A Reformed identity

The Reformed understanding of things is that we do not have immediate access to God's being. We have mediated access through God the Son incarnate and through the preaching of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments. The goal of our theology is to think God's thoughts after him, as his image-bearers, as analogues. —R. Scott Clark, Recovering the Reformed Confession, p. 151

Two Mountains: Sinai and Zion

The third chapter of Michael Horton's book Introducing Covenant Theology is a difficult one, but we are encouraged by looking at the opening of chapter four, where he says we have our most difficult work behind us.

The chapter is entitled, "A Tale of Two Mothers", after Galatians 4:21-31. First we have the covenant of promise, in which God promises a Messiah through which he will provide justification by faith alone (Genesis 15:6), which is typified by Mount Zion and Sarah. Then there is the covenant of law, given by Moses on Mount Sinai and typified by Ishmael's mother Hagar. One deals with freedom and true, miraculous sonship, and the other with slavery and striving according to the flesh. One corresponds to the ancient "royal grant", in which a free gift is bestowed upon the vassal with all the work is performed by another, and the other corresponds to the suzerainty treaty, in which the benefits are conditional upon the performance of the vassal and harsh sanctions are imposed if the vassal should fail.

One of the things that makes the chapter difficult is that Horton quotes some liberal-sounding textual critics who seem to look down on God's servants Moses and the reformer king Josiah as if they had totally dropped the ball. My brothers, we cannot approach Scripture in this way. Moses gave the Law not of his own volition, but the Law came directly from the mouth of Yahweh ("And God spoke all these words, saying, 'I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me...'" Exodus 20:1-3, ESV, cf. 2 Peter 1:20-21). These commandments were not given by men, and that is something we must remember whenever we look at the Torah. Secondly, when we contrast these covenants we need to remember that they are simultaneous; there are not two "dispensations" for different people in different times, but they run concurrently. This unity can also be observed in the accepted fact that Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible, so the people's representative in the Sinaitic covenant was the same one who wrote about God's covenant with Abraham in Genesis 15. Finally, the issue with these covenants is where does justification come from. It does not come (in either covenant) by obeying the works of the law, but by identification (e.g. through baptism and the covenant ritual meal passed down to us in the Lord's Supper, though these actions do not justify us but are symbolic of spiritual realities) with the One who fulfilled the covenant of law completely. In him the two covenants come together, as he was both promised and typified in both of them.

I submit that the issue at hand is that the religious performance of the Law without receiving the promise of justification by faith alone is meaningless, and even increases condemnation. I see the "royal grant" covenants of Noah, Abraham, and David as a thread that runs throughout history, with the law covenant as something clarified in the middle of them, but the thread of the promise continued to run. It's like looking at a sound wave file when you are editing music. You see the foundation of a pedal bass, but when other music is added on top of it, the bass continues, and when the music fades, the pedal bass remains. The bass is the basis for the music, and without it the music wouldn't know its proper limits. The music grows out of the bass, just as obedience to God's law is completely impossible for depraved humanity, and can only happen as the fruit of regeneration. (Another way to illustrate the concurrency of the covenant of law and the covenant of promise is the relationship between the invisible church and the visible church: although people may profess to be partakers of the covenant, only God knows to whom it actually applies.)

The problem with the Pharisees in Jesus' day, as well as the Galatian Judaizers whom Paul contended with, was that they were focusing on imitating the fruit externally, with no regard for the basis of justification which is only through the blood sacrifice of the spotless Lamb of God. "Salvation has always come through a covenant of grace (founded on an eternal and unilateral covenant of redemption), rather than on a contract or one's personal fulfillment of the law" (p. 36). They were going about it in the wrong direction, imitating the effects of justification with no regard to the cause. "Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt. But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness" (Romans 4:4-5, NKJV). No points will ever be scored by our outward obedience, but the performance of them, because they are done in hypocrisy, actually count against us! (the "debt" in Rom. 4:4), earning us a worse punishment in Hell than if we had lived our lives in blatant apostasy. As Horton says, "This covenant does not grade on a curve but requires absolute, perfect, personal obedience to everything in it" (p. 38). Paul says elsewhere in Romans 3:20 (ESV), "For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin" (cf. 7:7-12). Because of indwelling sin we must be cleansed and have the righteousness of Christ imputed to us. Only then, by his Spirit working within us, we will be able to bear the fruits worthy of repentance (Luke 3:8).

In the Sinaitic covenant, "there is no formal obligation on Yahweh's part" (quoting Hillers on p. 39), but the emphasis is on the obedience of the people (which we must recognize as fruit and also as the standard which only Christ can meet). In contrast, the Abrahamic covenant in Genesis 15 is all on God. Horton again quotes Hillers:

The man taking the oath is identified with the slaughtered animal. "Just as this calf is cut up, so may Matiel be cut up," is the way it is put in the text of an Aramaic treaty from the eighth century BC, and an earlier document describes a similar ceremony: "Abba-An swore to Yarim-Lim the oath of the gods, and cut the neck of a lamb, (saying): 'If I take back what I gave you....'" Among the Israelites it seems that a common way of identifying the parties was to cut up the animal and pass between the parts. [See Jer. 34:18.] From this ceremony is derived the Hebrew idiom for making a treaty, karat berit, "to cut a treaty." (p. 40)

God alone was the one who walked between the animal parts in Genesis 15, indicating that he was taking responsibility for the covenant in its entirety. The covenant is based entirely on God's faithfulness. But Paul says in Romans 3:3-4a (ESV) that his faithfulness extends to the Sinaitic covenant as well: "What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? By no means! Let God be true though every one were a liar..." Moses had this same attitude in Deuteronomy 4:30-31 (ESV):

When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the LORD your God and obey his voice. For the LORD your God is a merciful God. He will not leave you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers that he swore to them.

God's covenant faithfulness can be traced back even further, to Adam and Noah. Horton writes,

We could even include the promise made to Adam after the fall--the so-called protoeuangelion, as a type of unconditional royal grant treaty. unlike the obvious conditionality of the first arrangement with Adam, Genesis 3 promises Adam and Eve a messianic seed who will undo the damage they have caused in their alliance with the serpent. (p. 43)

The covenant with Noah is a "unilteral promise of God, and it makes no difference what Noah does," since it is made despite full knowledge that "the thoughts of a man's mind are evil from childhood" (p. 42, citing Hillers)

What is the justification for God's unconditional faithfulness even when the nation is so unfaithful? It is the "representative king who fulfills Israel's personal obligation and therefore the terms of the everlasting covenant" (p. 44). We have already seen this in the protoeuangelion, but we also see it in the Mosaic law, in Deuteronomy 4:18-20 (ESV):

And when he sits on the throne of his kingdom, he shall write for himself in a book a copy of this law, approved by the Levitical priests. And it shall be with him, and he shall read in it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God by keeping all the words of this law and these statutes, and doing them, that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers, and that he may not turn aside from the commandment, either to the right hand or to the left, so that he may continue long in his kingdom, he and his children, in Israel.

This is why Paul can say that "Christ is the end [the point aimed at; the purposed goal] of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes" (Rom. 10:4, ESV, cf. John 1:17, 45). We receive the promises by identification with Christ through faith.

I have already described the attitude of the textual critics towards Moses and Josiah, which Horton cites on the succeeding pages. But Horton redeems the chapter right away:

The sactions (threats) of the covenant made with God at Sinai must be taken seriously, and whatever continuity necessarily exists between the covenant of grace running through both testaments--the differences even structurally between, on one hand, the covenants with Adam, Abraham, and David concerning a seed and, on the other, the quite contingent and mutually adopted arrangement that distinguishes the Mosaic economy--must not be swept aside by theological prejudice. (p. 47)

This is the "trembling" posture we must have when we approach Scripture (Isa. 66:2).

Horton concludes the chapter by taking us back to the foundation of it all, which is the sovereign grace of God. "The bond made at Sinai is precarious, fragile as the people's faith; the bod with David is as firm as the sun and moon, as reliable as God" (p. 49, quoting Hillers).

