessions on the line that God has sent Christ to testify of Himself and of the truth. There is nothing that I have or that anyone could ever give to me that I would not place on the line that God has sent Jesus Christ to testify of Himself. That is just the nature of saving faith. It is not a leap in the dark, it is a revelation of light into the heart of that which is unseen is visible with a believing heart.

So God the Father loves His Son and He has sent His Son into the world to testify of Him. He has sent Him to testify of Him giving Him the Spirit above measure. Jesus who is the Word is sent to accomplish God's very purpose, "it shall not return to Him empty, but it shall accomplish that which He purposes, and shall succeed in the thing for which He sent it (Isa 55:10-11, emphasis mine)." And the Father has given all things into His hand. He is the heir of the Father's kingdom. And whoever believes in Him becomes co-heirs with Christ of all things. He inherits the kingdom of God and God Himself is his inheritance.

The last passage here is an intriguing one. It says "whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him." This is a statement where one clause makes the proposition, but the second clause gives another proposition of what the first clause implies but not made explicit. That is, namely, to believe in the Son also includes obeying Him. Those who do not obey the Son do not really believe in Him because saving faith results in a love for the Savior which evokes in us obedience. Those who do not obey Jesus do not belong to Him. 1 John is a wonderful complimentary epistle to the Gospel of John. 1 John 2:4-6 states, "Whoever says "I know him" but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may be sure that we are in him: whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked." Those who do not keep the commandments of Christ, do not know Jesus and therefore have not truly believed in Jesus. And therefore as the last clause of this chapter speaks, as it has spoken before, that those who do not belong to Christ, the wrath of God abides on them. Those who continue in rebellion against God will not receive the forgiveness of sins, but will receive the punishment for their sins which is the wrath of God for eternity.

But we must end on a positive note. Everyone who believes in Him who the Father has sent will receive eternal life. Eternal life is an endless life of communion with God. There will be no more sin, evil, pain, tears, anxiety, unsatisfied lusts, social injustice, famine, financial debt, impurity, greed, selfishness, death, disease, depression, weariness, fatigue, and the list goes on and on. Above all, you will get to see him face to face (1 Cor 13:12). Christ in all His glory is the most beautiful person you can imagine. Let us put off our unbelief, stubbornness, and rebellion and place all of our trust in Him.

Men Loved Darkness Rather Than Light

2006-07-14T06:14:00.000-07:00

John 3:19-21

19 And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his deeds have been carried out in God."

What a wonderful, merciful, gracious God who sent light into the world! God could have very much left us all in darkness and immediately punished us for eternity for our sins. The light that John is referring to here is none other than Jesus Christ. Light is a dominate theme in the book of John and almost always refers to Christ or is associated with Him. The following verses are some examples. In Him (Christ) was life, and the life was the light of men (Jn 1:4). John the Baptist came to bear witness about the light, that all might believe through Him (Jn 1:7). The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world (Jn 1:9). Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world..(Jn 8:12)."

John explains the definition of judgment. Judgment in this context is nothing less than blatant rejection of Jesus Christ. And the reason for that rejection is that men are sinful and they love their sinfulness and hate their sinful deeds to be exposed. What a terrible thing it is that men refuse to deal with their sins when the very remedy and antidote for their sins stands and shines them directly in the face. Christ has come in the world, not to condemn the world, but to save the world (Jn 3:17). He comes as a merciful, loving Savior and men blatantly reject Him because they love darkness rather than light and their deeds are evil.

When John says that those who do what is true, it does not mean that there are some people who are not sinful and these are the people who come to the light, no rather they are those who have been "born from above (Jn 3:3)" and their disposition has been changed radically that they can "see the kingdom of God" (Jn 3:3) and "can enter it (Jn 3:5)." They come to the light who is Christ, because they love the light. And doing what is true and having deeds that are carried out in God is none other than "to repent and believe in the gospel" (Mk 1:15). It is recognizing you are a sinner, that you have sinned and offended God, that you want forgiveness of sins, and seek to receive that forgiveness by the death and resurrection of Christ. This is what it means to come to the light and have your deeds carried out in God. It is a life of continual faith and repentance. It is an ongoing conversion of putting off your sin and turning to Christ.

What a merciful and gracious God who has done everything for you. All you have to do is turn from your sinful self and come to Christ. John explicitly states what you must do to receive eternal life in this passage and everywhere else in his gospel. He says, "these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name (Jn 20:31)." And this message is not only for the unbeliever but also for the Christian. We must all do this on a daily basis. Life is an ongoing conversion of turning from sin and turning to Christ.

Let us meditate on the following verses today and do what Jesus says that we all may receive and enjoy the free gift of eternal life. Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life (Jn 8:12)." I have come into the world as light, so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness (Jn 12:46).

God Did Not Send The Son Into the World To Condemn The World

2006-07-13T06:38:00.000-07:00

John 3:17-18

17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

What a marvelous thing it is that the Father did not send the Son in the world to condemn the world. Christ has the authority and the power to condemn the world. In fact, the Father has given judgment of the world to the Son (Jn 5:22). Matthew affirms "For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and WILL THEN REPAY EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS (Mt 16:27)." When will this time be? Matthew 25 warns us ""Be on the alert then, for you do not know the day nor the hour. (Mt 25:13)." He will come as a thief in the night. Paul notes for us "For you yourselves know full well that the day of the Lord will come just like a thief in the night (1 Thess 5:2)." This passage should elicit an immediate response in all of us. If we have not yet come to a saving faith in the Son of God, we should immediately without any delay. Why?

Because John says "whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God." If you have not believed in the name of the Son of God, you stand right now guilty of your sin against God; sin that demands eternal punishment. The only thing that stands in the way of the consummation of your punishment is the day that is appointed of you to die. Hebrews tells us "And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment (Hebrews 9:27)." But there is a certain present condemnation upon you right now as you stand unbelieving. Ephesians 2 speaks of those who are not Christ's are "dead in their trespasses and sins…and are by nature children of wrath." And until you believe in Christ, you have not been "made alive together with Christ and raised up with him seated with him in the heavenly places." Rather you stand under God's judgment dead in trespasses and sins, a child of wrath, and are waiting for the consummation for your punishment for eternity.

But I tell you my friend, that where "sin abounds, grace abounds all the more (Rom 5:20)." "Christ did not come into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world." And all you have to do is place your trust in Him! What are you waiting for? He is wonderful, full of lovingkindness, grace, mercy, peace, rest, and excitement! His yoke is easy and His burden is light (Mt 11:30)! Come and take His yoke upon you and you will have rest for your souls (Mt 11:29)! Receive the forgiveness of your sins. Receive rest from your guilt and shame! Receive your hope and anticipation of spending your life in eternity with this glorious, wonderful, infinite God, full of excitement, and endless peace, pleasure, and happiness! This truth makes "the sufferings of this present time not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us (Rom 8:18)." Doesn't it?!

God So Loved the World

2006-07-11T06:01:00.000-07:00

John 3:16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Consider the statement "for God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son." Now this statement does not reflect on the value and worth of this sinful world. This world does not have a value that God looks upon, considers its worth, and desires it for himself. Rather this statement demonstrates the glory of God. This demonstrates the infinity of God. Namely, His attribute of love. His love is so infinite, so magnificent, that He can love such a wicked, sinful, rebellious world such as us. And this love is so magnificent that it moved Him in action to do the unthinkable. Would you give your only son to die for a rebellious, wicked, worthless, sinful man, who blasphemed you daily? Well, that is exactly what God did. Romans 5 says "one would scarcely die for a righteous man, nor perhaps a good man, but while we were sinners and enemies, Christ died for us (paraphrasing verses)."

Now what does this mean that he gave His only Son? It could mean nothing less, that He gave His Son to die for the sins of this sinful world. Namely, that His Son took upon Himself the punishment of sin that was due to us. He bore the wrath of God on the cross so that we would not have to endure His punishment for eternity. Christ's infinite worth gave to His finite sufferings infinite value. The reason why it was a perfect sacrifice, a perfect atonement is because the Son's worth to the Father is infinitely more than all of humanity summed up together. No statement can demonstrate the worth of the Son to the Father. What I said is almost blasphemous to mention, but gives an idea of the scale we are talking about. We are sinful from conception and have done nothing but sin all our life. Christ has done nothing but perfection and holiness, and paid the penalty for every sin His people have committed and will commit. So for those whom Christ died stands before God perfect, holy, righteous, sinless, justified, and Christ stands before God.

This is eternal life. To stand before God for eternity in holy fellowship with Him. To enjoy communion with Him for eternity, praising Him, glorifying Him, worshiping Him, and marveling at His greatness. We will spend an eternity learning about Him and knowing Him. Every moment for eternity will be more enjoyable than the previous moment because we will know a little more about Him as every moment passes by. We can just sit here and fantasize about that for a while, can't we?

