26. Autobiography of Charles Finney
27. The Man who was Thursday by Chesterton
28. Simply Christian by Wright
29. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Twain
30. The Contemplative Pastor by Peterson
31. The Last Battle by Lewis
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
December
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Calvin in a Year
Here's a way to read the Institutes over the next year:
Princeton Theological Seminary has set up a daily reading and commentary that begins January 1st in commemoration of the 500th anniversary of Calvin's birth.
Notice the podcast and rss feed options.
Pretty nifty.
Monday, December 29, 2008
Wright on Pentecost, Scripture Reading, and Sacrament
A few excerpts from N.T. Wright's Simply Christian:
"The fulfillment of the Torah by the Spirit is one of the main themes underlying the spectacular description in Acts 2, or the day of Pentecost itself. To this day, Pentecost is observed in Judaism as the feast of the giving of the Law. First comes Passover, the day when the Israelites leave their Egyptian slavery behind for good. Off they go through the desert, and fifty days later they reach Mount Sinai. Moses goes up the mountain and comes down with the Law, the tablets of the covenant, God's gift to his people of the way of life by which they will be able to demonstrate that they are really his people.
This is the picture we ought to have in mind as we read Acts 2. The previous Passover, Jesus had died and been raised, opening the way out of slavery, the way to forgiveness and a new start for the whole world -- especially for all those who follow him. Now, fifty days later, Jesus has been taken into 'heaven,' into God's dimension of reality; but, like Moses, he comes down again to ratify the renewed covenant and to provide the way of life, written not on stone but in human hearts, by which Jesus's followers may gratefully demonstrate that they really are his people." (132-133)
On reading Scripture in worship:
"Reading scripture in worship is, first and foremost, the central way of celebrating who God is and what he's done.
Let me put it like this. The room I am sitting in at the moment has quite small windows. If I stand at the other side of the room, I can see only a little of what is outside -- part of the house opposite, and a tiny bit of sky. But if I go up close to the window, I can see trees, fields, animals, the sea, the hills in the distance.
It sometimes feels as though two or three short biblical readings are rather like the windows seen from the other side of the room. We can't see very much through them. But as we get to know the Bible better, we get close and closer to the windows (as it were), so that, without the windows having gotten any bigger, we can glimpse the entire sweep of the biblical countryside." (150-151)
On the sacrament:
"Like the children of Israel still in the wilderness, tasting food which the spies had brought back from their secret trip to the Promised Land, in the bread-breaking we are tasting God's new creation -- the new creation whose prototype and origin is Jesus himself." (154)
"...[T]here has been endless confusion over the relationship between the bread-breaking service and the sacrifice offered by Jesus on the cross. Catholics have usually said they were one and the same, to which Protestants have replied that Catholic interpretation looks like an attempt to repeat something which was done once and once only, and can never be done again. Protestants have usually said that the bread-breaking service is a different sacrifice to the one offered by Jesus -- they see it as a "sacrifice of praise" offered by the worshippers -- to which Catholics have responded that the Protestant interpretation looks like an attempt to add something to the already complete offering of Jesus, which (they say) becomes "sacramentally" present in the bread and the wine." (156)
Continual Sacrifice, Eucharist, and Hebrews
"For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect... But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God,from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified." (Heb. 10:1, 12-14)
The writer contrasts the sacrifices of the law which are offered continually but cannot make perfect (10:1) with the sacrifice of Christ which perfects forever those who are being sanctified (10:14).
What is striking is that the writer uses the same adjective to describe the continual offerings of the Law and the continual efficacy of Christ's sacrifice (translated 'forever'). In 10:1 the sacrifices are offered dianekes but can never bring to perfection. Likewise in 10:12, Christ has offered one sacrifice for sins dianekes and sat down at the right hand of God. And in 10:14, 'For by one offering he has perfected dianekes those being sanctified.'
The contrast then is most clearly on the number of the sacrifices which the the priests of the Law offered "frequently" (in 10:11 it's a different word than 10:1). Whereas the writer insists that Christ's offering was a single sacrifice (10:10, 12, 14). In 10:10, the offering of the "body of Jesus Christ" is described as ephapax which means once-for-all (cf. Rom. 6:10, Heb. 7:27, 9:12).
The word (dianekes) is used in one other place in Hebrews 7:3 where it describes Christs perpetual ministry as priest.
Of course all of this concerns issues which were significant in the Reformation. The Reformers all insisted that the Roman Mass had obscured the once-for-all character of the sacrifice of Christ. The concern was that the Mass had become a re-sacrifice of Christ which was both abhorrent to the glory of Christ who is seated at the right hand of the Father and also because of the kind of meritorious theology that seems to naturally flow from such ideas. If the one offering of Christ on the cross must be re-exhibited, re-offered, re-presented for sins to be forgiven, how does that not undermine the once-for-all sense in which Christ suffered on the tree under Pontius Pilate? How is it not in some sense insufficient for our salvation? It seems to imply that something more must be done. And further, if the Eucharist continually offers Christ as a sacrifice for sin, how are we not back in the same position as the people under the Law?
And yet, it does seem that the common translation of this word in Heb. 10 (as 'forever') may create a more severe contrast than is actually meant by the writer. Whatever the priests' many sacrifices could not do which were offered dianekes is what Christ's one sacrifice now actually accomplishes dianekes.
The Good Shepherd Gives Himself
“Thus says the Lord GOD to the shepherds: "Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves! Should not the shepherds feed the flocks? You eat the fat and clothe yourselves with the wool; you slaughter the fatlings, but you do not feed the flock.” Ez. 34:2-3
It is no accident that our Lord was born in a stable, and it is certainly not extraneous that we are told that he was laid in a manger. He was laid in a food trough, and shepherds were some of the first guests to bow before the newborn king. Shepherds, whose job it is to lead the sheep to their food, shepherds like David and Moses, whose calling it was to lead the flock of Israel, kings whose task it was to feed the people of God. But these shepherds, these representatives of the many failed kings of Israel do what every king must do in the presence of the King of Kings. They come to bow before Him. And what they find is the King of Kings not only preparing food for his flock, but having become the food for his flock. The King has been born and he has been laid in a manger, a food trough; he has immediately become their food, their nourishment, their strength. This is because He is the Good Shepherd, who gives his life for his sheep. In Christ, God has come for his scattered sheep. He has come to search for them and seek them out, and he has come to feed them in the good pasture, to lead them in quiet pastures, to restore their souls, and to give them rest. So come, your Good Shepherd still gives himself for his sheep, he still gives himself as their food. Come and rejoice, you once were lost but you have been found. You have come to the manger, and your Shepherd has given himself for you. Joy to the world, the Lord is come.
The Birth of Everything
We have just declared that Christ is born and called one another to worship Him. Just as we declare Christ risen during the season of Easter, so too, we proclaim Him born like the Shepherds, like the Wise Men, like the angels. Christ is born and we call everyone everywhere to glorify him. Historically, Christmas is not one day but 12. Beginning on December 25th, the Church has dwelled on these events for nearly two weeks, culminating on the 12th day of Christmas, the Feast of Epiphany, celebrating the manifestation of God in Christ, the revelation of God to the world in the person of Jesus. And this is not a little thing. This is everything. This is the birth of the Kings and Kings and the Lord of Lords. This is the birth of the Emperor whose kingdom will have no end, and the government will be upon his shoulders and he is the Prince of Peace. This is the gospel that there is a King to whom every knee must bow and every tongue confess, and this King’s name is Jesus, Emmanuel, Mighty God, and he must reign until all of his enemies have been put beneath his feet. He must rein until greed and materialism is put beneath his feet. He must reign until tyranny and oppression is put beneath his feet. He must reign until abdicating husbands and fathers are put beneath his feet. He must reign until harping, complaining, and bitter mothers and wives are put beneath his feet. He must reign until foolish sons and daughters are put beneath his feet. He must reign until disease and heartache and death are put beneath his feet. And he will reign until every tear has been wiped from every eye, until mercy and justice kiss, until all has been put to right. And this means that our proclamation that Christ is born means everything. So as we greet one another this morning and in the coming days of Christmas, greet one another with these words. Christ is born, Glorify Him.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Christ is Born! Glorify Him!
Christmas Eve 2008 Homily
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“The voice of one crying in the wilderness: "Prepare the way of the LORD; Make straight in the desert; a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted; and every mountain and hill brought low; the crooked places shall be made straight; and the rough places smooth; the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” Is. 40:3-5
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and Truth.” Jn. 1:14
“God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, who He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high...” Heb. 1:1-4
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We are accustomed to describing the act of God in the incarnation as a great act of humility, a great act of condescension, an act which is wonderful and amazing but in some way involves God leaving his glory behind. God as an infant, God as a crying baby in a stable, laid in a manger, what could be more humiliating? What could be more inglorious? Passages like Philippians 2:7 are quoted to describe this act: ‘But he made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, coming in the likeness of men.’ Some translations say that he “emptied himself,” and the famous Christmas Carol says “mild, he lays his glory by/ born that man no more may die.” We routinely describe the incarnation with regard to great contrasts. There is what God is in Himself, and then there is what God became in the incarnation. There is the glory and holiness and transcendent being of God enthroned as absolute King of the Cosmos, and then there is Jesus, born of a woman, born in a stable, laid in a manger, no crib for a bed.