God chose Israel and redeemed them from Egypt not because of their own righteousness, but because of his tender mercy (Deuteronomy 6-8). Their being saved from Egyptian captivity and brought into the Promised Land is a matter of grace, pure covenant grant (Gen. 26:5). So also is the status of every Israelite as a justified person in God's sight: all by grace along, through faith alone, in Christ alone, according to the Abrahamic covenant. However, once in the land, it is up to Israel as a nation to determine whether it will remain in God's land or be evicted from it.

This is similar to the final judgment of believers, when we will be judged by our works. By the works of the law no one will be justified (Gal. 2:16)--we are justified by faith in Christ's gracious work for us on the cross--but make no mistake, we will be judged.

He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. For God shows no partiality. (Rom. 2:6-11, ESV)

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. (2 Cor 5:10, ESV)

Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written,
“As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me,
and every tongue shall confess* to God.”So then each of us will give an account of himself to God. (Rom. 14:10-12, ESV)

In which day, not only the apostate angels shall be judged, but likewise all persons that have lived upon earth shall appear before the tribunal of Christ, to give an account of their thoughts, words, and deeds; and to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether good or evil. (Westminster Confession of Faith 33:1)

For believers, our works will be judged only to determine our reward. By God's grace, we who believe will be free from condemnation in the final judgment:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. (John 3:16-18, ESV)

We are not saved by our works, but by unconditional grace of God. But our regeneration is confirmed by our obedience (James 2:17, etc.), and the rewards we will receive in heaven are at least in some sense conditional upon our obedience. "If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward" (1 Cor 3:14, ESV). So let us be diligent to make our calling and election sure (2 Peter 1:10).

Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law. (Rom. 3:31, ESV)

Posts in this series:

• What's "The Big Idea?"
  
• "God and Foreign Relations"
• Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant
• The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace
• Two Mountains: Sinai and Zion

The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace

I am getting ready to post on another Chapter from Michael Horton's Introducing Covenant Theology, and I thought it might be helpful to clear up a couple things about covenant theology before we dig deeper into the book.

In Reformed theology, we see three covenants in Scripture: Redemption, Works, and Grace. The Covenant of Redemption is between the members of the Triune Godhead, by which God made a pact with himself in eternity past that he would carry out his redemptive purposes in history. Now, where do we place the other two covenants in Scripture?

Many modern Christians seem to confuse the theological understandings of the Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace in a way that I think is quite unhelpful. Typically, when these terms are first heard, the understanding goes that the Covenant of Works is equal to the Mosaic Law, or the Old Testament, and the Covenant of Grace is equal to the "New Covenant" through faith in Christ's atonement, or the New Testament.

While it is true that the Covenent of Grace is based on the atonement of Christ, what many Christians do not realize is that the traditional Reformed understanding of these covenants is completely different from what they would think.

The Covenant of Works refers only to the covenant God made with Adam in the Garden of Eden, in Genesis 3:15-17 (ESV):

The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

The Covenant of Works was broken when Adam sinned, and all humanity is suffering the consequences. There is no sort of "back to the Garden" spirituality available for us. Adam blew it. If there were second chances available for that covenant, then humans would not have been banished from Eden. All of the remaining covenants God makes with Man in Scripture are part of the Covenant of Grace.

Immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, God killed an animal as a substitutionary sacrifice for their sins, and clothed them with the animal's skin so that when he looked at them, the first thing he saw was the One who died for their sins. Genesis 15 says Abraham was justified by faith, and Paul comments in his epistles that this was long before he took the seal of circumcision. Even much later, in the dreaded Law of Moses, it was not performing all of the details meticulously that justified the Jews. Rather, all of the rituals, especially the bloody Day of Atonement sacrifices, pointed forward to Christ. Not only would the Messiah be the only one ever capable of obeying the Law perfectly, but also, because of his perfect obedience, he also fulfilled the Law as the only ever once-for-all sacrifice to pay for the sins of the whole world. "My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world" (1 John 2:1-2, ESV).

As Horton says on p. 32,

"[T]he very fact that God does exercise patience in this relationship points up that the Sinai covenant is not simply identical to the pre-fall Adamic covenant. After the fall, a covenant of works arrangement--even for a national covenant rather than individual salvation, cannot really get off the ground if absolutely perfect obedience is the condition."

So the Covenant of Works existed for about a chapter and a half, from the middle of Genesis 2 through chapter 3. The rest of Scripture is about the singular Covenant of Grace. But don't take my word for it. Here is Chapter 7 of the historic Westminster Confession of Faith (ca. 1646), in its entirety:

Of God's Covenant with Man

1. The distance between God and the creature is so great, that although reasonable creatures do owe obedience unto him as their Creator, yet they could never have any fruition of him as their blessedness and reward, but by some voluntary condescension on God's part, which he hath been pleased to express by way of covenant.

2. The first covenant made with man was a covenant of works, wherein life was promised to Adam; and in him to his posterity, upon condition of perfect and personal obedience.

3. Man, by his fall, having made himself incapable of life by that covenant, the Lord was pleased to make a second, commonly called the covenant of grace; wherein he freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ; requiring of them faith in him, that they may be saved, and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto eternal life his Holy Spirit, to make them willing, and able to believe.

4. This covenant of grace is frequently set forth in Scripture by the name of a testament, in reference to the death of Jesus Christ the Testator, and to the everlasting inheritance, with all things belonging to it, therein bequeathed.

5. This covenant was differently administered in the time of the law, and in the time of the gospel: under the law, it was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances delivered to the people of the Jews, all foresignifying Christ to come; which were, for that time, sufficient and efficacious, through the operation of the Spirit, to instruct and build up the elect in faith in the promised Messiah, by whom they had full remission of sins, and eternal salvation; and is called the old testament.

6. Under the gospel, when Christ, the substance, was exhibited, the ordinances in which this covenant is dispensed are the preaching of the Word, and the administration of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper: which, though fewer in number, and administered with more simplicity, and less outward glory, yet, in them, it is held forth in more fullness, evidence and spiritual efficacy, to all nations, both Jews and Gentiles; and is called the new testament. There are not therefore two covenants of grace, differing in substance, but one and the same, under various dispensations.

(Don't be thrown off by that word, "dispensations," as it means something completely different here than the way Dispensationalists use it.)

Posts in this series:

• What's "The Big Idea?"
  
• "God and Foreign Relations"
• Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant
• The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace
  

Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant

In the second half of chapter 2 in Introducing Covenant Theology, Michael Horton drills down towards the characteristics of the biblical covenant. It is founded on God's transcendence, his sovereign election, and his grace, which is proclaimed loudly in his forbearance.

The religion we see in Scripture is unlike the pagan religions because we see God as transcendent. Horton writes, "According to the Bible, that relationship--a covenant--is established by God in his freedom. We are not related to God by virtue of a common aspect of our being, but by virtue of a pact that he himself makes with us to be our God" (p. 29). Our God is not arbitrary or capricious; he is sovereign and omniscient and personal and ultimately trustworthy. History is "God's theater in which he promised to bring about his purposes" (p. 30). The religion is not man-made, and with a covenant with Yahweh as its foundation, the chief end of life is not the goals of the nation, but God's sovereign will. With such security, there is so much freedom. "Far from engendering a legalistic form of religion, Israel's covenant with Yahweh meant that they were no longer at the whim of petty warlords and heavy-handed suzerains" (p. 30). This is key. Covenant theology does not view Old Testament Judaism as legalistic, but as a relationship in which people had assurance that God would care for them.

The Treaty at Sinai

The oath at Mount Sinai closely parallels the suzerainty treaty. The Ten Commandments are not just "another part" of "the Law", but they are the stipulations of this covenant. Exodus 24:3 says, "Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules. And all the people answered with one voice and said, 'All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do'" (ESV). Yet, what happens right after Moses comes down from the mountain?

Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand, tablets that were written on both sides; on the front and on the back they were written. The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.” But he said, “It is not the sound of shouting for victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear.” And as soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses' anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. He took the calf that they had made and burned it with fire and ground it to powder and scattered it on the water and made the people of Israel drink it. --Exodus 32:15-20 (ESV)

God had the right to utterly annihilate the people of Israel after this rebellion, but he didn't. Horton says this is proof that the Covenant of Works (which we will later see was the covenant between God and Adam in the Garden of Eden before the Fall) can no longer be enforced. Justification by works cannot expected by any means, and we see that the entire point of the Law is to point to Christ. In this sense, even the Sinaitic covenant is one of grace.

What degree of disobedience God could put up with in order to allow Israel to keep its tenure in his land was always up to God, of course. His patience (long-suffering) received all too many opportunities to be displayed. Yet the very fact that God does exercise patience in this relationship points up that the Sinai covenant is not simply identical to the pre-fall Adamic covenant. After the fall, a covenant of works arrangement--even for a national covenant rather than individual salvation, cannot really get off the ground if absolutely perfect obedience is the condition. Remember, the purposes of the Jewish theocracy (i.e., the old covenant) was to point forward through types to the coming Messiah. (p. 32)

In this way, as Meredith Kline explains, an "appropriate measure of national fidelity" is required in order to "keep the typology legible," and God in his providence certainly made sure this was met.

The purpose of the Law is to point us to both the perfection of Christ, and our own imperfection and need for a redeemer. For the church, obedience to the law honors Christ, since he bore the horrible punishment for each and every time we disobeyed. But our obedience is also the fruit of his work in us in regeneration and sanctification.

The Promise of Genesis 15

Horton quotes G.E. Mendenhall (p. 33):

Both in the narrative of Gen 15 and 17, and in the later references to this covenant, it is clearly stated or implied that it is Yahweh Himself who swears to certain promises to be carried out in the future. It is not often enough seen that no obligations are imposed upon Abraham. Circumcision is not originally an obligation, but a sign of the covenant, like the rainbow in Gen 9.

He goes on to point out some differences between the Abrahamic covenant and the Sinaitic, since the latter did impose obligations. He seems to be implying that there are two covenants, a conditional one, and an unconditional one, and that we are going to learn more about them as we get further into our study (Lord willing).

Now we are at the end of the chapter, and there are only a couple points left to be made. First, Numbers 11:4 says the people who passed through the Red Sea and came to Sinai were a "mixed multitude." Have you ever heard a pastor point this out before? Not likely! The covenant community who bound themselves to Yahweh at the foot of the mountain were not all blood-related Israelites. This is very significant.

Then we learn that "untrusting speech" in Hittite treaties was considered a breach of the covenant, which means that the people of Israel were constantly breaking covenant every time Scripture says they "murmured." And they murmured a lot. Because their murmuring was a breach, this means every moment, every second of their continued existence, was entirely by the unmerited mercy of God.

Suzerainty treaties were common in the ancient Near East around the time of the giving of the Mosaic Law. But Israel's theocracy was the only one where the LORD was the suzerain. No other culture had a god who made promises to them. God in his providence has sanctified himself in his dealings with Israel, making himself wholly different from any of the manmade gods, so that no one can look at him and claim he's made up like all the rest.

Posts in this series:

• What's "The Big Idea?"
  
• "God and Foreign Relations"
• Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant
• The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace

What Is Distanciation?

I'm reading D.A. Carson's excellent work, Exegetical Fallacies, and, as I'm sure will happen quite frequently in this study, came across a word I did not know, and in fact could not find in my Dictionary.com iPhone app either!

The word is "distanciation", and I assumed it has to do with distancing oneself from the subject. But it must be more than that, for the ultimate end of exegesis is to know what God's Word says so that we might be better equipped to glorify God in our lives and to teach others to do so as well.

Here is what Carson says:

The fundamental danger with all critical study of the Bible lies in what hermeneutical experts call distanciation. Distanciation is a necessary component of critical work; but is difficult and sometimes costly. (23)

I found a good definition here.

The fallacy that comes from the omission of distanciation has to do with an interpreter's inability to distance himself from his presuppositions in the interpretive process and discerning the meaning of the text. We all have presuppositions which are simply beliefs or convictions we hold prior to handling the text (also called apriori convictions or control beliefs). Having presuppositions is not bad, of course, but what is detrimental and fallacious is when we use our presuppositions to influence our interpretation and alter the meaning of the text.

Beyond Carson, this subject of imposing our presuppositions on the text is something that's been at the forefront in my reading (Horton), mp3 listening (Riddlebarger), and discussions with pastors and elders at church as well. I am very thankful for these means of grace in my life and I hope that all students of God's Word would likewise have the eyes of their hearts enlightened (Eph. 1:18) to this subject.

Sent from my iPhone

"God and Foreign Relations"

Chapter 2 in Michael Horton's book, Introducing Covenant Theology, is called "God and Foreign Relations." In this chapter, anthropology comes into play as we learn about ancient treaties. We also learn that the covenants God made with his people were structured the same way as these treaties, but with some major differences. First, God as the deity was not called as witness, but he was the actual sovereign in the treaties. Second, the covenant, especially in Genesis 15 and 17, imposed no obligations upon Abraham, but it was God himself who promised to carry out his promises.

The form of the ancient suzerain-vassal treaty, or "suzerainty treaty," was already well-established in the ancient Near East before the Bible was written. This was God's providence at work in history, because it provided a cultural context for those with whom he made his own covenants. Horton explains, "A suzerain was a great king, like an emperor, while a vassal was what we would today call a 'client state'" (p. 24). The treaties from the Hittite Empire seem to parallel the covenants we find in Scripture, even using the phrase "oaths and bonds."

Horton gives examples of how such treaties would come about:

[T]he lesser king (vassal) could enter into a covenant with the great king (suzerain), or as often happened, a suzerain could rescue a vassal from impending doom and therefore claim his right to annex the beneficiaries of his kindness by covenant to his empire. They would be his people, and he would be their suzerain. (p. 25)

He then explains something that is quite foreign to us in the modern West:

What is often present in these ancient treaties and missing in modern analogies is the fact that these were not merely legal contracts but involved the deepest affections. The great king was the father adopting the captives he had liberated from oppression. Consequently, he was not simply to be obeyed externally, but loved; not only feared, but revered; not only known as the legal lord of the realm, but acknowledged openly as the rightful sovereign.... All of this is somewhat difficult for us to grasp, since for most of us, our day-to-day experience is shaped by life in liberal democracies in which personal choice and rights are enshrined. (p. 25, emphasis mine)

The features of the Hittite treaties included

• the preamble,
• historical prologue,
• stipulations,
• sanctions, and
  
• deposit of the treaty tablets in the sacred temples.

Historical prologue in the Scriptural covenants is significant because our religion is not based on myth, but fact.

God claimed sovereignty over all of life and anchored this total claim in history rather than in myth or general principles of truth and morality He said, 'I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me' (Exod. 20:2-3). It was because certain things had happened that Israel was obligated to him. (p. 26)

Israel was not first of all a nation, but a church, a community called out of darkness, sin, oppression, and evil to form the nucleus of God's worldwide empire. Not only the politics, but the religion, was anchored in historical events that gave rise to faith that this covenant Lord would be faithful to his promises (p. 28)

Regarding stipulations, Horton reiterates the deep affections the vassal would have for the suzerain. "[T]his was to be a relationship of trust, love, and genuine faithfulness, not simply of external obligation and consent. Far from being arbitrary, merely legal dos and don'ts, the stipulations were an utterly reasonable duty" (p. 27). When Jesus quoted Isaiah and said, "This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me" (Matthew 15:8, ESV), he affirmed that the Law was not designed for externals, but that the Lord was always after the hearts of his people, and obedience should have flowed from that love.

The deposit of the tablets was something we saw in Exodus when the tablets of the Law were placed inside the Ark of the Covenant. Horton said it was not only the placement of the covenant terms in a sacred place that was significant, but that there was also "periodic public reading, so that each new generation clearly understood its obligations" (p. 27).

