Church

reMARK’s on the Church

/ davidsschrock

Reading Mark Dever’s section on the church in A Theology for the Church, I came across a couple stimulating quotations.  One about the already-but-not yet marks of a true church by Donald Bloesch, another from Robert Reymond about the mark of true church being found in its connection with the apostle message, and finally one from Mark Dever himself that displays the power of the Word to form and reform the church.  Consider them with me: 

One, Holy, Universal, and Apostolic: Already and Not Yet

“The church is already one, but it must become more visibly one…in faith and practice.  The church is alread holy in its sources and foundation, but it must stirve to produce fruits of holiness in its sojourn in the world.  The church is already catholic [i.e. universal], but it must seek a fuller measure of catholicity by assimilating the valid protests against church abuse…into its own life.  The church is already apostolic, but it must become more consciously apostolic by allowing the gospel to reform and sometime even overturn its time-honored rites and interpretations” (Donald Bloesch, The Church [Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2002], 103; quoted by Mark Dever, “The Church” in Theology for the Church, edited by D. Akin [Nashville: B & H Academic, 2007], 778).

The Continuity of the Church: Dependent on the Ink of the Word and not on the Trail of Blood

“Just as the true seed of Abraham are those who walk in the faith of Abraham, irrespective of lineal descent, so also the apostolic church is one which walks in the faith of the apostles, irrespective of ‘unbroken succession'” (Robert Reymond, A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith [Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998], 844; quoted by Mark Dever, “The Church,” 778).

This has implications for Catholic theology and for those Baptists who depend upon the trail of blood for the legitimacy of their church.  Mark Dever continues the thought, focusing on the presence of the Word as the demarcation of a true church.

The physical continuity of a line of pastor-elders back to Christ’s apostles is insignificant compared to the continuity between the teaching in churches today and the teaching of the apostles…God’s people in Scripture are created by God’s revelation of himself (cf. Gen. 1:30; 3:7; 3:15; 12:1-3; Ex. 3:4; Ex. 20; Ezek. 37)…The right preaching of the Word of God that creates the church is not only the Word from God; it is the Word about God [i.e. the Gospel of Jesus Christ]… When God’s people hear about God and what he requires, they will respond (Dever, “The Church,” 778, 780).

May our churches be built on the cornerstone of Jesus Christ and the steady foundation of the apostles and prophets teaching (cf. Eph. 2:20).

Otto Piper on Marriage, pt. 2

/ davidsschrock

Otto Piper’s book on marriage, The Biblical View of Sexuality and Marriage (1960), is a helpful treatise on the subject, and it is filled with refreshingly biblical explanations and meditations on sex and marriage.  Some of these ideas were posted earlier, and today we will consider a few more of his statements.

The Goal of Marriage: Piper writes, “Husband and wife can have personal fellowship by engaging in common service for others, by sharing some mutual responsibility for other people, by cultivating common friendships or by developing some common interests” (135). For the Christian nothing could be more important than the cooperative work of co-laboring in the vineyard of the Lord, to tell the world about Jesus, to serve Christ in his church, and to raise a family that reflects the love of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Piper continues accordingly, “The purpose of the marriage has been sought, among other things, in the service thereby rendered to the state or nation, or in the happiness thereby provided, or in the procreation and rearing of children. Important as these purposes are, they represent only certain aspects of marriage never indicate its ulimate goal” (137).

The conclusion Piper is driving towards is that the ultimate goal of marriage must be a life-long union that envisions glorifying Christ and the church as its chief aim. Through a marriage that reflects that Divine Union, God’s redemptive purposes are advanced and heavenly joy is imported into the Christian family.  The goal of marriage then, in a fallen world, is to cooperatively carry forth the gospel of Jesus Christ and fulfill the great commission, making disciples of the nations–which is not coincidentally similar to the original command to “be fruitful and multiply.”

Marital Discipleship is Necessary for God-Glorifying Marriages: Piper continues to elaborate on the ultimate purpose for marriage and the need to instruct young couples. For Christians, the purpose in “marriage is an alliance of two persons who, notwithstanding their physical nature and their sexuality, are members of the Body of Christ, and who therefore share the mystery of Christ’s union with the Church. It is from this fact that the standards of married life are to be derived. Of course, not all Christian couples are clearly aware of this mystery when they marry. We may even safely assume that the social function of marriage is uppermost in the minds of most couples who stand before the pastor. All the more important, therefore, is it that instruction concerning the Christian view of marriage should be given to confirmands and couples asking for a wedding if our generation is to attaind to a renewed, deepened, and genuinely Christian understanding of marriage (138). 