But notice also there is a conditional clause "whoever believes in Him." This means to receive eternal life that was mentioned above is that we must believe in Jesus. Now we must read the rest of the book of John to get an idea of what believing in Christ is but let me sum this up in a few statements. There are many people who think they are saved. They think they believe in Jesus and have eternal life. But if they examine themselves in light of Scripture, they will find out that they do not believe in Jesus as the Bible commands them to believe. First, belief in Jesus involves an intellectual assent. That is understanding that the Father has sent the Son to die on the cross for our sins, and that the Father is willing to be gracious to you in canceling your debt and counting you as righteous granting to you eternal life. Many people stop at this point and believe they are saved. They may do this because of a fear for eternal punishment. This is a step toward salvation but falls short. Second, belief in Jesus involves a remorse for sin. This is the acknowledgment that you have offended a Holy God and you deserve eternal punishment for your sins. Lastly, belief involves a commitment of your life to Christ. If Christ is your savior then you belong to him. If you do not belong to him then you belong to the world and are under His wrath. This commitment involves a changed relationship to sin. No longer do you love and commit sin freely, but you continue to feel remorse for sin and daily turn from them to Christ asking forgiveness from Him and others you have offended. It involves a changed relationship to God. No longer are you at enmity with God and refuse to serve Him, obey Him, pray to Him, and read your Bible and seek His will for your life. But you seek to endeavor to know Him on a daily basis and share Him with others. It involves a changed relationship to the world. No longer do you pursue your passions to be counted as great in the eyes of the world. No longer are you self ambitious seeking your own glory and advancement in your eyes or in the eyes of the world. No longer to you pursue money for your personal gain. But in all these things do you pursue God's glory and seek to obey Him by being a servant of His kingdom to do all things to benefit His kingdom and not the one you were previously setting up for yourself. It is beneficial to seek high places, advance in this world, and earn money that you were previously, but only under the restrictions that God has set forth in His word. You may be called to be a successful businessman or woman, but only for His glory and not your own. You may be called to earn much money, but not to spend all on your own pleasures, but to give to the advancement of His gospel and kingdom. Lastly, a changed relationship to the church, the people of God. No longer do you view Christians as hypocrites, or Bible beaters, but beloved brethren. You long to fellowship with them, love them, and serve them. You long to go to church and worship with them. No longer do you make excuses to not go to church such as the pastor left and I don't like the new one; I don't like our church it is so legalistic; people at that church are so judgmental. A lot of these excuses are terminated when you are born from above and transformed from the inside out. You are no longer turned in upon yourself. Rather, you die to yourself and become a servant for the Lord and bearing one another's burdens.

Lastly, there is a reality of perishing. Those who do not believe in the Son of God will perish. There is no neutrality. This world belongs to God and if you are not on His side then you are a transgressor. You are a trespasser on His land and He will get rid of you. He is extending mercy to you right now by allowing you to live in this world under His abundant blessings even though you are way behind on your rent. But more than that, He has gone out of His way because of His infinite love, and have extended a sacrifice to pay for all the rebellion that you have done against Him. He has given to you His Son. There is no reason now why you should not turn from your own ways and believe in Him. But if you do not, you will spend eternity enduring His infinite wrath. Eternal punishment is eternal simply because you can never pay God back for your sins. That is why you will be paying it for eternity. A creaturely offense to an infinite God equals an infinite debt that only an infinite person can pay. Jesus is that infinite person who was able to pay that debt, and not only that but to credit those who believe in Him with His righteousness. But you, O man, who refuse God are only a finite creature with a debt so high right now you cannot bear to pay it. Many know Jesus as a gentle loving Jesus, but read the Gospels, He spoke of hell more than any other person in the Bible. For those who do not know what eternal punishment entails a most vivid description is defined for us in Revelation 14:10-11 . Those who reject the Son of God and continue in their rebellion will "drink the wine of God's wrath, poured full strength into the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. 11 And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest, day or night." But this does not have to happen to you. You still have time. You are still alive. The probationary period, the day of salvation, the era of redemption is now. Turn from your sin to Christ while you still have time.

Expelling Worldliness with a New Affection by Sinclair Ferguson

2006-06-26T09:11:00.000-07:00

A friend sent this to me in an e-mail. I had to publish it on my blog.

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This article was previously published in Eternity Magazine, December 1987.

Thomas Chalmers (1780-1847) was one of the most remarkable men of his time—a mathematician, evangelical theologian, economist, ecclesiastical, political, and social reformer all in one. His most famous sermon was published under the unlikely title: “The Expulsive Power of a New Affection”. In it he expounded an insight of permanent importance for Christian living: you cannot destroy love for the world merely by showing its emptiness. Even if we could do so, that would lead only to despair. The first world–centered love of our hearts can be expelled only by a new love and affection—for God and from God. The love of the world and the love of the Father cannot dwell together in the same heart. But the love of the world can be driven out only by the love of the Father. Hence Chalmers’ sermon title.

True Christian living, holy and right living, requires a new affection for the Father as its dynamic. Such new affection is part of what William Cowper called “the blessedness I knew when first I saw the Lord”—a love for the holy that seems to deal our carnal affections a deadly blow at the beginning of the Christian life. Soon, however, we discover that for all that we have died to sin in Christ, sin has by no means died in us. Sometimes its continued influence surprises us, even appears to overwhelm us in one or other of its manifestations. We discover that our “new affections” for spiritual things must be renewed constantly throughout the whole of our pilgrimage. If we lose the first love we will find ourselves in serious spiritual peril.

Sometimes we make the mistake of substituting other things for it. Favorites here are activity and learning. We become active in the service of God ecclesiastically (we gain the positions once held by those we admired and we measure our spiritual growth in terms of position achieved); we become active evangelistically and in the process measure spiritual strength in terms of increasing influence; or we become active socially, in moral and political campaigning, and measure growth in terms of involvement. Alternatively, we recognize the intellectual fascination and challenge of the gospel and devote ourselves to understanding it, perhaps for its own sake, perhaps to communicate it to others. We measure our spiritual vitality in terms of understanding, or in terms of the influence it gives us over others. But no position, influence, or evolvement can expel love for the world from our hearts. Indeed, they may be expressions of that very love.

Others of us make the mistake of substituting the rules of piety for loving affection for the Father: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!” Such disciplines have an air of sanctity about them, but in fact they have no power to restrain the love of the world. The root of the matter is not on my table, or in my neighborhood, but in my heart. Worldliness has still not been expelled.

It is all too possible, in these different ways, to have the form of genuine godliness (how subtle our hearts are!) without its power. Love for the world will not have been expunged, but merely diverted. Only a new love is adequate to expel the old one. Only love for Christ, with all that it implies, can squeeze out the love of this world. Only those who long for Christ’s appearing will be delivered from Demas-like desertion caused by being in love with this world.

How can we recover the new affection for Christ and his kingdom that so powerfully impacted our life-long worldliness, and in which we crucified the flesh with its lusts?

What was it that created that first love in any case? Do you remember? It was our discovery of Christ’s grace in the realization of our own sin. We are not naturally capable of loving God for himself, indeed we hate him. But in discovering this about ourselves, and in learning of the Lord’s supernatural love for us, love for the Father was born. Forgiven much, we loved much. We rejoiced in the hope of glory, in suffering, even in God himself. This new affection seemed first to overtake our worldliness, then to master it. Spiritual realities—Christ, grace, Scripture, prayer, fellowship, service, living for the glory of God—filled our vision and seemed so large, so desirable that other things by comparison seemed to shrink in size and become bland to the taste.

The way in which we maintain “the expulsive power of a new affection” is the same as the way we first discovered it. Only when grace is still “amazing” to us does it retain its power in us. Only as we retain a sense of our own profound sinfulness can we retain a sense of the graciousness of grace.

Many of us share Cowper’s sad questions: “Where is the blessedness I knew when first I saw the Lord? Where is the soul-refreshing view of Jesus and his word?” Let us remember the height from which we have fallen, repent and return to those first works. It would be sad if the deepest analysis of our Christianity was that it lacked a sense of sin and of grace. That would suggest that we knew little of the expulsive power of a new affection. But there is no right living that last without it.

Water and Spirit

2006-06-17T12:39:00.000-07:00

John 3:1-15

1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him." 3 Jesus answered him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." 4 Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" 5 Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' 8 The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." 9 Nicodemus said to him, "How can these things be?" 10 Jesus answered him, "Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? 11 Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know, and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. 12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? 13 No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. 14 And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

This passage flows beautifully from the previous chapter namely the verse stating “Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name, observing His signs which He was doing. But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men, and because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man.” Jesus knew Nicodemus’ heart, and the last thing that the Pharisees were concerned about were matters of the sinful heart. They were only interested in the outward, external, matters of the Law. So Jesus directs his discourse with Nicodemus to the very root of the matter. And the very root of the matter of this passage is man in and of himself is flesh. He cannot see the kingdom nor can he enter the kingdom of God unless he is born again. The term ‘born again’ is better defined as born from above. If a man is not born from heaven he cannot see nor enter the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is a heavenly kingdom, a spiritual kingdom, which natural man has no access whatsoever. The phrase “seeing the kingdom” here falls in between the idea of recognizing or experiencing. Later in John he speaks of “anyone keeps my word, he will never see death (Jn 8:51).” And “whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on him (Jn 3:36).”

To be born again is the renewal of the whole person. Jesus says, “unless one is born of water and of Spirit (Jn 3:5)” Clearly water and Spirit are referring to Ezekiel 36 as he says to Nicodemus “you are a teacher of Israel and do not understand these things (Jn 3:10)?” Ezekiel says "Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. "Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. "I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances (Ez 36:24-27).”

Being born of the Spirit is also mysterious. Jesus says, “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.” A wonderful illustration of this is Ezekiel 37 in the vision of the dry bones. The Spirit blows on these dry bones and they come to life. Here the presence of the Spirit is detected not so much in and of itself but by means of the sound it makes when it catches objects in its tracks. It blows sovereignly and mysteriously; its presence is recognized by the effect it has when it catches something up in its energy. The presence of the Spirit in rebirth is recognized by the effects of the Spirit in rebirth - not by any immediate access we have to the ministry of the Spirit in that rebirth.

