John 17:22-24

“I am in them and You in me,”
The Lord thus spoke the mystery
And gave perfected unity,
So that with him we all may be.

In Jesus Christ we somehow share
The glory of which he is sole heir.
Such depths of grace we cannot know;
Lord, lead us there; this blessing show.

Of this request you made in prayer,
Lord, make our hardened souls aware.
Our hearts are slow, our feelings cold,
We wish this union to behold.

The Father always loved the Son,
And sent this Christ with whom He’s one.
"When with us," Jesus said, "They'll see
The glory you have given Me.”

In you, Lord, all our hopes are bound–
In you eternal pleasure found!
We dimly know this glory here
But wish our view to be more clear.
Please let us know you more and more,
Our minds awaken to explore
The glory which we all now share
And soon will see unveiled There.

Can anything good come out of Grand Rapids?

John R. Franke introduces his recent book, The Character of Theology: A Postconservative Approach (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), with a couple quotations from Calvin's Institutes: "Without knowledge of self there is no knowledge of God," and "without knowledge of God there is no knowledge of self" (Institutes, vol 1., 1.1.1). What does this mean for Franke? Franke explains that this should teach us of the importance of contextualizing our theology:

"Calvin's observation continues to provide a helpful model for reflecting on the character of theology and suggests that we must always be attentive not only to the knowledge of God but also the knowledge of ourselves as human beings if we hope to practice and approach to theology that leads to wisdom. We must also be attentive to the fact that the knowledge of God and the knowledge of ourselves are not available to us in the form of timeless and undisputed teaching. Instead, we learn from the history of Christian thought that doctrines and conceptions of God and the nature of the human condition, as well as many other magnificant matters, have been developed and formulated in the context of numerous social, historical, and cultural settings and having in turn been shaped by these settings. This suggests that in the discipline of theology we must take account of the particular social and intellectual settings in which we engage in theological reflection and exploration. This is part of the knowledge of ourselves that is crucial for theology" (14).

He goes on, but I am sure you get the point. Let me concede here that I am sure John Franke would run circles around my theological and philosophical knowledge. But this remark is almost as funny as David Clark's: "Most people . . . are metaphysical realists" (To Know and Love God [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2003], 353).

Franke, of course, is wrong. Were he to take Calvin's entire argument seriously, he would realize that Calvin did not have the highly individualized conception of the human person that he does. Calvin is not talking about "historical and global manifestations" of Christianity, as Franke is. He is talking about something far more enduring, and not so particular. Calvin is talking about understanding the nature of mankind, not some postconservative mush about "ever-shifting contexts and circumstances." The theology of Christianity does not and should not change to speak to these different contexts. The theology of Christianity remains constant, speaking to every man everywhere, because it addresses the true nature of all mankind. Similarly, the theological conception of God himself is the same God in each setting, and must be in truth one and the same idea for it to be the same God. Thus the idea of God theologically informs our universal state as mankind. Listen to the words of our Protestant father himself:

"Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other. For, in the first place, no man can survey himself without forthwith turning his thoughts towards the God in whom he lives and moves; because it is perfectly obvious, that the endowments which we possess cannot possibly be from ourselves; nay, that our very being is nothing else than subsistence in God alone. In the second place, those blessings which unceasingly distil to us from heaven, are like streams conducting us to the fountain. Here, again, the infinitude of good which resides in God becomes more apparent from our poverty. In particular, the miserable ruin into which the revolt of the first man has plunged us, compels us to turn our eyes upwards; not only that while hungry and famishing we may thence ask what we want, but being aroused by fear may learn humility. For as there exists in man something like a world of misery, and ever since we were stript of the divine attire our naked shame discloses an immense series of disgraceful properties every man, being stung by the consciousness of his own unhappiness, in this way necessarily obtains at least some knowledge of God. Thus, our feeling of ignorance, vanity, want, weakness, in short, depravity and corruption, reminds us (see Calvin on John 4:10), that in the Lord, and none but He, dwell the true light of wisdom, solid virtue, exuberant goodness. We are accordingly urged by our own evil things to consider the good things of God; and, indeed, we cannot aspire to Him in earnest until we have begun to be displeased with ourselves. For what man is not disposed to rest in himself? Who, in fact, does not thus rest, so long as he is unknown to himself; that is, so long as he is contented with his own endowments, and unconscious or unmindful of his misery? Every person, therefore, on coming to the knowledge of himself, is not only urged to seek God, but is also led as by the hand to find him" (Institutes, vol 1, 1.1.1).

False dichotomies

Is a transcendent gospel necessarily distinct from ministering to the present age? Absolutely not. The question is not whether to present the gospel transcendently or minister contemporarily. The question is how must the gospel be presented? Must we, yea, can we, make the gospel "more relevant" to this age? We cannot. The gospel message is powerful in itself.

The gospel does not need to be made relevant--it is already relevant by the Spirit of God. Those who think that the only way to minister to contemporary culture is with some kind of "relevantized gospel" error on this point. When we believe that we must somehow change our presentation of the gospel to make it relevant, we err. The Apostle Paul said to the Corinthians,

And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God (1 Cor 2:1-5, ESV).

God is glorified when He, by his Spirit, uses the gospel in all its offensiveness and counter-cultural impact to save sinful men. We, unfortunately, do not often believe that this power is present to really save men. The sovereignty of God has not fully gripped us yet. So we try to add to it, or try to make it more "relevant," as if it somehow needed our help. But God has not asked us to make the gospel more appealing. He has asked to proclaim it, and then be astounded when God has powerfully saved this sinner by our simple proclamation of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then God is truly glorified, because our flashy words or slick presentations were not the instrument bringing this person to God, but He himself was the saving force. He opened the once blind eyes. The message was proclaimed truthfully and forthrightly, and he saw fit to use it.

And here is the most important point. Making the gospel relevant changes the gospel. The gospel of the death, resurrection, and coming Lord Jesus truthfully proclaimed, of course, glorifies Christ and God and this gospel. But efforts to relevantize the gospel alter the message of the gospel. If this were not true, there would be no desire for some to make it relevant. We would not hear the demands for a more relevant gospel were this "more relevant gospel," really, in the end a different gospel. The gospel forthrightly proclaimed in all its offensiveness should be adequate for all believers seeking to evangelize. The fact that we deceive ourselves into thinking that we should make it more relevant shows that the "more relevant" gospel is a different gospel. We are ashamed of the gospel as it is, and we are not convinced that is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe. In the end, the true, unfiltered, unwatered down, undistilled, forthright gospel as recorded in Scriptures is the relevant gospel, for it is the one the Lord uses powerfully to save sinners by his Spirit.

Some musings on the immanence of pop Christian culture

Among my many problems with Christian popular music is its (by virtue of its being popular) transitory and "trendy" nature. For example, many would consider the 70's music of the Gaither's "passé" today (I would at least hope so). I think the glory of hymns written before the middle of the 19th century is that they seemingly transcend this phenomenon. The chant form in particular, I think, resonates in a transcultural manner. Popular forms, on the other hand, are not usually able to transcend this barrier.

Every once in a while I will watch TBN on TV, and laugh at the old Michael W. Smith music videos because they are so "out of style" ("they are sooooo 80's," if you know what I mean). I feel the same way towards songs like "He Touched Me," El Shaddai," and "Shine, Jesus, Shine." Of course, this is well illustrated with other, older tunes like "At the Cross" and "Fill my Cup." All these songs have at two things in common: 1) they are not transcendent, and 2) they are popular. They did what they were intended to do; they were crafted to be immediately popular and strike a note with the current trends in popular evangelicalism at that time. So were the tunes of Ira Sankey, J. W. Peterson, even the recordings George Beverly Shae. Who knows how many "contemporary" Christian LPs of the 70's (which were very trendy at the time), donned with bell-bottoms, big hair, and 9-inch collars, are now sitting in Salvation Army bins of no use to timeless Christianity? I am willing, to a certain extent, to take the music of any culture (German, Russian, English, Italian, Romanian, and African) that speaks to this timeless message of the gospel and use it in worship. I am not willing, however, to get caught up in whatever popular American evangelicalism is doing and look back only to be embarrassed fifteen years from now because my worship then was soooooo "2000's."

In reality, this popular aspect of American fundamentalism and evangelicalism closely resembles what American liberalism had always sought to do: amalgamate Christianity to the prevailing culture. Whereas liberalism sought to force Christianity in the shapes of modernism and current philosophical trends (high culture), evangelicalism (broadly speaking) has historically sought to press their Christianity into the molds of the wasteland of popular culture (low culture). Both desired that Christianity would be relevant. But both were subtly deceived; the progeny of this interspecies breeding was a religion that was so quickly out of style that it had to be continuously updated to keep in step with the current "relevance." And in so doing, the new religion was hopelessly irrelevant--unable to really offer any kind of transcendent gospel to the world. And so it continues today.

Dorrien on Machen

"In many respects, [Machen] was far from a typical fundamentalist. Like Warfield, he opposed faith healing, revivalism, Holiness teaching, Pentecostalism, and any form of Christian doctrine or practice that smacked of anti-intellectualism. Politically, he was a libertarian who belonged to the Democratic Party. He believed that the very idea of Christian America was a terrible mistake that undermined the capacity of the churches to be Christian. He opposed most forms of government interference in public life and nearly all forms of church involvement in politics. He therefore opposed Prohibition, military conscription, the registration of aliens, jaywalking laws, child labor laws, and the creation of a federal Department of Education. He also opposed Bible reading in schools and school prayer. He was open to evolutionary theory and refused to join any fundamentalist organization that professed adherence to dispensational theology. He was repulsed by the aesthetic crudeness of fundamentalist preaching, hymnody, and public manners. Revival music especially repelled him."

-Gary Dorrien, The Remaking of Evangelical Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998), 35.

I really like Machen. I just wish he was not so anti-dispensationalism, and I would not go so much for the evolutionary theory part. His politics, though conservative, seem radical in an age where government grows larger and larger. The government overregulation largely comes from ideological concoctions of liberal social theory. And he pretty well had it on the question of church and state. I often wonder if the church, in becoming so active in politics and public policy, is not reacting to their former power being stripped from their hands. I think we would all do well to consider seriously the church's relationship to the state. Instead of embracing the neoevangelical (in the true sense of the word) dream of redeeming culture and America, we should become concerned with "doing church" well. Even if the possibility of an America revival existed, I am not sure the present methods (court battles, abortion protests, pushing prayer back into schools, ten commandment displays, etc.) are the most effective.

And those last two sentences are particularly instructive. There are many, I am sure, who assume that the position I and others take on music, and gospel songs in particular, is a recent invention. Even a cursory glance at the history of evangelicalism during the late 19th and early 20th centuries would show that the position is, in fact, quite old. Let that last sentence just roll around in your head for a while: "Revival music especially repelled him."

Of the Father's Love begotten

Although I will still be around, this will be my last post until after Christmas. This hymn was written by Aurelius Prudentius, translated by the prolific John Mason Neal, and often sung to DIVINUM MYSTERIUM.

Of the Father’s love begotten, ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega, He the source, the ending He,
Of the things that are, that have been,
And that future years shall see, evermore and evermore!

At His Word the worlds were framèd; He commanded; it was done:
Heaven and earth and depths of ocean in their threefold order one;
All that grows beneath the shining
Of the moon and burning sun, evermore and evermore!

He is found in human fashion, death and sorrow here to know,
That the race of Adam’s children doomed by law to endless woe,
May not henceforth die and perish
In the dreadful gulf below, evermore and evermore!

O that birth forever blessèd, when the virgin, full of grace,
By the Holy Ghost conceiving, bare the Savior of our race;
And the Babe, the world’s Redeemer,
First revealed His sacred face, evermore and evermore!

This is He Whom seers in old time chanted of with one accord;
Whom the voices of the prophets promised in their faithful word;
Now He shines, the long expected,
Let creation praise its Lord, evermore and evermore!

O ye heights of heaven adore Him; angel hosts, His praises sing;
Powers, dominions, bow before Him, and extol our God and King!
Let no tongue on earth be silent,
Every voice in concert sing, evermore and evermore!

Righteous judge of souls departed, righteous King of them that live,
On the Father’s throne exalted none in might with Thee may strive;
Who at last in vengeance coming
Sinners from Thy face shalt drive, evermore and evermore!

Thee let old men, thee let young men, thee let boys in chorus sing;
Matrons, virgins, little maidens, with glad voices answering:
Let their guileless songs re-echo,
And the heart its music bring, evermore and evermore!

Christ, to Thee with God the Father, and, O Holy Ghost, to Thee,
Hymn and chant with high thanksgiving, and unwearied praises be:
Honor, glory, and dominion,
And eternal victory, evermore and evermore!

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 4)

This will conclude the series of articles I have been posting on Matthew's use of Hosea 11:1, where Jesus' coming out of Egypt as a fulfillment of this prophecy. We are concerned here with Matthew 2:14-15, 'And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, "Out of Egypt I called my son."' I began by introducing the problem. Then we looked at Calvin's interpretation of the passage and the sensus plenior view. The third part looked at two more views: Gundry's interpretation of typology emphasizing sonship and the view that this passage is typological fulfilled. Today I will offer what I believe to the correct interpretation and some concluding remarks.

Sensus Literalis

This view, which was proposed by John Sailhammer,¹ begins with a proper understanding of Hosea–that his prophecies of judgment in chapters 4-14 are to be understood within the lens of 3:5, "Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the LORD their God, and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the LORD and to his goodness in the latter days" (ESV).² Sailhammer thereupon deduces that,

Hos 11:1 speaks of the future, not the past. The book, in fact, provides its own clue to the meaning of 11:1 in verse 11:5, “[Israel] will not return to Egypt, but Assyria will be their king because they have refused to repent.” In Hos 11:1-4, then, the historical exodus is understood as a metaphor. It is an image of future redemption. Egypt is Assyria, the enemy oppressor.³

Hos 11:1, although propositional statement on the surface, resonates the prophecy of messianic deliverance which is made by the Pentateuch’s own interpretation of the exodus. Hosea says in 12:10 that God speaks through his prophets by means of parables or “similitudes,” and this phrase itself rehearses the words of Balaam as he interpreted the Exodus event messianicly in Num 24.⁴ So how does Hosea speak of the future in his retrospective statement “Out of Egypt I have called my Son?”

