For the Lord’s Day (25)

My days are swifter than a runner; they flee away; they see no good.  They go by like skiffs of reed, like an eagle swooping on the prey.  If I say, “I will forget my complaint, I will put off my sad face and be of good cheer,” I become afraid of all my suffering, for I know You will not hold me innocent.  I shall be condemned; why, then, do I labor in vain?  If I wash myself with snow and cleanse myself with lye, yet You will plunge me into a pit, and my own clothes will abhor me.  For He is not a man, as I am, that I might answer Him, that we should come to trial together.  There is no arbiter between us, who might lay his hand on us both.  Let Him take his rod away from me, and let not dread of Him terrify me.  Then, I would speak without fear of Him, for I am not so, in myself.  (Job 9:25-35)

The Persons in 3 John

Nothing is known of the Gaius to whom 3 John is written save what the letter itself tells us.  But this is no great loss, for all that we need to know is apparent from the text.  To be sure, the New Testament knows of a number of other men named Gaius.  There is a Gaius of Macedonia who, together with Aristarchus, was seized by the rioting mob at Ephesus (Acts 19:29).  There was a Gaius who accompanied Paul on his last trip to Jerusalem and who formed part of the group of delegates that presented the offering from the Gentile churches to the church in Judea (Acts 20:4).  This Gaius was from Derbe and, presumably, represented that church and, possibly, the other churches of Galatia.  Finally, there was the Gaius of Corinth in whose house Paul lived while dictating the letter to the Romans (Romans 16:23).  But Gaius was a common name, and there is no reason to identify any of these persons with the Gaius of 3 John.  According to 3 John, this Gaius was simply a faithful and spiritual Christian leader in a local church over which the apostle John had oversight.

But troubles had come into this church and, in spite of a letter sent by John to the chief offender, the problems had, apparently, grown worse.  To begin with, a man named Diotrephes had assumed an unwarranted and pernicious authority in the church, so much so that, by the time of the writing of this letter, John’s own authority had been challenged, and those who had been sympathetic to John had been excommunicated from the local assembly.  Moreover, due to this struggle, traveling missionaries had been rudely treated, including, probably, an official delegation from John.  Gaius had received such persons and is, here, commended for it.  Diotrephes had not, and is rebuked.  Diotrephes is also promised further chastisement when the apostle comes to him, which he hopes to do shortly.  Toward the end of the letter, a third personality is mentioned, Demetrius, whom the apostle holds up as an example of one who does good and is, therefore, clearly of God.

The messages to, or about, these three personalities give a straightforward outline to the book.  There is (1) the message to Gaius, who is termed a fellow worker; (2) the message about Diotrephes, who is causing the problem; and (3) the message about Demetrius, who is designated an example to all.

From: The Epistles of John: An Expositional Commentary by James Montgomery Boice (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2004), p. 167.  Originally published in 1979.  The book began life as sermons preached to Boice’s congregation at Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia from September, 1974 to May, 1975.

The Wills of God

I need to clarify something before we go on.  When we speak of knowing the will of God, we commonly think of that which God does not promise to reveal and, usually, does not reveal.  God does not reveal His secret or hidden purposes (Deuteronomy 29:29).  What He does reveal is that kind of life or character which pleases Him.

Thus, we see already that there are different meanings attached to the word will.  In the Bible, one is that of the sovereign or efficacious will of God.  This will is beyond anything we can fully know on earth.  Indeed, it provides the origin of all things and orders them.  God’s will is absolute.  It is unlimited.  It is determined only by God Himself.  God does not need to consult anyone in formulating His plans, and He does not need help from anyone in carrying them out.  God’s will is independent.  It is fixed.  It does not need to adapt to changing circumstances.  It is omnipotent.  This is the sense in John 6:40, in which Jesus says, “This is the will of My Father, that every one who sees the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life.”

Another meaning of will in Scripture is the disposition of God, or, what pleases Him.  In the Lord’s Prayer is the petition which says, “Thy will be done.”  This does not refer to the sovereign or efficacious will of God for, if that were the case, there would be no need to pray for it.  God’s will, in that sense, will be done whether we pray for it or not.  In the Lord’s Prayer, the request is, rather, that what pleases God might be increasingly realized in our lives and in the lives of others.

So, when we speak of wanting to know God’s will, are we asking to know God’s hidden councils, those which are the expression of His sovereign will, or are we seeking to know what pleases Him?  If it is the former, we are doomed to frustration.  We will not learn God’s hidden councils for the simple reason that they are hidden.  If we are seeking to know what pleases God, much can be said, for God has revealed that to us.  “God wills our righteousness.  God wills our obedience.  And the law of God clearly reflects something of His will in the perceptive sense, the sense of His disposition.” [Boice quoting R. C. Sproul]

From: Foundations of the Christian Faith: A Comprehensive and Readable Theology by James Montgomery Boice (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1986), p. 476.  This quote is from the revised one-volume edition.

James Montgomery Boice (1938-2000) was senior minister of Tenth Presbyterian Church, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from 1968 until his death from liver cancer, at the age of 61.

