Seeing only sin

Dietrich Bonhoeffer bluntly states that:

the Lord will judge us each according to our works without partiality. For each person's works will become apparent, and to each the Lord will give "recompense for what has been done in the body, whether good or evil" (2 Cor 5:10; Rom 2:6ff; Matt 16:27). Whatever has not already received its judgment here on earth will not remain hidden on judgment day, but must come to light.

(p. 277, Discipleship)

The editor's footnotes also quote the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matthew 25:31-46) as further support.

[But a] surprising point arises from the fact that in Jesus' story the sheep think they are goats and the goats are sure they are sheep. "When did we see you naked, and not clothe you?" the latter boast. To these goats, who insist on following the law (and think they get perfect marks in so doing), the king replies, "You missed one! As often as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me." Try living by the law, and you will be toast. On the contrary, the poor befuddled sheep [...] cannot seem to see their gifts and works at all. "When did we see you naked, etc., and clothe you?" The king answers, "I remember one time." Rather like those poor split-brained disciples of the Sermon on the Mount, whose right hand did not know what the left was doing, these people's good works sneak up on them and remain hidden from to them (but not necessarily to others) their whole life long. The only thing Christians truly sense is their desperate need for a Savior, the Good Shepherd, who seeks the lost.

(italics original, p. 93, Timothy Wengert, A Formula for Parish Practice)

Dietrich Bonhoeffer doesn't disagree. We should not respond to the doctrine of judgement by works by looking at our achievements and trusting in them.

The saints themselves are unaware of the fruit of sanctification they bear. The left hand does not know what the right hand is doing. If they become curious to know something in this matter, if they decide to engage in self-contemplation, then they would have already torn themselves away from the root and their time of bearing fruit would have passed [...] In their own lives, only the saints see strife, hardship, weakness and sin. And the more maturity they gain in the state of sanctification, the more they recognize themselves as being overcome, as those who are dying according to the flesh.

(p. 266f, Discipleship)

As I once heard Dick Lucas preach on Romans 8: the Spirit witnesses to our adoption by making us aware of the constant presence of the battle with our old nature.

But don't you know people just like that? I do. People who cheerfully give and give, but have no awareness of the good works they are doing. They're just being normal in their own eyes, or perhaps not even doing enough. But sometimes other people see how exceptional the giving is, and give thanks for them.

The temporary nature of the law-gospel antithesis

"the antithesis between law and gospel is not an end in itself. It is not a theological ultimate. Rather, that antithesis enters not by virtue of creation but as the consequence of sin, and the gospel functions for its overcoming. The gospel is to the end of removing an absolute law-gospel antithesis in the life of the believer. How so? Briefly, apart from the gospel and outside of Christ the law is my enemy and condemns me. Why? Because God is my enemy and condemns me. But with the gospel and in Christ, united to him by faith, the law is no longer my enemy but my friend. Why? Because now God is no longer my enemy but my friend, and the law, his will, the law in its moral core, as reflective of his character and of concerns eternally inherent in his own person and so of what pleases him, is now my friendly guide for life in fellowship with God"

(italics original, p. 103, Richard Gaffin, By Faith, Not by Sight: Paul and the Order of Salvation)

I like that, although I don't fully agree. I think that he is right that the purpose of the second use of the law is to drive us to the gospel, which enables us to return to the law and use it in its third use. But for the Christian who is both the old man and the new man, we need to use it both as enemy and friend.

Compare Timothy Wengert commenting on Article six of the Formula of Concord:

faith in Christ truly makes all things new, even our relation to the law and works. To be sure, there are "works of the law" (par. 5). There are threats and coercion: "Do this or else!" The unbeliever and our own flesh must be forced [...]

But think how our of place this coercion sounds in the language of love (par. 6). If the beloved says, "Kiss me!" what kind of answer is "Do I have to?"

[...] To be sure the law remains the law (par. 7). The Ten Commandments contain enough for us to do to last a lifetime. However, when the law hits the old creature - whether in the unrepentant or in the flesh of the believer - it can only threaten and coerce. But when the believer, as God's new creature of faith, hears the law, all threats drop away, and there remains a willingness that comes not from ourselves (we cannot make ourselves willing), but from God. Then we hear only the voice of the beloved, and there is no coercion, only faith and love.

(p.99, A Formula for Parish Practice)

Hope for the future in Hebrews

The author of Hebrews explains that "God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking" to Jesus and, in him, to humanity (2:5).

This captures much of what Hebrews is about. It is not a about incorporeal reality in contrast to a corporeal sub-reality. Instead it is profoundly eschatological. It is a book about our future ("the world to come") which has already happened in Christ. "At present" we do not see this future world except when we look to Jesus where it is encapsulated (2:8-9).

Hebrews regularly exhorts its readers to "hope" that endures through present difficulties "to the end". This involves "patience" and "waiting" but we are not to be "sluggish", but should "run" towards the eschaton.

