Mystery Spoiled by a Word

One motif for understanding theological method is built on three approaches that work together in balance: Cataphatic, Pietistic, and Apophatic*. Cataphatic is the part of doing theology that deals with reason. This involves using one's mind towards the development of doctrine. The Pietistic approach involves the worshipful aspect of knowing God. This requires that we experience God and interpret belief about God existentially.

The third approach, Apophatic, deals with the aspect of mystery. While Pietistic and Cataphatic approaches have much to affirm intellectually and existentially, Apophatic approaches preserve the aspect of mystery within Christian theology, while at the same time affirming reason and experience. It supports the idea that we are limited in not only our knowledge of God, but our ability to know God. This is due to epistemological challenges from the human perspective, as well as to the nature of God - who is infinite, omniscient, and wholly 'other'.

These three aspects of theological method provide a nice balance for one another. If the Pietistic approach is too accentuated then the emotional and existential is too emphasized. If the Cataphatic approach is too emphasized then our reason will become god, and the search for truth primarily an intellectual pursuit. If the Apophatic is too emphasized then it's easy to, as one of my professors used to say, "punt on second down." We will too quickly chalk everything up to mystery instead of doing the hard work of discovering truth. 

But despite the contribution of all three, the Apophatic approach is especially interesting to me. This may be due to the traditions from which I come, which speak very little about mystery. It may be due also to my lack of knowledge regarding Eastern theology.

I am reading Brennan Manning's book The Relentless Tenderness of Jesus (previously titled Lion and Lamb) from which this quote comes:

"When Catherine of Sienna, a dynamic contemplative in action, was asked to describe the God of her personal experience, she cried, "He is pazzo d'amore, ebro di'amore" - crazed with love, drunk with love. Yet her words are feeble and inadequate, as are all human words, because Mystery is spoiled by a word."

Words are useful, and I think they help our understanding of God - after all, God speaks to us through his word. But although they contribute to our understanding of God, they don't complete it. Knowing God is a holistic affair - mind, body, heart, soul, strength, experience, etc. God desires our whole selves. 

But the inadequacy of words is not an excuse for not using them. The word musterion appears in Paul's letter's often, describing the work of the gospel in bringing the Gentiles into the fold and creating what we know as the church. The mysteries of God are the deep and ineffable things of God which we believe and proclaim, but only partially understand. Perhaps on the day when we see Christ face to face we'll fully understand those truths. Whether or not we'll have the words then to describe what we experience remains to be seen.



*I have Dr. Scott Horrell to thank for introducing me to this method.

Sometimes You Just Need a Drink

Nothing deeply theological here...just a great video. It's an old one, but one I came across again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yolUoethgHU&feature=player_embedded

Friendship and the Incarnation

I've learned a lot about friendship in my 30's. One of the things I've learned is that I have often not been a good friend to others. I tend to be 'out of sight out of mind' with friends, I don't follow up well, and I don't initiate simply spending time together. My wife often teases me for not keeping up with old friends, and, sadly, it's true. But over the past two years I've learned more about the positive aspects of being a friend, and mainly because I've learned from the example of new friends.

This is on my mind because my good friend Jon Lamb just moved to Kansas. We said our goodbyes on Saturday after twelve men from our church packed his Penske truck (in 45 minutes by the way), ate breakfast tacos and bid farewell. Jon and April have become dear friends to us and we will miss them already. I've learned a lot about being a good friend from Jon as well as from my friend Chris Kedroski and many others in our church.

Although I haven't always been a great friend, I've had the good fortune of having a lot of friends throughout my life. In college I had John 15.15 posted on my dorm room wall: "I no longer call you servants because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything I have learned from my Father I have made known to you." I have often thought about what a sublime truth that is - the second Person of the Trinity, the Incarnate Son of God, calls us friends.

I think it's interesting that in John 15 Jesus calls us friends based on what he's learned from the Father. It's not only the information passed on by the Father, to Jesus, and then to his disciples, but the example the Father sets for the Son that reveals the Father's will for his Son and all his children. Since the disciples are learning to follow Jesus in the context of being his friends, I wonder what role friendship plays in local church discipleship. Many of my formal discipleship relationships have not been in the context of natural friendships. In some cases friendships grew, in others they didn't. But I think much of my discipleship has come with 'rubbing shoulders' with friends who also have their eyes fixed on Jesus.

Praise God for his Son, my Savior, my Lord, and my friend. And praise God for friendships that help me to more like Jesus. 

Luther Kissing the Pope's Feet

On October 31st, 1999 the Lutheran World Council of Churches and the Catholic Church signed a document called The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, after many years of ecumenical dialogue on a doctrine essential to the distinction between these two major traditions. For some, this was a time of ecumenical and ecclesiastical success. For others, it was a time of compromise, or even a threat to the essence of the gospel. In either case, it was a step towards differing traditions understanding one another, and finding commonality after centuries of dispute.

