U2 and Psalm 40: A Modern Parable

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In a concert stadium in Denver, tens of thousands gathered to sing unwittingly from the Psalter. Joining rock band U2 in a chorus of praise from Psalm 40 they sang, “I will sing, sing a new song!” Ironically, when the song closed, and Bono and the band departed, the presumably unbelieving crowd continued to sing: “How long to sing this song… How long to sing this song!” In their amplified chorus, these men and women embedded in the miry pit of Psalm 40, sing of a reality that most of them know nothing about. Yet in their throats resound with words of praise to our God.

The illuminating point and sobering challenge to Christians is this: We who have tasted and seen the goodness of God, how loud do we sing our songs? Do these unbelievers bear louder witness than we? If so, we must turn up the volume, for surely the power of our praise has a far greater amplifier—the blood of Jesus Christ and the power of the gospel. Moreover, in hearing their song, we must have a responsibility to explain to others the deliverance that can be had in Jesus Christ.

May we this week, who know the benefits of Christ (Ps. 103), cry out to the Lord if we are wallowing the pit or suffering the effects of this rugged life; and if we have been plucked out of the miry bog, may we look for those pleading souls and tell them how they too might find the solid rock of Jesus–not in a concert, but in a Christ!

Psalm 40: From a Miry Pit to Mediated Praise

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From the Wednesday Word on Wellums Couples Sunday School class:

In Psalm 40 and throughout the Bible, the liberating work of deliverance accomplished by God on behalf of his people is the source of all praise! In fact, singing a “new song” as David rejoices in Psalm 40:3 is directly related to the Lord’s work of salvation. In Psalm 96:1 and Revelation 5:9, a new song is sung as a response to God’s “new” work of salvation. The result, through the ages, is the same. God’s people are filled with joy and perpetual praise. In this the divine design of God is manifest. God so loved the world that he sent his only son to die in order to make all who believeth in him infinitely glad!

Read the entire Wednesday Word here.

More Vaughan Roberts: The Goal and Glory of Marriage

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In his book, God’s Big Design: Life as He intends it to be, Anglican Rector Vaughan Roberts devotes a chapter to “God’s Design for Sex and Marriage.” In the chapter, he makes a three-fold assertion: God is for sex; Sex is for marriage; and Marriage is for life. Unpacking these premises, Roberts reiterates the point that the ultimate goal of marriage is more than relational companionship and the alleviation of loneliness, and that the glory of marriage is not found in the mere ability to achieve marital bliss but in the couple’s invitation to reflect Christ’s marriage to the church. His comments are worth pondering.

The Goal of Marriage:

Mutual delight was never intended to be the ultimate goal of the relationship. The words of Genesis 2:18 must be understood in context. God has issued the creation mandate: human beings are to “be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it” (Genesis 2:18). In Genesis 2:15 Adam is placed in the Garden of Eden and commanded “to work it and take care of it.” It is immediately after that command that God says, “It is not good for the man to be alone.” The natural thought from the low of the test, therefore, when we are told that Adma needs a “helper,” is that this is connected with the work that he has been given to do. He needs some one to come to his aid for he cannot do this work “alone” (78-79).

Quoting Christopher Ash, Marriage: Sex in the Service of God, Roberts continues],

“Marriage is given to enable humankind to exercise responsible dominion over God’s world.”  So, far from being inward-looking , a married couple should be looking upward to God and outward to the world in which he calls them to seve him. “In the Bible’s perspective the way forward is neither via individual autonomy nor introspective companionship, but in the joyful shared service of God” (79).

Roberts admonition flies in the face of therapeutic resolutions to marriage problems.  Its powerful implication is that it challenges couples encountering the corrosive effects of interpersonal sin to abandon the marriage retreat and go on a short-term mission trip.  (Point of clarification: I think marriage retreats are good and necessary, but short-term service better).  Rather than introspectively dividing character qualities into strengths and weaknesses, the goodness of marriage is found in shoulder-to-shoulder service where the object of compassion is a stranger, a widow, or an orphan.  If this does not produce spiritual fruit and sanctification, what will. 

