Furnished with reason that has a heart

In Luther's brilliant exposition of the First Commandment in his Large Catechism he says something rather strange:

it is the trust and faith of the heart alone that make both God and an idol.

Oswald Bayer, in his explanation of Luther's theology of the human being explains where that sort of thinking is coming from:

The human being is animal rationale, habens cor fingens - a being furnished with reason that has a heart, which imagines, makes pictures, invents...There are thus two basic powers that drive the human being - his rational consciousness and his utopian consciousness. The one defines the intellectual interaction with the world of human beings and is primarily oriented toward the present; the other is located in the realm of the imagination, which focuses primarily on the past and the future - interpreting the past and projecting into the future....The power of imagination fabricates images - sketches of goals for life, of happiness, as well as images of fears about disaster. They are all rational remembrances, diagnoses, prognoses, guided by images that the human heart has imagined and produced, by pictures of fear and hope, which once again are grounded in certain experiences.

Luther's definiton of the human being as an animal rationale, habens cor fingens has its theological validity within creation, but is to be understood first of alll...as a theological description of sin.... In an exactly parallel way, Calvin says: "the fantasy of the human being is a factory that works ceaselessly to make idols."

This is correct if the circumstances of the sinful situation are at are at issue. But at the same time, that which identifies what is appropriate to the creation in this formula still remains: even in faith I am cor fingens, in that I praise God by letting God by God, in that I, when I - in spiritual, spirit motivated (Col 3:16) creativity - accord to him what is appropriate to him. The cor fingens is at work even in a poetic song of praise, but in the sense that it offers thanks. Thus Luther's famous phrase fides creatrix divinitatis [faith is the creator of divinity] is to be understood as follows: the faith is the creator of the deity, to be sure, non in persona sua, sed in nobis - not in and of itself, but in us. We make God to be God, that we give him what is due to him; we let God be God.

(pp.174-175, Martin Luther's Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation)

Can't say I understand it deeply, or that I know what to make of it. But its interesting.

Why believe in the resurrection of Jesus?

Listening to: Pink Floyd: Wish You Were Here

[I've been asked by someone to explain why I believe in the resurrection. I'm just trying to get some thoughts together before I write. As I've got a few days I thought I'd throw down my first thoughts of a plan in the likely event that it could do with some improvements. Unfortunately I haven't really thought about this in a structured way for a long, long time. Nobody usually asks me about it! No time for much fresh reading or a masterpiece, but any suggestions appreciated. I'm particularly concerned about handling part 1. as that seems quite tricky to do right.... I must admit - I'm a bit nervous about posting any of it though in case it falls on the wrong side of anyone in the fat apologetics debate on Glen's blog.]

1. Limits of reasons

   (a) intellectual: Any experience of any kind can be explained away. People start with assumptions about the impossibility of miracles which would prevent them believing accounts of miracles even if they did happen.

   (b) moral: our unwillingness to believe the Gospel because of its implications.

   (c) Resurrection as starting point: Necessary given nature of God as ultimate authority. Witness of the Holy Spirit.

   (d) 'Fit' with experience/reason/historical method: Explanatory power of the bible's message. Personal experience. Role of reasons within framework of the resurrection as starting point.

2. Biblical account

   (a) The empty tomb: failings of alternative explanations.

   (b) Witnesses: Women, early writings of Paul when witnesses still alive.

   (c) Changed disciples: Fear to boldness (the 12), enemies to friends (Paul), spread of the Gospel, martyrs, miracles of disciples.

3. Ancient worldviews

   (a) similarities/dissimilarities with Jewish worldview

   (b) dissimilarities with Greek worldview

   (c) Chronological snobbery: common-sense of ancient society

4. The church

   Resurrection life in believers.

5. Good news

   Jesus is Lord. Therefore death and sin defeated. Hope for eternal life and adoption. Physicality and personality retained.

Books I'm leaning on: The Reason for God (Keller), Basic Christianity (Stott), Surprised by Hope (Wright), The Case for Christ (Strobel), Gospel in a Pluralistic Society (Newbigin)

Newbigin on Science

Further to my ambitious recent post about TF Torrance on science, here is a quote from Lesslie Newbigin which has some overlap:

Like all visions of ultimate truth, science is necessarily involved in a circular argument. It has to assume from the beginning the truth of what it seeks to prove. It begins from the conviction that the universe is acessible to rational understanding, it refuses to accept as final evidence that which seems to contradict this faith, and it seeks with a passion which is one of the glories of human history to prove that the faith is true.

(p.48, The Gospel in a pluralist society)

A bible study on Colossians 2:6-15

Listening to: Andrew Bird: Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs

Feedback welcome.