Rereading Paul Together: Protestant and Catholic Dialogues on Justification, ed. David Aune, is a compilation of articles from both Lutheran and Catholic scholars. Some of the articles are responses to one another, and others are dealing with some of the major issues in Pauline studies, especially over the last 30 years of research. The various articles are some of the most balanced, honest, charitable and irenic of any scholarly articles I've ever read. The ecumenical intention is refreshing, not because the writers are seeking compromise but because there is a concerted effort to go back to the biblical text for the basis of Christian theology.

One of the most interesting quotes was Lutheran theologian Michael Root's reference to Luther's quote in his commentary on Galatians: "All we aim for is that the glory of God be preserved and that the righteousness of faith remain pure and sound. Once this has been established, namely that God alone justifies us solely by His grace through Christ, we are willing not only to bear the pope aloft on our hands but also to kiss his feet." Although Luther is likely speaking in hyperbole, we also know what he thought of the pope. These are strong words.

Root's point (and what much of book reiterates) is that distinctives within Lutheran theology, especially over and against Rome, may be eventually unnecessary if dialogue such as the Joint Declaration continues to bring together various traditions. The challenge is seeking common ground, while clinging to the true, biblical gospel - and of course agreeing on the nature of the gospel itself. It's a challenging endeavor, but one worth the fight if ecumencity among Christians across denominations is something to be actually realized.

John Owen Pt 2: One Act of God

John Owen's classic The Death of Death in the Death of Christ is laborious, arduous, and daunting. His style of writing (I am told by my friend Jon Lamb) belongs to an older age of English prose that began to change significantly not long after the book was published in 1684. Nevertheless it is a fascinating and compelling work on the significance of the Christ's atonement.

What I find to be particularly compelling is Owen's ability to tie all the facets of Christ's atonement into one singular, focused and purposeful work - a work that begins with God's intention for the elect and ends with his finished work for his people. Christ's oblation, intercession, justification, sanctification, calling, glorification and future hope are all facets of the same intention in God to save those for whom he has died. This unifying picture of God's work in Christ raises stirring questions for those who hold to some form of Arminianism and hypothetical Universalism. One question in particular is: Why would Christ suffer on the cross on behalf of sinners, paying for their sins, only to have them suffer again for those same sins in hell? This question implies that Christ's work is efficacious, or it does what it was intended to do. This implication of course is predicated on a view of election in which God specifically chooses, by the mystery of his will and for his glory, those who will inherit eternal life.

I've always had a bent towards Calvinism. I cut my teeth on the John Piper school of theology, embracing an Anabaptist/Radical Reformation view of the sacraments, and a staunch Calvinist view of Soteriology. However, I've always danced the line on whether I was a 4 or 5 point Calvinist. Of course a true Calvinist would say there is no such thing as a 4 point Calvinist, that's an Arminian. And I would see their point. I guess having attended DTS and having been involved in a tradition/movement that expressed a belief in unlimited atonement (drop the L in TULIP), I've always struggled to take a stand on the issue concerning the great question, "For whom did Christ die?"

But Owen's book makes me much less comfortable with the idea of unlimited atonement, specifically because I believe in unconditional election. If God, before the creation of the universe, chose us, sent his Son as the perfect God/Man to suffer and die for our sins, justified us in Christ, adopted us, sanctified, glorified and gave everlasting hope and life to us, then why would he only do part of that for others? In other words, why would God send his Son as the perfect God/Man to suffer and die for the non-elects' sins but do nothing else for them in the aforementioned sentence? Would he not die for those who he elected? Would he not adopt those whom he justified? Why would he die for those he never intended to elect, justify, call, adopt, sanctify and glorify?

The point is this: Embracing unconditional election and understanding God's work in Christ for the sake of lost sinners as one singular, interconnected, intentional work from beginning to end changes the way we think of the atonement. I believe that passages such as 1John 2.2, John 3.16, and 2Pet 3.9 make it difficult to not see God's love for all humankind. But although I don't have time to expound on it, I will say that Owen's arguments for not understanding 'world' 'all' and other seemingly universal words as meaning "every man, woman and child who ever lived, is living now, and ever will live" are compelling, and the opposing view seemingly indefensible.

