There are piles of good works around, near to hand

Martin Luther's Treatise on Good Works was described by Melanchthon, in a letter to John Hess, as Luther's best book.

It is a cracking little read. A short 100 page exposition of the 10 commandments that brings the Decalogue alive in a way I have read no other writer do.

A refrain throughout the book are comments like this:

Now see what kind of good works a householder and a mistress can do! How splendidly God shows us all good works so near at hand, in such a variety and so continuously that we need not ask for good works to do and could well forget all those works devised by men, the showy, far-flung works, such as making pilgrimages, building churches, seeking indulgences, and things like that. (p. 180, Selected Writings of Martin Luther: Vol 1, ed. by Theodore G. Tappert)

What is striking about Luther in this book is his evident joy that there are a plethora of good works for us to do, and they are near at hand. I must confess that this actually fills me with trepidation for the future and guilt for the past because although good works are what we are saved for (Ephesians 2:10), I have time and again chosen not to live in that salvation.

So how can I develop that joy in the opportunity to do good? Luther is clear from the beginning:

Look here! This is how you must cultivate Christ in yourself, and see how in him God holds before you his mercy and offers it to you without any prior merits of your own. It is from such a view of his grace that you must draw faith and confidence in the forgiveness of all your sins. Faith, therefore, does not originate in works; neither do works create faith, but faith must spring up and flow from the blood and wounds and death of Christ. (p.120, ibid)

As good Protestants we all know it, but all forget it. Works flow from faith, not the other way round. If you have a couple of more minutes read Luther's classic description of faith from his 'An Introduction to St. Paul's Letter to the Romans'

The crowded judgment seat

If you were to imagine Judgment day you may imagine God the Father on the judgment seat meeting out our just deserts and Jesus jumping in at certain points to shout 'this one is mine'. Perhaps you haven't been reading the Apostles' Creed, or your Bible because it will be Christ in the judgment seat.

"Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy before the Lord, for he comes, for he comes to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples in his faithfulness." (Psalm 96:12-13)

"The Lord has taken his place to contend; he stands to judge peoples." (Isaiah 3:13)

"The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son" (John 5:22)

"And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that [Jesus] is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead." (Acts 10:42)

"he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." (Acts 17:31)

"Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead" (2 Timothy 4:1)

But wait a moment! Perhaps it is still not that simple. For if you really were reading your bible you would find out that the Church will be occupying the judgment seat too!

"the Ancient of Days came, and judgment was given for the saints of the Most High, and the time came when the saints possessed the kingdom." (Daniel 7:22)

"Jesus said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.'" (Matthew 19:28)

"do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life!" (1 Corinthians 6:2-3)

"Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years." (Revelation 20:4)

• How do you fit these passages into your understanding of Judgment day?
• How do you fit these passage into your understanding of your justification?
• How do you fit these passages into your understanding of the Trinity?
• How do you fit these passages into your understanding of what you are saved too?
• How do you fit these passages into your understanding of passages such as 'Judge not, that you be not judged' (Matthew 7:1; cf. Romans 14:13)? (perhaps 1 Corinthians 4:5 offers a clue)

Who's side is God on?

I have been refamiliarising myself with Tom Wright's stimulating reading of Paul in recent days by listening again to his series of lectures on Romans. I think I am clarifying more in my mind where I think he occasionally takes wrong turnings, and reminding myself again how I need to read Paul with much more focus on the OT background.

The most important wrong turn I think Wright makes is in deciding who's side God is on in the metaphorical law-court and is summarised in this quote:

...in Daniel chapter 7 you have exactly this scenario of God as the judge surprisingly vindicating Israel as his oppressed people and judging the wicked beasts who have been attacking her. That is the apocalyptic scenario of the covenantal law-court. Or if you like, the covenant scenario interpreted as a great law-suit. Now of course there are passages in the Old Testament which also speak of God and Israel being at law with one another, but that is essentially a secondary thing.