Then Horton gives a statement that helps show us the depth of what we see in Genesis 15:

In addition to the treaty itself was the public ceremony that sealed it and put it into effect. Such ceremonies included an event in which the suzerain and vassal would pass between the halves of slaughtered animals, as if to say, "May the same fate befall me should I fail to keep this covenant." In other rituals, the vassal king would walk behind the great king down an aisle as a sign of loyalty, service, and submission. (Hence, the language of "walking after" God in the Scriptures.) Celebratory meals at which the treaty was ratified were held as well. (p. 28)

In Genesis 15, it is Yahweh himself, in theophany, who passes between the carcasses, and not Abram, indicating that God is taking the full weight of the covenant upon himself. "May the same fate befall me"--It was Christ, God incarnate, our Redeemer, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, who bore the covenant curses on behalf of the elect! This is radically different from the Hittite treaties, in which all the stipulations and sanctions were borne by the vassal and the suzerain did not take an oath. The fact that it was the Sovereign Lord God who was making these covenants gave his people great confidence.

The remainder of the chapter will be addressed in a later post.

Posts in this series:

• What's "The Big Idea?"
  
• "God and Foreign Relations"
• Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant
• The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace

What's "The Big Idea?"

"The Big Idea" is the title for the first chapter in Michael Horton's book, Introducing Covenant Theology, which was previously published in hardcover under the title, God of Promise: Introducing Covenant Theology.

Horton quickly gets to the point, which is that Reformed Theology = Covenant Theology. The framework of the covenant is central to the Bible's teaching. TULIP (the Five Points of Calvinism, or the Doctrines of Grace) is "only the beginning of what Reformed theology is all about" (p. 11). Although an accurate expression of the gospel, these points are not the core of Reformed theology; rather, they are derived from careful exegesis of Scripture. As Horton puts it,

Reformed theology ... attempts to interpret the whole counsel of God in view of the principle that Scripture interprets Scripture. In other words, that which is clearest and is treated with the greatest significance in Scripture interprets those passages that are more difficult and less central to the biblical message. ...[T]he goal is to say what Scripture says and to emphasize what Scripture emphasizes. (p. 12)

The architectural structure that unites the diverse themes of Scripture is the covenant--"not simply the concept of the covenant, but the concrete existence of God's covenantal dealings in our history" (p. 13)

What Difference Does It Make?

Horton emphasizes that the covenantal structure is not something we impose on the Bible, but it rises "naturally from the ordinary reading of the Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation" (p. 14). He presents an anecdote that I think we can all relate to:

How often have we heard important debates about biblical teaching dismissed with a shrug and the words, "You have your verses and we have our verses," as if the Bible itself were internally inconsistent or contradictory? For Christians all of the verses are "our verses." Our interpretation of a given point must be demonstrated not only as taught in this or that passage, but as consistent with the whole teaching of Scripture. (p. 14)

Covenant theology, Horton contends, is the framework which Scripture itself provides, by which we can resolve its diversity and answer questions that may arise.

Not only does it help to resolve the diversity in Scripture, it helps to resolve the extremes that humans tend to go to in "dividing" or "confusing" things that are supposed to be held in balance. He uses a few examples from societies ancient or modern, and relates it all back to the idolatry of human sovereignty. "The point of idolatry is to maintain our own autonomy (i.e., sovereignty) over God, either by banishment or absorption." This affects the way we interact with our surroundings. "In our age, a lot of harm has been done to the natural creation because of the pretensions of human sovereignty" (p. 15). In contrast, there are movements that glorify creation, seeing God "in" everything.

He also address the ways in which individualism has elevated the self above the community.

The individual self is sovereign. This has infected the church profoundly, in both its faith and practice, wherever the emphasis on "me and my personal relationship with God" has supplanted the biblical assumption of covenantal solidarity. Covenant theology, in fact, requires such solidarity: that of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in the covenant of redemption; our solidarity with all of creation and especially our being "in Adam" by virtue of the creation covenant and "in Christ" in the covenant of grace. (p. 16)

The answer will not be found by allowing the societal pendulum to continue to swing from one extreme to the opposite. What we need is a healthy balance between the individual and the community. In all these issues, it's not one or the other, but both...and... The covenant allows us to have a proper perspective and fulfill our responsibilities.

...all of creation, especially all humans, stand already in a relationship to God as creator and judge in the covenant of creation. We all are bound together ethically in mutual responsibility. Each person, Christian or not, bears God's image, and we can work side by side with non-Christians to fulfill the scriptural command to show love to our neighbors. (p. 17)

As another example of holding to the extremes, Horton highlights the errant teachings of Arminianism and Hyper-Calvinism. Both of these views come to Scripture with a central dogma already presupposed, and they deduce all the possible interpretations of Scripture from that dogma. For Arminianism, it's the libertarian concept of human free will that is not subject even to one's own preferences. For Hyper-Calvinism, it's "a distorted concept of God's sovereignty that pushes everything else to the periphery" (p. 19).

But when we start with the covenant, it changes things considerably, because we're no longer working with abstract philosophical ideas, but concrete, historical facts. "When Reformed theology hears Scripture teaching both divine sovereignty and human responsibility, divine election and the universal offer of the gospel, it affirms both even though it confesses that it does not know quite how God coordinantes them behind the scenes" (p. 19). "In the covenant, both the Lord and the Servant are on trial for their faithfulness: there simply can be no choice between whose action we take seriously. This focus curbs our speculative tendencies" (p. 20).

The covenant framework helps us to read the Old and New Testaments together. It views Scripture in a way that moves from promise to fulfillment, not from one dispensation to another and back again. "It helps us to see the continuity between the old and new covenants in terms of a single covenant of grace running throughout..." (pp. 20-21)

Posts in this series:

• What's "The Big Idea?"
• "God and Foreign Relations"
• Chapter 2.5: God's Freedom in Covenant
• The Covenant of Works and the Covenant of Grace

The Necessity of Reprobation: without it, God would not be God

This is from page 44 of What's So Great About the Doctrines of Grace? by Richard D. Phillips:

Were no one ever condemned--were there no display of God's judgment and wrath--there would be no knowledge of the glories of God's grace. In that case, the true God would be unknown to His creatures, and His purpose in creation--to display the fullness of His glory--would be unrealized. Having failed in this purpose, God would no longer be God. For this reason, God's decree of reprobation is necessary. God being perfect in every attribute, it is necessary for His every attribute to be exercised: goodness in creation, power in triumph, mercy in grace, and justice in wrath.

Sent from my iPhone

The End for Which God Created the World

What follows is from a message from the 2003 Desiring God Conference that I was listening to on the way to work. John Piper quotes from Edwards' book, The End for Which God Created the World, which is one of the most important books I have ever read.

God is the beginning, the middle, and the end of all things. Nothing exists without his creating it. Nothing stays in being without his sustaining word. Everything has its reason for existing from him. Therefore nothing can be understood apart from him, and all understandings of all things that leave him out are superficial understandings, since they leave out the most important reality in the universe. We can scarcely begin to feel today how God-ignoring we have become, because it is the very air we breathe.

[...]

Listen as he [Edwards] weaves together God's joy in being God and our joy in his being God:

Because [God] infinitely values his own glory, consisting in the knowledge of himself, love to himself . . . joy in himself; he therefore valued the image, communication or participation of these, in the creature. And it is because he values himself, that he delights in the knowledge, and love, and joy of the creature; as being himself the object of this knowledge, love and complacence...[Thus] God's respect to the creature's good, and his respect to himself, is not a divided respect; but both are united in one, as the happiness of the creature aimed at, is happiness in union with himself.

In other words, for God to be the holy and righteousness God that he is, he must delight infinitely in what is infinitely delightful. He must enjoy with unbounded joy what is most boundlessly enjoyable; he must take infinite pleasure in what is infinitely pleasant; he must love with infinite intensity what is infinitely lovely; he must be infinitely satisfied with what is infinitely satisfying. If he were not, he would be fraudulent. Claiming to be wise, he would be a fool, exchanging the glory of God for images. God's joy in God is part of what it means for God to be God.

- John Piper, "A God-Entranced Vision of All Things", October 10, 2003

Switchfoot on Prince Caspian

So, I didn't even know they wrote a song for the movie. We left as soon as the credits began because, having just finished the book the night before, we were not impressed at all with the filmmakers' idea of "poetic license."