In a world that instructs us to rebel against God and his designs in our life and relationships, it should come as no surprise, that young couples entering into marriage are deletriously affected by their ambient culture.  Even Christian couples, on the whole, have little idea how influenced their views of sex, intimacy, communication, and happiness are by secular media, feminist ideals, and wordly philosophies.  Marriages that will most glorify God are those that from the beginning confess their ignorance and antagonism towards God’s designs.  In other words, admitting the latent patterns of sinfulness present in their unions, these married couples humbly and boldy repent of their worldliness and sin.  Turning to God’s design for marriage instead, they are through the power of the Spirit seek to grow in the grace God has given them in the reconciling work of Jesus Christ, the recreative work of the Holy Spirit, and the illuminating work of the Word of God to renew their minds and repattern their marriages after his divine design.  This is nothing new.  This is simply discipleship in the realm of marriage.

The Value of a Public Wedding: Piper also addresses the role public ceremonies for weddings serve.  “A word needs to be said here about the wedding ceremony as a means of grace . [By this he does not mean marriage as a sacrament or an infusion of grace]. The benediction pronounced by the pastor is no mere formality, or simply a nice looking appendage to the civil ceremony as many a young people seems to think. In the church ceremony the spouses publicly affirm their membership before the congregation, and thus they confess that they regard their union an expression of their Christian lives and of their desire to live them according to the Biblical understanding. The Church’s prayer and benediction form the congregation’s response to the couple’s declaration. The wedding ceremony, therefore, is not a mere public proclamation of the divine blessing promised to a Christian couple but also a valid offer of the great and real blessings that by God’s will the Church has to share with spouses. The minister communicates to them the portion they have in all those gifts of the Holy Spirit which they need in order to make theirs a Christian marriage” (171).

In this way, the public, ecclesial ceremony affords the energetic couple the chance to breath life into the congregation as they covenant together to love one another. Such a commitment reflects the Christ-church mystery, and it shows members and visitors an ultimate cosmic reality of Christ and his bride. At the same time, the church’s witness says something to the couple. It affirms the sanctity of marriage and with kingdom authority (cf. Matthew 16:18ff) it promises to enact discipline on the young couple if ever they seek divorce and defame their portrait of Christ and the church. The church is the authorized agent to hold the couple responsible to perform the vows spoken in their midst. In this way, the loving couple’s marriage is ratified by the church and the church itself is strengthened by a visible display of its forthcoming marriage to Christ.

Marriage as the Great Lighthouse: Piper writes on the role Christians should play in legislating sexuality. He says, “We believe the State acts in its own best interest by furterhing the Christian evaluations of marriage, and the Church must insist upon its right publicly to proclaim its interpretation. However, the strongest defense against un-Christian concepts of sex is to be found in Christian marriage. The light of faith shine to all in the house. By way of conduct Christians demonstrate the superiority of their ideal of marriage. Where it is lacking all prohibitions against adverse propaganda are valueless, because the Christian ideal seems to be of doubtful value to its own advocates” (181).

Piper’s evaluation is balanced and prophetic. Christian activists who lobby against same-sex marriages, but live in egalitarian marriages devoid of gender roles undermine their message.  They are imaging a heterosexual “same-sex marriage.”  Likewise, those who advocate  laws against polygamy, but who themselves are unbiblically divorced and remarried fail to see the connection.  They are serial polygamists themselves.  Consequently, Christian marriages will have the greatest voice in a dark and dying world when they begin to practice what  Bible teaches.  When Christian marriages take seriously the commands of Scripture and rest securely on the Rock of Jesus Christ, it is then that they will begin to have testimonies, in word and deed, that will catch the attention of the world.  Until then, Piper’s analysis will be the sad case because Christian marriages that fail to live up to the ideals they defend will be scoffed at by the world and ultimately discounted.  The result is that the light of Christ meant to be reflected in marriage is put under a basket (Matt. 5:15).  Since Christians are to be lighthouses (Matt. 5:14; Phil. 2:15), brightly illuminating the world with the light of Christ, we must strive with Holy Spirit power and Christ-like tenacity to see Christ and the church modeled in our homes.  For more than the preservation of our families–though for that reason, too–but in order that the world will take notice of what a true marriage is and come to see that God’s design for marriage is better than any man-made alternative, and that ultimately they who reject God’s pattern for marriage will give praise to our Father for the superior wisdom of marriage (Matt. 5:16) and that perhaps they themselves may desire to be a part of Christ’s bridal party (Matt. 22:1-14; 25:1-12).

