I HAVE OPENED MY NEW BLOG @: http://growrag.wordpress.com Mirifica Commutatio . I HAVE AN OPENING POST UP OVER THERE ALREADY, IT IS ON PRAYER. I HOPE YOU ALL FOLLOW ME OVER THERE, AND UPDATE YOUR BLOGROLLS AND RSS FEEDS!  Actually, I have just moved ‘The Evangelical Calvinist” over to this new url. See you there.

I know I have done this before, but I am serious this time . Many other bloggers at the moment (in the sphere within which I travel) have taken this season to “archive” their blogs, and move onto other endeavors; it seems like the season to do such things — and now an opportunity for me to “archive” The Evangelical Calvinist. This has been a good place for me to get me thoughts out on this stuff, and has aided in the production of our yet forthcoming book on Evangelical Calvinism. But my interests are expanding, and since this blog, by and large, has been dedicated as a “topical” blog (dealing with issues surrounding Calvinism, etc.); and insofar as my research interests are expanding, it is time to put this blog (as far as my activity) to sleep. I won’t delete this blog, instead I will “archive” it, and it will become a “place-holder” and a continued on-line presence for Evangelical Calvinism. Once our book is published, I will most likely write an update post here wherein the book will have an on-line advertisement, and exposure. Thank you all, you kind readers for spending some of your time with me here.

I will be setting up a new blog, maybe later today (I’ll never, probably not be blogging somewhere). Once it is all set up, I will attach an addendum to this post with a new url so you all can find me (if you want). My motivation, at least here, for blogging, is somewhat on the wane. Nevertheless, the new forthcoming blog should help spark my interests and motivations for blogging once again. I intend on writing a lot more on issues surrounding biblical studies, the ontology of scripture, and hermeneutics. These are interests of mine, and have been for many many years. I am going to try and incorporate a lot more of my areas of formal training into my forthcoming blog; which means writing in the area of hermeneutics and Historical Theology. Stay tuned for the addendum to this blog, and the new url for my new blog; I am still trying to conceive of what it will be called, and who will be hosting it (either WordPress or Blogger, probably the latter).

pax.

My point, I don’t see “Evangelical Calvinism” as a cliche; nor, though, do I see it as the end all or even what really matters (in “name”) in the presence of the Lord. Evangelical Calvinism captures a mood, and that mood is shaped by an ethos and a set of conceptual contours that are real, biblical, and evangelical; only because its trajectory starts with the idea that God is love demonstrated in Jesus Christ!

Just a little testimony.

For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6. who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time. ~I Timothy 2.5-6

Or John the Theologian says it like this:

14. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. . . . 19. Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20. The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will you raise it up in three days?” 21. But he was speaking about the temple of his body. 22. When therefore he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. ~John 1.14; 2.19-22

And Thomas Torrance said it like this:

(iv) Jesus Christ is the place where God and man meet in space and time

In order to express this more positively, let us turn back to the incarnation for a moment. Jesus Christ, the man Jesus, is the place in this physical world of space and time where God and man meet and where they have communion with one another. The temple in the Old Testament was the place where God has put his name, where he kept tryst [sic] with his covenanted people and where they kept covenant with him. Jesus Christ is that temple of God on earth and among mankind where God has put his name, and where he has appointed us to meet him. It is the place where heaven and earth meet, the place of reconciliation within our historical existence in flesh and blood. Jesus Christ is himself among us God’s mercy-seat, God’s place in the world where he is really present to us in our place. (Thomas F. Torrance, “Atonement,” 287)

Do you think Torrance’s articulation helps provide further grammar for what the Apostles Paul and John both wrote? It’s interesting, from Torrance’s approach, how all of the liturgy of the Old Testament and creation itself; finds its purpose in a person. I wonder what this implies about heaven, and what it will look like?

Torrance is discussing the impact that dualistic Hellenism has had upon Western-thought-forms; namely the precedence that classical thought has given to the optical mode of thinking and verification (so the obsession with empericism, etc.). TFT is highlighting the impact that this methodology and epistemology can have upon our construal of God’s “Father-hood” and “Son-hood,” and how Christian/Patrisitic theology, primarily through Athanasius’ influence, eschewed this “Hellenising” effect by reifying it through Christian ontology.