Our catechism implies this contrast when we ask the question ‘what is God?’ The answer is that “God is a Spirit, infinite, eternal, unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.” There is no mention here of the incarnation, and the answer implies that the incarnation is something quite different from the way God usually is. God is a Spirit, the answer says, God is infinite, eternal, unchangeable. Those first four attributes would seem to contradict any notion of an incarnation.
And so we describe the great act of the incarnation as this wonderful impossibility that God overcame. How can the infinite, eternal, and unchangeable become the exact opposite of those things? How can the infinite become finite? How can the eternal have a beginning? How can the unchangeable be conceived? We ask these questions with amazement and wonder, and ultimately we worship and adore the God who does this. We worship the God who is able to do this, the God who was willing to do this for us, despite His glory and perfection and honor, overcomes the distance, bridges the chasm, and becomes one of us.
And of course there is truth in all of this. There’s nothing untrue in these descriptions in and of themselves. But there is a danger if this is all that we say. The untruth can begin to creep in if we do not tell the rest of the story. If we stop here, it can serve to obscure a more fundamental fact about the person and character of our God. One of the ways, we catch a glimpse of this is in passages like the ones just read: Isaiah 40, John 1 and Hebrews 1. A common theme running through all of them is the theme of glory, and that glory being revealed. Isaiah says that the glory of the Lord is going to be revealed when God comes to save his people. The prophet doesn’t say that the glory of God will be laid aside or veiled or somewhat hidden or obscured. The prophet says that the Coming One will reveal the glory of the Lord. So too, John insists that the incarnation was fundamentally the revelation of the glory of God. When the incarnation occurred, when we saw Jesus, we finally saw His glory, and not just any glory, we beheld the glory of the Father, full of grace and truth.
Similarly, the writer of Hebrews says that Jesus the Son of God is the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person. And our tendency is to jump immediately to Trinitarian categories. We’re fine with the Son being the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person, but we don’t tend to think about the incarnation. The baby in Bethlehem, lying in a food trough? That’s the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person? But that seems to be the very thing that the writer is talking about. Immediately after saying that he is the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person, he says that he not only upholds all things by the word of His power, but he also purged our sins and sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Hebrews says that the brightness of God’s glory and his express image is evident in both his sovereignty in upholding all things and in purging our sins on the cross. The revelation of God is that God does both of these things.
And this gets back to our prior point. We tend to contrast the God who creates, the God who rules, the God who inhabits eternity with the God who is conceived, the God who is born, the God who dies. We are Christians, and we believe the Bible and so we don’t question these things. But we tend to contrast them nevertheless. We talk about God as God and then we talk about the incarnation as though it were something somewhat different. It’s something amazing and glorious, but we tend to describe the incarnation as though it doesn’t ordinarily fit with the idea of God. We have a notion of God, an idea of deity that pushes the idea of suffering and humility and incarnation to the far side of God-ness. To be God, we think, is to inhabit eternity, is to be a Spirit, is to be infinite, is to be unchangeable, is to be something and someone quite different than our human experience. And again, there is some truth there.
But these Scriptures push against this conception of God. John says that when Jesus was born we finally saw God for who he really is. We finally saw the glory of the Father full of grace and truth when Mary brought forth her Son and laid him in the manger. And when the child grew in wisdom and stature and in grace before God and men, we finally saw what God is like. And when that same carpenter’s Son was mocked and spat upon and despised and afflicted and finally crucified, Hebrews says that we saw the brightness of His glory; the express image of His person was revealed.
Similarly, in John’s first epistle, he says that the eternal life of the Father was manifested, revealed, seen, heard, looked upon, and handled. Whatever our conception of God, it must include this. When we ask ‘what is God?’ the first thing the New Testament writers would point to is the person of Jesus. Who is God? God is the one who revealed himself in Jesus. God is the one who was born of Mary. God is the one who lived as a man, who taught, who healed, who ate and drank with sinners, who was ultimately betrayed and crucified and rose again and ascended into heaven. That is our God. God is not first of all something else. God is not first of all infinite and eternal and unchangeable in a way that is at odds with the incarnation. Rather, the incarnation is the veil finally being torn away. If the ancients thought of God as someone distant and other and infinite and unchangeable they had some excuse for thinking that, although the Jews had plenty of hints that this was not the case. But when Jesus was born, when the incarnation occurred all of those preconceived notions were blown apart.
The incarnation is not something that we must try to fit into our doctrine of God. Rather, the incarnation is the beginning of our doctrine of God. It is the revelation of the glory of Lord, the brightness of His glory, the express image of his person. The incarnation is not merely consistent with the person and character of God; the incarnation shows us the kind of God we actually serve. The incarnation shows us not an aberration from the way God usually is; rather, the incarnation shows us what God is actually like. God is the God who both creates and sustains the worlds and gives himself for sinners. God is the God who both inhabits eternity and freely enters time and space and identifies with his people. God is the one who is both unchangeable, whose Word stands forever and cannot be moved, and He is at the same time always and unalterably free to experience growth and sorrow and love and joy. The God who rules heaven and earth is also the God who is born a child in Bethlehem.
And, as the hymn declares, this really is tidings of comfort and joy. The New Testament has a great deal to say about glory, and as we look at those passages we notice over and over again the association of glory with God’s people. We’ve already pointed out that Jesus is the revelation of God’s glory, but the New Testament writers don’t stop there. Paul says that in the New Covenant we have been given the Spirit, and as we read the Scriptures and hear the gospel proclaimed, we all with unveiled face, behold as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, and we are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:17-18). He says that we glory in tribulations (Rom. 5:3), and while our outward man is perishing and we experience afflictions, these are working in us an eternal weight of glory (2 Cor. 4:16-17). Paul’s own tribulations are the glory of the Ephesians (Eph. 2:13). He says that the Thessalonians have suffered like Christ and therefore they are his glory and joy (1 Thess. 2:14-15, 19-20). Peter, likewise says, ‘If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.’ (1 Pet. 4:13). A little later he says that he is a “witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that will be revealed.” (1 Pet. 5:1).
The reason it is great comfort and joy to know the God who is both sovereign and humble, the God who is both infinite and a child, who is both eternal and born of a woman, is that this same God promises to bestow this glory on us. Partaking of the glory of God, sharing in that glory, means living in this same reality, living as weak and broken people and yet strong and exalted, seated with Christ in the heavenly places. We live as those who have been given eternal life and yet have been born, and who will all die. We have been united to the changeless one, the one will never leave us or forsake us, and yet we grow up, and live, and change, and die and rise again.
In Ephesians Paul prays that the eyes of their understanding might be enlightened, that they might know what are the riches of his glory of His inheritance in the saints (Eph. 2:18). What the Ephesians need, and what we so often need is not for God to show us his glory. That has been revealed to us in Jesus. What we really need is for our eyes to be opened to see the glory right in front of us. We see a child in a manger, and say God has in some way laid his glory aside. But God says, ‘no, no, that is my glory, my wisdom, my infinity, my changelessness, my holiness, my justice, my goodness, my glory. God in the manger is the glory of God revealed. And if God in a manger is the glory of God revealed, then God on the cross is the Lord of Glory (1 Cor. 2:8). The glory of God is joy in suffering, peace in upheaval, mercy in justice, exaltation in humility, losing our lives to find them. If the glory of God is revealed in an infant lying in a manger, then why can’t the glory of God be revealed in your family? Why can’t the glory of God be manifest in your fellowship at a table, in your exchanging peace and joy and mercy with one another? Why can’t the glory of God be revealed in the midst of brokenness and confusion? Why can’t the wisdom and power of God be evident in weakness? The answer is that it can be and that it is. And so here we are assembled to proclaim that glory, the glory of the Lord that has been revealed to us and is being revealed in us through the working of the Spirit. Christ is born! Glorify Him! The glory of the Lord has been revealed. The veil is torn away. See the glory.
“O Zion, You who bring good tidings, Get up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, You who bring good tidings, Lift up your voice with strength, Lift it up, be not afraid; Say to the cities of Judah, "Behold your God!” Is. 40:9
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen!
Friday, December 19, 2008
ERH on Leisure and Holiday
Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy (ERH) (188-1973) says that the disintegration of our culture is tied directly to our inability to celebrate holiday which is not the same thing as having "leisure time."
Leisure takes men into pastimes whether future or past, or inner or outer ecstasies. Leisure is free time spent merely doing something else, something out of the central current of one's vocation. And any hobby or leisure activity which becomes a job is thereby no longer leisure. Similarly, ERH gives the examples of site-seeing/travel and interest in music. It's all good fun and serves to divert people from the central demands of life. But there is a kind of restlessness and aimless bound up in such an existence. ERH insists that peace and contentment is found in the center of this cross of human existence. If the inner, outer, future, and past form the four sides of the cross of human existence, only fixed to the center of the cross can human existence be fulfilling and fruitful. ERH names this "centered" existence one which celebrates holidays as contrasted with the individualism and escapism of mere leisure. It combines these modes of leisure into community life, fellowship, and celebration.
