Theology

Bavinck on the “Word of God”

/ davidsschrock

During the month of December, I am preaching on the “Word of God Made Fresh,” looking at how God’s Word in the Old Testament prepares for the Word of God Made Flesh in the New Testament.  In preparation for tomorrow’s sermon, I ran across this captivating quote by Herman Bavinck:

Finally the designation ‘word of God’ is used for Christ himself.  He is the Logos in an utterly unique sense: Revealer and revelation at the same time.  All the revelations and words of God, in nature and history, in creation and re-creation, both in the Old and the New Testament, have their ground, unity, and center in him.  He is the sun; the individual words of God are his rays.  The word fo God in nature, in Israel, in the NT, in Scripture may never even for a moment be separated and abstracted from him.  God’s revelation exists only because he is the Logos.  he is the first principle of cognition, in a general sense of all knowledge, in a special sense, as the Logos incarnate [i.e. ‘the word made flesh’], of all knowledge of God, of religion, and theology (Matt. 11:27) (Reformed Dogmatics: Prolegomena, vol. 1 [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003], 402)

Amen!  Let us worship the Word of God made flesh in Spirit and Truth, and consider all things in the light of God’s perfect revelation (cf. John 1:1-18; Heb. 1:1-2:4).

Soli Deo Gloria, dss

John Murray on Systematic and Biblical Theology

/ davidsschrock

Writing on the relationship between systematic and biblical theology, John Murray writes with great balance, saying

Systematic theology is tied to exegesis.  It coordinates and synthesizes the whole witness of Scripture on the various topics with which it deals.  However, systematic theolgoy will fail of its task to the extent to which it discards its rootage in biblical theology as properly conceived and developed.  It might seem that an undue limitation is placed upon systematic theology by requiring that the exegesis with which it is so intimately concerned should be regulated by the principle of biblical theology.  And it might seem contrary to the canon so important to both exegesis and systematics, namely the analogy of Scripture.  These appearances do not correspond to reality.  The fact is that only when systematic theology is rooted in biblical theology does it exemplify its true function and achieve its purpose (John Murray, “Systematic Theology: Second Article,” WTJ 26, no. 1 (1963), 44-45).

Well said.

(HT: Brian Payne, from his doctoral dissertation, The Summing Up of All Things in Christ and the Restoration of Human Viceregency: Implications for Ecclesiology, SBTS 2008, p. 15)

Covenant and Eschatology: The Divine Drama

/ davidsschrock / 2 Comments

Michael Horton’s Covenant and Eschatology: The Divine Drama is a book about theological method.  Unashamed of his Reformed heritage, the Westminster professor, draws on the redemptive-historical insights of John Calvin, Hermann Bavinck, Geerhardus Vos, and others, to speak to issues of post-modern literary theory and the narrative theology of George Lindbeck, Hans Frei, and Nicholas Wolterstorff.  As Kevin Vanhoozer puts it, “Messieurs Lindbeck and Wolterstorff, meet Geerhardus Vos and Herman Ridderbos!”  The result is an erudite and creative proposal that instructs Christians to conceive of the Bible as a Divine Drama.

In brief, Horton employs biblical theology and speech-act theory to show how this biblical drama–God’s acts of redemption and his interpretive revelation– should be the starting point for doing theology.  In this regard, Horton’s proposes an inductive method of doing theology.  Still, he relies on other theologians and philosophers to shape his thesis.  He depends heavily on Post-Reformational theologians and appropriates many of their redemptive-historical insights to combat and correct the modern philosophy and postmodern literary theory.  Yet, like Kevin Vanhoozer, Horton is adroit in gleaning from postmodern theories and philosophical instrumentation to better articulate what the Bible is doing.

The book is broken into two sections: “God Acts in History” (ch. 2-4) and “God Speech” (ch. 5-9); however, the contents of each chapter seem to move from one problem area to another.  In other words, instead of delineating a clear line of explanation, Horton responds to the problems and counter-proposals as he sets forth his case.  In this, he makes countless contributions to the subject of theological method; however, it is challenging to finish this book with a step-by-step program for ‘doing theology.’  Nevertheless, in the narrative of his book, there are four ideas that find repeated attention and that Horton sets out from the beginning.  They are a redemptive-historical method, an analogical mode (of discourse), a dramatic model, and a covenantal context.  We will consider these in turn.