(Romans in a Week, Lecture 3: Romans 1:1-3:20, Part II)

Again and again, as I read the Prophets I am struck by the opposite. The Prophets, unlike so many other religious people, do not focus on condemning those outside their group and argue how God is on their side against those outside, but rather the opposite. Israel is singled out for the harshest criticism and the most devastating judgements.

Yes, God does promise to take Israel's side against her enemies, but only after he has judged them.

Wright in the same lecture helpfully draws attention to how the Isaiah/Ezekiel quote in 2:24 functions in Paul's argument. Paul backs up his argument that those 'who boast in the law dishonour God by breaking the law' by quoting the Prophets' statement that 'the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you' (Ez 36:23; Is 52:5). When you consider their original context we see that Paul is arguing that the Jews should know that they broke the law because they were sent into exile as judgment by God upon them. But in quoting this passage he is also alluding to God's message in both OT passages that for the sake of his name God is going to redeem his people from the place of being judged by him, to the place of restoration. There is hope on the other side of judgment which has to be grasped by faith.

In the law-court Paul is clear who's side God is on, and it is not ours. God inflicts wrath on us (3:5) not our oppressors. The 'but' of 3:21 is precious though. For God's judgment (his righteousness) is revealed apart from the law, in Christ who died for our trespasses (4:35). God is now 'for us' (8:31).

God's righteousness is a saving righteousness not because our enemies are judged but because we are judged in Christ who was raised for our justification.

Seifrid says it better than me:

justification comes only through condemnation, life only through death. The way in which Paul connects the opening discussion in verse 18 to verse 17 signals this relationship: '...the righteous one shall live by faith, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven ...' If he had been thinking of a strict antitheses, one would have expected here a concession, an 'even if'. God's saving righteousness is revealed in the gospel precisely because God himself comes to his own righteousness in the cross of Christ. This simultaneous justification of God and the sinner drives Paul's argument in 1:18-3:26. (p. 48, Christ Our Righteousness: Paul's Theology of Justification, Apollos)

Apologies to those who are fed up of me banging on about the same things. But I don't think I will ever tire of it (by God's grace).

Reflecting again on Tom Wright's Paul

Tom Wright has written a new book on Justification, in part to respond to John Piper.

I was listening to Tom Wright on Romans the other day and he observed that 'Righteousness of God' had three dimensions:

1. Covenant
2. Law-court
3. Eschatology

The key to the current debate is that he makes the covenantal dimension of Paul's Righteousness/Justification the 'fundamental' dimension (to quote his lecture). Most of the focus in debate has been on word studies of the dikaiosune (Righteousness/Justification) word group. There are places where this word group seems to be fundamentally covenantal (e.g. Second Isaiah) but the chips are (in my mind) stacked in the traditional interpretation's favour because the language is from the law-court in the first place (at least). To settle things though the debate has to be far wider and involve the whole of Paul's theology and ask: 'where is the centre of Paul's theology?' Once you have answered that as 'the covenant' then you can do as Wright does and 'translate back into covenantal categories' (p.43, Letter to the Romans) any language which is not covenantal in the first place. Of course if the law-court is central then you can do the same in the other direction.

I am persuaded for the moment to give the law-court pole position in this contest (see here for why) but suspect that the answer may be simpler. If you were to ask the mythical average man in the pew what was the centre of Paul's theology he would immediately answer Jesus Christ, or particularly Jesus Christ crucified. And here perhaps is the answer. Neither the law-court nor the covenant are central, they are both interdependent but separate metaphors which are trying to describe something bigger than both of them, that 'in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself'.

In my head I keep on coming back to Mark Seifrid's comment that only in Jesus is there synthesis when 'the election of Israel and the demand of the Law meet in Christ, the crucified and risen. The tension within early Jewish thought between grace and demand was resolved in an event, not a higher idea' (pp. 5-6, 'The "New Perspective on Paul" and Its Problems', Themelios, Issue 25-2). I don't know if Seifrid would agree with how I spin him but there we go.

Again and again, I learn that theologians (and more often I) sometimes lose the wood for the trees. We do so love to replace Christ with an idea.