That's what holidays do. The are the "mortar of society," creating fellowship, togetherness, opportunities to plan, discuss, and organize. They are the concerted efforts of a whole community to celebrate despite what any circumstances may otherwise suggest, and ERH goes on to suggest that out of these holidays come creativity, ingenuity, productivity, and many other traits of a thriving society.
The Christian Future, 198-202.
Happy Snow
Here's what we've been enjoying the last week or so. Just got these pictures from my father in law. Happy Snow.
Still King
One of the gifts of the lectionary and church calendar is the backbone it gives to our lives. If these gifts are the collective, devotional wisdom of the Church down through the centuries, then they are Fathers advising us about how to pray and what to pray for and when. Of course we may generally pray for anything at any time, any place. But following the lead of our Fathers places some healthy constraints on us. While we may face a particularly trying situation, we may find ourselves in Christmas or Easter. Or we may be blessed with overwhelming gifts and kindness and mercy and find ourselves in Advent or Lent or Holy Week. And this doesn't mean that we must put on superficial faces to fit in with the tenor of the calendar. But it does offer a deeper wisdom to our situations. Even in deep, abounding joy and laughter, there must be a humility that recognizes our need for grace and mercy. Likewise, in our deepest sorrows, if we are entreated to sing psalms of joy and give gifts to one another, it is the wisdom of the Fathers that reminds us to rejoice in all things and to give thanks even in the shadow of death.
Something similar is found in praying through the Psalter on a regular basis. As the inspired prayer book of the Church, the Psalter leads us to pray for things we wouldn't ordinarily pray for, thank God for things we might not otherwise remember to thank him for, and again it directs the tenor of our lives, offering a masthead to our ship in the main.
In one of the Psalms for this morning's prayer, Psalm 99, it says, "The Lord is King, be the people never so impatient; he sitteth between the Cherubim, be the earth never so unquiet."
We have our storms and trials and victories and battles, and still the Lord is King, still he sits enthroned.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Passing the Peace and the Resurrection
Robert Webber at the end of a discussion remembering an Ash Wednesday service he once attended, says that the Passing of the Peace at the close of the liturgy is a reminder of the resurrection. "As I said, 'The Peace of the Lord be with you,' shook hands with my neighbor, and heard the words, 'Peace be with you,' I was hearing the resurrection. Here in these words that Jesus first spoke to his disciples in the upper room (see Luke 24:36-49), is the promise that the dark side of life in the world and in us will not prevail. The power of the evil one has been overcome." (Ancient-Future Time, 106)
And this is true of the liturgy every Lord's Day. We greet one another as heralds of the resurrection every Sunday before gathering to the table to celebrate the Eucharist, and this further highlights the celebratory nature of the Lord's Supper. We greet one another in peace because Christ is risen, sin is conquered, and we are about to participate in the wedding feast of the Lamb brought back from the future into our present. In the Passing of the Peace, we are enacting by faith not only the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, we are also enacting the resurrection of our own bodies and the bodies of our neighbors, greeting one another in the peace of the Lord as though we had just woken up at the Last Day, that great Lord's Day.
NT Wright and the Imago Dei
N.T. Wright points out that in the ancient world, and even in parts of the modern world, rulers often "set up statues of themselves in prominent places, not so much in their own home territory (where everyone knew who they were and recognized that they were in charge), but in foreign or far-flung dominions... For an emperor, the point of placing an image of yourself in the subject territory was that the subjects in that country would be reminded that you were their ruler, and would conduct themselves accordingly." (Simply Christian, 37)
While clearly the instinct to set up image-reminders in foreign jurisdictions comes from God himself, the point is worth remembering. People, as icons of the God of heaven, should be constant reminders to us to conduct ourselves according to the justice of the God of heaven. The Trinity has been pleased to fill this world with living pictures, breathing images of himself in order to remind us that he is King of this world.
It's also worth pointing out that the image of God in people means that on a fundamental level, people are like God. And of course that has been distorted and bent in various ways through sin, but it's still there all the same. In some sense, every human being should remind us of the Father, Son, and Spirit.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Church Calendar as Training for Prayer
One of the great blessings of the Church Calendar is the cumulative wisdom it brings to us in directing our prayers. The disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, and he gave them the Lord’s Prayer, the Our Father. But the apostles did not stop there. They taught their congregations to pray for all sorts of needs and situations, to give thanks in all things, to pray for those in authority, to pray without ceasing, to cast their cares upon the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. If God is our Father, as our foundational prayer teaches, then he is our Father at all times and in all places. And this apostolic wisdom has continued to grow and expand throughout the history of the church. The Calendar is training for prayer. The feasts and fasts of the Church Year are lessons in worship. During the Advent Season we are taught to pray in expectation, we remember Israel in exile awaiting the Messiah, we remember that we too await the Messiah who will come at the end of the ages to judge the living and the dead and to raise us up with new bodies when death is no more. But we not only await our King at the end, we must learn to wait on the Lord throughout our lives. We must wait and pray for many situations that are completely outside of our control. We must wait and pray for wayward children. We must wait and pray when we are afflicted with disease, when we are in pain, when we have offended someone who refuses to forgive us. We must wait and pray when finances are tight. We must wait and pray when we have lost a loved one. Sometimes sin afflicts us and no matter how hard we try, it does not seem to leave. And God does not seem to hear our cries, our pleas, our prayers. And Advent teaches us to continue to pray to our faithful Father. Advent teaches us to pray to the God who has come, to the God who will come, to the God who comes. The entire Christian Year is a tutorial in prayer. It reminds us to pray without ceasing, that prayer is the life-breath of the Church.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Blessing the Mountains
When Ezekiel prophesies against the mountains of Israel (Ez. 36), the curse levied against the mountains is that they will be desolate, no one will walk on them. A sign of the reversal of the curse is cities being rebuilt on the mountains and people walking on them.
Seems like an ecological or environmental reading of Scripture would need take passages like that into consideration when developing a biblical conservationism.
Swearing Oaths
Why do people raise their hand to swear an oath? Because that's how God swears his oaths (Ps. 106:26, Ez. 20:5, 6, 15, 23, 28, 42).
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Rio
My son was sitting with Jenny and I the other evening in front of the Christmas Tree. It was quiet for a moment, and then he looked up and said, "Dad, it feels like we're in a movie, right at the end."
Not only is he cinematically aware, he's also pretty sharp looking in his school uniform as you an see here. And furthermore, the guy is well on his way to being a first class Stratego player. And in his spare time he ice skates.
Peterson on Prayer and the Middle Voice
Eugene Peterson says that prayer is like the middle voice.
Active and Passive voices we know fairly well. Active means the subject is doing the verb; passive means the subject is being acted upon by someone or something else. Middle voice "is that use of the verb which describes the subjects as participating in the results of the action." Peterson uses the example of "counsel." "I counsel my friend" is in the active voice. "I am counseled by my friend" is in the passive voice. "I take counsel" is the middle voice. In the middle voice the subject participates in the results of the action which is initiated by someone else.
In prayer, we are invited to join the deliberations of the heavenly assembly and particularly, we are invited to participate in the council and deliberations of the Father, Son, and Spirit. We, like Abraham, reason with God; we, like Moses, are invited to present our case before the Godhead. But we have been granted participation in God far beyond what the faithful patriarchs enjoyed. We have the status of sons; we have been given the Spirit which cries out to God, "Abba, Father!" We are joined to the Son by the Spirit and are welcome to speak with the Father about the state of our life, the state of our family, the state of our world. We are invited to participate in what God is doing in the world. We are not the primary actors or initiators, but we are expected to participate in and join in the action through pleas, through our intercession, through our cries for mercy.
Peterson explains: "Prayer and spirituality feature participation, the complex participation of God and the human, his will and our wills. We do not abandon ourselves to the stream of grace and drown in the ocean of love, losing identity. We do not pull the strings that activate God's operations in our lives, subjecting God to our assertive identity. We neither manipulate God (active voice) nor are manipulated by God (passive voice). We are involved in the action and participate in its results but do not control or define it (middle voice). Prayer takes place in the middle voice." (The Contemplative Pastor, 103-104)
Of course when we think of results we usually think about what we want to see happen or change. But participating in the results doesn't necessarily mean that what we want actually happens. Of course in the cases of Abraham and Moses we see instances where prayer does prevail with God. But if we have been granted the status of sons, and we have the Spirit of Christ, then we have to remember that much of our prayer may be like Christ's prayer. And some of the clearest glimpses of Christ's prayer life are seen in the garden just before his arrest and betrayal. Christ's prayers participated in the results of the action of God in the world, but we know from Christ's own words, he struggled through that, he argued and pleaded with his Father in his circumstances, while perfectly trusting the will of his Father. Praying like sons may mean facing similar situations as the Son in the garden, the Son before Pilate, the Son on the Cross. But of course that should come as no surprise since that same Son invited us to follow him by taking up a cross. But the hope of course is that the same result as came to the Son comes to every son. Resurrection awaits all every son of God.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
Fishing for Men
In Mark 4, Mark belabors the point that Jesus is teaching from a boat which is in the water which is facing the land which is where the people are listening to Jesus who is in the boat in the water telling parables to the people. Mark, who is normally known more for brevity, makes a big deal about the setting.
