Swimming

This is a stupid post really. But I just thought I'd post on the great thing that is the The One Year® Bible. Yes it may be a registered trademark but God by his grace has used it to get me into regular daily reading of the bible. There is really nothing like it. If you want to get yourself a bible reading plan for the coming year I'd highly recommend it. I'd also say that take a look at this clever page visualizing loads of the plans out there for people like me who don't feel they have understood anything unless it can be described graphically. But the best thing about The One Year® Bible is that it rearranges the bible into the daily readings. It may seem like the definition of laziness to buy a bible that saves you jumping around the bible for each passage of the day, but in some way it has helped me.

My next plan to get into the bible is to start reading though a few books of the NT with John Calvin and John Chrysostom as company. I hope to do this in the break I have between law courses in the next few weeks. In reading up on John Chrysostom because I don't know much about except what I have picked up through John Calvin, and I found this quote on reading the bible:

"Listen carefully to me, I entreat you…. [P]rocure books that will be medicines for the soul.... At least get a copy of the New Testament, the Apostle's epistles, the Acts, the Gospels, for your constant teachers. If you encounter grief, dive into them as into a chest of medicines; take from them comfort for your trouble, whether it be loss, or death, or bereavement over the loss of relations. Don't simply dive into them. Swim in them. Keep them constantly in your mind. The cause of all evils is the failure to know the Scriptures well."

(Homilies on Colossians, Cited in Hall, Reading Scripture with the Church Fathers, 96]

What a great truth that is. If I ever needed reminding of the sovereign mercy of God, and the darkness of my contrary soul, I just need to be pointed to my irregular habits of reading the bible. I so often neglect it, but when God moves in my life to make it a regular thing it is like water to a thirsty soul.

A bit of a random post - but at least I've documented the link to that clever web page and that wonderful quote.

Who was Oscar Cullmann?

I've only read a few books by Oscar Cullmann, and while they are not astounding I think that they are only not because much of what he was about has become mainstream - in conservative evangelicalism at least. Wikipedia describes him so:

Oscar Cullmann (25 February 1902, Strasbourg - 16 January 1999, Chamonix) was a Christian theologian in the Lutheran tradition. He is best known for his work in the ecumenical movement, being in part responsible for the establishment of dialogue between the Lutheran and Roman Catholic traditions. Because of his intense ecumenical work, Cullmann's Basel colleague Karl Barth joked with him that his tombstone would bear the inscription "advisor to three popes."

Within the evangelical tradition he is remembered slightly differently as the author of the (good) cliché that Christ's death and Resurrection can be compared with D-day as the decisive battle in a war that rumbles on although VE-day, when sin and death are completely destroyed, is yet to come. I think this comes closer to the heart of what he was about (not that I have any authority to say so). He says of his important work Christ and Time:

The whole of early Christian thought is based in Heilsgeschichte [salvation history], and everything that is said about death and eternal life stands or falls with a belief in a real occurrence, in real events which took place in time. [...] The purpose of my book Christ and Time was precisely to show that this belongs to the substance, to the essence of the early Christian faith, that it is something not to be surrendered, not to be altered in meaning;

(Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead?)

Quotable: Oscar Cullmann on the Christian hope

The Emperor Marcus Aurelius, the philosopher who belongs with Socrates to the noblest figures of antiquity, also perceived the contrast. As is well known, he had the deepest contempt for Christianity. One might think that the death of the Christian martyrs would have inspired respect in this great Stoic who regarded death with equanimity. But it was just the martyrs’ death with which he was least sympathetic. The alacrity ['cheerful readiness, promptness, or willingness'] with which the Christians met their death displeased him. The Stoic departed this life dispassionately; the Christian martyr on the other hand died with spirited passion for the cause of Christ, because he knew that by doing so he stood within a powerful redemptive process. The first Christian martyr, Stephen, shows us (Acts 7:55) how very differently death is bested by him who dies in Christ than by the ancient philosopher: he sees, it is said, 'the heavens open and Christ standing at the right hand of God !' He sees Christ, the Conqueror of Death. With this faith that the death he must undergo is already conquered by Him who has Himself endured it, Stephen lets himself be stoned.

(Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead, p.59-60)

A truly brilliant lecture. Well worth the 60min it would take to read (and it's online here).

Rambling on the first Adam, the Last Adam, and grasping

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

(Philippians 2:5-7)

Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness [...] For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.

(Genesis 1:26a; 3:5-6)

Is it a coincidence that the same language pops up in both? I suspect not having heard a talk on Philippians 2 by Jeff Meyers. There are two ways to gain 'knowledge of good and evil' (the power/wisdom to judge, cf. 1 Kings 3:9; 2 Samuel 14:17 - thanks Jim Jordan) be given it or to take it. Take it and you yourself will be judged by THE judge.

It has often been commented that Paul never speaks of Christ's resurrection as something he does for himself, rather it is always something that the Father/the Spirit does to him. It seems Christ was passive in his resurrection, which is also his justification and his elevation to God's right hand.

As you can see I don't know exactly what you can do with all this so I'll continue to think about it. Thankfully Paul does the applying for me when he says 'Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves....Do all things without grumbling or questioning'. It's not complicated but it is hard.

'it is God who works' - just another way of saying Sola Deo Gloria really.

On not being detached but being fearful

Whenever we approach a doctrine taught in Scripture it is important that we think about how we ought to approach it. And a weighty matter like justification is not something that we are at liberty to look upon in a detached way. After all, whether we like it or not, we are involved in it. The doctrine of justification sola fide presupposes the guilt of sin, and as we are sinners we are best off approaching it with a due recognition of our guilt coram Deo (before God). (Martin Downes)

Temple language in Ephesians 2:11:22

Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called "the uncircumcision" by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

Justification according to some Federal Vision proponents

I'm still busy with studying law but that doesn't mean I've called a halt to thinking about the doctrine of justification. I came across a helpful summary from Peter Leithart on how he has come to think of justification as more than a matter of a 'bare verdict'.

My work on justification has focused on passages where the Bible uses "justification" terminology to apply to delivering acts of God. In these passages, "justify" is still a judicial term and describes a judicial act. God is acting as judge. But the verdict that He gives is an enacted verdict, a verdict that takes the form of deliverance from enemies and death. I’ve coined the term "deliverdict" to capture the two sides of this. Some evidence:

1) Romans 4:25 says that Jesus was raised for our justification. I accept Richard Gaffin’s exegesis of this passage, in which he argues that Paul implies that Jesus' resurrection was His justification, and that we share in that verdict by union with Christ. Jesus' resurrection is the ground of our justification, and the prototype justification. And it's certainly not a "bare verdict." God declared Jesus "righteous" by delivering Him from death and raising Him to new life.

2) This is, I think, what Paul means in Romans 6:7 when He says - in a context having to do with deliverance from the power of sin, and, not incidentally, with baptism - that we are "justified from sin." That is, God delivers a verdict of righteous that takes the form of liberation from sin’s power. (This is how John Murray understands Romans 6:7 as well.)

3) Behind these Pauline uses are various passages in the Psalms and prophets where judicial language is used in contexts where it refers to deliverance from enemies, from death, from national catastrophe. Jerusalem’s restoration is "their justification [vindication]" in Isaiah 54:17. David seeks deliverance from enemies when He calls on God to "judge me" (Psalm 7:6-11; 35:27-28). (source)

I find that pretty convincing. The quote comes from a post in a big Federal Vision showdown over at De Regno Christi. It's not a pretty sight to behold, and perhaps surprisingly to some it is focusing more on tradition than any controversy over the sacraments or justification. But in the same place James Jordan (another FV proponent) has posted a comment on Peter Leithart's post:

I[n] Numbers 19 there are two justifications, two cleansings, two resurrections. We have here ritually directed the Biblical philosophy of history, one that every Jew of Jesus' day would know very well from having to experience if ofttimes. The first justification, on the 3d day, is totally apart from any works we can have done, for we are dead (unclean = symbolically dead, having contracted the death that spreads to all). But after the first resurrection, we are now partly alive and can do good works, leading to the second justification of the 7th day.

