Hats off to Mark Driscoll

What Adam and Eve should have said to the serpent was: "This conversation is over!"

"If they knock on your door, you already gave

... You don't need no more of what's ailin' ya." -- Lenny Kravitz

I was over at an Eastern Orthodox forum, and I was astounded at the volume of guilty conscience. Guilt ridden people, led by a theology that says you might as well play it safe with God and confess confess confess. A theology that says that in the end you don't know if you're going to be saved, so do all you can. It's sad.

My hope: God made me alive in Christ. I who was once an enemy of God, who was dead in trespasses and sins, have been made alive in Christ, and I have been seated in heavenly places with Him. I have the Spirit of Sonship, a guarantee of my inheritance, by which I cry, "Abba, Father!"

My foundation: The finished work of Christ on the cross, and God's vindication of Him by raising Him from the tomb after 3 days. Christ bore God's wrath, so I wouldn't have to. (Lose this at your peril, Eastern Orthodox and Emergents....) Now by faith I am connected with God and His life flows through me.

So exhort me, but don't make me go to confession before communion.

Less filling! ... Tastes great!

Which is more important? Preaching the Gospel or Spreading the Kingdom?

This is a trick question, since it's not really either/or. Part of spreading the kingdom is preaching the Gospel (with words, Francis). The other part is stuff like physical healing, mental healing, and social healing. Oh, and exorcisms.

But I maintain that the Spiritual aspect of spreading the kingdom is more important than the physical aspect. In John 6, Jesus miraculously fed about 20,000 people, in a physical act of the Kingdom of God breaking into this world. However, the very next day, he said stuff like the following (vv. 26-29):

"Jesus answered, 'I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.' Then they asked him, 'What must we do to do the works God requires?' Jesus answered, 'The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.'

And then during the rest of the often spiky interchange between Jesus and the people, narrated in chapter 6, Jesus continued to drive home how much more important the spiritual aspect is than the physical. "The flesh profits nothing."

Here's another thing: the people had all benefited from a tremendous miracle, and the very next day they asked Jesus for a sign! What gall! A wise man, Jay Carty, once preached that miracles are like Chinese food. You're hungry two hours later.

Here's a disclaimer: I'm big on physical outworkings of the power of God. I'm a member of a Vineyard Church, and one of my biggest peeves is Cessationism. What an abomination!

It's not: 100% effort to one and 0% to the other. I don't know if I'd even put percentages on it, because the two are inextricably linked.

Pilate Was Postmodern

"For this reason I was born, and for this reason I came into the world – to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice." -- Jesus

"What is truth?" -- Pilate

Emergent is really starting to trouble me

Tony Jones, as a youth pastor, introduced his kids to the labyrinth, which is some ascetic practice.

So instead of giving them the Gospel, the power of God to salvation, he gives them this poison. Nice going, Tony.

Evangelicals and Catholics Apart

This is very sad. Why, oh why, James did you do it? What got into your head? You of all people! What a betrayal!

On the one hand, in _Evangelicals & Catholics Together: Toward a Common Mission_, you said, “. . . Roman teaching obscures the gospel and indeed distorts it in a tragically anti-spiritual and unpastoral manner . . .”
And, “Rome’s official doctrinal disorders, particularly on justification, merit, and the Mass-sacrifice, so obscure the gospel that were I, as a gesture of unity, invited to mass_which of course as a Protestant I am not, nor shall be_I would not feel free to accept the invitation.”
But then on the other hand, to justify your fellowship with darkness, you downplay the importance of the Justification issue, calling it "domestic differences about salvation". What is this all about? Did Paul have domestic differences with the Judaizers about salvation? No! In Galatians 1:8-9, he anathematized them, twice: "8. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! 9. As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!" He had no common mission with them.

Then you said, in 1996:

Can conservative Protestants, Eastern Orthodox, and Roman Catholics of mainstream type join together in bearing witness to all that I have spoken of? I urge that we can, despite our known and continuing differences about the specifics of the salvation process and the place of the church in that process. . . . To be sure, fundamentalists within our three traditions are unlikely to join us in this, for it is the way of fundamentalists to follow the path of contentious orthodoxy, as if the mercy of God in Christ automatically rests on persons who are notionally correct and is just as automatically withheld from those who fall short of notional correctness on any point of substance. But this concept of, in effect, justification, not of works, but of words_words, that is, of notional soundness and precision_is near to being a cultic heresy in its own right and need not detain us further now, however much we may regret the fact that some in all our traditions are bogged down in it.