Jesus is our "forerunner" who has entered the future before us. The OT temple is not modelled on heavenly realities only in the sense that it is modelled on an incorporeal dimension to reality. The Holy of Holies is symbolic of the future age which is "not yet opened" (9:8), and the Holy place "is symbolic for the present age" (9:9). Indeed the whole law is a "a shadow of the good things to come" (10:1).

Christ "entered once for all into the holy places [plural]" (9:12) to secure an "eternal redemption" (9:12; cf. 9:15).

We are waiting now for him to come a "second time" (9:28), just as he is "waiting [...] until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet" (10:13). The "Day" is "drawing near" (10:25) so we should encourage each other to hold firm and do good for "a little while" longer (10:37). Because "here [that is, in our present age] we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come".

The Theme of the Pentateuch by David Clines

I've just read David Clines's influential work, The Theme of the Pentateuch (1978). It is well worth the read. Short, well written and very persuasive it has a substantial and important point to prove, and you can see why it had the impact it did.

Overview of the Pentatuach

He summarises his proposal (p.29) as:

The theme of the Pentateuch is the partial fulfilment - which implies the partial non-fulfilment - of the promise to or blessing of the patriarchs. The promise or blessing is both the divine initiative in a world where human initiatives always lead to disaster and a re-affirmation of the primal divine intentions for man. The promise has three elements: posterity, divine-human relationship, and land. The posterity element of the promise is dominant in Genesis 12-50, the relationship element in Exodus and Leviticus, and the land-element in Numbers and Deuteronomy.

On Genesis 1-11 he concludes that in isolation it could be considered to have one of two themes: "(a) Mankind tends to destroy what God has made good", whether God responds in judgement or grace sin continues inextricably to spread; or "(b) No matter how drastic man's sin becomes, destroying what God has made good and bringing the world to the brink of uncreation, God's grace never fails to deliver man from the consequences of his sin" (p.76). However, he concludes that the genealogy of Abram makes it impossible to isolate Genesis 1-11 from the rest of the Pentatuach and read in the light of the whole "The patriarchal (or, Pentatuachal) narratives can then function as the "mitigation" element of the Babel story, and what is more, the divine promise to the patriarchs then demands to be read in conjunction with Genesis 1 - as a re-affirmation of the divine intentions for man" (p.78)

Clines concludes by reflecting on the theological function of the Pentatuach and argues that it functions as both story and promise.

Pentatuach as Story

As story it:

1. "highlights the freedom of action enjoyed by men and gods"
2. does not make a "distinction between the real and the unreal. Everything that happens really happens (whether we believe it or not)"
3. "moves through time" but doesn't reach a conclusion instead it "presses beyond itself to a goal that lies still in the future even when its story is over"
4. "is often played out in spatial as well as temporal terms".

Like many stories he explains that the Pentatuach is a travel story where "everyone seems constantly on the move". But it is a travel story that seems to fit with so many other travel stories that spring "from the desire of the unsettled to be settled, and of the settled to be unsettled". We all desire "to be running away and [at the same time] to be heading towards".

The Pentatuach reveals this same tension. In one sense it is a "a homecoming, tortuous and wearisome and rich in experience [to] the land of their fathers (Gen. 48:21; cf. 31:3), the land of the Hebrews (Gen. 40:15)." But at the same time it "is a land that has never really been their own. 'Land of the fathers' it may be called once or twice, but overwhelming it is 'the land of the Canaanites'...which at the return will have to be fought for as if it had never been Israel's at all"

However, in another sense it is "a laborious search for a new home". "But Israel...tells its primal travel story not as a tale of an abandonment of home under the divine impulse to search out a new home... but as the story of an escape from a home that was not a home in order to make for a home that had never been a home. Israel were 'sojourners', and so truly homeless.. They are unsettled in pursuit of the unobtained."

But, Clines asks, "Who wants, in short to view one's own life as neither moving towards a comfortable homecoming nor moving out towards heroic adventure?" "The Pentateuch offers us an unattractive option for our self-understanding... where 'you never reach the promised land; you only march towards it'".

Pentatuach as Promise

As promise it:

1. "binds man to the future";
2. "is more than hope" because it is "the word of the God of the fathers";
3. "indicates that the expected future does not have to develop within the framework of the possibilities inherent in the present, but arises from that which is possible to the God of the promise";
4. "creates a sense for history [because] it binds him to the past"
5. "speaks of what is not now but is only yet to be, the interval between the promise and its redemption is one of tension"
6. will not be exhausted in its fulfilment "because the God of the promises is greater than any fulfilment that cannot be expected" instead "there always remains an overspill

Clines, like the Pentatuach, does not tell us the end of the story, but leaves us there looking forward in anticipation. Thank God, that though we are in still in the midst of the same story longing for the fulfilment of the same promise in us, the future has already been revealed in Christ.

Struggling with the already/not-yet

Does anyone else have trouble explaining already/not-yet?

I don't know why I know so many people who doubt their salvation, but one thing they all have in common is that they don't accept theological jargon without questioning what that really means. I got pulled apart on 'already/not-yet' recently.