Lastly, the effects of this rebirth is belief in the Son of Man. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life (Jn 3:14-15).” Rebirth results in believing in the Son of Man, Jesus Christ for eternal life. So I encourage you today if you have not put your trust in Jesus Christ, to life your eyes to him. He who is lifted up, exalted to the right hand of the Father “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come (Eph 1:21).”

Christ, the Pure Worshipper of God

2006-06-11T09:17:00.000-07:00

John 2:13-22

13 The Passover of the Jews was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. 15 And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. 16 And he told those who sold the pigeons, "Take these things away; do not make my Father's house a house of trade." 17 His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for your house will consume me." 18 So the Jews said to him, "What sign do you show us for doing these things?" 19 Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up." 20 The Jews then said, "It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?" 21 But he was speaking about the temple of his body. 22 When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

Two of the most interesting things in this passage is the fact that the Passover and the Temple in the Old Testament were foreshadows of Christ. Jesus himself, the Passover Lamb, enters the Temple, which foreshadowed his body, to celebrate the feast. He is not only the substance of the foreshadow, but he fulfills the Law in his obedience with a pure heart celebrating that which the Father commanded. The Last Adam, the Second Man, does that which the first Adam, the first man and his offspring could not in offering perfect pure worship to the Father. He is not merely the Passover Lamb, who offers himself as a pure sacrifice and satisifaction for sins, but he also performs pure worship which is credited to those for whom he died.

Jesus also demonstrates his authority as the Son of God, the Son of Man, the Second Man, the Last Adam by making a whip of cords and driving the money changers out of his Fathers house. These sinners exchanged the worship of the glory of God of the Passover in the Temple for a business of trade that resembles the present day Wall Street. His Father’s house shall not be a house of trade, but a house of prayer and worship.

The task of driving out the moneychangers could have only been performed by the Son of God, the man the Father has given authority over the heavens and the earth. Mortal, sinful, weak men could not possess this amount of zeal for the Father’s house, nor was this authority given to them by the Father. As John points out in verse 17, that “his disciples remembered it was written, “zeal for your house will consume me,” it was this very event of Christ driving out the money changers, and proclaiming “destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up,” that his accusers brought against him at his trial before he was crucified. Many false witnesses came forward and accused Christ before Caiaphas, “This man stated, ‘I am able to destroy the temple of God and to rebuild it in three days (Mt 26:61).’” Then they mocked him again when he was on the cross, “You who are going to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save Yourself! You are the Son of God, come down from the cross (Mt 27:40).” And we know Christ did save himself after three days, he raised himself from the dead.

This reaction of cleansing the Temple by Christ appears to be an intrusion of the Eschaton into the present time when Christ who is enthroned as King at the right hand of the Father will come and destroy all corrupt worship. The Eschaton when Christ will come from heaven with his church and the holy angels to judge the living and the dead, only those who offer pure worship to God will remain as justified.

You can see in their reaction that they were amazed how any mere man would have done such a thing. So therefore, they ask for sign for a reason for doing such a thing. Jesus Christ the Son of God performed many miracles, but he is not subject to any man who asks him for a sign to demonstrate his authority. Jesus does not subject himself to man’s terms. He replies in parabolic form, “my resurrection from the dead will be sufficient for you as a sign.” He said in his gospels, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet (Mt 12:38).” In other words, the sign you will receive will be when I am raised from the dead on the third day, being exalted at the right hand of the Father, which may be a time too late for you to believe.

These are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name (Jn 20:31). Jesus Christ, is the Passover Lamb, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Jesus Christ, is the Temple of God, the Word that became flesh and dwelt amongst us (Jn 1:1), in whom all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form (Col 2:9), Jesus Christ is the zealous pure worshipper of God whose zeal for God consummed him when wicked, unbelieving, covetous men crucified him on the cross. Let us believe in Him whose pure worship is credited to our account. Let us have a zeal for the pure worship of God even if it consumes us to the point of death (Jn 2:17; Ps 69:9). Let us give ourselves for Christ as he has given himself for us.

You've Kept The Good Wine Until Now

2006-05-14T13:17:00.000-07:00

1 On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. 2 Jesus also was invited to the wedding with his disciples. 3 When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, "They have no wine." 4 And Jesus said to her, "Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come." 5 His mother said to the servants, "Do whatever he tells you."

6 Now there were six stone water jars there for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. 7 Jesus said to the servants, "Fill the jars with water." And they filled them up to the brim. 8 And he said to them, "Now draw some out and take it to the master of the feast." So they took it. 9 When the master of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the master of the feast called the bridegroom 10 and said to him, "Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now." 11 This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him. (John 2:1-11)

The reason for this passage in the book of John is nothing other than we should respond to Jesus Christ in faith at the manifestation of his glory. Christ is not a mere man nor magician that we should inquire of him to do a magic trick in order that we are misdirected from the Creator and give glory to the wonders of creation. Rather, Christ who created all things manifests his glory in all that he does with the creation that properly belongs to him. We who are his creatures ought repent, believe, and worship him for his great mercy, patience, and kindness.

Mary the mother of Jesus responded wrongly expecting him to show mercy to the bridegroom and the wedding guests in the way she had envisioned in her mind. Jesus responds to his mother in a fitting way that shows his proper authority to all mankind. He says, “Woman, what does this have to do with me, my hour has not yet come.” Jesus always executes his Father’s will in a fitting manner and at the proper time according to the Father’s will without regard to anyone’s counsel.

But notice also the continuing faith of Mary, she says to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” And Jesus shows his compassion and care for the bridegroom and his guests by performing a miracle that is not modest nor meager. He transforms 6 stone jars of 20 to 30 gallons of water to wine. That is a substantial amount of wine. If you do the math, it is approximately 750 regular size bottles of wine resulting in 3000-4000 servings. Notice also that it was not the cheap stuff either, the master of the feast said to the bridegroom “Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now." Can you imagine tasting wine that is immediately created by God?

The purpose of this message is no other than the purpose of all the other messages in the book of John, that “these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”

Those who do not know Christ, I encourage you to believe in him and you will have eternal life. Those who do believe, I encourage you also to believe in him. Your faith has not grown to a point that where it needs no further growth. It is not near the size of a mustard seed. The whole Christian life is a life of faith and repentance. The whole Christian life is an ongoing conversion where we are putting off the old and putting on the new. What Christ does in our life is analogous to what He does with the water used for Jewish rites of purification. These Jewish rites of purification was something in addition to the washing that was prescribed in the Law of God. "The world which is prone to excess in outward manners, the Jews, not satisfied with the simplicity which God had enjoined, amused themselves with continual washings; and as superstition is ambitious, they undoubtedly served the purpose of display." (Calvin's Commentaries - John p. 87).

He takes what is old, dead and unable to save and makes all things new. Wine in the New Testament in various places represents the new covenant, as Christ says when he inaugurates the Lord’s Supper, “for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matt 26:28). When you believe in Christ, he will will create new life in you, as it is written “I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people….For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more." (Heb 8:10-12).

Axioms of Baptism Part 3 "Nature and Grace"

2006-05-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

The relationship between nature and grace underlines God’s desire and purpose to bring about restoration precisely where there has been lapse. And hence focuses attention not merely on the salvation of the individual but the salvation of the individual as that individual is set in the context of the family. It is evident in the Genesis narrative of 3:3-4;3:4-5 that a key element in sin’s disruptiveness is the way in which it disrupts man covenantally constituted in family. One would only need to think of this principle and then reflect on Gen. 3 & 4 to see that this is one of the things that is being said in those chapters. The disruption is not individualistic but produces chaos in all dimensions of family life. Husband and wife, parents and children, brother and brother. It is important for us to recognize that enshrined within the principle of covenantal administration in the Old Testament, redemptive administration includes the seed of the individual and underlines for us the very important principle that grace has as its design the restoration of nature to what it was, and the glorifying of nature as what it was intended to be had Adam remained faithful.

That is a very important principle because it is a principle that lies enshrined in this great divide in the controversies between Baptists and Paedo-Baptists. Historically, it has been characteristic of paedo-baptist theology to emphasize that this is what grace does. Grace does not destroy nature but restores and perfects nature. It is characteristic of credo-Baptist theology in general to set grace over against nature. It is important to recognize within this context, that grace is not set over against nature in Scripture but set over against sin and what it does to nature. This so affects the emotion of this discussion as to be part of the engine that drives the conclusions.

Within this framework in the formulations in the Baptists arguments, there seems to be this antithesis of nature in grace by their way of explaining the discontinuities between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant. External vs. Internal. National vs. Spiritual. Outward vs. Inward. Physical vs. Spiritual. One can see almost connotations and denotations of Gnosticism.

The single most substantial objection to this general framework expressed by Craeo-Baptists is that paedo-baptist theology rightly sees the continuity in covenantal administration but wrongly fails to see the difference and diversity between the old and the new covenant, precisely at the points that impact the question of the administration of the covenant sign.

The whole issue stands or falls at this point: credobaptists at their best argue that paedo-baptists fail to understand that circumcision is a sign of natural, national, physical blessing with a commanded physical external sign because of this it has an external, physical, national means of entry. So that the presence or absence of spiritual life makes not difference to this. But baptism is exclusively a sign of spiritual blessing, not national or physical blessing. Therefore the NC knows nothing of a covenant community made up of believers and their seed, but only of a community of regeneration and saving faith.