Consider, why is it that so many empty-nester get divorces?  Could it be that their season of mutual service has ended and they are no longer working together on a common task?  They are no longer serving their children together and thus marital fidelty and cooperation has lost focus.  Roberts biblical exhortation is for all married couples to take seriously the original tasks (i.e. be fruitful, multiply, increase, and subdue) and to do it together.  Looking upwards to God and outwards to others, husbands and wives find their ultimate purpose in fulfilling the Great Commission in uniquely masculine and feminine ways.  Walking together with different gifts and abilities, these purpose-driven (excuse the expression) marriages co-labor for the sake of the kingdom.

The Glory of Marriage:

Marriage is a picture of the relationship of Christ and his church. The apostle Paul quotes Genesis 2:24 and comments, “This is a profound mystery–but I am talking about Christ and the church” (Ephesians 5:32). He is saying that the fundamental relationship is between Christ and his people. There is no deeper, more profound marriage than that. The marriage of a man and a woman is just a shadow of the marriage between Christ and his church. It is not that human marriage provides a useful illustration for Bible writers to use to speak of the relationship between God and his people; it is the other way round. The relationship between Christ and his church comes first; human marriage is patterned after it” (85).

Which means that from before the foundation of the world, God was thinking about marriage. As He was forming Eve in the Garden from Adam’s rib, our Heavenly Father was anticipating and preparing the way for His Son’s union with his bride–the church. So then the last marriage is first, and all earthly marriages serve as eschatological signs of the marriage of the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last. This cosmic representation heightens the importance of our marriages and the necessity for preserving them from the pollution of this world. Roberts concludes by emphasizing the Christ-church mystery which “underlines the importance of faithfulness. [God] never breaks his promises and he expects the same commitment in our marriages with one another” (85).

It is a glorious mystery and privilege when a man and woman marry.  Their marriage actually participates in the cosmic story of redemption, and their sexual union bears witness to the eschatological hope of consummation with Christ. It causes us to pause and to ponder the goodness and wisdom of God.  Moreover, reflecting on the heavenly origins of marriage elevates the value of our own marriages in a culture that consumes relationships like Chinese take-out.  The Divine Marriage dignifies human marriages so much more than relational consumerism.

May we live counter-cultural lives and love our wives for the sake of Jesus Christ and his bride, the church!

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Otto Piper on Marriage

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Today’s Christian supermarkets (a.k.a. bookstores) are filled with books on marriage, relationships, and sexuality.  The plethora of writings is indicative of a culture and a church trying desperately to find solid ground on which to build its marriages.  Unfortunately, a cursory overview of these books reveal the shallowness, the pragmatism, and the wordly accomodation that inculcates the Christian market for marital help.  Yet, on rare occasions, biblically-grounded and theologically-faithful works arise.  Books like God, Marriage, and Family (Kostenberger), Marriage:Sex in the Service of God (Ash) and God and Marriage (Bromiley) eschew pragmatism and embrace instead a rich biblical theology.  Another book of this kind is Otto Piper’s The Biblical View of Sex and Marriage (New York: Scribners, 1960).  Published nearly a half-century ago, its nomenclature is antiquated and its situational applications are out of date, but aside from its mid-twentieth century context, its biblical material is helpful.  In a sea of marriage manuals, it provides a sturdy raft on which to rest.

In addressing the topic of sexuality and marriage, Dr. Piper, a former professor of New Testament at Princeton, surprised me with his generally positive assessment of Scripture.  Though, I would disagree with him on the finer points of doctrine, he upholds the functional authority and veracity of the Scripture.  He calls his view of Scripture, “Biblical Realism,” and he says in his intro, “With the older Biblicism it [i.e. Biblical Realism] agrees that the Bible is God’s Revelation and that we may therefore confidently turn toward the Scriptures in search for the ultimate truth concering man’s predicament (vi).”  Such a foundation puts him at odds with modern philosophy and psychology, but this is not a problem for Piper as is evident in his clear assetion, “I confess that… more light has come to me from the wisdom of ancient times than from modern speculations” (vii).  Finally, concerning his approach to the Bible and his topic, he observes that the Biblical Realist “learns from the attitude God takes toward sex that it has its metaphysical dignity and is no mere shortcut to pleasure, and also that far from being unessential for the constitution of true life it is used by God as the means for execution of his redemptive plans” (vii).  In short order, Piper affirms the centrality of Scripture and the biblical role of human sexuality and marriage to bring about the redemptive purposes of God.  The rest of his book fleshes out this reality, and it does so with cogent exposition of the Scriptures and with helpful ethical synthesis. 