It can be no surprise then that the foundational justification is by faith alone, and yet there is a future justification in which God says that He likes us, likes what we've become, approves of us, and says "well done." All the good stuff we do (WCF 16) is in union with Jesus and by the Spirit, but it is still we who do it. The Judge approves of US and justifies US, not merely sees Jesus through us as if we don’t exist.

The first justification is by faith alone, and we return to that at the beginning of the liturgy each Day of the Lord. The final justification is God’s approval of who we have become in union with Christ and through faith.

There is no justification of "works" or "merits" because there is no merit theology in the Bible anywhere at all. God approves or disapproves of persons, not of merits. (source)

That's pretty controversial stuff and my gut doesn't like it. But I do respect Jim Jordan (I've never read/heard anyone who knows the Pentatuach better) so I'll have to take on board what he says and test it against the bible... Starting at Numbers 19.

The Prophets Redux

I keep on discovering more and more that Revelation repeats themes and imagery that can be found in the prophets hundreds of years before. I'm not sure what this means for our interpretation though.

Here's what I read this morning in Isaiah as an example:

In that day the Lord will punish the host of heaven, in heaven, and the kings of the earth, on the earth. They will be gathered together as prisoners in a pit; they will be shut up in a prison, and after many days they will be punished. Then the moon will be confounded and the sun ashamed, for the Lord of hosts reigns on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and his glory will be before his elders.

(Isaiah 24:21-23)

The same imagery is in Revelation:

And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

(Revelation 20:7-10)

And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day—and there will be no night there.

(Revelation 21:23-25)

Quotable: Peter Dray on lukewarm faith

I think often our answer to feeling lukewarm as Christians is to somehow try and whip ourselves up into a frenzy. I remember chatting to a friend a few months ago who felt lukewarm who was trying to take just this course of action. Jesus commands something very different to the church in Laodicea - not 'make yourself passionate', but repent. (source)

Compare and contrast

• Alister McGrath and Richard Dawkins(HT Mark Meynell)
• Woody Allen and Billy Graham (HT Tom Price)

Away for a week or so

I've got my last essay of the year due in next week so I'm going to have to suspend my thinking about justification - and my blogging about it.

I've just read 'Luther, Melanchthon and Paul on the Question of Imputation: recommendations on a current debate' by Mark Seifrid (him again) in (Justification: What's at Stake in the Current Debates ed Mark Husbands and Daniel J. Treier). It was very interesting so I'm going to read it again and blog on it once I have finished my essay (although Peter Leithart (yes him again too) has summarised it probably better than I will anyway).

I've never really read much about (never mind by) Philipp Melanchthon. However I think I can already make one confident assertion about him... he was the funniest looking fellow of all the reformers.

Yet more on justification

I'm still thinking about justification a lot trying to get things straight. I've still got some reading to go. I've just started Justified in Christ which is promising looking collection of essays. Sinclair Ferguson wrote the introduction and seemingly contradicts the viewpoint of Bill Dumbrell which I quoted in the first post documenting my 'quest'. Sinclair Freguson says that:

[For Tom Wright and Jim Dunn] when Paul speaks about justification he is not in fact talking about "the way in" but describing [I think they would say 'declaring'] the status of those already in [... in contrast] evangelicalism has always maintained that the "way in" is justification by faith.

I don't know what to make of this. I would presume that if you think justification is 'forensic' (as Ferguson does) then the natural understanding would be that it is declarative. So the question is when does this justification happen? - in the past (around the time of the new birth) or about the time of the bodily resurrection? But, is this is a false question.?Can it not be both? We are justified 'in Christ' and specifically in his resurrection (cf. Rom 4:25; 1 Tim 3:16). When do we participate in Christ's resurrection? In part following our new birth and fully when Christ comes again. Wright probably focuses too much on the justification of the church in the eyes of the world and so looks almost (perhaps only) to the future. However I don't think it can be an either/or, it is a past(in Christ), present (in the breaking in of Christ's life in new birth), and future (in the raising of the dead) event.