I read an article online that pretty well summed up what was wrong with the movie. I think it was on World Magazine, which requires a paid subscription in order to view the articles online, so I wouldn't be able to link to it anyway (my Dad linked it to me, which is why I was able to view the article "for a limited time"). The article mentioned that Aslan was misrepresented (and therefore, so was the Gospel) in that he roared at Trumpkin rather than playing with him.

But the biggest issue I had with the movie was the "preventative measures" taking by the Narnians, who chose to attack Miraz's castle unprovoked, even going to the length of attempted murder, which is in stark contrast to the more Davidic behavior of Prince Caspian and the Pevensies in the book. I bring up King David because when he never attacked King Saul, and even when his son Absolom rose up against him, he sounded a retreat rather than risk shedding royal blood.

C. S. Lewis was a theologian more than he was a novelist. He wrote what he wrote for a reason. I wish they wouldn't have messed with the story.

Foundations of Grace

Friends have been telling me about Steven J. Lawson's book Foundations of Grace for a very long time, and I finally got it, although I must admit I'm still in John MacArthur's (wonderful) introduction. Foundations of Grace is Volume 1 of a planned 5-volume set, and the first one covers the period of time coinciding with the lives of the men whose stories are told in the Old and New Testaments.

Steven J. Lawson also has mp3s of his sermons on his website. This mp3 series goes along with the subjects of his book series, one of the purposes of which is to show that the Doctrines of Grace have been the orthodox theological understanding throughout the history of God's covenant people.

(Note: I had intended to provide a link to these mp3s sooner, but their site was down for several days.)

Giving Is a Party

Kent Hughes may be a gifted teacher, but there are things to disagree with him about.

First of all, he's a pedobaptist (or halfway, anyway), meaning that he thinks it's cool to baptize babies before they're old enough to be able to even say "Jesus". (See last year's discussion in Matt Hall's blog).

Another issue troubled me recently when I was reading his chapter on giving in Disciplines of a Godly Man. First, I'd like to say that I know that I give less than I should. But the only reason for that is that I believe it's biblically less-than-ideal for me to have credit card debt, so I am putting more than half of my income towards remedying that situation, in order that I may be more free to give in the future.

There are some points I want to make about the issue of giving, and how the modern church misuses scripture and manipulates the poor in order to keep the coffers full.

First, ancient Israel was intended to be a theocracy. Which means that the government as well as the state religion were supported by a 10% tax. The Levites, 1/12 of the tribes of Israel, were set apart for temple service, and they were supported by the other 11/12 of the nation. This was called a tithe. Numbers 18:21 says that the tithes are to support the Levites, who work in the service of the Lord, and thus don't have their own fields and herds from which to eat.

Every year, the Israelites tithed to the temple. Except in every third year. Deuteronomy 14:28 clearly states, "At the end of every three years, bring all the tithes of that year..." (NIV). Now, maybe the NIV has it wrong, but this is the translation Hughes himself chose. But I always understood this to refer to that year's tithe, meaning that the Levites only ended up with 6.67% of Israel's income on average, and the other 3.33% went to the poor. If you count out the tribes and consider the Levites 1/13 of the nation, then giving them 6.67% of the nation's wealth is a little more fair (Joseph was split into two tribes in order to even things out in battle, since the Levites weren't soldiers).

Even though you might think of the concept of tithing as legalistic, if you look at Deuteronomy 14, you can see that God gives people immense freedom and variety in how they can give. Option 1: take your produce to the temple (verse 23). Option 2: if you live too far away from the temple and don't want to cart all your produce, you can just sell it for money, and take the money to the temple, with your family (verse 25). Option 3: every third year, you do this in your local towns so that orphans, widows, nomads, and Levites who don't live in Jerusalem can benefit.

But I think the big thing that stands out for me in Deuteronomy 14 is that it's like a huge party. Verse 23 says, "...you shall eat the tithe of your grain, of your wine, and of your oil, and the firstborn of your herd and flock..." (ESV). Verse 26: "...spend the money for whatever you desire--oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink, whatever your appetite craves." Hello! Did you see that? God wants his people to party like crazy animals! "And you shall eat there before the LORD your God and rejoice, you and your household." And every year, the party happened in the local towns, that all the disadvantaged in the area "shall come and eat and be filled, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands that you do."

No wonder people have a hard time giving today. It's not as fun as it used to be! There used to be huge parties where you'd spend all of your tithe on steak and adult beverages! This doesn't really have anything to do with the way tithing is done in churches today. I see more whine than wine when the offering plate is passed!

Now that I have the groundwork laid, I want to address the problems I have with Hughes' interpretation. My chief argument with Hughes is the way he interprets the tithe for the Levites, the festal tithe, and the third-year tithe for the local poor, as three distinct tithes, all of which happened at the same time, so that it comes out to 23.3% on average. But I think it's painfully obvious that each of these references refer to three different manifestations of giving for the same 10% of your income.

The trouble with Hughes' interpretation is his resulting application. He's either trying to guilt-trip people if they give less than 23.3% of their income, or he's trying to guilt-trip them into giving at least 10% by saying, "Oh, come now, you have it easy. It could be so much worse, just look at the Israelites! They had to give much more!" We know that on average, people who call themselves Christians in America don't give any more than those who don't (and it's much less than ten percent), so we all need to give more. But if someone already feels too overwhelmed and discouraged by a 10% goal to actually take action and commit to giving, how much more overwhelmed and discouraged they are going to be when you tell them the goal is 23.3%! Furthermore, by trying to use a Biblical reference to support a 10% tithe, and yet raising the Biblical tithe to 23.3%, he thereby nullifies his application of Old Testament law to support tithing 10% in the church. If we're supposed to tithe like the Jews, then we're supposed to tithe like the Jews. If we're not, then we're not!

My second gripe comes from something he said later in the chapter. For a chapter which is intended to be about how it's bad to be materialistic, I think he shows his weakness with materialism by making it about numbers. Instead of glorying in what giving is: worship unto the Lord, giving ourselves to him in trust that he'll provide for us. He mentions the widow's mite, and how Jesus said she gave more than all the rest. Clearly, for Jesus, it's not about quantity. And you'd think Hughes understood this, otherwise he wouldn't have used the illustration. However, he then goes on to say something terrible!

And in the case of the Macedonians' grace giving, the amount must have been way over 10 percent because 10 percent of their "extreme poverty" (2 Corinthians 8:2) would not have helped anyone. (pp. 198-199)

The audacity!!! It's actually harder for poor people to give ten percent of their income than it is for rich people to, because the poor do not have anything expendible. So even if the poor Macedonians only gave 10%, that's worth so much more to God than 10% given by a rich man, because it's an act of sacrifice. Looking back at the widow's mite, in Jesus' mind, the others who gave would be doing good by giving until what they had left was the same as the widow. I believe that's what God's economy is like.

Christianity was never intended to be a state religion. It was about living in community, not supporting institutions. In the second chapter of Acts, we have the best picture of what Christian giving is supposed to look like.

And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. (v. 44-45, ESV)

Remember, these were all Jews living in Jerusalem, the place where the temple was, the place where everybody took their tithes. Now they were Christians. It's not that they stopped tithing to the temple and started tithing to the church. They were Jewish citizens in a land occupied by Rome. They tithed to the temple, and they paid taxes to Caesar. It was the law! But both of these became for these Christians social necessities, just as, if you live anywhere but Nevada, you have to pay taxes to the state as well as the federal government, and you give as the Lord leads you.

In the biblical New Testament form, giving will always mean there are some people who will receive more than they give, because they had "all things in common" and distributed "the proceeds to all, as any had need". The biblical New Testament form, white American Christians would give to poor African Christians until you looked at their houses and couldn't tell the difference between those who earned $8,000 a month and those who earned $80 a month. That's what a literal interpretation and application of this verse would mean.

The church was never intended to look anything like the temple, just as giving was never intended to look anything like the tithe (although if it looked more like Deuteronomy 14, with the juicy meat and the drinking, we'd be doing a lot better!).