The Distinctive Mosaic Law

Elizabeth Anscombe has an admirable summary of the distinctiveness of the Mosaic Law:

For example, it greatly heightens his own notion of the paramountcy of God,; it absolutely forbids superstition, 'seeking truth from the dead', concern with omens, soothsaying; if we suppose him [a 'seeker after God'] acquainted with, say, Arabian tribes of the fiercer sort, we can also suppose that he is struck by the prescriptions tending to check the licence and bloody revenge natural among such people; the arrangements tending to make impossible the casual jetttisoning of wives and the killing of those who have suddenly or accidentally killed your relations. for while revenge was forbidden as a matter of personal ethic, it is also made difficult as a matter of public law by the establishment of the cities of refuge. He notes the prohibition on punishing any but the offender - remember that even Roman law, as codified by a Christian Emperor, permitted the destruction of the family and close associates of a man found guilty of treason against the state; but the Mosaic law forbade it. He notes the restriction on stripes as a punishment to forty 'lest thy brother become vile in they sight' - equally astonishing when you think of Roman floggings, or floggings in the British navy up to quite recent times. There is no torture in the Mosaic law: remember again that the Code of Justinian retained the requirement to torture slaves as witnesses. He notes the fact that if you so much as knocked out the tooth of a slave, he was to go free; the asylum to runaway slaves from the nations round about, the prohibition on man-stealing; the provision whereby you could not send a slave or bondman away if he had married in your house and chose to remain; the provisions forbidding persecution of poor debtors. He sees the contrast between the estimation of offences against property [...] and offences against the person and sexual offences.

(italics original, p. 35, 'Prophecy and Miracles' in Faith in a Hard Ground: Essays on Religion, Philosophy and Ethics)

The essay itself is very good, and I think I will read it again and maybe even post a summary.

The forgotten Father

I've just written in a comment: "I get to know Jesus as the one who loves us so much that he laid down his life for me". This is not wrong, but it is unlike most NT language. Spot the difference...

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

"God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8)

"He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all" (Romans 8:32)

"God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ" (Ephesians 2:4-5)

"the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 4:9-10)

The difference is that the NT emphasis (perhaps anticipating people like me) is on the Father's love for us in sending his Son, not the Son independently coming to us. Although other passages explain that Jesus loved us too (e.g. Ephesians 5:2). As if that was not enough, the emphasis in the NT is on the Son's death reconciling us to the Father and revealing him (Romans 5:10; 2 Corinthians 5:18).

I am either harbouring a view of the death of Christ that deserves the name 'cosmic child abuse' or a monistic view of God who is occasionally called by different names (Jesus, God, Father, YHWH etc).

The parable of the prodigal son as incomplete gospel

The parable of the prodigal son is receiving a lot of attention at the moment. So I thought I'd share a taster of PT Forsyth on the passage:

There are those who say you have the whole of the gospel really in the parable of the prodigal son, that that was the culmination of Christ's grand revelation of God...But you have not the whole gospel in the parable of the prodigal son...

Now the one ruling idea in the parable of the prodigal son is the idea of the centrality, the completeness, the unreservedness, the freeness, fullness, whole-heartedness of God's grace - the absolute fullness of it, rather that the method of its action. But however a parable might preach that fullness, it took the Cross and all its train to give it effect, to put it into action, life, and history, to charge it with the Spirit...Hence as to the method of God's free and flowing grace the parable has nothing to say. It does not even say that the father was seeking the prodigal. The seeking grace of God we find there as little as the redeeming grace....

[The prodigal can only be sure of the father's forgiveness if] the father not only says but pays. His mere repentance could not make him sure, could not place him at home again, could not put him where he set out. His mere repentance could turn his heart to his father, but it could not break the bar and fill him with certainty of his father's love and forgiveness. And that is what the sinner wants, and what the great and classic penitents find it so hard to believe. Now, the parable tells us of the freeness of God's grace, and its fullness, but the Cross enacts it and inserts it in real history. It shows to what length that grace could go in dealing with a difficulty otherwise insuperable when we turn from a single prodigal to a world...the act of Christ's Cross - is not simply to produce individual repentance, but it has its great effect upon the relation of the whole world to God. And the judgment, the payment, was on that scale. (The Work of Christ, pp.106-111)

I am not ashamed to ask the question

At work I have a colleague who asks me, again and again, why it is that God did not create human beings incapable of sinning. He is obviously far from satisfied with my answers, and I can't blame him. What would you say? You must have been asked the question.