But Ferguson is also suggesting that justification occurs before salvation, and the quotation from Calvin on the cover says the same:

those who were lost have their sins buried and are justified before God, because, as he hates sin, he can love only those whom he has justified.

But what does Paul have to say? Here are a few verses that may help:

'as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men.' (Rom 5:18)

'And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.' (Rom 8:30)

'For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.' (Rom 10:10)

'so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.' (Titus 3:7)

It is clear that justification and salvation/glorification/life are all so wrapped up together so as to be inseparable which seems to make this discussion seem slightly pointless (and after reading Seifrid I now recognise that the reason for much of the theological hair-spliting is because what God is doing is being downplayed at the expense of a human perspective of what is happening with us). Romans 8:30 is particularly interesting though. According to Don Carson 'calling' in Paul means 'effective calling' not just the free offer of the gospel. Therefore, justification happens between new birth and glory. So after you are through the doorway but before the mud has been shaken from your feet and you have been given some clean clothes (although that's only the best of a bad load of illustrations).

Through all of my thinking on this issue though I am sure of one thing. It is God who justifies and our concern should not be the seeking of justification as an abstract thing - and sadly it is sometimes put forward in that way. Our concern should be hearing the word and responding with faith. Our concern is that the gospel that 'Jesus is Lord' is declared and God is made known for his mercy and his judgment. As Seifrid says, first and foremost it is God that is justified in our justification and it is God's justification that ought to be our obsession and delight. Let us not seek to be justified (and if we are seeking justification by our faith then we are turning faith into a work I believe) but seek God and his glory (in which we participate when we are glorified - like everything it is not something that we own but something we share in as we share in Christ).

So those are my preliminary conclusions at this juncture. I hope I've expressed them well.

PS on related matters Piper's forthcoming book on Tom Wright's doctrine of justification is forthcoming and getting very positive reviews from some sensible people (the latest is here). I'm really thankful to God because his last foray on imputed righteousness was a an awful piece of writing. I read the book before it was published in the UK because I was looking forward to it so much but he was out of his depth and it showed. In focusing in narrowly on Tom Wright alone, and putting in the hours seems to have paid off this time. If anyone can be trusted to put God's glory at the centre in a discussion justification it must be John Piper.

Back to work

After that flurry of blogging (if you can call collecting excessive numbers of quotations blogging) I'm going to have to get my head down to study. No longer am I concerned whether 'the law' in Paul means 'the Mosaic covenant', 'the Torah', 'a set of moral commands', or 'the Scriptures'; for the next week or so 'the law' is whatever our judges, our Parliament, or the EU says it is.

But while I'm away please feel free to add your twopence worth on the doctrine of justification in the comments. I'd be interested to know what you think.

Quotable: CH Dodd on 'ethical religion'

CH Dodd argues that the gospels, the epistles, and the Pentatuach all combine 'ethics' and 'religion' in the same way:

first the proclamation, then the beginning of instruction in morals, first kerygma [preaching], then didache [teaching], seems to have been thoroughly characteristic of the Christian mission.

[...]

This way of approach to ethics was sharply distinguished from that of contemporary Greek moralists, who from the time of Aristotle had set our to provide a self-contained and self-justifying system of ethics. For Christianity, ethics are not self-contained or self-justifying; they arise out of a response to the Gospel.