Hosea intimately knew the Pentateuch, which was natural for prophets of his day.⁵ He doubtless observed the Pentateuch had its own eschatological interpretation of the exodus event, and, when Hosea drew from the Pentateuch’s language in referencing the exodus, particularly with this phrase, it is likely that he too was thinking of the future.⁶ The phrase Hosea uses is strikingly similar to Num 24:8, which says “God will bring him [this Messiah] out of Egypt,” which, in turn, closely echos the words in 23:22, “God brought them out of Egypt.” Sailhammer observes,

Balaam looked back at the exodus as the grounds for God’s future salvation of his people Israel. In . . . Num 24, Balaam viewed the coming of a future “king” as a new exodus–“God will bring him up from Egypt.” The later vision, Num 24, is patterned after the earlier, Num 23. . . . The past exodus is presented as a picture of the exodus of the future.⁷

Therefore, it is highly probable, particularly from Hosea’s word choice in 11:1, that the prophecy of Numbers 24:8 was to a great degree in his mind as he too looked to the future of God’s deliverance.⁸ Matthew would have likewise noticed this, and would have interpreted Hosea’s remark to be wholly prophetic. “[Matthew] was . . . drawing on the sensus literalis from the book of Hosea⁹.”

Conclusion

Given the understanding Hosea had for the messianic significance of the exodus, and the prophecies made from it by Balaam in Numbers 24, I tentatively conclude that it is best to understand Matthew as using “Out of Egypt I have called my Son” in the same sense that Hosea did: futuristically. This view best accounts for the fulfillment language with which Matthew introduces the statement. Jesus was brought of Egypt, just as it was prophesied regarding him in Numbers 24, and later in Hosea 11:1.

____________

¹John Sailhammer, “Hosea 11:1 and Matthew 2:15" Westminster Theological Journal 63 (2001): 87-96.

²Sailhammer builds his case on Brevard Childs and his canonical interpretation of Hosea (Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979]).

³Sailhammer, “Hosea 11:1,” 88-89.

⁴Both Num 24:3 and 15 say that Balaam “took up his parable.”

⁵Sailhammer convincingly demonstrates that Hosea had a very intimate knowledge with the Pentateuch (“Hosea 11:1,” 93-95).

⁶Ibid, 91.

⁷Ibid, 95.

⁸Another tie back to Num 24 is the correspondence of 24:3 and 15 that Balaam spoke in “parables” to Hos 12:1.

⁹Ibid, 96.

American Evangelicalism has issues (One Track Mind)

In effort to show that you really cannot make it up with American evangelicalism, I thought I would suggest the following as a gift for your teen-age daughter this Christmas: the "one-track mind" t-shirt. Yes, I stumbled across the renowned pious internet t-shirt emporium Hip-Edge.com, where they "spread God's Word one T-shirt at a time," is offering the little gem "One track mind" bright green t-shirt for only $14.75 (plus shipping) of your hard-earned Christian DOLLARS (of course, you can obtain this apparel wherever fine Christian t-shirts are sold, not just at Hip-Edge). And with the words "One-track Mind" plastered right across the chest. Although this troublesome saying has been usually reserved to reference those who only think about "you-know-what", the devout brethren over at Kerusso* (the company that actually makes the shirt in question) have finally rescued it from its wordly clutches to give it a new "Christian" "spin." And by wearing this T-shirt, anybody who does have a "one-track mind" for "you-know-what," since this message is displayed in so prominent a place, may instanteously get saved. Can somebody shout "Glory"?!

You see, Hip-Edge.com is smart. In their "About Us" portion of the website, they talk about how they know the world is taking over. Society's losing its moral compass. That's where Hip-Edge.com comes in. They will force the gospel message on people, even if it is plastered across their chests! They are tapping into the "explosion of Christian sentiment in the world," but it's up to us to "take a stand" by wearing T-shirts. This may seem contradictory to you, dear reader (that the world is taking over even though there is this big explosion of Christians), but this should not worry you. The point is that you should wear their T-shirts. Because somebody may get saved. And then that person will wear T-shirts. And then more and more people will get saved, like its compounding. And then more and more t-shirts are being worn. Pretty soon, the whole world will be saved. All because you had the guts to wear a Christian T-shirt. How's that for a investment from your little $14.75 (plus shipping)?

*Permission was requested from Kerusso to display the copyrighted image of the t-shirt in question on this blog. Permission was declined.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 3)

We have been looking at the diversely interpreted Matthew 2:15 and its use of Hosea 11:1. We began with an introduction and then discussed Calvin's and the sensus plenior views. Today we continue by looking at Robert Gundry's interpretation and the widely held "typological fulfillment" view.

Gundry’s Typology Emphasizing Sonship

Robert Gundry argues that Matthew used Hosea typologically to emphasize Jesus’ divine sonship. He believes that Matthew drew “a multiplicity of parallels”¹ between Israel and the life of Jesus, and that Jesus therefore served as the antitype of Israel as Son. He bases this on a number of observations.

First, he argues that εξ Αιγυνπτου should not be translated “Out of Egypt,” but, “Since Egypt,” or “from the time he dwelt there.”² This shifts the force of the citation from the location of the sojourn to the aspect of “Son.” Second, the clause that the quotation follows speaks of Jesus’ stay in Egypt, not his deliverance from it. Gundry deduces, “Matthew is not highlighting Jesus’ later departure from Egypt as a new Exodus, but God’s preservation of Jesus in Egypt as a sign of his divine sonship.”³ Finally, Matthew emphasizes that it was the Lord who spoke by the prophet, and it is the Lord who claims Jesus as “My Son.”⁴

The problem with Gundry’s view is that it does not seem plausible that Matthew had no intention to highlight Egypt, because he connects the fulfillment to the immediate context–both vv 14 and 15 mention the sojourn in Egypt, and the text from Hosea likewise speaks of it.


Typological⁵
This interpretation assumes (as do the previous two) that the meaning of πληροω does not necessarily mean the fulfillment of prophecy, but the “completion or consummation” of the event.⁶ Therefore, it may not be necessary for the cited text to be a prophecy per se.⁷ Further, this view, although held by many interpreters, has several variations, and tends to be rather inexact.

In this view, Jesus Christ is a type of Israel, in that they may both be rightly called “God’s Son.” Some also hold that He typifies the “new exodus,” the salvation for the church.⁸ Proponents point out that Matthew is full of such typology, particularly in the Temptation narrative, which explains why it is so natural for Matthew to implement this kind of understanding of Hosea’s statement.

It is important to realize that this view does not believe that Hosea meant his statement to be a prophecy, and, more importantly, that Matthew was not incorporating Hosea’s authorial intent.⁹ Thus, the main cause for at least one hesitation with this view is that it so dramatically discounts the literal meaning of the OT author’s original intent. Communication functions on the
ability to use words meaningfully. This view seems to infer that Matthew either did not understand meaning of Hosea’s text, or that he amplified it in order to make his point.¹⁰

____________


¹Robert Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Handbook for a Mixed Church under Persecution (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 34.

²Gundry, The Use of the OT, 93.

³Gundry, Matthew, 34.

⁴The Greek renders it thus: ινα πληρωθη το ρηθεν υπο κυριου δια προφητου λεγοντος.

⁵Representatives of this view (with minor variations) include Carson; Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard; Plummer; Kaiser; Longenecker; Hendrickson; Craig Keener (A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999]); Patrick Fairbairn (The Typology of Scripture [New York: 1900; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1975]); R. C. H. Lenski (The Interpretation of Matthew [Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1943]); Ed Glasscock ( Matthew: Moody Gospel Commentary [Chicago: Moody, 1997]); Donald Hagner (Matthew 1-13 [WBC 33a; Dallas: Word, 1993]); W. F. Albright and C. S. Mann (Matthew [Anchor 26; New York: Doubleday, 1971]); and R. T. France (“The Formula Quotations of Matthew 2 and the Problem of Communication” New Testament Studies 27 [1981]: 233-51).

⁶Walter Kaiser, The Uses of the OT, 52. Ed Glasscock says, “The idea of ‘fulfilled’ also does not necessarily need to be taken as implying that every detail must match but rather that the intent of the original message is brought to fruition in the later event” (Matthew, 59).

⁷Richard Longenecker argues that Matthew implements a pesher interpretation, which means he interprets the OT texts as though they are directly concerned with the interpreter and his community. Matthew, he argues, “is making the point that that which was vital in Israel’s corporate and redemptive experience finds its ultimate and intended focus in the person of Jesus the Messiah” (Biblical Exegesis, 71, 145).

⁸Tracy L. Howard defended what he calls “Analogical Correspondence” in a 1986 BibSac article (“The Use of Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2:15: An Alternative Solution” BibSac [1986]). He believes that “the New Testament writer looked back and drew correspondences or analogies with events described in the Old Testament,” and that his approach “considerably reduces the element of subjectivity that the traditional prefigurement view of typology introduces” (320-21). Yet, no matter what he may call it, the fulfillment is viewed typologically.

⁹“To ask whether Hosea thought of Messiah is the wrong question, akin to using a hacksaw when a scalpel is needed. It is better to say that Hosea, building on existing revelation, grasped the messianic nuances of the ‘son’ language already applied to Israel and David’s promised heir in previous revelation so that had he been able to see Matthew’s use of 11:1, he would not have disapproved, even if messianic nuances were not in his mind when he wrote that verse” Carson, Matthew, 92).

¹⁰This writer of this paper rejects this view with a degree of hesitation. Many of the arguments of the typologists have weight, and should not be discarded quite so quickly. For example, types are drawn from several OT events (1 Cor 10:1-5; John 3:14-15; etc). If the NT authors can seemingly tie such events to the life of Christ, why should this hinder Christians from understanding “typological fulfillment” as a means of prophetic fulfillment?

Come, Thou, Redeemer of the Earth

by Ambrose of Milan, sung to Pu­er No­bis Nas­ci­tur

Come, Thou Redeemer of the earth,
And manifest Thy virgin birth:
Let every age adoring fall;
Such birth befits the God of all.

Begotten of no human will,
But of the Spirit, Thou art still
The Word of God in flesh arrayed,
The promised Fruit to man displayed.

The virgin womb that burden gained
With virgin honor all unstained;
The banners there of virtue glow;
God in His temple dwells below.

Forth from His chamber goeth He,
That royal home of purity,
A giant in twofold substance one,
Rejoicing now His course to run.

From God the Father He proceeds,
To God the Father back He speeds;
His course He runs to death and hell,
Returning on God’s throne to dwell.

O equal to the Father, Thou!
Gird on Thy fleshly mantle now;
The weakness of our mortal state
With deathless might invigorate.

Thy cradle here shall glitter bright,
And darkness breathe a newer light,
Where endless faith shall shine serene,
And twilight never intervene.

All laud to God the Father be,
All praise, eternal Son, to Thee;
All glory, as is ever meet,
To God the Holy Paraclete.

We're like yogurt

We've got culture. All you have to do is listen to us talk. Where do we learn to talk like this? New converts after just a few months are very adapt at using our terminology. They have "asked Jesus into their hearts", were "raised in a Christian home," have "rededicated their life to the Lord," and, of course, have "accepted Jesus as their personal Savior." My point here is not that these phrases are bad in and of themselves. My point is that we all (generally speaking) talk the same way. We use the same phrases. Where do we learn this? Where do our people learn to end prayers "in Thy name", instead of something drastically more biblical (like, "in Jesus' name")?

We've got culture. And it's not Trinitarian. It's not Nicene. It's not even Biblical. It's American and it's fundamental, and (thanks to Christian radio) it's evangelical. We do not talk about Jesus as "Light of Light," he is "our personal Lord and Savior." The fact that we and our converts speak this way should instruct us in what we emphasize in our culture. And it should confirm to us that we have a culture.

Of course we have a culture. We by necessity have a culture. We like to think that we are above culture or that we are objective arbiters of what our culture is. Not so. This is akin to trying to pull the splinter out of our brother's eye while a Redwood is protruding from our own. We are unable to tinker with culture in this way. Culture is not a buffet where you take and leave what you will. Culture is rooted in us deeply; it comes to us veiled and we adopt it without even knowing it. How many times have you begun a prayer, "Dear Father, thank you for this day . . ." Where did you learn first to thank the Lord for the day (whatever that means) when you pray? Where did you learn that joy is supposed to be like winning a high school basketball game? Where did you get the idea that a songleader is supposed to be a cheerleader? Where did you get your idea of what David's dance in 2 Samuel 6:14 looked like? Our culture is much more homogenous than we like to believe.

We've got culture. And it's bad.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 2)

In the first part, I tried to introduce the problem in Matthew 2:14-15, "And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, 'Out of Egypt I called my son' " (ESV). Many different Bible scholars have weighed in on this passage, which is often used to push hermeneutical assumptions to their philosophical limits. The question is how Matthew used Hosea 11:1.

Israel is the Church

Calvin provides an interesting perspective. The passage perplexed scholars even in Calvin’s day, and he noted, “Some have thought [that] the intention of the prophet was different from what is here stated.” Although Calvin ardently contends that Hosea “is not tortured by Matthew,” his own interpretation of these texts has a unique bend. Calvin superimposes the Church into Hosea’s use of Israel here, and holds that the prophet was foretelling that the Church would be brought out of Egypt just as the nation of Israel was. He observes, “the light of salvation had been almost extinguished, when God begat the Church anew in the person of Christ. Then did the Church come out of Egypt in its head, as the whole body had been formerly brought out.”¹

Sensus Plenior

William LaSor advocated that Matt 2:15 is an example of sensus plenior in his article “Prophecy, Inspiration, and Sensus Plenior.” Sensus Plenior is the belief that God intended deeper and additional meaning not intended by the author. This deeper meaning is seen when the text is studied through the lens of additional revelation. LaSor sees many difficulties with Matthew’s quotation of Hosea. Yet, he believes that the great Exodus demonstrates God’s “redemptive plan.” According to LaSor, Hosea’s prophecy shows that,

If God had not brought Israel out of Egypt, there would have been no Israelite nation, no Davidic line, no prophets, and no Messiah. Jesus could not have been born to Mary, and there would have been no redemptive work on Calvary’s cross.²

Of course, LaSor admits that none of this was in Hosea’s mind when he wrote it. But, “he was inspired by God’s Spirit . . . and [he] led him to express his words in a form that was capable of a fuller meaning.”³

The problem with this view is sensus plenior. Carson observed that this approach “seems a strange background for Matthew’s insisting that Jesus’ exodus from Egypt in any sense fulfills the Hosea passage.”⁴ A meaningful statement has not been fulfilled when a different idea is the fulfillment. And why should this be limited to linking words and phrases–a kind of gezerah shewah? God could seemingly use sensus plenior to give any kind of meaning to any phrase.
________
¹Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists, trans. William Pringle (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949), 156-57.

²LaSor, “Sensus Plenior,” TynBull 29 (1978), 58.

³Ibid, 58.