Consider some of his thoughts that unite marriage with the purposes of God in redemption:

Concerning the Divine Marriage: The consummation of the Divine Marriage has been the God-intended goal for makind from the very beginning.  Therefore, the History of Salvation proves to be the gradual realization of this purpose.  The relationship between God and His people grows more intimate as time goes on, and a steadily deepeend understanding of the nature and goal of the mutual realtisonship of the sexes is thereby attained.  On the other hand, the history of sexual relationship in mankind is evidence the Divine Marriage operates everywhere as the basic pattern of sexual life (78).

Relationships That Foster Maturity Serve God: Those who believe that sex is meant to serve the purposes of God and not those of individual men and women will also be ready to notice the darker side of the relationship…Therefore, the misanthropist’s absolute withdrawal into isolation, as well as the exclusive association with members of one’s own sex, finally poisons the spirits of personality.  In many instances the spinster, the bachelor, and the habitues of bachelor clubs are types of atrophied humanity.  They are unlikable and humanly unproductive not because they have not married but because they have cut off their manhood and womanhood from the other sex.  This is confirmed by the fact that there are unmarried persons of both sexes who are highly enjoyable because they have retained their ability infromally to mix with people of both sexes far into old age (79-80).

The Role of Sex in Redemptive History: Sex has therefore not only made possible the subsequent history of mankind but also provided the opportunity both for the Incarnation and also for that body which the Saviour forms for Himself in the Church (81).

God’s Affirmation of Sex in Submission to God’s Sovereign Plan: The many serious warnings sounded against sex in the Bible, and particularly in the New Testament, are only limiting qualifications of a fundamentally affirmative attitude towards sex.  They are intended to remind the believer that there are situations and times where the boundaries of sexual life must be drawn in bold lines, because with all the marrying and giving in marriage people are prone to forget that this earthly life is not an end in itself.  Man is called upon to be God’s servant in the execution of His plans of history.  There are instances in which in the service of God celibacy is the right thing to choose for a person.  However, any unequivocal negation of sex is in opposition to God’s redemptive work and celibacy as a general demand for all people is therefore branded as a doctrine of the devil [1Tim. 4:1-3] (84).

In creating mankind male and female (Gen. 1:26) and in designing a repeating pattern of marriage in this world  (Gen. 2:24), God was from the start establishing millions of raindrops that would one day reflect the multivarigated glory of Jesus Christ cosmic marriage to his redeemed people.  In this, God’s plan of redemption was not secondary, nor were his purposes for marriage auxiliary.  Marriage was created with Jesus Christ in mind, and you, if you are a part of his church body.  Meditating on the Scriptural relationship between marriage and redemption is edifying for the individual marriage and exhilirating as the cosmos moves forward towards the final marriage feast.  May we who know Christ continue to ponder our eschatological union with him, and may those who do not yet call Jesus “Lord” be turned to the savior over and again as you see broken and beautiful marriages all around you–the former pointing you to something more and the latter enticing you to come to Christ and adore.  Until he comes may our marriages make us pant for his presence.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

The Good Insane Concordance Maker

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For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10).

For three centuries, Alexander Cruden’s Bible concordance has benefitted students of the Bible by helping them research and discover the placement of every word in the King James Bible.  Unlike Bill Mounce’s ESV Concordance which has understandably removed monotonous words like “and,” “but,” “he,” “she,” and the like, Cruden’s commentary counted them all–over 777,000 of them.  And he did this in a time before computers.  This feat is simply amazing!