When I talk about already/not-yet I think usually end up doing away with the tension and either saying:

• Its already fully but not yet revealed.
• Its already partly but not yet completed.
• Its not already at all, although we say it is (as some kind of legal-fiction) because it is certain that in the not yet it will be really true.

One ambition for 2010 is to tighten up my understanding on this. Any thoughts on books, bible verses, illustrations, etc which would help would be gratefully received.

Tom Smail on the Trinity at Easter

Listening to: Seth Lakeman: Freedom Fields

Tom Smail has three theses about the Trinity and the Resurrection of Jesus:

1. "it is the Father who is both the initiating source and the ultimate goal of all that happens in relation to the raising of the Son and the sending of the Spirit. It is from the Father that it all starts and it is to the Father that it is all to return."

"The resurrection is seen [in 1 Pet 1:3] as the distinctive personal act of God the Father, his justifying vindication of Jesus in the face of his crucifiers... Jesus rises because he has been raised up by his Father, he acts because he has first been acted upon by God. He is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25), not in and by himself but because he has received this from the Father.

What is true of his resurrection is also true of his exaltation. He does not exalt himself - that would be against his whole character - it is his Father who exalts him to his own right hand.... his exaltation remains the distinctive personal act of God the Father, 'God, exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name' (Phil 2:9). The authority in heaven and on earth that has been given to him (Matt 28:18) is to be exercised in a way that glorifies and serves the purposes of the Father who gave it (Phil 2:11). In the end indeed, also according to Paul, that kingly authority has to be surrendered back to the Father who gave it, so that God may be all in all (1 Cor 1:24-28)....

The Holy Spirit did not come on his own, he was poured out by Jesus after and as a result of his resurrection and his exaltation... Yet even Jesus is not the ultimate origin of the newly poured out Spirit. He gives him only because he has first received him from the Father.

2. "the integrated Easter event that proclaims the primacy of the Father equally clearly proclaims what we may call the derived deity of the Son."

When the Father raises his Son from the dead to his own throne, he is telling us something not just about himself, but about that son, namely that he belongs not just with us on the human side of reality, but with God himself on the divine side of reality.... 'What does "he ascended" mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions?' (Eph 4:9). His exaltation to God is seen to imply that his work and his person have their eternal origination in God's own life...

All this, however, is said on the clear assumption that it does not threaten the primacy of the Father. The Son is Son because on the one hand he is all that the Father is, he is of the very stuff of the Father's deity, but on the other hand all he has he owes not to himself but to the Father (John 5:19)...

The risen son of God shows himself to be not only our brother, but God's eternal Son, who is to us and does for us what only God can do. Yet at the same time he is to be differentiated from God the Father, as the one who is sent is to be differentiated from the one who sends him, the one who obeys from the one whom he obeys, the one who is raised from the one who raised him.

3. "the integrated Easter event that reveals the primacy of the Father and the derived deity of the Son, also reveals the mutual interdependence of the Son and the Holy Spirit"

"On the one hand it is through the activity of the Spirit that Jesus is raised, and on the other hand it is through the risen Jesus that the Spirit is sent to the church at Pentecost...

Acts 2:33, '[Jesus]...has poured out what you now see and hear', and John 16:7, 'Unless I go away the Counsellor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.' For Paul also the dependence of the work of the Spirit upon the work of Christ is so close that at some points... he seems to identify the one with the other... the Holy Spirit does nothing of his own that is apart from or beyond what Christ has done. He simply takes what is in Christ and so works in us that it becomes ours also...

[on the other hand] the Father raises the Son from the dead through the activity of the Holy Spirit (cf. Rom 1:4; 1 Cor 6:14; 1 Tim 3:16; 1 Pet 3:18). I that is so, then it is the son who is dependent upon the Spirit in his reception of resurrection life from the Father, just as he was dependent upon the Spirit for his human birth from Mary (Luke 1:35)...

The two-sided mutuality of that relationship is classically expressed in the words of John the Baptist in John 1:33, 'The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is he who will baptise with the holy Spirit.' At his baptism Jesus receives the Spirit and all that he brings from the Father for his own work; at Pentecost he sends that same Spirit from the Father to empower us in our work for him.

All quotes from pp. 63-78, Thomas A. Smail, "The Holy Trinity and the Resurrection of Jesus" in ed Andrew Walker Different Gospels: Christian Orthodoxy and Modern Theologies. Sorry for the extended quotations, but I thought it was all excellent stuff.

Christ's descent into hell

Listening to: Sibelius: Symphony No.5

"He descended into hell" (or "He descended to the dead") is an article of the creed that most people I know don't know what to do with. As a result some people just brush it off as nonsense and further proof that we shouldn't pay too much attention to the ecumenical creeds.

I think we ought to give our forerunners the benefit of the doubt whenever we can, but I'm not sure what to do with it myself.

The writers of the Lutheran Formula of Concord, saw two broad categories of interpretation, and because argument between the two were getting quite heated they judged that "there should be no dispute over this issue but it should be believed and taught on the simplest level". They explained that people disputed "whether this article of faith belongs to the suffering of Christ or to his glorious victory and triumph." I must confess that I was only aware of it belonging in some form to Christ's suffering.