⁴Carson, Matthew, 92. He continues, “This observation is not trivial; Matthew is reasoning with Jews who could say, ‘You are not playing fair with the text!’”

Edwards on listening to your spiritual fathers

This comes from the sermon The Necessity of Self Examination by Jonathan Edwards. This sermon is excellent. Edwards preaches in such a way as to make you think that American evangelicalism is bankrupt. His is a spirituality that is very concerned even the most intimate details of life. Nothing escapes his glance. In our age, we struggle over whether an orgy is appropriate worship for God. We are, it seems, largely incapable of self-reflection. It seems that we have lost the ability to scrutinize. We have, in a sense, lost our humanity. We are incapable of reflecting on what movies and theater do to our soul, or how a waltz (let alone jazz or pop) is erotic, or even in regards to the proportion of our eating (of which there is a good discussion here). I long for a kind of spirit of deep humanity to return, that not only reflects on these things, but acts on these things. I am concerned we do not have the chests to to do either. Enough of me; here's Edwards:

If you live in any ways which are generally condemned by the better and more sober sort of men, be especially careful to inquire concerning these, whether they be not ways of sin. Perhaps you have argued with yourselves that such or such a practice is lawful. You cannot see any evil in it. However, if it be generally condemned by godly ministers, and the better more pious sort of people, it certainly looks suspicious, whether or no there be not some evil in it. So that you may well be put upon inquiring with the utmost strictness, whether it be not sinful. The practice being so generally disapproved of by those who in such cases are most likely to be in the right, may reasonably put you upon more than ordinarily nice and diligent inquiry concerning the lawfulness or unlawfulness of it.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 1)

The hermeneutical significance of Matt 2:15 should not be underestimated. Consider, for example, Walter Kaiser’s remark regarding this passage: “Enter into a discussion of the NT citations of the OT and, before long, someone is bound to raise the example of Matthew’s use of Hos 11:1.”¹ In their discussion of “Levels of Meaning,” Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard use this puzzling passage as their platform.²

Over the next several days (while continuing to post other material), I will discuss the interpretation of this passage. This is not meant to be exhaustive or add to scholarship, but to provide a summary of the different approaches to this hotly debated text, as well as suggest a way of a correct interpretation.

Many who read Matthew quickly notice his emphasis on “fulfillment,” particularly near the beginning of the gospel.³ In the first two chapters alone Matthew uses some derivative of the word πληροω four times to indicate that a certain event in the life of Jesus had fulfilled an OT prophecy.⁴ Matthew used these OT passages in his attempt to establish the validity of Jesus’ claim as Messiah. He wanted to demonstrate that Jesus was in some way the embodiment of the long awaited Old Testament predictions and promises of a Davidic King.⁵

The problem is that when Matthew quoted OT passages (particularly Hos 11:1 in 2:15), the fulfillment he saw in them is not quite as evident to modern readers as it was to Matthew.⁶ In fact, in his attempt to deal with the problem, D. A. Carson states, “Untutored Christians are prone to think of prophecy and fulfillment as something not very different from the straightforward propositional prediction and fulfillment. A close reading of the NT reveals that prophecy is more complex than that.”⁷

The paragraph wherein the difficult passage lies is found after the pericope of the Magi and their dealings with Herod. Matthew records that at an angel appeared to Joseph and instructed him to take Mary and Jesus to Egypt in order to avoid the jealous massacre that would quickly be ordered by Herod. Matt 2:14-15 says,

“When [Joseph] arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and
departed into Egypt: And was there until the death of Herod: that it might be
fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt have I called
my son" (ESV).

In verse 15, the evangelist notes that these events are somehow related to the fulfillment of Hos 11:1. His quotation of the OT passage translates the Hebrew text word for word.⁸

Matthew’s use of Hosea here is seems problematic on many levels. First, the passage in Hosea cited does not appear to be a prophecy, but “a statement of an historical fact.”⁹ Second, the passage does not seem to be speaking of the Messiah at all.¹⁰ In fact, the entire verse in Hosea says, “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my Son out of Egypt.” So what does the evangelist mean when he says that the holy family’s sojourn in Egypt is a fulfillment of Hosea?

____________
¹The Uses of the Old Testament in the New (Chicago: Moody Press, 1985), 43.

²William W. Klein, Craig L. Blomberg, and Robert L. Hubbard, Jr. Introduction to Biblical Interpretation (Dallas: Word, 1993), 120ff.

³William Hendrickson observes, “In general it can be said that the purpose of this Gospel was fully to win the Jews for Christ; that is, to gain those still unconverted and to strengthen those already converted. . . . In order to achieve [this goal] the emphasis throughout is placed on the fact that Jesus is indeed the long awaited Messiah of the Hebrew Scriptures” (New Testament Commentary: Matthew [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1973], 97).

⁴Of course, many other additional allusions to the OT can be found in these chapters. Matthew uses πληροω in the sense of “fulfillment” of prophecy thirteen different times in his gospel. BDAG notes that πληροω can mean “to bring to a designed end, fulfill,” and that the particular nuance of these uses in Matthew should be understood as “the fulfillment of divine predictions or promises.” When used in this sense, the word is almost always found in the passive tense: “be fulfilled” (828d-829a).

⁵The seemingly standardized introduction of the formula quotations (“fulfillment” passages) in Matthew, coupled with the fact that each of the OT passages quoted are to some extent removed from the standard LXX have made some scholars wonder if these are not the unique personal reflections of the author. Thus they have become known as the Reflexionszitate. (D. A. Carson, Matthew. ed. Frank E. Gaebelein [Expositor’s Bible Commentary 8; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984], 27).

⁶Richard Longenecker observed that “the quotations within [Matthew] the Evangelist’s editorial comments . . . are distinctive not only in their introductory formulae and their textual variants, but also in their oft-times applications” (Biblical Exegesis in the Apostolic Period [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975], 140).

⁷Matthew, 27.

⁸Robert Gundry, The Use of the Old Testament in St. Matthew’s Gospel (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 93. The LXX reads εξ Αιγυνπτου μετεκανλεσα τα τεκνα αυτου.

⁹Alfred Plummer, An Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to Matthew (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956), 17.

¹⁰William LaSor may have stated the problem most severely when he said, “The literal meaning of Hosea 11:1 . . . does not seem to give us any basis for such a fulfillment. Hosea is clearly talking about the exodus of Israel from Egypt.. . . If there is any lingering desire on our part to make this apply to Jesus, we are suddenly faced by the words that follow immediately: ‘the more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and burning incense to idols.’” (“Prophecy, Inspiration and Sensus Plenior” Tyndale Bulletin 29 [1978]: 56).

Weaver on culture

This excerpt comes from a lecture by Ted Smith on Richard Weaver at ISI. It warns of the danger of rationalizing important elements of culture. You should listen to the whole lecture.

"Culture is really a form of sentiment. It is organized by sentiment towards the world, towards acceptance of certain ideals. What [Weaver] calls a 'tyrannizing image of the world.' . . . And if you subject culture to cold, rational, logical inquiry, it is defenseless and is destroyed. You cannot explain logically, for example, why it is still important, perhaps, for men to hold a door for women. You can have a perfectly logical notion of egalitarianism which says that it is stupid for a man to hold a door for woman. Either nobody should hold a door for anybody, or everybody should hold a door for everybody, regardless of sex. . . . You can't explain rationally, you can't defend logically the sentiment involved in the cultural practice of holding a door, or bowing to someone. Weaver's concern is that dialectic has been used to strip away important aspects of culture, and to leave us with nothing in their stead."

A Christmas hymn not to sing this year

I really hate the fact that I cannot sing "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear"; I take great pleasure in the tune CAROL. But the words were written Edward Hamilton Sears, a Unitarian minister, and even if it were possible for me to sing in a Christian congregation a song written by a Unitarian, "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" fails the test for a number of other reasons.

The carol takes as its theme the angel's song of "peace on earth, good will toward men." Leave aside the fact that this is probably not a very good rendering of the meaning of Luke 2:14. Sears, writing this poem in 1850, appears to be post-millennial at best; he wants to usher in the age with "peace" and social good-will. This is good, old-fashioned 19th century liberalism at its very finest.

It came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth,
To touch their harps of gold;
“Peace on the earth, good will to men,
From Heaven’s all gracious King.”
The world in solemn stillness lay,
To hear the angels sing.

Still through the cloven skies they come
With peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heavenly music floats
O’er all the weary world;
Above its sad and lowly plains,
They bend on hovering wing,
And ever over its Babel sounds
The blessèd angels sing.

Verses one and two set the stage. The angels brought this message of peace and social harmony. Now they continue to sing this "heavenly music o'er all the weary world." Sears is concerned the world is not listening, even though the angels are so intent on seeing that we do.

Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love-song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife
And hear the angels sing.

You probably have not sung the third verse. Here we begin to see Sear's point even more explicitly, though it comes through much clearer in the verses following. We are not listening to the angels. We are still engaging in our wars and battles.

And ye, beneath life’s crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing.
O rest beside the weary road,
And hear the angels sing!

Now Sears turns his attention to those who are poor and afflicted by society. Yes, you who are being mistreated by the social injustices of your time, rest in the fact that "glad and golden hours comes swiftly on the wing."

For lo! the days are hastening on,
By prophet-bards foretold,
When with the ever circling years
Comes round the age of gold;
When peace shall over all the earth
Its ancient splendors fling,
And the whole world send back the song
Which now the angels sing.

Here comes the climax. Any thinking person who has been in a congregation where this song was sung (hopefully) at least wondered to himself, "what in the world is this verse about?" Sears wants us who are beneath "life's crushing load" to know that "the days are hastening on" until the "age of gold" finally comes. Yes, society is getting there, and we should rest in that. Soon the whole world will enter this age of peace and good-will towards one another.

Eric Routley says that this hymn "characteristically links the Christmas mesage with the social and international needs of the world" (Hymns and Human Life [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979], 228). This was written during an age when the achievement and hope in man was at its peak; Calvinism and its emphasis on depravity and divine grace was slouching under the weight of progress. Sears hoped in the promise of human progress, and it comes out in this carol. The "ever circling years" will bring the "age of gold."

For those of you who have a say in your church's worship, I urge you not to lead your congregations in singing "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear." No Christian congregation should sing it. No, instead of the promise of a social agenda, we must confess our faith in and proclaim the glory of the true gospel of salvation through the atoning death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Instead of the greatness of humanity, we must exalt the Son of God who became man to save us in our depravity, whom the (oft neglected) verse of "O Come All Ye Faithful" so eloquently exalts:

God of God,
Light of Light,
Lo! He abhors not the virgin's womb;
Very God,
Begotten, not created;
O Come let us Adore Him,
O Come let us Adore Him,
O Come let us Adore Him,
Christ the Lord.

Some random questions and comments concerning Sensus and References Plenior

So is it possible for a passage of Scripture to mean more than the human author intended? Could the divine author have intended an additional meaning above the author's? If so, what does this do to our idea of the purpose of revelation? How do we know what that "fuller sense" or "fuller referent" is? Did the New Testament authors have, in addition to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in their writing, a peculiar illumination of the Holy Spirit to understand what the Divine author intended above the human author? If God in the prophecy meant both the original referent and the fuller referent, how can we say that the first one is fulfilled? Theodore of Mopsuestia (though I am not certain, were he alive today, that he would embrace sensus or references plenior) would say that the hyperbolic and puzzling nature of the prophetic language would show that a greater fulfillment could be antcipated by the readers of the prophecy. It showed itself to be fulfilled in "shadow," while Christ fulfilled the prophecy in "reality" or "fact." Yet there do seem to be some Scriptures that indicate the possibility of sensus or references plenior. Darrell Bock cites these three passages to show that the Divine author may use an oracle to have greater meaning than the human author understood:

Daniel 12:5-9 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

5Then I, Daniel, looked, and behold, two others stood, one on this bank of the stream and one on that bank of the stream. 6And someone said to the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream, "How long shall it be till the end of these wonders?" 7And I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream; he raised his right hand and his left hand toward heaven and swore by him who lives forever that it would be for a time, times, and half a time, and that when the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things would be finished. 8I heard, but I did not understand. Then I said, "O my lord, what shall be the outcome of these things?" 9He said, "Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.

John 11:44-52 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

44The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go." 45Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him, 46but some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. 47So the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the Council and said, "What are we to do? For this man performs many signs. 48If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." 49But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, "You know nothing at all. 50Nor do you understand that it is better for you that one man should die for the people, not that the whole nation should perish." 51He did not say this of his own accord, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, 52and not for the nation only, but also to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad.

1 Peter 1:10-12 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

10Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, 11inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. 12It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.

Words we use in church: "Just"

Though I would not consider myself the most eloquent of men, nor one with any kind of satisfactory vocabulary, there are many words we use in church (speaking of the evangelical church at large) that puzzle me. One of these words is "just." Here I am not talking about "the just" as in Romans 1:17, but as in "only" or "merely."

Let me give you some examples of how we use the word "just" in church:

"I just want to encourage you to attend the Sunday evening service tonight . . . "

"We are just trying to worship the Lord the best way we know how . . . "

"I just want to know that we're happy you're here . . . "

"The Lord just asks you to let him into your heart . . ."

"You just have to believe and pray for the Lord to save you . . ."

Getting the picture? Now I am sure that there are churches out there that never use the word "just" in this sense or the contexts I listed above. I am generalizing a bit here. But sometimes we Christians can get pretty mousy about the gospel. We want to make it as easy as possible. Our language has taken us to a place where we no longer understand the words of our Lord like those found in Luke 14,

26If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my
disciple. 27And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. 28For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? 29Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, 30Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish. 31Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand? 32Or else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace. 33So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. 34Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be seasoned? 35It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

This is something our Lord said "after great multitudes" started coming to him (v 25). If we had great multitudes following us, we would probably say something like, "boy, we're just happy to have you with us today."

We have become so apologetic that we have forgotten that this is the gospel and the Lord God we serve. We sound like this Christianity thing is just another option on the shelf. We make it sound as if God is not really going to demand that every knee bow and every tongue confess. We are stumbling over ourselves not to offend any possible living creature with the claims of the gospel. They can find happiness in so many other things, why should they bother to find it here?

I am not astute enough to pin-point why we speak in this way. It is probably a number of things. Certainly part of it is our fear of man, and our desire for numbers. Probably part of what drives us to speak this way is that we are so eager to see the salvation of souls, that we do not want to "step on any toes." We want to grease the floor so that the unregenerate will slip right into heaven. The Lord will take care of all that "discipleship stuff" after we get the poor man saved first. So we hope.