However, what makes the life and work of Alexander Cruden even more jaw-dropping is the kind of person that he was and the manner of life that he lived.  To put it bluntly he was a “crooked stick.”  John Piper, in an inspiring vingette on his life, records:

Cruden was institutionalized for madness four times in his life. His behavior was often bizarre. [Piper goes on to quote from Tim Larson’s article on Cruden in Books and  Culture]  “On another occasion, Cruden had apparently gone to break up a brawl but ended up spending the best part of an hour admonishing disorderly soldiers not to swear while periodically whacking them on the head with a shovel. He also would propose to women with whom he had established no romantic bond (one such intended he had not even met). Being unable to take no for an answer, he would then turn himself into a persistent nuisance, if not a stalker.”

In sum, the life of Alexander Cruden exemplifies the truth that God uses the weak things of the world to shame the strong, and the foolish to confound the wise (cf. 1 Cor. 1:27ff).  Likewise, his life engenders hope that in every Spirit-indwelt follower of Jesus Christ, God has from the foundation of the world prepared a path of good works mapped out His children (Eph. 2:10).  Piper’s story of the “Good, Insane Corcordance Maker” reminds us of that.  

Surely if we encountered someone like Cruden today we would be tempted to dismiss their efforts or discourage them in such Hurculean tasks, but why?  Perhaps, Cruden’s life can remind each of who think we are “straight,” how crooked and fragile each of our lives are and that only by the grace of God can anyone of do anything that has lasting significance (cf. Psalm 90:15).  As Jesus said, “Apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).  Cruden’s testimony is a timeless example of the goodness of God in the life of those who dedicate themselves to Christ’s service.

This week may we have eyes to see and encourage the good works of those “crooked sticks” that might help us all walk straighter.  And may we, who are all truly mishapen by the effects of the Fall, petition God to use us in our weaknesses and idiosyncracies so that lasting fruit may be born (cf. John 15:7-8).

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Vaughan Roberts on Marriage

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Vaughan Roberts is gifted in saying a lot in a very little space. His books God’s Big Picture:Tracing the storyline of the Bible, Life’s Big Questions: Six major themes traced through the Bible, and God’s Big Design: Life as he intends it to be are outstanding in their ability to convey biblical theology in accessible language. In an ongoing effort to consider a biblical theology of marriage, let me highlight a few cogent remarks by the Anglican Rector.

The relationship between God and his people… is not referred to as marriage until some way into the Bible, but the image becomes increasingly important until it reaches its culmination with the description of the heavenly marriage of the Lamb in the book of Revelation.  But we should not think of this marriage simply as an image that has been imported from human relationships to help us understand spiritual realities.  The apostle Paul assumes that the archetypal marriage is between Christ and his people and not the human relationship between a man and a woman.  [Roberts quotes from the NDBT], “Human marriage is not the reality of for which Christ and the church provide a sermonic illustartion but the reerse.  Human marriage is theearthly type, pointing towards the heavenly reality (V. Roberts, Life’s Big Questions [Leicester: IVP, 2004], 64).

Tracing marriage through eight developmental stages of the kingdom, Roberts speaks of the marital allusions found when Israel encounters YHWH at Mt Sinai:

The occassion described in Exodus 24 has much in common with a marriage ceremony.  Two parties are committing themselves to one another in an exclusive relationship.  The Lord has already declared his love for Israel as his holy people, set apart from all the otehr tribes and nations of the earth.  Now the people bind themselves to him.  Just as a human couple ‘forsake all others,’ so Israel agrees to God’s commandments, all of which flow from the first: “You shall have no other gods before me” (67).

Moving from Israel to the New Testament Church, Roberts contrasts the uninvolvement of the modern bridegroom with the proactive nature of Jesus Christ in preparing himself a bride.  He writes:

The Divine Bridegroom is very different.  He could not ahve gone further in his efforts to ensure that his people will be perfect on their big day and he could not have paid a higher price; he died to make it possible.  There could be no more loving husband.  Because of his death for us, we are completely cleansed from sin the moment we respond with faith to the gospel.  Paul no doubt has the allegory of Ezekiel 16 in mind, with its story of a girl who is rescued, washed and clothed by the Lord.  [Quoting from Christopher Ash’s book on marriage, Roberts concludes]: The Christ/church parallel is not merely illustrative but the generating theological centre of his entire presentation” (78-79).