First, Horton argues that we should read the Bible along redemptive-historical or biblical-theological lines.  Following the Dutch-American Reformed tradition, Horton conceives of biblical theology as an organically-connected development in biblical history–one that is laced with eschatological anticipation.  In this way, eschatology is not simply a systematic loci, but an interpretive lens.  Promise-fulfillment is the basic structure of the biblical narrative.  And the entire Bible itself takes on an escalating covenantal shape.

Horton contrasts the Platonic dualism that has lurked within the church from Augustine to Bultmann with the biblical, “two-age model”  which integrates history and eschatology.  Whereas the former sets up an unbiblical noumenal-phenomenal antithesis, the latter places eschatology within history and sees one age following another.  Jesus inaugurated the age to come with the ratification of the new covenant–the shedding of his blood on the cross– and his triumphant resurrection/ascension.  Today, we await the culmination when the King of Kings comes again.  Thus, according to Horton, we should read the Bible redemptive-historically.  I agree.

Second, Horton addresses the subject of biblical language.  Is it univocal, equivocal, or analogical?  He argues for the last of these three, and shows how and why proposals that turn away from analogical discourse result in aberrant doctrines.  For instance, in chapter two he shows the difficulty of fusing liberal, God-denying action in history with biblical & orthodox language (e.g. when Bultmann uses the language of resurrection, he is not speaking of physical, historical event).  Horton supplies four possible ways that the Bible and the world relate: (1) “mythological-symbolical-metaphorical” language where the God has spoken in his word but not in a way that comports with history, (2)  “communal interpretation of natural occurencce” where God acts providentially in history but does not provide sufficient interpretation of explanation, thus communities of faith are left to devise their own meaning, (3) “narrative interpretation” in which the Bible gives a plausible explanation of reality, but which may not in fact correspond to reality, and (4) “immanent interpretation” where belief is held that God lives, moves, and has his being in the world–this is a panentheist approach that blurs Creator and creation.

Horton lists all these to show the competing (and false) models in the church and academy today and to argue for a view of the Bible that recounts both God’s acts in history, as well as his covenantal speech found in Scripture.  God acts in his works and in his words, and Horton emphasizes that while the Bible only gives us analogical expressions of the God who acts and speaks, these analogical accomodations are true interpretations of God’s work of redemption.  He goes further though, asserting that Jesus Christ, the incarnate God, is in fact the univocal center of revelation, and that in him their is a univocal and irreducible core to the revelation of God in redemptive history.

Third, building on the redemptive-historical storyline and the way that God reveals himself through redemptive acts and inspiring nterpretive speech, Horton shows that this results in a divine drama where the world is a stage, the Bible a script, the people of God actors, and the covenantal structures (e.g. circumcision and the sacrificial system under the Mosaic administration; baptism and the Lord’s supper under the New Covenant) serve as visible props to reenact the drama.  This dramatic ideal is not held exclusively by Horton.  Hans von Balthasar developed it at length in his 5-volume Theo-Drama, and before that John Calvin even appealed to theatrical language.  More recently, Kevin Vanhoozer has appealed to this understanding in his The Drama of Doctrine. 

As with his emphasis on “two-world” model mentioned earlier, this historical progression of people and plot, which is sovereignly written and directed by God himself, overturns the static, platonic view of reality.  Instead of a purely vertical understanding of the platonic cosmology, with the earthly, material world somehow reflecting the timeless, immaterial noumenal worls, the Bible as Divine Drama puts the story on a horizontal axis that is moving from Creation to Consummation.  Simultaneously, the biblical drama casts God as the intervening hero who descends from heaven to earth to wisely, powerfully, and gloriously deliver his people–this is seen typologically in the OT and definitely in the NT with the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Fourth, Horton develops this drama along the unifying theme of the biblical covenants.  He maintains that biblical canon itself is a covenantal document (a la Meredith Kline, The Structure of Biblical Authority), and that the revelation of redemption contained therein reflects the gracious initiative of God to save a people for himself, a people who journey in this age as pilgrims but in the age to come as partakers of the Kingdom of God.  As Horton works out this proposal, he on more than one occasion emphasizes the necessity of a theology of the cross, over against a theology of glory.  The Christocentric reality is that the covenantal pattern of the Bible is that those who will enter into glory must travel the road of redemption as sojourners and sufferers (cf. Phil. 2:5-11).  He critiques any reading of Scripture that purports an overrealized eschatology, and he cautions those of us in covenant with Jesus Christ to realize that the cross comes before glory.