To "parable" -- if we make it verb -- is a nautical term meaning literally to throw out a sounding device, to measure depth (e.g. Acts 20:15). And of course that is precisely what the parables of Jesus are for, sounding the depth of the people. And the first parable recorded has everything to do with how deep their soil is, how deep the seed of the word is allowed to sink in and grow to produce fruit.
And it's hardly irrelevant that Jesus began his ministry calling disciples to help him fish for men. This is what it looks like. Fishing for men looks like telling stories, confusing some and intriguing others.
Monday, December 08, 2008
Advent Traditions
It's been our tradition for a number of years now to celebrate Advent by decorating our tree in stages, a little at a time. We do other fun stuff with the kids throughout the week, but each Sunday in Advent is marked by new decorations on the tree.
We get our Christmas tree on the first Sunday of Advent and begin by decorating the tree with all sorts of fruit. We have apples, grapes, strings of cranberries (or berry-looking beads), and the like. We often have a fruit-themed dinner and/or breakfast for the first Sunday in Advent as well. All of this reminds us of the Garden of Eden, the sin of Adam and Eve, and the fruit of the Tree of Life that has been restored to us in Jesus.
On the Second Sunday of Advent we add salt dough ornaments to the tree along with a variety of different star ornaments. The salt dough and stars remind us of exile, being in a foreign land, and the promise of God to bring the gentiles into Israel. It was of course a star that brought the wisemen from the East to worship Jesus, and that itself is a great reversal of the exile. Instead of Israel being led by foreign kings into the east away from the presence of God (Like Adam and Eve and later the whole nation of Israel), at the birth of Christ we have foreign kings coming west into the presence of God to submit themselves to the King of Israel. Since we're remembering exile during this week, we turn off music for this week (Ps. 137:1-4).
On the Third Sunday of Advent we put up lights. Lots of lights. Actually, we've recently decided to put the lights on the tree on the First Sunday of Advent, but we only turn them on on Sunday. Starting on the Third Sunday of Advent, we put more lights, and keep the lights turned on all day, every day. Jesus is the light of the world who comes to shine in our darkness, so we have a party with the lights, inside and outside.
On the Fourth Sunday of Advent we break out all the gifts, the bows, the ribbons, the stockings, and any of the other snow men or santas or whathaveyous that haven't made it onto the tree or shelves yet. God has given himself to us in the incarnation, and so it seems fitting to make a big deal about presents and gift giving and bows and ribbons and wrapping paper and stockings.
Part of the point of this sort of tradition is to make Advent fun, but also to add more elements of expection to our celebration. Advent is about remembering that God has come to the aid of his people in the past, remembering that God is faithful to remember his promises and come and save his own. Cheifly this means remembering that our God has come for us in Jesus. And that means that this same God will be faithful to remember us and come for us in our day. He promises to meet us as we gather for worship. He promises to hear our prayers and come to our aid in our distress. And he promises to come at the end of the world and raise us up from the dead and renew all things. But here in the middle of the story, it is important to learn the virtue of joyful expectation, hopeful patience. And our Advent tradition is just one way to practice that.
Sunday, December 07, 2008
Advent 2: Deuteronomy 6: OT Feasts and the Christian Calendar
Opening Prayer: Gracious Father, we thank you that you are the God of Advent, the God who comes to His people. We thank you have already welcomed us into your presence this morning, and we ask that your Spirit continue your great work in us now through your word, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen!
Introduction
Deuteronomy 6 calls upon the conquering people of God to love Him with everything they are, and for this love to be evidenced all day long, everywhere they go so that they do not forget (Dt. 6:12). This is based on the overwhelming graciousness of God (Dt. 6:10-11, 18-19, 21-23), and the calendar of Israel was designed to regularly remind Israel of that grace and to be that grace for them.
Feasts as Memorials
The foundational feast of the Israelite calendar was the Sabbath (Lev. 23:3), and central to keeping the Sabbath was “memorializing” it, remembering it (Ex. 20:8-11, Dt. 5:15). And the central things being remembered were God’s great acts of creation and redemption. Almost all of the feasts are “holy convocations” and thus “Sabbath days” and “memorials,” but they are also given to remember certain historic events. Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were celebrated as the high memorial of the Exodus (Ex. 12:2, 13:3-10), and the Feast of Tabernacles memorialized the fact that God had led his people through the wilderness in tents (Lev. 23:41-43). The Feast of Weeks was to be kept so that “you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt” (Dt. 16:12). The Sabbath before the Day of Atonement included the blowing of memorial trumpets (Lev. 23:24), probably as a reminder of the Sinai covenant. Likewise the sabbatical year was a memorial (Dt. 15:15). At the center of all of these memorials is worship, which is why our high memorial is our Lord’s Day Eucharist.
Filling Life with Memorials
God didn’t stop with marking time. Along with the repeated command to “remember,” God established numerous ways to remember in the life of Israel. The daily sacrifices were acts which God used to cause his name to be remembered (Ex. 20:24). Justice to the strangers and fatherless was to be a memorial of God’s justice in redeeming Israel out of Egypt (Dt. 24:18). Likewise, harvesting regulations were meant to memorialize God’s deliverance of Israel out of slavery (Dt. 24:19-22). Even their clothing was to include reminders: the tassels on their garments were memorials (Num. 15:39). And the general command to put the law everywhere is getting at the same point (Dt. 6:1-9, 12, 20-25). And the question really comes down to thankfulness. As the priests and kings of this new world in Christ (Rev. 1:6), what will we remember to be thankful for? People will always rejoice in something, they will always remember something on their calendars, the question is not whether but which.
Applications
If thankfulness is the foundation of remembering, then church calendar keeping cannot be an opportunity for rivalry, vainglory, or crankiness. It is a matter of freedom, and freedom means living by the Spirit. All of this is about joy before the Lord; we should love excuses to give thanks and remember God’s goodness. Related to this point, is that thankfulness and joy result in obedience to God and love toward our neighbors. This leaves no room for shallow, hypocritical, and ignorant bliss on the one hand or dour, pietistic puddle-glumming on the other. And remember what this is teaching your children. Thankfulness trusts and obeys: repenting, believing, rejoicing.
And this helps to explain how a “festival calendar” can include days and seasons of joy and penitence. Fundamentally, joy and thankfulness is the foundation of true repentance (2 Cor. 7:9-11).
We must also note that the overwhelming emphasis of Israel’s calendar was celebratory. While the Day of Atonement was a day of affliction and other fasts and penitential days were introduced later in Israel’s history, and Jesus fully expects his people to fast (Mt. 6:16-16, 9:14ff), the tenor of the calendar is one of rejoicing and gratitude. As we recover the church calendar we want our memorials to be feasts, high celebrations full of joy and thanksgiving. And this means that principally we want to make a big deal about the life of Christ who is the greater Joshua.
Last, it has been noted that the memorial calendar was tied in numerous ways to the care of neighbors, strangers, widows, and orphans. One of the ways we can gauge faithfulness is by the impact it has on the people nearby. We want our celebration of the church calendar to not only be a blessing for Trinity Reformed Church, we want the city of Moscow to be thankful that we’ve recovered this ancient wisdom. This can only be the case if we love God with everything we are, and that is only possible if we remember the God of Advent, the God who loves his people and comes to their aid.
In the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen!
Closing Prayer: Kind Father, you have brought us into a good land, flowing with milk and honey. We have all kinds of material benefits and blessings, and we have been brought into fellowship with you through Jesus, in the power of the Spirit. We confess that we have hardly begun to fathom what all of this means, but we ask that as we celebrate the life of Jesus throughout this calendar year, we would more and more be partakers of that endless life that is yours. Through Jesus, who came to give us that abundant life and taught us to pray, singing…
Thursday, December 04, 2008
Advent Catechism
Jeff Meyers has an Advent Catechism up on his blog along with a few thoughts on the subject. Check it out.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
Original (Voluntary Moral Depravity) Sin?