May we who struggle to accept the love of God–and we all do–meditate on God’s love found in the face of Jesus Christ, our heavenly bridegroom and our redeeming savior.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

J.G. McConville on How the OT Relates to the NT

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Reading this morning a chapter in The Messiah in the Old and New Testament edited by Stanley Porter, Tremper Longman quotes  J.G. McConville on how the Old Testament relates to the New.  His two-way approach is akin to Christopher J. H. Wright’s hermeneutic laid out in his popular book Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament.  Consider McConville’s assertion as you read your Bible today and think about how God’s antecedent revelation shaped  the NT apostles (cf. Rom. 15:4; 1 Cor. 10:6) and how the OT prophets were looking forward to a coming Messiah, often writing “better then they knew” (cf. 1 Peter 1:10-12). 

The interpretation of the Old Testament is not a one-way, but a two-way flow, in which contemporary situations were compared with the Scriptures, and the Scriptures were then brought to bear, sometimes in (to us) unexpected ways, on the situations.  The Old Testament, indeed, underwent a good deal of reinterpretation even as hopes of deliverance were being worked out (J. G. McConville, “Messianic Interpretation of the OT in Modern Context,” in Satterthwaite et al., eds., The Lord’s Anointed [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1995], 13).

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

The iBible (3): Personal Illumination and Incredible Praise

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Personal Illumination: Finally, we arrive at the place where believers read the Bible today, and we must admit that the authenticity of history and the authority of Scripture is not enough to for modern readers to “get” the message. We know this because too many biblical scholars are incredulous agnostics and ardent opponents of the faith. The Scriptures which are “living and active” (Heb. 4:12), must be accompanied by the work of the Spirit in order to be believed. This is process of Spririt-wrought instruction is called illumination.

On the road to Emmaus with two of his disciples, Jesus had to open their eyes in order for them to see all things concerning himself in Scriptures (Luke 24:27, 31), and today Jesus is still opening blinded eyes. Without this spiritual illumination, no one can see to repent and believe (like Lydia in Acts 16). This is the work of regeneration (John 3:3-8) that overcomes the faith-denying blindness of sin and Satan (2 Cor. 4:4). When Paul speaks about this in relation to understanding the Scriptures in 1 Corinthians 2:10-16, he says, “The natural person does no accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned” (v. 14). However, “[Christians] have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual” (v. 12-13).

Consequently, the final stop in God’s process of life-giving revelation is that of personal saving faith accomplished by a divine illumination of our souls. Paul captures this re-creative vision in 2 Corinthians 4:6 when he says, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” In this way, illumination comes full circle. God who originated the world with a command for light to burst forth from darkness, performs the same miracle in every regenerated soul. At the sound of his voice, we who have ears to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ experience the resurrecting, illuminating experience of new creation (like Lazarus in John 11). The result of this monergistic illumination is that all who have eyes of faith to see will place faith in the message of the gospel which has gone into and is now going to the ends of the earth (cf. Rom 10:13-18). Moreover, walking in this light produces overwhelming joy in the revealed message that was initiated in heaven, sent to earth through divine intervention, inscripturated through years of inspired men preaching and recording the words of God, and deposited in hearts as the illumination of God himself (cf. James 1:18). This leads to one final “I”.

Incredible: Rumination on this process of revelation must result in praise and adoration. Remove anyone of these steps and the gospel would be neutered. Its potency would be lost. Apart from God’s redemptive intervention in space and time, there would be no historic foundation for the faith once delivered to the saints (Jude 3); without the Spirit’s work in the Old Testament (2 Pet. 1:19-21) and the New (cf. 1 Thess 1:5; 2:13; 2 Pet. 3:16; 1 John 4:6; Rev. 22:18-19), there would be no sure word in which we could believe; and without the active work of the Spirit illuminating darkened minds, there would be no regenerative vision that induce cries of “Abba, Father.” For only as the Triune God has planned, personalized, and implanted truth in the hearts of believers, is the effect of the gospel sure to bring about salvation to all those for whom Christ died.