Cur Deus Homo has a brief aside about the question. In contrast to the rest of the book this section is as clear as mud to me. Nevertheless Anselm's answer manages to shut up his dialogue partner...

Boso: given that God is capable of creating such a man, why did he not make the angels and the first two human beings such that they would likewise be both incapable of sinning and worthy of praise for their righteousness?

Anselm: Do you understand what you are saying?

Boso: It seems to me that I understand it, and that is why I am asking why he did not make them like this.

Anselm: This was because it was neither right nor possible for it to be brought about that any one of them should be identical with God, as is the case, so we are saying, with this man [Jesus, who is righteous and incapable of sin 'independently']. And if you ask why he does not bring this about for as many such human beings as there are persons of God, or why he did not at least do it for one of them, I answer that reason did not at all demand that this should be done: rather, since God does nothing irrationally, it prohibited this.

Boso: I am ashamed at having asked this question.

(Cur Deus Homo, Book 2, Chap 10)

Now I don't want to shut up my friend so completely, but want I do want him to be pointed to him who does make us incapable of sin. So I'm not ashamed to ask such a question of my intelligent readers, in the hope of fresh insight.

Top ten films I saw in 2008

This list is more for me than anyone else. But I would strongly recommend that everyone see number 1 on the list. I really do believe it is a genuine masterpiece. (Watch it on a big screen if you can.)

1. There Will be Blood
2. No Country For Old Men
3. Wall-E
4. Juno
5. The Dark Knight
6. Changeling
7. The Duchess
8. Sweeney Todd
9. Burn after Reading
10. Iron Man

Why am I not blogging?

To be honest I'm not really sure. Perhaps it is because I'm busy... but that has never stopped me before.

I think it has to be due to the fact that I'm doing a decent amount of reading. I've recently read, or I'm in the middle of:

• The Work of Christ by PT Forsyth. Amazing to read an entire book on the atonement again. He is an engaging writer who thinks really deeply and originally. I don't think I really got it till the end, but he is very thought-provoking. I greatly enjoyed it, although I wouldn't agree with all of it.
• The Shack by William P. Young. The book of Job if it had been written by a 21st century Christian who has a problem with authority.
• Dogmatics in Outline by Karl Barth. Beautiful, moving, massive yet concise. Lots of questions but I'm beginning to understand why his impact was so huge.
• Faith in a Hard Ground: Essays on Religion, Philosophy and Ethics by G E M Anscombe. Interesting lady, but crazily hard to understand. Is she right or wrong... I simply can't compute.
• The Road by Cormac McCarthy. A dying world with a total lack of hope and humans that lie to themselves about their future and their present. Wonderfully written. I read it in a single evening. Thanks Steve.
• Cur Deus Homo by Anselm. A clear and simple walk through reasons why the atonement had to be substitutionary, with less weird asides than I'm used to in ancient Christian books.

Next on my list: Rowan Williams, TF Torrance, and John Murray.

What I'm trying to say is that because of my request for recommendations and other factors I've been reading more widely than usual and I feel like I am so far from getting my bearings that I cannot manage even my usual half-baked thoughts which I pass of as posts.

I'm sure you are not missing me.

As an aside I have just come across a bunch of excellent looking MP3 lectures by some top-notch scholars from a recent conference on 'Reading the Decalogue through the Centuries'. I've listened to Timothy Wengert on Luther's view of the Decalogue which was very good. I'm looking forward to listening to some more.

Mental illness and the Gospel

About one in four people in the UK suffer from a mental illness (source). Probably the most challenging thing that has happened in the last two years of my life has been to discover its destructive power over so many people's lives.

I am extremely grateful to Steve Timmis and Tim Chester in particular for making me see how the Gospel is relevant to this as with any area of life - hard though it is to apply it. Tim Chester has just posted on depression, and there is more from Steve Timmis here. I encourage you to read/listen and absorb it.