So overall, Horton’s proposal is compelling, even if it is hard to follow at points.  His argumentation is strong and his knowledge of biblical theology and postmodern philosophy is vast.  Furthermore, it is obvious that his intention is not to advocate a system of theology.  This is seen in the way that he answers objections from liberal theologians on his left and the way he challenges hyper-conservative theologians on his right.  He aims to traverse a narrow path between “experiential-expressivists”  who subvert the Bible to contemporary prejudices and “cognitive-propositionalists” who in the name of orthodoxy reduce the Bible to a series of eternal truths and miss the narrative, historical, and eschatological framework of the Bible. 

Similarly, Horton’s use of speech-act theory and double author discourse does not distort the text or run into the rocks of Tillich’s method of correlation.  Instead, Horton deftly employs philosophical language to articulate what the Bible is in fact doing.  This selective use of literary theory and philosophy, along with his repeated appeals to biblical theology, serves as a needed corrective against extreme liberalism and reductionistic biblicism.  Against both of these polarities, Horton is emphatic on the covenantal structure of the Bible, the way in which God has time and again redeemed a people for himself, something that the Divine Drama is continuing to do today.  Which leads to a final point.

Horton concludes his work with a chapter on the “Community Theater” where he suggests ways in which the twenty-first century church is called to perform the drama found in Scripture.  Appealing to the likes of Calvin, he shows how preaching the Word, performing the sacraments–his word, not mine, and effecting church discipline display for a watching world the Divine Drama.  Thus the church is to appropriate the speech and acts found in the biblical narrative, the language of the covenant, and to continue walking by faith in the redemption once for all accomplished in Christ and once for all delivered (read: spoken) to the saints.  While the objective work of redemption and revelation is completed, its local reenactment by the redeemed people of God will continue until the end of age.

On the whole, Horton’s book is an enriching proposal on how to do biblical and systematic theology.  It is not for the faint of heart, though.  It is a technical work that requires background knowledge of contemporary theology and Post-Reformation Reformed theology.   Simultaneously, it is a book that while written clearly could be structured better.  The book is generally organized by the four emphases consider here, but the execution of explaining these ideas is lacking.  Nevertheless, his main point of reading the Bible redemptive-historically, analogically, and covenantly comes through, and his model of a Divine Drama is one that helps unify the gap between theory and practice.  I commend Horton’s book to you and hope that it helps you delight in the God who acts and speaks!

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Hearing the Word of God

/ davidsschrock

In his chapter on the way God speaks in the Bible, Michael Horton quotes Gabriel Fackre to argue that God’s speech comes to us through a unified series of prophetic utterances that God commands that we hear and believe.  Fackre posits,

The Bible is a book that tells an “overarching story.”  While imaginatively portrayed, it is no fictive account, having to do with turning points that have “taken place” and will take place, a news story traced by canonical hand.  Its “good news” is about events in meaningful sequence, unrepeatable occasions with a cumulative significance internal to their narration (in contrast to “myth” that dissolves uniqueness, expressing what is always and everywhere the case) (Covenant and Eschatology: A Divine Drama [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2002], 145).

Horton goes on to commend us to hear God’s unified Word instead of attempting to see God,

A theology of vision corresponds to a theologia gloriae [a theology of glory], while a theology of promise [i.e. one that comes by hearing, cf. Rom. 10:17] corresponds to the theologia crucis [a theology of the cross].  The former craves an unmediated encounter with the sacred in a realized eschatology, while the latter patiently and joyfully receives the mediated encounter with a personal God in the ‘already’ and ‘not yet’ tension that belongs to faith rather than sight (145).

 May we come to the storyline of Scripture not to vainly see God in some sort of mystical/magical way, but rather to hear the words of our Christ, and walk by faith anticipating the day when we will see him face to face. 

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

From Sinai to Chile to Zion: Why Visual Aids Do and Do Not Help Us See Christ in the Bible

/ davidsschrock

I am not a big fan of visual aids.  So, when I preach or teach, I do not use powerpoint and rarely use other forms of multimedia to explicate the biblical text.  There is much to debate here, but as a personal conviction, I aim at–i.e. pray for and work at– letting the Word of God speak in and through the words that I speak.  Why?  Because the word of God is effective and the Spirit is able.  Likewise, visual imagery has a way of overshadowing the text and effectively dulling us from the power and precision of God’s Word (Heb. 4:12-13). 