(p. 10, Gospel and Law)

Mark Seifrid takes aim at Tom Wright's biblical meta-narrative

In 'The Narrative of Scripture and Justification by Faith: A Still Fresher Reading of Paul' Mark Seifrid says:

The narrative approach can be in its own way just as radically systematic as any doctrinal outline. It is worth reminding ourselves that just as the Scripture has not been given to us as a dogmatic outline, neither has it been given to us as a single, unified story. It is a collection of narratives, which not only complement one another, but also overlap and stand in tension with one another. There are two accounts of creation in Genesis, two accounts of the Davidic monarchy, four Gospels. The psalms tell and retell the story of Israel in ways that are sometimes remarkably different from one another. More significant than the variations in perspective, and often lying behind these variations are the differing ways in which God encounters his people. We no longer live in Eden, yet God’s quiet governance and preservation of the present world preserves the traces of Eden in it. In this fallen world, however, human beings encounter the God who works not only life and blessing, but also death and destruction, and that not in predictable retribution of evil, but seemingly without reason or cause (cf. Isa 45:7; 1 Sam 2:6).

It is strange that in the same essay Mark Seifrid then seems to criticise Tom Wright's for 'three interrelated tensions in Wright’s reading of Scripture':

1) the tension that we already have touched upon between conditionality and unconditionality within the promise to Abraham as Wright construes it; which leads, secondly, 2) to the central and fundamental tension between the purpose of God for Israel in the gift of Torah and God’s saving work in Christ; and finally 3) the instructive tension between the exclusivity of the gift of Torah to Israel and the universality of God’s saving purpose.'

Still I think its fair to ask whether...

One may therefore reasonably ask whether the implicit narrative which Wright proposes is present at all. Reading between the lines has its weaknesses and dangers.

Church unity and justification, is it illustrative or constitutive

Michael Bird comments

The error is frequently made of mistaking the context of justification with its purpose.There can be no doubt that justification and righteousness are rooted firmly in the debate concerning the identity of the people of God, but it is wrong to think that the verdict rendered in justification can be reduced to sociological descriptions of group-identity and self-definition.

[...]

Is the unity of Jews and Gentiles in the body of Christ illustrative of the effects of justification or is it constitutive in that God's saving righteous [sic] creates a new people, with a new status, in a new covenant, as a foretaste of the new age? I am persuaded that we must pursue the latter. Justification by faith means that God justifies the ungodly and calls our a new people to be the true Israel and the renewed human race.

(p.32-33, The Saving Righteousness of God: Studies on Paul, Justification and the New Perspective)

Mark Seifrid would disagree, and finds the unity of Jews and Gentiles illustrative...

The reason that the inclusion of Gentiles appears so regularly in connection with Paul’s teaching on justification is that their participation in the people of God was a visible expression of the justification of the ungodly (see Gal 2:11-21). Table-fellowship with Gentiles was therefore a call to mission, to the evangelization of the world, a call to an ever-expanding community. This community of Jews and Gentiles was not held together by any visible outward ties, but solely by the invisible bond of faith in the risen Messiah Rom 15:5-13). It was a community of forgiven sinners who came to one another not by means of an ideal of equality (defined on whose terms?), and certainly not by a common culture (cf. Rom 14:1-23), but through Jesus Christ alone. As Paul instructs his readers in Romans 9-11, Israel and the nations were, after all, God’s work. Their varying paths to Christ were the open, visible and necessary indications that God’s mercy, if it is to be mercy, must be radically free.

(The Narrative of Scripture and Justification by Faith: A Still Fresher Reading of Paul)

Quotable: Moo on overhhistoricizing

Douglas Moo in his commentary on Romans states that:

We moderns must beware the tendency to overhistoricize: to focus so much on specific local and personal situations that we miss the larger theological and philosophical concerns of the biblical authors. That Paul was dealing in Romans with immediate concerns in the early church we do not doubt. But, especially in Romans, these issues are ultimately those of the church - and the world - of all ages: the continuity of God's plan of salvation, the sin and need of human beings, God's provision for our sin problem in Christ, the means to a life of holiness, and security in the face of suffering and death. Augustine, Luther, Calvin and Wesley, whatever their failings as exegetes, saw this; and perhaps they understood more clearly than many of their latter-day critics.

