Books I have read
Cross section of books that I have read http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php
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In the Presence of Eternity
A site devoted to my random thoughts on God, life, theology, philosophy, Biblical studies, etc.
About Me
- Name: Blake
- Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota
There are some really big events coming up in my life (Marriage, North Carolina, finishing my bachelors online at Bethel, then Southeastern Seminary just to name a few.) www.librarything.com/catalog.php
- Why I like Calvin
- Calvin on Women
- Luther and Women
- Isaiah 45:7 not a good text to use, in order to pr...
- When the Foundations are Destroyed What Shall we D...
- Corporal Punishment and Micah 1
- Where is Jesus or a Problem of the Naïve Metaphysi...
- Dealing with Delay, or An Integral Tension Within ...
- Historical Knowledge and Man's Subjectivity
- Historical Knowledge and Man's Subjectivity
Tuesday, December 27, 2005
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Sermon I preached a while back on Colossians:
Introduction
Reading of God’s word Colossians 1:15-20/ Prayer.
15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
16For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all things have been created through Him and for Him.
17He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
18He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.
19For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him,
20and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
Is there a part of the Christian life that requires us to think deeply about our faith? I imagine that some of you today would say, “Of course not! Tell me how the bible relates to my own life! I do not want to know about all of that abstract stuff that does not make sense to me.”
This position really doesn’t make any good non- sense, as a friend of mine likes to say, as a story of one of the greatest theologians to ever live, shows very well. The world-renowned theologian Karl Barth was at a major American Seminary, and one of the students in class asked Barth, “What is the most difficult thing you have learned about the Christian faith.” Barth paused for a second, and then looked up and said, “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.” The point is that even the things that we take for granted as simple, can be extremely deep and beautiful to think about. The Christian message is extremely simple, but at the same time very complex. It is this tension that makes the faith easy enough for a child and very complex for an adult.
I hope as we dig in to this beautiful passage of scripture that you will go with me on a journey, into the very person of God as He has revealed himself in Holy Scripture. I also pray that you will come to find that there is not correct living with out correct belief.
Background
Paul in this letter to the Colossians was writing a letter to a church in a small town in the Lycus River Valley, which is in modern day turkey. As with many other towns in this time Colossae would have had many religions to choose from, and mix together. Most of Paul’s converts like many of us came to a saving faith in Jesus Christ later in life. There was also a group of false teachers in Asia Minor at the time. Paul is essentially fighting a battle against these false teachers, who do not believe Jesus to be the Messiah, and who are trying to convert the Pagan converts in the church into form Judaism. These false teachers where challenging the supremacy of Jesus Christ and also the fact that he was God, so Paul felt the need to respond, and his letter to the Christians at Colossae is the response.
I. Christ’s Supremacy over Creation V.15-17
In the preceding verses of chapter one Paul has just finished telling the Colossians how pleased he is with their progress in the Gospel, or the Christian life. Now Paul turns to give praise and glory to the one who God had used to rescue the Colossians out of what Paul calls the Dominion of Darkness, in verse 13.
In v.15 Paul says that Christ is the “image of the invisible God” this does not mean that Paul only thought of Christ as a cheap copy of the father, but a perfect manifestation of God. This is what the Greek word “eikon” means by the use of this word, Paul is stressing that Jesus is the perfect manifestation of God. To see what God is like, we must look at Jesus (cf. John 14:7-10; 1:14-18; 12:45; Heb. 1:3). Jesus was not a creature, but God himself. This does not mean that God the Father and God the Son are the same persons, but that they are one God. The One True and Living God of Christian faith is distinguished from all other religions by this very fact, He is a Trinity, that he exists eternally as three persons, but is still one God. This is the significance of what Paul is saying in the first half of Colossians 1:15. In the second half of v.15 Paul then turns to the fact that Christ is the first born over all creation, what this means is not that Christ was created, but that he is of first rank above all things. This means that there is nothing that we should give more value to than the eternal Son of God, because if He is the creator then he gets all of the glory and honor.
This belief that Christ is to have the glory, or the supremacy in His creation is reinforced by the fact that v.16 proclaims that Christ is the Creator of all things. Paul plays off three pairs of words to emphasize this fact. First, Christ created the heavens and the earth. Second, Christ created all things, visible and invisible. Third, Christ has created all authorities and powers both human and spiritual. In a few short words Paul would say, “Christ is Lord over all!” Paul finishes v. 16 with the phrase; “all things have been created through Him and for Him.” Do not pass over this passage without realizing its implications. All powers and authorities; the entire creation; everything you touch, taste, see, smell, feel they all where created for Christ’s Glory. In v. 17 Paul states what the implications of Christ being the creator means is that Jesus is eternal, and that God the Father holds the universe together through Christ. Paul is countering the belief that there are other powers in this world that could challenge God’s power. Paul says this is absolutely wrong, because Christ is the Creator, and by Him everything that exists has its existence because Christ created them and sustains them. Many people will ask who created God? The answer of scripture is absolutely no one. Our Holy God has always been here and will always be here, He is eternal.
By now I am sure I have put you to sleep, or you are asking, “Blake, so what? What can this possibly have to do with my everyday practical life?” I respond by pointing out four applications from the above previous observations.
1. First, this teaching can affect where you will spend eternity, and I do not think that you can get much more practical than that. If you do not believe me look up 1 John 2:22 “Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.” There are many groups today in our very own small towns of Lanesville, and Corydon who deny the Son and the Father. Some are known as Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others are known as Mormons. They both have one thing in common with all other false religions; they have a defective view of whom Jesus Christ is and what He came to do.
2. The second application is that Christ is Lord now! In v.16 we come back to the point that Christ is the eternal Son of God who is ruling over all powers and authorities in this world, and they are in fact created for His glory. This is the essence of the strength that believers in other countries find when they are persecuted for their faith. To narrow it down as an application for our church in America, this verse may bring you comfort to know that behind the course of world events, God is orchestrating all things for His own glory. There is not one reason for the Christian to panic when things like 9/11 happen! Why? Because Christ is sitting at the Father’s right hand and is ruling the world even though the world that is still in its rebellion is ignoring the fact that He will return in judgment. So, we must remember that Christ is Lord now! This is the significance of the imagery of Christ now sitting at the right hand of the father; this is biblical kingship language.
3. Third, if the world and all that is in it is created for the Glory of Christ as Paul says, this should affect the very way that we live our lives. We live in the King’s world, and as His subjects we are to give Him all of the glory. (“All things have been created through Him and for Him.) This means, that you, your life, your family, and everything that is yours is just on lone in order give Christ the Glory and honor, therefore our resources, all of our resources, should be ready and at the disposal of the God who allowed you to have them.
II. Christ’s Supremacy in the Church
In verses 17-18 we see that Paul switches subjects from the Creation to the Church. Why does Paul do this? Paul does this because he is depicting the church as the beginning of God’s new creation, we are moving from creation to new creation. Just as Christ is the firstborn or is of first rank in his creation (see v. 15), so too, he is the first in the Church (see v. 18). The two ideas that run through the background of this teaching about the old and the new creation are story of man’s rebellion against God, in Eden, that plunged the creation into darkness and decay, and the idea that runs throughout the New Testament known as the “already” and “not yet”. A good example of this “already and not yet” is our salvation, we are already saved, but we will be saved when Christ returns. Or to take an example from recent history; we all know that D-day was the day that Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy and the tide of WWII was changed, but VE Day or victory day did not come until 11 months later. It is as if Christ’s death and resurrection where D-Day and the turning point of History, but we wait for the day that he returns to make all things new, or VE Day. Paul is saying that God is already recreating our world, and when he returns it will be fully changed, and he will wipe away all the tears from our eyes. That is why Christ has risen, because the resurrection is a sign of the New Creation, and the body of believers that he has established is another sign of this new creation! The implications of this New Testament teaching are staggering!
1. First, The supremacy of Christ should change the way we see ourselves. What if we as a Church started to see our church, not as a gathering of people, but as a beginning of something much bigger than ourselves? What if we saw ourselves as God’s New Creation calling a dead and dying world to salvation? What if we saw ourselves as agents of God’s New Creation bringing hope to a world with out hope, feeding the homeless, loving the unlovable, being Christ to the world? The Christian life is so much more than your personal relationship with Jesus. There is more to the Christian life than prayer, bible study, and church. There is discipleship that may cost us our lives. If the church is being this new creation then it will do so, by discipleship, keeping one another accountable, dealing with sin, confessing to one another, and praying with one another. I will tell you right now if there is anyone in this room right now who has difficulties with pornography, alcoholism, lying, cheating or some other sin there is absolutely no chance for you if you do not repent of your sin, and find a group of fellow believers whom you trust that can help you through this bondage, trust me I know first hand. There is not freedom from sin with out the help of the church. Paul assures us in v. 13 that we have freedom from our biggest struggles only in Christ because Christ has rescued us. We are no longer who we where before Salvation, but we are part of God’s new community, and we have the ability to change.
2. Second, the Church with Christ as its head must follow its Lord no matter what the cost, and it must share the gospel with humility. What if we realize that being a Christian is more than getting a fuzzy feeling on Sunday morning because of good music, and realize that God is calling us to live a life of obedience to him right this moment? If we would only see ourselves as the New Community of God to the world, the New Israel if you will, that is called to be a “city set on a hill”, then and only then will the church do what it was intended to do. As a city set on a hill I do not mean one in which, we look down on an unbelieving world, and go hide in our Christian ghettos. What Jesus means by “a city set on a hill” is a group of believers who are willing to love and show love to the prostitute, the alcoholic, the girl who had an abortion, or whatever sin you think is the worst. We are to avoid doing these evil deeds, but the only thing we have to tell an unbelieving world is that they need Christ, we do not need to point the finger and tell people how bad they are unless we are willing to present the full Gospel to them. The Gospel is not a stick we get to brandish over the heads of unbelievers, but the very power of God for salvation.
3. Third, since the church has been risen with Christ, the members should put away all the wickedness of their former lives that they lived before Christ. Paul says in Colossians 3:1-3 “Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking, the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Before we where believers we where dead in our sins on our way to hell, but when God reached down and graciously gave us the ability to believe in His Son we where changed. This has serious implications for our Christian walk, because if we are united with Christ in His church, then we should constantly be fighting our sin, and if we are not fighting sin, then that may tell us something about ourselves. A Christian life is a changed life, not just coming to church on Sundays. The Christian life is supposed to affect every part of our lives.
