The Trinity and John's Gospel

I picked this book up at EMA in June. I like the series, well, not ever volume, but most of them are very good. Biblical theology is a hobby of mine and this book is a very good example of excellent biblical theology.

The authors give us a really good example of biblical studies providing a strong foundation for theological reflection.

The Bible is, after all, a profoundly theological document. Readings that fail to move beyond literary and genetic/historical issues to substantive doctrinal ones thus fail to grasp the Bible’s main subject matter. (pages 20-21)

No fear with this work, theological reflection is the final aim, but the route to it is through detailed study of the text of scripture. John’s gospel is the source and verse by verse, section by section a detailed account of what John writes about God, and how this is fully Trinitarian is carefully built up. Chapters 2 to 6 are entirely given over to a study and synthesis of what John’s gospel contributes to our understanding of God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The biblical studies are excellent, the theological reflections start from the text and build four square upon what has been learned from John’s gospel. Jesus is shown to be God theos, in the whole gospel – note the inclusio 1:1, 18 and 20:28. But also in the references which include Jesus in the monotheistic character and nature of God, theos.

I don’t want to fall into blogging another long book review, although that would be very easy from this great book. Buy the book, read the book and share with me how much you have benefitted from it.

Just one more quote, on the author’s approach to their work:
we have read the Fourth Gospel with awe and wonder and with prayerful dependence upon ‘the Spirit of truth’ (14:17; 15:26; 16:13). (page 23)

May we all so read every page of scripture and find there displayed for us the glory of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Tom Wright Justification 2

Chapter 2 – Rules of engagement.

In the long term, this may be one of the most important chapters in Wright’s book. Here Wright sets out a methodology for the study of Paul and/or justification. So often in church life today there is disagreement about theology or praxis which arises in large part from the different starting places and varied assumptions made by those taking part in the debates.

Wright contends that exegesis “close attention to the actual flow of the text, to the questions that it raises in itself and the answers it given in and of itself” (page 23) is the beginning and end of the task of understanding Paul and justification.

Systematise all you want in between; we all do it, there is nothing wrong with it and much to be said for it, particularly when it involves careful comparing of different treatments of similar topics in different contexts. But start with exegesis, and remind yourself that the end in view is not a tidy system, sitting in hard covers on a shelf where one may look up ‘correct answers’, but the sermon, or the shared pastoral reading, or the scriptural word to a Synod or other formal church gathering, or indeed the life of witness to the love of God, through all of which the church is built up and energized for mission, the Christian is challenged, transformed and nurtured in the faith, and the unbeliever is confronted with the shocking but joyful news that the crucified and risen Jesus is the Lord of the world. That is letting scripture be scripture. (pages 23-24)

Yes, what a wonderful paragraph! Any attempt to study scripture, to know God in any meaningful way involves theology. We cannot but have a theology, so we might as well have one that is well thought through and holds together well (a good systematics). But, too often we have allowed the system to control our reading of the text. We instinctively reject readings of scripture that don’t fit in with the system we hold. We look for answers in the big system rather than in the text of scripture. I heard Phillip Jensen at the EMA in 1997 tell us that he thinks Calvinists have a real problem with this. Thinking that Calvin’s system is so good we cannot imagine the text of scripture ever disagreeing with Calvin, so we amend our understanding of scripture to fit in with what we think Calvin wrote, although most times we have that wrong as well! So a big yes to having a good systematic theology, but a massive no (or even a Pauline me genoito) to allowing our system to take priority over our exegesis. It is good exegesis that will bring God’s word with power into all of the situations described by Wright at the end of the paragraph, and how great is the need for a clear statement of scripture in our churches and church courts.

Wright makes a good case for the inclusion of Ephesians in any study of Paul and justification, pages 26-28. It is curious how often conservative readings of justification do not attend to Ephesians, or Colossians for that matter.

Wright then suggests that we need to develop ‘A Hermeneutics of Doctrine’ (page 28 and following). There is a hermeneutic circle of theology and theological interpretation. Luther and Calvin were not only influenced by Augustine and the New Testament, but by all the theology that had been written and taught in between. It is important to consider which theological technical terms are not biblical, e.g. ‘the imputation of Christ’s righteousness’ and what associations are gathering into theology by the use of the Latin term iustitia? Now this is not to say that non biblical terms cannot be wisely used to help us understand scripture, rather that we do this too often without being aware of it and we do need to remind ourselves of the theological baggage we bring to scripture.