Finney explains the basic outline of the gospel he preached: "I insisted upon the voluntary moral depravity of the unconverted, and the unalterable necessity of a radical change of heart by the Holy Spirit and by means of the truth." (66)
Finney on Seminary Education
When Charles Finney was encouraged to attend Princeton Seminary to get a deeper theological training (he was a laywer before his conversion), he declined. When someone offered to pay his way he declined again, explaining, "I plainly told them that I would not put myself under such influence as they had been under. I was confident that they had been wrongly educated and were not ministers that met my ideal of what a minister of Christ should be." (47)
Later, discussing the criticisms that many of his fellow Presbyterian ministers leveled at his ministry and preaching style, he says that he remained unconvinced of their criticisms given the fruit he saw from their ministries compared with his own. "I am still solemnly impressed with the conviction that the schools are to a great extent spoiling the ministers." (72)
He goes on: "Ministers in these days have great facilities for obtaining information on all theological questions, and are vastly more learned, so far as theological, historical, and Bible learning is concerned, than they perhaps have ever been in any age of the world. Yet with all their learning they do not know how to use it. They are, after all, to a great extent like David in Saul's armor." (73)
This last point is clearly even more true today than in his day. Given the wealth, the vast resources of the American Church, the relatively high level of education, etc., the state of our nation does not reveal a great benefit for all that.
Finney's Feeling of Justification
Charles Finney (1792-1875) on experiencing justification by faith:
"I arose upon my knees in the bed and wept aloud with joy, and remained for some time too much overwhelmed with the baptism of the Spirit to do anything but pour out my soul to God... In this state I was taught the doctrine of justification by faith as a present experience. That doctrine had never taken possession of my mind. I had never viewed it distinctly as a fundamental doctrine of the Gospel... I could see that the moment I believed, while up in the woods, all sense of condemnation had entirely dropped out of my mind, and that from that moment, I could not feel a sense of guilt or condemnation by any effort I could make. My sense of guilt was gone, my sins were gone, and I do not think I felt any more sense of guilt than if I never had sinned. This was just the revelation I needed. I felt myself justified by faith, and, so far as I could see, I was in a state in which I did not sin. Instead of feeling that I was sinning all the time, my heart was so full of love that it overflowed. My cup ran over with blessing and with love. I could not feel that I was sinning against God, nor could I recover the least sense of guilt for my past sins. Of this experience of justification I said nothing to anybody at the time." (The Autobiography of Charles G. Finney, 24-25)
Without completely dismissing the tremendous emotional relief of forgiveness and reconciliation with God, it's hard to miss the foundational role of feelings, senses, experience, emotion, etc. One wonders if he ever *felt* unjustified later.
Monday, December 01, 2008
The Table as Warfare
It’s been pointed out before that worship is warfare. What we do here on the Lord’s Day is not pacifism. What we do here on the Lord’s Day is not apathy to the world we live in. What we do here is not retreat. No, what we do here on the Lord’s Day is the most potent weapon to fight sin and wickedness and injustice and all the enemies of God in this world, and this is because we understand that God is our Redeemer and he does not rest while we are in peril. He does not rest while we are vulnerable. He does not leave us or forsake us. And the way this works is that God calls us here and tells us to sit down. He welcomes us into his presence, cleanses us, and seats us in his presence. He speaks to us, and we respond and sing and present our prayers, and then he feeds us and tells us to rejoice around his table. And our God says while you sit here and rejoice in faith, I am fighting all your enemies. I am dealing with your sin, and I’m working on all of your concerns. While we rest here, our God is not at rest. He is at war with all injustice, with all envy and bitterness and brokenness and death. And not only this, but he intends for us to take these weapons with us into the world. These are the weapons of song and prayer and Word and Sacrament. And of course these weapons don’t always seem very strong, very potent, but that is because they all point to the primary point which is that we are called to trust him. Is there strife in your home? Then sing the psalms. Is there division among you? Then sit down at a table and rejoice together. Are you struggling with sin? Then read the Scriptures and call out to God in prayer. We don’t do these things because they are nice religious things to do. We do these things because we are at war. And when the battle is fierce don’t forget that the main point is that God fights for us, and that is how we fight. We take up these little stones of bread and wine and joy and rest, and God our Redeemer sends them flying into the foreheads of the giants in our lives. So what should you do when you surrounded? What should you do when your enemies and sins crowd around you? You should sit down. You should sing a psalm of praise and then eat your bread and drink your wine with glad hearts. God always spreads tables for his people in the presence of their enemies. That’s so he can slay them. So come with joy, come with faith. You are seated, so rest in the care of your God. Rest, because your Redeemer God will not rest until he has done all that he has promised for you and your family.
Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Trinity: Ruth 4
Opening Prayer: Gracious Father, we come to you now in faith, believing that this is your Word and that by the power of the Spirit it will not return to you void. Make these your words food for our souls, strengthen us, correct us, turn us to you that we might know real joy, real peace, and so may your word return to you bearing fruit. Through Jesus…
Introduction
We come now to the end of Ruth, and we see the house of Elimelech restored and his name preserved in honor. This is brought about through the selfless courage of a faithful Moabite woman and Boaz the redeemer. But ultimately it is all the covenant mercy of God.
Redemption
The book of Ruth opens and closes with “tens” (1:4, 4:2, 18-22). Ten is the number of “Words” of Yahweh (Ex. 34:28, Dt. 4:13), and it is the number of times Israel rebelled in the wilderness (Num. 14:22). Boaz says that Naomi is selling a portion of the field that belonged to Elimelech (4:3), and Boaz says that he wanted the near kinsman to know about this opportunity. He says literally that he wanted to “uncover his ears” just like Ruth uncovered the feet of Boaz (3:4, 7). Boaz presents the opportunity to redeem Elimelech’s inheritance in two distinct steps. First the land is offered (1:3-4) then the levirate duty to Ruth (1:5). This appears to be so that it is clear which part of the offer the near kinsman objects to. The near kinsman fears for his own inheritance (1:6). A portion of the levirate law is recorded as the near kinsman’s sandal is removed (4:8), and Boaz calls upon the elders and the people to be witnesses of the wedding (4:9-10). And the witnesses in turn bless the new bride and groom (4:11-12). The blessing of the witnesses is two-fold: that Ruth would be like Rachel and Leah and that the house of Boaz would be like the house of Perez the son of Tamar (4:11-12, cf. Gen. 38).
A Son is Born
The Lord gives Ruth conception, and she bears a son (4:13). The women speak with Naomi and bless the Lord and Naomi’s redeemer, and they call upon God to make this son a Moses who brings Exodus which restores life and be a provider for Naomi in her old age (4:15). Naomi becomes the nurse of her own grandchild which is itself miraculous, but this indicates that not only has the barrenness of Ruth been removed but so has Naomi’s (4:16). It’s the “neighbor women” who call the “son born to Naomi” Obed which means servant or worshipper (cf. Num. 3-4). The involvement of the neighbor women may have been customary, but it at least suggests that this son is born to the broader community-family. A son has been born to Israel by Ruth and Naomi. The book closes with the “generations of Perez.” Not only do the names take us back to the book of Genesis but so does the “Toldoth” formula (e.g. Gen. 2:4, 5:1, 6:9, etc.). King David, according to the Genesis allusion, will be like a Noah and an Abraham. The last paragraph reveals that the curse of God on the illegitimate birth of Perez has now been undone since David is the tenth generation and will be permitted to enter the assembly of the Lord (Dt. 23:2). This also suggests that Obed ought to be understood as meaning “worshipper.” Not only will David be a Boaz-like ruler, he will restore faithful worship to the house of Israel.
Applications & Conclusions
The book of Ruth is a gospel story: a son is born to a Mary, and the house of the dead is brought back to life (4:11-12, cf. Eph. 2:1). Notice also that this salvation is accomplished through gentile women (cf. Rom. 11:15). And this salvation is for worship.
The final blessing of the women reveals that beneath all the toil, beneath all of the restlessness (1:9, 3:1, 18), it has been Yahweh at work all the time (4:14-15). And this is all the more startling when spread over generations (4:18-22). And this is the God you serve.
In the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen!
Closing Prayer: Our Father, you are faithful. You always come to the rescue of your people. You always hear the humble pray. We thank you and praise you that you are at work and that you do not rest when we are hurting. You are not resting while we are confused and unsure. You do not rest while we suffer, but you are the Redeemer God, the God who acts, the God who hears, the God who plans and executes judgments, and you do this even while we grow old and die, you do this generation after generation, and you will do it until all your enemies have been put down, until the earth is full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. And therefore we praise you, we worship you, and we place our trust in you, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who taught us to pray, singing…
The God Who Loves
The greatest commandment is to love God with all that we are and for that love to spill out into our lives toward everyone we come in contact with. The greatest commandment is love. In the coming week, we will be celebrating Thanksgiving with family and friends, and then next Sunday we will celebrating the beginning of Advent, the season that leads up to the Feast of the Incarnation: Christmas. And all of this is a grand reminder first of all of the love that God has for us. The love of God is manifested in the many blessings he pours all of over us all year long, and our Thanksgiving Feast is a very Christian way of marking that love and kindness that God has shown us. But all of those blessings are just the icing on the greater reality that God has given himself to us in Jesus. He has drawn near to us in our barrenness, in our famine, in our brokenness, in our confusion, in our sickness, in our hurt, and he has not just sent us a card wishing us well. He has not just sent flowers or sunshine or a meal (although he does that too), but in Jesus Christ God has come in person to find us, to touch us, to speak to us, to heal us, and to intervene in our lives to turn them around, to face the judgment on our sins, to stand in our place, and to win justice and mercy for us. All of this is to say that God welcomes you here and now with joy. You are his people, his favorite people. He rejoices over you, sings about you, he has given his only son for you, and there is nothing that can separate you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. And if this is the kind of love that has been bestowed upon you, if you have a Father who loves you and keeps on loving you, then respond in love, and let that love overflow. And the coming weeks are for that. If you do nothing else, love God with everything you are and let it overflow. Whether you cut turkey or eat pumpkin pies or put up a tree or decorate your home with lights or bake cookies or give and receive gifts. Do it with love. Do it, knowing that your God is all about you. He has come for you, and he will always come for you. You are the apple of his eye, his favorite. So come and confess your sins, your Father can hardly contain his excitement. He wants you to come, and he is smiling upon you now.