1. Belonging to the suffering of Christ

John Calvin argues that the phrase refers to the depths of the suffering that Jesus suffered on the cross for us:

"subjected to condemnation, he undertook and paid all the penalties which must have been exacted from them, the only exception being, that the pains of death could not hold him. Hence there is nothing strange in its being said that he descended to hell, seeing he endured the death which is inflicted on the wicked by an angry God." (Institutes 2.16.10)

2. Belonging to the victory of Christ

Luther read the article more in connection with Christ's resurrection than his death:

"The customary way of depicting how Christ descended into hell on church walls represents him with a cape and with banners in his hand as he makes his descent and stalks and assaults the devil, as he storms hell and rescues his own people from it. The children's play presented at Easter depicts it in a similar way. It seems better to me that you depict, act out, sing, and recite the story in a very simple way and let it remain at that and not concern yourself with sublime and precise ideas about how it actually took place. for it did not happen in a physical manner, since he remained three days in the grave." (p. 159, cited in Timothy J. Wengert, A Formula For Parish Practice)

Did Moses let his anger get out of control?

'The Lord said to Moses, "Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke."' (Exodus 34:1)

The first set of tablets were 100% made by God. The second time round Moses contributes. Why?

John Calvin believes it is to serve as a reminder to Israel of their sin, so that "the ignominy of their crime was not altogether effaced". Another alternative is floated by Peter Enns who says it "may indicate God's displeasure with [Moses] at having smashed them" (p. 584, Exodus (NIVAC)).

I'm not sure, and would welcome any suggestions, but find the idea that God did not approve of Moses's actions on finding the golden calf intriguing. In Exodus 32 there are the following facts to consider:

• God's is angry with Israel's sin and warns Moses, "my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them"
• Moses implores God "Turn from your burning anger", and God does so.
• Moses comes down and his "anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain".
• Moses calls together some Levites and "he said to them, 'Thus says the Lord God of Israel, "Put your sword on your side each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbour."'" Throughout Moses emphasises that they are doing the LORD's work, and yet the narrator says "the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses."

All in all, the actions of Moses are some of the most brutal in the OT, not very discerning (Aaron suffers no punishment, and the commands to the Levites seem to encourage undiscerning punishment), not specifically commanded by God, and seem to have been done in the heat of the moment.

Nevertheless, God himself offers no opinion on Moses's actions, either positive or negative. When Moses meets God again, God has decided to send a plague on Israel because of their sin, although he sticks to his promise not to destroy them.

There seem to be arguments either way.

Bitter water

When Moses came down the mountain and finds the Golden Calf, he burns it and grinds it up and then scatters it into the water supply of the people so that the people of Israel have no choice but to drink it (Exodus 32:20).

In a way he is reversing the miracle of God at Marah, when the bitter water was made sweet (Exodus 15:22-25).

Peter Enns also notes that there may be a connection with Numbers 5:12-31 which "describes an elaborate ceremony whereby a woman suspected of adultery is made to drink a mixture of water and dust from the tabernacle in order to determine her guilt or innocence [...] it may be that the guilty parties [the 3,000 killed by the Levites] are exposed by the drinking ceremony, thus enabling the Levites know whom to kill" (p.575, Exodus (NIVAC))

Upstairs/downstairs

I wrote some notes on Exodus 19-40. I was having trouble keeping track of all the comings and goings that Moses had meeting God on Sinai. Reading it with this focus, you get the feeling of shuttle diplomacy. The mediating role of Moses is very clear, emphasising the holiness of God. Which makes the final descent from the mountain by God himself all the more amazing.

• 19:3 ↑ Moses goes up
• 19:3-6 Moses given message (reminder what God has done, exhortation to obey, promise of special place of people)
• 19:7 ↓ Moses goes down and reports to people
• 19:8 People respond (express desire to obey)
• 19:8 ↑ Moses goes up and reports to God
• 19:9 Moses given message (God is coming in cloud)
• 19:9 Moses reports to people
• 19:10-13 Moses given message (Preparation of people for God's visit)
• 19:14-15 ↓ Moses goes down and reports to people
• 19:16-20 ↓ God comes down to top of mountain
• 19:20 ↑ Moses goes up
• 19:21-24 Moses given message (for people to keep their distance)
• 19:25 ↓ Moses goes down and reports to people
• 20:1-17 God speaks the 10 commandments to his people directly
• 20:18-19 People respond (in fear, ask Moses to mediate)
• 20:21 ↑ Moses goes up
• 20:22-24:2 Moses given message (book of the covenant: exposition of 10 commandments, festivals & Sabbath, promise of conquest)
• 24:3 ↓ Moses goes down and reports to the people
• 24:3 People respond (express desire to obey)
• 24:9 ↑ Moses goes up (with others)
• 24:11 Covenant meal
• 24:13 ↑ Moses goes up further with Joshua
• 24:15-18 ↑ Moses goes up further alone and remains 40 days/nights
• 25:1-31:18 Moses given more instructions (all about tabernacle except ending with reminder about Sabbath)
• 32:7-14 God threatens to destroy Israel because of the golden calf, but Moses persuades God not to.
• 32:15-30 ↓ Moses goes down, breaks tablets, kills people
• 32:31 ↑ Moses goes up
• 32:31-33:3 Moses offers himself as substitute, God rejects this and says he will send a plague then will bring them to Canaan but will not go with them
• 33:4 ↓ Moses goes down (?) and reports to people
• 33:4-6 People respond (in mourning)
• 33:7-34:3 Moses meets God in the tent of meeting (asks that God will go with Israel, and that he will see God's glory)
• 34:4 ↑ Moses goes up
• 34:5-28 Moses given message (sees God's glory, promise of conquest, festivals and Sabbath)
• 34:29 ↓ Moses goes down
• 34:31-36:1 Moses delivers message
• 36:2-40:33 Tabernacle built
• 40:34-38 ↓ God comes down to the tabernacle and dwells with his people