III. Christ Supremacy in the incarnation and redemption v.19-20 “For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.”
As vs. 16 gave the explains the appropriateness of what was said about Christ in verse 15, so verse 19 explains the appropriateness of Christ being the preeminent one in verse 18. The reason why Christ is first in the Church is because he has secured our redemption by being the very presence of God on earth. Jesus in His earthly life was both fully God and fully man. This is a divine mystery that no one can, or ever will be able to solve, but this mystery is what saves us, because we as sinful people have sinned against and infinite Holy God, and one transgression against a Holy God is a debt that cannot be paid back by anything that we can do so in our dark state we needed a rescue. So God in order to glorify Himself, by showing us his love, sent His son who was both fully God and fully man to suffer under the perfect wrath of God so that we may have life with Him. Not only have we marred the lives that God has given us, but we have also affected the world around us, that is why Paul can say in this passage that Christ is reconciling all things by the blood of His Cross. Maybe the most vivid illustration of the love God in a the Bible is the story of the Prodigal Son, I would encourage you to read the story this evening before you go to bed. I am going to read the story of the Prodigal to you now [Luke 15;11-32], because I do not think that reconcillation will need any explanation once we read this story. The story of the prodigal is a story of God’s love for his sinful and rebellious people.
How can we possibly apply this to our lives? First, we give Christ all of the glory in our salvation, because there is nothing we can do to save ourselves. Before we are saved we are rightly under God’s just wrath, but when the spirit comes up on us, and moves our hearts to realize that we are sinners in need of Christ it is totally an act of God. Even after we have been saved and we have been in the church for many years we will continue to struggle with sin. The moment that you say you have no sin you need to examine your life, because 1 John says that, “the man who says he has not sin deceives himself, and the truth is not in him.” The Christian life is a continual turning from sin, and sadly the church has failed miserably in helping men and women deal with their deepest darkest sins. Our natural reaction is to hide our sins from others, so that we look as if we are not sinners, but the truth is that though, saved, we are still in a fallen world with fallen desires. This should make us fall in humble adoration of our gracious God who continually empowers us, and forgives us when we stumble. Second, there is no room as a Christian to think that there is some corner of our lives that does not belong to God. Paul is clear that all things where created, held together, and reconciled through Christ. There is not one place of our lives that we should keep from our infinitely Holy God.
I would like everyone to close your eyes, and keep them closed. Maybe you have come here this morning, and you have felt God’s spirit move in your heart as you have heard the message of Colossians. Maybe you are a new face in this church, or maybe you have been in church your whole life, and are just now realizing that you need Christ to change you. If you feel the spirit calling you to Christ, then right where you are raise your hand so that I can pray for you. I am not going to ask anyone to come forward this morning, if you have a decision to make come to Pete or I after service so that we can pray with you, and help you make the next step in the walk of Christian discipleship.
Introduction
Reading of God’s word Colossians 1:15-20/ Prayer.
15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
16For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all things have been created through Him and for Him.
17He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
18He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.
19For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him,
20and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
Is there a part of the Christian life that requires us to think deeply about our faith? I imagine that some of you today would say, “Of course not! Tell me how the bible relates to my own life! I do not want to know about all of that abstract stuff that does not make sense to me.”
This position really doesn’t make any good non- sense, as a friend of mine likes to say, as a story of one of the greatest theologians to ever live, shows very well. The world-renowned theologian Karl Barth was at a major American Seminary, and one of the students in class asked Barth, “What is the most difficult thing you have learned about the Christian faith.” Barth paused for a second, and then looked up and said, “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.” The point is that even the things that we take for granted as simple, can be extremely deep and beautiful to think about. The Christian message is extremely simple, but at the same time very complex. It is this tension that makes the faith easy enough for a child and very complex for an adult.
I hope as we dig in to this beautiful passage of scripture that you will go with me on a journey, into the very person of God as He has revealed himself in Holy Scripture. I also pray that you will come to find that there is not correct living with out correct belief.
Background
Paul in this letter to the Colossians was writing a letter to a church in a small town in the Lycus River Valley, which is in modern day turkey. As with many other towns in this time Colossae would have had many religions to choose from, and mix together. Most of Paul’s converts like many of us came to a saving faith in Jesus Christ later in life. There was also a group of false teachers in Asia Minor at the time. Paul is essentially fighting a battle against these false teachers, who do not believe Jesus to be the Messiah, and who are trying to convert the Pagan converts in the church into form Judaism. These false teachers where challenging the supremacy of Jesus Christ and also the fact that he was God, so Paul felt the need to respond, and his letter to the Christians at Colossae is the response.
I. Christ’s Supremacy over Creation V.15-17
In the preceding verses of chapter one Paul has just finished telling the Colossians how pleased he is with their progress in the Gospel, or the Christian life. Now Paul turns to give praise and glory to the one who God had used to rescue the Colossians out of what Paul calls the Dominion of Darkness, in verse 13.
In v.15 Paul says that Christ is the “image of the invisible God” this does not mean that Paul only thought of Christ as a cheap copy of the father, but a perfect manifestation of God. This is what the Greek word “eikon” means by the use of this word, Paul is stressing that Jesus is the perfect manifestation of God. To see what God is like, we must look at Jesus (cf. John 14:7-10; 1:14-18; 12:45; Heb. 1:3). Jesus was not a creature, but God himself. This does not mean that God the Father and God the Son are the same persons, but that they are one God. The One True and Living God of Christian faith is distinguished from all other religions by this very fact, He is a Trinity, that he exists eternally as three persons, but is still one God. This is the significance of what Paul is saying in the first half of Colossians 1:15. In the second half of v.15 Paul then turns to the fact that Christ is the first born over all creation, what this means is not that Christ was created, but that he is of first rank above all things. This means that there is nothing that we should give more value to than the eternal Son of God, because if He is the creator then he gets all of the glory and honor.
This belief that Christ is to have the glory, or the supremacy in His creation is reinforced by the fact that v.16 proclaims that Christ is the Creator of all things. Paul plays off three pairs of words to emphasize this fact. First, Christ created the heavens and the earth. Second, Christ created all things, visible and invisible. Third, Christ has created all authorities and powers both human and spiritual. In a few short words Paul would say, “Christ is Lord over all!” Paul finishes v. 16 with the phrase; “all things have been created through Him and for Him.” Do not pass over this passage without realizing its implications. All powers and authorities; the entire creation; everything you touch, taste, see, smell, feel they all where created for Christ’s Glory. In v. 17 Paul states what the implications of Christ being the creator means is that Jesus is eternal, and that God the Father holds the universe together through Christ. Paul is countering the belief that there are other powers in this world that could challenge God’s power. Paul says this is absolutely wrong, because Christ is the Creator, and by Him everything that exists has its existence because Christ created them and sustains them. Many people will ask who created God? The answer of scripture is absolutely no one. Our Holy God has always been here and will always be here, He is eternal.
By now I am sure I have put you to sleep, or you are asking, “Blake, so what? What can this possibly have to do with my everyday practical life?” I respond by pointing out four applications from the above previous observations.
1. First, this teaching can affect where you will spend eternity, and I do not think that you can get much more practical than that. If you do not believe me look up 1 John 2:22 “Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.” There are many groups today in our very own small towns of Lanesville, and Corydon who deny the Son and the Father. Some are known as Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others are known as Mormons. They both have one thing in common with all other false religions; they have a defective view of whom Jesus Christ is and what He came to do.
2. The second application is that Christ is Lord now! In v.16 we come back to the point that Christ is the eternal Son of God who is ruling over all powers and authorities in this world, and they are in fact created for His glory. This is the essence of the strength that believers in other countries find when they are persecuted for their faith. To narrow it down as an application for our church in America, this verse may bring you comfort to know that behind the course of world events, God is orchestrating all things for His own glory. There is not one reason for the Christian to panic when things like 9/11 happen! Why? Because Christ is sitting at the Father’s right hand and is ruling the world even though the world that is still in its rebellion is ignoring the fact that He will return in judgment. So, we must remember that Christ is Lord now! This is the significance of the imagery of Christ now sitting at the right hand of the father; this is biblical kingship language.
3. Third, if the world and all that is in it is created for the Glory of Christ as Paul says, this should affect the very way that we live our lives. We live in the King’s world, and as His subjects we are to give Him all of the glory. (“All things have been created through Him and for Him.) This means, that you, your life, your family, and everything that is yours is just on lone in order give Christ the Glory and honor, therefore our resources, all of our resources, should be ready and at the disposal of the God who allowed you to have them.
II. Christ’s Supremacy in the Church
In verses 17-18 we see that Paul switches subjects from the Creation to the Church. Why does Paul do this? Paul does this because he is depicting the church as the beginning of God’s new creation, we are moving from creation to new creation. Just as Christ is the firstborn or is of first rank in his creation (see v. 15), so too, he is the first in the Church (see v. 18). The two ideas that run through the background of this teaching about the old and the new creation are story of man’s rebellion against God, in Eden, that plunged the creation into darkness and decay, and the idea that runs throughout the New Testament known as the “already” and “not yet”. A good example of this “already and not yet” is our salvation, we are already saved, but we will be saved when Christ returns. Or to take an example from recent history; we all know that D-day was the day that Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy and the tide of WWII was changed, but VE Day or victory day did not come until 11 months later. It is as if Christ’s death and resurrection where D-Day and the turning point of History, but we wait for the day that he returns to make all things new, or VE Day. Paul is saying that God is already recreating our world, and when he returns it will be fully changed, and he will wipe away all the tears from our eyes. That is why Christ has risen, because the resurrection is a sign of the New Creation, and the body of believers that he has established is another sign of this new creation! The implications of this New Testament teaching are staggering!
1. First, The supremacy of Christ should change the way we see ourselves. What if we as a Church started to see our church, not as a gathering of people, but as a beginning of something much bigger than ourselves? What if we saw ourselves as God’s New Creation calling a dead and dying world to salvation? What if we saw ourselves as agents of God’s New Creation bringing hope to a world with out hope, feeding the homeless, loving the unlovable, being Christ to the world? The Christian life is so much more than your personal relationship with Jesus. There is more to the Christian life than prayer, bible study, and church. There is discipleship that may cost us our lives. If the church is being this new creation then it will do so, by discipleship, keeping one another accountable, dealing with sin, confessing to one another, and praying with one another. I will tell you right now if there is anyone in this room right now who has difficulties with pornography, alcoholism, lying, cheating or some other sin there is absolutely no chance for you if you do not repent of your sin, and find a group of fellow believers whom you trust that can help you through this bondage, trust me I know first hand. There is not freedom from sin with out the help of the church. Paul assures us in v. 13 that we have freedom from our biggest struggles only in Christ because Christ has rescued us. We are no longer who we where before Salvation, but we are part of God’s new community, and we have the ability to change.