I have to bring up my friend Jon Lamb again, who always asks, "So what's at stake?" Why does this matter? That part, I'm still figuring out. Often times practical issues as they relate to evangelism are discussed when limited vs unlimited atonement is in question. But hopefully one would not think that embracing limited atonement somehow devalues evangelism. I suppose it could, but it doesn't have to. The truth is that, unless you're a complete Universalist, the atonement in Christian orthodoxy will always be limited to some degree or another. Even an Arminian would admit that some people do not place their personal trust in Christ and thus pay for this sins. What good is Christ's death on their behalf in that case? Unlimited atonement brings me no additional comfort, in fact it's that much more heartbreaking considering that one's sins were paid for, and yet they rejected  the free gift in Christ. Limited atonement (or particular atonement) in fact is comforting, because it says that the work God intended in Christ for his children is one complete work with many facets, initiated before time began, and comes with a promise to be completed, to the glory of God. 

Synchronicity

All day Wednesday I struggled at work with boredom. It's not that I didn't have anything to do, it was that I didn't feel like doing anything. I was working from home, which is sometimes counterproductive. The house is too quiet and the climate control too comfortable for serious work. So my mind wandered and my body relaxed the more I slumped in my chair and stretched out my legs.

As soon as I went into work the next day I received an email titled: "Boredom at Work is Self Inflicted". It was from a daily devotional of a ministry called Work Life: http://www.worklife.org/

I felt like a complainer...and I was. It's absurd when you think about all the blessings and gifts and resources I've been given to provide for my family and live a comfortable life (comfortable in light of the world population, not necessarily middle or under middle class Americans). My current vocation does not line up with what I perceive to be my long-term vocational calling...so I often enjoy whining about it, which leads to boredom, self-loathing and apathy, instead of being thankful, which leads to praise, contentment and a gracious spirit.

What I was especially reminded of in all this was the power of the gospel, to redeem, transcend and inspire any given situation. Isn't that what makes the power of the gospel so great? The gospel is not controlled or produced by its context, but changes the lives of people within a given context in order for God's work to be made manifest in the world. It's a quiet power that moves in the hearts of men with indelible grace and strength.

Opening that email the other day was also a reminder of God's sense of humor in synchronicity, or 'an apparently meaningful coincidence.' I can't remember if I laughed or cussed, but the irony was wonderful. To receive that email, blasted out to thousands, the day after I struggled mightily with boredom, was, what I interpret as, God's providence. I don't look for 'synchronic signs' under every rock...but I know them when I see them.

May we all 'work as though working unto the Lord' (Col 3.22-24) and allow the peace of Christ to do the rest (Phil 4.4-7).

Revelation, not Explanation

My pastor, Keith Ferguson, is taking a break from his current Galatians series to preach on tragedy (Tragedy and Trinity is the sermon title), due to all the questions he's been getting about the relationship between God's goodness and omnipotence (Keith's blog: http://www.gospelrenewal.com/blog/). If God is in fact good, as well as sovereign and all-powerful, then why does he allow (or worse yet be the first cause of) tragedy in our world? This is often referred to as the theodicy, or the problem with evil. It's a legitimate problem, and one that all religions who believe in a personal God are forced to face.

One of the quotes Keith is using, which I think is great, is from a David Platt sermon:  

The greatest need that God says we have in the book of Job in the face of personal tragedy and immense suffering is not explanation, but revelation. David Platt, The Church At Brook Hills

In the face of tragedy trite explanations and tired cliches don't cut it. Unfortunately even Scripture sometimes doesn't cut it (yeah, I said it). If one of my children died in a car crash and someone said, "Well you know God works for the good of those..." I know that's true, but sadly that reminder probably wouldn't help. Instead I need a person to just be there, not an explanation for why something happened.

In the face of tragedy there's a balance that needs to be struck. On the one hand there is hope, a hope that we must cling to and remind ourselves of all the time. On the other hand there is an acceptance of the reality of the tragedy in which we find ourselves. A good friend from seminary was flying home a few years back for his father's funeral. His father died of a heart attack in his 50's. My friend, while at the airport, happened to run into one of the seminary's teaching assistants, who gave his condolences. My friend responded, "Well yeah, but he's in a better place." The teaching assistant paused for a moment and said, "Well yeah, but it still sucks." That was a powerful reminder that we shouldn't sugar coat tragedy. We don't sweep it under the rug so that we can feel better about it. It is what it is. Death is horrible - always. Even when a person is relieved of their current sufferings in this life. Death is an abomination. Suffering and sin and sadness are things that are not right with the world - and were not part of God's original intention for human beings. But the great hope we have is that all those things will pass away, when Christ returns in glory.

It's interesting in Job that the vast majority of the book is made up of attempts at explanation in the face of tremendous suffering. And then the voice of God drives home the fact that what Job needed was a Person, not an commentary. He needed a revelation, not an explanation. Our world needs Jesus, to come face to face with the Person, who is the only one who can deliver on hopeful promises.