Personal from beginning to end

John Frame points out that for most people today ultimate reality is impersonal. Most people believe that the personal came out of the impersonal and will return to impersonality. That is the story of our culture tells. Consequently science, which deals in the impersonal and excludes the personal from its discourse, has taken Theology's old crown as "Queen of the Sciences".

The Bible says that before time there was the personal God who created all that is personal and impersonal. Personal communion is also the goal and end of Creation according to the Bible.

I wonder, does this have any implications for our understanding of Genesis 1?

Reformulating the question of theodicy

1. Theodicy is not the attempt to fit the God of the Bible to a 'God' we already know. The problem of evil is the problem of how the God of the Bible is consistent.

'Today many of the skeptics I talk to say, as I once did, they can't believe in the God of the Bible, who punishes and judges people, because they "believe in a God of love." I now ask, what makes them think God is Love? Can they look at life in the world today and say, "This proves that the God of the world is a God of love"? Can they look at history and say, "This shows that the God of history is a God of love"? Can they look at the religious texts of the world and conclude that God is a God of love? By no means is that the dominant, ruling attribute of God as understood in any of the major faiths. I must conclude that the source of the idea that God is Love is the Bible itself. And the Bible tells us that the God of love is a God of judgment who will put all things in the world to rights in the end.'

(pp. 82f, Tim Keller, The Reason for God)

2. Theodicy is not the attempt to understand how God is consistent according to reason, but how he is consistent according to himself. The measure of consistency is not logical coherence (what does that prove anyway?), but the revelation of God in the Gospel as the God of love (that proves we have hope, God is true, Christ is Lord, etc).

Theodicy is not, as Leibniz thought, to be brought before the forum of reason, which can understand and judge, so that one can dispute or reflect about God; as Job experienced it, it is much more about a dispute with God - summoning God against God (Job 16;19); one appeals to God against God.

(p. 213, Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther's Theology)

3. Christ engaged in theodicy long before Leibniz. He cried "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" appealing to God against God. Three days later he was answered not with an argument, but with his resurrection. It was a revelation of God himself, and like all God's revelations it was an act. It was an act of love and an act of power, showing God as both loving and almighty.

The question of theodicy should not be avoided by Christians, but it should be reformulated into the model provided by Jesus. It is Biblical and Christian to wrestle with God, to cry out against evil and not to accept it passively. Like Christ we might have to wait for the revelation of God we are want, but "if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him".

Resolving the paradoxes

I fear sometimes I love the paradoxes of the Christian life too much. I tend to see both sides of an argument and what is lost if you just only said one thing to the neglect of the other. I see problems when we try and resolve things too quickly and don't let two seemingly opposing statements stand at full strength. But I must remember that things will not always be so paradoxical. Most, if not all the paradoxes, may be resolved in eternity. Standing between the ages, there is inevitably going to be a tension.

Corollary or contradiction? God's love and anger

Listening to: Radiohead: The Bends

[Rather hasty and unrefined thoughts that I was decided to put down prematurely because of a discussion in comments to a post of Dave Bish]

We can drift into a simplistic dualism when thinking of God's wrath and love. God's anger and God's love can be seen as implacable enemies never to be reconciled, and the cross can be seen as the place where God's love is shown to be stronger. People then seem to drift into either seeing either:

• God the Father as the angry one, and God the Son as the loving one;
• The devil as angry (god?), and God as love; or
• God as schizophrenic.

Against this we can say that God gets angry because he cares, not despite caring. He punishes us to bring us to repentance, as a father disciplines his children. Or, he hates all that is destructive and acts to protect his creation, as an artist won't stand by and see his painting be destroyed.

We remember that God is love from all eternity, but God's anger is a recent response of this love to the invasion of sin. Perhaps we could describe God's anger as an 'aspect' of his love.

But I think that perspective can lead to problems too. Anger and sadness with God's acts of punishment are disallowed, and God's love becomes distasteful.

