Archive for the ‘Gospel’ Category
Debating, Yes! Quarrelling, No!
Filed under: By Tim Brassell, Christian Living, Church, Evangelism, Gospel, Perichoresis, The Plan of Adoption, Trinity |
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The race to be President of the United States is on and so is the political debating! I must admit that I like the professional and orderly way most debates are handles in the United States and the opportunity to hear different thoughts and approaches about how our country might be led best. Of course, I get as frustrated as anyone with what I consider to be purely political responses, rather than speaking from the heart, but I think you get my point.
Unfortunately, it’s not always that professional and orderly in debating the Gospel. I wish we would, both in my denomination and beyond it, take more opportunity to do so! As I go around sharing the Good News as the Father, Son and Spirit Himself, and the Adoption of all into His Life and Love through the Son and in the Spirit, someone will inevitably say during a discussion time something like, “Can’t we stop debating theology and simply love one another!” Many times I want to say, “Can’t we debate AND love one another?!” because I am learning by experience that it doesn’t always have to be an either/or approach.
Understandably, I must admit that because of the way sin messes with our motives and attitudes, debates aren’t always the respectful interactions they ought to be between human sisters and brothers. Before you know it we can find ourselves responding defensively and antagonistically, experiencing a debate that quickly descends into nothing but sophisticated name-calling. That’s certainly NOT who we really are in Christ and I don’t think that is right either! Quarreling, no! Especially as outlined in Titus 3:9-11.
Nonetheless, I want to suggest that debating the Gospel isn’t all that bad, all the time, and especially if it can lead (comfortably or not), to rethinking and embracing the Truly Good News of the God revealed in Jesus Christ! Plus, and because we are sinners, there is often nothing less than a debate that will get the job done of provoking sinners to think differently and better about who we are in Jesus.
C.S. Lewis addresses the issue a little better, I think, when he says that:
If all the world were Christian, it might not matter if all the world were uneducated. But, as it is, a cultural life will exist outside the Church whether it exists inside or not. To be ignorant and simple now – not to be able to meet the enemies on their own ground – would be to throw down our weapons, and to betray our uneducated brethren who have, under God, no defence but us against the intellectual attacks of the heathen. Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered. The cool intellect must work not only against cool intellect on the other side, but against the muddy heathen mysticisms which deny intellect altogether. ~ The Weight of Glory: Learning in War-Time, pp.58-59
Interestingly, C.S. Lewis became a Christian because of his much debating with J.R.R. Tolkien. You can see a portrayal of some of this interaction here. It gets really Gospel interesting at 3:32.
Taking off on what C.S. Lewis has to say, if everyone in the Church were thinking more properly about God, it might not matter to try and clarify the Gospel. But, as it is, a cultural life exists inside and outside the Church that primarily sees God as a single, solitary being, even though it professes in scripture and creed that it believes God is in fact the Relational God of Father, Son and Spirit. To be ignorant and simple now, after the Holy Spirit in the Church has gone through such painstaking efforts and time within the Church to make the Gospel of the Triune God and our Inclusion in His Life and Love so plain, would be to let the adversary have his way, and to throw down our Good News weapons, betraying our uneducated brethren who, under God the Trinity, have no defense but us for the truth and against the lies twisting that truth to their harm!
Good theology must exist, if for no other reason than that bad theology needs to be answered. The transformed and right mind must work not only against the transformed and alienated mind on the other side, but against the muddy illusions and lies (prevalent even in many Christian circles!), which almost deny the mind altogether!
Though I can appreciate a desire for the peace and simplicity we were all designed for, it is obvious in the God revealed in Jesus “a man of sorrows” (Isaiah 53:3) that, because of our sin, it doesn’t happen without debate and a kind of war. I think I have discovered by personal experience and in my many discussions on the Gospel with others, that it is not always so much the negative atmosphere of quarreling that others desire to flee as it is the pain of repentance or rethinking. Exposure to the Light of Christ in our darkness is, admittedly, not a pleasant experience, and especially after such a huge investment of our time, talents and treasure given to such darkness. Ouch!!! I’ve been embarrassed and done my share of hair-pulling!
So, leave quarrels about the law alone! But also leave some room in your love and Christian fellowship for a dose of healthy Gospel debating! If you are familiar with Church history, the Church has remained grounded on, or come back to, interacting with and discussing God the Trinity and mankind’s inclusion in His relationship because of much debating.