As if true evangelicals only believed in intellectual assent. James, you would criticize the Apostle Paul for being contentious. You would say to him: "Now Paul, let's not get carried away. Can't we just reason with the Judaizers, and find common ground with them? After all, we and they stand against this brutal Roman Empire, so why not stand together and thus be stronger. Let's put aside our domestic differences."

James, what were you thinking?? Why do you call it domestic differences? Haven't you read what Paul said, "Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?" (2 Cor 6:14).

Thank you, Richard Bennett and your website, Berean Beacon (sermon entitled, Apostasy of New Evangelicals), for your faithful witness for the truth.

More J.P. Moreland musings

From J.P. Moreland's answer to comments on the CT blog on his ETS paper, "How Evangelicals Became Over-Committed to the Bible and What Can Be Done About It":
"Does anyone seriously think that non-Christians who have never seen a Bible have no knowledge of God or the moral law?"

Which moral law?

Knowledge gained from archaeological digs is in now way the same as the knowledge of how to be saved. Archaeology (or whatever hard experimental science) will only give you interesting facts. The framework in which they are put comes from somewhere else. You won't get this framework experimentally. Neither will you get a salvation framework experimentally.

...he grounds Christian engagement on natural theology and moral law...

Why is this a good thing, J. P.?

In his paper written for the ETS, "How Evangelicals Became Over-Committed to the Bible and What can be Done about It," Moreland is opening the door for other ultimate authorities.

You really want to bank on calling extra-biblical hypotheses about angels and demons "knowledge"? What's the basis for such knowledge? Why would you have confidence in it? We're talking scary entities here, and you want to use a different map that what God graciously provided for us. Please stick with Scripture! There's plenty of guidance there (by this I don't mean Words of Knowledge, etc., are out).

Moreland continues: "Yea, verily, and amen! Since the spiritual realm is real, one should be able to learn about it in appropriate ways outside the biblical text." You don't see the gaping hole here? Satan is the great deceiver. He can make anything look good and consistent if you go outside the protection of God's word. What's next--a scientific study of enneagrams and tarot cards? I'm not saying the conclusion is wrong, but you seem to be over eager to get there. Have a care!

I realize I've said contradictory things here, but hey, it's my blog! And I'm working through what he said and refining what I think. Moreland says the problem is an over-commitment to the Scriptures, but if people were really committed to God's Word, they wouldn't park their brains at the door. I believe the problem lies elsewhere. The thing which stunts people's growth is a commitment to someone's interpretation of Scripture. If, for example, MacArthur or Warfield look askance at the miraculous gifts, I go to scripture (to which I am committed) and find that their views on the subject are not in line with Scripture. (I must say that I applaud Moreland's commitment to signs and wonders.)

As a scientist, I look at Science with a grain of salt. And this is with physical realities. Spiritual realities are much harder to pin down empirically, so the grain turns into a large boulder. But regarding the faithfulness of Scripture: Thy Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

Faith is Necessary and Sufficient

This is one of the reasons why I subscribe to faith-alone:

Hebrews 11:6 says that faith is necessary: "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him."
Romans 14:23b says that faith is sufficient: "and everything that does not come from faith is sin."

Incarnation and Redemption

Just heard on "Our Life in Christ", an Eastern Orthodox podcast, the following quote, "The Incarnation changes everything."

In OT typology, the servant could go free after, I believe, 7 years of service. However, if he marries and has children during that time, he can't take them with him when he goes. If he wants to be with them, he must stay as a servant. This is a picture of Christ who came into the world and purchased a family for himself (the Church). He could have lived the perfect life and not endured the Cross and gone home, and he wouldn't have known the pain of separation from God. But He didn't. He shed His blood for us, and in so doing paid the price for our ransom. Paul makes much of the Cross. Probably more than he does of the Incarnation.

"Our Life in Christ" is big on Incarnational, Sacramental theology, where, since God became Matter (not to mention also becoming Man), Matter now has a new meaning, or at least a new potential meaning. (In the East, this leads to icons and prayer ropes, and in the West it leads to Rosaries and Scapulars, but this is beside the point.)