I might add that I need never have fallen into so much debt after the dot-com bubble burst, if giving in the church today looked like it's supposed to, with those who have taking care of those who have not, rather than giving to support a new building, fancy lighting and video projection system, and a fancy new Mercedes M-class and Saab convertible for the pastor, all the while telling those who were receiving unemployment benefits that if they weren't putting 10% of it in the offering basket, they were "robbing God" just as Malachi says. However, I must point out that even in my poorest state, I was much more well-off than tons of homeless people in America and the poor around the world.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel! (Matt. 23:23-24, ESV)

If the chief phrase for you in that passage is "without neglecting the others", then you're totally missing Jesus' point.

Like a quote a friend of mine likes to repeat as often as possible, "How much can I do without that I may have more to give?"

Like I said, giving in the New Testament is not about supporting institutions and building projects. It's about helping those in need. There are links on my blog to WorldVision, an organization I support because they are Christians who preach Christ whenever they can, yet they care blindly for those who need their help, because you can't preach to them if they starve to death. My parents support a bunch of missionaries. And if you need more ideas, there's also Samaritan's Purse and Gospel for Asia.

Simplifying things

Quote:

Be it for the praise of other Christians, or just to get them off your back, the desire to have people praise your progress in the faith can be just as vain as the need to be seen as a success by your peers, or society, or any of those other forms of "acceptable" ego-stroking. Since the very essence of God's grace is that He has given us unmerited mercy in return for our wickedness, ego should have nothing to do with our growth as Christians. I believe that taking pride in driving a better car or having a nicer house than your neighbor is no less a matter of pride as the desire to hear other Christians praise your so-called godliness. While it's good to encourage others by maturing in your faith, just as the spiritual maturity of those around us is encouraging, it's also easy to get off track. I'm talking about that need for a spiritual "Atta-boy!" or a better seat in church on Sunday, or the always dangerous acceptance into that inner circle of "church staff." (No, I don't think that the position of a church staff member is evil. I just know that if Christianity is treated like a social club, it often has the same entanglements as one. From someone who spent half of his life growing up in churches, I can say it happens, and more often than you might think.) - Mark Salomon, Simplicity

I am no longer on church staff. Please pray for me. As far as my heart goes, He has been preparing me for this. I can totally see his hand in it, but I was just expecting him to have things all lined up before he pulled the rug out from under me. Pray that God will return me to successful independent-contractorship and bring me some clients, and pray that he would lead me where to go from here in terms of ministry and church community, etc.

A New Agenda for our Talk

[Listening to: "You Know How It Is" - Stavesacre - Punkzilla (02:18)]

...he does according to his will among the host of heaven
and among the inhabitants of the earth;
and none can stay his hand
or say to him, "What have you done?" Daniel 4:35 (ESV)

"And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church" Eph. 1:22 (ESV).

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son..." Rom 8:28-29 (ESV) (emphasis mine).

I am currently reading a book by Paul David Tripp called War of Words, published by P&R. To say it's really good would be an understatement.

Chapter 5 is all about how the root of all of our communication breakdowns (complaining, arguing, manipulating, criticizing, etc.) is a fundamental lack of trust in God's sovereignty.

...a life of godly communication is rooted in a personal recognition of the sovereignty of God. Let me put it this way: Only when I submit to the rule of God, who has a perfect plan and is in complete control, will I begin to live and speak as he has purposed. Only at this level will the idolatry of heart that leads to idol [sic] words be broken. Here alone will my words be freed from being the tools of my agenda, my attempts at control, and my glory-seeking.

When my heart is more controlled by a desire for the creation (a person, possession, position, or experience) than it is by a desire for the Creator, I will seek to control my world (and the people in it) to get what I want....None rests in God's sovereignty, believing that he will give what is best. (p. 69)

...the roots of biblical communication grow in the soil of his sovereignty. If my words don't flow out of a heart that rests in his control, then they come out of a heart that seeks control, so I can get what I want. I need a better understanding of what God is doing. (p. 71)

When I know that God is in control of my life, I do not give in to panic. I do not begin thinking that life is out of control, and I do not despair when I am confused about what is going on. I know that every situation is under the careful administration of the King of Kings. (p. 72)

God is sovereign over the circumstances of our lives, but Scripture says more. It tells us that these circumstances are a principal means by which God actually produces what he predestined for our lives before the foundation of the world--that we would be transformed into the likeness of his Son, holy as he his holy.

When we complain about the problems and pressures in our lives, we are essentially grumbling in the face of God. We are complaining that we have been chosen by his love and grace, and that he is putting us in situations designed to make us his holy people! These relationships and circumstances, these problems and trials, and these times of grief and suffering come from his hand. They are tokens of God's wonderful grace, given to deliver us from the power of remaining sin! Behind the circumstances is a God of love who is relentlessly at work to make us holy. Praise that comes from hearts of worship is the only legitimate response to these circumstances. Rather than telling us that God has forgotten us, our circumstances shout to us that he has remembered us and will not leave us until his work is complete! Really understanding this will do much to alter the way we talk. (p. 77)

This is all good stuff on it's own. But Tripp takes it further with a discussion of why theology itself is so important. You can't just go to the scriptures that tell you what to do. You have to understand the whole of Scripture to see God's reason behind those commands.

God's will is that all of our speaking be done for the praise of his glory [see Eph. 1]--an exciting new agenda very different from our own. For this reason it is important to understand what the Bible teaches about God's sovereignty. It is the cornerstone for a new agenda for our words.

In talking about this doctrine, I know that I am raising thorny issues that go beyond the scope of typical communication discussions....We live in a church culture that tends to separate biblical commands and principles from the rest of Scripture. We look at specific verses about communication and seek to apply them to our lives without understanding the way they are rooted in the history and theology of Scripture. We miss the big picture--the way the rest of Scripture gives these commands their meaning and rationale. The commands and principles of Scripture flow from the theology of Scripture. More than that, they find their hope and meaning in the person and work of Christ.

For example, the only reason it makes sense to do good to your enemies is that the One who has told us to is a God of perfect justice. The call to forgive is rooted in the fact that Christ has forgiven us. The call to give sacrificially is rooted in God's promise to provide for all our needs. Every command and principle has its roots in redemptive realities--what God has done and will do for us in Christ. This is theology--but it's certainly not abstract information! Scripture is full of theology because when you undestand truth about God, you understand why and how you are to carry out the commands of Scripture. You understand how your actions connect with what God is doing, and how you can actually bring glory to his name. (pp. 70-71)

When I was a kid, whenever my parents would tell me to do something, I would always want to know why. I needed to know the reason behind it, that there was some purpose, some greater meaning to it all. Unfortunately, the answer was usually, "Because I said so." Granted, that is all that should be required of obedience. But one of the coolest things about this understanding of theology is that it shows us that God is not like the parent who says, "Because I said so." Yes, his purpose is to teach us his character--that we might know him--to get us to the place where we will stop complaining and always do what he wants without questioning, but he wants us to truly have an understanding of his goodness and faithfulness. He doesn't just want to keep us as little children; he wants to raise us up as heirs.

In Exodus 14, when the Israelites were trapped by the Red Sea, they started complaining. But God had a purpose in it. "Notice that this trial produced exactly what God had planned for his people. 'And when the Israelites saw the great power the LORD displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the LORD and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant' [Ex. 14:31 (NIV)]" (Tripp, p. 80).

This happened over and over again in Israel's history. Each time, God wills their being put in a situation where they complain, with his purpose being precisely to teach them not to complain the next time the same thing happens.

It's not just a problem that laypeople face. Look at Elijah--I just read 1 Kings 18 this morning. But what does Elijah say in 19:4? "It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers" (ESV). He's completely given up on God's will in his life, even after the power God evidenced through him on Mt. Carmel and the euphoria of slaughtering 450 bad guys!

Let us rest in his sovereign arms (Jason, Piña, are your reading this?). We don't have to have everything figured out, but we need to continually remember that we are not the lords of our own domain. God himself is in charge, and there's a point to what he's doing: redemption and sanctification. It's really not about what we want. It's about glorifying him while we watch him work his will in our lives and make us the men and women of God that he wants us to be.