May we all who know the Savior, strive to have such Spirit-filled, Christ-exalting, gospel-telling marriages, by the Grace of God.

Sola Deo Gloria, dss

Marriage: A Heavenly Sculpture Formed From Earthly Clay

/ davidsschrock


In his popular-level book on marriage, Married for God,Christopher Ash relates a story from Britain that illustrates the way that marriage is expressly intended to display the lovingkindness of God.

Some years ago I read of a dispute in Britain between the Foreign Office and the Treasury. The argument was about which British Ambassadors would be provided with a Rolls Royce for their official duties in a foreign capital [sic]. The Treasury unsurprisingly wanted the wonderful cars restricted to a few: perhaps Washington, Moscow, and Paris. The Foreign Office argued for many more and I love the reasoning. Most people in a foreign capital [sic] have never been to Britain, they said. But when they see this magnificent car gliding through the streets with the Union flag on the bonnet, they will say to themselves, “I have not been to Britain. I don’t know much about Britain. But if they make cars like that there [and in those days we did!], then Britain must be a wonderful place.

In a similar way, I like to think that men and women may say to themselves as they watch a Christian marriage: “I have never seen God. Sometimes I wonder, when I look at the world, if God is good, or if there is a God. But if he can make a man and woman love one another like this; if he can make this husband show costly faithfulness through sickness as well as health; if he can give him resoucres to love when frankly there is nothing in it for him; well, then he must be a good God. And if he can five this wife grace to submit so beautifully, with such an attractive gentle spirit under terrible trials, then again he must be a good God. If you are married or preparing for marriage, pray that others might be able to say this of you in the years ahead (Christopher Ash, Married For God:Making Your Marriage the Best It Can Be [Leicester: Inter-Varsity Press, 2007],96).

Christopher Ash’s analogy points to the way God has designed marriages to radiate His glory and reveal truth about His faithfulness and love. In the human clay of marriage, God has imprinted his heavenly signature, and men and women who are joined by him have the dignified privilege of serving as heavenly ambassadors in a fallen world. Such a living portrayal of God’s love is neither optional or incidental, it is God’s design and his desire for every marriage–Christian or otherwise. Of course, patterned after Jesus Christ and his bride, only those marriages founded on Christ and filled with the Spirit are able to fully reflect his glory (cf. Matt. 7; Eph. 5:18). Nevertheless, every truly Christian marriage should invite others–married couples and interested singles–to experience the increasing depths of heavenly intimacy had in the display of Jesus’ redemptive love portrayed in marriage.

Reading Ash’s account challenges those married or soon to be married to consider how your own marriage discloses or covers Christ and the Church, the love of God, and the blessed hope of union with Christ at the end of the age, to name a few. Marriage was not ultimately created to provide temporal pleasures in a rough-and-tumble world; it was created to picture a greater reality that might draw all the nations into the gracious embrace of the Risen Savior. While providing wonderful pleasures, marriage points to a greater and more lasting union– the marriage feast with the lamb of God (Rev. 19:6-10).

May our marriages grow in the glory of God’s love, and may a skeptical world be awakened by the light of Christ shining forth from our Christ-centered marriages.

Sola Deo Gloria,dss

The Academy and the Church

/ davidsschrock / 2 Comments

Owen Strachan, friend and “Consumed” blogger has recently contemplated the tension raised between the priority of local church ministry and the allure of academic pursuits. A few weeks ago he referenced an article by Covenant Seminary professor and administrator,Sean Michael Lucas, which cogently articulated many of these notions with which seminarians–young and old–wrestle.