2My goal is that they may be encouraged in heart and united in love, so that they may have the full riches of complete understanding, in order that they may know the mystery of God, namely, Christ, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. 4 I tell you this so that no one may deceive you by fine-sounding arguments. 5 For though I am absent from you in body, I am present with you in spirit and delight to see how disciplined you are and how firm your faith in Christ is.

6 So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, 7 rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

8 See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.

9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. 11 In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your sinful nature was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.

13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having cancelled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. (TNIV)

• What was the Colossians' problem before they were Christians (vv. 13-14)? [Dead/indebted/condemned/power and authorities against them]

• What did God in Christ do in the past to solve this problem (vv. 13-15)? [God forgave us having: (i) nailed legal indebtedness to the cross; and (ii) disarmed the powers and authorities]

• What did the Colossians 'do' in their past so that Christ’s work was effective for them? [v.6: "received Christ"; v.12: "baptism…through your faith"; Why did I put 'do' in scare-quotes?]

• What two paths could the Colossians take from where they are (vv. 6-8)? [live in Christ or be taken captive by human philosophy]

• In what way is one path hollow and the other full?

• Why do hollow ideas deceive us and capture us?

• Remembering the passage 2 weeks ago as well as this week's, how has Paul helped the Colossians live in Christ rather than be deceived? [(i) he prayed that they may know Christ and understand the riches we have in him; (ii) he has reminded them of the worth of Christ and what he has done for them]

• How can we help each other?

Do everything to the glory of God

"whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Corinthians 10:31)

So how exactly do you do that?

Perhaps its by constantly having God in mind as you munch on your fish fingers and thanking him for providing you with this food. Perhaps its not quite as 'spiritual' as that and simply enjoying munching on that marmite on toast as it fills a hole. But perhaps its not even as conscious an activity as that.

The sermon at church this evening was on Psalm 148 where the Sun and Moon are called on to Praise God.

Our pastor pointed out that given all creation is called to worship God, there is a problem with a definition of worship which limits it to human beings (e.g. Don Carson who defines worship as: "the proper response of all moral sentient beings to God, ascribing all honor and worth to their Creator-God", p.26, Worship by the Book).

But given that all creation should worship God, have you ever thought how the Sun and Moon worship God? I don't think I really have. I think I've always just skimmed over those statements as hyperbole, but you do come across it remarkably often in Scripture don't you? I can understand how the Sun and Moon witness to his magnificent creative power and so give him glory that way; but praise him? A bit too far perhaps?

It struck me this evening that the only way God can be praised by a lump of stone hanging in the vacuum of space is by it being what it is. It not only doesn't have intelligent thoughts, you couldn't even say it has feelings. It simply exists. It is what it was made to be.

I suppose our worship is the same really. Our worship is just living life as we were made to live life as human beings made in the image of God. God designed us to eat and drink to sustain ourselves, so we eat and drink and that is worship. Of course we are also made to be in relationship with him, to serve each other, etc. But the act of eating and drinking is pure worship in and of itself. It doesn't need anything else adding. Similarly, sleeping is worship, it doesn't become worship because its sleeping in order to do something in the morning. So having already eaten and worshipped God that way, in a couple of hours I'm going to go to sleep to worship God.

That all seems banal perhaps. But I think its actually quite important.

Judas and Peter

A friend asked what the difference between Judas and Peter was given that both deserted Jesus, but one hung himself and the other became a pillar of the church.

The short answer is the unmerited grace of God, but was there any difference in their actions?

I promised I'd email some quotes from the Reformers for him. Here they are for what it's worth.

They [i.e. the Roman Catholics] teach that by contrition we merit grace. In reference to which, if any one should ask why Saul and Judas and similar persons, who were dreadfully contrite, did not obtain grace, the answer was to be taken from faith and according to the Gospel, that Judas did not believe, that he did not support himself by the Gospel and promise of Christ. For faith shows the distinction between the contrition of Judas and of Peter. But the adversaries take their answer from the Law, that Judas did not love God, but feared the punishments. Is not this teaching uncertain and improper things concerning repentance? When, however, will a terrified conscience, especially in those serious, true, and great terrors which are described in the psalms and the prophets, and which those certainly taste who are truly converted, be able to decide whether it fears God for His own sake out of love it fears God, as its God, or is fleeing from eternal punishments? These people may not have experienced much of these anxieties, because they juggle words and make distinctions according to their dreams. But in the heart, when the test is applied, the matter turns out quite differently, and the conscience cannot be set at rest with paltry syllables and words. These great emotions can be distinguished in letters and terms; they are not thus separated in fact, as these sweet sophists dream. Here we appeal to the judgments of all good and wise men who also desire to know the truth. They undoubtedly will confess that these discussions in the writings of the adversaries are very confused and intricate. And nevertheless the most important subject is at stake, the chief topic of the Gospel, the remission of sins. This entire doctrine concerning these questions which we have reviewed, is, in the writings of the adversaries, full of errors and hypocrisy, and obscures the benefit of Christ, the power of the keys, and the righteousness of faith to inexpressible injury of conscience [...]

faith [in Christ] shows the distinction between the contrition of Judas and Peter, of Saul and of David. The contrition of Judas or Saul is of no avail, for the reason that to this there is not added this faith, which apprehends the remission of sins, bestowed as a gift for Christ's sake. Accordingly, the contrition of David or Peter avails, because to it there is added faith, which apprehends the remission of sins granted for Christ's sake.