And remember:
A man named Apollos came to Ephesus. He was a Jew, born in Alexandria, Egypt, and a terrific speaker, eloquent and powerful in his preaching of the Scriptures. He was well-educated in the way of the Master and fiery in his enthusiasm. Apollos was accurate in everything he taught about Jesus up to a point, but he only went as far as the baptism of John. He preached with power in the meeting place. When Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and told him the rest of the story. When Apollos decided to go on to Achaia province, his Ephesian friends gave their blessing and wrote a letter of recommendation for him, urging the disciples there to welcome him with open arms. The welcome paid off: Apollos turned out to be a great help to those who had become believers through God’s immense generosity. He was particularly effective in public debate with the Jews as he brought out proof after convincing proof from the Scriptures that Jesus was in fact God’s Messiah. ~ Acts 18:24-28, The Message
~ Timothy J. Brassell
Deification in Christ
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Church, Gospel, The Plan of Adoption | Tags: Deification, Jesus, Perichoresis, Trinity
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Why did the Son of God become the man Jesus? Most of us have been trained in a form of Christianity that says that our sin created the necessity for the incarnation. This answer to the question was first described in detail by St. Augustine, then expounded in Medieval Theology and handed on to us by the Reformers. I believe that this perspective minimizes the Bible’s teaching on the Father’s plan of Adoption (Eph. 1:5).
One of my favorite quotes on this subject comes from the Greek Orthodox theologian Panayiotis Nellas in his book Deification in Christ. Here Nellas describes the negative results of this truncated, sin-centered view of Jesus’ Mission:
. . [negative] consequences followed also from Augustine’s axiom that “if many had not perished, the Son of Man would not have come.” [Enchiridion viii, 27-ix, 29.] This trapped Christ, and by extension the Christian life and the realities of the Church, the sacraments, faith and the rest, within the bounds defined by sin. Christ in this perspective is not so much the creator and recapitulator of all things, the Alpha and Omega as Scripture says, but simply the redeemer from sin. The Christian life is regarded not so much as the realization of Adam’s original destiny, as a dynamic transformation of man and the world and as union with God, but as a simple escape from sin. . . The Church forgets her ontological bond with the world. And the world, seeing that its positive aspects are not appreciated within the Church, feels a sense of alienation and breaks off relations with it. ~ Deification in Christ: The Nature of the Human Person, by Panayiotis Nellas, p. 95. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1997.
As Nellas suggests, we must recover the early Christian perspective on Christ that sees his work as not only the cure of sin but as the deification of humanity – that is to say, the adoption of humanity into the Triune Life of the Deity and our maturing into full sons and daughters of the Father, in the Son, through the Spirit. We must recover the full, comprehensive view of Christ which sees him as the beginning and purpose of all things, all people, and the whole creation.
~ Jonathan Stepp
Giving Counsel in an Emergency
Filed under: By Tim Brassell, Christian Living, Evangelism, Gospel, Ministry, Trinity | Tags: Counseling, Jesus, Perichoresis, Trinity
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“Could you please call me back soon! This is kind of an emergency!” “Uh-Oh!” I thought as I processed the voicemail message, “Not another one!” I had only recently experienced helping a neighbor of mine with a house fire and his 3rd degree burns in another Gospel emergency. When it rains it pours as they say!
Because of who called, I expected to hear of someone’s death, or sickness unto death, as is often the case of a pastoral emergency call. At the very least I expected someone with a hospital emergency or dealing with a demon. I quickly returned the phone call but didn’t receive an answer, so I left a message. An hour later or so my friend called back and unveiled the mystery! In one sense I was relieved and very glad it was not anything near what I was thinking. In the next instant I was proud that my friend had recognized the issue as a REAL emergency. Here is what they said, to my memory:
Pastor Tim, thanks for calling! I really need your help because I have a situation where I have to speak with someone, soon, who is having a difficult time! They’ve been through a lot of bad stuff, and they’re currently going through a lot of bad stuff, and they’ve called ME in order to talk about it. The only problem is, they don’t know Jesus Christ, even though many have tried to help them receive Christ, but I don’t want to say the wrong thing! Do you have any words of counsel as to how I might help them?
If you are a regular reader of this blog, I hope you can see the real emergency in this emergency. It’s not that my friend was absolutely dependent upon me before they could serve their hurting friend! No way! However, in light of the fact they are understanding and embracing the Gospel of Humanity’s Adoption in Jesus, and taking it more seriously along with me, they didn’t want to throw burdens on a friend that they themselves weren’t willing to carry! I’ve got to respect their alignment with Jesus! (Matt 23:4)
And, let’s face it, as you repent with Jesus and learn to think in an inclusive versus exclusive way about all of humanity’s relationship with the Father, through Jesus, and in the Spirit (Col 1:17), there can be quite a gap between what you know on the inside and what you can communicate with your tongue to the outside! Ha-Ha!