As an historian Wright is always concerned about historical questions.
We come with the questions and issues we have learned from elsewhere [other than scripture]. This is a perennial problem for all of us, but unless we are to declare, here and now, that God has no more light to break out of his holy word – that everything in scripture has already been discovered by our elders and betters and that all we have to do is read them to find out what scripture says – then further research, precisely at a historical level, is what is needed. I know that John Calvin would have agreed wholeheartedly with this. (page 33)

Wright is not saying that God will give fresh revelations of himself other than scripture (that’s a whole different discussion!). His point is this: can we in our study of scripture understand God’s word more clearly than earlier generations of students? If not, why do we study scripture, we should print text with Augustine, Luther and Calvin, like some Christian Gemora, and learn to interpret the few chosen interpreters. But, if we do believe that God will lead us in our study of scripture into his ways, not previously known, then historical study, not only of scripture but of theology is urgently required.

Wright ends this chapter with a complaint against contemporary English translations of Paul, particularly the NIV. In particular Wright mentions the translation of Rom 3:21-26

NIV - Romans 3:21 But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished-- 26 he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

I’ve copied the text above and you can see that the NIV has used ‘righteousness’ in vv. 21, 22, but justified, justice, just, justifies in vv. 24-26, which the same dikaisoun- root is used in the Greek. (I tried to copy the NA27 text but this blog post doesn't hold that font) Wright’s point is that this variety in English usage sets up a particular way of reading vv. 21-22 which is not what Paul intended. This point will be picked up in great detail in chapter 7 when Wright offers comments on Romans.

Three main things then:
1. Exegesis needs to have priority over systematic theology.
2. History is important, both in relation to scripture and theology.
3. Read the text, and make sure what you are reading is the text.

Sojourners, US and Politics

If you haven't visited the Sojourners blog it is very good, you can read it here.

They send out emails, and I like this one about a visit to a U2 concert.

U2's Music and Mission--and My Kid's First Rock Concert

Oh no, my eleven-year-old went to his first rock concert this week! Oh good, it was Bono and U2. That would express the feelings of many parents about their child’s introductory rock and roll concert experience. FedEx Field, where the Washington football team plays with much less energy and appeal, was filled with people from bottom to top, in boxes to bleachers, with a sound that seemed to reach every corner of the gigantic stadium, and with lights that inspired admiration and awe.

The stage alone was more than any other contemporary rock band has produced, according to 25 year-olds I know, who really “know” about this stuff. It has been described as a 164-foot high “claw” that loomed over the stadium, to a “cathedral,” to a “spaceship” said Bono, "But it isn't going anywhere without you!"

“Mom, how do you know the words to all these songs?” Luke asked Joy Carroll, who has been singing along with this band for its whole 33-year career. U2 roused the huge crowd with its best tunes like “Beautiful Day,” “Sunday Bloody Sunday,” “Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For;” with the highlight for me coming when Bono began with a solo rendition of “Amazing Grace” that moved right into "Where the Streets Have No Name."

But it was the stunning and extravagant stage, set, and lights of the U2 tour that stole the show. U2 literally lit up the sky and filled the air over the nation’s Capital with a display of sight and sound unlike anything I had ever seen. And in the middle of the show, Joy and I got a light tap on the back, turned around, and lit up ourselves with big smiles as we greeted our long-time friend Willie Williams—the man responsible for the amazing grace of all that light. “I heard you were here, and they told me where you were sitting. So I had to come over and just say hi.” “This is the person responsible for all the lighting,” I told Luke, who could hardly believe this was all happening to him.

And because it was the nation’s Capital, the politicos were all on hand. How many concerts feature shout-outs to Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Judiciary Chair, Patrick Leahy, (who Bono called the “John Wayne” of Washington), or one to Catholic Cardinal Theodore McCarrick , who were all on hand. “Can you believe it,” cried Bono, “A Cardinal at a rock concert!” And we even got to come in on the One Campaign bus with the Cardinal!
“Politics” was indeed part of the concert, not the partisan politics that dominate Washington D.C. – (Bono made it a point to praise politicians on “both the left and the right” who have cared about places like Africa, he even dedicated a song to President Bush for increasing foreign aid) – but the moral politics that characterize Bono’s clarion call to conscience and action which echoed throughout the evening.

In fact, what I love about a U2 concert, headlined by the Irish tenor with the sun glasses, is how it achieves such a powerful combination of art and social justice, music and message; and all with such fun. The New York Times titled its review of the opening concert in Giants stadium as “Fun With a Mission.”