But then we start using the word "just" with our church members. "We just want to encourage you to come to prayer meeting." Is this what pastoring has become today, just offering a list of possible things to do? "I just want to encourage you to be more faithful in prayer." All we do anymore, it seems, is "just encourage" one another.

There is a ditch on the other side of the "just" ditch. I am not advocating we beat the unregenerate and lax laity with some kind of set of legalistic commandments. But I am concerned about how much time we spend apologizing over the demands of God on people's lives. He does not want "just trying" worship, he demands our reverent worship. He does not "just encourage" men to repent, he demands repentance. We should compel them to come in, and do it in a way that lifts up the gospel in all of its high demands--unfiltered, undistilled, unsoftened. When we do this responsibly, we can cofidently rest in the work of the Spirit to save those he will.

But there is yet a greater danger. Our overuse of words like "just" threatens us with a terrible result, that we begin to view the Christian life in a distorted fashion. The believers in our midst begin to view Christianity differently when we grow lax in how we speak and worship. The Christian culture changes, because the words have changed.

Thus may we guard against careless expressions, and pray that we would so understand and love the gospel and the God of the gospel that we proclaim as it is meant to be proclaimed--lovingly, boldly, and completely.

What the early church thought about beards

Okay, this post is for fun. You will have to pardon my limiting my recent posting to merely quotations. I am working on a paper.

I know many of my readers are interested in the early church's attitude about beards. Well, your curiosity is about to be quenched. I myself have recently grown a beard, and have found a great source of inspiration.

So here are some early church meditations on beards. The references at the end of each selection give you where you can find it in the Ante-Nicene Fathers. Though I am being somewhat light-hearted in the presentation here, I really do find these thought-provoking. You may agree with some of the observations more than others:

"How womanly it is for one who is a man to comb himself and shave himself with a razor, for the sake of fine effect, and to arrange his hair at the mirror, shave his cheeks, pluck hairs out of them, and smooth them! . . . . For God wished women to be smooth and to rejoice in their locks alone growing spontaneously, as a horse in his mane. But He has adorned man, like the lions, with a beard, and endowed him as an attribute of manhood, with a hairy chest, a sign of strength and rule." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 275)

"This, then, is the mark of the man, the beard. By this, he is seen to be a man. It is older than Eve. It is the token of the superior nature. . . . It is therefore unholy to descrate the symbol of manhood, hairiness." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 276)

"The nature of the beard contributes in an incredible degree to distinguish the maturity of bodies, or to distinguish the sex, or to contribute to the beauty of manliness and strength." - Lactantius (vol. 7, p. 288)

"This sex of ours acknowledges to itself deceptive trickeries of form peculiarly its own--such as to cut the beard too sharply, to pluck it out here and there, to shave around the mouth." - Tertullian (vol. 4, p. 22)

"Let the chin have the hair. . . . For an ample beard suffices it for men. . . . The hair on the chin is not to be disturbed." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 286)

These selections were taken from David W. Bercot, ed., A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1998), 66-67.

God's holiness most greatly manifested in the Son of God dying

In his sermon God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Man, Jonathan Edwards explains the greatness of the manifestation of God's holiness and hatred for sin in the death of the Jesus Christ, the Son of God:

God is an infinitely holy being. The heavens are not pure in his sight. He is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity. And if God should in any way countenance sin, and should not give proper testimonies of his hatred of it, and displeasure at it, it would be a prejudice to the honour of his holiness. But God can save the greatest sinner without giving the least countenance to sin. If he saves one, who for a long time has stood out under the calls of the gospel, and has sinned under dreadful aggravations; if he saves one who, against light, has been a pirate or blasphemer, he may do it without giving any countenance to their wickedness; because his abhorrence of it and displeasure against it have been already sufficiently manifested in the sufferings of Christ. It was a sufficient testimony of God's abhorrence against even the greatest wickedness, that Christ, the eternal Son of God, died for it. Nothing can show God's infinite abhorrence of any wickedness more than this. If the wicked man himself should be thrust into hell, and should endure the most extreme torments which are ever suffered there, it would not be a greater manifestation of God's abhorrence of it, than the sufferings of the Son of God for it.

Chrysostom on the Precision of the Scriptures

"It says, 'I will go down and see whether or not they are committing what the cry reaching me suggests.' What is meant by the expression in all its synkatabasis [considerateness]? 'I will go down,' it says, 'and see'. Does the God of all things shift from place to place? Hardly. It does not mean that; instead, as I have often said, he wants to teach us by the concreteness (pachutes) of the expression that there is need for great akribeia [precision], and that sinners are not condemned by hearsay nor sentences delivered without evidence."

Hom. XXIV in Gen (PG 54; 414B), quoted in Robert Hill, "Akribeia: A Principle of Chyrostom’s Exegesis” Colloquium 14 (1981):36.

Does God manifest all of his attributes?

Jonathan Edwards argued that it is necessary that God manifest all of his attributes. Of course, in saying this, we do not mean to say that God manifests exhaustively all His glory to his creatures, as Edwards explains. But a complete manifestation of his glory means that all of his attributes must be manifested. He explains it in his sermon God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men:

It is agreeable to God's design in the creation of the universe to exercise every attribute, and thus to manifest the glory of each of them. God's design in the creation was to glorify himself, or to make a discovery of the essential glory of his nature. It was fit that infinite glory should shine forth; and it was God's original design to make a manifestation of his glory, as it is. Not that it was his design to manifest all his glory to the apprehension of creatures; for it is impossible that the minds of creatures should comprehend it. But it was his design to make a true manifestation of his glory, such as should represent every attribute. If God glorified one attribute, and not another, such manifestation of his glory would be defective; and the representation would not be complete. If all God's attributes are not manifested, the glory of none of them is manifested as it is: for the divine attributes reflect glory on one another. Thus if God's wisdom be manifested, and not his holiness, the glory of his wisdom would not be manifested as it is; for one part of the glory of the attribute of divine wisdom is, that it is holy wisdom. So if his holiness were manifested, and not his wisdom, the glory of his holiness would not be manifested as it is; for one thing which belongs to the glory of God's holiness is, that it is a wise holiness. So it is with respect to the attributes of mercy and justice. The glory of God's mercy does not appear as it is, unless it is manifested as a just mercy, or as a mercy consistent with justice. And so with respect to God's sovereignty, it reflects glory on all his other attributes. It is part of the glory of God's mercy, that it is sovereign mercy. So all the attributes of God reflect glory on one another. The glory of one attribute cannot be manifested, as it is, without the manifestation of another. One attribute is defective without another, and therefore the manifestation will be defective. Hence it was the will of God to manifest all his attributes.

Amidst us Our Belovéd Stands

Here is a communion hymn by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. You can find the entire hymn here. I know of a pastor who began every communion service by reciting these stanzas.

AMIDST us our Belovéd stands,
And bids us view His piercéd hands;
Points to His wounded feet and side,
Blest emblems of the Crucified.

What food luxurious loads the board,
When at His table sits the Lord!
The wine how rich, the bread how sweet,
When Jesus deigns the guests to meet!

If now with eyes defiled and dim,
We see the signs but see not Him,
Oh, may His love the scales displace,
And bid us see Him face to face!

Knowing the Will of God

What is the "will of God"? Romans 12:2 says, "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." What is it talking about here? Consider Col 1:9, where Paul says to the church of Colosse, "For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding." What does Paul mean here? The popular notion of "the will of God" seems to limit it to "big" or "important" decisions, determined by some kind of subjective feeling. Now I am not completely against this understanding of the will of God, but it needs to be tempered a bit, I think. Although there will always be a subjective element in making decisions, we certainly do not want to be driven impulsively, nor do we want to presume that a certain "leading" or "voice" is, in fact, the Spirit of God. Perhaps this "will of God" should encompass all matters pertaining to our lives--"what we eat, what we drink, whatsoever we do."

Yes, "the will of God" includes the "big decisions", but, more importantly, it includes our ethics. I believe Paul, in both of these passages, is talking about knowing how to live. God never intended the Bible to be a rule book, a kind of constitution where we cite a chapter and verse that explicitly tells us how to live in every matter in life. For example, he never intended us to look up a verse to tell us exactly what we should wear. He gives us some direct principles, and some not-so direct principles. He never intended to give us a catalog detailing our action for every response to every possible scenario on earth. If he would have, he would have given to us an entire library, not a book. Instead, he wanted us to be, as Rom 12 tells us, not conformed and transformed. The Lord wants your mind to be renewed. What does the Blessed Apostle say is the purpose of this renewing? So that we may prove the will of God. In other words, Paul wants us to use our minds to prove or reason what the Lord's will is. He wants us to be active in criticizing our choices, and careful in showing what the Lord's will would be. So what about when we are faced with those tough questions? Paul is saying in Rom 12:1-2 that we should be proving the validity of all things. This includes the entire range of choices, whether big or small. Paul is very concerned the people in the Roman church live lives in conformity to the will of God. So he tells them to prove it with a transformed and renewed mind. He knew that the revelation they had would never engulf every situation, so he told them to use their minds to prove what God's good, acceptable, and perfect will is.

Paul uses the word "prove" (δοκιμάζειν) a few verses later in Rom 14:22, where he says, "The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves (εν ω δοκιμάζει)" (ESV). Paul continues, "But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin" (ESV). In other words, know what is right and wrong. When you can prove that something is good and acceptable and perfect, then do it. If you cannot, then you had better not partake in that activity. The key to partaking in a certain activity is being able to prove that it is the will of God for you to do that. Paul says in Colossians 3:17, "And whatsoever you do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father by him." Everything--and note how Paul makes sure we get that thorny "everything" part by repeating himself--every word and deed we do should be in the name of the Lord Jesus.

And this is a theme he takes up in other books. I have already cited Col 1:9. Consider also 1 Thess 5:21, "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." He has a very similar remark in Phil 1:9-10: "And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ." Even the author of Hebrews, whoever he may be, says in 5:14 that "strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil."

Again the Scriptures are key here. They are both sufficient, and, I believe, necessary and key, along with the work of the Holy Spirit, in the process of transforming and renewing our minds. But the Scriptures are not exhaustive to address explicitly every situation--they were never intended to be so. Complex ethical issues like nuclear arms, recycling, and stem cell research were never addressed by Scripture. But for sake of example (and the author), let's keep it simple: how do you know whether you should exceed the speed limit? The Scriptures never explicitly address this question. It gives us some general principles, like "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers" (Rom 13:1), but how would we get from there to "you should not exceed the speed limit"? Here I would have to insert a minor premise: "the law says I should not exceed the speed limit" (my intent here is illustrate the reasoning process more than condemn the speeders in the audience). Only when I insert this "minor premise", can I get to "you should not exceed the speed limit." The art of inserting the right "minor premises" is an important part of proving the will of God.

Take another example: Playboy magazine. How do I know that I should not look at Playboy? Well, I can indeed start by citing Matthew 5:28, "whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." But this does not explicitly address Playboy. Before I can say, "You should not look at Playboy", I must add a minor premise: "Playboy causes me to lust because of the nature of the pictures." Now I am speaking very loosely here of "minor premises" and such, particularly when I add the observation that these minor premises may get very complex and detailed in nature. But the command Paul repeats in the texts I have cited is clear: we are obligated to prove the rightness or wrongness of things. We are commanded to be discerning. As I have stated, the scope of the activity is to cover all matters: our eating, our drinking, the forms in our worship, our behavior towards one another, our leisure--nothing escapes this blanket. And the nature of the activity demands that these ethics are not inscribed propositional edicts, and that the possibility of our coming to incorrect conclusions, for whatever reason, is real. Our responsibility, as Paul shows in Romans 12, is to reason through the validity of the activity with transformed and renewed minds. And we are blessed, as the Apostle shows in Romans 14, if we can engage in that activity with a clear conscience. For whatsoever is not of faith is sin.

A good word

This post by Kevin Bauder at Nos Sobrii should be read.

How the Sovereignty of God is Relevant

Jonathan Edwards gives the following as one of his applications in his sermon "God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men." In the sermon, he draws out the great and glorious doctrine of the sovereignty of God, defining the doctrine and elaborating on its implications. He says, "It is impossible that we should go to excess in lowliness and reverence of that Being, who may dispose of us to all eternity, as he pleases." He also soberly reminds us that if the sovereignty of God in our salvation is to us an offense, "it will be to our eternal ruin." Yet sovereignty also presses us who believe into the what I believe to be yet more relevant application of sovereignty in our life--the praise of God and giving Him glory who has so graciously saved us. Edwards says it best:

Those who are in a state of salvation are to attribute it to sovereign grace alone, and to give all the praise to him, who maketh them to differ from others. Godliness is no cause for glorying, except it be in God. 1 Cor. 1:29,30,31. "That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." Such are not, by any means, in any degree to attribute their godliness, their safe and happy state and condition, to any natural difference between them and other men, or to any strength or righteousness of their own. They have no reason to exalt themselves in the least degree; but God is the being whom they should exalt. They should exalt God the Father, who chose them in Christ, who set his love upon them, and gave them salvation, before they were born, and even before the world was. If they inquire, why God set his love on them, and chose them rather than others, if they think they can see any cause out of God, they are greatly mistaken. They should exalt God the Son, who bore their names on his heart, when he came into the world, and hung on the cross, and in whom alone they have righteousness and strength. They should exalt God the Holy Ghost, who of sovereign grace has called them out of darkness into marvellous light; who has by his own immediate and free operation, led them into an understanding of the evil and danger of sin, and brought them off from their own righteousness, and opened their eyes to discover the glory of God, and the wonderful riches of God in Jesus Christ, and has sanctified them, and made them new creatures. When they hear of the wickedness of others, or look upon vicious persons, they should think how wicked they once were, and how much they provoked God, and how they deserved for ever to be left by him to perish in sin, and that it is only sovereign grace which has made the difference. 1 Cor. 6:10. Many sorts of sinners are there enumerated; fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate, abusers of themselves with mankind. And then in the eleventh verse, the apostle tells them, "Such were some of you; but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." The people of God have the greater cause of thankfulness, more reason to love God, who hath bestowed such great and unspeakable mercy upon them of his mere sovereign pleasure.

John 17:22-24

“I am in them and You in me,”
The Lord thus spoke the mystery
And gave perfected unity,
So that with him we all may be.

In Jesus Christ we somehow share
The glory of which he is sole heir.
Such depths of grace we cannot know;
Lord, lead us there; this blessing show.

Of this request you made in prayer,
Lord, make our hardened souls aware.
Our hearts are slow, our feelings cold,
We wish this union to behold.

The Father always loved the Son,
And sent this Christ with whom He’s one.
"When with us," Jesus said, "They'll see
The glory you have given Me.”