As I said, my first response was “Whew!” My second response was something you may find helpful if you ever get in a similar situation. Here is a brief outline of my counsel to my friend in the Light of the Gospel:
1.) “Remember Who Jesus is as the One in, through, by and for Whom all things are created and sustained.” Jesus is the Father’s Son made human and sharing His relationship with His Father in the Spirit with you and me and everyone. He has created and is sustaining everyone! Therefore, you will not be in that situation by yourself but with the Triune God Who already lives in you and your friend and in your relationship!”
I said this because knowing Who God is as revealed in Jesus means that we can go into these types of situations with security and assurance in God’s presence, confident that He is already in each of us as the Source of Wisdom, Guidance and Relational Power we need!
2.) “Be Who you are in Jesus and be Him to and for your friend!” – Jesus is simply with us and for us because He loves us and that is Who He is in His relationship with His Father, the Spirit, Humanity and Creation!”
I said this because, in the first instance, we don’t have to try to make anything happen or try to get people to believe in Jesus! Jesus is the fullness of God made human simply to share His life and love with us, period. This means that God didn’t just come to manipulate us, influence us, or get us to love Him. He came, being Himself, to love us! He won’t change His mind about being with us in our humanity because we don’t believe in Him because He believes in being with and for us (even when we choose to be in darkness!) And besides, even if He were to have a good influence on us, He has a much better chance of being and doing that if He loves us unconditionally, and He DOES love us unconditionally!
3.) “If your friend is open to you, and does seek your input, make sure to tell them who they are in Jesus, and help them see that even their very suffering is a share in His life!”
I counseled in this way because my friend’s friend IS who they are in Jesus! (2 Cor 5:15, 1 Tim 4:10-11). Ultimately, only Truth can overcome the lies, depression and delusions we have about life and us and, in Jesus, Truth already has (John 14:6).
As I repeatedly say, we know something is wrong because we know “down to our toenails” that which is right and good! We know this because ONLY God is good (Matt 19:17), and He lives in us(Acts 1:17), being and doing Who He is (Heb 13:8). Bottom line, tell them that even their pain is a sign pointing to the Jesus Who lives in them and that He would never leave or forsake them, least of all in their suffering! In fact, He is sharing His suffering with them and suffering with them in you, you both being the children the Father always wanted!
Another emergency solved in Jesus, and beginning to be believed and participated in by us! Ha-Ha!
~ Timothy J. Brassell
Is the United States a Christian Nation?
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Christian Living, Church, Evangelism, Gospel | Tags: Christian Living, Evangelism, Jesus, Perichoresis, Trinity
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This article is about the way that we as Christians in the United States interact with our culture, especially in the political processes of our nation. I wrote it a year ago and it first appeared in the September 2010 issue of The Adopted Life. With another Presidential election cycle gearing up here in the States I thought it might be relevant once again.
Please note: there are at least two references in this article that could be construed as allusions to specific candidates for President, but they are not. One is my reference to “Mormons.” That sentence, as you will see, is a comment on the relationship between economic conservatives, evangelical Christians, and Mormons in general – it is not meant to refer specifically to any candidate. The second reference is when I critique the phrase “America needs to turn back to God.” A prominent candidate for President recently led a rally in his home state with a theme very similar to this. Obviously, since I wrote this article a year ago, I did not have this candidate, or that rally, specifically in mind when I talked about this phrase. However, I have to admit, that some of the themes of that rally did strike perilously close to what I am talking about. Never the less, I am not trying to use this article to speak for or against any candidate specifically.
Is the U.S. a Christian Nation? This question is significant for what the answer tells us about how we, as Christians in the U.S., are going to relate to the culture around us. The answer to this question depends on what you mean by “Christian Nation.”
It is certainly true that for most of its history the culture of the United States was religiously dominated by a Christian world view. The vast majority of people in the U.S. have traditionally identified themselves as Christians and attendance at churches has always far outnumbered the attendance at synagogues, mosques, and other houses of worship.
But was Christianity enshrined in the political foundations of the U.S.? The answer to that question is clearly “No.”