Lord, help me to trust in you. Give me the grace to get through these times. Take control of my heart and my mind in order that you might continually intervene in my thoughts and remind me that you are in control. Help me, Lord to submit to your will for my life, and to seek your glory above all. And please forgive me, Father, for those times when I have sought to take the reigns for myself, only to wind up in the mud.

"Now I'm riding in the back seat, and I'm leaving all the driving to the Chief." - Dallas Holm

"Apprehending God"

O God, quicken to life every power within me, that I may lay hold on eternal things. Open my eyes that I may see; give me acute spiritual perception; enable me to taste Thee and know that Thou art good. Make heaven more real to me than any earthly thing has ever been. Amen. (Tozer, The Pursuit of God, 59)

But why do the very ransomed children of God themselves know so little of that habitual, conscious communion with God which Scripture offers? The answer is because of our chronic unbelief. Faith enables our spiritual sense to function. Where faith is defective the result will be inward insensibility and numbness toward spiritual things. (Tozer, 52)

This faith isn't the same thing as what faith-healers keep telling us we are lacking. That "faith" is actually imagination, "positive thinking", daydreaming, usually based on what we want. No, real faith--belief that what God says is true, belief that the spiritual kingdom of heaven is real even though we can't see it--is based on the One Absolute reality, the fact that God is God, and He would be who He is apart from my recognition. It's not one of those "if a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"-- No, God is real, and he is speaking, and if we can't hear the tree fall it's because we're spiritually deaf.

Faith lives with a conscious acknowledgment of the spiritual realities. All my life I have lived with attention to the spiritual, but unfortunately I think most of that attention has been given to the imaginary rather than the real.

For example, life is not all about me. The reality of God is so much bigger than little old me. His ways are higher, and His purpose so much more vast. Yet I think on the way to the knowledge of God as personal (and He is a personal God), and the realization that He actually cares about us, it is possible for us to develop a pattern of faith whereby our faith is based on what we want God to do for us. This type of faith is a faith that concerns itself with improving quality of life, "finding my place," being vindicated against my unjust enemies, and so on. I think my faith can so often become self-centered in this manner. I know I've prayed for God to heal my knee (and I've seen another person go forward to get prayer for 20/20 vision so he wouldn't have to wear contacts when he surfs...).

While I do believe God concerns himself with our daily lives, I think living a lifestyle where our faith seeks what we can get out of it rather than where our faith seeks to know more and more of God's character, is kind of a one-sided relationship, don't you?

The Pursuit of God is all about experiencing God personally, but we have to make sure that we're submitting our minds to Christ, so that this experience is based on Reality and not imagination.

~May 7, 2005, Brown's Hole, Chico

The High Price of Packer Pride

[Listening to: Directed Youth - The Crucified - Take Up Your Cross/Nailed (01:58)]

I just finished reading Simplicity by Mark Salomon. It only took me four days to read it, and I can't remember the last time I was so engulfed in a book. I've been a fan of Stavesacre and The Crucified since 1996, when I made it a habit of picking up anything in the Tooth & Nail catalog, and driving all over So-Cal to see Christian punk, ska, and hardcore shows from bands like the Supertones, Value Pac, MxPx, Slick Shoes, EDL... I could go on, but I think my favorite shows were always the Stavesacre shows. Mark's book was written to tear down the image that has been set up by Christian music industry in order to take advantage of the "Christian market" (the word that industry uses to refer to God's people, the Body of Christ). This task of unmasking the crooked machine requires some serious rethinking of the way things have been, and also some harsh tactics of looking reality straight in the face and admitting some serious personal failures that occurred even while Mark was hiding behind the mask of "Christian rock star" in the late eighties and early nineties. God took him through a period of serious humbling at the end of The Crucified, revealing to him just how much he was in need of Grace. Sometimes for kids who grow up in the church, knowing the Lord, the only way the Lord can remove their own self-righteousness and pride is to let them fall... hard. Since then, Mark was restored to music again with Stavesacre, and now with this book, he has a message to bring to the world: Worship the Lord with all your heart, soul, and strength, love your neighbor as yourself. Take off your masks, stop judging others, be real and pursue truth and humility in the way we live our lives towards believers and unbelievers, so that we can more effectively reflect Christ to those who are watching. I still need some time to digest it before I write a full-on review, but this excerpt will give you guys a perfect taste of what the book is all about.

I'm not the first to say it, but the book goes well with Charlie Peacock's At the Crossroads, which deconstructs the industry from a producer's perspective, and describes all the different ways that musicians can glorify God with the gifts he's given them, within the church and without (the kingdom of God is actually bigger than this universe, not a small subset of it).

"Removing the Veil"

DISCLAIMER: This blog was written before I became a 5-point Calvinist. In this blog entry I quoted A.W. Tozer saying, "it is what the cross would do to every man to set him free." Tozer is an Arminian and therefore believes that the atonement is not limited to the elect, but that the cross "would" set every man free if only they make the free-will choice to come to God.

Original entry:

John Piper says, "The chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying Him forever." But the capacity for this manner of enjoyment is something impossible for man in our fallen state. Our grandfather Adam has planted in all of us a tendency to shy away from the presence of God. The flesh strives against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh.

Though it is impossible for a sinful being to survive in the Presence of God, yet it is our purpose to live in the Presence. This is the significance of Mark 15:38: "And the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom" (ESV). It was God's initiative that tore the veil. And it was Christ's sacrifice which enables us to enter the Presence.

Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. (Heb 10:19-22, ESV)

Because Christ is our high priest, we can have "full assurance of faith." And not only that, but we have the evidence of the Spirit. "For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, 'Abba! Father!' The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God" (Rom 8:15-16, ESV). What son doesn't know he has been adopted? (Moby, who doesn't think a Christian can really know he's saved, needs to read these passages.)

A.W. Tozer writes,

Everything in the New Testament accords with this Old Testament picture. Ransomed men need no longer pause in fear to enter the Holy of Holies. God wills that we should push on into His presence and live our whole life there. This is to be known to us in conscious experience. It is more than a doctrine to be held; it is a life to be enjoyed every moment of every day. (The Pursuit of God, 36)

Is this the abundant life that Jesus came to give us? And can we really experience it for ourselves while we're still walking in this case of meat?

At the heart of the Christian message is God Himself waiting for His redeemed children to push in to conscious awareness of His presence. That type of Christianity which happens now to be the vogue knows this Presence only in theory. It fails to stress the Christian's privilege of present realization. According to its teachings we are in the presence of God positionally, and nothing is said about the need to experience that Presence actually...Ignoble contentment takes the place of burning zeal. We are satisfied to rest in our judicial possessions and, for the most part, we bother ourselves very little about the absence of personal experience. (37)

Children, if we are doubting our adoption, it's because we haven't known the Father's Presence. And the Presence is something we're supposed to know.

...the scribe tells us what he has read, and the prophet tells what he has seen. The distinction is not an imaginary one. Between the scribe who has read and the prophet who has seen there is a difference as wide as the sea. We are overrun today with orthodox scribes, but the prophets, where are they? The hard voice of the scribe sounds over evangelicalism, but the church waits for the tender voice of the saint who has penetrated the veil and has gazed with inward eye upon the wonder that is God. And yet, thus to penetrate, to push in sensitive living experience into the holy Presence, is a privilege open to every child of God. (43)

Tozer says that there is a veil in our hearts which separates us from the Presence of God today, and it is the veil of Self.

It is woven of the fine threads of the self-life, the hyphenated sins of the human spirit. They are not something we do, they are something we are, and therein lies both their subtlety and their power.

To be specific, the self-sins are self-righteousness, self-pity, self-confidence, self-sufficiency, self-admiration, self-love and a host of others like them. They dwell too deep within us and are too much a part of our natures to come to our attention till the light of God is focused upon them. The grosser manifestations of these sins--egotism, exhibitionism, self-promotion--are strangely tolerated in Christian leaders, even in circles of impeccable orthodoxy. They are so much in evidence as actually, for many people, to become identified with the gospel. (45)

But this veil is so much a part of us, that it can "be removed only in spiritual experience, never by mere instruction. We may as well try to instruct leprosy out of our system" (46). Only God can rend the veil.