Yet, with that said, there are still times when visual imagery helps us discern Scriptural truth, where without the “visual aid” we would not understand the biblical text as well.  For instance, in 2005, as I stood on the Mount of Olives overlooking the temple mount, the Kidron Valley, and the Valley of Hinnom, the drama of Jesus’ last supper, arrest, and trials before Pilate and Herod took shape in my mind as I imagined him walking with his disciples to the Garden of Gethsemane and then back through the City of David to encounter the unrighteous judgments of his accusers.  All told, passages of Scripture like Matthew 26-28 and John 13-19 were illumined by the geographical imagery of Jerusalem

Still, coming back from Israel, I realized that a “holy land experience” is not necessary for understanding the Bible, even if it provides visual images for biblical texts.  Thus, I learned in a fresh way, that the word of God is sufficient for everything I need to know and love God.  As 2 Peter 1:4 says, through our knowledge of Christ (as found in Scripture), God has given us everything we need for life and godliness (cf. 2 Tim. 3:16-17; Deut. 29:29). So while my travels in Israel were profitable for visualizing the Bible, such a pilgrimmage is not necessary for salvation and sanctification. 

With that grid in place–namely that visual aids can be selectively helpful for understanding the Bible– I introduce a ‘visual aid’ that I ran across today, and which prompted thoughts of Exodus 19-24 and Hebrews 12.

01_chaitenv

Lightning bolts appear above and around the Chaiten volcano as seen from Chana, some 30 kms (19 miles) north of the volcano, as it began its first eruption in thousands of years, in southern Chile May 2, 2008. Picture taken May 2, 2008. (Carlos Gutierrez)

As you ponder the picture, consider Moses words in front of Mount Sinai:

On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled. Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly. And as the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in thunder. The Lord came down on Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain. And the Lord called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up (Ex. 19:16-20).

This electrifying image of a thunderstorm on top of a volcano in Chile provokes images of  what it must have been like to encounter the living God at Sinai.  Yet, that historical event, which may have looked something like this, is not spectacular because of its atmospheric power,  as much as its redemptive-historical significance.  Consequently, as terrifying as such an image is, Scripture tells us that the people did not fear the cosmological occurence, nearly as much as the One who stood behind the smoking curtain and SPOKE (cf. Deut. 4:33).  What terrified the people was not just the smoke on the mountain, but the Word of God itself.  Listen to their plea:

Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” The people stood far off, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was (Ex. 20:18-21).

What this picture and these texts remind us is that God’s world is frightening, and he is present in the world; but his word is even more fear-producing and his presence to save and to judge is mediated through his Word.  Accordingly, the people of God begged Moses for a mediator, and God was pleased to speak to them through Moses (Deut. 5:28-33).  The people’s fears were both incited by God’s Holy Word, and allayed by God’s merciful mediator.

The same is and should be true for us.  In the fullness of time, God sent another mediator, a greater Word, His own Son, Jesus Christ to confirm the words spoken at Sinai and to speak to God’s people as a sympathetic mediator.  Hebrews 12, in fact, says this very thing recalling the temptuous events at Sinai to beckon us to believe in Jesus Christ with greater fear and faith.  Consider these fearful words

For you have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire and darkness and gloom and a tempest and the sound of a trumpet and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that no further messages be spoken to them. For they could not endure the order that was given, “If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned.” Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I tremble with fear.” But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven (Heb. 12:18-25).

While we can picture Sinai, we have no way to preview Zion, but here is where the sufficiency and severity of God’s word is most powerful: The truth of the matter is that Zion is more awesome–terrible and glorious–than anything visible today.  Visual aids cannot helps us discern Zion, only God’s word can do that.   We can only apprehend Zion’s reality by faith in God’s word.  Thus we prepare ourselves for the kingdom’s arrival by meditating on God’s Word and prayerfully anticipating the coming of Jesus Christ, the final Word and the perfect mediator.

