Our Renewed Image

  For John Calvin, the suffering and atoning death of Jesus the Messiah is the locus of God's reconciliatory plan for his creation (cf. Institutes 2.16.5; 3.11.23). He writes in his commentary on 1 Peter 2:24 that “the death of Christ is efficacious…for the mortification of the flesh.” What, in practical terms, might this look like in everyday life? Maybe 
the primary question is, how does the death of one actually give life to another? To understand this first may help us to see more easily how the mortified or sanctified life goes. In Saint Peter’s own words: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness” (1 Peter 2:24). “Living to righteousness” means the same thing that Calvin...

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Husk and Kernel: The Assembly at Westminster

I've been perusing Bob Letham's new book on the Westminster Assembly, reading portions here and there as items catch my eye. There's all kinds of helpful discussions in it, but I wanted to highlight a few criticisms he makes, mostly because I think they symbolize how helpful this book can be in demythologizing the Westminster Confession. Sometimes one gets the impression that certain confessionalists think the writing simply fell from the sky. This almost always leads to unfortunate hermeneutics. Yet it is proper, Letham writes, "to attempt to interpret a text in its original context. A striking example of carelessness, of failure to do basic homework, that renders a contextual reading improbable is this extract from the introduction to a...

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O day most calm, most bright

Heads up on my recent article over at Ref21, which discusses the seventeenth-century Welsh poet George Herbert's poem “Sunday,” with hopes of being led through a contemplation of the joys of worship toward doxology itself. The thing about Herbert is that he embodies the fact that one can be both evangelical and sacramental, biblical and liturgical, reformational and catholic. So, why is he all but unknown?Read the whole thi...

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Epistemological Modesty

 In response to this great article on Keith Mathison’s Shape of Sola Scriptura over at Called to Communion, an interesting discussion has emerged revolving around the tu quoque—certain folks are arguing back that Catholics are in no way on better ground epistemologically. That is to say, the Catholic position and subsequent argument against the non-Catholic positions can be applied equally to the Catholic making the argument. Slightly related to this issue, in my opinion, is the question of epistemological certitude, which I perceive has deep roots within the Called to Communion crowd. After all, once having swum the Tiber (or any conversion, for that matter), who wouldn’t want to consider those newly held beliefs with 100 percent certainty?...

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Land of the Lost, part 7

As we start in on Propositions 11–13, Walton begins to wrap up his exegetical arguments on how to read the creation narrative of Genesis 1. In so doing, he moves on to discuss a few things that many people like to spend time arguing about (age of the earth, etc.). This brings to mind a recent post over at Bring the Books on this very subject. Its content doesn't bear on our current discussion so much, but I thought it interesting nonetheless. Adam does a good job succintly setting out the epistemological reasons for affirming an old earth. On to the props: Proposition 11: “Functional cosmic temple” offers face-value exegesis This is the most “literal” reading, for the ancient author intended the ancient text, Gen 1, to be read as his own view,...

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Land of the Lost, part 6

On to Props 9–10. I realize this can be pretty boring stuff, at least the way I've presented it, so thanks for taking the time to read along. (I'm writing a lot of other stuff right now and am feeling a bit lazy.) Proposition 9: The seven days of Genesis 1 relate to the cosmic temple inauguration Confirmed by the divine rest on the 7th day (and divine rest only takes place in temples). The number “7” is a predominant theme in ANE temple texts and in the Bible; in Gen 1, it implies temple inauguration Creation, only if it’s an account of functional origins, fits like a hand in glove with temple inauguration (88). Just like a temple is made functional at an inauguration ceremony, so too was creation, the cosmic temple, made functional during...

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Land of the Lost, part 5

Here we go, continuing our walkthrough of Walton's Lost World. I think what follows (unlike the previous post on the days of creation) is fairly non-controversial. My only hope is that it's taken seriously, because this cosmic-temple theme is seriously embedded in the ancient text itself (and, indeed, I think it runs throughout the canon). Proposition 7: Divine rest is in a temple The true climax: a temple text w/o which the creation would have no meaning. The work of separating and subduing and assigning functions is done; the day of “rest” is the day on which the creator God can begin his providential sustenance of the ordered system w/o any obstacles. Stability is here. From such rest he rules. The temple is his headquarters. This is typical temple theology for the ANE. Proposition 8:...

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JBU ROCK

Kirk Demarais of JBU ROCK writes: "A special era in John Brown University music-making took place decades after Sound Generation, and years after Joysong (but prior to the Apocalypse). Students of the early 1990s, inspired by the do-it-yourself garage rock mentality of the time, gathered instruments and assembled in dorm rooms, rented houses and otherwise to create an alternate soundtrack for our college years. The results of our musical endeavors were mixed, but often memorable, and usually fun. This is a place for collecting, archiving and sharing our music and our memories for all the ages (at least until the Apocalypse). The initial collection of memorabilia featured here is quite Demarais-centric, but I hope this batch of videos and mp3s...