This struggle is not new, as illustrated by John Angell James comments in his book on the need for earnestness in ministry. The pastor emeritus does not dismiss the place of scholarship, but neither does he exalt it. In his day, he speaks of the commality of such degrees and reflects on how such ubiquity will temper pride and how attainment will eventually undo the all-consuming initial desire for learning. Consider his balanced sentiments and his emphatic call for earnestness–regardless of ones level of schooling:

In an age like the present, when so much is said about knowledge, and such high value is attached to it, there is a danger of our being seduced from every other qualification, and taken up with this. The establishment of the London University, and the incorporation of our Colleges with it, have give our students access to academic degrees and honours: and there is some danger in the new condition of our literary Institutions, lest our young men should have their minds in some measure drawn away from much more important matters, by the hope of having their names graced by the marks of Bachelor’s or a Master’s degree [or Doctor]. It is a foolish clamour that has been raised against all attention to such matters, and it is a vain and barbarous precaution that would fortify the ministerial devotedness of our students, by restraining them altogether from such distinctions. The studies necessary to enable them to attain this object of their ambition, are a part of the their professional education; while the vanity likely to be engendered by success will soon be annihilated by the commonness of the acquisition. When these degrees are so common that almost all ministers possess them, they will no longer be a snare to their possessors. Besides, like every other object of human desire, when once they are possessed, much of the charm that dazzled the eye of hope has vanished. Henry Martyn, when he came from the senate-house at Cambridge, where he had been declared Senior Wrangler of his year, and had thus won the richest honour the University had to confer, was struct with the vanity of human wishes, and expressed his surprise at the comparative worthlessness of the bauble he had gained, and the shadow he had grasped. It is not by closing the door against such distinctions that we can hope to raise the tone of devotedness in our ministry, but by fostering in the minds of our young men at College, and in the minds of our congregations, and our ministers in general, the conviction that earnestness is just that one thing, to which all other things must be, and can be, made subservient, and without which all otehr things which educaiton can impart are as nothing (John Angell James, An Earnest Ministry: The Want of the Times [Edinburg: Banner of Truth, 1993: Original 1847], 247-48).

Corn Creek Baptist Church and the Spiritual Gift of Listening

/ davidsschrock / 2 Comments

This morning my wife and I had the privilege of worshiping with Corn Creek Baptist Church.  Located in the rolling hills of Northern Kentucky just off the Ohio River, it is a church with a long history, as indicated by the cemetery plot in back.  The people were so kind and welcoming, and those to whom we spoke indicated that they had been in that area and at that church for their whole life.  Aaron O’Kelly is the pastor and a seminary student at Southern, and someone who kindly allowed me to come and preach to his congregation while away in Texas.

Preaching there this morning reminded me of the honor it is to serve churches like CCBC who have for decades permitted young seminarians from Southern to come and fill their pulpits.   Reflecting on this, it strikes me that so many of these churches are gifts to young men cutting their teeth on the preaching of God’s word.   And I wonder how many even know of their service to the kingdom.  So many of these churches endure the constant rotation of young men who come to seminary, take a church (for 1-5 years, perhaps), and then move on to another mission field or congregation somewhere beyond Louisville.

And while the effects of our rotating ministry must be soberly considered by us young preachers, we must at the same time, be grateful for these churches who sacrifice and endure with our developing ministries.  We ought thank them publicly and before the Lord for their investment into the church at large for allowing people like me to come and open God’s word.  Such kind opportunities have been invaluable in my life and in the lives of thousands of current and future pastors, missionaries, and preachers of gospel.   In this service then, these churches clearly have a gift of listening.

I can think of countless moments this morning where improvements could have been made and points clarified, and where a more seasoned pastor could have better exposited in the text.  Yet, with grace and patience the people from Corn Creek allowed me to go on.  So that despite my youth, the Word was preached, Christ was lifted up, the people were encouraged (so they kindly said), and God  was honored.  He was honored both in the preaching of and in the listening to the Word.   For aspiring pastors and young seminarians, may we pause and give praise for the countless rural and street corner churches who permit us to lisp in their presence; and may  those who fill their pulpits labor hard to honor them with Christ-centered sermons and faithful biblical exposition.  May we not forget or diminish their longstanding ministry of serving the church as the incubator of young preachers.  Truly, if seminary, etymologically speaking, is a seedbed, then churches like Corn Creek are incubators and greenhouses for developing pastors.  In this unique role, they serve the church at large and build up the kingdom.

Corn Creek Baptist Church, thank you for your ministry of listening to and loving on a young preacher like myself.  Know that churches all over the globe are built up because of your unique ministry!

Sola Dei Gloria, dss