The contrast between Christianity and Hellenism could hardly be greater than at this fundamental level, where biblical patterns of thought governed by the Word of God and the obedient hearing of faith (υπακοη της πιτεως) conflict sharply with those of Greek religion and philosophy. The issue came to its head in the Arian controversy over the Father – Son relation at the heart of the Christian Gospel. Are the terms ‘father’ and ‘son’ to be understood as visual, sensual images taken from our human relations and then projected mythologically into God? In that event how can we avoid projecting creaturely gender into God, and thinking of him as grandfather as well as father, for the only kind of father we know is one who is son of another father? To think of God like that, in terms of the creaturely content of images projected out of ourselves, inevitably gives rise to anthropomorphic and polymorphic notions of deity and in fact to polytheism and idolatry. However, if we think from a centre in God as he reveals himself to us through his Word incarnate in Jesus Christ, then we know him as Father in himself in an utterly unique and incomparable way which then becomes the controlling standard by reference to which all notions of creaturely fatherhood and sonship are to be understood. ‘God does not make man his pattern , but rather, since God alone is properly and truly Father, we men are called fathers of our own children, for of him every fatherhood in heaven and earth is named.’ Unique Fatherhood and unique Sonship in God mutually define one another in an absolute and singular way. As Athanasius pithily expressed it in rejection of Arian anthropocentric mythologising: ‘Just as we cannot ascribe a father to the Father, so we cannot ascribe a brother to the Son’. (T. F. Torrance, “The Trinitarian Faith,” 69-70)

Out Of Bounds

. . . May Theodore Beza comfort your soul:

In order to resist this second [temptation], it is necessary to know if we have this faith or not. The means is to ascend (monter) from the effects (effets) to a knowledge of the cause (cause) which produces them. Now, the effects (effets) that Jesus Christ produces in us, when we have apprehended him by faith, are two. In the first place, there is the testimony that the Holy Spirit gives to our spirit, that we are children of God . . . . Secondly, . . . when by faith Jesus Christ has given himself to us eternally in order to dwell in us, his virtue produces and reveals there his powers, which are known in Scripture by the word “regeneration” . . . . This regeneration has three parts . . . . The power of Jesus Christ coming to take possession of us produces three effects (effets) in us: the mortification of this corruption which Scripture calls the old man, his burial, and finally, the resurrection of the new man . . . . To know this regeneration it is necessary to come to its fruits. Thus, . . . the man, being set free from sin . . . begins to do what we call good works (4.13).

Need more:

[Good works] make us more and more certain of our salvation, not as causes of it, but as testimonies and effects (effets) of the cause (cause), that is, our faith . . . . Since good works are for us sure testimonies of our faith, it follows that they also make us certain of our eternal election . . . . So then, when Satan puts us in doubt about our election, it is not necessary to first go and search for the decision of the eternal plan (conseil) of God; his majesty would dazzle us. But, on the contrary, it is necessary to begin with the sanctification which one experiences in oneself, and to climb higher (monter plus haut). Since our sanctification, from which proceeds good works, is a sure effect (effet) of faith, or rather of Jesus Christ is necessarily called and elected by God to salvation, . . . it follows that sanctification with its fruits is the first step (le premeier degre) by which we begin to ascend (monter) all the way to the first and true cause (la premier . . . vraye cause) of our salvation, that is, our eternal and gratuitous election (4.19).

– Theodore Beza quoted from his, “Confession de la Foy (1558),” in “Adaptations of Calvinism in Reformation Europe,” 64-5 ed. Matt P. Holt

Rest now my weary souls! Look to the decree and find rest . . .

How can anyone read this, and say, “yep, this is pure ‘Gospel’ truth?” Let me just say, with all of my attitude in-tact, that I realize folks like Beza & co. were just working with the theological tools they had (they didn’t know any better). What’s your excuse? Have you paid attention to the kind of spirituality that this kind of stuff produced in the ensuing years following . . .

There are too many people, who I care about, stuck under this kind of ‘spirituality’, one that doesn’t invite them into the loving arms of Jesus; but instead calls them to the courtroom of the ‘Divine Law-giver’, and asks them to examine themselves to see if they think that they have evinced enough ‘good works’ to be found worthy to look at the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Typically folks, who are serious about this, never get past the moment they wake up. The kind of ‘spirituality’ shaped by a Bezan framework can only lead to one place . . . despair, bewilderment, and wonderment over whether or not Christ died for me. I know, I know, you hold to something similar that Beza speaks of here, and you have no problems this way at all — well your special then. But, I know (personally) folks who aren’t so assured; and it’s because this kind of soteriology is taken seriously by them, even if they know, intellectually, that they are saved (thanks to the practical syllogism), yet they can’t shake the implicaitons of this kind of salvific project. They can’t get past the idea that God is this Sovereign Law-giver who decrees that some are elect, and the rest reprobate; that He died for some, and maybe not them (they’re not totally sure, since they’re good works aren’t really measuring up today). Anyway . . .