(Philip Melanchthon, The Defense of the Augsburg Confession, Article XII (V): Of Repentance)

They [e.g. Philip Melanchthon] give Cain, Saul and Judas, as examples of legal repentance. Scripture, in describing what is called their repentance, means that they perceived the heinousness of their sins, and dreaded the divine anger; but, thinking only of God as a judge and avenger, were overwhelmed by the thought. Their repentance, therefore, was nothing better than a kind of threshold to hell, into which having entered even in the present life, they began to endure the punishment inflicted by the presence of an offended God. Examples of evangelical repentance we see in all those who, first stung with a sense of sin, but afterwards raised and revived by confidence in the divine mercy, turned unto the Lord. Hezekiah was frightened on receiving the message of his death, but praying with tears, and beholding the divine goodness, regained his confidence. The Ninevites were terrified at the fearful announcement of their destruction; but clothing themselves in sackcloth and ashes, they prayed, hoping that the Lord might relent and avert his anger from them. David confessed that he had sinned greatly in numbering the people, but added "Now, I beseech thee O Lord, take away the iniquity of thy servant." When rebuked by Nathan, he acknowledged the crime of adultery, and humbled himself before the Lord; but he, at the same time, looked for pardon. Similar was the repentance of those who, stung to the heart by the preaching of Peter, yet trusted in the divine goodness, and added, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?" Similar was the case of Peter himself, who indeed wept bitterly, but ceased not to hope...Though all this is true, yet the term repentance (in so far as I can ascertain from Scripture) must be differently taken [Calvin was much more concerned with words in systematics corresponding with the biblical usage].

(John Calvin, Institutes 3.3.4-5)

Fantastic Forsyth

Every other historical fact than the Gospel finds the human mind with such a disposition for truth that it has merely to present itself with sufficient evidence or attraction. It appeals to the instinct for natural certainty or excellence. But with the Christian certainty it is otherwise. The element of natural certainty or proof in it is very subordinate. Its rational appeal is always inadequate, and its desirability is not at once apparent. Nay, it has a power all its own of rousing antagonism and even hate. Its certainty comes with a blow to human nature and human reason, or with an unwelcome demand for submission, or at least preferential treatment. It has no foundation in either nature or reason, but only contact, only points of attachment for appeal. It is more despotic than constitutional, so far as rational law is concerned. How is the natural man to verify a gospel which takes the confidence out of human nature and its instincts, and destroys the egoism which is its first certainty? How can the foolishness of such a Gospel commend itself to man s native wisdom? And is the Gospel not such? I am not speaking of religion. Religion is natural to man, faith is not, Christianity is not. The Gospel revelation means self-condemnation and no confidence in the flesh, in human nature. It upsets the ordinary bench of appeal. Its protectorate begins by dissolving parliament [...] The Gospel must create the power to believe it. Revelation here is so radical that in the same act it must be Regeneration. The calling voice of a holy God to us sinners is such a judging, crushing voice that it becomes effectual only as a new-creating word.

(my bold, italics original, pp.118-119, The Principle of Authority)

Three things that make that brilliant:

The emphasis on the moral: Forsyth's great strength is always to see how its a moral world we live in. Every problem is a moral problem. So often in apologetics we forget the noetic effects of sin. This is probably horrendously wrong, but while Barth would say something similar to Forsyth here (see previous post for an example) I think he isn't usually as good because the moral dimension would not be as prominent. Instead Barth would emphasise the unknowable nature of God as god, in a way which I always feel is something like what I'm told Kant taught about how the phenomenal cannot know the noumenal (this is all way above my pay-grade though).

The recognition of connections with experience/reason/nature/history: While we cannot cannot argue someone to belief starting with where they are, there are "points of attachment for appeal". We can have discussions about the historicity of the gospels, we can show how people's longings for good relationship find their fulfilment only in God, etc. These are valid and fruitful things to do.

The Gospel-word of God creates faith: there are two points here: firstly, it is God that creates faith not our arguments; and secondly, it is through the preaching of the Gospel, and not apart from it that he does his work.