They're big on some of the essentials of the faith--Trinitarian Theology and Christology--for which we thank God. But where is Soteriology? Seems to take a back seat, much like it did in the early Church until Augustine (who, as it seems to me, never really hit it big in the East).

I must conclude that the above quote misses the mark. The Incarnation only changes at most half of everything. Redemption changes the other half.

More On James

Last week I was listening to Mitch Pacwa, a Roman Catholic priest and a Jesuit, on a podcast of his call-in radio program. Someone called up about faith or the letter of James. I forget what exactly Pacwa said about it, but it was the typical Catholic answer to salvation by faith alone. Now I remember. Pacwa took issue with Luther, who explicitly added the word 'alone' when he translated. This was meant to show that Luther was dishonest in his translation of Scripture. (Not to mention that many modern translations, NIV included, are concept-for-concept, not word-for-word, so I'm not sure why Pacwa takes issue, unless he wants to find another chance to swipe at the Great Reformer.) Luther indeed added the word 'alone' in his German translation of Paul's Letter to the Romans, chapter 3, verse 28, which in the ESV reads, "28. For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law." Luther put the word 'alone' after the word 'faith', and Catholics rail against him for that.

My question is, "What part of 'apart from' do you not understand?" What part of "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness," (Romans 4:2-3), don't you understand?

Whenever the topic of Salvation by grace alone through faith alone is brought up with a Catholic, set your watchclock and take bets on how many seconds the discussion will get to James chapter 2, where he says, in contradiction to Paul, that man is justified by works. They place a ton of weight on this little letter as though it should drive the doctrine. Even if one took the letter as Scripture (let's get this clear--I don't, along with the early church up to the end of the 3rd century, and along with Luther), you have whole didactic chapters in multiple letters of Paul showing how you are justified through faith, and this stuff is never contradicted by the likes of, say, John and Jesus. So it would be the tail wagging the dog to say that, because of the Letter of James, you're really not justified by faith alone. The speed with which one goes to the letter of James (or to the Catholic mistranslation of Galatians 5:6--it's not "faith formed by love," but "faith expressing itself in love") smells fishy to me.
The sola-fide deniers claim to go with "the whole counsel of God", as though holding two contradictory truths together is a good habit of reason. Ever since James, people obstinately resist the Great News that we're justified by Grace Alone through Faith Alone.

How I Know the Whole System is Wrong

I was listening to an mp3 of a Bible Answer Man radio program from around 1996 (#471 on James White's website: http://www.aomin.org/). They talked a bit about sola fide, and Roman Catholic apologist Tim Staples threw in something from Romans 2 to justify (pardon the pun) the idea that you have to continue to do right in order to get eternal life (I think he was referring to Romans 2:6-7 "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;"). He took this out of context. Clearly, Romans 3 talks of another righteousness, another way to be right with God. Romans 3:21-22 says: "But now a righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it, a righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe...."

Later that week, when James White and Tim Staples debated sola scriptura (or maybe it was 4 years later, when they debated papal infallibility, #487 on James White's website), during Q&A, someone asked Tim Staples, roughly, "What is the Gospel? And what must I do to be saved?" Staples replied to the first question that the Gospel is all that Jesus commands us, through the Church. He replied to the second question that we must give full intellectual and willful assent to all that the Church teaches.

That's not what the Bible says. In answer to the question, "What must we do to do the works God requires?" Jesus said, in John 6:29,40 "29. The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.... 40. For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day." Paul and Silas said, in Acts 16:31: "And they said, Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household."

Eastern Orthodoxy Ain't All That

Finally, I've found somebody saying what needs to be said to the Orthodox.
They come in with their pride and their arrogant assertion (much more soft-
spoken than the Roman Catholics, but every bit as hardened) that they are
the One True Church.

Thank you, William Webster.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Love Formed by Faith

Roman Catholics and others who deny Sola Fide often misquote Galatians 5:6 ("... faith expressing itself through love.") as "faith formed by love." They have it backwards. Love is the fruit of the Spirit.