In you, Lord, all our hopes are bound–
In you eternal pleasure found!
We dimly know this glory here
But wish our view to be more clear.
Please let us know you more and more,
Our minds awaken to explore
The glory which we all now share
And soon will see unveiled There.

Can anything good come out of Grand Rapids?

John R. Franke introduces his recent book, The Character of Theology: A Postconservative Approach (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), with a couple quotations from Calvin's Institutes: "Without knowledge of self there is no knowledge of God," and "without knowledge of God there is no knowledge of self" (Institutes, vol 1., 1.1.1). What does this mean for Franke? Franke explains that this should teach us of the importance of contextualizing our theology:

"Calvin's observation continues to provide a helpful model for reflecting on the character of theology and suggests that we must always be attentive not only to the knowledge of God but also the knowledge of ourselves as human beings if we hope to practice and approach to theology that leads to wisdom. We must also be attentive to the fact that the knowledge of God and the knowledge of ourselves are not available to us in the form of timeless and undisputed teaching. Instead, we learn from the history of Christian thought that doctrines and conceptions of God and the nature of the human condition, as well as many other magnificant matters, have been developed and formulated in the context of numerous social, historical, and cultural settings and having in turn been shaped by these settings. This suggests that in the discipline of theology we must take account of the particular social and intellectual settings in which we engage in theological reflection and exploration. This is part of the knowledge of ourselves that is crucial for theology" (14).

He goes on, but I am sure you get the point. Let me concede here that I am sure John Franke would run circles around my theological and philosophical knowledge. But this remark is almost as funny as David Clark's: "Most people . . . are metaphysical realists" (To Know and Love God [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2003], 353).

Franke, of course, is wrong. Were he to take Calvin's entire argument seriously, he would realize that Calvin did not have the highly individualized conception of the human person that he does. Calvin is not talking about "historical and global manifestations" of Christianity, as Franke is. He is talking about something far more enduring, and not so particular. Calvin is talking about understanding the nature of mankind, not some postconservative mush about "ever-shifting contexts and circumstances." The theology of Christianity does not and should not change to speak to these different contexts. The theology of Christianity remains constant, speaking to every man everywhere, because it addresses the true nature of all mankind. Similarly, the theological conception of God himself is the same God in each setting, and must be in truth one and the same idea for it to be the same God. Thus the idea of God theologically informs our universal state as mankind. Listen to the words of our Protestant father himself:

"Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves. But as these are connected together by many ties, it is not easy to determine which of the two precedes and gives birth to the other. For, in the first place, no man can survey himself without forthwith turning his thoughts towards the God in whom he lives and moves; because it is perfectly obvious, that the endowments which we possess cannot possibly be from ourselves; nay, that our very being is nothing else than subsistence in God alone. In the second place, those blessings which unceasingly distil to us from heaven, are like streams conducting us to the fountain. Here, again, the infinitude of good which resides in God becomes more apparent from our poverty. In particular, the miserable ruin into which the revolt of the first man has plunged us, compels us to turn our eyes upwards; not only that while hungry and famishing we may thence ask what we want, but being aroused by fear may learn humility. For as there exists in man something like a world of misery, and ever since we were stript of the divine attire our naked shame discloses an immense series of disgraceful properties every man, being stung by the consciousness of his own unhappiness, in this way necessarily obtains at least some knowledge of God. Thus, our feeling of ignorance, vanity, want, weakness, in short, depravity and corruption, reminds us (see Calvin on John 4:10), that in the Lord, and none but He, dwell the true light of wisdom, solid virtue, exuberant goodness. We are accordingly urged by our own evil things to consider the good things of God; and, indeed, we cannot aspire to Him in earnest until we have begun to be displeased with ourselves. For what man is not disposed to rest in himself? Who, in fact, does not thus rest, so long as he is unknown to himself; that is, so long as he is contented with his own endowments, and unconscious or unmindful of his misery? Every person, therefore, on coming to the knowledge of himself, is not only urged to seek God, but is also led as by the hand to find him" (Institutes, vol 1, 1.1.1).

False dichotomies

Is a transcendent gospel necessarily distinct from ministering to the present age? Absolutely not. The question is not whether to present the gospel transcendently or minister contemporarily. The question is how must the gospel be presented? Must we, yea, can we, make the gospel "more relevant" to this age? We cannot. The gospel message is powerful in itself.

The gospel does not need to be made relevant--it is already relevant by the Spirit of God. Those who think that the only way to minister to contemporary culture is with some kind of "relevantized gospel" error on this point. When we believe that we must somehow change our presentation of the gospel to make it relevant, we err. The Apostle Paul said to the Corinthians,

And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God (1 Cor 2:1-5, ESV).

God is glorified when He, by his Spirit, uses the gospel in all its offensiveness and counter-cultural impact to save sinful men. We, unfortunately, do not often believe that this power is present to really save men. The sovereignty of God has not fully gripped us yet. So we try to add to it, or try to make it more "relevant," as if it somehow needed our help. But God has not asked us to make the gospel more appealing. He has asked to proclaim it, and then be astounded when God has powerfully saved this sinner by our simple proclamation of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then God is truly glorified, because our flashy words or slick presentations were not the instrument bringing this person to God, but He himself was the saving force. He opened the once blind eyes. The message was proclaimed truthfully and forthrightly, and he saw fit to use it.

And here is the most important point. Making the gospel relevant changes the gospel. The gospel of the death, resurrection, and coming Lord Jesus truthfully proclaimed, of course, glorifies Christ and God and this gospel. But efforts to relevantize the gospel alter the message of the gospel. If this were not true, there would be no desire for some to make it relevant. We would not hear the demands for a more relevant gospel were this "more relevant gospel," really, in the end a different gospel. The gospel forthrightly proclaimed in all its offensiveness should be adequate for all believers seeking to evangelize. The fact that we deceive ourselves into thinking that we should make it more relevant shows that the "more relevant" gospel is a different gospel. We are ashamed of the gospel as it is, and we are not convinced that is the power of God unto salvation for all who believe. In the end, the true, unfiltered, unwatered down, undistilled, forthright gospel as recorded in Scriptures is the relevant gospel, for it is the one the Lord uses powerfully to save sinners by his Spirit.

Some musings on the immanence of pop Christian culture

Among my many problems with Christian popular music is its (by virtue of its being popular) transitory and "trendy" nature. For example, many would consider the 70's music of the Gaither's "passé" today (I would at least hope so). I think the glory of hymns written before the middle of the 19th century is that they seemingly transcend this phenomenon. The chant form in particular, I think, resonates in a transcultural manner. Popular forms, on the other hand, are not usually able to transcend this barrier.

Every once in a while I will watch TBN on TV, and laugh at the old Michael W. Smith music videos because they are so "out of style" ("they are sooooo 80's," if you know what I mean). I feel the same way towards songs like "He Touched Me," El Shaddai," and "Shine, Jesus, Shine." Of course, this is well illustrated with other, older tunes like "At the Cross" and "Fill my Cup." All these songs have at two things in common: 1) they are not transcendent, and 2) they are popular. They did what they were intended to do; they were crafted to be immediately popular and strike a note with the current trends in popular evangelicalism at that time. So were the tunes of Ira Sankey, J. W. Peterson, even the recordings George Beverly Shae. Who knows how many "contemporary" Christian LPs of the 70's (which were very trendy at the time), donned with bell-bottoms, big hair, and 9-inch collars, are now sitting in Salvation Army bins of no use to timeless Christianity? I am willing, to a certain extent, to take the music of any culture (German, Russian, English, Italian, Romanian, and African) that speaks to this timeless message of the gospel and use it in worship. I am not willing, however, to get caught up in whatever popular American evangelicalism is doing and look back only to be embarrassed fifteen years from now because my worship then was soooooo "2000's."

In reality, this popular aspect of American fundamentalism and evangelicalism closely resembles what American liberalism had always sought to do: amalgamate Christianity to the prevailing culture. Whereas liberalism sought to force Christianity in the shapes of modernism and current philosophical trends (high culture), evangelicalism (broadly speaking) has historically sought to press their Christianity into the molds of the wasteland of popular culture (low culture). Both desired that Christianity would be relevant. But both were subtly deceived; the progeny of this interspecies breeding was a religion that was so quickly out of style that it had to be continuously updated to keep in step with the current "relevance." And in so doing, the new religion was hopelessly irrelevant--unable to really offer any kind of transcendent gospel to the world. And so it continues today.

Dorrien on Machen

"In many respects, [Machen] was far from a typical fundamentalist. Like Warfield, he opposed faith healing, revivalism, Holiness teaching, Pentecostalism, and any form of Christian doctrine or practice that smacked of anti-intellectualism. Politically, he was a libertarian who belonged to the Democratic Party. He believed that the very idea of Christian America was a terrible mistake that undermined the capacity of the churches to be Christian. He opposed most forms of government interference in public life and nearly all forms of church involvement in politics. He therefore opposed Prohibition, military conscription, the registration of aliens, jaywalking laws, child labor laws, and the creation of a federal Department of Education. He also opposed Bible reading in schools and school prayer. He was open to evolutionary theory and refused to join any fundamentalist organization that professed adherence to dispensational theology. He was repulsed by the aesthetic crudeness of fundamentalist preaching, hymnody, and public manners. Revival music especially repelled him."

-Gary Dorrien, The Remaking of Evangelical Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998), 35.

I really like Machen. I just wish he was not so anti-dispensationalism, and I would not go so much for the evolutionary theory part. His politics, though conservative, seem radical in an age where government grows larger and larger. The government overregulation largely comes from ideological concoctions of liberal social theory. And he pretty well had it on the question of church and state. I often wonder if the church, in becoming so active in politics and public policy, is not reacting to their former power being stripped from their hands. I think we would all do well to consider seriously the church's relationship to the state. Instead of embracing the neoevangelical (in the true sense of the word) dream of redeeming culture and America, we should become concerned with "doing church" well. Even if the possibility of an America revival existed, I am not sure the present methods (court battles, abortion protests, pushing prayer back into schools, ten commandment displays, etc.) are the most effective.

And those last two sentences are particularly instructive. There are many, I am sure, who assume that the position I and others take on music, and gospel songs in particular, is a recent invention. Even a cursory glance at the history of evangelicalism during the late 19th and early 20th centuries would show that the position is, in fact, quite old. Let that last sentence just roll around in your head for a while: "Revival music especially repelled him."

Of the Father's Love begotten

Although I will still be around, this will be my last post until after Christmas. This hymn was written by Aurelius Prudentius, translated by the prolific John Mason Neal, and often sung to DIVINUM MYSTERIUM.

Of the Father’s love begotten, ere the worlds began to be,
He is Alpha and Omega, He the source, the ending He,
Of the things that are, that have been,
And that future years shall see, evermore and evermore!

At His Word the worlds were framèd; He commanded; it was done:
Heaven and earth and depths of ocean in their threefold order one;
All that grows beneath the shining
Of the moon and burning sun, evermore and evermore!

He is found in human fashion, death and sorrow here to know,
That the race of Adam’s children doomed by law to endless woe,
May not henceforth die and perish
In the dreadful gulf below, evermore and evermore!

O that birth forever blessèd, when the virgin, full of grace,
By the Holy Ghost conceiving, bare the Savior of our race;
And the Babe, the world’s Redeemer,
First revealed His sacred face, evermore and evermore!

This is He Whom seers in old time chanted of with one accord;
Whom the voices of the prophets promised in their faithful word;
Now He shines, the long expected,
Let creation praise its Lord, evermore and evermore!

O ye heights of heaven adore Him; angel hosts, His praises sing;
Powers, dominions, bow before Him, and extol our God and King!
Let no tongue on earth be silent,
Every voice in concert sing, evermore and evermore!

Righteous judge of souls departed, righteous King of them that live,
On the Father’s throne exalted none in might with Thee may strive;
Who at last in vengeance coming
Sinners from Thy face shalt drive, evermore and evermore!

Thee let old men, thee let young men, thee let boys in chorus sing;
Matrons, virgins, little maidens, with glad voices answering:
Let their guileless songs re-echo,
And the heart its music bring, evermore and evermore!

Christ, to Thee with God the Father, and, O Holy Ghost, to Thee,
Hymn and chant with high thanksgiving, and unwearied praises be:
Honor, glory, and dominion,
And eternal victory, evermore and evermore!

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 4)

This will conclude the series of articles I have been posting on Matthew's use of Hosea 11:1, where Jesus' coming out of Egypt as a fulfillment of this prophecy. We are concerned here with Matthew 2:14-15, 'And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, "Out of Egypt I called my son."' I began by introducing the problem. Then we looked at Calvin's interpretation of the passage and the sensus plenior view. The third part looked at two more views: Gundry's interpretation of typology emphasizing sonship and the view that this passage is typological fulfilled. Today I will offer what I believe to the correct interpretation and some concluding remarks.

Sensus Literalis

This view, which was proposed by John Sailhammer,¹ begins with a proper understanding of Hosea–that his prophecies of judgment in chapters 4-14 are to be understood within the lens of 3:5, "Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the LORD their God, and David their king, and they shall come in fear to the LORD and to his goodness in the latter days" (ESV).² Sailhammer thereupon deduces that,

Hos 11:1 speaks of the future, not the past. The book, in fact, provides its own clue to the meaning of 11:1 in verse 11:5, “[Israel] will not return to Egypt, but Assyria will be their king because they have refused to repent.” In Hos 11:1-4, then, the historical exodus is understood as a metaphor. It is an image of future redemption. Egypt is Assyria, the enemy oppressor.³

Hos 11:1, although propositional statement on the surface, resonates the prophecy of messianic deliverance which is made by the Pentateuch’s own interpretation of the exodus. Hosea says in 12:10 that God speaks through his prophets by means of parables or “similitudes,” and this phrase itself rehearses the words of Balaam as he interpreted the Exodus event messianicly in Num 24.⁴ So how does Hosea speak of the future in his retrospective statement “Out of Egypt I have called my Son?”

Hosea intimately knew the Pentateuch, which was natural for prophets of his day.⁵ He doubtless observed the Pentateuch had its own eschatological interpretation of the exodus event, and, when Hosea drew from the Pentateuch’s language in referencing the exodus, particularly with this phrase, it is likely that he too was thinking of the future.⁶ The phrase Hosea uses is strikingly similar to Num 24:8, which says “God will bring him [this Messiah] out of Egypt,” which, in turn, closely echos the words in 23:22, “God brought them out of Egypt.” Sailhammer observes,

Balaam looked back at the exodus as the grounds for God’s future salvation of his people Israel. In . . . Num 24, Balaam viewed the coming of a future “king” as a new exodus–“God will bring him up from Egypt.” The later vision, Num 24, is patterned after the earlier, Num 23. . . . The past exodus is presented as a picture of the exodus of the future.⁷

Therefore, it is highly probable, particularly from Hosea’s word choice in 11:1, that the prophecy of Numbers 24:8 was to a great degree in his mind as he too looked to the future of God’s deliverance.⁸ Matthew would have likewise noticed this, and would have interpreted Hosea’s remark to be wholly prophetic. “[Matthew] was . . . drawing on the sensus literalis from the book of Hosea⁹.”