Bad Barth

Listening to: David Ford: I Sincerely Apologise for All the Trouble I've Caused

Just about the worst thing I ever have read from Karl Barth:

Unquestionably, the resurrection narratives are contradictory. A coherent history cannot be evolved from them [...] The witnesses attended an event that went over their heads, and each told a bit of it. But these scraps are sufficient to bear witness to us of the magnitude of the event and its historicity. Every one of the witnesses declares God's free grace which surpasses all human understanding. God alone can prove the truth of that history since he himself is the subject. Fortunately, God has never ceased to work in men's hearts and send the faith needed to see those things.

(p. 92, The Faith of the Church: A commentary on the Apostles' Creed)

But its a quote worth thinking about some more, so I'm posting it for my future reference. There are a lot of interesting and important things to think about both in what he says that is correct and what he says that is wrong. What was wrong with his thinking that allowed him to get to the point of making an argument like that, and think it made sense?

An Anatomy of Christian Righteousness

Listening to: Franz Schubert: Piano Sonatas (Uchida)

"Our theology" said Luther, consisted of a distinction between two kinds of righteousness:

the active and the passive, so that morality and faith, works and grace, secular society and religion may not be confused. Both are necessary, but both must be kept within their limits. (Lectures on Galatians, 1531-1535, cited in p.21 The Genius of Luther's Theology)

Melanchthon in his commentary on Colossians 2:10-15, the consummate teacher (rather than preacher), offers an anatomy of our passive/Christian righteousness. First he observes that for Paul the definition of Christian Righteousness is "In Christ you are complete" (NIV: "you have been given fullness in Christ"). He further analyses things by observing two differences between Christian and human Righteousness:

1. "Christian righteousness satisfies God, because it believes that the Father has forgiven for Christ's sake" [DK: Christ acts on the Father]
2. "the Holy Spirit, who puts the flesh to death, brings Christian righteousness into being" [DK: Christ acts on us]. This is further divided into:
   1. putting to death: "Putting to death, or repentance, is to recognize sin and to be truly afraid of God's judgement"; and
   2. bringing to life: "Bringing to life is for the conscience the conscience being raised up through faith or trust; for it to seize hold of the consolation of believing that God has forgiven one's sins for Christ's sake". This "Making alive contains two things":
      1. "taking away a bad conscience. For, when God has forgiven sins, he effects peace and joy in our hearts through faith. After that, we dare to be sure he has forgiven us, and dare to call him Father"
      2. "governing through the Holy Spirit.... in the kingdom of Christ, where he watches over them through the Hoy Spirit [and] defends them against the snares of the devil"

PS: I know I must stop posting with titles like this one. It almost seems heretical.

God and his glory

• God is glorified by saving sinners
• God's glory is his salvation of sinners
• Sinners are saved by God's glorification

Does it matter which we say?

Are they all true?

Is any one statement more basic than the others?

The clarity of Scripture is found in Christ alone

Listening to: Regina Specktor: Far

Erasmus argued against Luther that some doctrines in the Bible are unclear, and you cannot make confident statements about them. He believed that the freedom of the will was one of these.

Luther, was having none of it:

This indeed I confess, that there are many places in the Scriptures obscure and abstruse; not from the majesty of the thing, but from our ignorance of certain terms and grammatical particulars; but which do not prevent a knowledge of all the things in the Scriptures. For what thing of more importance can remain hidden in the Scriptures, now that the seals are broken, the stone rolled from the door of the sepulchre, and that greatest of all mysteries brought to light, Christ made man: that God is Trinity and Unity: that Christ suffered for us, and will reign to all eternity? Are not these things known and proclaimed even in our streets? Take Christ out of the Scriptures, and what will you find remaining in them? (source)

He goes on to make a incredible statement:

If many things still remain abstruse to many, this does not arise from obscurity in the Scriptures, but from their own blindness or want of understanding, who do not go the way to see the all-perfect clearness of the truth.

That is a radical statement. But its born out of a faith which sees Christ as all of Christianity. Do we think the same way? Luther argues that the test is whether we find things in the Scriptures unlcear.

Contingent Rationality and Science

[I'm not sure that I fully understand Torrance fully, so please point out any errors in my interpretation.]