(p.22, A Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans. New International Commentary on the New Testament (NICNT). Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996)

This ties in (unintentionally) with the comments in my previous post.

New Perspective v. Old Perspective

What's behind the current debates? Here are a few ideas:

• History v. Theology: If you look at the main proponents of the NPP they all come from a study of Paul that is focused on the history of the early church (this is especially the case with Dunn and Wright), more traditional perspectives often visit the NT looking for theology instead.
• Gospels v. Paul: Sanders, Dunn and Wright have all spent as much time in the gospels as with Paul, traditional Protestants from Luther onwards has always had Paul as their first love.
• Horizontal v. Vertical: NPP proponents are very concerned with reconciling different people (Catholics and Protestants, Jews and Gentiles - esp. clear in earlier writings), where as traditional protestantism has been concerned primarily "how can I find a Gracious God?".

That's not in anyway a complete list but it's what comes to mind at the moment.

Favour in God's eyes

Peter Leithart comments:

By definition, justification must be by grace. Since the eyes are organs of judgment in Scripture, to find "favor in one's eyes" is to be justified. Plus, "favor" just means "grace."

We can put it more strongly: Justified by grace is redundant, since "justified" means "grace in one's eyes."

The author of Genesis says:

The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, "I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them." But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

[...] Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God.

(Genesis 6:5-9)

John Calvin comments on Genesis 6:8:

['Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord'] is a Hebrew phrase, which signifies that God was propitious to him, and favored him. For so the Hebrews are accustomed to speak: [...] here Noah is declared to have been acceptable to God, because, by living uprightly and homily, he kept himself pure from the common pollutions of the world; whence, however, did he attain this integrity, but from the preventing grace of God? The commencement, therefore, of this favor was gratuitous mercy. Afterwards, the Lord, having once embraced him, retained him under his own hand, lest he should perish with the rest of the world.

I'm thinking about justification at the moment. The only one of these three quotations I totally understand is John Calvin's so I think I've got some more thinking to do.

Quotable: Leithart on the Beatitudes

Peter Leithart comments:

The Beatitudes are a description of Jesus. He is meek (11:29). He mourns for Jerusalem (26:36-46). He fulfills righteousness (3:15). He is merciful (9:27; 15:22). And for His trouble He is persecuted, reviled, slandered, and killed. Yet, He is blessed above all men, for in His resurrection He receives the kingdom, is comforted, inherits the earth, is filled, sees God, is declared Son of God.

Much as the Beatitudes are good news for us, they are good news only if we are in Jesus participating in his poverty as well as his glory.

To him be the glory.

Another theory about Romans

If Romans was a very obedient church (as I suggest in my previous post) and Paul was concerned to justify 'his gospel' against detractors (as I suggest here), perhaps large swathes of Romans are written to show that Paul is not an antinomian, and not just Romans 6. However, while he is keen to show this he remembers his experience with the Galatians and wants to make clear that obedience is 'of faith', and this means that obedience must take into account that Jesus has come and so obedience is to what James calls 'the law of liberty' and Paul 'the law of faith'.

Interesting fact

• 26% of the uses of the word 'obedience', and 27% of the uses of the word 'obedient', in the (ESV) bible can be found in Romans.

A theory about the Roman church

The Roman church was a very obedient church (1:8; 6:17; 16:19). However they had a judgemental spirit that was leading to divisions. They certainly did about others having different gifts (12:2-7), eating the 'wrong' foods (14:1-4), and observing certain days (14:5-9). Perhaps certain churches were also involved in judging the Jews, and others the gentiles. Certainly Paul seems concerned to show that both have a place in God's plan. The long list of people Paul greets in chapter 16 suggests to some that there were a lot of small churches in Rome. Perhaps they did not all get along. Perhaps this problem of judgementalism is behind the numerous references to judging yourself as well as others in the early chapters of Romans.

I don't know if my theory is correct. I'll keep on thinking about it.