2. Second, the Church with Christ as its head must follow its Lord no matter what the cost, and it must share the gospel with humility. What if we realize that being a Christian is more than getting a fuzzy feeling on Sunday morning because of good music, and realize that God is calling us to live a life of obedience to him right this moment? If we would only see ourselves as the New Community of God to the world, the New Israel if you will, that is called to be a “city set on a hill”, then and only then will the church do what it was intended to do. As a city set on a hill I do not mean one in which, we look down on an unbelieving world, and go hide in our Christian ghettos. What Jesus means by “a city set on a hill” is a group of believers who are willing to love and show love to the prostitute, the alcoholic, the girl who had an abortion, or whatever sin you think is the worst. We are to avoid doing these evil deeds, but the only thing we have to tell an unbelieving world is that they need Christ, we do not need to point the finger and tell people how bad they are unless we are willing to present the full Gospel to them. The Gospel is not a stick we get to brandish over the heads of unbelievers, but the very power of God for salvation.
3. Third, since the church has been risen with Christ, the members should put away all the wickedness of their former lives that they lived before Christ. Paul says in Colossians 3:1-3 “Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking, the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. Before we where believers we where dead in our sins on our way to hell, but when God reached down and graciously gave us the ability to believe in His Son we where changed. This has serious implications for our Christian walk, because if we are united with Christ in His church, then we should constantly be fighting our sin, and if we are not fighting sin, then that may tell us something about ourselves. A Christian life is a changed life, not just coming to church on Sundays. The Christian life is supposed to affect every part of our lives.
III. Christ Supremacy in the incarnation and redemption v.19-20 “For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.”
As vs. 16 gave the explains the appropriateness of what was said about Christ in verse 15, so verse 19 explains the appropriateness of Christ being the preeminent one in verse 18. The reason why Christ is first in the Church is because he has secured our redemption by being the very presence of God on earth. Jesus in His earthly life was both fully God and fully man. This is a divine mystery that no one can, or ever will be able to solve, but this mystery is what saves us, because we as sinful people have sinned against and infinite Holy God, and one transgression against a Holy God is a debt that cannot be paid back by anything that we can do so in our dark state we needed a rescue. So God in order to glorify Himself, by showing us his love, sent His son who was both fully God and fully man to suffer under the perfect wrath of God so that we may have life with Him. Not only have we marred the lives that God has given us, but we have also affected the world around us, that is why Paul can say in this passage that Christ is reconciling all things by the blood of His Cross. Maybe the most vivid illustration of the love God in a the Bible is the story of the Prodigal Son, I would encourage you to read the story this evening before you go to bed. I am going to read the story of the Prodigal to you now [Luke 15;11-32], because I do not think that reconcillation will need any explanation once we read this story. The story of the prodigal is a story of God’s love for his sinful and rebellious people.
How can we possibly apply this to our lives? First, we give Christ all of the glory in our salvation, because there is nothing we can do to save ourselves. Before we are saved we are rightly under God’s just wrath, but when the spirit comes up on us, and moves our hearts to realize that we are sinners in need of Christ it is totally an act of God. Even after we have been saved and we have been in the church for many years we will continue to struggle with sin. The moment that you say you have no sin you need to examine your life, because 1 John says that, “the man who says he has not sin deceives himself, and the truth is not in him.” The Christian life is a continual turning from sin, and sadly the church has failed miserably in helping men and women deal with their deepest darkest sins. Our natural reaction is to hide our sins from others, so that we look as if we are not sinners, but the truth is that though, saved, we are still in a fallen world with fallen desires. This should make us fall in humble adoration of our gracious God who continually empowers us, and forgives us when we stumble. Second, there is no room as a Christian to think that there is some corner of our lives that does not belong to God. Paul is clear that all things where created, held together, and reconciled through Christ. There is not one place of our lives that we should keep from our infinitely Holy God.
I would like everyone to close your eyes, and keep them closed. Maybe you have come here this morning, and you have felt God’s spirit move in your heart as you have heard the message of Colossians. Maybe you are a new face in this church, or maybe you have been in church your whole life, and are just now realizing that you need Christ to change you. If you feel the spirit calling you to Christ, then right where you are raise your hand so that I can pray for you. I am not going to ask anyone to come forward this morning, if you have a decision to make come to Pete or I after service so that we can pray with you, and help you make the next step in the walk of Christian discipleship.
posted by Blake | 3:23 PM
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2 comments
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Review of Colson's "Being the Body"
Colson, Charles and Ellen Vaughn. Being the Body: A New call for the Churches to be Light in the Darkness. Nashville: Word Publishing, 2003. 491 pp. $16.99.
Chuck Colson is well known for his involvement in the Nixon administration, and the controversy that surrounds it. He became a Christian while in prison. When he got out he started a ministry called Prison Fellowship Ministries, and he also has his own radio program, “Break Point,” which airs daily. He founded the Wilberforce forum, which is designed to equip Christians with a Christian worldview. He is the author of over twenty books, many of which deal with the relation of Christianity to culture.
Ellen Vaughn is a fiction author, and co-author with Colson on many books. She is former vice president of Prison Fellowship Ministries.
The authors’ purpose in writing this book was to” … look at the church, as it is commonly perceived, from outside and inside. We’ll address the biblical definition of the church and its characteristics, both the universal and the local confessing congregation.”
In Part one of the book the authors’ answer the question: What is the Church? In Part 2 the relationship of the church to the unbelieving world. Part three explains Church’s praxis, or way of being in the world. How should the church serve the culture that surrounds it?
In Part one the authors describe what a biblical view of the church is. The church is criticized for its modern individualism in America, along with its sensate consumerist culture, the lack of a sense of community, the lack of a belief in truth, the profaning of the sacraments, and the lack of the preaching of the word. The authors correct this view by emphasizing the importance of reverence toward a Holy God, the need for unity among orthodox believers, rediscovering the power of the sacraments, the biblical exposition of God’s word, and the Church as a community that holds its members accountable to be Christ’s followers in a rebellious world.
In Part two the authors turn to the topic of what the church militant looks like, when it is mobilized in a biblical fashion. Colson and Vaughn paint a picture of the church that is the guardian of truth and meaning in an intellectual and popular culture that has rejected these two foundations of society. The authors stress the point, that it is the church’s duty to uphold this truth courageously, and bring it to bear on every aspect of the individual believer’s life. The motivation for this should be a holy fear of the one true and living God. The authors are adamant about these points because if the church does not recognize its responsibility, to bring the truth to the world, then it runs the risk of not answering the ultimate questions that a truth starved society is needing answers. If the church does not meet this challenge, then it will become irrelevant
Part three gives in depths look at how the Church should train Christians to live out their Christian lives. The authors put a major emphasis on Christian discipleship, meaning the intellectual, moral, and spiritual training the church needs, to wage its warfare on the world. The Church must do this by teaching its members the deep truths about the faith, and how our faith, corresponds, and works out in reality. The training should go down the bedrock of the lives of the members of the church, from the financial to how the family is organized. The authors also have hard words for the leaders of the church, calling out what the authors call, the pedestal complex. The pedestal complex is seen to be a poison in the church, because it makes the pastor out to be a celebrity instead of the preacher of God’s word. Not only this but the pastor also loses accountability when he is put on a pedestal. A correction to this problem is the model of Jesus’ servant leadership, which the authors go to some good length in explaining. Furthermore, the church must be in the world by taking the gospel to the world. This must be done in a well thought out contextualized fashion. The authors determine that when the church adopts its mission, then and only then, will the church be salt and light to a world that finds itself in a pool of increasing confusion.
Throughout the book in order to illustrate their point, the authors employ the use of true stories of Christians who embody what the Church is supposed to be. This is helpful because it gives the reader something concrete to see instead of speaking in the abstract.
The authors both state that their background is from within the Reformed tradition. Colson a Reformed Baptist, and Vaughn a member of the Presbyterian Church of America. The authors try to put forward a vision of church unity based on the Nicene tradition, which all orthodox traditions can agree on. The position of Colson and Vaughn is at variance with much of reformed tradition that typically sees the Catholic Church, at best as a false church with some believers, and at worst, as a totally apostate church. Colson and Vaughn are influenced by a philosophy of the Church that believes, that there are true, and false believers in all denominations (13). This “open” perspective makes this book valuable to all denominations, because it calls the church universal to stand united against the coming tide of unbelieving secularism. In short, it is time for Protestants to stop making 16th century disputes as the main problems in the world today. There is now a new enemy at our gates, secularism.
The authors also masterfully weave in chapters of stories of inspiration and hope in between their more didactic chapters. These chapters seem to expand on, and make the points they are trying to make more life like. A good example of this is chapter 23-24. The authors set up a didactic/story-telling dialectic. Chapter twenty-three concerns the humility of Christ, and how believers should have the same mind set as their lord. Then in the next chapter they tell the story of Father Maximilian Kobe who gave his life for a man, at Auschwitz that the did not even know. The story reinforces the teachings so strongly that it drives the point home. This is done throughout the book.
When the authors turn to the matters of church culture and its corruptions they offer some penetrating analysis. On pages eighteen through twenty-five they show how the church has become individual and consumer oriented. They note how this consumer impulse in American society corrupts the members and the theology of the church. By putting the focus on the self and feel good culture, the church, instead of teaching the doctrines of man’s sinfulness, and need for God, the church tries to please the consumer. The church has even gone so far as to use marketing techniques to draw people into the church. On pages 44-45 the authors helpfully distinguish between the church particular and the church universal. The church particular is the divided up universal body, with its varying differences and denominations, but the church is still unified on the main points of faith.
Colson and Vaughn, helpfully, in chapter fifteen explain and critique the different world-views are destroying the church and western society. They confront the emptiness of the modern world and the emptiness of these philosophies by showing the inherent flaws in each (177-196).