Scholasticism

The term scholasticism has a narrower reference than the term orthodoxy: it well describes the technical and academic side of this process of the institutionalization and professionalization of Protestant doctrine in the universities of the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.  If the doctrinal intention of this theology was confessional orthodoxy, its academic motivation was certainly intellectual adequacy.  Indeed, rather than draw on such grandiose and speculative notions as the nineteenth-century central-dogma theory or the large scale working out of “tensions” between doctrines (argued by numerous twentieth-century writers), much of the reason for the development of Reformed scholastic orthodoxy must be found in the intellectual culture of the successful Protestant academies and universities.  The theology of the great systems written in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, like the theology of the thirteenth-century teachers, is preeminently a school theology.  It is a theology designed to develop a system on a highly technical level and in an extremely precise manner by means of the careful identification of topics, division of these topics into their basic parts, definition of the parts, and doctrinal or logical argumentation concerning the divisions and definitions.  This, moreover, is the sense of the term used by the writers of the sixteenth century to describe their own academic, technical, and disputative theology as distinct from other genre and approaches, namely, the catechetical, biblical-exegetical, and simply didactic or ecclesial.  Thus, large numbers of the works of the late sixteenth and seventeenth-century Reformed orthodox - including works by the authors of scholastic theological systems - are not scholastic.

From: Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725: Volume One: Prolegomena to Theology Second Edition by Richard A. Muller (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003 [1987]), pp. 34-35.

The Universe’s Uniqueness

Existence often ceases to be beautiful but, if we are men at all, it never ceases to be interesting.  This divine creation, in the midst of which we live, does commonly, in the words of the good books, combine amusement with instruction.  But dark hours will come when the wisest man can hardly get instruction out of it, but a brave man can always get amusement out of it.  When we have given up valuing life for every other reason, we can still value it, like the glass stick, as a curiosity.  For the universe is like the glass stick in this, at any rate: it is unique.

G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936), from “The Unfashionable Tastes of the Poor,” Illustrated London Times, Saturday, December 16, 1905.

A Different Eschatology?

It isn’t necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice - there are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia. - Frank Zappa (1940-1993)

Frank Vincent Zappa was a rock musician of distinctly independent - not to say radically feisty - views.

The Virgin Conception of Jesus Christ

This subject has been one of great controversy during recent years, and it is not surprising, since it has a very definite bearing on the Christological problem.  It is impossible to do more than indicate the proper line of approach, leaving the thorough discussion to special works on the subject.

1.  The first thing to do is to take the life of Christ and study His sinlessness and uniqueness.  How are these to be accounted for apart from some Divine intervention that made them possible?

2.  Then, we should proceed to the Apostolic interpretation of Christ.  To the Apostles, Jesus Christ stood in an unique relation to God and, of this, the simplest expression is found in the idea of His pre-existence (1 Corinthians 8:6; Colossians 1:15ff; 2 Corinthians 8:9; Philippians 2:6).

3.  At this point, the narratives in the Gospels may be studied.  They are very early manifestations, but give no evidence of being inventions, or of having come from earlier sources, or of being of composite character.

4.  One of the surest proofs of primitive belief on this subject is the opposition to it and denials from the time of Cerinthus.  These disputes have to be explained.

5.  Then, comes the enquiry as to how Jesus Christ can be accounted for?  If He is unique in history, must He not also be so in origin?  Every effect must have its adequate cause, and it is only by the Virgin Birth that we can account for the unique earthly life of Jesus Christ.  The miracle of the Incarnation is, thus, fitly expressed in the miraculous entrance, and harmonises with the miraculous departure in the Resurrection.

6.  It is believed that a new start was then made, by means of which the eternal Son of God entered into humanity, as the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, did not come by ordinary generation.  The first Adam had failed, and a new race was necessary, of which Jesus Christ was the new Head.  This necessitated a fresh creation, and the Virgin Birth meant this (Luke 1:35).

7.  The decision will depend, almost wholly, upon our view of the miraculous, in general.  The Virgin Birth is not impossible unless all miracles are impossible, but if, on a priori grounds, we believe that no miracle has ever occurred, then the Virgin Birth necessarily falls to the ground.  Yet, if we believe that Jesus rose from the dead, we shall avoid greater difficulties by accepting the miraculous birth.  Thus, opinion will depend upon the conception we form of His Person.

8.  It is perfectly true that the Virgin Birth had no place in the preaching and teaching of the Apostolic days, and this is only natural, and to be expected, because the Virgin Birth is no necessary proof of Deity, but only of a Divine Personage.  While the rejection of the Virgin Birth would certainly undermine faith, yet its acceptance is quite compatible with the rejection of the Deity of Christ.  The truth of His Sonship, as implied in the Virgin Birth, is merged into the profounder truth of His greater Sonship which is proved by the Resurrection (Romans 1:4).  St. Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi was not due to the Virgin Birth because “flesh and blood” could easily have revealed this fact to him.

9.  Denials of the Virgin Birth proceed from the assertion that a sinless character is possible without a Virgin Birth, or without even ordinary paternity.  But, the real question is not a sinless character, but a sinless personality.  Character is always an attainment, while personality is an endowment.