"Natural science tacitly assumes the contingence, as well as the orderliness, of the universe. If there were no order immanent in the universe, if there were chaos and not a cosmos, the universe would not be accessible to scientific knowledge; if the universe were not characterized by contingence, the laws of nature would be derived from it immediately and necessarily through logico-deductive processes without experimental questioning of nature to induce it to yield its secrets - which would make empirical science quite pointless. It is through relying on the indissoluble bond between contingence and order in the universe that natural science has come to operate with the distinctive interconnection between experiment and theory which has characterized our greatest advances in knowledge of the physical world. Yet we cannot prove that there is order in the universe, for we have to assume it in order even to attempt proof of it; while genuine contingence is something that natural science on its own cannot come up with, but is rather something that natural science, through its ways of determining regularities in nature and formulating universal laws, is always on the point of resolving away. Quite evidently science must assume conceptions and principles that are themselves not logically derivable, explainable, or provable, but without which it could not function. Contingence and order are assumptions of that kind"

(pp. 26-27, Divine and Contingent Order)

How can you know that there is an order to the universe? How can you assume that it is understandable?

We assume order all the time. Inductive reasoning is based on it, and science is just the most refined example of this. But it is not provable, as David Hume and others have shown. In faith scientists commit to trying to understand the order of the world, without being able to prove that order exists to understand. However, Christianity provides the support for believing in an ordered universe because it believes the universe was created by God who is reliable, rational and loving.

Why do we use experiments to understand the order in the universe?

Scientists in faith believe that the way to understand the world is empirical research. Their whole enterprise is founded on this commitment. Why not assume that the world must be a certain way? Why not assume that the order of the universe is necessarily X? That was what the Greeks tended to do and that was why they also tended to think that "its regularities and laws can be discovered by pure a priori thought alone" (p. 31, ibid). However, if the universe is contingent then we cannot use reason alone to understand it. If it is contingent we expect it to constantly challenge our attempts to understand it, and so we perform endless experiments to understand from nature what its laws are. However, again it is Christianity that provides the support for believing in a contingent universe. In opposition to prevailing Greek thought and on the authority of the Bible it rejected the idea that the universe (and God) had to be a certain way. It insisted on the freedom of the personal Creator, and so gave the foundations for assuming that the way to understand nature is endless experiments.

To quote Torrance again:

"It is through being correlated to the endless possibilities of the Creator, that the universe is endowed with innate power constantly to surprise us in its manifestation of unexpected features and structures which nevertheless always turn out to be consistent with its other features and structures. What else is that but a manifestation of its contingent intelligibility and indeed its objective reality over which we have no control? This intelligibility of the created universe, its intrinsic orderliness, consistency, and reliability, is the ground of our confidence in scientific inquiry, but it is the contingent nature of that intelligibility which makes the universe attract and challenge the most arduous and unremitting scientific effort, and gives discovery its immense excitement" (p. 40, ibid).

Modern science flourished in Western Europe, to a degree not seen in other cultures where it existed but did not flourish, because of the Biblical teaching about our Creator. The biblical worldview has now been largely cut away but that was the origin of the foundations it is now built on.

The halo effect and Q&As at conferences

Listening to: Wilco: Sky Blue Sky

Martin Downes is posting on the cult of celebrity preachers.

An aspect of this cult that I feel like venting about is the Q&A session which seems to be part of every Christian conference.

People gather and hear the preachers expound the bible. Then for an hour or more they are then asked for their wisdom on everything from daily bible reading, to operational management, to evangelism, to the latest theological fad or even to relationship advice (apparently most questions at Banner of Truth Youth Conferences are on this... I wouldn't know).

This seems to be a classic case of the halo effect. The Economist describes the halo effect as:

the phenomenon whereby we assume that because people are good at doing A they will be good at doing B, C and D

Just because someone is a good preacher does not mean that they are the good at prayer, evangelism, strategy or anything else. These questions are worth asking, but lets get the people that are good at them to talk about them.

RVG Tasker on James Denney

"It was the greatness of James Denney that he refused to separate Christian theology from Christian evangelism. Well acquainted with the biblical criticism of his day, and ready always to evaluate such criticism with the care and patience of the true scholar, he nevertheless remained very sure that the nerve of Christianity is that it is a gospel to be preached; and that the power of that gospel lies in the truth contained in the words 'Christ died for the ungodly'. 'I haven't the faintest interest', he once said, 'in theology which does not help us to evangelize.' And the 'theology which helps us to evangelize' is the theology which recognizes 'the centrality, the gravity, the inevitableness and the glory of the death of Christ', wherein the unity not only of the New Testament but also of the entire Bible is to be found."

(p.8, James Denney, e.d. RVG Tasker, The Death of Christ)

I really must get round to reading Denney properly. I've got a few others higher up my list though at the moment.