Bavinick on the Lutherans and the Reformed

I'm supposed to have loads of free time at the moment but for some reason haven't had time to do much thinking recently, and hence no blogging. But as usual I return to blogging when I need to get down a quote for future reflection...

I found the quote from Bavinick below quite helpful in my continuing quest to get a handle on Lutheranism. It was mentioned in a comment here which follows an interesting post and discussion.

The difference seems to be conveyed best by saying that the Reformed Christian thinks theologically, the Lutheran anthropologically. The Reformed person is not content with an exclusively historical stance but raises his sights to the idea, the eternal decree of God. By contrast the Lutheran takes his position in the midst of the history of redemption and feels no need to enter more deeply into the counsel of God.

For the Reformed, therefore, election is the heart of the church; for Lutherans, justification is the article by which the church stands or falls. Among the former the primary question is: How is the glory of God advanced? Among the latter it is: How does a human get saved? The struggle of the former is above all against paganism - idolatry; that of the latter against Judaism - works-righteousness. The Reformed person does not rest until he has traced all things retrospectively to the divine decree, tracking down the "wherefore" of things, and has prospectively made all things subservient to the glory of God; the Lutheran is content with the "that" and enjoys the salvation in which he is, by faith, a participant. From this difference in principle, the dogmatic controversies between them (with respect to the image of God, original sin, the person of Christ, the order of salvation, the sacraments, church government, ethics, etc.) can be easily explained. (Reformed Dogmatics 1:177)

The temptation in such discussions is to start getting partisan and claim superiority over the other. I think that is difficult position to maintain. As John H comments 'Vive la différence'!

Incidental notes:

1. I like Kletos Sumboulos' comment that '"Among the latter it is: How does a human get saved?" should read "Among the latter it is: What has Christ done for us?"'
2. I wonder how this links to Melanchthon's famous comment 'to know Christ means to know his benefits' which I am still trying to properly understand.

How we grow

I'm feeling the force of this hymn right now...

I ask’d the Lord that I might grow
In faith, and love, and every grace;
Might more of His salvation know,
And seek more earnestly His face.

‘Twas He who taught me thus to pray,
And He, I trust, has answered prayer;
But it has been in such a way
As almost drove me to despair.

I hoped that in some favour’d hour
At once He’d answer my request,
And by His love’s constraining power
Subdue my sins and give me rest.

Instead of this, He made me feel
The hidden evils of my heart,
And let the angry powers of hell
Assault my soul in every part.

Yea, more, with His own hand He seem’d
Intent to aggravate my woe;
Cross’d all the fair designs I schemed,
Blasted my gourd, and laid me low.

Lord, why is this: I trembling cried,
Wilt Thou pursue Thy worm to death: ‘
‘Tis in this way,’ the Lord replied,
‘I answer prayer for grace and faith.

These inward trials I employ
From self and pride to set thee free;
And break thy schemes of earthly joy
That thou may’st seek thy all in Me.’

(John Newton. Olney Hymns (1799), Book III, 36)

We have a strange God.

Obedience of faith

I've been away on holiday in the Lakes so sorry for the lack of posting. I have not got much to post right now but the books I ordered on peoples recommendations have arrived so I'll start having a go at them soon.

While I'm here though I'd just like to note down a parallel before I forget it.

A much disputed phrase in modern Pauline studies is the phrase 'the obedience of faith' which is particularly important as it appears at the beginning and end of Romans (1:5 and 16:26):

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

...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.

I've just realised that Paul seems to be seeing in his ministry the fulfilment of Jacob's blessing in Genesis 49:10:

The scepter shall not depart from Judah,
nor the ruler's staff from between his feet,
until tribute comes to him;
and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.

Who says Paul doesn't talk about the Kingdom of God?

From a lover of love...