10.  In reality, the difficulty is one that Christianity has always had to face, and the force of the objections can easily be perceived.  Yet, the Gospel has never been destroyed by this weight and, although historical scholarship may still be able to say something in regard to the documents and the historical side, yet, in the future, as in the past, the problem will, naturally, be solved in the light of the complete impression formed of the life of Jesus Christ.  We do well to emphasize the almost insuperable difficulties of the mythical theory by asking how the idea of the Virgin Birth arose, if it was not based on fact, and how the narratives could have obtained such appearances of trustworthiness unless they were historical.  But, the fundamental question is that Christ, being such as He was, and coming into this world for the purpose of redemption, it cannot be regarded as either unnatural or incredible that His life should have begun in this way.  The ultimate decision will, assuredly, lie in the realm of effects.  If we believe that the world is only imperfect, and not sinful, we shall be content with an ethical and human Christ.  But, if there is such a thing as human sin, we shall be compelled to fall back upon a miraculous Christ, who was “conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary.”

From: The Principles of Theology: An Introduction to the Thirty-Nine Articles by W. H. Griffith Thomas (London: Longmans, Green and Company, 1930), pp. 47-49.  Discussion of Article II, “Of the Word or Son of God which was made very man.”

William Henry Griffith Thomas (1861-1924) was an Anglican educator, theologian, and author.  He was Professor of Systematic Theology at Wycliffe College in Toronto, Canada, and Principal of Wycliffe Hall in Oxford, England.  Had he lived, he would also have been a member of the founding faculty of the Evangelical Theological College (now known as Dallas Theological Seminary) in Dallas, Texas.  The Principles of Theology was his last book; he completed the manuscript, after 40 years of research and study, shortly before his death at the age of 63.  The manuscript was seen through the press by his colleagues and friends.

For the Lord’s Day (24)

For, although they knew God, the did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened.  Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Therefore, God gave them up, in the lusts of their hearts, to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever!  Amen.

For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions.  For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men, likewise, gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men, and receiving, in themselves, the due penalty for their error.

And, since they did not see fit to acknowledge God,  God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.  (Romans 1:21-28, emphases mine)

And it’s still true - no matter what the California State Supreme Court decides!

Chesterton on Marriage and Christianity

All the things that make monogamy a success are, in their nature, un-dramatic things: the silent growth of an instinctive confidence, the common wounds and victories, the accumulation of customs, the rich maturing of old jokes. (p. 191)

…in all honest religion there is something that is hateful to the prosperous compromise of our time.  You are free, in our time, to say that God does not exist; you are free to say that He exists and is evil; you are free to say (like poor old Renan) that He would like to exist if He could.  You may talk of God as a metaphor or a mystification; you may water Him down with gallons of long words, or boil Him to the rags of metaphysics; and it is not merely that nobody punishes, but nobody protests.  But, if you speak of God as a fact, as a thing, like a tiger, as a reason for changing one’s conduct, then the modern world will stop you somehow, if it can.  We are long past talking about whether an unbeliever should be punished for being irreverent.  It is now thought irreverent to be a believer. (pp. 231-232)

From: George Bernard Shaw by G. K. Chesterton (London: John Lane, 1909)

The second quotation demonstrates that not much has changed in the last 100 years - it’s only intensified.

The Doctrine of Scripture

A word must be said about the willingness of the Confession to include within the “whole counsel of God” truths that “by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture.”  Some Christians have urged that logical deduction adds to Scripture and, therefore, must be resisted.  This is wrong.  Validly deduced truths add nothing to the overall truths of Scripture.  John Frame has, rightly, declared:

Implication does not add anything new [in syllogistic argument]; it merely rearranges information contained in the premises.  It takes what is implicit in the premises and states it explicitly.  Thus, when we learn logical implications of sentences, we are learning more and more of what those sentences mean.  The conclusion represents part of the meaning of the premises.

So, in theology, logical deductions set forth the meaning of Scripture…

When it is used rightly, logical deduction adds nothing to Scripture.  It merely sets forth what is there.  Thus, we need not fear any violation of sola scriptura, as long as we use logic responsibly.  Logic sets forth the meaning of Scripture.

A case in point is the doctrine of the Trinity.  In no single passage of Scripture is the full doctrine of the Trinity set forth.  But the church has deduced “by good and necessary consequence,” as the implicate of all the Scripture data, the doctrine of the Trinity - to be believed as surely as the explicit declaration of Scripture that God is loving!

One final comment.  While the framers of the Confession were absolutely convinced of the Scripture’s sufficiency, and stated as much, they affirm once again, here, that “the inward illumination of the Spirit of God [is] necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the word.”  In so doing, they indicated their zeal to keep the source of spiritual life where it must always be kept - directly in God alone.  It is the Spirit of God, working immediately and directly by and with the Word of God in the hearts of men, who imparts spiritual life!

From: A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith by Robert L. Reymond (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1998), pp. 86-87.

The Frame quotation is from: The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God by John Frame; A Theology of Lordship series (Phillipsburg: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1987), p. 247.