November
23. Elders in Every City by Beckwith
24. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
25. Martin Bucer and the Book of Common Prayer by Bucer (Whitaker, ed.)
Friday, November 21, 2008
Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Trinity: Ruth 3
Introduction
We’ve been introduced to the mighty man, Boaz, the redeemer of Naomi and Ruth, and now we see more of Ruth and her might.
The Levirate Law
The salvation that Boaz brings to Elimelech’s family is based upon a specific provision in the Old Testament law called the “levirate law.” This provided for a family of brothers where one had died and left no heir. The episode of Judah and Tamar is an early example of this principle (Gen. 38:1-30). Later it is codified under Moses (Dt. 25:5-10). This action is for the preservation of the “name” of the dead brother, but the overarching point of the actions of Boaz is to “redeem” the family of Elimelech.
Covenant Kindness, Might, and Commitment
Notice that Ruth is called the daughter of Naomi and Boaz (3:1, cf. 2:2, 2:8, 2:22, 3:10, 11, 16, 18). The narrative suggests that Boaz is in the process of becoming Naomi’s husband, but this is also more broadly what it means to be part of the covenant people of God. The episode pays particular attention to the “feet” of Boaz (3:4, 7, 8, 14). Uncovering the feet of Boaz can have sexual overtones, but the point is a symbolic action of submission and marriage. Ruth asks Boaz for the very thing that Boaz has already noted about her. She asks him to take her under his wing (3:9, cf. 2:12). Ruth sees the close connection between covenant with God and her family. Boaz is impressed and says, “You have done better in your lovingkindness at the end than at the beginning” (3:10). It’s good to remember that Boaz was probably literally old enough to be her father, and therefore he praises her for her wisdom in not going after some younger fellow (3:10). A woman of wisdom is a KHAYIL woman (Pr. 12:4, 31:10, 31:29), and Boaz says that the “whole gate of the city” knows that Ruth is a KHAYIL woman. Previously, it was noted that this commonly refers to mighty warriors, and frequently, this word is also used to describe the army of some nation (e.g. Ex. 14, Jer. 35:11, Ez. 37:10, etc.), and this is why Ruth is better than seven sons (4:15). One use of this word in other contexts is a description of a woman in labor (Ps. 48:7, Jer. 50:43, Mic. 4:9). Ruth’s covenant oath to Naomi included the promise that where “you lodge, I will lodge…” (1:16). In the interview with Boaz, he instructs her to “lodge” with him (3:13). This is revealing in both directions: this is confirmation of the marriage-like commitment that Ruth was entering in her oath to Naomi as well as the covenant-like request that Ruth is making of Boaz.
Who are you, Israel?
This is the fifth time we’ve had a question of identification: 1:19 (Naomi), 2:5 (Ruth), 2:19 (Boaz), 3:9 (Ruth), and 3:16 (Ruth). Of those five, there are three that are specifically “who?” questions, and they all refer to Ruth (2:5, 3:9, 3:16), progressively revealing Ruth’s character. And this question applies more broadly to Israel as a whole. We already noted that Ruth is being filled by Boaz, and this filling is a reversal of Naomi’s emptiness. This becomes explicit when Ruth comes home to Naomi with barley because Boaz insists that she not return to Naomi “empty” (3:17). Naomi is being filled by Boaz through Ruth. Israel is a nation who will be blessed by their Redeemer through outsiders. Naomi says to wait until Ruth knows what will happen because Boaz will not rest until this proposal has been settled. This word for “rest” is the same used in Joshua and Judges to describe the “land having rest from war” during and after the conquest (Josh. 11:23, 14:15, Jdg. 3:11, 3:30, 5:31, 8:28, etc.). Boaz is acting like a judge to bring rest to the land of Israel through the care of Ruth and Naomi. Throughout the narrative Boaz is referred to as the “man” and Ruth is referred to as the “woman,” and this language suggests that Boaz and Ruth are a new Adam and Eve. Notice that this man, like Adam, goes to sleep and wakes up to find a woman.
Conclusions & Applications
This is a new creation story: the story goes from darkness to light, from death to life, from striving to Sabbath, from barrenness to the birth of a son, and in the center of the story is this reversal story. Ruth the Moabitess is a reversal of Noah’s sons (Gen. 9:20-24), a reversal of Lot’s daughters (Gen. 19:30-38), a more righteous Tamar (Gen. 38), a reversal of the Moabite harlotry (Num. 25:1ff), and in every story there is some sort of Adam made vulnerable in a scandalous situation. And Boaz and Ruth could easily be seen as scandalous, but this all points again to God the Redeemer who became a vulnerable Adam on a scandalous cross and gave a son to another “Mara” (Jn. 19:26). And this is the KHAYIL of God, the power of the cross, and the promise of the gospel that will overrun this world and set all to right.
And we are called to cultivate this excellence in our lives. One of the things that is obvious is how bold and courageous Ruth and Boaz are. They take chances, and they are fearless. Be fearless in uncovering sin: it is scandalous to point out sin or confront sin, and it’s embarrassing to confess it, but you are the army of God. Be fearless in facing hardship and danger: commit yourself to the care of your God, plead with him in prayer, and then worship him with thanksgiving. Be fearless as you face the world: God is saving this world through bringing prostitutes and Moabites into the kingdom. There’s something in the Trinity that loves the scandal of bringing worlds out of nothing, light out of darkness, life out of death. And we are called to follow in this and glory in it.
A Sketchy Introduction to Karl Barth (1886-1968) and His Christological Aims
Note: These are notes for a presentation I gave for the New St. Andrew's College graduate program this week.
Pope Pius II called Barth the greatest theologian since Thomas Aquinas. He was invited to attend Vatican II, and he is widely considered to be one of the most significant contributors to the modern theological world. He wrote on a wide area of subjects, was politically involved during the rise of Hitler and the Third Reich. He grew up and studied theology in the milieu of German Nationalism and the modern liberal push in German theology. His break with liberalism with the publishing of his commentary on Romans in 1918 is widely hailed as one of the most significant developments in the theology in the 20th Century. He is loved, hated, denounced, praised, but footnoted prolifically throughout the landscape of modern theology.
Barth’s Christology
In Barth’s theology “there is no Christology as such; on the other hand, it is all Christology.” (Thompson, 1)
“There are, strictly speaking, no Christian themes independent of Christology” (CD II.1).
Speaking of the Apostles’ Creed, we writes, “We could not possibly have given a genuine exposition of the first article without continually interpreting it by means of the second. Indeed, the second article does not just follow the first, nor does it just precede the third; but it is the fount of light by which the other two are lit.” (DO, 65)
“And as for what is involved in the relationship between creation and the reality of existence on the one hand, and on the other hand the Church, redemption, God – that can never be understood from any general truth about our existence, nor from the reality of history of religion; this we can only learn from the relation between Jesus and Christ… That is why Article II, why Christology, is the touchstone of all knowledge of God in the Christian sense, the touchstone of all theology. ‘Tell me how it stands with your Christology, and I shall tell you who you are.’” (DO, 66)
Possible Objections/Criticisms:
Colin Brown suggests that making Jesus Christ the complete center of everything can actually slide into a certain abstraction problem. Jesus Christ ends up functioning as a “Christ-principle.” (Thompson, 5) Whether Barth is susceptible to this criticism or not, he is clearly at war with this sort of thing throughout his writings. H. Volk suggests something similar to Brown. He says that in Barth “Christology is so much a principle (Prinzip) that there is the danger of systematizing over a wide field… the danger of the use of a principle in a forced way is not far distant. For even in Christian theology Christology can be sued as a principle in such a powerful way that it results in a narrowing of the theological basis and contents.” (cited in Thompson, 6)
This criticism has sometimes been called “Christomonism.” The concern was that an overemphasis on the redemptive work of Christ ignored important doctrines such as creation or the work of the Holy Spirit, etc. Barth answered this question directly in an interview:
"In what specific way, Professor Barth, does your theology avoid being Christomonistic?"