PT Forsyth:

I was turned from a Christian to a believer, from a lover of love to an object of grace

(somewhere in p. 281ff of Positive Preaching and the Modern Mind)

Taking sides

In faith, one takes the side of God in his claim against one's self, giving God justice. At the same time, one takes hold of God's gift in Christ, whom he has 'put forward' as an atonement and in whom he has taken the side of the sinner. In Christ and in faith, the justification of God the Creator meets the justification of the godless.

(Mark A. Seifrid, p. 18, 'The "New Perspective on Paul" and Its Problems', Themelios, Issue 25-2

PS. I'm still hoping for book recommendations...

Random Law and Gospel things

1. Hosea

Reading Hosea 1 last night I was painfully aware of my whoring after other gods. That I didn't believe Jesus was the source of all good and went looking for it elsewhere. That word of judgment felt so real, and so final, because I could see that the rest of my life I would just not stop repeating. But then God said "I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People 'You are my people'" (2:23). That word would have no comfort if you were not called Lo-ruhama ('No Mercy'). If God has mercy on you before then there is no word of mercy for you now. That is law and Gospel in action.

2. The cross drawing threads together

One thing that has always struck me about the OT is the finality of many of the pronouncements of punishment. So often it seems that this is not just discipline, this is judgment. It is not a warning of what may happen, but it is a dark promise of what is going to happen. And yet contradictions to these dark words always surface. This has always caused me a little bit of a problem. The doctrine of law and Gospel has helped sort this out for me. Mark Seifrid tends to put it better than most when he comments that there are different and contridictory words from God in the bible to us, but no resolution of them apart from in the event of Jesus' death and resurrection. For example in commenting on the Sander's characterisation of Second Temple Judaism as Covenantal Nomism he argues that Sanders' has actually reduced Second Temple Judaism to Covenantalism without the Nomism. In contrast in the past scholars have focused on the Nomism without the Covenantalism. "In other words in the rabbinic materials, 'covenantalism' (Sanders' 'covenantal nomism') stands alongside 'nomism' without the overarching synthesis which Sanders has proposed". "Rather than striving to produce a system in which all contradictions were eliminated, the rabbis view salvation from (at least) these two independent perspectives". Only in Jesus is there synthesis when "the election of Israel and the demand of the Law meet in Christ, the crucified and risen. The tension within early Jewish thought between grace and demand was resolved in an event, not a higher idea" (pp. 5-6, 'The "New Perspective on Paul" and Its Problems', Themelios, Issue 25-2

3. Law and Gospel as uses or effects

Something that has also helped me understand the doctrine of law and Gospel is the realisation that the same words in scripture can function as both. Stephen D. Paulson provides some helpful examples in a great essay (if you can get hold of it):

The two classic examples of this in Luther are his use of the first commandment and the proclamation of the cross and resurrection. "I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods before me" produces both fear and love, and in one word or phrase gives both law and gospel grammatically. Its function will depend upon the receiving of faith or the hearing apart from faith. One hears the "I am" as the basis for the "you shall," and the other vice versa.

By the same token, the proclamation of the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, though one sermon or word, has very different effects. When Peter says, "let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified" (Acts 2:36), the hearers "were cut to the heart." A short time later, and in very different circumstances, the same sermon is preached and, "While Peter was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word" (Acts 10:44), and the hearers were heard extolling god in tongues.

(p.174, 'Law and Gospel: Two Preaching Offices", Dialog, Vol 39, No.3, Fall 2000)

4. Barth's Gospel-Law

One thing I have gathered in my limited reasoning is that Barth famously reversed the traditional order of law and Gospel. I have for the first time come across a hint of why, in his brilliant little book Dogmatics in Outline that I am reading:

Gospel and law are not to be separated; they are one, in such a way that the gospel is the primary thing, that the glad tidings are first in the field and, as such, include the law. Because God is for us, we may also be for Him. Because He has given Himself to us, we may also in gratitude give Him the trifle which we have to give. (p.19)

So the reversal comes from one of Barth's primary concerns that God reveals himself to us, and before that we can have nothing to do with him. God is gracious to reveal himself and so obviously before he does that the law doesn't come into it.

I am glad that I have the first inkling of what Barth was trying to get at.

Any recommendations?