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Land of the Lost, part 4

On to propositions 5–6 and the six days of creation . . . Proposition 5: Days 1–3 establish functions Day 1: “light” (not a material thing) is not “day”; so what gives in v. 5? The obvious: the “light” spoken of is a “period of light,” i.e., “day”. Thus “light” is a metonymy (“God called the [period of] light Day, and the [period of] darkness he called Night.”) So, working backward to v. 3 we see that God is here creating the basis for time. A function is given (a material is not created) to serve humans. “God said, ‘Let there be [a period of] light.’” But how could there have been light w/o Day 4’s sun? The order of events concerns function, not material creation. Day 2: a solid expanse to hold the waters above the earth? Well, the Hebrew...

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Land of the Lost, part 3

Here's Part 3 of this walkthrough of The Lost World. Note that by the end of this post my thoughts took on a more "outline" form, which will continue on through the remainder of this series. (Bah, prose. Who needs it?) Proposition 3 takes a good look at the Hebrew word bārā’ (“create”), where Walton seeks to make the case that it concerns (primarily) functions. The verb is used about fifty times in the Old Testament and in every case, deity is always either the subject or the implied subject. Virtually all Hebraists agree on this point. Apparently few, however, discuss the objects of that verb. According to Walton, though some examples are ambiguous, a large percentage of the contexts require a functional understanding (he provides a helpful...

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Land of the Lost, part 2

I might have unnecessarily tainted these series of posts, revealing as I did in the previous post my general indifference to whatever theories scientists come up with to explain the material origins of the universe. This mindset does not drive Walton's book. His concern is, emphatically, hermeneutical and exegetical. To be sure, the reader may deduce certain motivations on his part that wag the exegetical dog, but the only one he explicitly reveals is a desire to handle God's Word rightly. It just so happens that I appreciate the way he handles it because it frees me up to continue thinking as I always have throughout my adult life—that whatever theory the scientific community puts forth is worth entertaining precisely because it has no bearing,...

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Land of the Lost, part 1

When I arrived at seminary on the cusp of a new century, the conservative Reformed world seemed abuzz with discussions about cosmology. In my partial ignorance, I found this odd, that churches would formulate opinions on things about which they were clearly not experts. Coming as I did from a home not too terribly concerned with how God created but that he simply did (which was only reinforced at my conservative Christian college and an evolutionist professor of biology), I found this doubly odd. But I soon recognized my blind spot and saw that the main issue revolved around hermeneutics—the meaning, in this case, of the creation narrative in Genesis, which of course lies well within the purview of the church.1 John H. Walton’s Lost World...

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An Exilic Presbyterian's Manifesto, final thoughts

I realized last week that I didn't have much more to say about Stellman's project than what I've said already (see parts 1, 2, 3 and 4). I was expecting a little pushback from folks on the points I raised about the sacraments (if not the Sabbath)…. So, one final word of caution might be in order: a healthy skepticism of the modern church, and especially evangelicalism, on a bad day slides easily into cynicism, which is just a hair’s breath away from devolving into hatred for fellow believers. This was one of the major sins of the leaders of Israel during Jesus’ day, as they held contemptuous what God himself had wept over. For us, it’d be like sitting through a Bible study about the Pharisee who thanked God that he was not as bad a sinner...

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An Exilic Presbyterian's Manifesto, part 4

This fourth installment marks the end of my walkthrough of Jason J. Stellman's Dual Citizens: Worship and Life Between the Already and the Not Yet. I appreciate your reading thus far, and I will follow this up with a few reflections in the coming days. Without further adieu: Chapter 11 simply seeks to demonstrate how “Pilgrim Theology, driven as it is by the doctrine of the two kingdoms, actually carves out some valid space for creation and the goodness of earth and its blessings” (126). Using G.K. Chesterton’s delineation of the two poles that mess this up (“puritans” and “pagans,” broadly understood) as his point of departure, Stellman intends here to show how the two-kingdoms paradigm provides the needed balance between the pagans’ pursuit...

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An Exilic Presbyterian's Manifesto, part 3

On the heels of the sabbath discussion comes Stellman’s next concern (chap. 7): “to highlight the fact that, regardless of any earthly nation’s horizontal goodness and civic uprightness, there is only one nation with which God is in redemptive covenant, and that is the church.” We can thus free ourselves from the notion that any nation-state (such as America or Israel) “carries redemptive significance” (64). Not much else needs to be said other than Stellman’s own recounting of Donald Barnhouse’s musings about what a city would look like if Satan took it over: “He didn’t envision rampant violence and deviant sexual perversion, with Christians being tortured or thrown into prison. Rather, Barnhouse surmised that if the Devil were...

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