Conclusion

Given the understanding Hosea had for the messianic significance of the exodus, and the prophecies made from it by Balaam in Numbers 24, I tentatively conclude that it is best to understand Matthew as using “Out of Egypt I have called my Son” in the same sense that Hosea did: futuristically. This view best accounts for the fulfillment language with which Matthew introduces the statement. Jesus was brought of Egypt, just as it was prophesied regarding him in Numbers 24, and later in Hosea 11:1.

____________

¹John Sailhammer, “Hosea 11:1 and Matthew 2:15" Westminster Theological Journal 63 (2001): 87-96.

²Sailhammer builds his case on Brevard Childs and his canonical interpretation of Hosea (Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979]).

³Sailhammer, “Hosea 11:1,” 88-89.

⁴Both Num 24:3 and 15 say that Balaam “took up his parable.”

⁵Sailhammer convincingly demonstrates that Hosea had a very intimate knowledge with the Pentateuch (“Hosea 11:1,” 93-95).

⁶Ibid, 91.

⁷Ibid, 95.

⁸Another tie back to Num 24 is the correspondence of 24:3 and 15 that Balaam spoke in “parables” to Hos 12:1.

⁹Ibid, 96.

American Evangelicalism has issues (One Track Mind)

In effort to show that you really cannot make it up with American evangelicalism, I thought I would suggest the following as a gift for your teen-age daughter this Christmas: the "one-track mind" t-shirt. Yes, I stumbled across the renowned pious internet t-shirt emporium Hip-Edge.com, where they "spread God's Word one T-shirt at a time," is offering the little gem "One track mind" bright green t-shirt for only $14.75 (plus shipping) of your hard-earned Christian DOLLARS (of course, you can obtain this apparel wherever fine Christian t-shirts are sold, not just at Hip-Edge). And with the words "One-track Mind" plastered right across the chest. Although this troublesome saying has been usually reserved to reference those who only think about "you-know-what", the devout brethren over at Kerusso* (the company that actually makes the shirt in question) have finally rescued it from its wordly clutches to give it a new "Christian" "spin." And by wearing this T-shirt, anybody who does have a "one-track mind" for "you-know-what," since this message is displayed in so prominent a place, may instanteously get saved. Can somebody shout "Glory"?!

You see, Hip-Edge.com is smart. In their "About Us" portion of the website, they talk about how they know the world is taking over. Society's losing its moral compass. That's where Hip-Edge.com comes in. They will force the gospel message on people, even if it is plastered across their chests! They are tapping into the "explosion of Christian sentiment in the world," but it's up to us to "take a stand" by wearing T-shirts. This may seem contradictory to you, dear reader (that the world is taking over even though there is this big explosion of Christians), but this should not worry you. The point is that you should wear their T-shirts. Because somebody may get saved. And then that person will wear T-shirts. And then more and more people will get saved, like its compounding. And then more and more t-shirts are being worn. Pretty soon, the whole world will be saved. All because you had the guts to wear a Christian T-shirt. How's that for a investment from your little $14.75 (plus shipping)?

*Permission was requested from Kerusso to display the copyrighted image of the t-shirt in question on this blog. Permission was declined.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 3)

We have been looking at the diversely interpreted Matthew 2:15 and its use of Hosea 11:1. We began with an introduction and then discussed Calvin's and the sensus plenior views. Today we continue by looking at Robert Gundry's interpretation and the widely held "typological fulfillment" view.

Gundry’s Typology Emphasizing Sonship

Robert Gundry argues that Matthew used Hosea typologically to emphasize Jesus’ divine sonship. He believes that Matthew drew “a multiplicity of parallels”¹ between Israel and the life of Jesus, and that Jesus therefore served as the antitype of Israel as Son. He bases this on a number of observations.

First, he argues that εξ Αιγυνπτου should not be translated “Out of Egypt,” but, “Since Egypt,” or “from the time he dwelt there.”² This shifts the force of the citation from the location of the sojourn to the aspect of “Son.” Second, the clause that the quotation follows speaks of Jesus’ stay in Egypt, not his deliverance from it. Gundry deduces, “Matthew is not highlighting Jesus’ later departure from Egypt as a new Exodus, but God’s preservation of Jesus in Egypt as a sign of his divine sonship.”³ Finally, Matthew emphasizes that it was the Lord who spoke by the prophet, and it is the Lord who claims Jesus as “My Son.”⁴

The problem with Gundry’s view is that it does not seem plausible that Matthew had no intention to highlight Egypt, because he connects the fulfillment to the immediate context–both vv 14 and 15 mention the sojourn in Egypt, and the text from Hosea likewise speaks of it.


Typological⁵
This interpretation assumes (as do the previous two) that the meaning of πληροω does not necessarily mean the fulfillment of prophecy, but the “completion or consummation” of the event.⁶ Therefore, it may not be necessary for the cited text to be a prophecy per se.⁷ Further, this view, although held by many interpreters, has several variations, and tends to be rather inexact.

In this view, Jesus Christ is a type of Israel, in that they may both be rightly called “God’s Son.” Some also hold that He typifies the “new exodus,” the salvation for the church.⁸ Proponents point out that Matthew is full of such typology, particularly in the Temptation narrative, which explains why it is so natural for Matthew to implement this kind of understanding of Hosea’s statement.

It is important to realize that this view does not believe that Hosea meant his statement to be a prophecy, and, more importantly, that Matthew was not incorporating Hosea’s authorial intent.⁹ Thus, the main cause for at least one hesitation with this view is that it so dramatically discounts the literal meaning of the OT author’s original intent. Communication functions on the
ability to use words meaningfully. This view seems to infer that Matthew either did not understand meaning of Hosea’s text, or that he amplified it in order to make his point.¹⁰

____________


¹Robert Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on His Handbook for a Mixed Church under Persecution (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1994), 34.

²Gundry, The Use of the OT, 93.

³Gundry, Matthew, 34.

⁴The Greek renders it thus: ινα πληρωθη το ρηθεν υπο κυριου δια προφητου λεγοντος.

⁵Representatives of this view (with minor variations) include Carson; Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard; Plummer; Kaiser; Longenecker; Hendrickson; Craig Keener (A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999]); Patrick Fairbairn (The Typology of Scripture [New York: 1900; reprint, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1975]); R. C. H. Lenski (The Interpretation of Matthew [Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1943]); Ed Glasscock ( Matthew: Moody Gospel Commentary [Chicago: Moody, 1997]); Donald Hagner (Matthew 1-13 [WBC 33a; Dallas: Word, 1993]); W. F. Albright and C. S. Mann (Matthew [Anchor 26; New York: Doubleday, 1971]); and R. T. France (“The Formula Quotations of Matthew 2 and the Problem of Communication” New Testament Studies 27 [1981]: 233-51).

⁶Walter Kaiser, The Uses of the OT, 52. Ed Glasscock says, “The idea of ‘fulfilled’ also does not necessarily need to be taken as implying that every detail must match but rather that the intent of the original message is brought to fruition in the later event” (Matthew, 59).

⁷Richard Longenecker argues that Matthew implements a pesher interpretation, which means he interprets the OT texts as though they are directly concerned with the interpreter and his community. Matthew, he argues, “is making the point that that which was vital in Israel’s corporate and redemptive experience finds its ultimate and intended focus in the person of Jesus the Messiah” (Biblical Exegesis, 71, 145).

⁸Tracy L. Howard defended what he calls “Analogical Correspondence” in a 1986 BibSac article (“The Use of Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2:15: An Alternative Solution” BibSac [1986]). He believes that “the New Testament writer looked back and drew correspondences or analogies with events described in the Old Testament,” and that his approach “considerably reduces the element of subjectivity that the traditional prefigurement view of typology introduces” (320-21). Yet, no matter what he may call it, the fulfillment is viewed typologically.

⁹“To ask whether Hosea thought of Messiah is the wrong question, akin to using a hacksaw when a scalpel is needed. It is better to say that Hosea, building on existing revelation, grasped the messianic nuances of the ‘son’ language already applied to Israel and David’s promised heir in previous revelation so that had he been able to see Matthew’s use of 11:1, he would not have disapproved, even if messianic nuances were not in his mind when he wrote that verse” Carson, Matthew, 92).

¹⁰This writer of this paper rejects this view with a degree of hesitation. Many of the arguments of the typologists have weight, and should not be discarded quite so quickly. For example, types are drawn from several OT events (1 Cor 10:1-5; John 3:14-15; etc). If the NT authors can seemingly tie such events to the life of Christ, why should this hinder Christians from understanding “typological fulfillment” as a means of prophetic fulfillment?

Come, Thou, Redeemer of the Earth

by Ambrose of Milan, sung to Pu­er No­bis Nas­ci­tur

Come, Thou Redeemer of the earth,
And manifest Thy virgin birth:
Let every age adoring fall;
Such birth befits the God of all.

Begotten of no human will,
But of the Spirit, Thou art still
The Word of God in flesh arrayed,
The promised Fruit to man displayed.

The virgin womb that burden gained
With virgin honor all unstained;
The banners there of virtue glow;
God in His temple dwells below.

Forth from His chamber goeth He,
That royal home of purity,
A giant in twofold substance one,
Rejoicing now His course to run.

From God the Father He proceeds,
To God the Father back He speeds;
His course He runs to death and hell,
Returning on God’s throne to dwell.

O equal to the Father, Thou!
Gird on Thy fleshly mantle now;
The weakness of our mortal state
With deathless might invigorate.

Thy cradle here shall glitter bright,
And darkness breathe a newer light,
Where endless faith shall shine serene,
And twilight never intervene.

All laud to God the Father be,
All praise, eternal Son, to Thee;
All glory, as is ever meet,
To God the Holy Paraclete.

We're like yogurt

We've got culture. All you have to do is listen to us talk. Where do we learn to talk like this? New converts after just a few months are very adapt at using our terminology. They have "asked Jesus into their hearts", were "raised in a Christian home," have "rededicated their life to the Lord," and, of course, have "accepted Jesus as their personal Savior." My point here is not that these phrases are bad in and of themselves. My point is that we all (generally speaking) talk the same way. We use the same phrases. Where do we learn this? Where do our people learn to end prayers "in Thy name", instead of something drastically more biblical (like, "in Jesus' name")?

We've got culture. And it's not Trinitarian. It's not Nicene. It's not even Biblical. It's American and it's fundamental, and (thanks to Christian radio) it's evangelical. We do not talk about Jesus as "Light of Light," he is "our personal Lord and Savior." The fact that we and our converts speak this way should instruct us in what we emphasize in our culture. And it should confirm to us that we have a culture.

Of course we have a culture. We by necessity have a culture. We like to think that we are above culture or that we are objective arbiters of what our culture is. Not so. This is akin to trying to pull the splinter out of our brother's eye while a Redwood is protruding from our own. We are unable to tinker with culture in this way. Culture is not a buffet where you take and leave what you will. Culture is rooted in us deeply; it comes to us veiled and we adopt it without even knowing it. How many times have you begun a prayer, "Dear Father, thank you for this day . . ." Where did you learn first to thank the Lord for the day (whatever that means) when you pray? Where did you learn that joy is supposed to be like winning a high school basketball game? Where did you get the idea that a songleader is supposed to be a cheerleader? Where did you get your idea of what David's dance in 2 Samuel 6:14 looked like? Our culture is much more homogenous than we like to believe.

We've got culture. And it's bad.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 2)

In the first part, I tried to introduce the problem in Matthew 2:14-15, "And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt, and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, 'Out of Egypt I called my son' " (ESV). Many different Bible scholars have weighed in on this passage, which is often used to push hermeneutical assumptions to their philosophical limits. The question is how Matthew used Hosea 11:1.

Israel is the Church

Calvin provides an interesting perspective. The passage perplexed scholars even in Calvin’s day, and he noted, “Some have thought [that] the intention of the prophet was different from what is here stated.” Although Calvin ardently contends that Hosea “is not tortured by Matthew,” his own interpretation of these texts has a unique bend. Calvin superimposes the Church into Hosea’s use of Israel here, and holds that the prophet was foretelling that the Church would be brought out of Egypt just as the nation of Israel was. He observes, “the light of salvation had been almost extinguished, when God begat the Church anew in the person of Christ. Then did the Church come out of Egypt in its head, as the whole body had been formerly brought out.”¹

Sensus Plenior

William LaSor advocated that Matt 2:15 is an example of sensus plenior in his article “Prophecy, Inspiration, and Sensus Plenior.” Sensus Plenior is the belief that God intended deeper and additional meaning not intended by the author. This deeper meaning is seen when the text is studied through the lens of additional revelation. LaSor sees many difficulties with Matthew’s quotation of Hosea. Yet, he believes that the great Exodus demonstrates God’s “redemptive plan.” According to LaSor, Hosea’s prophecy shows that,

If God had not brought Israel out of Egypt, there would have been no Israelite nation, no Davidic line, no prophets, and no Messiah. Jesus could not have been born to Mary, and there would have been no redemptive work on Calvary’s cross.²

Of course, LaSor admits that none of this was in Hosea’s mind when he wrote it. But, “he was inspired by God’s Spirit . . . and [he] led him to express his words in a form that was capable of a fuller meaning.”³

The problem with this view is sensus plenior. Carson observed that this approach “seems a strange background for Matthew’s insisting that Jesus’ exodus from Egypt in any sense fulfills the Hosea passage.”⁴ A meaningful statement has not been fulfilled when a different idea is the fulfillment. And why should this be limited to linking words and phrases–a kind of gezerah shewah? God could seemingly use sensus plenior to give any kind of meaning to any phrase.
________
¹Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists, trans. William Pringle (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949), 156-57.

²LaSor, “Sensus Plenior,” TynBull 29 (1978), 58.

³Ibid, 58.

⁴Carson, Matthew, 92. He continues, “This observation is not trivial; Matthew is reasoning with Jews who could say, ‘You are not playing fair with the text!’”