It is also refreshing in chapter twenty that Colson restates the reformed view of everyday life. He adequately grasps the fact that the Christian life transforms everything we do, into and act of worship to God. This chapter is a great corrective for the practical atheism that so often has seeped into our churches.
The third section of the book lays out a great plan for Christian discipleship. Foundational, to this section is as the authors say, “What we do, therefore, flows from who we are.” This is foundational to understanding Christian discipleship (311). So often in the Church we have forgot to disciple people after conversion. We must tell new believers to believe in Christ is synonymous with following him, because if we believe in someone we will follow them. One thing that Colson and Vaughn do not realize is that the statement, “Being precedes doing (359) (essence before existence)” is in direct contradiction to the modern existentialist teaching that “existence precedes essence.” The should have realized this, because it would have been very helpful to flesh it out a little bit more with in the context of contemporary society.
This book is the second book on the church that this reviewer has read in the last two months. The other book was Mere Discipleship, which was from an Anabaptist perspective on cultural engagement. There where many correspondences between the two books and their ideas concerning the church and discipleship. Both books call Christians to be more radical disciples calling a broken and lost world back to its creator. The one thing that Mere Discipleship was stronger in than Being the Body is the eschatological view of the Christian community. While Colson does note this teaching, it is not nearly a big enough topic in the book.
This book is a breath of fresh air in the Christian community for two reasons. First, it challenges the reformed community that is still in many ways stuck in the sixteenth century disputes of the reformers. Colson and Vaughn challenge these Christians to realize that there is now a much bigger enemy at the door than the Catholic Church, because Protestants and Catholics are trying to reconcile differences. Secularism is now the single most dangerous ideology to Protestant and Catholic traditions, and it is about time that Protestants and Catholics recognize this. Second, it challenges the “limp wristed” ecumenism of the mainline Protestant denominations that want to simply act like there are no differences what so ever between denominations. Colson and Vaughn call these groups back to theological purity (261-289).
It would have been helpful if the authors would have gave a chapter devoted to the Emergent Church movement, since it has been the topic of discussion for quite some time. The critiques of post modernity in section two of the book would have been very helpful when examining the works of Brian Mclaren, and other emergent writers.
Everything the authors include in this book is right on target. Their critiques of the church need to be heard, and their suggestions on discipleship need to be implemented into our churches.
This book was a very enjoyable and edifying read. The stories are gripping and the didactic chapters are intellectually stimulating, they are written from a solid orthodox position, which will be good for people in the church who are not as well read in theology. This book will be good for anyone in the church who wants to further his or her understanding of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.
More specifically this book is extremely valuable to any student of theology who is looking to take a leadership position within the church. The book gives good guidelines for how churches should disciple new believers, and how the church must regain its collectivist roots by combating western individualism. The book is not afraid to step on toes, but this is exactly what a church that has grown complacent needs.
Chuck Colson is well known for his involvement in the Nixon administration, and the controversy that surrounds it. He became a Christian while in prison. When he got out he started a ministry called Prison Fellowship Ministries, and he also has his own radio program, “Break Point,” which airs daily. He founded the Wilberforce forum, which is designed to equip Christians with a Christian worldview. He is the author of over twenty books, many of which deal with the relation of Christianity to culture.
Ellen Vaughn is a fiction author, and co-author with Colson on many books. She is former vice president of Prison Fellowship Ministries.
The authors’ purpose in writing this book was to” … look at the church, as it is commonly perceived, from outside and inside. We’ll address the biblical definition of the church and its characteristics, both the universal and the local confessing congregation.”
In Part one of the book the authors’ answer the question: What is the Church? In Part 2 the relationship of the church to the unbelieving world. Part three explains Church’s praxis, or way of being in the world. How should the church serve the culture that surrounds it?
In Part one the authors describe what a biblical view of the church is. The church is criticized for its modern individualism in America, along with its sensate consumerist culture, the lack of a sense of community, the lack of a belief in truth, the profaning of the sacraments, and the lack of the preaching of the word. The authors correct this view by emphasizing the importance of reverence toward a Holy God, the need for unity among orthodox believers, rediscovering the power of the sacraments, the biblical exposition of God’s word, and the Church as a community that holds its members accountable to be Christ’s followers in a rebellious world.
In Part two the authors turn to the topic of what the church militant looks like, when it is mobilized in a biblical fashion. Colson and Vaughn paint a picture of the church that is the guardian of truth and meaning in an intellectual and popular culture that has rejected these two foundations of society. The authors stress the point, that it is the church’s duty to uphold this truth courageously, and bring it to bear on every aspect of the individual believer’s life. The motivation for this should be a holy fear of the one true and living God. The authors are adamant about these points because if the church does not recognize its responsibility, to bring the truth to the world, then it runs the risk of not answering the ultimate questions that a truth starved society is needing answers. If the church does not meet this challenge, then it will become irrelevant
Part three gives in depths look at how the Church should train Christians to live out their Christian lives. The authors put a major emphasis on Christian discipleship, meaning the intellectual, moral, and spiritual training the church needs, to wage its warfare on the world. The Church must do this by teaching its members the deep truths about the faith, and how our faith, corresponds, and works out in reality. The training should go down the bedrock of the lives of the members of the church, from the financial to how the family is organized. The authors also have hard words for the leaders of the church, calling out what the authors call, the pedestal complex. The pedestal complex is seen to be a poison in the church, because it makes the pastor out to be a celebrity instead of the preacher of God’s word. Not only this but the pastor also loses accountability when he is put on a pedestal. A correction to this problem is the model of Jesus’ servant leadership, which the authors go to some good length in explaining. Furthermore, the church must be in the world by taking the gospel to the world. This must be done in a well thought out contextualized fashion. The authors determine that when the church adopts its mission, then and only then, will the church be salt and light to a world that finds itself in a pool of increasing confusion.
Throughout the book in order to illustrate their point, the authors employ the use of true stories of Christians who embody what the Church is supposed to be. This is helpful because it gives the reader something concrete to see instead of speaking in the abstract.
The authors both state that their background is from within the Reformed tradition. Colson a Reformed Baptist, and Vaughn a member of the Presbyterian Church of America. The authors try to put forward a vision of church unity based on the Nicene tradition, which all orthodox traditions can agree on. The position of Colson and Vaughn is at variance with much of reformed tradition that typically sees the Catholic Church, at best as a false church with some believers, and at worst, as a totally apostate church. Colson and Vaughn are influenced by a philosophy of the Church that believes, that there are true, and false believers in all denominations (13). This “open” perspective makes this book valuable to all denominations, because it calls the church universal to stand united against the coming tide of unbelieving secularism. In short, it is time for Protestants to stop making 16th century disputes as the main problems in the world today. There is now a new enemy at our gates, secularism.
The authors also masterfully weave in chapters of stories of inspiration and hope in between their more didactic chapters. These chapters seem to expand on, and make the points they are trying to make more life like. A good example of this is chapter 23-24. The authors set up a didactic/story-telling dialectic. Chapter twenty-three concerns the humility of Christ, and how believers should have the same mind set as their lord. Then in the next chapter they tell the story of Father Maximilian Kobe who gave his life for a man, at Auschwitz that the did not even know. The story reinforces the teachings so strongly that it drives the point home. This is done throughout the book.
When the authors turn to the matters of church culture and its corruptions they offer some penetrating analysis. On pages eighteen through twenty-five they show how the church has become individual and consumer oriented. They note how this consumer impulse in American society corrupts the members and the theology of the church. By putting the focus on the self and feel good culture, the church, instead of teaching the doctrines of man’s sinfulness, and need for God, the church tries to please the consumer. The church has even gone so far as to use marketing techniques to draw people into the church. On pages 44-45 the authors helpfully distinguish between the church particular and the church universal. The church particular is the divided up universal body, with its varying differences and denominations, but the church is still unified on the main points of faith.
Colson and Vaughn, helpfully, in chapter fifteen explain and critique the different world-views are destroying the church and western society. They confront the emptiness of the modern world and the emptiness of these philosophies by showing the inherent flaws in each (177-196).
It is also refreshing in chapter twenty that Colson restates the reformed view of everyday life. He adequately grasps the fact that the Christian life transforms everything we do, into and act of worship to God. This chapter is a great corrective for the practical atheism that so often has seeped into our churches.
The third section of the book lays out a great plan for Christian discipleship. Foundational, to this section is as the authors say, “What we do, therefore, flows from who we are.” This is foundational to understanding Christian discipleship (311). So often in the Church we have forgot to disciple people after conversion. We must tell new believers to believe in Christ is synonymous with following him, because if we believe in someone we will follow them. One thing that Colson and Vaughn do not realize is that the statement, “Being precedes doing (359) (essence before existence)” is in direct contradiction to the modern existentialist teaching that “existence precedes essence.” The should have realized this, because it would have been very helpful to flesh it out a little bit more with in the context of contemporary society.
This book is the second book on the church that this reviewer has read in the last two months. The other book was Mere Discipleship, which was from an Anabaptist perspective on cultural engagement. There where many correspondences between the two books and their ideas concerning the church and discipleship. Both books call Christians to be more radical disciples calling a broken and lost world back to its creator. The one thing that Mere Discipleship was stronger in than Being the Body is the eschatological view of the Christian community. While Colson does note this teaching, it is not nearly a big enough topic in the book.
This book is a breath of fresh air in the Christian community for two reasons. First, it challenges the reformed community that is still in many ways stuck in the sixteenth century disputes of the reformers. Colson and Vaughn challenge these Christians to realize that there is now a much bigger enemy at the door than the Catholic Church, because Protestants and Catholics are trying to reconcile differences. Secularism is now the single most dangerous ideology to Protestant and Catholic traditions, and it is about time that Protestants and Catholics recognize this. Second, it challenges the “limp wristed” ecumenism of the mainline Protestant denominations that want to simply act like there are no differences what so ever between denominations. Colson and Vaughn call these groups back to theological purity (261-289).
It would have been helpful if the authors would have gave a chapter devoted to the Emergent Church movement, since it has been the topic of discussion for quite some time. The critiques of post modernity in section two of the book would have been very helpful when examining the works of Brian Mclaren, and other emergent writers.
Everything the authors include in this book is right on target. Their critiques of the church need to be heard, and their suggestions on discipleship need to be implemented into our churches.