At his point one might be driven almost to despair. Here we are at a point where the whole of our Biblical hermeneutic influences our prospect. But in response to this, Reformed theology is bound to say that whatever national, ethnic, and physical implications the covenant with Abraham had (and let’s not think the New Covenant in Christ has no physical implications – after all we shall inherit the earth which is a physical implication). The argument here is that whatever national, ethnic, and physical implications the covenant of Abraham had sealed in the blood rite of circumcision, its fundamental significant lies in the fact that it was given to Abraham as a sign of the righteousness which God covenantally gives and which is to be received by faith. It is a sign centrally of the covenant communion which God offers to faith, a covenant communion which commanded and required the cutting off of the old and the living out of the new. So just as was true of all the physical elements of the promise given to Abraham, that Old Testament believers saw beyond their physicality to the reality to which they pointed, that is within the OC itself, that OC recognized that it was not the land that was ultimately his inheritance, but the land was symbolic of the Lord who was his inheritance, circumcision is not primarily a sign of physical and material blessing, but of the covenant, spiritual blessings involved in communion with God. And indeed ultimately, from the apostolic perspective, Col 2 and so on, it points to Jesus Christ, the circumcised one, as the ultimate covenant blessing and covenant inheritance.

In that context, it would be a travesty of the Old Testament’s own understanding of circumcision, never mind the NT understanding, to suggest that it means one thing when administered to Abraham and another thing when administered to Abraham’s seed. At this point it is an element of subjectivism that makes all this hard to grasp in much credo-baptism theology. It is characteristic at this point for them to say what about Ishmael, he was circumcised? The reformed answer is Ishmael’s circumcision which is an administration of God’s command, not an illumination of God’s election, means precisely the same thing as Isaac’s circumcision. Just as is true in the Gospel narrative where Jesus washed the feet of Judas Iscariot, which feet washing was symbolic of the work on the cross for salvation and the washing that would flow from it, that feet washing did not symbolize something different when he washed Judas from what it symbolized when he did it to Simon Peter. Only when the sign and the thing signified are confused or identified, does this principle present a difficulty. We need to go back to our basic orientation when we understand that these signs are of an objective to subjective nature not subjective nature, then we understand the significance of a sign may be identical in both those who respond to it in faith and those who respond to it in unbelief and disobedience.

When Paul speaks of the significance of circumcision in Rom 4:11-12, he sees its core significance as absolutely continuous with the Gospel. Yes, there is advance from the old to the new, that is enshrined among other things in the fact that the sign in the new may be administered to all, male and female. Where the sign in the Old by its very nature was restrictive. There is advance of all kinds. But at this point there is a continuity of principle. If one says that circumcision was simply a sign of natural, national, physical blessing, then we evacuate circumcision of the use that what was made of it by prophets of the OT pointing out that it demanded inner spiritual circumcision. To put it this way and here again is a great point of contrast. It was never okay to be circumcised under the OC and not to be a believer. It is characteristic of credo-Baptist theology at this point to assume that it was all the extent of covenantal administration.

Evangelical Penance

2006-05-10T14:06:00.000-07:00

“It was a great stroke of genius on Luther’s part when he began his thesis – inscribed in careful Augustinian terms, and first of all as a topic for academic discussion that would overthrow the whole of the medieval theology - that penance is not repentance, and evangelical penance is not evangelical repentance. Isn’t it interesting how in our evangelical world we have replaced Romish penance with evangelical penance , that evangelical penance by in large is the sheer embarrasment of walking the aisle, the catharsis of the public exposure, the penance of coming bare footed to the front . How we have replaced Gospel repentance with our evangelical sacrament of penance . There is baptism, the Lord’s supper, and you walk the aisle, or you raise your hand, pray the prayer. Repentance in Scripture is not the remorse of a moment, the psychology of a moment, the decision of a moment. When the Lord Jesus Christ said, “Repent” he meant the whole of the Christian life would be repentance.”

Sinclair Ferguson

ISRAEL'S KING

2006-04-10T06:07:00.000-07:00

Psalm 2

1 Why do the nations rage
and the peoples plot in vain?
2 The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers take counsel together,
against the LORD and against his anointed, saying,
3 "Let us burst their bonds apart
and cast away their cords from us."
4 He who sits in the heavens laughs;
the Lord holds them in derision.
5 Then he will speak to them in his wrath,
and terrify them in his fury, saying,
6 "As for me, I have set my King
on Zion, my holy hill."
7 I will tell of the decree:
The LORD said to me, "You are my Son;
today I have begotten you.

8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage,
and the ends of the earth your possession.
9 You shall break them with a rod of iron
and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel."
10 Now therefore, O kings, be wise;
be warned, O rulers of the earth.
11 Serve the LORD with fear,
and rejoice with trembling.
12 Kiss the Son,
lest he be angry, and you perish in the way,
for his wrath is quickly kindled.
Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

Israel's king reigns from Zion. YHWH made promises to Abraham and his seed "in you all the nations of the earth will be blessed" and "kings will come forth from you." YHWH delivered Israel the Son of God from Egypt the house of bondage across the Jordan to the promise land and installed and anointed His Son as king. This was not only for Israel, but so that all the nations would be subservient to YHWH's rule. Israel was called to subdue and be a blessing to all the nations, by being a light showing covenant worship and obedience to YHWH. All nations were set in bonds and cords to Israel by the Abrahamic promise. There will be a day when all nations are under the rule of Israel's king who reigns from Zion. Needless to continue speaking of the story of Israel in their struggle against surrounding nations, the story has its goal and end purpose in Jesus Christ. What David and Israel could not do, Jesus the Son of God did. YHWH called His Son out of Egypt and fulfilled Israel's calling by being the perfect obedient Son and accomplishing even beyond the Law to YHWH's calling of bearing the sins of the world. By fulfilling His obedience and calling as YHWH's Son, Jesus did what no man has ever done, even God Himself. Jesus clothed Himself in flesh and became a human, died on the cross reversing the curse of the Fall, and was resurrected becoming the Son of God in power. He is now ascended at the right hand of God and reigns over all the earth fulfilling this Psalm.

The second half of this Psalm is where the application comes for us. Jesus asked of His Father and He made the nations His inheritance. By our adoption as sons of God we receive our calling. Ask of Jesus and He will make the nations our inheritance. Jesus stands before His entrance back into heaven and says "All authority has been given to me in heaven and earth. Go, make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and behold I am with you to the end of the age." What a priveledge we have in our adoption as God's sons. Jesus will make the nations our inheritance. We have this authority enclosed in the spoken Word of God. We have the power of the Spirit of Christ living in us. Let us go and receive the nations as our inheritance knowing that they will either "kiss the Son" or "will perish in the way." May YHWH have mercy and all the nations of the earth will "kiss the Son" so that they will not perish. Father, grant us the power of the Spirit of Your Son to obey our calling with joy.

Axioms of Baptism Part 2 "Baptism as a Seal"

2006-03-10T21:50:00.000-08:00

Baptism is not only a sign but a seal. It is a seal because it is a confirmation, an attestation of the reality that is said to be sealed. In 1 Corinthians 9:2 the Corinthians were a seal of Paul’s apostleship. Circumcision in the case of Abraham and his descendants not only signified the promise of God in his covenant but was a confirmation of that promise. Circumcision functioned as a seal on the flesh of the male seed by which God confirmed his promise.

The vital question is what does baptism in particular seal? Romans 4:11 “He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.” It is fundamental to resolve the issued of whether Baptism functions as a seal to faith or a seal of faith. What is the basic movement in Baptism? The question can be answered by Genesis 17. The sign functioned as a seal of the righteousness which Abraham had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The seal is not a seal of the faith by which Abraham became righteous, but a seal of that covenant promised righteousness which Abraham received by faith.

Genesis 17:11 helps us interpret Romans 4:11. “You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. (Gen 17:11). Notice it is a sign of the covenant not a sign of Abraham’s faith in the covenant. The movement that is involved in understanding circumcision is from the objective to subjective, not subjective to objective. What is essentially set forth in the tangible symbol of baptism is an emblem of the divine work of grace, which is to be received by faith, not an emblem of the faith by which we receive the divine work of grace. They function as signs and seals of the covenant which faith receives, not signs and seals of the faith that receives the covenant.

The Reformed view of baptism as a seal is in contrast to Roman Catholics and those of a baptistic origin. First in contrast to Roman Catholicism, Trent emphasized that the sacraments of the Gospel seal individuals subjectively. Trent Canon 9 states “If any one saith, that the sacraments of the New Law are not necessary unto salvation, but superfluous; and that, without them, or without the desire thereof, men obtain of God, through faith alone, the grace of justification;-though all (the sacraments) are not indeed necessary for every individual; let him be anathema.” In other words baptism seals the recipient in a quasi physical fashion. It is a subjective sealing of the individual. In contrast, the Reformed view states promise of the covenant in the person of Jesus Christ is what is sealed. The believer who receives that objective reality as a seal and confirmation of the promise of God. So the movement in view is a movement from grace to faith. It is grace that is being confirmed, the work of Christ to be received by faith. It is not the faith that is sealed.