Thus as we look on the image of this Chilean mountain we are helped to imagine what it must have been like for the people of Israel to stand before God, but our hearts must not be contented to only look backwards.  By the revelation of God’s word, we are beckoned to look forward to the coming, unshakeable kingdom of God, remembering this fact: Our God is a Consuming Fire!  What happened at Sinai is only a foreshadowing of things to come.  In this respect, the visual aid above both furthers our understanding of Exodus 19-24, but fails to do the same for us and our impending encounter with God.  It is only God’s Word, written and incarnate (cf. John 1:14), that enables us to envision Zion and the reality of entering God’s presence.  Thus with fear and faith, may we respond in faith to the Holy Word of God (cf. Heb. 4:2).

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Herman Bavinck on Scripture’s Fuller Sense

/ davidsschrock

In volume 1 of his Reformed Dogmatics, Herman Bavinck reflects on the multiple ways in which the New Testament authors use and apply the Old Testament.  In the discussions that swirl today on this subject, it is noteworthy that he writes in favor of sensus plenior.  He says,

In the case of Jesus and the apostles, this exegesis of the OT in the NT assumes the understanding that a word or sentence can have a much deeper meaning and a much father reaching thrust than the original author suspected or put into it.  This is often the case in classical authors as well.  No one will think that Goethe, in writing down his classical poetry, consciously had before his mind the things that are now found in it.  “Surely that person has not gotten far in poetry / In whose verses there is nothing more than what he had [consciously] written into them.”

In Scripture this is even much more strongly the case since, in the conviction of Jesus and the apostles, it has the Holy Spirit as its primary author and bears a teleological character.  Not only in the few verses cited above [verses from the NT that employ the OT is various fashions] but in its entire view and interpretation of the OT, the NT is undergirded by the thought that the Israelitish dispensation had its fulfillment in the Christian.  The whole economy of the old covenant, with all its statutes and ordinances and throughout its history, points forward to the dispensation of the new covenant.  Not Talmudism [i.e. Judaism] but Christianity is the rightful heir of the treasures of salvation promised to Abraham and his seed (Reformed Dogmatics: Prolegomena, vol. 1 [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003], 396-97; Bavinck also includes a broad bibliography on this subject from Dutch, German, and English-speaking scholars).

Two things should be noted from his statement.  (1) While Bavinck  supports a view allowing for the expansion of meaning in the text as that ‘word or sentence’ is read in the light of later revelation, namely in the coming of Christ; his own theological method does not overdo this proposition.  He is rigorous, even ‘scientific’ (a term he uses positively), in his attention to the original meaning of the text in his doctrinal formulation.   Thus, it seems that in comparison with his own method interpretation, his sensus plenior is controlled by further biblical revelation (i.e. the canonical horizon) and not by spurious philosophies or extra-biblical ideas.  In fact, large sections of volume 1 are devoted to ardently rejecting theological methods that depend on such eisegesis.

(2) Bavinck’s appeal to Goethe does appear, at least today, to support a postmodern hermeneutic, namely that the reader can and should bring their own meaning to the text.  However, in Bavinck’s defense, it must be remembered that he is writing decades before the influence of postmodern literary theory with its influnence on theology. And again, the proof is in the pudding: Does Bavinck himself believe, encourage, or legitimate a reader-centered hermeneutic?  I don’t think so. 

In short, Bavinck’s quotation is helpful to reveal his own method of interpretation and to remind us of the organic unity and eschatological nature of the OT which finds its telos in Jesus Christ.  Likewise, this statement shows why the Reformed Dogmatics are so good; Bavinck recognized the progressive nature of revelation and undergirds his dogmatics with a biblical-theological framework that collects the sparks of doctrine of in the Old Testament and sets them ablaze as he moves into the New. (A great example see his section on the Trinity).

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

A Helpful Primer on Justification

/ davidsschrock

Trevin Wax has put together a helpful primer on the justification debate that has been raging between John Piper and N.T. Wright.  You can check it out at Christianity Today. 

The New Testament professors here at Southern Seminary also discussed this subject a few months ago.  You can hear the round table discussion between Drs. Tom Schreiner, Brian Vickers, and Mark Seifrid, facilitated by Denny Burk, the Dean of Boyce College online.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

(HT: Russell Moore)

The Theologian’s Task

/ davidsschrock / 1 Comment

What is the task of a Christian theologian?  Or more generally, what is the task of understanding Christian doctrine?