This book was a very enjoyable and edifying read. The stories are gripping and the didactic chapters are intellectually stimulating, they are written from a solid orthodox position, which will be good for people in the church who are not as well read in theology. This book will be good for anyone in the church who wants to further his or her understanding of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ.
More specifically this book is extremely valuable to any student of theology who is looking to take a leadership position within the church. The book gives good guidelines for how churches should disciple new believers, and how the church must regain its collectivist roots by combating western individualism. The book is not afraid to step on toes, but this is exactly what a church that has grown complacent needs.
posted by Blake | 9:01 AM
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4 comments
Monday, December 05, 2005
The Problems with Boyce College
Boyce College is a small bible college in the midwest that I have recently stopped attending. This is an open letter of sorts to Jimmy Scroggins and everyone else at Southern Seminary who have allowed the academic standards to plummet over the last few years. I see four major problems that need to be fixed at the school or it will remain an obscure insititution: 1) Students are not introduced to liberal theology in the biblical studies program, because of a fear they may lost their faith, we are told that they are wrong, but we never read Wellhausen, Bultmann, Kaseman or any other writer. 2) Philosophy classes are a joke, we read no original sources and any decent discussions are not carried on when they arise. 3) Lack of examination of differing view points within Christianity. We are never taught about Roman Catholocism, Eastern Orthodoxy etc. we are simply told that they are wrong, because the Baptists have the faith once and for all handed down to the saints. 4) The Academic climate is stifling, with no freedom of descent on theological issues. No one can openly ask questions in a comfortable context, and if the student has an opinion that is at variance with the professor on things like Predestination, Eschatology, or nature of scripture it is not welcomed. A good example is the dismantling of the Berea Forum after Hal Ostrander left. Notice we no longer have debates like the Eschatology debate. What if we wanted to have a debate from some liberal thinker with an Evangelical? For instance if we had a debate between a John Dominic Crossan and N.T. Wright. Or even better what if we had an open forum with the Presbyterian Seminary right next door? I doubt this would happen since the Seminary is afraid to even touch views that may be somewhat contrary to what we confess. I am confessional in my theology but it is no excuse for lack of learning, or a lack of engagement with those around us. I hope that Southern becomes more conversant with the outside world, and that Boyce would stop placating to the Youth Majors and recovers its sense of Academic respectability. I am done with the school personally, but for those who continue to enroll I hope that the school will start to care about the mind a little bit more than it has recently, and maybe even care for your spiritual well being.
In Christ,
Blake
In Christ,
Blake
posted by Blake | 8:19 AM
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4 comments
Saturday, December 03, 2005
Absurdity, Suicide, and Camus
As I have been reading Camus, and some snippets of other existentialist writers I am struck at the possibility of an Existential Argument for God's Existence. Camus says that the absurd is not something outside of the human mind, as if it is caused by the universe, but it is the combination of an amoral and irrational universe that clashes with the being called man, who seeks answers to everything. Man, as Camus notes loves consistency and the ability to rap his mind around ideas, concepts, truths, or whatever. The same goes for our existence, we like to feel comfortable, we do not like to feel as if the world may fall apart on us, better yet we like to feel like things are familiar, but Camus notes that there are those moments when the hum drum of life breaks down, and man becomes concious, because as Camus notes, Absurdity begins at the beginning of consiousness. When we become concious of our position in the universe man sees the absurdity of it all, and yet he still feels as if there must be hope or purpose. Camus opts for the option that life is meaningless, but somehow we must rise above and make meaning (existence precedes Essence). If we do not rise above, the only option becomes suicide, because the way to resolve the absurdity is to either kill man, or get rid of the world. Camus of course lost faith in his answer towards the end of his life as the book "Camus and the Minister" by Mumma shows. Camus, it appears committed suicide by driving his car into a tree.
This leaves a huge question for me; just why does man want something more? This makes me remember the point that C.S. Lewis made one of his works. Lewis made the point that when a human has needs that are integral for his well being that they where met, if a man is hungry there is food, if man is thirsty there is water, and so on, so what would make it so odd if the massive urge for meaning and purpose in life actually reflected something that did exist that we need? Would this not point to what Augustine said, "Are hearts are wrestless until they find rest in you," I find this to be the most likely solution, since the angst that everyone feels when life is out of control which does not contribute to survival in anyway, which would rule out an "evolutionary" need for the feeling of absurdity, it is simply not something that we need to survive, it actually hinders survival. Therefore, if man has a tendency to need meaning or purpose in life, I think, it is highly likely (probable) that there is something transcendent that gives our lives meaning.
Is it possible that there is not a God? I do not think so, due to many other problems that it causes, but I have been convinced of a theistic worldview, so the argument above seems stronger to me than someone who does not believe in a theistic world view, becuase I have certain epistemic supports that prop up this final "existential" argument or reason to believe in God's existence. Of course this "argument" may have more weight with someone who is fence sitting on the question of God's existence.
In Christ,
Blake
This leaves a huge question for me; just why does man want something more? This makes me remember the point that C.S. Lewis made one of his works. Lewis made the point that when a human has needs that are integral for his well being that they where met, if a man is hungry there is food, if man is thirsty there is water, and so on, so what would make it so odd if the massive urge for meaning and purpose in life actually reflected something that did exist that we need? Would this not point to what Augustine said, "Are hearts are wrestless until they find rest in you," I find this to be the most likely solution, since the angst that everyone feels when life is out of control which does not contribute to survival in anyway, which would rule out an "evolutionary" need for the feeling of absurdity, it is simply not something that we need to survive, it actually hinders survival. Therefore, if man has a tendency to need meaning or purpose in life, I think, it is highly likely (probable) that there is something transcendent that gives our lives meaning.
Is it possible that there is not a God? I do not think so, due to many other problems that it causes, but I have been convinced of a theistic worldview, so the argument above seems stronger to me than someone who does not believe in a theistic world view, becuase I have certain epistemic supports that prop up this final "existential" argument or reason to believe in God's existence. Of course this "argument" may have more weight with someone who is fence sitting on the question of God's existence.
In Christ,
Blake
posted by Blake | 2:11 PM
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0 comments
Camus and Buber
I have started to read Albert Camus and Martin Buber. Camus' idea of the absurd is interesting, and I believe that it is a necessary conclusion for the person who does not want to, or does not believe in the I-You relationship with God. It is interesting though that Camus, it appears, was close to converting to some sort of Christianity. This comes from the book "Camus and the Minister". Anyway, more on my existential ramblings later, I do not think anyone is reading anway, are you?
In Christ,
Blake
In Christ,
Blake
posted by Blake | 10:11 AM
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0 comments
Friday, December 02, 2005
Church and State My Position Roughly Stated
The Relationship of Christianity to the State
The issue of the nature of the state and Christianity is a complex one, not to mention the fact that it can become a heated debate in countries where Christians tend to be very patriotic. A biblical view of the nature of the church will be examined first, followed by an examination of the nature of the state, followed up by some conclusions that we can from the nature of the two, and third, Christian sinfulness and realism. The point of this paper is that traditional views of the relationship between church and state are wholly inadequate in part, if not in whole.
The Nature of the Church
The nature of the church, especially in the Anabaptist tradition, holds that the church is the baptized body of believers. It is closest to the biblical position because first, the church is the in breaking of God’s new kingdom. Second, and related to the first, the church is no longer part of the Old Age, but of the New Age. This is seen very clearly in the teachings of Jesus in Mark 3:21-22. This means that the church is an eschatological community in its very essence. It is the first fruits of the new creation, because believers are already being changed, and they have already begun to be transformed “in Christ”. The New Testament writers hold a tension of what Oscar Cullman called the “already” and “not yet”, meaning that Christ had already come, and through his redeeming work he had already finished all of the prophecies of the Old Testament except the final judgment. Since this is the case the church must be seen as part of the eschatological consummation as Paul says in Ephesians 1:18-23,
“ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might which He brought about in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power, and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.
In this passage we notice that Paul links the reign of Christ with His resurrection, in effect God has brought about a new age in the death and resurrection of Jesus. The kingdoms of this world are of the Old Age, but the church exists in the New Age because of its Lord. What this means for the church is, that it is called to be a distinct community that stands in judgment upon an unbelieving world that is stuck in the Old Age. Part of the way that the church testifies to the world about its Lord is through its main occupation; through out the rest of history, before the return of Christ, the church is to tell the world the gospel that Christ is king and Caesar is not.
History only finds its purpose now in the church of Jesus Christ. The story of the world is the story of God’s grace shown in the church, and his continual call through his church to bring salvation the nations. This is where the church looks like Israel. In the Old Testament God repeatedly, in the prophets, speaks of a day when the Gentiles would come and worship at His temple this is exactly what the church fulfills. The out-pouring of God’s grace on the nations has taken place in His church. This is why it is said that the church is thoroughly and eschatological community, standing on threshold of time. The church is not to be aloof from the world though, on the contrary, it is to be for the world! The book of James speaks against Christians holding their wealth back from helping others, and Jesus speaks of helping the sick and dying, and loving our neighbors. The church is a new community, but it is also to act like a new community that has been redeemed by God’s grace.
The Nature of the State
The nature of the state, biblically, is not as many theologians down through history have construed it to be. First, the main job of the state is to keep the peace so that the gospel may spread, as 1 Timothy 2:1-4, “First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions, and thanksgiving, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet lives in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” This passage seems to link living “calm and tranquil lives” with “God wanting all men to be saved” this could only mean that the state must be prayed for so that the church can adequately do its job with out persecution.
Second, Romans 13 and Revelation 13 are two of the most commonly misunderstood passages. Romans 13, contrary to the popular theological treatments, does not set an ideal for the state but only says what the state is doing empirically in a fallen world. The state is not something that God had in mind from the beginning as if it is a good thing, but it is a necessary evil, to help channel evil from being as prevalent as it could be due to the effects of human sin.
Revelation 13 also does not depict a state in which the church can rebel against the states injustice, since the whole book of Revelation is about Christians trusting God to save them in his own time from their oppression it cannot be used to justify revolution.
These considerations lead to the conclusion that the state will never in this fallen world live up the standards that Christians need it to. The state will always be a pagan entity, because it is an unnatural institution set up because of human sinfulness.