After 4 years of studying law I now have at least 10 months without having to decipher a case report, so have a quite a bit of time on my hands. At the same time I'm feeling unusually unexcited about the books on my waiting-to-be-read list.

The comments box is open. What are your must-read books that I should read this winter? I will buy and read at least one from every comment.

Total Church Conference Audio

Audio from the North American Total Church Conference including Tim Chester and Steve Timmis is now available here (HT Tim Chester).

Some problems with Luther's theology

Just in case you were beginning to think that I think Luther is perfect...

If I had to do without one or the other - either the works or the preaching of Christ - I would rather do without the works than without his preaching. For the works do not help me, but his words give life, as he himself says [John 6:63]. Now John writes very little about the works of Christ, but very much about his preaching, while the other evangelists write much about his works and little about his preaching. Therefore John's Gospel is the one, fine, true and chief gospel, and is far, far to be preferred over the other three and placed high above them. So, too, the epistles of St. Paul and St. Peter far surpass the other three gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke.

("Preface to the New Testament" (1546), in Luther's Works, Vol. 35, p. 357)

Can we blame Luther for two of the problems that have continued today? An emphasis on the didactic rather than narrative parts of the Bible, and a approach that listens only to what it already agrees with.

I think we can but I also recognise that these two issues come out of some of the strengths of Luther's theology. Firstly, the Bible is not a book of examples for us to follow, but God speaking to us. Secondly, the recognition that the Bible points beyond itself to Jesus. However, I think they are still serious problems... I need to think more about this.

Viewing the church with the eyes of faith

Martin Luther writes:

This article, "I believe in the holy Christian Church," is as much an article of faith as the rest. This is why natural reason cannot recognize it, even if it puts on all its glasses. The devil can cover it over with offences and divisions, so that you have to take offence at it. God too can conceal it behind faults and shortcomings of all kinds so that you necessarily become a fool and pass false judgment on it. Christendom will not be known by sight, but by faith. And faith has to do with things not seen

("Preface to the Revelation of St. John [II]" (1546), in Luther's Works, Vol. 35, p. 410)

This connects with the Magisterial Reformers understanding of the marks of the church. Calvin writes:

Wherever we see the word of God sincerely preached and heard, wherever we see the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there we cannot have any doubt that the Church of God has some existence, since his promise cannot fail, "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them" (Mt. 18:20)

[...]

We have said that the symbols by which the Church is discerned are the preaching of the word and the observance of the sacraments, for these cannot anywhere exist without producing fruit and prospering by the blessing of God.

(Institutes 4.1.9-10)

The reason that the preaching of the word and administration of the sacraments were identified as marks of the church was because of faith that these would not be without effect. God had promised that his word would not go forth without achieving his aim, so that must be the case. We may see evidence to contradict this but we have faith in God and his promises.

I need to do some thinking on how this relates to the renewed interest in the church as community. We are rediscovering that we are not independent souls that do not need each other but were saved as a body. However, this seems to be happening while we at the same time we judge that the Church is something we can define, see and touch. Today we rarely hear about the Reformers' marks of the Church, although we often hear about the mark being love.

I see both viewpoints as true to the Bible and experience, but I am concerned that I don't know how to relate them to each other. I suspect it has to do with eschatology.

On trusting authority

The wise author of nature hath planted in the human mind a propensity to rely upon human testimony before we can give a reason for doing so. This, indeed, puts our judgment almost entirely in the power of those who are about us in the first period of life; but this is necessary both to our preservation and to our improvement. If children were so framed as to pay no regard to testimony or authority, they must, in the literal sense, perish for lack of knowledge. I believed by instinct whatever they [my 'parents and tutors'] told me, long before I had the idea of a lie, or a thought of the possibility of their deceiving me. Afterwards, upon reflection, I found they had acted like fair and honest people, who wished me well. I found that, if I had not believed what they told me, before I could give a reason for my belief, I had to this day been little better than a changeling. And although this natural credulity hath sometimes occasioned my being imposed upon by deceivers, yet it hath been of infinite advantage to me upon the whole; therefore, I consider it as another good gift of Nature.