In human experience that veil is made of living spiritual tissue; it is composed of the sentient, quivering stuff of which our whole beings consist, and to touch it is to touch us where we feel pain. To tear it away is to injure us, to hurt us and make us bleed. To say otherwise is to make the cross no cross and death no death at all. It is never fun to die. To rip through the dear and tender stuff of which life is made can never be anything but deeply painful. Yet that is what the cross did to Jesus and it is what the cross would do to every man to set him free.

There can be no self-surgery here. Only our Divine Physician can handle this scalpel. And as John Owen says, we must beware of using our reasoning and rationalization to produce our own peace when the Holy Spirit has not pronounced such a peace for our souls. We must let Him work in our hearts and have His way in us.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting. (Psalm 139:23-24, NIV)

Within the veil
I now would come
Within the Holy Place
To look upon Thy face
I see such Beauty there
None other can compare
I worship Thee, my Lord
Within the veil (Ruth Dryden, © 1978 Genesis Music)

Simplicity and Surrender

Oswald Chambers wrote:

There are times when it seems as if God watches to see if we will give Him even small gifts of surrender, just to show how genuine our love is for Him. To be surrendered to God is of more value than our personal holiness. Concern over our personal holiness causes us to focus our eyes on ourselves, and we become overly concerned about the way we walk and talk and look, out of fear of offending God. ". . . but perfect love casts out fear . . ." once we are surrendered to God ( 1 John 4:18 ). We should quit asking ourselves, "Am I of any use?" and accept the truth that we really are not of much use to Him. The issue is never of being of use, but of being of value to God Himself. Once we are totally surrendered to God, He will work through us all the time. (My Utmost for His Highest, Feb. 21)

This is a book I'm really looking forward to reading. It's by Mark Salomon, the lead singer of the classic and influential Christian punk band The Crucified, who set the stage for other bands like The Blamed and Officer Negative, and 90 Pound Wuss. In the mid 90s, he started the Christian rock band Stavesacre, which was originally signed to Tooth and Nail, but now they're on Nitro records (as in The Offspring).

This is a guy I admire. He shaves his head, and he has a tattoo in Hebrew on his bicep. The first time I ever saw him--it must have been in 1995--Stavesacre was playing a show in Orange County, and they started out with a beautiful, feedback-driven song called "Minus", which is called that because only three members of the band participate (it is an instrumental and Mark is just a singer). Normally, you'd think the guy would either be waiting backstage, or dancing around like a drunken lunatic, but Mark was standing there in the middle of the stage, with his back to the audience, his arms raised in worship, and his eyes on the cross on the front wall of the church fellowship hall. The sight definitely made a lasting impression on me.

The other day, Relevant Magazine e-mailed me a chapter from the book, and I think it ties in directly with what Chambers was saying about the difference between visible holiness (to be seen by men) and extravagant devotion. Here's a teaser:

Be it for the praise of other Christians, or just to get them off your back, the desire to have people praise your progress in the faith can be just as vain as the need to be seen as a success by your peers, or society, or any of those other forms of "acceptable" ego-stroking. Since the very essence of God's grace is that He has given us unmerited mercy in return for our wickedness, ego should have nothing to do with our growth as Christians. I believe that taking pride in driving a better car or having a nicer house than your neighbor is no less a matter of pride as the desire to hear other Christians praise your so-called godliness. While it's good to encourage others by maturing in your faith, just as the spiritual maturity of those around us is encouraging, it's also easy to get off track. I'm talking about that need for a spiritual "Atta-boy!" or a better seat in church on Sunday, or the always dangerous acceptance into that inner circle of "church staff." (No, I don't think that the position of a church staff member is evil. I just know that if Christianity is treated like a social club, it often has the same entanglements as one. From someone who spent half of his life growing up in churches, I can say it happens, and more often than you might think.)

"The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing"

"Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him." 2 Tim. 2:3-4 (ESV)

"Then Jesus told his disciples, 'If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.'" Matt. 16:24-25 (ESV)

This week I went to a worship conference with Sam and Kevin. One recurring theme at the conference was the need for worship leaders to recognize that we don't bring anything to the table, that God does not need us, and that when God calls us, we need to leave all of our past accomplishments as well as future ambitions behind.

On Thursday night, before I went to sleep, I read chapter 2 in The Pursuit of God, "The Blessedness of Possessing Nothing." At first glance, the chapter appears to be about materialism, but when you go deeper, you find it is more about the sin of putting anything other than God on the throne of your heart, whether that be material things, people, abilities, ambitions, ideas, desires, dreams, whatever.

At first, as I read, I was thinking about a certain materialistic person whom I had known, and how correct I was in my opinion of the wrongness of this materialism, and how right I was in choosing to dissociate myself from this individual. But when we read, we cannot read for other people. Even a preacher who is reading in order to prepare a sermon that has to be made relevant to a congregation, has to first read for himself. "We preach best what we need to learn most." So a better application than strengthening my resolve against other people's materialism is to humbly recognize my own idols.

For example, the idea of getting married was an idol for me, for a very long time. I made compromises in critical areas, the way musical artists might sell out on their convictions and their friends in order to get a recording contract. This was such a bad issue for me, and even when healing is complete and I'm ready to open up my heart to make it available to somebody else in the future, I doubt that Theoretical Future Girl will be able to believe that I'm really interested in her and not just in the idea of marriage.

The core of the chapter uses Abraham's attempted sacrifice of Isaac as an illustration. By asking Abraham to kill his only son, God humbled him and took away all of his earthly security, and thus reset his priorities. In the same way I had to come to a place where I was humiliated, in order to discover in my shame that the whole wanting to get married thing was an idol for me after all. This is an area God's been dealing with in my heart for months, but right now what I'm learning is that idolatry has deeper roots than what is visible or obvious, and it has to do fundamentally with our understanding of contentment.

This week I came to a realization that the word contentment does not mean what we think it means, and I think that it is possible for us to have idols and not know it, and it is by changing our definition that these very idols will be exposed.

I once had a friendship that was so special to me, I said that I could go the rest of my life and be okay, even if I never got married, as long as I still had this friendship with this girl. And in so thinking, I thought I was being content, and therefore spiritual. But that's not contentment at all. Biblical contentment is not the same thing as being happy with the status quo and not wanting more than we already have. No, true spiritual contentment is being happy even if everything we have is taken away from us, because our treasure and our hope is internal, and it is eternal. In this way, expressions of perceived contentment can actually point out idolatry in our lives, when we are expressing satisfaction with things we hope will not be taken away, when we are satisfied with God's gifts rather than with God. Even a friendship can be an idol, when you say it's the one thing that will keep you happy as long as you get to hold onto it forever.

Everything was different for Abraham after the trial was over. As Tozer puts it,

The old man of God lifted his head to respond to the Voice, and stood there on the mount strong and pure and grand, a man marked out by the Lord for special treatment, a friend and favorite of the Most High. Now he was a man wholly surrendered, a man utterly obedient, a man who possessed nothing. He had concentrated his all in the person of his dear son, and God had taken it from him. God could have begun out on the margin of Abraham's life and worked inward to the center. He chose rather to cut quickly to the heart and have it over in one sharp act of separation...

I have said that Abraham possessed nothing. Yet was not this poor man rich? Everything he had owned before was his still to enjoy: sheep, camels, herds, and goods of every sort. He had also his wife and his friends, and best of all he had his son Isaac safe by his side. He had everything, but he possessed nothing. There is the spiritual secret. There is the sweet theology of the heart which can be learned only in the school of renunciation. (p. 27)

What God did to Abraham produced a profound change of character that affected how he looked at everything else in his life. In the same way, in terms of applying this in our own lives, we need to look to make sure that we get the full affect of what God has done to us when we go through experiences like this; that we don't just see the one particular issue he addresses as being re-ordered in our lives, but that the root of idolatry is completely eradicated!

The next morning, we led worship for the whole group gathered there and Sam spoke on Genesis 22. Lord, are you trying to tell me something?