Human Sinfulness and Christian Realism
A Christian political position will also be that of realism. Christian realism is simply the position that takes human depravity seriously by realizing its destructive nature in relationships among people, and in the institutions that humanity constructs. This is why Christians should never be held hostage to any one politically ideology as evangelicals in the American church are. The rank nationalism and the idolatry that is the Christian support for America and the Republican Party is a good example of the Christian idealization of the state and on particular ideology. Christians should guard against both, and realize, that neither party will ever live up to biblical standards, and even though the republican party takes descent stands on moral issues they neither go far enough, nor is their prostitution of the American church correct.
Christians must hold the position, not of “prophets” that is only for the believing church, but as social critics who are not afraid to speak truth to power.
Christians with a Christian realist view of reality will also be ready to speak out against all injustices that they see in society, not just abortion, but also poverty, neglect for the mentally ill, elderly, and genocide in other countries.
Conclusions
First, the church must always be willing to confront the state and any political party that may obstruct that church’s mission in the world. This is the case whether that is issues of social justices or the spread of the gospel.
Second, the Church and that State are to be totally separate in the sense that the church never becomes so involved with the state that the state can tell the church what it must do, because that would mean that the state would have more than one Lord. This is the problem with modern faith based initiatives. They are willing to give money to the church for social justice work, but not wiling to allow the church to evangelize.
Third, the Church must be pacifistic in its approach to war, but this does not mean that the state as a pagan institution loses its right to be a coercive force, as long as it is within means of keeping the peace. Christians cannot realistically think that pagans will act like Christians.
Fourth, Christians can be active in political office only if they are not seeking selfish gain, but the greater good of their neighbors, which is what Christ calls us to do. In other words the believer cannot make political statements only in order to get reelected.
Fifth, Christians will oppose and us versus them mentality, which leads to crusades, or going after evil because “god is on our side”. When ever the empire starts using religiously charged language that is when the church must speak out.
Sixth, Christians cannot become captured by the borderline fascist nationalism that so many Christians slip into. When the church does this it becomes a tribalistic entity exactly like that of Israel in the Old Testament with such a narrow vision of the world that it forgets everyone but the nation that it exists in, or even worse the state become equated with the church, as many Christians have done with the America in biblical prophecy routine.
The issue of the nature of the state and Christianity is a complex one, not to mention the fact that it can become a heated debate in countries where Christians tend to be very patriotic. A biblical view of the nature of the church will be examined first, followed by an examination of the nature of the state, followed up by some conclusions that we can from the nature of the two, and third, Christian sinfulness and realism. The point of this paper is that traditional views of the relationship between church and state are wholly inadequate in part, if not in whole.
The Nature of the Church
The nature of the church, especially in the Anabaptist tradition, holds that the church is the baptized body of believers. It is closest to the biblical position because first, the church is the in breaking of God’s new kingdom. Second, and related to the first, the church is no longer part of the Old Age, but of the New Age. This is seen very clearly in the teachings of Jesus in Mark 3:21-22. This means that the church is an eschatological community in its very essence. It is the first fruits of the new creation, because believers are already being changed, and they have already begun to be transformed “in Christ”. The New Testament writers hold a tension of what Oscar Cullman called the “already” and “not yet”, meaning that Christ had already come, and through his redeeming work he had already finished all of the prophecies of the Old Testament except the final judgment. Since this is the case the church must be seen as part of the eschatological consummation as Paul says in Ephesians 1:18-23,
“ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of the strength of His might which He brought about in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power, and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And He put all things in subjection under His feet, and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all.
In this passage we notice that Paul links the reign of Christ with His resurrection, in effect God has brought about a new age in the death and resurrection of Jesus. The kingdoms of this world are of the Old Age, but the church exists in the New Age because of its Lord. What this means for the church is, that it is called to be a distinct community that stands in judgment upon an unbelieving world that is stuck in the Old Age. Part of the way that the church testifies to the world about its Lord is through its main occupation; through out the rest of history, before the return of Christ, the church is to tell the world the gospel that Christ is king and Caesar is not.
History only finds its purpose now in the church of Jesus Christ. The story of the world is the story of God’s grace shown in the church, and his continual call through his church to bring salvation the nations. This is where the church looks like Israel. In the Old Testament God repeatedly, in the prophets, speaks of a day when the Gentiles would come and worship at His temple this is exactly what the church fulfills. The out-pouring of God’s grace on the nations has taken place in His church. This is why it is said that the church is thoroughly and eschatological community, standing on threshold of time. The church is not to be aloof from the world though, on the contrary, it is to be for the world! The book of James speaks against Christians holding their wealth back from helping others, and Jesus speaks of helping the sick and dying, and loving our neighbors. The church is a new community, but it is also to act like a new community that has been redeemed by God’s grace.
The Nature of the State
The nature of the state, biblically, is not as many theologians down through history have construed it to be. First, the main job of the state is to keep the peace so that the gospel may spread, as 1 Timothy 2:1-4, “First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions, and thanksgiving, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet lives in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” This passage seems to link living “calm and tranquil lives” with “God wanting all men to be saved” this could only mean that the state must be prayed for so that the church can adequately do its job with out persecution.
Second, Romans 13 and Revelation 13 are two of the most commonly misunderstood passages. Romans 13, contrary to the popular theological treatments, does not set an ideal for the state but only says what the state is doing empirically in a fallen world. The state is not something that God had in mind from the beginning as if it is a good thing, but it is a necessary evil, to help channel evil from being as prevalent as it could be due to the effects of human sin.
Revelation 13 also does not depict a state in which the church can rebel against the states injustice, since the whole book of Revelation is about Christians trusting God to save them in his own time from their oppression it cannot be used to justify revolution.
These considerations lead to the conclusion that the state will never in this fallen world live up the standards that Christians need it to. The state will always be a pagan entity, because it is an unnatural institution set up because of human sinfulness.
Human Sinfulness and Christian Realism
A Christian political position will also be that of realism. Christian realism is simply the position that takes human depravity seriously by realizing its destructive nature in relationships among people, and in the institutions that humanity constructs. This is why Christians should never be held hostage to any one politically ideology as evangelicals in the American church are. The rank nationalism and the idolatry that is the Christian support for America and the Republican Party is a good example of the Christian idealization of the state and on particular ideology. Christians should guard against both, and realize, that neither party will ever live up to biblical standards, and even though the republican party takes descent stands on moral issues they neither go far enough, nor is their prostitution of the American church correct.
Christians must hold the position, not of “prophets” that is only for the believing church, but as social critics who are not afraid to speak truth to power.
Christians with a Christian realist view of reality will also be ready to speak out against all injustices that they see in society, not just abortion, but also poverty, neglect for the mentally ill, elderly, and genocide in other countries.
Conclusions
First, the church must always be willing to confront the state and any political party that may obstruct that church’s mission in the world. This is the case whether that is issues of social justices or the spread of the gospel.
Second, the Church and that State are to be totally separate in the sense that the church never becomes so involved with the state that the state can tell the church what it must do, because that would mean that the state would have more than one Lord. This is the problem with modern faith based initiatives. They are willing to give money to the church for social justice work, but not wiling to allow the church to evangelize.
Third, the Church must be pacifistic in its approach to war, but this does not mean that the state as a pagan institution loses its right to be a coercive force, as long as it is within means of keeping the peace. Christians cannot realistically think that pagans will act like Christians.
Fourth, Christians can be active in political office only if they are not seeking selfish gain, but the greater good of their neighbors, which is what Christ calls us to do. In other words the believer cannot make political statements only in order to get reelected.
Fifth, Christians will oppose and us versus them mentality, which leads to crusades, or going after evil because “god is on our side”. When ever the empire starts using religiously charged language that is when the church must speak out.
Sixth, Christians cannot become captured by the borderline fascist nationalism that so many Christians slip into. When the church does this it becomes a tribalistic entity exactly like that of Israel in the Old Testament with such a narrow vision of the world that it forgets everyone but the nation that it exists in, or even worse the state become equated with the church, as many Christians have done with the America in biblical prophecy routine.
posted by Blake | 7:01 PM
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Christianity and the State
What is Christianity's relation to the state? What is the proper role of Christians in the state? Can a Christian hold political office? These questions can only be answered by examining what the nature of the church is, and conversly what is the nature of the State. This discussion inevitably runs into the question of Eschatology. I will answer these questions over the next few days, and post them as I go.
posted by Blake | 12:00 PM
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Currently Reading: The presence of eternity: History and eschatology (The Gifford lectures, 1955)
I am reading Rudolf Bultmann's "History and Eschatology: The Prescence of Eternity" and I came across a passage that I found curious. In the chapter that i am reading he has been discussing the understanding of history in light of eschatology. He examines Cosmic meaning mythological eschatology, and historical eschatology which is historicized myth, meaning that the writers use mythological language to give events there full meaning. He then discusses History and eschatology in Judaism. He says the prophets and the rest of the Old Testament except Daniel look forward to God's acts in History not the end of the world, but Daniel presents a shift that follows into other intertestamental literature such as 4 Ezra etc. that of a dualism between two ages. Finally he comes to History and Eschatology in Primitive Chritianity, he notes that Christianity believes that Christ fulfills the OT promises which I agree with but I disagree with the following. I will break the following down into 1,2,3,4 my comments will be under each part of what he says. The excerpt from Bultmann is a full continous excerpt interrupted by me :)!
He says, "The New Covenant is not grounded on an even of the history of the people as was the Old Covenant. For the death of Christ on which it is founded is not a "hisotical event" to which one may look back as one may to the story of Moses. The New People of God has no real history, for it is the community of the end-time, and eschatological phenomenon. How could it have a history now when the world-time is finished and the end is imminent!
1) I do not see why Eschatology must be seperated from History, nor why since the Old aeon is passing away that it is still not in some sense over lapping with the New Aeon (or age). Bultmann never explains why the death of Christ cannot be considered a historical event of delieverance as was the exodus in the Old Testament. Bultmann is essentially trying to make Eschatology only and existential "present" for the individual with no grounding in the real world.
Continuting...