I think the Bible offers a more complex and paradoxical picture of the relationship between God's anger and love than we often allow. We either subsume anger into love, losing both. Or oppose them so completely that God is robbed of his sovereignty and we are robbed of our hope of final victory. I think this paradoxical picture can be seen when considering three different ways in which God acts in anger at sin:

1. People

• Habakkuk complains to God about the sin of Israel, and cries to God for justice. God responds by explaining that he will use the Chaldeans as a tool to punish the people.
• Understandably this doesn't satisfy Habakkuk, but neither does it satisfy God. He promises to bring the agents of his punishment to an end too.

2. The devil

• The devil is depicted in chapter 1 of Job as if he is a servant of God, even if their relationship does not seem amicable. But the bible is clear that the power of the devil is derived from God. He is called 'Satan' ('the Accuser), because he accuses, appealing to God's justice. As Henri Blocher says "the weapon in the devil's hand is God's own law" (p. 139, cited in PFOT).
• At the same time Christ's victory over the devil is fundamental to the Gospel. From the Genesis 3:15 to Revelation 20 we are promised that he will be crushed, imprisoned, and thrown into the lake of fire.

3. Death

• In Genesis it is clear that death is God's active response of punishing human sin. In the NT there is hope that death is essential to our process of being freed from this body of sin, to new life. It is clearly from God, and for believers a 'good' thing.
• But despite all that "the last enemy to be destroyed is death" (1 Cor 15:26).

Asymmetrical paradox

We should notice though that the paradox is not equally weighted. It remains a paradox, but God stands asymetrically behind the two sides. God's anger is always done through tools:

• God uses other people to punish, but when he loves he does himself in sending his only Son.
• God uses Satan as an agent of his wrath, but he restores us himself.
• In God there isn't death, but pulsating life (John 1:4)

Wrestling with God

This is not an impractical thing to wonder about. If we want to escape punishment we have to believe that it is under God's control, but we also have to believe that he has acted, and is acting, to save us from it.

We want to protect every part of the truth that "one appeals to God against God" (p. 213, Bayer, Martin Luther's Theology).

A Bible study on prayer and the Trinity

[This a supposed to be a fairly short bible study on a rather big subject. The plan is to split into three or four groups and allocate one set of questions to each, and then get them to join back together to share. Any thoughts on the questions or bible passages would be helpful.]

"Prayer is talking to God" (Goldsworthy)

"through Christ we both have access to the Father by one Spirit" (Ephesians 2:18)

Praying to the Father... (Luke 11:1-13)

• What are we talking about? Using simple language, what does it mean to say that we pray to the Father?
• Is there an alternative? Who/what else do non-Christians, and Christians, pray to?
• Who cares? If we pray to the Father, what difference should that make to our prayers?

...through the Son... (Hebrews 4:14-16; 7:24-25; 10:19-23)

• What are we talking about? Using simple language, what does it mean to say that we pray through the Son?
• Is there an alternative? Who/what else do non-Christians, and Christians, pray through?
• Who cares? If we pray through the Son, what difference should that make to our prayers?

...by (or 'in') the Spirit (Romans 8:11-30; cf. Ephesians 6:17-18, Jude 19-20)

• What are we talking about? Using simple language, what does it mean to say that we pray by/in the Holy Spirit?
• Is there an alternative? Who/what else do non-Christians, and Christians, pray by/in?
• Who cares? If we pray by/in the Holy Spirit, what difference should that make to our prayers?

[ The Trinity talks (John 16:13-14, 17:6-21; cf. Genesis 1:26, Romans 8:26, 34)

• What are we talking about? Using simple language, what does it mean for the three persons of the Trinity to talk to each other?
• Is there an alternative? Who/what do Christians and non-Christians think of as talking, and how else can we think of God?
• Who cares? If the Trinity talks, what difference should that make to our prayers? ]

Laying yourself out in prayer

[Our offering of ourselves]

The first thing we realize from the Psalms is that in prayer anything goes. Virtually everything human is appropriate as material for prayer:

• reflections and observations,
• fear and anger,
• guilt and sin,
• questions and doubts,
• needs and desires,
• praise and gratitude,
• suffering and death.

Nothing human is excluded. The Psalms are an extended refutation that prayer is being "nice" before God. Not at all - it is an offering of ourselves, just as we are.

[God's offering of himself]

The second thing is that prayer is access to everything that God is for us:

• holiness,
• justice,
• mercy,
• forgiveness,
• sovereignty,
• blessing,
• vindication,
• salvation,
• love,
• majesty,
• and glory.

The Psalms are a detailed demonstration that prayer brings us into the welcoming presence of God as he generously offers himself, just as he is, to us.

(formatting mine, p. 617, Eugene Peterson, "Prayer" in Dictionary for Theological Interpretation of the Bible)

Key questions on the Lord's Supper

Listening to: Led Zeppelin III

Who is being offered in the Lord's Supper? (or what is being spoken?)

• Firstly, Christ and his death
• Secondly, in Christ, our resurrection: forgiveness of sins, New Creation, the Church, the Messianic banquet

Who is offering Christ? (or who is speaking these things?)