This is also true in contrast to the subjectivist view characteristic of Baptists in general. In the Baptistic view, the attention is focused on the recipient rather than the covenant emblem. It points to the individual’s inner spiritual condition. A historic Baptistic confession reads “Baptism into the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit shows forth in a solemn and beautiful emblem our faith in the crucified, buried and risen Savior with its effect in our death to sin and resurrection to a new life.” A 20th century Baptistic confession reads “Christian Baptism in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit is an act of obedience symbolizing the believer’s faith in the crucified, buried, risen savior.” In both of these statements what is signified in the administration of baptism focuses attention to the response to the Gospel. It is a sign of my faith in the Gospel that is sealed.

That stands on its head, the directionalism of covenant signs in Scripture. Covenant signs in scripture are not primarily signs of my response to the Gospel, but signs of the Gospel in Christ himself, which elicits and affects the response of faith in me. In other words, Baptism is not to be viewed first and foremost as saying “I have been converted,” but as saying “Christ has died for sinners.”

When we grasp this principle, we have not only grasped a principle that is fundamental to the administration of the covenant in Scripture, and in reformed theology, but we have opened up the door which helps us understand part of the reason why there is so much unresolved controversy in discussions that take place among Baptists and Paedobaptists.

We are using identical terminology but this terminology denotes different things. We need to be aware that we are talking about identical terms that are functioning with radically different dynamics. Until we recognize this, we spend much of our time talking past one another. We need to return to the fundamental teachings of Baptism in Scripture and out of that general background resolve the difficulties we have.

Axioms of Baptism Part 1 "Baptism as a Sign"

2006-03-10T21:49:00.000-08:00

Baptism is a sign in the sense that they symbolize as Augustine states “visible words of the blessings of the Gospel made over to us in the New Covenant in Jesus Christ.” The strand of teaching in the NT presents that these signs are not merely exhibitive, but communicative. They are not “bare signs” representing an absent reality, but communicative signs, representing tangible realities, by means of that which is signified is communicated to the faith that receives them. This is called the sacramental union between the sign and the thing signified which cracks open for us the way in which the NT like the OT uses the language of sacramental administration in an apparently realistic way. When we are baptized, in that baptism, we are crucified, buried, and raised with Christ.

There is a tendency to respond to what Paul is saying by telling him that if you put it this way, you will confuse the church and Paul responds “if I do not put it this way you will never understand the benefit these signs intended to be.” They do not point us to an absent reality, but they are means by which we have communion with the crucified, buried, risen, ascended Lord Jesus Christ. By means of these signs, these physical realities, that which is emblemized by them is communicated to us from and by Christ himself.

The sacramental union enables us to understand the principle that the reality which is symbolized by physical tokens is not locked within the physical tokens, but this should not lead us to the false conclusion that the reality that is signified is absent. Rather the reality that is signified is Christ himself, who is not only present but received by faith. In this sense, baptism functions as a sign of an objective nature by means of which Christ communicates with faithful receptors and they in term communicate with him. In this sense, they function in a way completely analogous to the preaching of the word. None of us say when we read the Bible we are having communion with the Bible, but with Christ himself. We have communion with Christ by the Spirit spoken through the preached or read Word of God. So this is directly analogous that the sacramental union of the thing and the thing signified. So baptism is a physical, and a tangible means by which Christ communicates to us.

Axiom's of Baptism Introduction

2006-03-10T21:45:00.000-08:00

Baptism is a sign and a seal. Notice that we do not see Baptism directly defined as a sign and seal in the New Testament. The phrase “sign and seal” is derived from Romans 4:11. “He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.” What gives us justification of transferring this language from the Abrahamic Covenant to the New Covenant? It is obvious that in all of God’s covenants, this relationship between the physical emblem of the covenant and the covenantal administration function in the same way. So that the insight Paul gives us into the way circumcision functions is applicable to all of these signs. In the Noahic Covenant, the rainbow functioned as a sign and seal representing that covenant administration of God’s promise to Noah and his seed as a guarantee of God’s keeping that covenant. Similarly, in the New Covenant in Christ, baptism functions both as a sign of the content of the New Covenant which essentially Christ’s own baptism on the cross. "But I have a baptism to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished! (Lk 12:50)” Christ’s water baptism in the Jordan is for him the sign and seal of his blood baptism on the cross which is why he looks forward to the cross as the baptism with which he is to be baptized. Our water baptism which follows the cross functions to us as Christ’s water baptism functioned to him, as the sign of that blood baptism, and as the confirmation of the covenant which is sealed in that blood.

Hence it is a sign of the covenant in its New Covenant form in Christ, and functions as Peter makes clear a pledge of the forgiveness of sins which is ours in Christ. So there is adequate biblical justification for taking language that is appropriated by one of these covenantal tangible additions and applying it to all tangible additions of the covenant. While they each serve in a different phase of God’s covenantal administration, they all operate with respect to that phase in precisely the same way that circumcision did in the Abrahamic covenant.

Avery's Baptism

2006-03-10T21:25:00.000-08:00

This Sunday, Lord willing, Avery Elisabeth Edwards will be baptized. This would be a good season in the blogg (and I hope I make the time to complete this) to expound what I believe is the biblical view of baptism in short axioms. I don't intend to exhaust the subject, but to hopefully give what is most central to the issue and which hopefully can point out the essential differences where we can come to a consensus with our other Christian brothers who do not subscribe to the same.

Baptizing Avery does not mean that she is regenerated or will be at the time of baptism, however she could be and it may happen at that particular time. She is a member of the visible church and we do pray that she is already converted which is possible from the evidence of Jeremiah and John the Baptist. We paedobaptists do not believe that covenant children do not need to be converted and only riff-raff children do. We raise our children in the way of the Lord and can pray with them saying "Our Father who art in heaven...." Our children are Christians and we treat them as such because they belong to the visible church. They belong to the Lord even before believing. Don't have a heart attack that I said that Avery is a Christian. She is, but there is a tension between the inner reality and the outer representation as analagous to Paul's statement in Romans 9 that "not all Israel are Israel."

God's grace must be made real in their heart just us we professing Christians must make our calling and election sure by living a life of faith and repentence to the end. It is not significant that I can point back to a point in time when I think I had a religious experience and claim that to be my conversion, but to make sure I have faith and repentance now towards Christ. There is a real transition from wrath to grace, but it is not nessessary to locate that point in time. In fact I don't know when I was converted, but I believe I have faith in Christ now.

Having said that, I cannot wait for the day that that only by God's grace Deanna and Avery will profess a childlike faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and become communing members hoping that faith and repentance are present in their life right now as it would be evident in a manner suitable for an infant or toddler.

(I will be indebted to Sinclair Ferguson who has wonderfully expressed in words in his lectures on Baptism which probably cannot be improved.)

Calvin on Assurance of Election

2006-02-24T20:35:00.000-08:00

"Accordingly, those whom God has appointed as his sons are said to have been chosen not in themselves but in his Christ [Eph. 1:4]; for unless he could love them in him, he could not honor them with the inheritance of his Kingdom if they had not previously become partakers with him. But if we have been chosen in him, we shall not find assurance of our election in ourselves; and not even in God the Father, if we conceive him as severed from his Son. Christ, then, is the mirror wherein we must, and without self-deception may, contemplate our own election. For since it is into his body the Father has destined those to be engrafted whom he has willed from eternity to be his own, that he may hold as sons all whom he acknowledges to be among his members, we have a sufficiently clear and firm testimony that we have been inscribed in the book of life[cf. Rev. 21:27] if we are in communion with Christ."

Inst. III.xiv.5

We cannot gaze into the blinding eye of God's eternal decree to find our election, but Christ is the mirror in which we look. Paraphrasing David McWilliams

Prayer of Jabez

2006-01-21T11:43:00.000-08:00

The Puritans sure did have a different perspective of the interpretation of the Scriptures than modern evangelicalism!

I found this quote when I was reading "Indwelling Sin" from John Owen. This book is an exposition of two verses in Romans 7. The context of where this quote came from was a chapter on "captivating power of indwelling sin, wherein it consisteth; the prevalency of sin, when from itself, when from temptation; the rage and madness that is in sin."

O that we would take sin as serious as the Puritans did in this prosperous, and sensual culture we live in!

1 Chronicles 6:10 "Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me!"

"The holy man took occasion from his own name to pray against sin, that that might not be a grief and sorrow to him by its power and prevalency. "

"For what sin soever gets such power in a man, be it in its own nature small or great, it becomes in him in whom it is a sin of boldness, pride, and presumption; for these things are not reckoned from the nature or kind of the sin, but from its prevalency and customariness, wherein its pride, boldness, and contempt of God doth consist."

Indwelling Sin
Chapter 7. p. 203
Works of John Owen

Jesus' Kingship

2005-12-31T07:53:00.000-08:00

Matt 8:14 (NASU) When Jesus came into Peter's home, He saw his mother-in-law lying sick in bed with a fever. He touched her hand, and the fever left her; and she got up and waited on Him.

It is amazing how the living God is concerned with what seems to be such a small matter. However, this is not such a small matter. The Kingdom of God has come and Jesus is declaring the sovereignty of His kingship as the second Adam over all opposition to serve Him. Jesus has claimed Peter's mother in Law as His child delivering her from the dominion of darkness. She serves Him with joy now that she is a child of the King. Nothing now will keep her from serving Him as she has Jesus as her Lord. As Israel remains under the dominion of not so much the Romans, but darkness, Jesus their Messiah comes to deliver His remnant and re-defines Israel setting up His kingdom. Israel are those who repent and believe in Jesus not those who are of the works of Torah.