The conciousness of being the eschatological community is at the same time conciousness of being tqaken out of the still existing world. The world is the sphere of uncleanness and sin, it is a foreign country for the Christians whose commonwealth is in heaven (phil 3:20). Therefore neither the Christian community nor the individuals within it have any responsibility for the present world and its orders, for the tasks of society and the state. On the contrary, the believers must keep themselves pure from the world, tht they may be "blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whome you shine as lights in the world' (Phil 2:15)
2) This to me is disturbing that a giant of New Testament Scholarship could misread the New Testament. It is not possible on any Critical Method to come the the conclusion that Jesus and the Early Christians did not believe that they where God's community for a dying world. The Church was to be active in the world, not withdraw as Bultmann seems to think in this passage. I am not even going to attempt to list the numerous passages in the Pauline letters and the Gospels in which Christians are called to be examples to the world, and living for the world! Again in regards to the state and society Bultmann is trying to reduce Christianity to Existiential feeling in order to take Crhstianity out of public life
Continuation of Bultmann
... To sum up. All this means that in early Christianity history is swallowed up in eschatology. The early Christian community understands itself not as a historical but as an eschatological phenomenon. It is concious that it belongs no longer to the present world but to the New Aeon which is at the door. The question then is how long this conciousness can remain vivid, how long the expectation of the imminent end of the world remain unshaken.
3) Bultmann thinks that, since, the christian community believes that it is part of the New Aeon, that they did not believe that they did not live live at all in the Old Aeon. But he misses the point that there is tension in the New Testament between "already" and "not yet" Christians believe that the New Aeon began with the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus, but also that the Old Age and the New Age have continued to run side by side. The Church is the New Community of God and is the New Age in the Old Age. We are prophets to this Old Age that the rest of the world lives in. When someone enters into the new community of God, they automatically come out of the Old Aeon,and into the New Aeon.
Granted everything that I have said about Bultmann's denegration of History is lacking any comment on his critical reconstruction of Christianity, which probably brings him to some of the conclusions that the comes to. I will note them as I go along.
In Christ,
Blake
Public - 11:46 AM - add eprops - add comments - edit it - email it
Saturday, November 26, 2005
Currently Reading: A History of Philosophy (Book One, Volumes I, II, III)
My girlfriend is teaching me to set goals so here is a rough reading list for December-September
1. Coplestone's History of Philosophy (8 Volumes)
2. A.J Ayer's "Language, Truth, and Logic
3. Bertrand Russel's History of Western Philosophy
4. Scham's logic (on going project)
5. Russ Fuller's Hebrew Composition book (ongoing project)
6. Fueherbach's "Essence of Christianity
7. The Old Testament Speaks
8. The Historical Reliability of the Old Testament
9. "Is There a Meaning in this Text" Vanhoozer
10. Cambridge Companion to Postmodernity
11. Ferdinand Braudel's "History of Civilization"
12. Finish Crime and Punishment
13. Finish the Farie Queen by Spenser
14. A book that I just bought by Rudolph Bultmann
15. An Analysis of Van Til's Thought by Greg Bahnsen
16. God's Politics by Jim Wallis.
That is it for now if I make it through these I will read more.
The longer I live the more confused i get as to where my story fits into God's story, since our only significance comes fromt that Eph.1 says as much. If it was not for God's predestination of believers our stories would be that of the spiritually dead, but I often am so scared. te deum
In Christ
Blake
Public - 10:20 PM - add eprops - add comments - edit it - email it
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
I have come to the very difficult decision that I will not be taking classes at Boyce next semester. I love school, I just dislike Boyce. I am taking a Semester off and working for my dad to save money so that I can transfer to Bethel College, Trinity International, or some other school. Due to the down grade in academic standards, and the lack of desire to bang my head against books like Wayne Grudem (Oh please, hasn't anyone read a real reformed writer like Bavnick?), and the lack of academic diversity, I will gladly take a semester to read some liberal theology, philosophy, biblical studies, History, Literature, etc. A good friend of mine and I will also be launching a Website that deals with questions of faith, philosophy,etc. I guess this means that I can be a true member of Sans boyce!
In Christ,
Blake
Public - 4:17 PM - 4 eprops - 3 comments - edit it - email it
Monday, November 21, 2005
I am glad to be on Sans boyce Blogring. Woohoo
Public - 1:16 PM - 6 eprops - 3 comments - edit it - email it
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Currently Reading: The Bondage of the Will
Random thoughts
What is this angst that we all feel? This wanting someting more, or never feeling satisfied? I know that I am to find my satisfaction in God, but will I ever be fully satisfied in this life or will I always have this low level divine discontent? If only we could see the beautific vision now, the day when we behold God and can do nothing, but praise His infinite majesty. It is amazing that God picks wretched sinners like us up from our dead state and breathes the breath of life into us! I do not deserve his grace, and that is the most humbling thing that this prideful and arrogant heart has ever encountered.
When we finally realize the glory and nature of God, which is a gift from God in and of itself, we become who we truly are! The man-in-his-sinful-state becomes man-in-his-sinful-state-before-God. Only by this act of the divine will can we ever come to a place where we go from man-in-corruption to man-being-brought-out-of-corruption. We cannot be brought to this place of our own power of course, and that is what is so frustrating to the "human-will", because while "free" it can only choose one option "evil" it is not free to choose the "good" or God. Freedom of the will as the Apostles, Edwards, and Luther pointed out is only freedom to follow God, and bondage is to be a slave to sin. A wise friend of mine once said, "I am glad that my salvation was never up to me! If it was I would still be dead in my sins!"
The problems that flow from God's absolute Soveriengty in our salvation, and in reality as a whole does lead to some pretty thorny problems, but I like Luther's distinction. Luther said that we as fallen people with fallen will, and intellect cannot understand everything about God, if we could we would have the mind of God, thus the flaw of natural theology. We can only know what God has told us in scripture, and that is as far as we can go. Systemizing is important but only within the confines of what God has affirmed about himself, sometimes we must allow tensions to stand (Trinity, incarnation, Predestiination and responsibility, etc.)! We like Abraham have been called to go into a strange land, where we are told that our family (reason) and our friends (the will) do not have the power that we once believed. In this place we are forced to make a decision everyday, by God's grace, will I follow today, or will I run from God! The strange land is not comfortable, and it is called faith. Faith is not irrational but suprarational, we cannot grasp the mind of God, nor should we try.
In Christ Alone,
Blake
A Cool poem from Ben Witherington's website www.benwitherington.com
Agrapha
I.
Peel back the layers of me,
I am stratified.
I am Mark, I am Special M, Special L.
I am Q.
I am red and black beads,
I am hazy grey and pink.
Touch me, I am words on a page.
I am redactions. I am parts.
I am the idea of a man.
I am waiting for the end of the world.
I am creating a new social order.
I am marginalized. I am privileged.
I am radical egalitarianism.
I am patriarchy.
I am academic words and original-language texts,
Aramaicisms and multiple attestations.
Why is the truth of me so heavy?
I am a tortured body, naked, hanging there.
What is heavy is my staggered breath,
the weight of my own body suffocating me,
the stares of those who watch me suffer and die.
I am the reports of the eyes that see me.
I breathe one last breath and then
I become a story.
I am dead already, but you ravage me.
Your scholarly sentences pierce my skin,
a grammar of spears.
My god, my god.
Peel back the layers of me, I am a fruit
you will never core.
I am scrolls, codices, best-sellers.
I am your prophet and your seer.
I am your profit and your livelihood.
I give your life meaning, yes, even you.
Artists cover my waist with
your strips of imagined cloth,
but you strip me,
reconstruct me,
excavate me.
I am two-thousand years exhumed,
and when will you let me decompose?
My god, my god.
Peel back the layers of me, I am gospel, story, narrative.
I am criteria of authenticity. I am social context.
I am the mysterious agendas of implied authors,
the attentive ears of implied audiences.
I am oral tradition.
Listen.
I hang lifeless on a cross.
You pierce me, and black beads spill out.
With my last breath, I become nothing but
black beads, black beads.
My god, my god.
I am your tower of Babel, the confusion
of your paragraphs and theses and tomes.
I tear up your academic temple,
overthrow your tables.
I am logos and logia.
I am the word become flesh, and the work
of your hands turns me back into words.
The church releases me like a dove,
and I soar. You catch me with strings of phrases,
and I drift slowly down, a spirit body, ethereal.
I am a wisp of smoke in your windless sky.
I am nothing but ideas and air.
You breathe me in, and somehow I sustain you.
My god, my god.
II.
But look, I am you, and I am unashamed.
I walked, I walked, and everywhere I went,
I tried to peel back layers.
I died, and I became the story of God.
Now you are the stewards of my details,
preservers of my name.
Peel back the layers of me, tell me who I am,
because I never knew.
I listen, I watch.
Into your hands, I commend my story.
I hope you unravel me, because my life
and my death are tangled and gnarled.
If I could, I too would peel back layers,
cut my own skin like a fisherman, and out would spill
the special letters of the alphabet that spell me
and spell you still.
Translate me out of this language I don’t
understand, tell me about my native tongue.
Could I read and write?
Tell me who they say I am.
Reveal me, scholars, teachers –
you shower me with divinity
with every book you bind.
Peel back the layers of me, I am waiting.
The parousia happens daily.
I come and come again with every class
you teach, every argument you construct,
every phrase you coin. You keep me alive.
The resurrection is the Jesus Seminar,
the unintentional cathedral and its
circle of high priests,
controversies and decisions and
the constant invocation of my name.
If I didn’t mean something then,
I know I mean something now.
You, in your academic temples,
cut carefully with your pens,
your dexterous fingers peel gingerly back
the thin thin layers
and there will always be more layers.
Show me how alive I am.
Stratify me.
Reconstruct me.
I am yours.
Maria Mayo Robbins
December 11, 2002
I am reading Rudolf Bultmann's "History and Eschatology: The Prescence of Eternity" and I came across a passage that I found curious. In the chapter that i am reading he has been discussing the understanding of history in light of eschatology. He examines Cosmic meaning mythological eschatology, and historical eschatology which is historicized myth, meaning that the writers use mythological language to give events there full meaning. He then discusses History and eschatology in Judaism. He says the prophets and the rest of the Old Testament except Daniel look forward to God's acts in History not the end of the world, but Daniel presents a shift that follows into other intertestamental literature such as 4 Ezra etc. that of a dualism between two ages. Finally he comes to History and Eschatology in Primitive Chritianity, he notes that Christianity believes that Christ fulfills the OT promises which I agree with but I disagree with the following. I will break the following down into 1,2,3,4 my comments will be under each part of what he says. The excerpt from Bultmann is a full continous excerpt interrupted by me :)!