Edwards on listening to your spiritual fathers

This comes from the sermon The Necessity of Self Examination by Jonathan Edwards. This sermon is excellent. Edwards preaches in such a way as to make you think that American evangelicalism is bankrupt. His is a spirituality that is very concerned even the most intimate details of life. Nothing escapes his glance. In our age, we struggle over whether an orgy is appropriate worship for God. We are, it seems, largely incapable of self-reflection. It seems that we have lost the ability to scrutinize. We have, in a sense, lost our humanity. We are incapable of reflecting on what movies and theater do to our soul, or how a waltz (let alone jazz or pop) is erotic, or even in regards to the proportion of our eating (of which there is a good discussion here). I long for a kind of spirit of deep humanity to return, that not only reflects on these things, but acts on these things. I am concerned we do not have the chests to to do either. Enough of me; here's Edwards:

If you live in any ways which are generally condemned by the better and more sober sort of men, be especially careful to inquire concerning these, whether they be not ways of sin. Perhaps you have argued with yourselves that such or such a practice is lawful. You cannot see any evil in it. However, if it be generally condemned by godly ministers, and the better more pious sort of people, it certainly looks suspicious, whether or no there be not some evil in it. So that you may well be put upon inquiring with the utmost strictness, whether it be not sinful. The practice being so generally disapproved of by those who in such cases are most likely to be in the right, may reasonably put you upon more than ordinarily nice and diligent inquiry concerning the lawfulness or unlawfulness of it.

A Difficult Christmas text: Matthew 2:15 citing Hosea 11:1 (Part 1)

The hermeneutical significance of Matt 2:15 should not be underestimated. Consider, for example, Walter Kaiser’s remark regarding this passage: “Enter into a discussion of the NT citations of the OT and, before long, someone is bound to raise the example of Matthew’s use of Hos 11:1.”¹ In their discussion of “Levels of Meaning,” Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard use this puzzling passage as their platform.²

Over the next several days (while continuing to post other material), I will discuss the interpretation of this passage. This is not meant to be exhaustive or add to scholarship, but to provide a summary of the different approaches to this hotly debated text, as well as suggest a way of a correct interpretation.

Many who read Matthew quickly notice his emphasis on “fulfillment,” particularly near the beginning of the gospel.³ In the first two chapters alone Matthew uses some derivative of the word πληροω four times to indicate that a certain event in the life of Jesus had fulfilled an OT prophecy.⁴ Matthew used these OT passages in his attempt to establish the validity of Jesus’ claim as Messiah. He wanted to demonstrate that Jesus was in some way the embodiment of the long awaited Old Testament predictions and promises of a Davidic King.⁵

The problem is that when Matthew quoted OT passages (particularly Hos 11:1 in 2:15), the fulfillment he saw in them is not quite as evident to modern readers as it was to Matthew.⁶ In fact, in his attempt to deal with the problem, D. A. Carson states, “Untutored Christians are prone to think of prophecy and fulfillment as something not very different from the straightforward propositional prediction and fulfillment. A close reading of the NT reveals that prophecy is more complex than that.”⁷

The paragraph wherein the difficult passage lies is found after the pericope of the Magi and their dealings with Herod. Matthew records that at an angel appeared to Joseph and instructed him to take Mary and Jesus to Egypt in order to avoid the jealous massacre that would quickly be ordered by Herod. Matt 2:14-15 says,

“When [Joseph] arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and
departed into Egypt: And was there until the death of Herod: that it might be
fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt have I called
my son" (ESV).

In verse 15, the evangelist notes that these events are somehow related to the fulfillment of Hos 11:1. His quotation of the OT passage translates the Hebrew text word for word.⁸

Matthew’s use of Hosea here is seems problematic on many levels. First, the passage in Hosea cited does not appear to be a prophecy, but “a statement of an historical fact.”⁹ Second, the passage does not seem to be speaking of the Messiah at all.¹⁰ In fact, the entire verse in Hosea says, “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my Son out of Egypt.” So what does the evangelist mean when he says that the holy family’s sojourn in Egypt is a fulfillment of Hosea?

____________
¹The Uses of the Old Testament in the New (Chicago: Moody Press, 1985), 43.

²William W. Klein, Craig L. Blomberg, and Robert L. Hubbard, Jr. Introduction to Biblical Interpretation (Dallas: Word, 1993), 120ff.

³William Hendrickson observes, “In general it can be said that the purpose of this Gospel was fully to win the Jews for Christ; that is, to gain those still unconverted and to strengthen those already converted. . . . In order to achieve [this goal] the emphasis throughout is placed on the fact that Jesus is indeed the long awaited Messiah of the Hebrew Scriptures” (New Testament Commentary: Matthew [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1973], 97).

⁴Of course, many other additional allusions to the OT can be found in these chapters. Matthew uses πληροω in the sense of “fulfillment” of prophecy thirteen different times in his gospel. BDAG notes that πληροω can mean “to bring to a designed end, fulfill,” and that the particular nuance of these uses in Matthew should be understood as “the fulfillment of divine predictions or promises.” When used in this sense, the word is almost always found in the passive tense: “be fulfilled” (828d-829a).

⁵The seemingly standardized introduction of the formula quotations (“fulfillment” passages) in Matthew, coupled with the fact that each of the OT passages quoted are to some extent removed from the standard LXX have made some scholars wonder if these are not the unique personal reflections of the author. Thus they have become known as the Reflexionszitate. (D. A. Carson, Matthew. ed. Frank E. Gaebelein [Expositor’s Bible Commentary 8; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1984], 27).

⁶Richard Longenecker observed that “the quotations within [Matthew] the Evangelist’s editorial comments . . . are distinctive not only in their introductory formulae and their textual variants, but also in their oft-times applications” (Biblical Exegesis in the Apostolic Period [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975], 140).

⁷Matthew, 27.

⁸Robert Gundry, The Use of the Old Testament in St. Matthew’s Gospel (Leiden: Brill, 1975), 93. The LXX reads εξ Αιγυνπτου μετεκανλεσα τα τεκνα αυτου.

⁹Alfred Plummer, An Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to Matthew (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956), 17.

¹⁰William LaSor may have stated the problem most severely when he said, “The literal meaning of Hosea 11:1 . . . does not seem to give us any basis for such a fulfillment. Hosea is clearly talking about the exodus of Israel from Egypt.. . . If there is any lingering desire on our part to make this apply to Jesus, we are suddenly faced by the words that follow immediately: ‘the more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and burning incense to idols.’” (“Prophecy, Inspiration and Sensus Plenior” Tyndale Bulletin 29 [1978]: 56).

Weaver on culture

This excerpt comes from a lecture by Ted Smith on Richard Weaver at ISI. It warns of the danger of rationalizing important elements of culture. You should listen to the whole lecture.

"Culture is really a form of sentiment. It is organized by sentiment towards the world, towards acceptance of certain ideals. What [Weaver] calls a 'tyrannizing image of the world.' . . . And if you subject culture to cold, rational, logical inquiry, it is defenseless and is destroyed. You cannot explain logically, for example, why it is still important, perhaps, for men to hold a door for women. You can have a perfectly logical notion of egalitarianism which says that it is stupid for a man to hold a door for woman. Either nobody should hold a door for anybody, or everybody should hold a door for everybody, regardless of sex. . . . You can't explain rationally, you can't defend logically the sentiment involved in the cultural practice of holding a door, or bowing to someone. Weaver's concern is that dialectic has been used to strip away important aspects of culture, and to leave us with nothing in their stead."

A Christmas hymn not to sing this year

I really hate the fact that I cannot sing "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear"; I take great pleasure in the tune CAROL. But the words were written Edward Hamilton Sears, a Unitarian minister, and even if it were possible for me to sing in a Christian congregation a song written by a Unitarian, "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" fails the test for a number of other reasons.

The carol takes as its theme the angel's song of "peace on earth, good will toward men." Leave aside the fact that this is probably not a very good rendering of the meaning of Luke 2:14. Sears, writing this poem in 1850, appears to be post-millennial at best; he wants to usher in the age with "peace" and social good-will. This is good, old-fashioned 19th century liberalism at its very finest.

It came upon the midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth,
To touch their harps of gold;
“Peace on the earth, good will to men,
From Heaven’s all gracious King.”
The world in solemn stillness lay,
To hear the angels sing.

Still through the cloven skies they come
With peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heavenly music floats
O’er all the weary world;
Above its sad and lowly plains,
They bend on hovering wing,
And ever over its Babel sounds
The blessèd angels sing.

Verses one and two set the stage. The angels brought this message of peace and social harmony. Now they continue to sing this "heavenly music o'er all the weary world." Sears is concerned the world is not listening, even though the angels are so intent on seeing that we do.

Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love-song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife
And hear the angels sing.

You probably have not sung the third verse. Here we begin to see Sear's point even more explicitly, though it comes through much clearer in the verses following. We are not listening to the angels. We are still engaging in our wars and battles.

And ye, beneath life’s crushing load,
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow,
Look now! for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing.
O rest beside the weary road,
And hear the angels sing!

Now Sears turns his attention to those who are poor and afflicted by society. Yes, you who are being mistreated by the social injustices of your time, rest in the fact that "glad and golden hours comes swiftly on the wing."

For lo! the days are hastening on,
By prophet-bards foretold,
When with the ever circling years
Comes round the age of gold;
When peace shall over all the earth
Its ancient splendors fling,
And the whole world send back the song
Which now the angels sing.

Here comes the climax. Any thinking person who has been in a congregation where this song was sung (hopefully) at least wondered to himself, "what in the world is this verse about?" Sears wants us who are beneath "life's crushing load" to know that "the days are hastening on" until the "age of gold" finally comes. Yes, society is getting there, and we should rest in that. Soon the whole world will enter this age of peace and good-will towards one another.

Eric Routley says that this hymn "characteristically links the Christmas mesage with the social and international needs of the world" (Hymns and Human Life [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979], 228). This was written during an age when the achievement and hope in man was at its peak; Calvinism and its emphasis on depravity and divine grace was slouching under the weight of progress. Sears hoped in the promise of human progress, and it comes out in this carol. The "ever circling years" will bring the "age of gold."

For those of you who have a say in your church's worship, I urge you not to lead your congregations in singing "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear." No Christian congregation should sing it. No, instead of the promise of a social agenda, we must confess our faith in and proclaim the glory of the true gospel of salvation through the atoning death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Instead of the greatness of humanity, we must exalt the Son of God who became man to save us in our depravity, whom the (oft neglected) verse of "O Come All Ye Faithful" so eloquently exalts:

God of God,
Light of Light,
Lo! He abhors not the virgin's womb;
Very God,
Begotten, not created;
O Come let us Adore Him,
O Come let us Adore Him,
O Come let us Adore Him,
Christ the Lord.

Some random questions and comments concerning Sensus and References Plenior

So is it possible for a passage of Scripture to mean more than the human author intended? Could the divine author have intended an additional meaning above the author's? If so, what does this do to our idea of the purpose of revelation? How do we know what that "fuller sense" or "fuller referent" is? Did the New Testament authors have, in addition to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in their writing, a peculiar illumination of the Holy Spirit to understand what the Divine author intended above the human author? If God in the prophecy meant both the original referent and the fuller referent, how can we say that the first one is fulfilled? Theodore of Mopsuestia (though I am not certain, were he alive today, that he would embrace sensus or references plenior) would say that the hyperbolic and puzzling nature of the prophetic language would show that a greater fulfillment could be antcipated by the readers of the prophecy. It showed itself to be fulfilled in "shadow," while Christ fulfilled the prophecy in "reality" or "fact." Yet there do seem to be some Scriptures that indicate the possibility of sensus or references plenior. Darrell Bock cites these three passages to show that the Divine author may use an oracle to have greater meaning than the human author understood:

Daniel 12:5-9 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

5Then I, Daniel, looked, and behold, two others stood, one on this bank of the stream and one on that bank of the stream. 6And someone said to the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream, "How long shall it be till the end of these wonders?" 7And I heard the man clothed in linen, who was above the waters of the stream; he raised his right hand and his left hand toward heaven and swore by him who lives forever that it would be for a time, times, and half a time, and that when the shattering of the power of the holy people comes to an end all these things would be finished. 8I heard, but I did not understand. Then I said, "O my lord, what shall be the outcome of these things?" 9He said, "Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.

John 11:44-52 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

44The man who had died came out, his hands and feet bound with linen strips, and his face wrapped with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go." 45Many of the Jews therefore, who had come with Mary and had seen what he did, believed in him, 46but some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done. 47So the chief priests and the Pharisees gathered the Council and said, "What are we to do? For this man performs many signs. 48If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." 49But one of them, Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, said to them, "You know nothing at all. 50Nor do you understand that it is better for you that one man should die for the people, not that the whole nation should perish." 51He did not say this of his own accord, but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, 52and not for the nation only, but also to gather into one the children of God who are scattered abroad.

1 Peter 1:10-12 (English Standard Version)
English Standard Version (ESV)

10Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, 11inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. 12It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.

Words we use in church: "Just"

Though I would not consider myself the most eloquent of men, nor one with any kind of satisfactory vocabulary, there are many words we use in church (speaking of the evangelical church at large) that puzzle me. One of these words is "just." Here I am not talking about "the just" as in Romans 1:17, but as in "only" or "merely."

Let me give you some examples of how we use the word "just" in church:

"I just want to encourage you to attend the Sunday evening service tonight . . . "

"We are just trying to worship the Lord the best way we know how . . . "

"I just want to know that we're happy you're here . . . "

"The Lord just asks you to let him into your heart . . ."

"You just have to believe and pray for the Lord to save you . . ."

Getting the picture? Now I am sure that there are churches out there that never use the word "just" in this sense or the contexts I listed above. I am generalizing a bit here. But sometimes we Christians can get pretty mousy about the gospel. We want to make it as easy as possible. Our language has taken us to a place where we no longer understand the words of our Lord like those found in Luke 14,

26If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my
disciple. 27And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. 28For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it? 29Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, 30Saying, This man began to build, and was not able to finish. 31Or what king, going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand? 32Or else, while the other is yet a great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth conditions of peace. 33So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. 34Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be seasoned? 35It is neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill; but men cast it out. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

This is something our Lord said "after great multitudes" started coming to him (v 25). If we had great multitudes following us, we would probably say something like, "boy, we're just happy to have you with us today."

We have become so apologetic that we have forgotten that this is the gospel and the Lord God we serve. We sound like this Christianity thing is just another option on the shelf. We make it sound as if God is not really going to demand that every knee bow and every tongue confess. We are stumbling over ourselves not to offend any possible living creature with the claims of the gospel. They can find happiness in so many other things, why should they bother to find it here?