(Thomas Reid, "Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man", in R. Beanblossom and K. Lehrer (eds.), Thomas Reid's Inquiry and Essays (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1983), pp. 281-82, cited in "Pyrrhon, Pyrrhus and the Possibility of the Past: A Response to David Henige" by Iain Provan, JSOT 27.4 (2003) 413-438)

Having quoted that because I think it is quite wise, I hasten to add that my faith is not that of my father's, in a great many different ways.

Random law fact from my 2 weeks of law overload:

• "George Bernard Shaw left money in his will on trust to develop a 40 letter alphabet (Re Shaw, Public Trustee v. Day [1957] 1 WLR 729)". The trust was held to be invalid.

The NT witness

From a great post from Glen Scrivener summing up the philosophy behind some of his recent posts on the parables

New Testament does not mean 'gospel'. It doesn’t mean 'gospel' any more than Old Testament means 'gospel'. Rather, both are witnesses to Christ.

You see it’s not the New Testament that fulfils the Old

No. Jesus fulfils the OT, not the NT. There’s a difference. It’s He that stands above both Scriptures.

[...]

The Old is in need of fulfilment in Christ yes. But so is the New. To understand Old or New demands that we read them as witness to Jesus.

It reminds me a little of The Solid Declaration of the Formula of Concord:

the term Gospel is not always employed and understood in one and the same sense, but in two ways, in the Holy Scriptures, as also by ancient and modern church teachers. For sometimes it is employed so that there is understood by it the entire doctrine of Christ, our Lord, which He proclaimed in His ministry upon earth, and commanded to be proclaimed in the New Testament, and hence comprised in it the explanation of the Law and the proclamation of the favor and grace of God, His heavenly Father, as it is written, Mark 1, 1: The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And shortly afterwards the chief heads are stated: Repentance and forgiveness of sins [...] So Paul, too, calls his entire doctrine the Gospel, Acts 20, 21; but he embraces the sum of this doctrine under the two heads: Repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. [...] Furthermore the term Gospel is employed in another, namely, in its proper sense, by which it comprises not the preaching of repentance, but only the preaching of the grace of God, as follows directly afterwards, Mark 1, 15, where Christ says: Repent, and believe the Gospel. (source)

Although I'm also thankful to Glen for reminding me to make what I think the Gospel is fit Christ, and not Christ fit what I think the Gospel is (see his excellent post "Jesus, not some Christ-principle").

Rejecting reconciliation not revelation

Most modern Christian apologetics is a response to the Enlightenment and its apparent rejection of Christian revelation in favour of rationalism.

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This reading of the history of Western thought has been challenged by Stephen Williams in his book, Revelation and Reconciliation. Williams argues that modern atheism has its roots elsewhere. The rejection of revelation is only a symptom of an underlying problem. The real problem is the rejection of the idea or reconciliation and all that is implicit in that idea: moral accountability to the Creator, human helplessness, and reconciliation with God through a substitutionary sacrifice. The underlying issue was not a rejection of the possibility of revelation, but a rejection of the actuality of revelation.

(pp.159-161, Tim Chester & Steve Timmis, Total Church: A radical reshaping around gospel and community, IVP)

I think it is right that the Enlightenment was not firstly a rejection of supernaturalism and so revelation. I think it had more to do with rejection of authority (rather than reconciliation). Having said that, God's saving action is where his authority is most clearly demonstrated (that was what the OT writers thought, e.g. Exodus 7:5, and NT writers followed when they said that 'Jesus is Lord').

Back to the internet

You will be pleased to know my revision is going well, but I'm allowing myself an evening of Internet after 5 days without it. The Desiring God Conference has been going off and lots of people are linking to the talks. I think I may skip them this year and listen to Still Deeper Conference talks which has some interesting titles and interesting people speaking.

Interestingly Total Church by Tim Chester and Steve Timmis is one of the Desiring God Conference recommended books. I've recently finished it and may even get round to a proper review at some point (probably another empty promise!) but I'm really pleased DG have recommended it. It deserves a wide readership.