Herman Bavinck answers that question in the opening chapter of his four-volume Reformed Dogmatics.  He writes,

The imperative task of the dogmatician [or theologian] is to think God’s thoughts after him and to trace their unity.  His work is not finished until he has mentally absorbed this unity and set if forth in a dogmatics.  Accordingly, he does not come to God’s revelation with a ready-made system in order, as best he can, to force its content into it.  On the contrary, even in his system a theologian’s sole responsibility is to think God’s thoughts after him and to reproduce the unity that is objectively present in thoughts of God and has been recorded for the eye of faith in Scripture… (Reformed Dogmatics: Prolegomena, vol. 1 [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003], 44).

He continues later to describe the synthesizing and organizing work that theology entails to help understand and assemble God’s word,

dogmatics is not a kind of biblical theology that stops at the words of Scripture.  Rather, according to Scripture itself, dogmatics has the right to rationally absorb its content and, guided by Scripture, to rationally process it and also to acknowledge as truth that which can be deduced from it by lawful inference (45).

Whether you are a theologian or not, may you seek to absorb God’s word and think God’s thoughts after Him.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Will the real Jesus please stand up?!

/ davidsschrock / 2 Comments

Today Kevin DeYoung summarized his message from this year’s Next Conference. In his message on the “Life of Christ” he includes a thought-provoking and sadly revealing list of Jesus makeovers found throughout the bulging corridors of American evangelicalism.  Some of the false Jesuses on his list include Republican Jesus, Democrat Jesus, Therapist Jesus, Starbucks Jesus, Open-Minded Jesus, Touchdown Jesus… Hippie Jesus, Yuppie Jesus, and on it goes. 

In place of these extrabiblical examples, DeYoung turns to the language of biblical promise and fulfillment to describe who Jesus is.  Instead of painting a velvet Elvis, fad Jesus to enforce any number of partisan policies, DeYoung simply turns to the Bible to say that the Messiah is

the Son of David and Abraham’s chosen seed, the one to deliver us from captivity, the goal of the Mosaic law, Yahweh in the flesh, the one to establish God’s reign and rule, the one to heal the sick, give sight to the blind, freedom to the prisoners and proclaim good news to the poor, the lamb of God come to take away the sins of the world…

He embodied the covenant, fulfilled the commandments, and reversed the curse. This Jesus is the Christ that God spoke of to the serpent, the Christ prefigured to Noah in the flood, the Christ promised to Abraham, the Christ prophesied through Balaam before the Moabites, the Christ guaranteed to Moses before he died, the Christ promised to David when he was king, the Christ revealed to Isaiah as a suffering servant, the Christ predicted through the prophets and prepared for through John the Baptist.

Reading this catena of descriptions, I was reminded of the simple fact that apart from the Bible in general and the Old Testament in particular, we cannot know Jesus as the Christ.  Just to name the name of Jesus is not enough.  Even to simply quote an isolated verse, “Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” may not be enough, if this verse is removed from its canonical context and antecedent meaning.  The question that has to be asked then is, “Which Jesus are you talking about?”

In a world of competing Jesuses, Kevin DeYoung calls us back to a biblical portrait of Jesus, so that we might not confuse Jesus the Christ with Jesus the brand name, Jesus the salesman, or Jesus the talisman.  May we endeavor more to know the Christ of the Bible and the Bible which all points to Christ.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss


 

The Trinity in Biblical Theological Perspective (2)

/ davidsschrock

The Trinity in Biblical Theological Reflection: New Testament Appropriations of Old Testament Evidence 

Three NT passages that are often used to support the doctrine of the Trinity are Matthew 28:19; John 1:1-8; and 1 Corinthians 8:1-6.  They show the New Testament revelation of the Trinity–one God, three persons.  However, as will be evidenced below these passages are not merely New Testament irruptions, rather they find dependence on earlier Old Testament passages.  The point being made then is that while the doctrine of the Trinity is not explicitly made in the OT, there are incomplete revelations in the Hebrew Bible that prepare the soul for the Christian revelation of the Triune God.  Let us consider these passages together. 