Mounts of curse and blessing

'That day Moses charged the people, saying, "When you have crossed over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin. And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali."' (Deuteronomy 27:11-13)

Do you think it is a coincidence that:

• Those particular tribes were told to stand on those particular hills? I think it is probably because Mount Gerizim was the Southern mountain and those were the 'Southern' tribes, and vice versa for Mount Ebal. But nevertheless the mountain of blessing included the most blessed tribes as well.
• In the previous few verses we are told that the plastered stones with all the words of the law on them should be placed on Mount Ebal from which the curses were announced (vv.1-8)?
• Paul would also talk about two mountains, one that is free and the other that is of slavery to the law (Galatians 4:24-25)?
• Moses only bothers to describe the responsive curses to be declared at this event (27:14-26)?
• In Chapter 28 which seems to be summing up the blessings and curses again, the blessings get 14 verses and the curses 68?

I'd like to believe, but can't!

I have now met a few people who have:

1. been persuaded that Christianity is good news;
2. heard most of the evidential arguments for why we can trust the bible and why Christianity is coherent;
3. have prayed to God that they he would convince them he is real; and
4. still don't think that they are sure enough to commit their lives to Jesus.

So, my wise and learned readers, how do you help such people?

Perhaps there is no hard and fast advice. For some they may in reality be baulking at the cost, and need to be confronted with that. For others they may believe but be seeking an unreasonable level of certainty, and just need to be encouraged to live out the Christian life.... Perhaps there are other categories as well. In fact there are probably as many categories as there are people... But do you folks have any guidance?

Two theses on prayer

Once upon at time theologians used to present a list of theses to be publically disputed as a way of doing theology (see trusty Wikipedia). Luther's theses presented at the Heidelberg Disputation in 1518 are a wonderful example.

I've just read PT Forsyth's The Soul of Prayer, and although its not his greatest book, the last chapter made it worth persisting. In it he effectively argued two theses:

1. "Prayer may really change the will of God, or, if not His will, His intention."
2. "It may, like other human energies of godly sort, take the form of resisting the will of God. Resisting His will may be doing His will."

They taste like Luther theses to me. Meaty stuff.

I was won over to his cause, but they would be fun and important topics to have a disputation over. If you want to read more, read the last chapter of The Soul of Prayer: "The Insistency of Prayer". Its only 12 pages, and I think it would be spiritually beneficial to everyone.

Taming Leviathan

Christopher Ash's Out of the Storm is a great straight-forward companion to reading Job. In explaining God's speeches at the end of the book he challenges an interpretation of chapters 40-41 which sees Leviathan and Behemoth as just powerful creatures that God created, i.e. an extension of 38:1-40:2 where God shows himself as the Almighty Creator.

There are a number of problems with seeing Leviathan and Behemoth as just plain vanilla creatures like the ox, hawk, ostrich, horse and donkey of chapter 39:

1. The description doesn't seem to fit any animal we know of. Not hippos, crocodiles or even dinosaurs!
2. The second speech from God (40:6-42:6) provokes a "stronger reaction of worship and penitence in Job than the first"
3. While Job never provides a complete answer to the 'problem of evil', a reminder that God is our Almighty Creator is a very partial answer indeed. As Ash quotes George Bernard Shaw:

God really has to do better in explaining the problem of evil than to say, "You can't make a hippopotamus, can you?"

Instead there is a promise contained in this second speech of God, if you really understand who Leviathan and Behemoth are:

Leviathan in biblical imagery is the arch-enemy of God, the prince of the power of evil, Satan, the god of this world (as Jesus calls him). Here is the embodiment of beastliness, of terror, of undiluted evil [...]

The Lord has sung the praise of Leviathan's terrifying strength. But why has he done so? Why has he filled Job's mind with the awesome terrors of evil? Answer: so that Job may understand that he, the Lord, is stronger still [...]

Even Satan, the Leviathan, is God's Satan, God's pet - dare we put it like this. And that means that as we suffer, and as we sit with others who suffer, we may with absolute confidence bow down to this sovereign God, knowing that the evil that comes may be terrible, but it cannot and will not ever go one tiny fraction beyond the leash on which God has put it. And it will not go on forever. For the One to whom we belong is God.

(pp. 95-97)

Marching some of the way in the protest of Protest Atheism

I'm not sure I would be a big fan of Moltmann, although I haven't read him. But in a spare moment today I enjoyed reading Richard Bauckham's preface to The Crucified God.

The God who, omnipotent and unaffected, remains simply sovereign over the horrors of twentieth-century western cultural history is the God against whom what Moltmann calls 'protest atheism', represented by Albert Camus, finds it morally necessary to rebel. But is this God truly the Christian God? For Moltmann and others, the crisis of credibility of classical theism provides Christian theology with the opportunity to return to the biblical story of God, with its centre in the cross and resurrection of Jesus, in which, Christian theology has always believed, God defines for us who he truly is. Here God is not only the authority responsible for the world, to whom protest against meaningless suffering can be directed, but also the fellow-sufferer, who enters into the hell of abandonment and suffers it in love for the godless and godforsaken [...] In Jesus' cry of godforsakeness, God the divine Son not only shares the godforsakeness which is at the heart of suffering, but also takes up the cry of protest against it.