The Declaration of Independence, for example, only mentions God once when it makes reference to “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” in the opening sentence of the document. Who or what is “Nature’s God”? The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit I know, but I can’t tell for sure whether “Nature’s God” is this same Blessed Trinity whom I know through Jesus. Perhaps it is in the eye of the beholder. The primary author of the document, Thomas Jefferson, once said of the Trinity:
When we shall have done away with the incomprehensible jargon of the Trinitarian arithmetic, that three are one, and one is three; when we shall have knocked down the artificial scaffolding, reared to mask from view the simple structure of Jesus . . . we shall then be truly and worthily his disciples . . . ~ “Letter to Timothy Pickering, on a Sermon by Doctor Channing”, in A Library of American Literature: From the Earliest Settlement to the Present Time, Vol. III. , pp. 283-284.
So clearly, when Jefferson said “Nature’s God” he did not mean the Father, Son, and Spirit. Jefferson’s Deism led him to go so far as to put together his own version of the Gospels in which he cut out all the miracles and references to Jesus as the Son of God and reassembled the text to portray Jesus as a good moral teacher. The University of Virginia has a copy of his version of the Gospels online if you’d like to have a look at it: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/JefJesu.html
We know the signers of the Declaration ran the gamut, from devout Christians to devout Deists such as Jefferson. So I think it is entirely possible that some of the Christians who signed the document would have read “Nature’s God” to mean the Trinity revealed in Jesus. What is significant, though, is that they all signed the document. The Christians present were comfortable signing a document with only one, ambiguous reference to a general Deity and with no specifically Christian statements about that Deity.
Eleven years later, when American political leaders gathered to draft a Constitution they created a document that didn’t even mention “Nature’s God.” In fact, there is not a single reference to God in the U.S. Constitution.
Compare this to the Constitution of Ireland, for example. The Irish Constitution begins with the words “In the Name of the Most Holy Trinity . . .” The U.S. Constitution begins with the words “We the People . . .” The Preamble to the Irish Constitution goes on to mention “. . . our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ . . .” while the U.S. Constitution, of course, makes no mention of Jesus at all. (Here’s a link to the Irish Constitution, see page 8 specifically: http://www.constitution.ie/reports/ConstitutionofIreland.pdf)
Is Ireland a Christian Nation? Their founding documents would seem to say “Yes.” Is the United States? Our founding documents say “No.”
So there are two key facts here:
- A large number of Christians were present for, and participated in, the drafting and adoption of the U.S. Constitution.
- Yet the document provides no special place for Christianity in our nation and makes no reference to any Christian understanding of God.
These two facts make it clear that the founders of the United States had no intention of founding a Christian nation. They founded a nation intended to function with people of many different religions, or no religion at all, living in peace together.
This is highly significant for us as American Christians when we seek to interact with our culture. What message does it send to atheists, Jews, Muslims, and Hindus when we Christians say things like “America is supposed to be a Christian nation” or “America needs to turn back to God”? The message it sends is that Christians are included and all others are excluded—or, at best—Christians are first class citizens and everyone else is a second class citizen somehow.
Is that the gospel? Is the gospel a message about doctrine and morality which says to other human beings “You aren’t included but you can be included if you believe what we believe and act the way we act”? I don’t believe that is the gospel.
The gospel is the good news that the Son of God has included everyone in his relationship with his Father. The gospel is the good news that we all belong, whether we believe it or not. Just as Christian and Muslim citizens of the U.S. are all full citizens, so also are all Muslims and Christians fully adopted children of the Father.
The structure of American polity, which says that people of all religions are equally included in our national life, offers us Christians in the U.S. a profound opening to preach the gospel. The very structure of our government enables us to show non-Christians the acceptance and inclusion that the gospel itself preaches.
The Scripture says “It is for freedom that Christ has set you free” (Gal. 5:1), and that freedom includes the freedom to not believe or to believe wrong things, and even the freedom to build houses of worship dedicated to wrong ideas. Jesus has never thrown down a lightening bolt from heaven to stop the construction of a mosque, yet here where I live in Tennessee, hundreds of people who call themselves Christians are trying to take freedom away from others and stop the construction of a mosque.
I think American Christians need to take a step back from the fiery political rhetoric of our current culture and ask ourselves “What is the core message that we really want non-Christians in America to hear from Christianity?”
An intersection of political interests has formed in the U.S. where economic conservatives, evangelical Christians, and Mormons are finding common political cause in resisting changes in American society. However you may personally feel about the changes in our society (from gay marriage to a greater role for government), I want to encourage you to think carefully about how this marriage of economics, politics, and religion can impact our ability to share the gospel. [Related Article: Why I No Longer Call Myself An Evangelical.]