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. ¹⁵ “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. ¹⁶ By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? ¹⁷ Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. ¹⁸ A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. ¹⁹ Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. ²⁰Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. ²¹ “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. ²² Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ ²³ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’ ~Matthew 7:13-23 (NIVr)

I am simply going to offer some observations—versus brute exegesis—on this passage. My hope will be to suggest an alternative frame from which to read this pericope; contra the one Tim Challies, and most (at least Calvinist) interpreters view this from.

My first suggestion would be to look at the context wherein this passage is situated. Jesus is talking about his disciples, and warning them to be wary of false prophets. The idea of false prophets for the Jew would not be foreign; Israel very early on, in the Torah, is warned about false propehts. In fact Yahweh makes clear that the way his people could know if they were in the presence of false prophets would be if what they prophesied came to pass or not. Likewise, Jesus develops this line of thought (found in passages like Deut. 13; 18:21-22) for his disciples, now, to be able to identify these all too common of characters (“wolves”) amongst God’s people. Jesus says that these kinds of characters will be those who think because they spoke in a “holy language,” did miracles (maybe like Elisha), or all kinds of ”sacred” acts; that this would be grounds for them to enter into the kingdom of the Messiah. So the primary issue and context is that Jesus is indicating that just as there always has been false prophets in Israel, there still is; and thus always will be, even until the end.

What the contextual markers suggest to me, is that the way that it is usally used—like the way Tim Challies is using it—is not what Jesus was intending to deal with or answer. In other words, when someone in the 21st century reads this passage (uncritically) through a 16th & 17th century set of theological assumptions; that this lens yields an impact on said exegetes’ interpretive decisions in a way that would make them think that this text’s primary intention is to discuss issues surrounding justification, sanctification, & glorification (with all of the dogmatic assumptions surrounding that, which was given shape within the post-Reformed caldron of development).

All of this to say, I believe that Tim Challies’ (and anyone else like him) appropriation of this passage does not parallel or correlate with what Jesus originally was intending to teach his disciples. The context in Matthew does not seem to be providing a matrix for a teaching on the fine points of justification. Instead, it seems to be dominical teaching about the fact that there are false prophets in Israel who will seek to establish their own righteousness (cf. Mt. 5.17-20); through good works, prophesying (even in the “Messiah’s” name), healing people (see the sons of Sceva cf. Acts 19.11-20), etc. And therefore, Jesus’ disciples should be wary and aware of such characters; even in the environs God’s people. In brief, Jesus’ intention was not for this text to become paradigmatic for our idiosyncratic and dogmatic machinations upon our broader concerns relative to a theory of salvation.

My conclusion, without actually engaging in exegesis, is even upon simple observational reflection; the way this classic text is utilized is unwarranted, and in fact makes this pericope walk on all fours toward an end that it was never intended. I would propose that the reason this kind of interpretation has become dominant amongst Western interpreters (even Leon Morris interprets this passage like Challies; e.g. “Calvinistically”) is because a certain strain and mode of theological discourse has become dominant in these here parts. Which will lead me, naturally, to at least a couple more posts of looking at what the informing theological grid must be for Tim Challies to come to the conclusions that he does about the possibility for there to be what can really only be called temporary faith.

PS. My mom is coming into town for an extended weekend (through Monday); so it might not be until early next week that I get my next post up on this . . . we’ll see. I actually think my next post in response to Challies will be on how the “analogy of scripture” and the “analogy of faith” should impact the theological assumptions that we bring to Matthew 7 interpretively. I am afraid that what is happening, in Challies’ case, is the usual situation, wherein the interpreter comes to the text with the idea that s/he does not have a prior commitment to a theological tradition that impinges upon and informs said exegetes’ interpretive conclusions relative to whatever text happens to be under consideration. We all do, and I think it best to admit that up front. I think if we would do that we would be more able to be critical in our exegetical endeavors. In other words, Challies just assumes his interpretive tradition (5 point Calvinism), without apparently wondering how that is shaping his questions about assurance supposedly found in Matthew 7.