SKJ Today

Its Not About You!

September 20, 2011 // No Comments »

In Against the Protestant Gnostics, Lee contends that for gnostics of all historical types, salvation is about knowledge of the self for the sake of the self, as opposed to knowledge of the mighty acts of God:

As far as the gnostics were concerned, the “many” were overly fascinated by historical happenings, even by the historical events in the life of Christ. Elaine Pagels, writing on the ahistorical views of Heracleon, reports that he claimed: that those who insist that Jesus, a man who lived in the flesh, is Christ fail to distinguish between literal and symbolic truth. . . . Heracleon goes on to say that those who take the events concerning Jesus “literally”—as if the events themselves were revelation—have fallen into flesh and error. Concern about the mighty acts of God in both the Old and New Covenants was from a gnostic perspective a lower stage in the development of an authentic Christian understanding. To know Christ was not in any sense to have knowledge about the “historical man of flesh and blood” but rather to be personally related to the mythical heavenly being who liberates humanity from historical concerns…

…The reason for this totally different concern of the gnostics is their conviction that the root problem of humankind is ignorance. Judaism and Christianity in their orthodox expressions would understand the basic source of all our misery to be sin, humanity’s failure to meet God’s expectations or its own potential; gnosticism would see the human predicament as resulting from a profound blindness concerning the human situation. “Ignorance of the Father,” states the Gospel of Truth, “brought about anguish and terror. And the anguish grew solid like a fog so that no one was able to see.

Posted in Bible, Culture, Hermeneutics, History, Spirituality, theology

What’s In Your Bible?

January 4, 2010 // 1 Comment »

Posted in Bible

Live And Let Die

September 30, 2009 // No Comments »

According to Peter Leithart, Israel’s prophet’s did not preach a legalistic message that aimed at moral reform. They preached an evangelical word. Ever since humanity has lived East of Eden the curse that follows sin is “dying you shall die”. This same curse haunts Israel since the covenant at Sinai. The prophets don’t proclaim: “Israel has sinned; therefore Israel needs to to get its act together or it will die.” The message is, “Israel has sinned; therefore, Israel must die, and its only hope is to entrust itself to a God who will give it new life on the far side of death.” Or, perhaps more simply: “Israel has sinned; Israel is already dead. Cling to the God who raises the dead.” This is the message of 1-2 Kings, which in Leithart’s mind “systematically dismantles Israel’s confidence in everything but the omnipotent mercy and patience of God.”

Posted in Bible

To Fear or Not to Fear

July 30, 2009 // No Comments »

“In his explanation of the commandments, Luther begins every one with these words, ‘We should fear and love God…It is perhaps well known that there are some Christians today who maintain that Luther made a mistake in this. They strike out the ‘fear’ and say that we should love God, nothing more…But when people of our superficial generation have read the the Bible as thoroughly as Luther did, they will see that Luther was right also in this…He has seen that love to God does not exclude fear, but that they mutually strengthen each other…The greater the good in life, the more dangerous it becomes to us, if we misuse it. And since the grace of God is life’s most precious good, grace is more dangerous than anything else int he world, if we misuse it.”-Ole Hallesby, Under His Wings

How does one make sense of a passage like this in light of the most preponderant commandment in Scripture: “Be not afraid”? What about John’s insistence that “perfect love drives out fear”. (1 Jn 4:18)?

There is certainly a sort of fear that is inappropriate for the baptized. Such fear is more likely the product of an unsanctified imagination than a pious heart. Perhaps it’s the sort of fear rooted in the suspicion that when confronted with God, we will meet someone or something much like ourselves. One who reckons, forgives, judges much the same way we do. This is indeed a fearful prospect, but in the end it probably tells us more about ourselves than about God (which as Calvin reminds us isn’t a bad thing, as true knowledge of self will ultimately, by God’s grace, lead us into knowledge of God).

The fear Luther finds appropriate, which the Scriptures tell us is the beginning of wisdom, must be rooted in something much more like the Psalmist speaks of in Psalm 147:

“He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and and his judgments to Israel.
“He has not done so to any other nation; to them he has not revealed his judgments.
Hallelujah!”