Let us rejoice in Jesus our King who has dominion over this present world and seek His leading and liberation over any hindrance from serving Him that is claiming dominion in our lives.

John Owen Quote on "Mortification of Sin"

2005-12-29T08:35:00.000-08:00

This week I began to read John Owen's book on "Mortification of Sin." I forgot how immersed the Puritans were in Scripture and how profound they would illustrate their propositions with imagery and connectiveness with other Scriptures. They were masters of letting Scripture interpret Scripture. I highly recommend reading this book if you have not read it. Or find some classic Puritan masterpiece and submerge yourself in it to begin the new year!

"Sin will not only be striving, acting, rebelling, troubling, disquieting, but if let alone, if not continually mortified, it will bring forth great, cursed, scandalous, soul-destroying sins. … Sin aims always at the utmost; every time it rises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin in that kind. Every unclean thought or glance would be adultery if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression, every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its head. Men may come to that, that sin may not be heard speaking a scandalous word in their hearts, — that is, provoking to any great sin with scandal in its mouth; but yet every rise of lust, might it have its course, would come to the height of villany: it is like the grave, that is never satisfied. And herein lies no small share of the deceitfulness of sin, by which it prevails to the hardening of men, and so to their ruin, Heb. iii. 13, — it is modest, as it were, in its first motions and proposals, but having once got footing in the heart by them, it constantly makes good its ground, and presseth on to some farther degrees in the same kind. This new acting and pressing forward makes the soul take little notice of what an entrance to a falling off from God is already made; it thinks all is indifferent well if there be no farther progress; and so far as the soul is made insensible of any sin, — that is, as to
such a sense as the gospel requireth, — so far it is hardened: but sin is still pressing forward, and that because it hath no bounds but utter relinquishment of God and opposition to him; that it proceeds towards its height by degrees, making good the ground it hath got by hardness, is not from its nature, but its deceitfulness. Now nothing can prevent this but mortification; that withers the root and strikes at the head of sin every hour, so that whatever it aims at it is crossed in. There is not the best saint in the world but, if he should give over this duty, would fall into as many cursed sins as ever any did of his kind."

John Owen
Mortification of Sin
Chapter 2

CREATION

2005-12-10T07:04:00.000-08:00

Below is a summary of a thought provoking article by Rick Watts.

INTRO
This article is an alternative way than taking Genesis 1 as too literal. Gen 1 is approached with assumptions already at hand. It needs to be reassessed in light of our growing knowledge and recognize that truth in this kind of historical and literary endeavor is much more a matter of coherence than of certainty.

LITERARY GENRE
Problems begin when we read Gen 1 in our mother tongue rather than Hebrew. The Hebrews at that time had a very different culture than our own. Genre, the contract made between the writer and the reader as to how the signs are to be read, are to be paid attention to. Literary genre is communicated through form and content. Metaphor, image, and poetic license, whether simplification or hyperbole. In our scientific world, it is easy to forget that there are ways of telling the truth other than algebraic formulae or Western-style history. Some of the most important and meaningful things in our lives are best shared using metaphor and poetic image.

STYLE
Genesis 1 is highly stylized. Days 1-3 and 4-6 are correlated, with days 1 and 4, 2 and 5, and 3 and 6 concerning the same elements of creation. Two sets of three days: the first concerning giving form or structuring what was formless and the second concerning filling the newly created but empty forms. In both sets there is a progression from heaven to earth, with the preparation of the land and the formation of humanity respectively as the climactic moment. Unless we have a previous agenda this kind of detailed and highly stylized literary patterning strongly cautions against taking this account too concretely. This is not to say that it is not true, but not to be taken literally as we define the word literal.

CULTURAL CONTEXT
We also need to compare Genesis 1 in the cultural context it was written, its Ancient Near Eastern Environment. The three different environments that are mentioned are Sumerian, Babylonian, and Egyptian. Very little is mentioned of the Sumerians of the third millennium B.C., but they do have a division between heaven and earth.

The Babylonian story of creation is an aetiology to elevate Marduk, the chief god of the Babylonian pantheon, showing how he attained his supremacy in cosmological terms and to explain why Babylon with its Temple is the chief city. This becomes significant when the main point of Genesis 1 is that it is the God YHWH who creates the heavens and the earth all very good.

The Egyptian creation account is the most significant in understanding Genesis 1. We need to read Genesis 1 as a book written by Moses in light of the Exodus. As the Egyptian god Ptah creates by his tongue, YHWH spoke creation into being. Creation emerges from the deep and darkness, and formlessness and emptiness like Genesis 1. Light is created out of darkness before the sun-god is created. Ptah separates the earth and sky. There is a firmament that divides the upper and lower waters. Same can be seen in the creation of vegetation. Also there is a similar sequence in creation of sun, moon, starts, and then fish and birds. Also, unlike Babylonian traditions the Egyptians grant a special role to humans. According to the Great Hymn to Atum, the god “created mankind and distinguished their nature and made their life.” We also find that man is made of clay and God is his potter. There is even evidence that man was made in the image of the god. Impartation of life from breath to the nostrils. Man made from the dust of the earth.

WARFARE OF THE GODS
For ancients, the very order and coherence of the natural world implied some kind of personal agency. There is not a hint of the idea that the ordered world emerged from chaos by purely natural means. No one wrote these texts to argue for the existence of the gods. That much was simply assumed. More probably it was designed to answer the question: which god(s) ordered and filled the heavens and the earth? There is an idea of warfare, though absent from Egyptian or Sumerian, but prominent in Babylonian stories and particularly the defeat of the choas-storm monster. See allusions in Job 26:12; Ps 89:10; Is 51:9, and Genesis 1:21. The notion of humans bearing the deity’s image is found in Egypt and Genesis 1. In the latter, all humanity, not just a single individual, acts as Elohim’s vice regents superintending his creation. Apart from Genesis 1, there appears to be no concern with duration or literary framework wherein time is broken into series of consecutive days. Only in the Baal palace-building story – and there is a debate over whether this is a creation narrative – is there mention of a seven day program build Baal’s palace temple.

EGYPT AND EXODUS
It is important to see Genesis 1 in light of Israel’s Exodus experience. The Egyptian accounts most likely have influenced the language of Israel’s creation story precisely to make it all the more effective against the gods of Egypt. Genesis 1 was most likely written with a particular concern to declare that it was YHWH and not Ptah, Atum, or any other of Egypt’s failed deities who was alone responsible for the good and perfect order of creation. God had just delivered Israel from Pharaoh, Egypt, and their false gods, magicians. The ten plagues dissolved the boundaries that gave Egypt its order and form. YHWH caused light to shine in darkness delivering Israel across the Red Sea causing dry land to appear. When Moses judicial staff and symbol of his authority into a serpent that swallows up Pharaoh’s magicians and when Pharaoh’s armies are drowned in the unrestrained sea at YHWH’s command it is probably not an accident that one can hear echoes of light and darkness, the wind over the deep, and the appearance of dry land in Genesis 1: they had seen YHWH do this when he delivered them over the Red Sea. It is suggested that other ancient creation stories are distorted echoes of the original creation story, namely Genesis 1.

PALACE/TEMPLE
In the Babylonian Enuma Elish, the outcome of Ea’s victory over the water god Apsu is not creation but the building of a palace-temple on the body of his foe. Similarly is the Canaanite story of Baal’s temple. If Baal’s temple is a microcosm then this act of temple-building could perhaps correspond to creation such that creation, kingship, and temple-building all belong together. Interestingly Baal’s temple is created in seven days and YHWH’s Jerusalem Temple, itself a microcosm in seven years. The evidence of this notion in the Bible is overwhelming. Ps 104:2-3 YHWH “wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters.” Job 28:4ff speaks of the earth’s foundation, marked off dimensions, measuring lines. The Hebrew Bible is awash with architectural imagery when describing creation. Foundations of the earth; the pillars of the earth and of the heavens, the heavens windows, the stretching out of the heavens like a canopy/tent, and storehouses. Isaiah 66:1 says "Heaven is YHWH’s throne and the earth is his footstool. "Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting place be? Where does one find a throne and a footstool if not in a palace, and what is the palace of YHWH if not a temple. And note too the image of resting in his house the Temple in light of YHWH’s resting in his completed abode on the seventh day of Genesis 1. In this sense, the whole of creation is seen as YHWH’s palace-Temple, and hence the reason for his Jerusalem temple itself being a microcosm, a mini-universe: it serves to remind Israel that the whole world is YHWH’s. So Elohim naturally creates realms for the lesser rulers (Gen 1:16) as he forms his palace-temple out of the deep and gives order to and fills it. And as the Great King, having ordered his realm, he now rules over all in Sabbath rest, sitting in the great pavilion of his cosmos-palace temple. This is also significant in the book of Revelation in the absence of the Temple is explained in the whole city coming down to earth. The final goal is not destruction of creation, but the unification of heaven and earth such that the renewed earth itself now becomes YHWH’s very throne room.