Answer: "Sound theology cannot be either dualistic or monistic. The Gospel defies all isms,' including dualism and monism. Sound theology can only be 'unionistic,' uniting God and man. Christomonism (that's an awful catchword!) was invented by an old friend of mine whose name I will not mention. Christomonism would mean that Christ alone is real and that all other men are only apparently real. But that would be in contradiction with what the name of Jesus-Christ means, namely, union between God and man. This union between God and man has not been made only in Jesus Christ but in him as our representative for the benefit of all men. Jesus Christ as God's servant is true God and true man, but at the same time also our servant and the servant of all men. Christomonism is excluded by the very meaning and goal of God's and man's union in Jesus Christ." (http://theologytoday.ptsem.edu/jul1962/v19-2-article2.htm, accessed 11.18.08)
Robert Letham, while generally appreciative of Barth’s work, concedes that “his vigorous christocentrism is certainly exaggerated, almost to a point of a christomonism. While his overall theology is strongly Trinitarian, he hardly did justice to the consistent emphasis in the New Testament that it is God who chose us and the election is particularly a work of the Father (e.g. Eph. 1:4)” (Letham 54)
But for Barth, Creation, Revelation, Trinity, soteriology, and everything else are summed up in the person of Christ, and therefore all truth is found in and through the living Christ (e.g. Rom. 11:36, Eph. 1:10, Col. 1:20).
One of the ways Barth sought to guard against the Christ-principle and/or christomonistic criticisms was by pushing much of his theology in more dynamic directions. The “being in becoming” language is this movement. Christ as event is another instance of the same, and this comes out in Barth’s discussion of the person and work of Christ.
Person and Work:
“What is needed in this matter is nothing more or less than the removal of the distinction between the two basic sections of classical Christology, or positively, the restoration of the hyphen which always connects them and makes them one in the New Testament. Not to the detriment of either the one or the other… Not to cause the doctrine of the person of Christ to be absorbed or dissolved in that of his work, or vice versa. But to give a proper place to them both.” (IV.1)
“[T]his person does not exist apart from this office, nor this office apart from this person.” (DO, 73)
Barth gets at this connection between person and work when he insists that the “he suffered” of the creed includes the entire earthly life of Jesus from birth to the cross. And this makes more sense as we consider the kind of reception the Creator of the world enjoyed. (DO, 102)
If Christ is the center of Barth’s theology, the cross and resurrection are the center of Christology.
The person of Christ is not first to be established and then his work. Rather, for Barth it is actually the event of the cross that establishes both the who and the what. In particular the doctrine of the two natures of Christ is fundamentally built upon the act of reconciliation and not the other way around. The doctrine of the incarnation is built upon the doctrine of reconciliation. And this seems consistent with the concerns of the early church fathers.
Another way to say this is that what is begun at Christmas is completed at Easter. There is movement in the incarnation. What is established in principle in the Jesus conceived by Mary is moving towards a conclusion. The incarnation is completed in some sense in the cross and resurrection. “[I]ncarnation and atonement enclose, embrace, and interpret each other and are really one though distinguishable” (Thompson, 14).
Another aspect of this discussion is the great lengths which Barth goes through to insist upon the “God-ness” of Christ. Christ is the center of his theology because he is utterly convinced that when we consider Christ, we are dealing with the Triune God. And there are numerous implications for thinking and discussing along these lines.
This means that the incarnation should not be seen as something fundamentally different from the way God is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Barth emphasizes this in particular with regard to the roles of the Father, Son, and Spirit. The Son as the one who obeys and submits enacts this reality in the incarnation according to the will of the Father, in the power of the Spirit. (See McCormack on Barth and Kenosis, cf. Phil. 2) More on this below.
Thus Barth insists: “There is no greater depth in God’s being and work than that revealed in these happenings and under this name” (CD II/2, 54). There is not a hidden “remainder” in God that is not revealed or disclosed in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
“Who God is and what it is to be divine is something we have to learn where God has revealed himself and his nature, the essence of the divine. And if he has revealed himself in Jesus Christ as the God who does this, it is not for us to be wiser then he and to say that it is in contradiction with the divine essence. We have to be ready to be taught by him that we have been too small and perverted in our thinking about him within the framework of a false idea of God.” We need to “reconstitute” our notions of God “in the light of the fact that he does this [i.e. incarnation].” (CD IV/1, 186)
The cross is not merely a symbolic center reflecting the “limit of human existence.” The death of Jesus is not merely another story about the martyrdom of a religious founder. The story of the cross is the “concrete deed and action of God Himself. God changes himself, God himself comes most near, God thinks it not robbery to be divine, that is, He does not hold on to the booty like a robber, but God parts with Himself. Such is the glory of His Godhead, that He can be “selfless,’ that he can actually forgive Himself something.” (DO, 116) This ability to be selfless, to forgive, to part with Himself is what Barth calls the freedom of God.
Barth insists that our definition, our description of God must be built upon the centrality of the incarnation and not something in tension with it. The incarnation is not an afterthought or something particularly different that God does. “Far from being against himself, or at disunity with himself, he has put into effect the freedom of his divine love, the love, in which he is divinely free. He has therefore done and revealed that which corresponds to his divine nature.” (CD IV/1, 186)
And this means that his attributes must be described and illustrated around the incarnation and not with the incarnation become the list of exceptions to the otherwise neat and tidy categories of deity. God’s immutability must not be understood to be at odds with the incarnation. Rather, the incarnation is itself an expression of God’s changeless love and freedom toward his creation, to take both the form of glory and the form of humility, the form of God and the form of a servant. (CD IV/1, 186)
Likewise, God’s omnipresence is seen in the way God dwells in Christ, descends into the lowest parts of the earth, and ascends into heaven. His omnipotence is displayed in the fact that God displays his power even in weakness. His eternity is revealed the fact that he can enter time and remain eternal. And so on.
Reconciliation & Atonement:
“In the doctrine of reconciliation we come to the heart of the theology of Karl Barth.” (Thompson, 47)
Barth dwells on the parable of the Prodigal Son insisting upon a Christological reading which sees God revealing the kind of God that he is. He is the God who goes “into the far country.” By this, Barth means to picture the identification of God with us. This is the fulfillment of the covenant and election. God becomes our brother and thereby identifies with the prodigal nation of Israel.
Berkouwer says, “Through the man Jesus Christ, God himself is revealed as the divine subject in the work of Christ. This conception brings us to the heart of Barth’s doctrine of reconciliation… For Barth, the truth of the whole of dogmatics rests on this God himself.” (cited in Thompson, 49)
“The way of the Son of God into the far country is the way of obedience… the first and inner moment of the mystery of the deity of Christ.” (CD IV/1)
Again, Barth insists that the humiliation, the suffering, and death of Jesus is the revelation of God, and therefore it rests upon the way the Son submits and obeys the Father in the Spirit. But how does this not slide into some form of subordinationism or modalism? Barth says that ironically both of these errors actually push obedience out of the center of God by their formulations. The former is based upon an actual inferiority while the latter has no differentiation allowing such an economy.
The other heading that Barth uses to describe the atonement is “The Judge judged in our place.” Barth says that a judge is “Basically and decisively ... the one whose concern is for order and peace, who must uphold the right and prevent the wrong, so that his existence and coming and work is not in itself and as such a matter for fear, but something which indicates a favor, the existence of one who brings salvation.” (CD IV/1)
Barth cannot get over the fact that Jesus is not only God with us, but he is supremely God for us. And this comes to the fore in numerous ways, not least the crucifixion and death of Jesus. “In this humiliation, God is supremely God … in this death he is supremely alive,” such that “he has maintained and revealed his deity in the passion of this man as his eternal Son.” (Cited by Thompson, 69)
Several implications:
Kenosis: If Christ is the person who does what God does for us then the act of incarnation is in startling ways a revelation of the way God is in himself. For God the Son to take on flesh, humble himself in obedience to the point of suffering and death, is for God-Father-Son-Holy Spirit to be revealed as he is. The Son who submits to the Father in eternity is the Son who submits to the Father in the flesh.
This answers two extremes: The more orthodox Chalcedonian definition can tend to suggest (though not necessarily) that what happens in the incarnation is fundamentally different from the way God is in eternity. And while orthodoxy insists upon the perfect union of God and man in the person of Jesus Christ, there is still a certain amount of tension which tends to push in heretical directions (e.g. docetism or apollinarianism). Yet what Barth insists that this is the polar opposite of the truth. What God does and who God is in the incarnation is in some sense the supreme expression of who he is and what he does. Likewise the less orthodox modern attempts to reconcile vere deus and vere homo have resulted in displacing attributes of God or man (usually the former).
Barth’s Doctrine of Scripture
The supremely personal nature of the event of the incarnation comes to bear on Barth’s description and understanding of Scripture. A static relation-less “being” of Scripture would be an inaccurate revelation of Christ since that is not the way Christ is. While Barth’s doctrine of Scripture would be less careful than we might prefer, his use and appeal to Scripture clearly indicates that it is the supreme and infallible authority in matters of faith and practice. But they are the supreme and infallible voice of the living and active Christ through the working of the Holy Spirit (Jn. 5:39).