Matthew 28:19.  The Great Commission is the most explicit Trinitarian verse in the Bible.  While there are other triads,[1] no other passage of Scripture so clearly and concisely delineates the three persons of the Godhead.  It reads, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”  Here all three members of the Godhead are listed in order and united under a singular name,[2] and as was referenced previously this New Testament postulations depends upon Old Testament revelation, in at least three ways.  In short order, Matthew 28:18-20 has a typological precedent in 2 Chronicles 36:22-23,[3] a literary precursor in the three-fold, baptismal benediction found in the Aaronic blessing (Num. 6:22-26);[4] and a view of the Godhead that corresponds with the eschatological vision in Daniel 7:13-14.[5]  In each of these Old Testament passages there are glimpses of what is fully conceived in Matthew 28:18-20.   More to the point theologically, the significance of God’s name cannot be undervalued.  That the “I am” is now the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, marks a seismic shift in Theology Proper; nonetheless, it is one that was anticipated in the OT (cf. Isa. 7:14; Jer. 23:6; cf. Isa. 43:25 –> Phil. 2:9-11).[6]

John 1:1-18.  John’s prologue is another lucid example of the way OT ideas of Word and Wisdom were taken and applied to Jesus, so that God the Father and God the Son were inseparably united and yet hypostatically distinguished.  Consider John’s use of Genesis 1 as he introduces Jesus as the eternal Word of God—the one in whom “all things were made,” the source of all life, and the light of the world (1:1-5).[7]  That the Word, the Son of God, Jesus Christ is responsible for creation, life, and light is a clear testimony to his uncreated eternality and the fact that he is the unnamed divine agent in the Old Testament.  Köstenberger summarizes, “The prologue’s portrayal of the Word’s creative agency thus establishes an important theme [in John]… While the Word is personally distinct from God, the work he performs is nonetheless nothing but the work of God.”[8]  

Then, using imagery from the revelation on Mt. Sinai, John compares Jesus intimate knowledge of the Father with Moses fiery encounter in Exodus 19-20.  Moses was permitted into God’s presence, but he was disallowed from seeing God’s face, or later entering into his presence (i.e. the promised land).  Alternatively, Jesus Christ, “is in the bosom of the Father” (1:18 NASB).  He is the “one-of-a-kind Son” who alone has seen God and now is explaining him to the world.  In this comparison, Jesus is not a New Moses.  Rather, if the imagery from Sinai holds, he himself is YHWH in the flesh.  So that as Bauckham concludes,

Without contradicting or rejecting any of the existing features of Jewish monotheism, the Fourth Gospel, therefore redefines Jewish monotheism as Christological monotheism….in which the relationship the relationship of Jesus the Son to his Father is integral to the definition of who the one true God is.[9]

1 Corinthians 8:1-6.  Like John, Paul in his letter to the Corinthians expands the static notion of monotheism to include Jesus Christ.  Quoting the shema (Deut. 6:4) in 1 Corinthians 8:4, he argues against idolatry in verse 6 saying, “yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.”  It is absolutely fascinating to see Paul reject the existence of other (so-called) gods in one verse and then to turn and insert into the singular deity of God two names—God and the Lord Jesus, the Father and the Son.  Certainly, this Christology interpretation was a result of his Dasmascus Road experience with the risen Lord.  Richard Bauckham’s balanced explanation summarizes Paul’s thought process here,

The only possible way to understand Paul as maintaining monotheism is to understand him to be including Jesus in the unique identity of the one God affirmed in the Shema.  But this is, in any case, clear from the fact that the term ‘Lord’, applied here to Jesus as the ‘one Lord’, is taken from the Shema itself.  Paul is not adding to the one God of the Shema a ‘Lord’ whom the Shema affirms to be one.  In this unprecedented reformulation of the Shema, the unique identity of the one God consists of the one God, the Father, and the one Lord, his Messiah (who is implicitly regarded as the Son of the Father).[10]

While it has been argued by some that the semantic range of the word ehad allows for complexity,[11] this is a shocking statement.  Still, it is this kind of OT-dependent reading that best explains how we are to understand the traces of the Trinity in the Old Testament.  For nowhere in the shema is there a negation of a Triune God.  Rather, there is a firm affirmation of God’s unity, which orthodox Trinitarians also hold.  What Paul does in 1 Corinthians 8:6, however, is to unpack the unity of God in the OT in a way that fits with the greater revelation of Jesus as God (cf. Rom. 9:5; Tit. 2:13).  That the Spirit is not present in this passage does not deny the Trinitarian nature of the verse, it simply indicates that like the OT, aspects of the Godhead can be spoken of in isolation, though never upheld ontologically as independent or separate.