The forming of humanity male and female in the image of Elohim where his image is placed in the deity’s house. So Israel, and her king are called to be God’s son in the sense of being faithful bearers of his image, that is, to reflect his character and act as his vice-regents as they live in his palace-temple. From this perspective, Genesis 1 is a “poetic” account in which YHWH, Israel’s god, is proclaimed the builder of creation, his palace-temple. It is he who by the fiat of his kingly command provided the fundamental structures of ancient human experience and who filled these sub-realms with their rulers, over all of which he has placed humanity, his image-bearer, as his vice regent.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, given Genesis 1 genre and highly stylized form and unrealistic content, it should not be taken literally in the modern sense of the term. No one in the ancient world except for Baal’s palace-temple seems to be concerned with a seven day pattern. The structure of the Hebrew’s world of day/night, above/below, land/sea is conceptualized in terms of deity’s construction of his palace/temple where he gives form and fills it. The fundamental issue - YHWH brought order to the world and not any other god or deity, most particularly Egypt’s gods of the exodus. It uses the language and imagery to which that world and particularly Egypt was accustomed. The literal days or dawn to dusk days probably reflect the notion of customary daily periods of work. Consequently, the injunction to keep Sabbath is less intent on imitating six literal twenty-four hour days of creation than it is a summons for Israel to live out her creation story – structured as it is in the nature of the case by six days with a seventh to rest – and so to declare herself to be YHWH’s “son”, imitating him in continuing his creation work of bringing order with the ultimate goal of Sabbath rest.

APPLICATION TO MODERN WORLD
The fundamental concern for the ancients was the emergence of humanity, society, and culture. Same for Israel. YHWH designed this palace-temple, this pavilion, to be the habitation of his image-bearer, namely, humanity. Creation was designed for us. Genesis 1 is not so much concerned with the “how” technical or mechanical sense, as it is with the “who” namely YHWH. It is Israel’s God who has created this world, and humanity will never truly know what it means to be human until we learn to reflect his image. Two final observations is that this is YHWH’s palace-temple, and we had best take good care of it. Rev 11:18 says that God will destroy those who destroy his earth. Heaven will soon come down here. Second if humans are made in God’s image, then repercussions are serious indeed. Defacing the image of God is high treason. If we take Genesis 1 account seriously, namely, that every human being is made in God’s image, then we need to know that any act of abuse against another human being is an act of high treason against the God whose image we bear and to how kingship and sovereignty we therefore inherently bear witness.

Should the Ten Commandments be Removed from Schools?

2005-11-15T11:13:00.000-08:00

Should the Ten Commandments be Removed from Schools?

Another Perspective

Excerpt from Peter Enns Commentary on Exodus

"The Ten Commandments are not primarily concerned with personal, private morality. There is a corporate dimension to them and they are not to be followed so that individuals can show their worth before God, and certainly not so that they can either earn or secure their salvation, but so that God's people can show the world the kind of God they worship.

We should never wonder when God's law is broken by people who were never intended to keep it in the first place (I wonder here if Enns has the covenant of works in mind, that is, all of humanity is obligated to give proper obedience to God as creatures. I think he is more concerned with the Ten Commandments as given to God's people. I wouldn't balk at this too much) Moreover, by chiding these individuals for doing so, are we not sending the wrong message, that being right with God is primarily a matter of proper conduct? Are we not, contrary to the place of the law both in the Old and New Testaments, putting the cart before the horse? We are saying to them that God demands a high moral standard apart from the work of Christ, that proper behavior is what makes us right with God. But the opposite is true. Apart from being in Christ first we are incapable of good works that please God. Such legalistic, pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps theology is only too natural for human beings, it is our nature to want to do it ourselves.

Expecting unbelievers to keep God's law, or even to respect it, blurs sharp divide between those who are God's people and those who are not. Even if they keep the law in an external, superficial way, this is not to say that they do what really matters, which is to keep the law in a manner pleasing to God. To single out the Ten Commandments and set them up as a standard of conduct for unbelievers or American society in general indicates not only a misunderstanding of the purpose of the Ten Commandments, but of the good news itself. Christ died and rose to provide another way. We should do nothing to make the way obscure.

I do not think that the Ten Commandments should be displayed in public schools. Making that statement is a good way to lose a lot of friends if you say it in the wrong company. By this point it should go without saying that I feel strongly that they should be kept (although precisely how they should be kept is a matter of constant reflection). The point, however, is that they should be kept by the right people and for the right reasons. It is not really for me a matter of the "separation of church and state" - a wonderful idea in its original intention, but one that has been distorted in our day - as much as a matter of separation of those who are in Christ from those who are not.

What do we hope to accomplish by imposing God's law on those who do not know him? To make better citizens? To make better-behaved children? Neither of these goals is wrong. In fact, they are important. They are not, however, the goal of the gospel, which is the change those who are not God's into those who are. Better people and citizens, these thing are byproducts (again, important ones) of the spread of the gospel.

If I may put the matter somewhat differently, placing the Ten Commandments in public schools represents a misuse and misunderstanding of the purpose of these laws; it is, therefore, tantamount to promoting a false religion. It is not Judaism, and it certainly is not Christianity. It may be a "Judeo-Christian ethic" - a thoroughly no biblical concept - but such an ethic has not life if it is presented as anything other than the gift of God for those already redeemed by grace. God's laws are for his people. Those who do not know him are walking tombs. They do not need whitewashing but complete renovation, from the inside out. They do not need their moral gyroscopes pushed in the right direction, but the Spirit of the risen Christ breathed into them. "

I think Peter Enns has a wonderful argument that needs to be discussed and pondered. However, my wife made a wonderful point when we were discussing it this evening. She said something along the lines of "wouldn't it be good to have God's Word posted whenever the opportunity."

I am thinking along the lines that God does obligate from all his creatures obedience. However, God has sent Christ to redeem humanity and that is the message we should be preaching. That arises the question of how we should preach. Do we preach the law to convict sinners and then give them the gospel? What is our method and intention with what we are doing with the Ten Commandments, I think is Enns point. And as I ponder that question, I continually scratch my head.

Self-Admiration

2005-11-14T20:28:00.000-08:00

Here, then, is what God’s truth requires us to seek in examining ourselves: it requires the kind of knowledge that will strip us of all confidence in our own ability, deprive us of all occasion for boasting, and lead us to submission. We ought to keep this rule if we wish to reach the true goal of both wisdom and action. ….There is, indeed, nothing that man’s nature seeks more eagerly than to be flattered. Accordingly, when his nature becomes aware that its gifts are highly esteemed, it tends to be unduly credulous about them…For, since blind self-love is innate in all mortals, they are most freely persuaded that nothing inheres in themselves that deserves to be considered hateful.…But if any take a more modest attitude and concede something to God, so as not to appear to claim everything for themselves, they so divide the credit that the chief basis for boasting and confidence remains in themselves.

Nothing pleases man more than the sort of alluring talk that tickles the pride that itches in his very marrow. Therefore, in nearly every age, when anyone publicly extolled human nature in most favorable terms, he was listened to with applause. But however great such commendation of human excellence is that teaches man to be satisfied with himself, it does nothing but delight in its own sweetness; indeed, it so deceives as to drive those who assent to it into utter ruin. For what do we accomplish when, relying upon every vain assurance, we consider, plan, try, and undertake what we think is fitting; then — while in our very first efforts we are actually forsaken by and destitute of sane understanding as well as true virtue — we nonetheless rashly press on until we hurtle to destruction? Whoever, then, heeds such teachers as hold us back with thought only of our good traits will not advance in self-knowledge, but will be plunged into the worst ignorance.

Calvin's Institutes II.i.2

We Never Mature Beyond the Cross

2005-11-10T11:12:00.000-08:00

This is a clip from our church's vision statement.

"While irreligious people simply don’t repent, moral and religious people repent only of their sins and failures and then try harder to be good or to be nicer. When the gospel transforms us, we repent of our sins and our best deeds, and we rely wholly on Jesus for salvation. Trust in the finished work of Christ is not just the beginning of the Christian life, but the means and end as well. We never mature beyond the cross. Therefore, we must continually apply the gospel more deeply to our lives in order to live as Christians."

"We never mature beyond the cross."
— David B. McWilliams

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEANNA!!!!!

2005-11-08T08:48:00.000-08:00

Today is Deanna's 1st Birthday. She was born a year ago today at 11:23pm at Trinity Hospital in Carrollton, TX. I can remember the day very clearly. She came out making no noise at all. She was a month early but weighed 6 lbs 6 oz and was 20 inches long. She had the cutest little face, bright red lips and a little conehead. We have enjoyed you so much Deanna. You have been a blessing in our life. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

HAPPINESS

2005-11-08T06:56:00.000-08:00

“All moments of unhappiness in life are ultimately due to a person’s experience of separation from God. A person who is in real communion with God and with the Lord Jesus Christ is happy. It does not matter whether he is in a dungeon, or whether he has his feet fast in the stocks, or whether he is burning at the stake; he is still happy if he is in communion with God. Is not that the experience of the saints down the centuries? So the ultimate cause of any misery or lack of joy is separation from God, and the one cause of separation from Him is self. And self always means defiance of God; it always means that I put myself on the throne instead of God, and therefore it is always something that separates me from Him. Whenever we are unhappy it means that some way or other we are looking at ourselves and thinking about ourselves, instead of communing with God.”

“The Christian should always be anxious to know himself. No other man truly wants to know himself. The natural man thinks he knows himself, and thereby reveals his basic trouble. He evades self-examination because to know one’s self is ultimately the most painful piece of knowledge that a man can ever acquire....But...it is only the man who has truly seen himself for what he is who is likely to fly to Christ, and to seek to be filled with the Spirit of God who alone can burn out of him the vestiges of self and everything that tends to mar his Christian life and living.”