(p.xii, The Crucified God)

With this kind of theology I'd always want to keep the balance that God is both the forsaken and the one who forsakes. But nevertheless I think that is a helpful quote as far as it goes.

Jews and Arabs

My home group leader pointed out today that in Galatians 4 when Paul is explaining how the Jews were sons of the slave woman (Hagar's son Ishmael) instead of the chosen sons of Abraham (Sarah's son Isaac), that actually he was saying to the Jews that they were Arabs. That was surely explosive then, and it is probably even more explosive now.

Also explains why Paul says that "Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia", a seemingly superfluous addition otherwise.

Cruciformity MP3s

Listening to Julie Fowlis on myspace

I may not have any time to read, but I still make time to run and listen to stuff. Most recently I've listened to some excellent sermons from Tim Keller and a couple of others at The Christian Life Conference (2007) on Cruciformity. Highly recommended... for what its worth.

The other years of the conference look good too.

Why you should take care in choosing songs for worship

Funny quote from Stanley Hauerwas:

One reason why we Christians argue so much about which hymn to sing, which liturgy to follow, which way to worship is that the commandments teach us to believe that bad liturgy eventually leads to bad ethics. You begin by singing some sappy, sentimental hymn, then you pray some pointless prayer, and the next thing you know you have murdered your best friend. (HT John Halton)

It seems hard to see how that could come about, but when it is your best friend who has chosen that insipid meaningless chorus for the twentieth time this year then perhaps you'd understand that it is probably for the best that he was prevented from making the same mistake again.

More random thoughts, this time on fear

Listening to: Antony and the Johnsons: I Am a Bird Now

Stream of conciousness blogging...

When Martin Luther expounded the 10 commandments in his Small Catechism he began every explanation with "We should fear and love God....". Fear and love/Law and Gospel/Repentance and faith etc. The two sides the Christian life are fundamental to Lutheran spirituality, and I think to the Bible too. But the language of fear is something that I really struggle with. I've been thinking about it a bit recently as I've come across things all over the place which have challenged me to think.

For example, Mark 4:35-5:20 which describes Jesus performing two miracles. In the first he stills a storm. In the second he casts out demons into some pigs. In both the reaction of the people is fear. The disciples fear him, but keep following him. The second group fear him, and ask him to depart from their region.... Is the first a good fear and the second a bad fear? In which case what is it about the fear which is good/bad? Is it what it leads to... i.e. pushing Jesus away, or clinging to him?

Perhaps, but what about Luke 5:1-10? Again Jesus performs a miracle and people are afraid. Peter falls on his knees and says "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord". He is pushing Jesus away, and Jesus responds by telling him "Do not be afraid".

Is that good fear or bad fear? Presumably good, but Jesus doesn't think it is appropriate!

But maybe that is because fear is the beginning of wisdom, but not the end. Fear is good at pushing us into the arms of love, but then be left behind. Verses could be multiplied to show this is not the case, but one striking example was brought up by Richard Coekin in the A Passion for Life DVDs the men in our church are watching. Looking at 2 Corinthians 5-6 he helpfully drew out four motivations for evangelism:

1. The fear of Christ (5:11)
2. The love of Christ (5:14)
3. The commission of Christ (5:20)
4. The day of Christ (6:1-2)

Surely the fear of Christ which motivates us to evangelism is fear for the sake of those who don't believe? Well, 2 Corinthians 5 doesn't seem to say that. Christians will appear before the judgment seat of Christ (5:10) "therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others" (5:11). It is fear for ourselves that motivates us!

Discussing the Richard Coekin video at church this morning a friend said that he understood the fear of God, but not the love. I think he meant experientially rather than intellectually. I think I understand both experientially to some degree, but I really don't understand fear intellectually. In my heart I felt that he had too much of the fear of death and condemnation that we have been freed from (Romans 8:1-17; Hebrews 2:15). But I'm not sure that I was right. I do feel that we too often take the freedom described to mean that 'fear of God' for Christians is an insipid 'respect' or 'reverence' without any fear of punishment. This doesn't seem to be what the Bible describes, and besides it all just seems too neat. Fear isn't so easily packaged as Melachthon commented:

when will a terrified conscience, especially in those serious, genuine, and great terrors that are described in the Psalms and the Prophets and certainly experienced by those who are truly converted, be able to determine whether it fears God on account of himself or in fear is fleeing eternal punishments? These two great impulses can be distinguished on paper, but they cannot be separated in real life, as these slick sophists dream. (p.189, Apology to the Augsburg Confession, Article XII: Repentance, BOC)

Sorry for the mess that is this post. It reflects the mess my mind is in on this issue! But at least nobody can accuse me of being a "slick sophist"!