Paul's concern in Romans

Peter Dray has had me thinking about Romans. I always think the beginning and end of a book are the best bits to find out the author's concerns, and when I looked at Romans sure enough the first and last few sentences contain several similar themes. I think it's likely that the same themes found at both the beginning and end of the letter they will continue throughout the book.

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ,

[...]

Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith— to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ! Amen.

(Romans 1:1-6; 16:25-27)

So here are themes I see in both the beginning and end:

• Paul teaches the true gospel ('a servant of Christ Jesus...'; 'my gospel').
• The gospel is about Jesus ('concerning his son'; 'the preaching of Jesus Christ').
• Gospel was promised in the OT ('promised beforehand through his prophets'; 'through the prophetic writings').
• Mission is to 'all nations' (i.e. including the gentiles).
• The goal of mission is 'the obedience of faith'.
• The ultimate goal of mission is God's glory ('for the sake of his name'; 'to the only wise God be glory').

Things that only occur in one or the other:

• Jesus was descended from David.
• Jesus was declared to be Son of God by resurrection.
• Roman church is called to belong to Jesus.
• God will strengthen the Roman church.
• Mystery (of God's purposes for the gentiles) has been revealed.
• God is the only wise one.

So in summary I think Paul has two main concerns in writing Romans.

1. Justify himself and his gospel against his detractors, principally by showing it is rooted in the OT.
2. Encourage the Romans to get behind his mission to all nations - in particular Spain (15:24) - by showing them God's plan for the gentiles.

I don't think that will surprise many, but never mind - novelty is not the goal.

Justification as aquital not forgiveness

I've been thinking that through lack of disciplined thinking my understanding of justification is in need of some sharpening up. This is thanks largely to a post by Tim Suffield and Michael Jensen's continuing review of Chris Wright's Mission of God. Michael Jensen has been pointing out a lot of Chris Wright's 'conceptual confusions', and I've been thinking that if I were ever to write anything it would be infested with the same problem. So, anyway, you may find me blogging a little on Justification for a while. Today I read this:

If the meaning of justification is forensic, then the understanding of justification is basically 'acquittal'. To be justified is thus to be the recipient of God's favorable verdict in regard to our final state. Justification, whose basis is forgiveness, is not itself forgiveness (with which it is often popularly identified), but the declaration that forgiveness, which confirms our new relationship with God, has been granted. The judge has pronounced in our favor! True, by our acquittal we have been forgiven, but justification is the recognition that forgiveness has occurred, not forgiveness in itself. Forgiveness is the gift, justification its recognition. Justification says that, as a result of forgiveness, we are now in right relationship with God.

Justification by grace through faith announces that we have moved from under the wrath of God to new life in Christ. The basic movement has occurred through the work of the Spirit in regeneration and it is this movement which justification recognizes. [...] Justification is the declaration of our change in status from sinner to membership of the new people of God.

(p. 53, Romans: A New Covenant Commentary, William J. Dumbrell)

I'll have to keep this in mind.

Ephesians and Paul's Theology

It is simply a travesty that the name "Paul" for most people, summons up a pastiche of Romans and Galatians while the other letters are relatively neglected. Ephesians 2.8-10 might make the cut but not much else.

I say it is a travesty because the evidence indicates that Ephesians was probably Paul’s generic tract–a circular letter meant to summarize the Gospel for any Christian in particular rather than an ad hoc letter dealing with a specific pastoral agenda for a particular church. Thus, if one wants to understand the foundations of "Pauline Theology," Ephesians would be the natural place to begin. (source)

Mightily interesting comment. It is common to believe that Ephesians is a circular letter but this is the first time I have read the corollary that therefore it is in Ephesians rather than Romans that we should look for the summary and structure of Paul's theology.

Why has this not been brought to my attention before? Perhaps because despite the strength of Evangelical scholarship the framework still being operated in is a liberal one where the authenticity of Ephesians is denied. Perhaps though the obsession with 'discovering' Paul's theology is a framework from liberal biblical studies anyway.

Still, its a statement worthy of further thought.