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, M. D., Studies in the Sermon on the Mount

Indwelling Sin

2005-11-04T23:59:00.000-08:00

The more men exercise their grace in duties of obedience, the more it is strengthened and increased; and the more men exert and put forth the fruits of their lust, the more is that enraged and increased in them; — it feeds upon itself, swallows up its own poison, and grows thereby. The more men sin, the more are they inclined unto sin. Every sin increaseth the principle, and fortifieth the habit of sinning. It is an evil treasure, that increaseth by doing evil. And where doth this treasure lie? It is in the heart; there it is laid up, there it is kept in safety. All the men in the world, all the angels in heaven, cannot dispossess a man of this treasure, it is so safely stored in the heart. Never let us reckon that our work in contending against sin, in crucifying, mortifying, and subduing of it, is at an end. The place of its habitation is unsearchable; and when we may think that we have thoroughly won the field, there is still some reserve remaining that we saw not, that we knew not of. Many conquerors have been ruined by their carelessness after a victory, and many have been spiritually wounded after great successes against this enemy.

John Owen (1616-1683)
Indwelling Sin, Chp. 3.
Works of Owen Vol. 6.

Wormwood

2005-11-04T12:50:00.000-08:00

PROVERBS 5

1 My son, be attentive to my wisdom; incline your ear to my understanding, 2that you may keep discretion, and your lips may guard knowledge. 3 For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, 4 but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. 5 Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol; 6 she does not ponder the path of life; her ways wander, and she does not know it.

This Proverb really hits our culture between the eyes in all its sensuality. The bottom line of adultery as Solomon speaks is folly. The fool refuses to "incline his heart to understanding and discretion". He is attracted by the enticing candy coated appearance of a poisonous adulterous woman whose "lips drip with honey" and whose "speech is more bitter than wormwood." The fool does not look underneath the surface to see that "her feet go down to death."

The punishment of this adulterous act which gave this fool minutes of pleasure is a lifetime of pain. His "honor is given to others," his "years are given to the merciless," his "labors go to the house of a foreigner" and at the end of his life he "groans when his body and flesh are consumed."

But for the one who fears the Lord and has "inclined his heart to understanding and wisdom," he "drinks from his own cistern." He delights in the wonderful bride the Lord has given him and is satisfied in the"wife of his youth" as a "lovely deer," and a "graceful doe." Her "breasts fill him at all times with delight" and he is "intoxicated with her love." This wise young man is taking advantage of the wonderful gift of sex that God has given him within God given bounds.

But the fool does not recognize that his "ways are always before the Lord" and "He ponders all his paths." His iniquities have "ensnared him" and he is "held fast in the cords of sin."

Odessa Permian at Abilene Cooper

2005-11-04T11:16:00.000-08:00

Odessa Permian and Abilene Cooper battle it out tonight for last place in district. Neither teams have won a district game this season. This is irony at its best. Midland High, and Abilene High which were the worst teams when I attended Permian back in the early 90's are now the best teams, and Permian, Midland Lee, and Abilene Cooper who were the best teams are now the worst teams.

A year after Friday Night Lights was released, the Panthers cannot win a district game. When I attended Permian our record was something like 41-2-1 for the three years I was there with 3 district championships, and one state championship. Each year we were ranked number 1 in the state at a certain time during the season, and two of those years ranked nationally at #2 and #3. Also we were unbeaten for 30 years against our cross town rivals Odessa High, and this is the second year in a row that OHS beat Permian. This has not happened since 1964. I am not bragging against the poor Panthers of this generation because I did not choose to be in my generation. But what happened to this program that has not made the playoffs since 1998? What are the solutions to restoring the program and the tradition? I miss watching the old Mojo football!

Law of Sin

2005-11-04T06:31:00.000-08:00

So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members."

Romans seven - eighteen through twenty two

.....but it is so with this law, it does so dwell in us, as that it will be present with us in every thing we do; yes, oftentimes when with most earnestness we desire to be rid of it, with most violence it will put itself upon us: “When I would do good, it is present with me.” Would you pray, would you hear, would you give to charity, would you meditate, would you be in any duty acting faith on God and love towards him, would you work righteousness, would you resist temptations, — this troublesome, perplexing indweller will still more or less put itself upon you and be present with you; so that you cannot perfectly and completely accomplish the thing that is good, as our apostle speaks, verse 18.

Sometimes men, by hearkening to their temptations, do stir up, excite, and provoke their lusts; and no wonder if then they find them present and active. But it will be so when with all our endeavors we labor to be free from them. This law of sin “dwelleth” in us; — that is, it adheres as a depraved principle, unto our minds in darkness and vanity, unto our affections in sensuality, unto our wills in a loathing of and opposition from that which is good; and by some, more, or all of these, is continually putting itself upon us, in inclinations, motions, or suggestions to evil, when we would be most gladly rid of it.

John Owen
Indwelling Sin, Chp. 2
Works of Owen Vol. 6

2005-11-03T08:24:00.000-08:00

Our little 11 month old daughter Deanna is growing in her talent. She has not only learned to walk in the past few weeks, but she can carry around her donut string toy with her mouth. She is showing that she is using "no hands." She has truely been a blessing to us. She turns 1 on Nov. 8th. HAPPY 1ST BIRTHDAY DEANNA!!!

Christ's Obedience Credited

2005-11-03T06:47:00.000-08:00

Here is a good illustration that Calvin borrows from Ambrose in explaining Christ's obedience reckoned to us as if it were our own.

"For this reason, it seems to me that Ambrose beautifully stated an example of this righteousness in the blessing of Jacob: noting that, as he did not of himself deserve the right of the first-born, concealed in his brother’s clothing and wearing his brother’s coat, which gave out an agreeable odor [Genesis 27:27], he ingratiated himself with his father, so that to his own benefit he received the blessing while impersonating another. And we in like manner hide under the precious purity of our first-born brother, Christ, so that we may be attested righteous in God’s sight. Here are the words of Ambrose: “That Isaac smelled the odor of the garments perhaps means that we are justified not by works but by faith, since the weakness of the flesh is a hindrance to works, but the brightness of faith, which merits the pardon of sins, overshadows the error of deeds.” And this is indeed the truth, for in order that we may appear before God’s face unto salvation we must smell sweetly with his odor, and our vices must be covered and buried by his perfection."

- Calvin's Institutes III.xi.23

Free Grace

2005-11-02T20:14:00.000-08:00

Give me the grace, O Lord, to do as you command, and command me to do what you will! O Holy God, when your commands are obeyed, it is from you that we receive the power to obey them.

Augustine of Hippo (354-430 A.D.)

The Flesh

2005-11-02T20:09:00.000-08:00

He that comes to Christ cannot, it is true, always get on as fast as he would. Poor coming soul, thou art like the man that would ride full gallop whose horse will hardly trot. Now the desire of his mind is not to be judged by the slow pace of the dull jade he rides on, but by the hitching and the kicking and the spurring as he sits on his back. Thy flesh is like this dull jade, it will not gallop after Christ, it will be backward though thy soul and heaven lie at stake.

John Bunyan

Marriage

2005-11-02T20:06:00.000-08:00

Next to God's Word, there is no more precious treasure than holy matrimony.

Martin Luther

Physics

2005-11-02T19:43:00.000-08:00

When we study physics, we do not usually think of the fact that we are dealing with revelation. We study the individual objects in the physical universe. We try to see in accordance with what laws they work. We try to bring the particulars and the universals together. We deal, therefore, first of all with the object-object relation. But we also deal with the object-subject or the subject-object relation. It is the human mind or subject that seeks to get information about the objects of knowledge. We hold that God has so created the objects in relationship to one another that they exist not as particulars only, but that they exist as particulars that are related to universals. God has created not only the facts but also the laws of physical existence. And the two are meaningless except as correlatives of one another. Moreover, God has adapted the objects to the subjects of knowledge; that the laws of our minds and the laws of the facts come into fruitful contact with one another is due to God’s creative work and to God’s providence, by which all things are maintained in their existence and in their operation in relation to one another.

It is of particular significance to see clearly that the laws of mathematics are but modes of the created universe. They are not, as theologians have all too often held, existences that are independent of God. Many theologians have followed Plato in thinking of the laws of mathematics as somehow existing from all eternity alongside of God. And what holds true for the laws of mathematics holds equally true for the conception of time. Time is not a moving image of the abstract notion of eternity. It is God-created as a mode of finite existence.

Now since we think of nothing as having existence and meaning independently of God, it is impossible to think of the object and the subject standing in the fruitful relation to one another that they actually do unless God is back of them both. Hence, the knowledge that we have of the simplest objects of the physical universe is still based upon the revelational activity of God.

Van Til, Intro. to Systematic Theology pg. 57

Knowledge

2005-11-02T19:33:00.000-08:00

All analogical knowledge may be called theological knowledge. We can even, if we wish, identify the concept of analogical knowledge with the concept of theological knowledge. We cannot do without God any more when we wish to know about physics or psychology than when we wish to know about our soul’s salvation. Not one single fact in this universe can be known truly by man without the existence of God. Even if man will not recognize God’s existence, the fact of God’s existence none the less accounts for whatever measure of knowledge man has about God. We can readily see that this must be so. The idea of creation is implied in the idea of the self-sufficient God. Now if every fact in this universe is created by God, and if the mind of man and whatever the mind of man knows is created by God, it goes without saying that the whole fabric of human knowledge would dash to pieces if God did not exist and if all finite existence were not revelational of God.

- Van Til, Intro. to Systematic Theology pg. 15

True Wisdom

2005-11-02T14:39:00.000-08:00

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;
fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Proverbs 1:7