The Fifth Commandment
It seems to me that one of the greatest needs of the Church at large is a recovery of and thereby a thorough repentance with regard to the fifth commandment.
The command to honor father and mother is not limited to merely honoring mom and dad. Honoring father and mother applies to all lawful authorities. Civil magistrates are fathers and mothers, pastors and elders are fathers and mothers, teachers, employers, principles, police men, uncles, grandparents, older siblings and all others 'over us' in our lives are fathers and mothers due honor and respect and as far as possible obedience.
Strikingly, one of the places where we are in the greatest danger regarding our keeping of the fifth commandment is in some of the most conservative, family-values sorts of homes and communities. In the Leave-It-To-Beaver outposts of conservative Christianity there is frequently a robust disregard of authority that is being lived out by moms and dads, and the lesson is being learned fabulously by their children.
So this is the drill: Dad leads the family, mom teaches the kids, bakes amazing dinners, and the kids all generally obey and are respectful. The family is all squeaky clean. But when any lawful authority imposes upon mom and dad, the reality bursts out into the open. So for example, when the elders of a presbyterian church do not allow the young children of this family to partake of the Lord's Supper, the parents throw a pietistic hissy-fit, cause a ruckus, and leave to find a church that will allow them to do what they want.
And of course it is all done with somber faces and pious tones. There are solemn conversations about following the conscience and submitting to Scripture, and all the rest.
But the kids are busy taking notes: "Always get your own way. If they say 'no,' throw a fit and leave."
Or maybe the issue is baptism or education or taxes or in-laws or grandparents.
And my suspicion is that the consequences may frequently be worse in good, Christian families. The greater the order, the better the lesson is learned. The more engaged the kids are, the more likely they will get the point. The more strictly they are required to "obey dad" while this is going on, the more clearly they will get the point.
And so ironically, the home where the fifth commandment is most fervently venerated on the surface may in fact be the breeding ground for some of the worst dishonor, some of the most flagrant disrespect and disobedience.
Feet
Just a little concordance study here:
The word is "foot/feet."
What's fun is that "spies" in the OT are commonly referred to as "feet." And when they are "spying" out the land, they are "footing" the land.
Friday, November 14, 2008
The Proverbs of River
My son spoke his first proverb last night:
"A fighting family is sadder than being eaten by a T-Rex."
Another variation includes Velociraptors.
Note: I posted another version earlier, and my son informed me that I was wrong. So here is the revised and corrected version.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Bucer on Bread Worship
Throughout his Commentary on the Book of Common Prayer, Bucer refers to the adoration of the host as artolatreia, that is, "bread worship."
He also says that the reason the early Church Fathers called the Eucharist a sacrifice is because all the faithful were expected to bring offerings and alms, and they were placed on the table in the assembly. Out of these sacrifices of praise, the bread and wine were taken, given thanks for, and shared as the communion in the body and blood of the Lord. But these alms and gifts were meant to be for the poor and needy and strangers in their midst and community. Thus, the Eucharist was a sacrifice for the life of the world on a number of levels.
Beware of Premature Repayment
"He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just." (Lk. 14:12-14)
Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Trinity: Ruth 2:1-23
Opening Prayer: Gracious Father, we thank you that you have sent your only Son to be our life and light. We thank you that you have also given us His Spirit. Grant us grace now to hear your word rightly, to love you more fully, and to walk faithfully before you.
Introduction
We considered the sharp contrasts last week between Ruth and Naomi, and yet we have also noted that despite Israel’s failures God is still visiting his people, still giving bread to the hungry (1:6, 22). The point is that God’s people always need a great Savior, and this “Mary” will bring life to Israel though the birth of a son.
Boaz the Relative
Boaz was the son of Rahab of Jericho (Mt. 1:5, cf. Ruth 4:20-21, Josh. 2:1ff), and this gives us some important insight into who Boaz is and what makes him such a “great” and “mighty” man (2:1). Gideon and Jephthah were also called “gibor khayil” (Jdg. 6:12, cf. 1 Sam. 9:1, 1 Kg. 11:28, 2 Kg. 5:1). Khayil can also mean “competent” (Gen. 47:6). Boaz contrasts sharply with Elimelech: his name probably means something related to “strength,” but it is clear fairly quickly that his strength is in his generosity, in his kindness, and in his diligence. Boaz did not leave the land when times got tough, he trusted God through the difficulties expecting to be raised up in due time.
The Field
Ruth asks Naomi’s permission to glean in the field (2:2). There was a “field” around every city which was divided according to the inheritance of various families (e.g. Lev. 25:34). Certain portions of the field might be sold in hard times, but they would be returned in the year of Jubilee (Lev. 25:13-17, 28-31). The idea of gleaning behind the harvesters is part of Israel’s legal code for the protection of the poor (Lev. 19:9-10, 23:22, Dt. 24:19-22). The “field” in Bethlehem is contrasted here with the “fields” of Moab (1:1, 2, 6, 22).
Finding Grace
Ruth says that she wants to go into the field in order to gather after one in whom she finds “grace” (2:2). This is the same word used to describe the “grace” that Noah found in the eyes of the Lord (Gen. 6:8). It is this very expression that Ruth uses when she bows down before Boaz (2:10, 13). Boaz calls Ruth his “daughter” (2:8) and entreats Ruth to stay with his “young women” (2:8-9). This attention that Boaz shows Ruth is fairly extraordinary, but Boaz is most impressed with Ruth’s commitment to the God of Israel, “under whose wings” she has come for refuge (2:12). The “wings” of God is a reference back to the Exodus when God bore his people on “eagles’ wings” (Ex. 19:4, Dt. 32:9-12) as well as the wings of the cherubim that overshadowed the mercy seat in the Most Holy Place (Ex. 25:20, 37:9). To be under the “wings” of Yahweh is to be covered in blood, in the care of his covenant. Boaz’s kindness extends further when he invites her to eat with him, giving her more than enough (2:14), and she is “filled” despite Naomi’s emptiness. Boaz also orders that his men not only allow her to gather after them but that they intentionally leave extra stalks for her (2:15-16). As Ruth “clung” to Naomi (1:14), Boaz now instructs Ruth to “cling” to his young women (2:8) and young men (2:21), and she does (2:23). Salvation is found in clinging to the people of God.
Conclusions & Applications
Ruth returns to Naomi “full,” and Naomi cannot help but bless Yahweh who has not forgotten his covenant mercy and kindness (2:17-20). This is of course a huge reversal of her previous statements (1:20-21). But this is what grace does, and we should be hungry for more.
Naomi tells Ruth that this man Boaz is their Near Redeemer (2:20). This word describes God’s redemption of Israel from Egypt (Ex. 6:6, 15:13), and forms the basis upon which Israel is to live like freemen: A redeemer is one who frees a slave (Lev. 25:47-55), buys back land or an inheritance (Lev. 25:25-34), or even avenges murder (Num. 35:9-29, Dt. 19, Josh. 20:2-9). Redemption is also an act of substitution before the Lord (Lev. 27:14-34). And the one appointed to these tasks was a near relative (Lev. 25:48-49).
Ultimately, all of this is about our Lord Jesus who is our Savior-Brother, our Near Redeemer (Ps. 19:15, Is. 43:1, Tit. 2:14, 1 Pet. 1:18). And this is good news for our families (Mk. 3:35), and it means that we have become Kinsmen-Redeemers to one another and to our communities, to the lost, to the hungry, to the barren, and to the bitter.
In the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen!
Closing Prayer: King Father, you have truly blessed beyond anything we could have expected. You sent your Son to die for us while we were still sinners. While we were still your enemies, you came for us. You claimed us as your family, your relatives, and you intervened on our behalf. We thank you and praise you and ask you to give us the grace to live this way for others both those in our own families and all of our neighbors. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, who taught us to pray, singing…
Friday, November 07, 2008
Bethlehem in Uproar
When Naomi and Ruth return to Bethlehem, the whole city is in an "uproar" because of them (1:19). The word for “uproar” is used to describe armies in panicked confusion (Dt. 7:23), the shouts that accompany the ark of the covenant (1 Sam. 4:5), the acclamation of a king (1 Kg. 1:45), and the noise of a multitude (Mic. 2:12).
Why does the writer tell us this? What is it about the return of Naomi that produces this response? Or is this a word that is meant to tip off readers to a particularly important typological meaning? If the latter, what?
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Goshen as Protection
In a series of talks on the book of Ruth, James Jordan discusses the history of Israel in the book of Genesis. He suggests in particular that God wanted Israel down in Goshen in Egypt in order to protect them from the worst of the pagan influences in Canaan. He cites the various failures of Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, and suggests that this was due to the influence of the Canaanites all around them. But because the sons of Israel were shepherds they would be kept at arms' length and despised by the Egyptians, and this would be good for Israel. They would be less influenced by their open enemies and at the same time enjoy the best of the land and grow strong as a nation. Clearly, despite all of Israel's weaknesses and later failings, this is exactly what happened leading up to the Exodus.
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