He says, "The New Covenant is not grounded on an even of the history of the people as was the Old Covenant. For the death of Christ on which it is founded is not a "hisotical event" to which one may look back as one may to the story of Moses. The New People of God has no real history, for it is the community of the end-time, and eschatological phenomenon. How could it have a history now when the world-time is finished and the end is imminent!
1) I do not see why Eschatology must be seperated from History, nor why since the Old aeon is passing away that it is still not in some sense over lapping with the New Aeon (or age). Bultmann never explains why the death of Christ cannot be considered a historical event of delieverance as was the exodus in the Old Testament. Bultmann is essentially trying to make Eschatology only and existential "present" for the individual with no grounding in the real world.
Continuting...
The conciousness of being the eschatological community is at the same time conciousness of being tqaken out of the still existing world. The world is the sphere of uncleanness and sin, it is a foreign country for the Christians whose commonwealth is in heaven (phil 3:20). Therefore neither the Christian community nor the individuals within it have any responsibility for the present world and its orders, for the tasks of society and the state. On the contrary, the believers must keep themselves pure from the world, tht they may be "blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whome you shine as lights in the world' (Phil 2:15)
2) This to me is disturbing that a giant of New Testament Scholarship could misread the New Testament. It is not possible on any Critical Method to come the the conclusion that Jesus and the Early Christians did not believe that they where God's community for a dying world. The Church was to be active in the world, not withdraw as Bultmann seems to think in this passage. I am not even going to attempt to list the numerous passages in the Pauline letters and the Gospels in which Christians are called to be examples to the world, and living for the world! Again in regards to the state and society Bultmann is trying to reduce Christianity to Existiential feeling in order to take Crhstianity out of public life
Continuation of Bultmann
... To sum up. All this means that in early Christianity history is swallowed up in eschatology. The early Christian community understands itself not as a historical but as an eschatological phenomenon. It is concious that it belongs no longer to the present world but to the New Aeon which is at the door. The question then is how long this conciousness can remain vivid, how long the expectation of the imminent end of the world remain unshaken.
3) Bultmann thinks that, since, the christian community believes that it is part of the New Aeon, that they did not believe that they did not live live at all in the Old Aeon. But he misses the point that there is tension in the New Testament between "already" and "not yet" Christians believe that the New Aeon began with the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus, but also that the Old Age and the New Age have continued to run side by side. The Church is the New Community of God and is the New Age in the Old Age. We are prophets to this Old Age that the rest of the world lives in. When someone enters into the new community of God, they automatically come out of the Old Aeon,and into the New Aeon.
Granted everything that I have said about Bultmann's denegration of History is lacking any comment on his critical reconstruction of Christianity, which probably brings him to some of the conclusions that the comes to. I will note them as I go along.
In Christ,
Blake
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Saturday, November 26, 2005
Currently Reading: A History of Philosophy (Book One, Volumes I, II, III)
My girlfriend is teaching me to set goals so here is a rough reading list for December-September
1. Coplestone's History of Philosophy (8 Volumes)
2. A.J Ayer's "Language, Truth, and Logic
3. Bertrand Russel's History of Western Philosophy
4. Scham's logic (on going project)
5. Russ Fuller's Hebrew Composition book (ongoing project)
6. Fueherbach's "Essence of Christianity
7. The Old Testament Speaks
8. The Historical Reliability of the Old Testament
9. "Is There a Meaning in this Text" Vanhoozer
10. Cambridge Companion to Postmodernity
11. Ferdinand Braudel's "History of Civilization"
12. Finish Crime and Punishment
13. Finish the Farie Queen by Spenser
14. A book that I just bought by Rudolph Bultmann
15. An Analysis of Van Til's Thought by Greg Bahnsen
16. God's Politics by Jim Wallis.
That is it for now if I make it through these I will read more.
The longer I live the more confused i get as to where my story fits into God's story, since our only significance comes fromt that Eph.1 says as much. If it was not for God's predestination of believers our stories would be that of the spiritually dead, but I often am so scared. te deum
In Christ
Blake
Public - 10:20 PM - add eprops - add comments - edit it - email it
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
I have come to the very difficult decision that I will not be taking classes at Boyce next semester. I love school, I just dislike Boyce. I am taking a Semester off and working for my dad to save money so that I can transfer to Bethel College, Trinity International, or some other school. Due to the down grade in academic standards, and the lack of desire to bang my head against books like Wayne Grudem (Oh please, hasn't anyone read a real reformed writer like Bavnick?), and the lack of academic diversity, I will gladly take a semester to read some liberal theology, philosophy, biblical studies, History, Literature, etc. A good friend of mine and I will also be launching a Website that deals with questions of faith, philosophy,etc. I guess this means that I can be a true member of Sans boyce!
In Christ,
Blake
Public - 4:17 PM - 4 eprops - 3 comments - edit it - email it
Monday, November 21, 2005
I am glad to be on Sans boyce Blogring. Woohoo
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Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Currently Reading: The Bondage of the Will
Random thoughts
What is this angst that we all feel? This wanting someting more, or never feeling satisfied? I know that I am to find my satisfaction in God, but will I ever be fully satisfied in this life or will I always have this low level divine discontent? If only we could see the beautific vision now, the day when we behold God and can do nothing, but praise His infinite majesty. It is amazing that God picks wretched sinners like us up from our dead state and breathes the breath of life into us! I do not deserve his grace, and that is the most humbling thing that this prideful and arrogant heart has ever encountered.
When we finally realize the glory and nature of God, which is a gift from God in and of itself, we become who we truly are! The man-in-his-sinful-state becomes man-in-his-sinful-state-before-God. Only by this act of the divine will can we ever come to a place where we go from man-in-corruption to man-being-brought-out-of-corruption. We cannot be brought to this place of our own power of course, and that is what is so frustrating to the "human-will", because while "free" it can only choose one option "evil" it is not free to choose the "good" or God. Freedom of the will as the Apostles, Edwards, and Luther pointed out is only freedom to follow God, and bondage is to be a slave to sin. A wise friend of mine once said, "I am glad that my salvation was never up to me! If it was I would still be dead in my sins!"
The problems that flow from God's absolute Soveriengty in our salvation, and in reality as a whole does lead to some pretty thorny problems, but I like Luther's distinction. Luther said that we as fallen people with fallen will, and intellect cannot understand everything about God, if we could we would have the mind of God, thus the flaw of natural theology. We can only know what God has told us in scripture, and that is as far as we can go. Systemizing is important but only within the confines of what God has affirmed about himself, sometimes we must allow tensions to stand (Trinity, incarnation, Predestiination and responsibility, etc.)! We like Abraham have been called to go into a strange land, where we are told that our family (reason) and our friends (the will) do not have the power that we once believed. In this place we are forced to make a decision everyday, by God's grace, will I follow today, or will I run from God! The strange land is not comfortable, and it is called faith. Faith is not irrational but suprarational, we cannot grasp the mind of God, nor should we try.
In Christ Alone,
Blake
A Cool poem from Ben Witherington's website www.benwitherington.com
Agrapha
I.
Peel back the layers of me,
I am stratified.
I am Mark, I am Special M, Special L.
I am Q.
I am red and black beads,
I am hazy grey and pink.
Touch me, I am words on a page.
I am redactions. I am parts.
I am the idea of a man.
I am waiting for the end of the world.
I am creating a new social order.
I am marginalized. I am privileged.
I am radical egalitarianism.
I am patriarchy.
I am academic words and original-language texts,
Aramaicisms and multiple attestations.
Why is the truth of me so heavy?
I am a tortured body, naked, hanging there.
What is heavy is my staggered breath,
the weight of my own body suffocating me,
the stares of those who watch me suffer and die.
I am the reports of the eyes that see me.
I breathe one last breath and then
I become a story.
I am dead already, but you ravage me.
Your scholarly sentences pierce my skin,
a grammar of spears.
My god, my god.
Peel back the layers of me, I am a fruit
you will never core.
I am scrolls, codices, best-sellers.
I am your prophet and your seer.
I am your profit and your livelihood.
I give your life meaning, yes, even you.
Artists cover my waist with
your strips of imagined cloth,
but you strip me,
reconstruct me,
excavate me.
I am two-thousand years exhumed,
and when will you let me decompose?
My god, my god.
Peel back the layers of me, I am gospel, story, narrative.
I am criteria of authenticity. I am social context.
I am the mysterious agendas of implied authors,
the attentive ears of implied audiences.
I am oral tradition.
Listen.
I hang lifeless on a cross.
You pierce me, and black beads spill out.
With my last breath, I become nothing but
black beads, black beads.
My god, my god.
I am your tower of Babel, the confusion
of your paragraphs and theses and tomes.
I tear up your academic temple,
overthrow your tables.
I am logos and logia.
I am the word become flesh, and the work
of your hands turns me back into words.
The church releases me like a dove,
and I soar. You catch me with strings of phrases,
and I drift slowly down, a spirit body, ethereal.
I am a wisp of smoke in your windless sky.
I am nothing but ideas and air.
You breathe me in, and somehow I sustain you.
My god, my god.
II.
But look, I am you, and I am unashamed.
I walked, I walked, and everywhere I went,
I tried to peel back layers.
I died, and I became the story of God.
Now you are the stewards of my details,
preservers of my name.
Peel back the layers of me, tell me who I am,
because I never knew.
I listen, I watch.
Into your hands, I commend my story.
I hope you unravel me, because my life
and my death are tangled and gnarled.
If I could, I too would peel back layers,
cut my own skin like a fisherman, and out would spill
the special letters of the alphabet that spell me
and spell you still.
Translate me out of this language I don’t
understand, tell me about my native tongue.
Could I read and write?
Tell me who they say I am.
Reveal me, scholars, teachers –
you shower me with divinity
with every book you bind.
Peel back the layers of me, I am waiting.
The parousia happens daily.
I come and come again with every class
you teach, every argument you construct,
every phrase you coin. You keep me alive.
The resurrection is the Jesus Seminar,
the unintentional cathedral and its
circle of high priests,
controversies and decisions and
the constant invocation of my name.
If I didn’t mean something then,
I know I mean something now.
You, in your academic temples,
cut carefully with your pens,
your dexterous fingers peel gingerly back
the thin thin layers
and there will always be more layers.
Show me how alive I am.
Stratify me.
Reconstruct me.
I am yours.
Maria Mayo Robbins
December 11, 2002
posted by Blake | 10:43 AM
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