• Firstly, God. Christ offered himself at the first Lord's Supper. As the Word of God, he is offered/spoken by God himself.
• Secondly, in Christ and on his authority, the Christian performing the act.

What happens when Christ comes near? (or what happens when God speaks?)

• Firstly, to be in Christ's presence is to be blessed by God - it is heaven itself.
• However, if rejected because of unbelief then sin is increased and judgement occurs ("... that is why many of you are weak and ill", 1 Corinthians 11:30, cf. Forsyth).
• Either way, when God's word is spoken it will not return empty (Isaiah 55:11).

Praying to the Son?

Listening to: The Unthanks on Myspace

Should you address prayers to the Son, or just the Father?

I'm not entirely sure, but think the best answer is summed up nicely by Tim Chester:

"The unity of the Trinity means we can address prayer to the Son and the Spirit - the Son and the Spirit are truly God and so can truly receive prayer. But the norm in the New Testament is to address prayer to the Father through the Son by, or with the aid of, the Holy Spirit." (p. 39, The Message of Prayer)

In relation to this discussion I found the following references in the Gospel of John, intriguing.

"Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it." (14:13-14)

"I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser... Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me... If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you...I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you." (15:1-16)

"you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy... So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. In that day you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full." (16:20-24)

Most exciting was to see that the parable of the true vine is so much about prayer.

Paul growing downwards year by year

HCG Moule said of Charles Simeon:

"'Before honor is humility,' and he had been 'growing downwards' year by year under the stern discipline of difficulty met in the right way, the way of close and adoring communion with God" (p. 64)

Today our pastor, leaning on Jim Packer, mentioned the following passages in which Paul demonstrates the same growth.

1 Corinthians 15:9, AD 51-55:

I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God

Ephesians 3:8, AD 60-62:

I am the very least of all the saints

1 Timothy 1:15, AD 65:

The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost

(dates from IVP Dictionary of the NT)

Stairways to heaven

Listening to: Bob Dylan: Blood on the Tracks

The people of Babel said to themselves "Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens" but YHWH saw the ladder they had created and said "Come, let us go down [it?] and there confuse their language" (Gen 11).

At Bethel Jacob dreamed of "a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!" God stood at the top and blessed Jacob below (Gen 28).

Samson's father, Manoah, made a burnt offering to YHWH and "the angel of the Lord went up in the flame of the altar" (Judg 13).

Centuries later Jesus promised his disciples "you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man"

Jesus, by his sacrificial offering of himself, is a ladder down which God's ministering spirits come to serve God's people (Heb 1:14). If we build alternative ladders angels will use those to come to us as well, but they may not be coming to serve.

The Triune God as Speech Event

It's quite fashionable to describe the Trinity as a dance. CS Lewis does in Mere Christianity, and Tim Keller picks up on this in The Reason for God (p.215):

When we delight and serve someone else, we enter into a dynamic orbit around him or her, we center on the interests and desires of the other. That creates a dance, particularly if there are three persons, each of whom moves around the other two [...] Each person of the Trinity loves, adores, defers to, and rejoices in the others. That creates a dynamic, pulsating dance of joy and love. the early leaders of the Greek church had a word for this - perichoresis. Notice our word "choreography" within it. It means literally to "dance or flow around"

That's great, I love it. But I'm also slightly disatisfied. Maybe it's because I don't really like dancing, but despite all that is said about other-centredness and movement it feels slightly self-contained and static to me. Perhaps it's because I see the dance as happening somewhere over there, and "Jesus...inviting you into the dance" (p.221, ibid). Instead I should see the dance as "Jesus moving toward us and encircling us with an infinite, self giving love" (ibid) and then it would be better. But usually the "dance of God" is a description of the triune life apart from the salvation of the world, and I'm increasingly convinced that we mustn't talk about the Trinity apart from that.

In Luther's hymn "Dear Christians, one and all rejoice", Luther imagines the triune life of God not as a dance but as a conversation about the salvation of the world. Oswald Bayer comments on this hymn:

If the Trinity is a dialogue, if God, within himself, is communication, relationship, a relational three-ness, then he does not allow himself to be conceptualized in any way as a monad, as a monarchical being or subject. Instead, within himself he is in motion: speaking and hearing, speaking and answering, as Father and Son, to whom the Spirit listens, so that what is heard can be communicated to us [cf. John 16:13]. Thus the entire being of the triune God is a unique communication to me and to all creatures, an event of complete giving and a trustworthy, reliable promise.

(p.341, Martin Luther's Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation)

I like that more. Although I must make sure it is not my likes and dislikes driving my theology!

Praying in Jesus' name

"In that day you will ask in my name, and I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf; for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God." (John 16:26-27)

We often talk about Christ's intercession and rightly rejoice in that. We also rejoice that we can come into God's presence covered by Christ's righteousness and cleansed by his blood.

But it's amazing to understand what this does not mean. It does not entirely mean, as a wonderful friend recently prayed, that we thank God that when we pray God does not see us but only sees his Son. Don Carson comments:

Jesus wants his followers to understand that the phrase in my name does not mean that they are thereby distanced from God. It does not mean that they are restricted to asking Jesus for things... Far from it: the Father himself loves you, and needs no prompting from the Son.