As always on nights with U2, activism for human rights and democracy was lifted up. “Walk On” was dedicated to Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate under house arrest in Burma/Myanmar. “How long has she been under house arrest,” asked Luke. “20 years” I said, and watched the look of concern and indignation on the face of a pre-teenager—at a rock concert. Luke also got to see a short video of a beaming Desmond Tutu, another Nobel Peace Prize winner, talk about “the kind of people” who make a difference in this world, and invited us all to join the One Campaign.

On the way out of the concert, Luke whispered that he had just heard somebody say, “The only thing I don’t like about Bono is his political sh*t.” Luke asked me what he meant. I said there are some people who don’t like the message of Bono and U2, just the music. But it is precisely the incredibly inspiring blend and, dare I say, integration of music, message, and mission that makes U2 not only so compelling; but also so important.

It was a night of mutual affirmation with a band and an adoring audience, their community, who truly seemed to love being together again. It was an evening of joy and justice. The final comment of a first time almost teenager was, of course, “It was awesome,” but, unlike most of the moments and venues where this overused affirmation of the younger generation is invoked, this time it was accurate and appropriate. The concert was truly “awesome.”

Stuart Townend - Slipstream podcast

There is another helpful podcast from the Slipstream team at EA. You can download it here.

I've copied the blub to encourage you to listen to this.

Stuart Townend is a well-known Christian songwriter, worship leader, musician and seminar speaker. He also spends time training emerging worship leaders and songwriters. His latest album Creation Sings was released in May 2009.

Here is a taster from Stuart's podcast interview:
If people don't have a mentor or encourager and they want to test out a calling in worship leading, what are some of the recommendations you could make to them?

I think everyone needs pastoral input. Everyone needs someone speaking into what you do in terms of ministry. If you haven't got that, you look for that, not necessarily in someone who is musically massively gifted, but somebody who pastorally can have input into you as a person, and input into how you interact with the church and how you develop resources for the church...But it's important to have some pastoral input - even if it's your local church pastor. I would be very cautious about people who are writing songs who are not connected into a local church, who are not part of that body of believers. First, because I think that if you do develop ministry, you need support; but secondly, that's where you learn what it's all about. You learn what works as a song by trying it out with your local congregation. That's what keeps you sharp in terms of your writing. Otherwise the tendency is you can go off and write songs, but actually they don't work when people sing them because you're not hearing people sing them. You're not learning your trade, if you like, not learning your craft in the local church...

Download the Slipstream Podcast 18: Stuart Townend podcast (Note: Right-Click / Save As...)

Culture Slaves

I thought this week's Friday Night Theology from the EA was interesting. A good example of how to turn a current news story into an opportunity for the gospel.

It's The Son Wot Won It

There may not be that many FNT subscribers who read the Sun on a regular basis but for those that do the question is whether or not they will change their voting intentions now that Britain’s best-selling daily has come out for the Conservatives.
Of course, the response of the Labour party to this has been that “People win elections, not newspapers.” But is that actually true? Following the Sun’s claim in 1992 that they had changed the election outcome, a number of academic studies set out to demonstrate whether or not they had. The result is that it is unclear, though probably unlikely, that they changed the overall result, but what is clear is that newspapers do influence how people vote.

More broadly, it is also clear that a vast range of media outlets, from books to films to magazines to the web, impact how we think and behave on many fronts. So, when Coronation Street portrayed a character dying from cervical cancer, there was a substantial increase in the take up of cervical screening services. More negatively, a report in 2004 found that 40% of people think that half of all crimes are committed by young people despite the reality being much less. Excessive media reporting of youth crime was considered to be the main culprit for this misapprehension.

And yet, despite all this, when people are asked whether they think that the media influences their personal beliefs and choices, the answer is frequently in the negative. In particular, they consider it to have a strong influence on others, but just not on themselves.

What we have then is the strange situation where clearly the media does impact the public but this is not fully acknowledged by that public whose opinion is being swayed. What makes this worse is that the media themselves usually claim that they do not drive public opinion, they merely reflect it.

In response to all this, perhaps the first thing to note is that none of this is new. The apostle Paul warned us: “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” (Romans 12:2) He knew that we are subject to cultural influences, which is precisely why he actively encouraged us to adopt a different approach: the renewal of our minds in conformity to Christ. Even stronger is 1 John 4:4 which gives us hope that such resistance to cultural patterns is not futile, but can actually succeed: “The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God.”

All of us then, including the church, are prone to social and cultural influences. We may like to think we make our own decisions and form our own beliefs, but the reality is that we swim in a tide of public opinion that is hard to escape. Moreover, subconsciously (if not consciously) we all like to conform. In order, then, to be different we need some other source of knowledge and wisdom to draw upon. That source is, of course, Christ. He provides an alternative base which enables us to think differently from the rest, indeed enables us to think with the mind of God.