I am not astute enough to pin-point why we speak in this way. It is probably a number of things. Certainly part of it is our fear of man, and our desire for numbers. Probably part of what drives us to speak this way is that we are so eager to see the salvation of souls, that we do not want to "step on any toes." We want to grease the floor so that the unregenerate will slip right into heaven. The Lord will take care of all that "discipleship stuff" after we get the poor man saved first. So we hope.

But then we start using the word "just" with our church members. "We just want to encourage you to come to prayer meeting." Is this what pastoring has become today, just offering a list of possible things to do? "I just want to encourage you to be more faithful in prayer." All we do anymore, it seems, is "just encourage" one another.

There is a ditch on the other side of the "just" ditch. I am not advocating we beat the unregenerate and lax laity with some kind of set of legalistic commandments. But I am concerned about how much time we spend apologizing over the demands of God on people's lives. He does not want "just trying" worship, he demands our reverent worship. He does not "just encourage" men to repent, he demands repentance. We should compel them to come in, and do it in a way that lifts up the gospel in all of its high demands--unfiltered, undistilled, unsoftened. When we do this responsibly, we can cofidently rest in the work of the Spirit to save those he will.

But there is yet a greater danger. Our overuse of words like "just" threatens us with a terrible result, that we begin to view the Christian life in a distorted fashion. The believers in our midst begin to view Christianity differently when we grow lax in how we speak and worship. The Christian culture changes, because the words have changed.

Thus may we guard against careless expressions, and pray that we would so understand and love the gospel and the God of the gospel that we proclaim as it is meant to be proclaimed--lovingly, boldly, and completely.

What the early church thought about beards

Okay, this post is for fun. You will have to pardon my limiting my recent posting to merely quotations. I am working on a paper.

I know many of my readers are interested in the early church's attitude about beards. Well, your curiosity is about to be quenched. I myself have recently grown a beard, and have found a great source of inspiration.

So here are some early church meditations on beards. The references at the end of each selection give you where you can find it in the Ante-Nicene Fathers. Though I am being somewhat light-hearted in the presentation here, I really do find these thought-provoking. You may agree with some of the observations more than others:

"How womanly it is for one who is a man to comb himself and shave himself with a razor, for the sake of fine effect, and to arrange his hair at the mirror, shave his cheeks, pluck hairs out of them, and smooth them! . . . . For God wished women to be smooth and to rejoice in their locks alone growing spontaneously, as a horse in his mane. But He has adorned man, like the lions, with a beard, and endowed him as an attribute of manhood, with a hairy chest, a sign of strength and rule." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 275)

"This, then, is the mark of the man, the beard. By this, he is seen to be a man. It is older than Eve. It is the token of the superior nature. . . . It is therefore unholy to descrate the symbol of manhood, hairiness." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 276)

"The nature of the beard contributes in an incredible degree to distinguish the maturity of bodies, or to distinguish the sex, or to contribute to the beauty of manliness and strength." - Lactantius (vol. 7, p. 288)

"This sex of ours acknowledges to itself deceptive trickeries of form peculiarly its own--such as to cut the beard too sharply, to pluck it out here and there, to shave around the mouth." - Tertullian (vol. 4, p. 22)

"Let the chin have the hair. . . . For an ample beard suffices it for men. . . . The hair on the chin is not to be disturbed." - Clement of Alexandria (vol. 2, p. 286)

These selections were taken from David W. Bercot, ed., A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1998), 66-67.

God's holiness most greatly manifested in the Son of God dying

In his sermon God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Man, Jonathan Edwards explains the greatness of the manifestation of God's holiness and hatred for sin in the death of the Jesus Christ, the Son of God:

God is an infinitely holy being. The heavens are not pure in his sight. He is of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on iniquity. And if God should in any way countenance sin, and should not give proper testimonies of his hatred of it, and displeasure at it, it would be a prejudice to the honour of his holiness. But God can save the greatest sinner without giving the least countenance to sin. If he saves one, who for a long time has stood out under the calls of the gospel, and has sinned under dreadful aggravations; if he saves one who, against light, has been a pirate or blasphemer, he may do it without giving any countenance to their wickedness; because his abhorrence of it and displeasure against it have been already sufficiently manifested in the sufferings of Christ. It was a sufficient testimony of God's abhorrence against even the greatest wickedness, that Christ, the eternal Son of God, died for it. Nothing can show God's infinite abhorrence of any wickedness more than this. If the wicked man himself should be thrust into hell, and should endure the most extreme torments which are ever suffered there, it would not be a greater manifestation of God's abhorrence of it, than the sufferings of the Son of God for it.

Chrysostom on the Precision of the Scriptures

"It says, 'I will go down and see whether or not they are committing what the cry reaching me suggests.' What is meant by the expression in all its synkatabasis [considerateness]? 'I will go down,' it says, 'and see'. Does the God of all things shift from place to place? Hardly. It does not mean that; instead, as I have often said, he wants to teach us by the concreteness (pachutes) of the expression that there is need for great akribeia [precision], and that sinners are not condemned by hearsay nor sentences delivered without evidence."

Hom. XXIV in Gen (PG 54; 414B), quoted in Robert Hill, "Akribeia: A Principle of Chyrostom’s Exegesis” Colloquium 14 (1981):36.

Does God manifest all of his attributes?

Jonathan Edwards argued that it is necessary that God manifest all of his attributes. Of course, in saying this, we do not mean to say that God manifests exhaustively all His glory to his creatures, as Edwards explains. But a complete manifestation of his glory means that all of his attributes must be manifested. He explains it in his sermon God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men:

It is agreeable to God's design in the creation of the universe to exercise every attribute, and thus to manifest the glory of each of them. God's design in the creation was to glorify himself, or to make a discovery of the essential glory of his nature. It was fit that infinite glory should shine forth; and it was God's original design to make a manifestation of his glory, as it is. Not that it was his design to manifest all his glory to the apprehension of creatures; for it is impossible that the minds of creatures should comprehend it. But it was his design to make a true manifestation of his glory, such as should represent every attribute. If God glorified one attribute, and not another, such manifestation of his glory would be defective; and the representation would not be complete. If all God's attributes are not manifested, the glory of none of them is manifested as it is: for the divine attributes reflect glory on one another. Thus if God's wisdom be manifested, and not his holiness, the glory of his wisdom would not be manifested as it is; for one part of the glory of the attribute of divine wisdom is, that it is holy wisdom. So if his holiness were manifested, and not his wisdom, the glory of his holiness would not be manifested as it is; for one thing which belongs to the glory of God's holiness is, that it is a wise holiness. So it is with respect to the attributes of mercy and justice. The glory of God's mercy does not appear as it is, unless it is manifested as a just mercy, or as a mercy consistent with justice. And so with respect to God's sovereignty, it reflects glory on all his other attributes. It is part of the glory of God's mercy, that it is sovereign mercy. So all the attributes of God reflect glory on one another. The glory of one attribute cannot be manifested, as it is, without the manifestation of another. One attribute is defective without another, and therefore the manifestation will be defective. Hence it was the will of God to manifest all his attributes.

Amidst us Our Belovéd Stands

Here is a communion hymn by Charles Haddon Spurgeon. You can find the entire hymn here. I know of a pastor who began every communion service by reciting these stanzas.

AMIDST us our Belovéd stands,
And bids us view His piercéd hands;
Points to His wounded feet and side,
Blest emblems of the Crucified.

What food luxurious loads the board,
When at His table sits the Lord!
The wine how rich, the bread how sweet,
When Jesus deigns the guests to meet!

If now with eyes defiled and dim,
We see the signs but see not Him,
Oh, may His love the scales displace,
And bid us see Him face to face!

Knowing the Will of God

What is the "will of God"? Romans 12:2 says, "And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." What is it talking about here? Consider Col 1:9, where Paul says to the church of Colosse, "For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding." What does Paul mean here? The popular notion of "the will of God" seems to limit it to "big" or "important" decisions, determined by some kind of subjective feeling. Now I am not completely against this understanding of the will of God, but it needs to be tempered a bit, I think. Although there will always be a subjective element in making decisions, we certainly do not want to be driven impulsively, nor do we want to presume that a certain "leading" or "voice" is, in fact, the Spirit of God. Perhaps this "will of God" should encompass all matters pertaining to our lives--"what we eat, what we drink, whatsoever we do."

Yes, "the will of God" includes the "big decisions", but, more importantly, it includes our ethics. I believe Paul, in both of these passages, is talking about knowing how to live. God never intended the Bible to be a rule book, a kind of constitution where we cite a chapter and verse that explicitly tells us how to live in every matter in life. For example, he never intended us to look up a verse to tell us exactly what we should wear. He gives us some direct principles, and some not-so direct principles. He never intended to give us a catalog detailing our action for every response to every possible scenario on earth. If he would have, he would have given to us an entire library, not a book. Instead, he wanted us to be, as Rom 12 tells us, not conformed and transformed. The Lord wants your mind to be renewed. What does the Blessed Apostle say is the purpose of this renewing? So that we may prove the will of God. In other words, Paul wants us to use our minds to prove or reason what the Lord's will is. He wants us to be active in criticizing our choices, and careful in showing what the Lord's will would be. So what about when we are faced with those tough questions? Paul is saying in Rom 12:1-2 that we should be proving the validity of all things. This includes the entire range of choices, whether big or small. Paul is very concerned the people in the Roman church live lives in conformity to the will of God. So he tells them to prove it with a transformed and renewed mind. He knew that the revelation they had would never engulf every situation, so he told them to use their minds to prove what God's good, acceptable, and perfect will is.

Paul uses the word "prove" (δοκιμάζειν) a few verses later in Rom 14:22, where he says, "The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves (εν ω δοκιμάζει)" (ESV). Paul continues, "But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin" (ESV). In other words, know what is right and wrong. When you can prove that something is good and acceptable and perfect, then do it. If you cannot, then you had better not partake in that activity. The key to partaking in a certain activity is being able to prove that it is the will of God for you to do that. Paul says in Colossians 3:17, "And whatsoever you do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father by him." Everything--and note how Paul makes sure we get that thorny "everything" part by repeating himself--every word and deed we do should be in the name of the Lord Jesus.

And this is a theme he takes up in other books. I have already cited Col 1:9. Consider also 1 Thess 5:21, "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." He has a very similar remark in Phil 1:9-10: "And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ." Even the author of Hebrews, whoever he may be, says in 5:14 that "strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil."

Again the Scriptures are key here. They are both sufficient, and, I believe, necessary and key, along with the work of the Holy Spirit, in the process of transforming and renewing our minds. But the Scriptures are not exhaustive to address explicitly every situation--they were never intended to be so. Complex ethical issues like nuclear arms, recycling, and stem cell research were never addressed by Scripture. But for sake of example (and the author), let's keep it simple: how do you know whether you should exceed the speed limit? The Scriptures never explicitly address this question. It gives us some general principles, like "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers" (Rom 13:1), but how would we get from there to "you should not exceed the speed limit"? Here I would have to insert a minor premise: "the law says I should not exceed the speed limit" (my intent here is illustrate the reasoning process more than condemn the speeders in the audience). Only when I insert this "minor premise", can I get to "you should not exceed the speed limit." The art of inserting the right "minor premises" is an important part of proving the will of God.

Take another example: Playboy magazine. How do I know that I should not look at Playboy? Well, I can indeed start by citing Matthew 5:28, "whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." But this does not explicitly address Playboy. Before I can say, "You should not look at Playboy", I must add a minor premise: "Playboy causes me to lust because of the nature of the pictures." Now I am speaking very loosely here of "minor premises" and such, particularly when I add the observation that these minor premises may get very complex and detailed in nature. But the command Paul repeats in the texts I have cited is clear: we are obligated to prove the rightness or wrongness of things. We are commanded to be discerning. As I have stated, the scope of the activity is to cover all matters: our eating, our drinking, the forms in our worship, our behavior towards one another, our leisure--nothing escapes this blanket. And the nature of the activity demands that these ethics are not inscribed propositional edicts, and that the possibility of our coming to incorrect conclusions, for whatever reason, is real. Our responsibility, as Paul shows in Romans 12, is to reason through the validity of the activity with transformed and renewed minds. And we are blessed, as the Apostle shows in Romans 14, if we can engage in that activity with a clear conscience. For whatsoever is not of faith is sin.

A good word

This post by Kevin Bauder at Nos Sobrii should be read.

How the Sovereignty of God is Relevant

Jonathan Edwards gives the following as one of his applications in his sermon "God's Sovereignty in the Salvation of Men." In the sermon, he draws out the great and glorious doctrine of the sovereignty of God, defining the doctrine and elaborating on its implications. He says, "It is impossible that we should go to excess in lowliness and reverence of that Being, who may dispose of us to all eternity, as he pleases." He also soberly reminds us that if the sovereignty of God in our salvation is to us an offense, "it will be to our eternal ruin." Yet sovereignty also presses us who believe into the what I believe to be yet more relevant application of sovereignty in our life--the praise of God and giving Him glory who has so graciously saved us. Edwards says it best:

Those who are in a state of salvation are to attribute it to sovereign grace alone, and to give all the praise to him, who maketh them to differ from others. Godliness is no cause for glorying, except it be in God. 1 Cor. 1:29,30,31. "That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." Such are not, by any means, in any degree to attribute their godliness, their safe and happy state and condition, to any natural difference between them and other men, or to any strength or righteousness of their own. They have no reason to exalt themselves in the least degree; but God is the being whom they should exalt. They should exalt God the Father, who chose them in Christ, who set his love upon them, and gave them salvation, before they were born, and even before the world was. If they inquire, why God set his love on them, and chose them rather than others, if they think they can see any cause out of God, they are greatly mistaken. They should exalt God the Son, who bore their names on his heart, when he came into the world, and hung on the cross, and in whom alone they have righteousness and strength. They should exalt God the Holy Ghost, who of sovereign grace has called them out of darkness into marvellous light; who has by his own immediate and free operation, led them into an understanding of the evil and danger of sin, and brought them off from their own righteousness, and opened their eyes to discover the glory of God, and the wonderful riches of God in Jesus Christ, and has sanctified them, and made them new creatures. When they hear of the wickedness of others, or look upon vicious persons, they should think how wicked they once were, and how much they provoked God, and how they deserved for ever to be left by him to perish in sin, and that it is only sovereign grace which has made the difference. 1 Cor. 6:10. Many sorts of sinners are there enumerated; fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate, abusers of themselves with mankind. And then in the eleventh verse, the apostle tells them, "Such were some of you; but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." The people of God have the greater cause of thankfulness, more reason to love God, who hath bestowed such great and unspeakable mercy upon them of his mere sovereign pleasure.