John Calvin comments:

This is a remarkable passage, by which we are taught that we have the heart of God as soon as we place before Him the name of His Son.

I think that's fairly wonderful.

We get the best of both worlds. We get to come to the Father ourselves and be heard by him because of his love for us AND Jesus himself, as he does a few verses later in John 17, prays for us. So that we are not alone, and don't need to fear that if we forget to confess one particular sin, or pray for our neighbour's salvation that God's good plan for his people will fail.

A few notes on not coveting

Listening to: Belle and Sebastian: The Life Pursuit

Mark 10:19 (parallel: Luke 18:20)

The Christianity Explored booklet asks "What did Jesus expect the man to notice about his list of the commandments in Mark 10:19?" I can't remember what it exactly wants to answer to be, but you have commands 5-9 listed - i.e. not the first table and not the command not to covet. I think Jesus was pointing out to the rich young man that while he had not done the external acts prohibited by the second table of the law, he had not obeyed the spirit of them.

I have been challenged before that honouring your father and mother is not an external act but, like coveting, is about the state of your heart. But Exodus 21:15-17 expounds the commandment as not striking or cursing your parents. Deuteronomy 27:16 talks about not dishonouring and Matthew 15:4 (parallel: Mark 7:10) expands on honouring by saying that it is not reviling. All of which suggests it was seen more as an external act.

1 Timothy 1:9-10

the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers [5th commandment], for murderers [6th], the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality [7th], enslavers [8th? cf. Deuteronomy 24:7], liars, perjurers [9th], and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine,

Again the absence of the 10th commandment not to covet is notable. Also interestingly, I believe the Reformers considered this passage to be mainly about the 'civil use of the law'.

Hosea 4:2

there is swearing, lying [9th], murder [6th], stealing [8th], and committing adultery [7th]; they break all bounds, and bloodshed follows bloodshed.

... no commandment to honour father and mother, or not to covet.

James 4:2

You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.

James sees coveting as the cause behind murder. Justifiably you could also quite easily see that it is the cause of breaking all the rest of the second table, or at least commandments 6-9. This is anticipated in part within the 10th commandment itself which lists some of the things we may covet - i.e. wives who we may commit adultery with and possessions we may steal.

Romans 7

When Paul chooses to explain how the law works to bring knowledge of sin, he picks the commandment not to covet. Mark Seifrid commenting on this passage explains this not an insignificant choice:

All other transgressions against other (the dishonouring of parents, murder, adultery, theft and false witness, and so on) have their root in coveting, which is the antithesis of the love commandment. In this commandment the whole weight of the law comes to bear on us.

(p. 117, Christ Our Righteousness)

The Trinity in Salvation

I think this diagram represents how I think of our salvation.

I want to use it to explain a few things in future posts if I get the time. For example:

• The differnce between how contemporary Evangelicals and the Reformers view the marks of the church/Christian
• How in the 'law' God works in an sub-Trinitarian way (will have to be careful with that one)
• How Stuart Olyott, and not Luther, got it wrong (with all due respect)
• How the cross both is and isn't where Christ is glorified, and why weakness is and isn't where Christians are strong
• Where we should find our assurance
• The dangers of ritualism, and anti-ritualism

But firstly I'll just throw my big-picture out there for you to point out my heresies.

As a bit of clarrification, what I'm trying to communicate in the diagram is a whole range of things, such as:

• How all three persons are at work in our salvation, at every stage
• How Christ and the Holy Spirit are inseperable
• The Father's initiative
• The centrality of the cross and resurrection
• How the humbling of the Son was both going in the opposite way to getting glory, but also the way to glory
• The ultimate end of salvation being the glory of God
• That works come from faith which comes from the external word which comes from Christ's death and resurrection. They are all of an ordered piece.
• and probably a load of other random things I've forgotten

Imperatives and indicatives

Wonderfully clear post from Tim Chester:

Think how you would summarise Ephesians 5:1 in your own words: 'Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children.'

I wonder if your summary focused on the call to imitate God or the description of Christians as 'dearly loved children'?

It is all too easy for us to hear only the commands of Scripture and miss the descriptions out of which they arise. The prescription to behave like God only makes sense as the outworking of the description that we are God’s children. The imperatives (commands) of the New Testament always arise out of the indicatives (description). We are already God's dearly loved children so let's live as God’s dearly loved children by imitating our Father.

Reading Paul, and to a lesser extent other Biblical writers, as arguing from indicative to imperative, is probably one of the most important things I've ever been taught. But I sometimes struggle to spell out exactly what it means. It is easy to trot out "be what you already are", but it is more difficult to explain what that really means.

Melanchthon in his commentary on Colossians 3:1 helpfully breaks it down into three things:

1. cause to effect - what will make us be
2. what is due from us - what we ought to be
3. what is possible - what we have the resources to be

I find that quite helpful in actually applying it to my life.

BTW this is my 500th post on this blog. Crazy stuff!