It is only when one comes into the embrace of grace that one even glimpses the nature of divine judgment and justice. Von Balthasar gets at something like this in Love Alone Is Credible:

“…the moment we see our sins objectified before us on the Cross, it becomes all the more impossible to leave the One who died for us to his fate; so loveless a thought reveals our whole evil heart to us, love awakens fear in us, and the terrifying reality of being left behind by God (which is timeless as far as the one abandoned is concerned) shows us vividly that hell is no pedagogical threat, it is no mere ‘possibility’. Instead, it is the reality that the God-forsaken one experienced in an eminent way because no one can even approximately experience the abandonment by God as horribly as the Son, who shares the same essence with the Father for all eternity…We are therefore not required to bring a systematically conceived hell into harmony with the love of God and make it credible, or indeed justify it conceptually as love (and not perhaps merely as the revelation of self-glorifying divine justice), because no such system could be constructed out of a possible ‘knowledge’ apart from or beyond love and at the same time related to it. We are required only not to let go of love, the love that believes and hopes through both is suspended in the air so that its Christian wings may grow. Soaring in the air, I also necessarily experience the abyss below, which is only part of my own flight. Similarly, I can speak of hell only in relation to myself, precisely because I can never imagine the possible damnation of another as more likely than my own.”

There is perhaps no more painful fear than that of wounding or betraying one’s beloved. And yet this fear is not possible without first pledging, with one’s whole self, one’s love. Before that, it is abstract, a possibility, one that cannot produce the sort of fear that is rooted in love. Perhaps perfect love drives out imperfect fear, replacing it with a fear that flows from faith, rather than inhibiting it.

Posted in Bible, Spirituality, Uncategorized

What you need to know to understand the Bible…

July 18, 2009 // 1 Comment »

“No one can understand Virgil in his Bucolics and Georgics unless he has been a shepherd or a farmer for fifty years. No one can understand Cicero in his letters unless he has been involved for twenty years in the life of a state. Let no one think that he has tasted Holy Scripture unless he has for a century ecclesias gubernarit and has been responsible for the Church.”-Martin Luther

Posted in Bible, Hermeneutics, History

Hermeneutical Lessons Part Deux…

June 15, 2009 // No Comments »

Posted in Bible, Video

A Very Important Reminder, How You Read The Bible Affects How You Understand Jesus, Watch And Learn…

// 1 Comment »

Posted in Bible, Hermeneutics

Ordain Colbert Tomorrow…

August 20, 2008 // 1 Comment »

…alright, maybe a semester of seminary first. But Colbert points out the simplistic and reductionistic nature of Ehrman’s arguments with…simplicity and reductionism. That’s right people, fight fire with fire, or silly with silly.

Posted in Bible, Culture

The Woes Of Westminster

July 11, 2008 // No Comments »

Several folks have emailed me regarding this article about Westminster Seminary.

Let me say first off that I have a lot of respect for Westminster Seminary and always have. It’s a rigorous place. The students are well trained and I’ve had the pleasure of visiting the campus a number of times. The scholarship at Westminster is first rate and I’ve been blessed to know many fine graduates. That being said, I’m saddened by the way Pete Enns is being treated (and not just because he’s a fellow Messiah grad).

The book in question which has created the controversy is a very responsible piece of scholarship. I don’t know that I’d want to use the metaphor of Incarnation for understanding the Scriptures, but still I like the book. And at a place like Princeton Seminary, Pete would be in the conservative camp. He believes the Bible is the inspired Word of God. He trusts its authority. In his book he attempts, not to undermine biblical authority, but to help pious evangelicals who want to believe in the Bible’s reliability and authority but struggle with issues surrounding its origins and background. For this Professor Enns ought to be lauded, not tried.

Posted in Bible, theology

Suprised By Colbert

June 26, 2008 // No Comments »

N.T. Wright on the Colbert Report. Must watch….

Posted in Bible, Culture, Eschatology