We are surrounded by a non-Christian culture that perceives Christians (especially evangelical Christians) as mean, angry, and moralistically judgmental. They perceive the Christian message as a message of morality and doctrine: Do what we say, and believe what we say, and God won’t roast you over a fire for all eternity.
When we use our email, our Facebook accounts, and our conversations to publicly ally ourselves with the elements of American political life that say “America is a Christian nation” and “America needs to turn back to God,” we are only reinforcing this distasteful image of the gospel in the minds of our non-believing friends, family, and neighbors.
I think we need to be focused on one core message to everyone we know:
You are the Father’s beloved child in Jesus Christ. Believing or non-believing, Muslim, Hindu, or Jewish, straight or gay, good or bad—you and I are part of the same world and the same Triune Life. We are all Americans and we are all the brothers and sisters of Jesus.
Only then will those who do not believe in their adoption begin to really understand how much their Father in heaven loves them.
~ Jonathan Stepp
Gospel Emergency!
Filed under: By Tim Brassell, Christian Living, Gospel, Relationships, Trinity | Tags: Gospel, Jesus, Perichoresis, Relationships, Trinity
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A few weeks ago I had a gospel emergency come to my direct attention. It literally came knocking at my front door in the form of my 16 year old neighbor Marcus. I had just finished exercising and stripped down to my basketball shorts and a t-shirt for a shower when I heard the door bell ringing. The timing was not good, so I almost didn’t answer it, but I decided to at least look through the peep hole. I noticed Marcus standing there and I must admit a little frustration at first. I thought that, as usual, he was wanting to visit one of my daughters and try to “talk some game” and I wasn’t in the mood for it, so I backed away and headed toward the showers. However, he kept at it persistently and way past the “I’m here to see one of your daughter’s” kind of door-ringing, so I relented and went to the door planning to tell him “No visitors at the moment!” But, lo and behold, as soon as I opened the door I saw more clearly that he was holding his left arm and that his left hand actually looked a little burnt and then he began yelling asking me to call 911 because his kitchen was on fire! The Holy Spirit sprung me into immediate helpful action and I called 911, followed the operators directions, and helped Marcus with his situation until all three firetrucks and an ambulance arrived. I am happy to say that Marcus got the kitchen fire out (not without some damage to himself or the kitchen, but the fire didn’t spread elsewhere, thankfully!) and the fire department handled their business and saved the day in record time!
I call this a Gospel emergency because I now understand how much it REALLY IS one! Because of the Good News of Who Jesus is as the Father’s Son made forever human I now understand WHO is behind the preservation of the entire humanity of all of humanity.Taking Jesus seriously, we are educated in the fact that it is not simply Marcus or me, or the 911 operator, or the fireman and ambulance drivers, or YOU, making that preservation stuff up on our own! Seeing that Jesus has dignified and bestows upon humanity and creation the highest nobility and favor by becoming and remaining human forever, and including us in His relationship with His Father in the Spirit, it only makes Gospel sense that we find ourselves wanting to do what He has done in Himself…preserve our humanity and see it saved! Plus, we get a HUGE hint of the heart of God the Father, Son and Spirit before the Incarnation when they plainly say that They “take no pleasure in anyone who dies” (Ezekiel 18:32).
Yes, through Jesus, see not only a statistic about the dangers of cooking in a kitchen but see the Inclusive, Life-saving God Who made and preserves us in such a way that a burning kitchen fire incites a young man’s entire body to be put at risk to put out the fire so that he and grandmother’s house is preserved and their relational space survives! And not only put out the fire, but run next door to a neighbor and ring a doorbell furiously, filling his lungs up with air, and moving his tongue to yell intensely at the neighbor, asking for help to find more help! And not only ask for more help, but compel the neighbors body to move and actually help, dialing a phone with his fingers, and placing such concern in his heart that he himself runs outside while submitting to the unknown operators voice commands, while also praying, watching out for more fire, and being like a father to the young man, Marcus! I mean actually feeling a heart of love for him – “the game talking” grief of my daughters father! 🙂
We are not only fearfully and wonderfully made, I am happy to report, in the Good News of Who Jesus is, that we are also fearfully and wonderfully, eternally preserved! (By the way, I am happy to report that Marcus had no major damage to his hand although the areas that were burned were 3rd degree burns and we, now, greet each other everyday with, dare I say, more Love? Too bad it sometimes takes fires, but thanks be to the Relational Triune God Who burns passionately and redeems things even in the middle of them!)
~ Timothy J. Brassell
The Father and The Son
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Christian Living, Gospel, Relationships, Trinity | Tags: Bible, Christian Living, Jesus, Perichoresis, Trinity
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The love of God the Father for his Son Jesus Christ, in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, is the fundamental reality of all existence. That means that we need to read every verse of the Bible and interpret every aspect of our lives in the light of the Father and the Son. What would that look like?
We would never think of sin, judgment, redemption, humanity, heaven, hell or anything else in the Bible without defining those subjects based on the way a good and loving Father loves his beloved Son. For example: would a good, loving father torture his son for all eternity even if the son was sorry for what he’d done? No, only a psychotic monster would do that. Therefore anyone who “goes to hell” can leave hell any time they want to.
We would never let the bad stuff in life define God, we would let the Son, Jesus Christ, define God. For example: if my life doesn’t work out the way I want it to, does that mean that God is against me or doesn’t love me? No! Jesus tells me that his Father is 100% on my side and always working for my good. Therefore I believe that all things will work together for my good because of how much the Father loves me in and through the life of his beloved Son.
God is the foundational basis of all reality and existence and he is a loving, good Father loving his beloved Son in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Always read everything in existence with that truth as your guiding principle.
~ Jonathan Stepp
Lady Gaga and the Good News
Filed under: By Nan Kuhlman, Gospel, Uncategorized | Tags: being famous with God, C.S. Lewis, Ellen Degeneres, good news, Lady Gaga, loving yourself, pop culture, Religion, self-worship, Weight of Glory
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Lady Gaga was a recent guest on Ellen Degeneres’s talk show, and interestingly enough, she touched on the topic of religion:
“Pop culture is our religion, and through self-worship (in terms of your identity, through honoring your identity and really fighting for who you are every single day down to your core) you can have more faith and more hope in life and in the future.” Lady Gaga to Ellen Degeneres, 7/21/11.
She went on to describe how she spends five minutes a day in meditation, thinking compassionate thoughts about herself. “Love who you are. You’re all you’ve got,” Gaga encouraged the audience.
I actually think that, without realizing it, Lady Gaga aptly addressed the issue that has plagued humankind since the Fall. We want someone to give us value, even as broken and messed up as we are. We want someone to love us.
Lady Gaga was right that pop culture is a religion for many people. By this, I mean that we tend to think if we conform to what the media tells us is acceptable, we will be loved and valued. Usually this involves buying the right jeans or shampoo or car. Religion implies that we have to do something to receive something, and the concept of relationship is completely missing from the picture.
Unfortunately, her advice to direct compassionate thoughts toward oneself as a means of boosting self-love falls short. Why? We all have this built-in need to be approved of and accepted by someone we perceive as greater than ourselves. Gaga’s advice, while well-intentioned, will never fill that hole. As C.S. Lewis puts it, what we truly want is “fame” with God:
“To please God…to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness…to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son –it seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is” (Weight of Glory).
When we fully comprehend that we are pleasing to the Father, Son, and Spirit with all of our faults, we finally understand that any self-admiration we might feel for any good we have done will never fill the hole in hearts. Lewis calls it “the most creaturely of pleasures…the specific pleasure of the inferior: the pleasure of a beast before men, a child before its father, a pupil before his teacher, a creature before its Creator.” The beautiful thing is that we already have this “fame” with the Triune God. We are loved and accepted without reserve, without requirement.
Lady Gaga is to be commended for her kind encouragement to “fight for who you are” and “love who you are,” although I don’t think that self-worship will bring about the hope and healing she speaks of. Even though she is famous worldwide and fast becoming a pop-culture icon, the good news for Lady Gaga is that she (and we) are already “famous” with God. And we didn’t have to do a thing.
~by Nan Kuhlman
~photo courtesy of www.robotceleb.com
The Trinitarian Faith
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Gospel, The Plan of Adoption, Trinity | Tags: Christianity, Doctrine, Jesus, Perichoresis, T.F. Torrance, The Trinitarian Faith, Theology, Trinity
Leave a comment One of my favorite works of theology has become The Trinitarian Faith by T.F. Torrance. I am currently working my way through it for a second time, highlighting and underlining as I go. In this book Torrance goes line by line through the Nicene Creed and shows the Biblical basis for the Creed as well as the thinking of the Church Fathers who lived at that time and wrote the document.