Any thoughts?

Obey the gospel - send missionaries

Listening to: JS Bach, Mass in B Minor - I'm going to nick Dan Hames' habit and start doing this. Sometimes its hard to keep quiet about stuff you're loving, so this gives me an additional excuse to vent. Plus you may find out something about me!

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!" 16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, "Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?" 17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.

18 But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for

"Their voice has gone out to all the earth,
and their words to the ends of the world."

19 But I ask, did Israel not understand? First Moses says,

"I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation;
with a foolish nation I will make you angry."

20 Then Isaiah is so bold as to say,

"I have been found by those who did not seek me;
I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me."

21 But of Israel he says, "All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people."

(Romans 10:14-21)

Glen has provoked me to make sense of the flow of this passage. I think I now have, thanks mainly to the insights of my learned housemate with whom I had a good session thrashing over it this evening. I think it taught us:

• to support for world mission
• to be humble because the whole world is disobedient
• to be happy that this means that all missionaries are forgiven sinners and so preach a message which is not 'be like me and be good' but 'be forgiven like me'
• to witness to Christ in a way which makes it clear we are sinners, not standing over non-Christians in judgment
• to be amazed at the complexity and non-instinctual way in which God achieves his purposes.
• God gets the glory, not us.

Briefly, this is what I think is going on.

vv.14-15a: is a pretty easy to understand chain of how people are saved. People call on God because they have heard the gospel, because someone preached to them, because someone sent that missionary to them.

15b: missionary activity is a beautiful thing. Get with the program! Specifically Paul's program for his mission to Spain.

16a: the Jews have not got with the program. They have not been missionaries to the world. When Paul says they did not obey the gospel, he does not mean they did not believe it for their own salvation. The gospel is usually something that we believe, accept or confess for our salvation. We obey it in obeying its implicit call to spread it. We obey the gospel by supporting God's mission to the world.

16b: is a quotation from Isaiah 53:1a. The reasons the Jews are not sending out missionaries declaring the coming of the Messiah is that Jews did not believe that the suffering Jesus hung on a cross, was the promised Messiah.

17: Summarising vv.14-16.

18: Psalm 19 has already been told to the Jews so they should know about God's universal purposes. They should know about general revelation, and so should realise that God plans salvation for all people. He has been speaking to all people through creation, so the Jews should follow his lead and take the gospel to all people.

19: Even the beginning of the bible ('first Moses') tells the Jews of God's purposes for the gentiles, although it also says that they will be jealous of them.

20: Isaiah much later ('then') says the same thing and says that God has purposes for the gentiles to, although again points out that the Jews won't like it.

21: The Jews have not listened to their vocation but instead been disobedient.

Challenge to the Romans and to us: be obedient, see God's universal purposes. Support mission, and marvel at God's universal love.

Brief thoughts. Feedback appreciated. All responsibility for any mistakes belongs to my housemate.

Thoughts on Job 33

Job believes two things:

1. He is 'pure', he has 'done no wrong', he is 'clean and free from sin' (33:9); and
2. Despite that God unjustly considers him 'his enemy' (33:10; cf 34:5)

Elihu contends that Job is not right. This is his human reasoning, and God is greater than human imagining.

God does speak and reveal himself and he does this 'now one way, now another' (33:14):

1. To those who are slumbering soundly in bed God speaks 'in their ears and terrif[ies] them with warnings' (33:16)
2. To those with 'constant distress in their bones' (33:19) he sends a angel who 'is gracious to them and says to God':

"Spare them from going down to the pit;
I have found a ransom for them—
let their flesh be renewed like a child's;
let them be restored as in the days of their youth'—
then they can pray to God and find favour with him,
they will see God's face and shout for joy;
he will restore them to full well-being." (33:24-26)

What will those who hear these two words say:

1. 'We have sinned, we have perverted what is right'
2. 'we did not get what we deserved. God has delivered us from going down to the pit, and we shall live to enjoy the light of life'

It seems cruel or irrational that God would say these two contradictory words to people. Why does God say both these things to human beings? The answer is that both are to bring them us to life (33:18,28-30), and the chances are that God will have to speak these words repeatedly to us over our lives in order to save us (33:29).

Elihu was angry with Job because he was 'justifying himself rather than God' (32:2) and YHWH isn't too happy about that either (40:8). But actually Elihu admits that he wants to justify Job (33:32) and YHWH does so in the end too (42:7). Job is justified through YHWH's own justification. Only when YHWH is allowed to be just in a way above human comprehension, can we too be justified. If we seek YHWH to be just according to our own standards we will be righteous and God will seem unjust and our enemy.