Indeed, the message of Jesus Christand God’s method of revelation is incredible! Accordingly, the responsibility of the church to guard this deposit is immense. From all angles, detractors who would limit the Bible’s inspiration, inerrancy, or its authority must be repudiated (cf. Tit. 1:10-16). For if the Scriptures lose their veracity or their infallibility, then the good news they impart is, at best, damaged and, at worst, destroyed. Tampering with or denying the doctrine of Scripture imperils the gospel and all those who believe it. This is the work of Satan and has been seen in every age of the church. Like all those generations who have shed blood for the Bible’s preservation, we too must fight to protect it—its history, its inspiration, its transmission, and its illumination. Only then can forthcoming generations join with us and praise God for his iBible–inspired, inscripturated, infallible, inerrant, illuminated, and incredible!

Sola Deo Gloria, dss.

The iBible (2): Divine Inspiration and Information Transmission

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Neither the illuminating power of God in creation, nor the intervening work of God in history is sufficient to save. It must be coupled with divinely inspired interpretations that explain the saving plans of God in humanity. Thus inspiration, inscripturation, and the transmission of information are necessary to unveil the promise of redemption to every generation.

Inspiration & Inscripuration: The God who defines history (cf. Isa. 46:9-11) is the same God who also inspires his word authoritatively. Just as He has made Himself known through mighty deeds in the world (cf. Ps. 103:7), He has also inspired a deposit of writing that rightly interprets his works on the earth (2 Tim. 3:16-17; 2 Pet. 1:19-21). Without this divine revelation, God’s people and humanity at large would be blind to the intentions of His redemptive plans and purposes. Indeed, fallen sinners would be unable to know or love Jesus Christ, because our sin disallows us from seeing, let alone knowing by faith, the immortal, invisible, infinitely holy God (1 Tim 1:16). In short, man’s ability to know God is dependent entirely on his gracious revelation. Mercifully, God has at many times and in many ways disclosed Himself and his gracious offer of salvation through Jesus Christ. The Scriptures are replete with this attestation. Consider:

Concerning the content of the inspiration, Jesus explains that all the Scriptures bear witness about one thing–Himself. He says, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled” (Luke 24:44ff; cf. John 5:39).

Concerning the veracity of the witness, Psalm 12:6 says, “The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times;” and Proverbs 30:5 agrees, “Every word of God proves true.” Moreover, the New Testament concurs when Jesus prays, “Sanctify them in your truth; Your Word is truth” (John 17:17); and when the writer of Hebrews says that God has sworn an oath to his covenant people and “it is impossible for God to lie” (Heb. 6:18).

Concerning the scope and the manner of the revelation, Paul writes, “All Scriptures is God-breathed and useful for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16), and Peter affirms that God’s word is more sure his experience on the Mount of Transfiguration when he says, “No prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Peter 1:20-21).

Concerning the unity of the Bible, Jesus said in his sermon on the mount, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished” (Matt. 5:17-18); and later John records Jesus saying that “the Scriptures cannot be broken” (John 10:35).

And finally, concerning the earnestness of the message and necessity for receiving it as God’s Word: Moses exhorts, “Take to heart all the words by which I am warning you today, that you may command them to your children that they may be careful to do all the words of this law. For it is no empty word for you, but your very life, and by this word you shall live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess” (Deut. 32:46-47). Likewise, John at the end of his apocalypse and at the close of the canon, reminds Christians that blessing is dependent on our adherence to the Word of Christ. “I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book” (Revelation 22:18-19).