To whet your appetite for the book, I offer this excerpt, taken from his discussion of the Creed’s statement about the Son and the Fathers’ writings about what the reality of Christ means for humanity.
Athanasius . . . insisted on the universal range of the vicarious work of Christ . . . due to the fact that it was not just a man who suffered and died for us but the Lord as man, not just the life of a man that was offered to save us but the life of God as man. . . . he never tired of asserting that what Christ accomplished . . . applied to all without any qualification. . . the profound interaction between incarnation and atonement in Jesus . . . has the effect of finalising and sealing the ontological relations between every man and Jesus Christ. . . he [Jesus] has now anchored human nature in his own crucified and risen being, freely giving it participation in the fullness of God’s grace and blessing embodied in him. Since he is the eternal Word of God by whom and through whom all things that are made are made, and in whom the whole universe of visible and invisible realities coheres and hangs together, and since in him divine and human natures are inseparably united, then the secret of every man, whether he believes it or not, is bound up with Jesus for it is in him that human contingent existence has been grounded and secured. ~ The Trinitarian Faith, pp. 182-183
~ Jonathan Stepp
Happy St. Irenaeus’ Day!
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Church, Gospel, Trinity | Tags: Gospel, Irenaeus, Jesus, Perichoresis, Theology, Trinity
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Today is the feast day of St. Irenaeus of Lyons. His careful and passionate explanation of the gospel is enormously helpful in understanding what the Bible means when it says that Christ has made all people right with God (Rom. 5:18.)
As you may know, the life of a saint is celebrated on the day of his or her death, not the day of their birth, because the day he died is the day he was born into eternal life. So, today is the traditional date given for Irenaeus’ death by the Catholic and Anglican churches. The Eastern Orthodox churches celebrate him on August 23.
Irenaeus was bishop of Lyons, France, around 180-200 A.D. He wrote several books, only two of which have survived to this day intact: Against Heresies and The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching.
Against Heresies is the longer, more famous and more entertaining of the two. In it he defends and explains the gospel by contrasting the teaching that the Church had received from the apostles with the heretical ideas running rampant in some Christian circles at the time. In one of my favorite parts of the book Irenaeus addresses the question of whether Adam is saved. He says:
. . . inasmuch as humanity is saved, it is fitting that he who was created the original human should be saved. For it is too absurd to maintain that he who was so deeply injured by the enemy, and was the first to suffer captivity, was not rescued by Him who conquered the enemy, but that his children were — those whom he had begotten in the same captivity. Neither would the enemy appear to be as yet conquered, if the old spoils remained with him. ~ Against All Heresies, Book 3, Chap. 23, Para. 2 .
There are two aspects of this statement that hit me like a ton of bricks when I first read it:
The Resurrected Christ lifts Adam and Eve, and thus humanity, from the grave.
1. He believes that the teaching of the apostles is the salvation of humanity in Christ. The gospel is not a message about how some lucky few have been elected for salvation or how some lucky few can save themselves by their faith. It is a declaration of the deliverance of humanity from captivity in Jesus the Redeemer (cf. Rom. 5:18, Col. 1:19-20.)
2. His primary image of Christ’s work does not involve God beating Jesus to death instead of beating us to death. His primary image is of Jesus defeating Satan our enemy and rescuing us from captivity (cf. Col. 2:15, Heb. 2:14-15.)
These two realities hit me like a ton of bricks because I realized that no one in modern, American Evangelicalism talks this way about Christ and the gospel. How many sermons have you ever heard that explain Christ’s saving work as a victorious triumph over Satan, sin and death? Or how many sermons have you heard about how Adam and all his descendants have been saved in Jesus? I had never heard or preached such a sermon until about six years ago. Now, if you come to one of the churches I pastor, that is all you will hear!
And, by the way, Irenaeus was not a universalist. He understands that all humanity has been adopted into the life of the Trinity and saved from the devil, but that doesn’t mean that all humanity believes this truth about themselves. In our distinction we can still choose to believe the enemy’s lie that we are his captives, even when the truth is that Jesus has rescued us all.