So I guess the challenge to our non-Christian friends is to ask whether they want to continue to be slaves to cultural whims, or whether instead they should choose to become slaves of Christ. Whatever else people say about evangelical Christianity, it’s probably the only way to be a cultural rebel these days – and that alone seems a good reason to choose it.

Justin Thacker, Head of Theology

New Blog to Follow

I was directed to a blog by Alan Macgregor, and I know he and I might be the only one's interested - but just is case ...

It's called Evangelical Textual Criticism, and you can view it here.

Long past time for Evangelicals to stop being afraid of academic biblical studies and join in once more.

Evangelicalism in Modern Britain (1)

Some years ago I bought a copy of David Bebbington’s Evangelicalism in Modern Britain (pub Routledge 1989). Bebbington’s book can hardly be described as a page turner, however, it has become a major text in terms of understanding Evangelicalism in an historical context. In the Church of Scotland, and I’m sure other denominations, Evangelical is a slippery term which seems difficult to define and its origins are uncertain if not in dispute. Bebbington’s work is highly commended to anyone interested in understanding Evangelicalism.

I hope to write a series of posts on this important work as an offering towards understanding and communication between Evangelicals and non-Evangelicals especially in the Church of Scotland at this time.

Bebbington begins with an attempt to define Evangelicalism.
Evangelical apologists sometimes explained their distinctiveness by laying claim to particular emphases. … according to Henry Venn in 1835 Evangelical Clery differs from others, ‘not so much in their systematic statement of doctrines, as in the relative importance which they assign to the particular parts of the Christian System, and in the vital operation of Christian Doctrines upon the heart and conduct.’ And Bishop Ryle of Liverpool asserted that it was not the substance of certain doctrines but the prominent position assigned to only a few of them that marked out Evangelical Churchmen from others. … It [the Evangelical tradition] gave exclusive pride of place to a small number of leading principles. (page 2)

What Venn and Ryle are saying here is that Evangelicals do not hold different doctrines from other Christians, but that in their systematic exposition of the Christian faith they give prominence to a few of those, which are not so privileged in other systems of Christian doctrine. I’m sure there is a danger in elevating only a few doctrines amongst others, the obvious danger is of imbalance. There would need to be more said to identify the particular points of doctrine so elevated and a case made for their place in the Evangelical scheme.
I do like Venn’s comment about the vital operation of Christian Doctrines upon the heart and conduct. There is far too much that passes under the name of Christian doctrine or theology that would only move the heart to coldness and leave all matters of conduct to personal preference. For Evangelicals this will not do. If the heart is not affected by our Christian doctrine and our life is not conformed to the likeness of Christ then our doctrine is wrong and needs changed.

Bebbington describes four characteristics which he says emerge clearly from a study of Evangelical history:
conversionism – the belief that lives need to be changed.
activism – the expression of the gospel in effort.
biblicism – a particular regard for the Bible.
crucicentrism – a stress on the sacrifice of Christ on the cross.

These are not elegant terms and should not be widely used. However, they do get to the heart of what is distinctive about Evangelicalism. Of interest, Bebbington can show that for eighteenth century Evangelicals the Bible was not normally put among the most important features of their religion, however, by the time of Bishop Ryle at the end of the nineteenth century the first principle of Evangelical religion is the absolute supremacy it assigns to Holy Scripture. (page 3) In particular the primacy of Scripture was directed against those who exalted the authority of either church or reason. And then in the twentieth century those attributing most importance to Scripture became known as conservatives.
This ‘change’ in the relative importance attached to Scripture is something Bebbington returns to, as we will in later posts.

There is what I find a sad note on page 4,
Instead of the joy of new discovery that pervades eighteenth-century lists of distinctives, there is a resolve to resist an incoming tide of error.
For many resisting error has become the main thing in Evangelical religion in the early twenty-first century. But this cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged. Yes, resisting error is important, the watchman must sound a warning, the sheep must be guarded from the wolves. But is this all Evangelicalism has to offer the church, and more importantly the non-Christian world? I hope not!
And yet, the joy of new discovery doesn't seem quite right. Perhaps what should be more evident in Evangelicalism is that joy in the Lord and in his wonderful gospel which brings to life a confidence and humility in trusting our Lord. We could do with more of this!

I think it will be good to post separately on each of these four distinctives before moving onto the rest of Bebbington’s book, so watch out for more on this theme.