These are not the only passages either.  Other relevant Trinitarian passages in the NT that appeal to the OT  include Acts 2:17-21, where Peter quotes the prophecy in Joel to explain the events of Pentecost and the coming of God’s Spirit; Philippians 2:9-11, where Paul applies Isaiah 45:23, which speaks of YHWH, and applies it to Jesus saying God “bestowed on [Jesus] the name that is above every name;”[12] and 1 Corinthians 1:24, 30 and Colossians 2:3 which call Jesus “the wisdom of God,” the one “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”  Each of these passages develops Old Testament evidences for the Trinity—the coming of the Spirit, the Name of God, and the Wisdom of God. 

And I am sure that there are others.  Can you think of any? 

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

[1] Matt. 3:16-17; 1 Cor. 12:4-6; 2 Cor. 13:14; Eph. 4:4-6; 1 Pet. 1:2; Jude 20-21; Rev. 1:4-5.

 

[2]  For more on the significance of ordered relationships in the Godhead see Bruce Ware, Father, Son, & Holy Spirit: Relationships, Roles, & Relevance.  (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2005).

 

[3] G.K. Beale makes this often overlooked connection in The Temple and the Church’s Mission: A biblical theology of the dwelling place of God (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004), 169-80.  He writes, “This passage [2 Chron. 36:22-23] has three things in common with Matthew 28:18-20: (1) both Cyrus and Jesus assert authority over all the earth; (2) the commission to ‘go’; and (3) the assurance of divine presence to fulfill the commission…the 2 Chronicles passage would be viewed as a historical event to commission a temple that foreshadowed typologically the much greater event of Jesus’ ‘Great Commision’ to build a greater temple” (176-77).  This observation is very informative for understanding the work of the Trinity expounded in Matthew 28, where the Son is building the temple, the Spirit is indwelling the temple, and ultimately the temple is for God the Father (cf. 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19).

 

[4] Viviano cites Luise Abramowski’s research and summarizes her work showing the relationship between the Aaronic blessing, the Nazarite vow, and the rite of baptism.  He writes, “Crucial to her case is the placing or putting of God’s name on the people.  This then links up with baptism in the name of the Father, Son, and Spirit” (Viviano, “The Trinity in the Old Testament,” 16). 

 

[5] Craig Blomberg writes, “Jesus’ closing ‘Great Commission’ of his apostles seems to allude to Daniel 7:14.  Jesus whose favorite title for himself throughout the Gospel has been ‘Son of Man,’ is given all authority on heaven and earth (Matt. 28:18), just as the Son of Man in Daniel’s vision received an identical universal authority.  It is even possible that the Trinitarian formula in 28:19 reflects a modification of the triad of Ancient of Days (God the Father), Son of Man (God the Son), and angels as God’s spiritual servants as the implied agents of the Son of Man being led into God’s presence (and thus functioning analogous to the Holy Spirit), also found in Dan. 7:13-14” (“Matthew” in Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, ed. G. K. Beale and D.A. Carson [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], 100.

 

[6] For more on the names of God see John Frame, The Doctrine of God, 343-61; cf. John Piper, The Pleasures of God (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 2000), 98, 193-94.

 

[7] Andreas Köstenberger, “John” in Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, ed. G. K. Beale and D.A. Carson [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], 421; see also Carson’s comments and detailed exegesis in The Gospel According to John (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1991), 111-39.

 

[8] Andreas Köstenberger, The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: The Trinity and John’s Gospel (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2008), 115.

[9] Richard Bauckham, “Monotheism and Christology in the Gospel of John” in Contours of Christology in the New Testament, ed. Richard Longenecker (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 165.

 

[10] Richard Bauckham,  Jesus and the God of Israel, 101.  This quotation comes from an entire section devoted to solving this theological riddle, see pp. 97-105.

 

[11] The task of demonstrating God’s singularity and unity in the OT is more challenging than may first appear.  OT scholars like Michael Heiser are pressing for a reappraisal of traditional OT monotheism, where an OT binitarianism is asserted over against the classic understanding of monotheism. See his dissertation “The divine council in late canonical and non-canonical Second Temple Jewish literature” Ph.D. diss., The University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2004 and his weblog devoted to the subject, http://michaelsheiser.com/TwoPowersInHeaven.  In his recent article “Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, or Henotheism? Toward an Assessment of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible” in Bulletin for Biblical Research  18.1 (2008), 1-30, Heiser concludes, “It is my hope that scholars will be encouraged to re-evaluate their assumptions about the reality of divine plurality in Israel’s worldview and how to parse that reality in understanding Israelite religion” (30).

 

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