Here is my prayer of thanksgiving for Irenaeus:
Loving Father, thank you for rescuing Adam and all his children from death and captivity through your Son Jesus Christ, the last and greatest Adam. Jesus, we thank you for the lives of all those faithful ministers of the gospel who have gone before us and handed on to us the teaching of the apostles and the words of the Bible. We especially thank you for pouring out the Holy Spirit on Irenaeus so that he could work with you to preserve the light of the truth in the midst of dark times. May we also walk in step with you, Holy Spirit, and be able to stand firmly for the good news of humanity’s redemption as Irenaeus did. In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
~ Jonathan Stepp
God’s Justice
Filed under: By Jonathan Stepp, Evangelism, Gospel, The Plan of Adoption, Trinity | Tags: Atonement, Forgiveness, Hell, Jesus, Justice, Perichoresis, Sin, Trinity
Comments (8) Here’s a common question I hear about Trinitarian Theology: If all of humanity is reconciled to the Father in Christ, what about God’s justice?
Consider two different administrations of justice: One would be a judge sentencing a criminal. The Judge is bound by the law because the rule of law is greater than him. He must sentence the convicted felon to a fine, prison, or even execution. Another administration of justice would be the way a Father treats his children. If one child is hurting the other the Father may choose any number of methods, including punishment, in order to discipline his children.
Here is the main difference between these two methods of justice: the Father who disciplines his children is doing so in order to restore relationship. The purpose of the Father’s justice in his family is to set right the relationships that had gone wrong and restore peace. The Judge sentencing the criminal is doing nothing more than trying to protect society and, in some philosophical sense, exact a measured retribution against the offender on society’s behalf. Sometimes the sentencing of criminals involves a plan for their rehabilitation but such mercy is not required for legal justice to be served.
So, which idea of justice is closer to who God is? Is God the divine Judge who is subject to the law and must administer that law according to the sentencing guidelines established within it? And here’s a bonus question: if God were subject to the law then wouldn’t that make the law really God? Or, is God a Father who loves his Son in the love of the Holy Spirit? Is the ultimate truth about God his judgeship or his identity as Father, Son and Spirit?
Perhaps we can now see why the doctrine of the Trinity is not just “a” doctrine, it is “the” doctrine of the Christian faith. In order to correctly define any aspect of human existence – including a concept such as “justice” – we must start with the Father’s love for the Son and with humanity’s inclusion in that love through the Son’s life as the man Jesus Christ (Rom. 5:18, Col. 1:19-20, Eph. 2:15, 1 Tim. 4:10.) If we don’t start there then we don’t have the right idea of justice.
God disciplines us for our good ~ Heb. 12:10
Is God just? Yes. He is just in the way that only a perfect, loving Father can be. Everything he does, from the forgiveness of sins to the disciplining of his children, is done with one goal in mind: to help humanity live out the reality of who we already are in Christ. We are his beloved children through his Son Jesus Christ, baptized in the Spirit (Acts 2:17; 2 Cor. 5:18-20.) The justice of God the Trinity is about bringing peace and right relationship into his family and therefore it is not about torture, eternal imprisonment, or legal games such as “you have until sundown to figure out who Jesus is and if you don’t then you’re screwed.”
Consider these two scenarios:
1. A teenage boy who lives next door to you (let’s call him Joey) comes over one day and tells you about what happened at his house the night before. He tells you that he drank several beers with his friends and then came in past curfew. His older brother Frank saw him sneaking in and said “you better look out, Dad is going to kill you!” Just then, Joey’s Dad walked in the room, smelled the beer on Joey’s breath and in a rage his Dad picked up a baseball bat and chased him around the house screaming “I’m going to kill you for breaking my rules!” Suddenly, Frank stepped between him and their Dad and said “don’t beat him, beat me instead!” And so the Dad beat Frank unconscious. And then Joey says his Dad turned to him and said “you see, Joey, how much I love you? I beat Frank up instead of you. Now, you better believe in Frank’s sacrifice for you or I’m still going to beat you with a bat, except then I won’t just beat you unconscious the way I beat Frank, I will beat you with this bat forever, no matter how sorry you may be someday for breaking my rules.”
2. Joey comes over and tells you how he came home last night past curfew after having several beers with his friends. His brother Frank caught him sneaking in the house and said, “Joey, this is dangerous! I love you and we’ve got to talk to Dad about this.” Joey admits that Frank made him so mad (and he was a little bit drunk) that he started punching Frank. But Frank didn’t hit him back, he just dragged him into the next room where their Dad was. Their Dad then had a long talk with Joey about why teenagers shouldn’t be drinking and why he has a curfew. Then Joey tells you that his Dad grounded him for 3 months and is going to make him paint their entire house.
Which version of the story displays the justice of a loving Father? And which version of the story would prompt you to call the police?
~ Jonathan Stepp