Ways to Worship the Creator Rather than the Creature

1. Recognize that God is the source of life and we are just vessels passing it on.
2. Look to heaven and get a spiritual understanding. When tempted to go all ablather about physical blessings God gives, turn them back to Him in praise.
3. When someone says, "Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!" say, "Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!"
4. When someone says, "Hoc est corpus meum," say "Christ's body is in heaven (exalted at the right hand of the Father), and on earth (in the Church), but not in a box. Besides, it was a Passover seder, loaded with symbolism, at which Jesus said it. He just changed the symbolism."
5. When someone says, "I would not have God for my Father if I didn't have the Church for my Mother," make sure they don't put the cart before the horse and say that in order to be saved you have to join the church. It's the other way around. And note the absence of Biblical didactic teaching on the supposed Motherhood of the Church.
6. Paul said to eagerly desire the expressions of the Spirit, especially to prophecy. But recognize that you can want these blessings too much, and if you're not expressing them in love, you're a clanging symbol. Desire communion with the Giver of the gifts, over the gifts.
7. Recognize that the tendency to canonize people isn't limited to the Catholics and Orthodox. It's a human failing, very present in Protestants as well. They just don't call it that.
8. Love God, not money. It's deceitful and offers a false sense of security.
9. Stick with Scripture. Councils (yes, even Nicea and Chalcedon), Magisteria, Pastors, Bishops, Priests, Movements, Commentaries, Synods, and Confessions, are *all* relative.
10. Trust God. Eat from the Tree of Life, and not from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Obey God and understand that His commands are for our life (point one of the Genesis 2:17 prohibition) and that pistis is greater than gnosis (point two).

N. T. Wright Seems to Be a Bit Off on Righteousification (dikaiosune)

This is a bit disturbing. According to John Piper, N. T. Wright has it wrong on Righteousification (what some call Justification, from the Greek dikaiosune). Bummer.

Patrick and Augustine and Nestorius and Pelagius

Kinda blows my mind that Nestorius took Pelagius under his protection for a while, until both were anathematized by the Council of Ephesus in 431. Up until now, I've been very sympathetic towards Nestorius, but I wonder now if he had Pelagian tendencies.

I wonder if Pelagius was actually only a semi-Pelagian.

I'm pretty sure Nestorius wasn't a Nestorian. Gotta go find his Bazaar of Heraclides.

While I'm at it, I wonder what Patrick thought of Pelagius, or if they met, or if they knew about each other.

What did Patrick think of Augustine?

Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?

Still bugging me. I'm listening to the Church History podcast of Reformed Theological Seminary, and we've gotten to Nestorius and the Council of Ephesus. It seems that the "proper" interpretation of the events is that Nestorius was a heretic, because he believed in two persons in Christ, which we know because he opposed the term Theotokos (literally 'God-bearer', but translated 'Mother of God') used for Mary.

Let's get this straight: Mary is not Theotokos.

"But then you deny Christ's divinity!"

No. Calling Mary Theotokos makes her divine. I don't care how many Church Fathers used that term and had in the back of their mind the proper understanding of Mary as just a woman and of Jesus as the God-man. The blasphemy is written in the words up front. For Mary to "bear" God, she has to be the source of the material God is made out of, she has to feed God with spiritual food (since God is spirit) while nurturing Him in her spiritual womb or in her spiritual arms. Mother, Father, Sister, Brother, are all relationships of like kinds. They can only be used in that context. To say that "Mary is the Mother of God only means Jesus is simultaneously fully God and fully man," breaks this proper usage of the term. Only God could be the Mother of God.

You have a war of conundra here. One side says that to deny that Mary is the Mother of God logically leads to a denial of the Hypostatic union of divine and human natures in the one person of Christ. My side says that to affirm that Mary is the Mother of God logically (and with fewer logical steps) leads to the blasphemy that Mary is God.

By the way, I completely affirm the hypostatic union of divinity and humanity in the one person of Christ.

Here's what really bugs me. Why is there a 'term' in the first place? Since when did she come on the scene? Why is she that important that we should have epic arguments of her title? Why the pressure? Could it be that Semiramis/Aphrodite/Diana of the Ephesians/Ashtoreth/Artemis is trying to rear her ugly head and usurp the position that properly belongs to God?

The Catholic Fudge Factor.

I got the following quotation from James White's website. Thank you, James, for your faithful defense of the Gospel!

As Karl Keating said in Catholicism and Fundamentalism, p. 275,

Still, fundamentalists ask, where is the proof from Scripture? Strictly, there is none. It was the Catholic Church that was commissioned by Christ to teach all nations and to teach them infallibly. The mere fact that the Church teaches the doctrine of the Assumption as something definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.

Stunning Nature Video

James White posted this amazing video on his blog.