Information Transmission: The route from inspired authors and original manuscripts to twenty-first century translations and paraphrases is long and circuitous, but one that is incredibly well documented and faith-insuring. Under the sovereignty of God, contemporary Bibles contain Scripture that is confirmed by extra-biblical history, archaeological evidence, and voluminous extant documents—first century fragments, second century manuscripts totaling in the thousands. So that there is no doctrine left hanging by a paucity of textual evidence. An excellent treatment of this matter is found in Peter Wegner’s The Journey From Text to Translation.

Even with all of these informative measures in place, God’s Holy Spirit is still requisite for opening darkened minds. Man-made, human-generated understanding is not enough. A plethora of unbelieving Bible scholars throughout the centuries proves this point. So tomorrow we will conclude our brief bibliology survey by considering how God’s illuminating Spirit makes plain the wisdom of God for salvation for those dead in their trespasses and sins.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss.

A Biblical Meditation on God’s iBible (1): Illumination and Intervention

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In a informational age, where “data smog” threatens to pollute the air we breathe, where iPods, iPhones, and iGoogle have become part and parcel of daily living, and where keeping up with the Jones requires 24-hour instant information, it is salubrious to be still and know that our Lord is still God (Ps. 46:10) and that His Word remains fixed in the heavens (Ps. 119:89).  Yet, God’s Word is not a static, concrete fixture of law, suspended in time and space; it is living and active (Heb. 4:12), it has taken on flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14), and as we will consider over the next three days, it has come to God’s people over an extended period of time that has been marked by a number of progressive steps.  By means of nmenonic device, these stages included: general illumination (i.e. general revelation), historical intervention, divine inspiration, and Spirit-wrought inscripturation, transmission of information, and personal illumination.  Taking these “I” steps together, you might say that God has given us his own iBible.  Let us consider together the amazing process by which God has given us his Word:

Illumination (in General): In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1). With the power of his voice he breathed life into being (Ps. 33:6; cf. Gen. 2:7) and with the command of his voice he spoke light into existence (Gen. 1:3ff). In a very real sense, the first day began with a massive burst of light, a grand illumination. From this moment in time until now God has illuminating his world with his glory and has been making himself known (cf. Rev. 22:5).  He maintains the existence of all things by the power of His Word (Heb. 1:3), and in his creation he has made his divine nature and infinite power known (Rom. 1:18-20).  As Psalm 19 says: “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaim his handiwork; day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge; there is no speech, nor are there words, whose voice is not heard.”  In other words, God’s general revelation, or general “illumination,” has transcended the cosmos.

Intervention (in History): Throughout the Scriptures, the God of the Bible is a God who reveals Himself. This is seen in his creation (Ps 19:1-7) and in his written Word (Ps 19:8ff); this is evident in the Imago Dei and in the mystery of marriage. In every area of life and in each stage of creation he gives more light to view ponder his nature and understand His work in the world. As the author of Hebrews says, “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his son, who he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he created the world (Heb. 1:1-2)” This progressive revelation can be seen in the way that each stage of Scripture offers are more complete picture of who the Triune God is:

Pentateuch: The God who is (Ex. 3:14)
History: The God who acts in love on behalf of his people (Ex. 34; Deut. 7)
Psalms: The God who reigns and deserves all worship (Ps. 93, 97, 99)
Prophets: The God who keeps his Word; the Covenantal God (Jer. 31; Ezek. 36)
Gospels: The God who is with us (Matt. 1:23)
Epistles: The God of Glory seen in the face of Jesus Christ (Eph. 1:1-14)
Revelation: The Creator and Redeemer God; the Alpha and Omega (Rev. 1:8)

(For a more complete discussion of theocentric revelational see Timothy George’s chapter on God in Theology for the Church, edited by Danny Akin [Nashville: B & H Academic, 2007]).

Perhaps today is the day to be still and once again know that he is God, to turn off the iPod and pick up God’s inspired Word. If that is hard, as it so often is, there is all the more reason and need to once again hear the voice of God in his eternal Word. Or perhaps, instead of opposing one against the other, download God’s Word on you iPod. Listen to it as you go, drive, workout, or whatever. In any case, wherever the word finds you, may we together make sure that we find the Word; may we have ears to hear what the Spirit of Christ is saying in God’s holy book.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss.