I like to be personally preemptive in my own theology, making myself aware of the weaknesses of particular positions I hold. Some of the weaknesses are significant and some are relatively minor in my view. This helps me to keep perspective about why people disagree with my position. As well, it helps to disarm conversations so that productivity can happen in theological discourse (i.e. you are not just trading shots, one-upping each other). Without this, theological advancement rarely takes place. It simply turns into an exercise in trying to win an argument, and I am not interested in that. I hope my goal is to discover truth.

Therefore, I have put together a list of some of my positions along with what I perceive to be the biggest problems of these positions. I encourage others to do the same. It will give you quite a bit of legitimacy when you can admit your own weaknesses:

Sola Fide. I believe that justification is by faith alone, without the addition of any works whatsoever.

Biggest problem with this belief: There are many passages in the Scripture that are hard to reconcile with sola fide. The one that stands out the most in my opinion is Matt 25:22-46. Christ seems to indicate that the judgment will be on the bases of deeds that we have done or failed to do, not on faith alone.

Eternal security: I believe that once a person is saved, he or she cannot lose their salvation.

Biggest problem with this belief: Hands down, for me, the biggest problem does not arise from the infamous Hebrews passages (I actually think that are relatively easy to understand), but from Matthew 18:23-35. Christ seems to teach that the forgiven can have their penalty laid back on their shoulders due to their own non-forgiveness of others. This parallels the Lord’s Prayer which seems to make our forgiveness from God contingent upon our forgiveness of others (Matt. 6:12). “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespasses against us.” Continue Reading »

I sit here with a bit of a conflicted soul. On the one hand, I got the new issue of Christianity Today and found that it is devoted to the importance of doctrine in spiritual formation. Giddy. That is what I was when I read it. However, I also received an email yesterday that serves to curb my excitement, reminding me of the reality of our desperate condition. (I’ll get to the email soon).

Christians often scare me. Really, all religious people scare me. But Christians in particular because they are the ones I have to deal with everyday. I have a deep empathy for the so-called “new atheists” such as Daniel Dennet and Christopher Hitchens who find religion repulsive and counterproductive to the betterment of society. While I completely disagree with them for a variety of reasons that will not be covered here, I can put myself in their shoes and find myself saying the same things. Namely: Christians can be so bizarre.

Seriously, we can produce the craziest nutcases the world has to offer. Sadly, it is often our beliefs that are the issue. From the “God told me to kill my children,”  “I cannot talk to you because you are going through a divorce,” “If you say the earth is going around the Sun we are going to put you in jail,” to “Our ministry needs a million dollars or I am going to kill myself,”  we have our embarrassments. The things said and done in the name of God are astonishing and disturbing. Yes, I know. Everyone has their nutcases, but we have the tendency to breed a special variety. I have already, in times past, talked trash on my own breed: Calvinism. But now I am going to get after the species in general: Christians.

In the interest of full-disclosure I must tell you something. I have Gail Riplinger’s book Which Bible is God’s Word sitting right in front of me. Its basic argument is that all Bible translations other than the King James Bible are from Satan. Oh yeah, I am serious. The sin is not that I have this book, but that it is representative of times past when I was, for about six weeks, a KJV Only advocate, believing that all other Bible versions were from Satan. To make matters worse I was actually an outspoken evangelist of this belief. I told my family, my friends, and everyone who would listen about Satan’s plot to get you to read another version of the Bible. I can only imagine what the conversation sounded like. I had “evidence” that I thought was solid, but as I look back on this “evidence”, my face turns red. I guess I keep Riplinger’s book in front of me to keep me humble and always aware of how bizarre I can be.

Christianity is dangerous. The Bible is dangerous. Please don’t get me wrong. I believe that both, rightly understood, are wonderful and true. However, the “rightly understood” is so hard to come by. The difficulty is not that one has to be a super-genius to understand the Bible or the Christian faith. Quite the opposite. The Bible is wonderfully simple and so is the Christian faith.

I believe that the difficulty lies in two areas:

1. Christians believe that the Bible is God’s word.
2. There is not a bolt of lightening that strikes you when you interpret it wrong (i.e. there is no immediate evidence of or consequence for wrong interpretation.)

The reality of these two make a potentially lethal combination. They don’t make good bed-fellows and hence the Roman Catholic cry for an imperial authority to regulate such things. Although Catholics have their share of bizarre teachings themselves, their problem is bigger in my opinion since their bizarre doctrines get dogmatized and everyone must believe them. At least in Protestantism we can both recognize and repudiate our weird uncles. Catholics are stuck having to defend them for all time. (Another story, another time.)

Now for the bizarrity of the moment. . .

This is from an email I received from a concerned follower of our ministry. It is a phone message from his Bible Study leader. Every time I listen to this, I am reminded of the movie “The Jerk” when Steve Martin is getting shot at but he naively thinks the guy is shooting at the cans beside him. “Its the cans. He hates the cans!” Well, in this case: “Its the buildings. God hates the buildings.” Listen and you will see what I mean:

(Please note that the audio has been altered to protect the identity of the caller.)

 

 "He Hates the Buildings" [2:07m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (286)

Buildings are the whore of Babylon? Really? Satan is luring people into buildings which is the great apostasy? Really? Continue Reading »

I often get asked this question: Which Bible translation is the best? This issue creates more polemics than you would believe. People become impassioned for or against certain Bible translations. I think we need to take a very balanced approach to this, understanding the “whats” and the “whys” of Bible translations.

All translations have their particular characteristic that makes them unique. Bible translations will distinguish themselves in two primary ways:

1. What underlying Greek text do the translation use? Is it the “Majority” or “Received” text (a group of late Greek text that primarily comes from the Byzantine area) or the Eclectic/Critical text (mixture of different types of manuscripts, primarily using the earliest text). The KJV, NKJV, and many older translations used the former, while the newer and more up-to-date Bible’s such as the NAS, NIV, ESV, NLT, NET, etc. use the latter. We should also use the latter since most believe that they represent the better manuscripts.

2. Bible’s also differ in purpose, all of which have their place. Was it written for study or reading? Was it written for the seminary or the church? When available, you should have a variety of translations for different purposes, but you must understand the differences. Here are the three translation methods:

• Formal Equivalence: Translations that seek to translate word for word (although this is really impossible). Examples: NAS, KJV, ASV, ESV. Less readable, but better for study in contemporary languages. Why? Because they will usually attempt to make fewer interpretive decisions on any text that can be understood in many ways. This allows the reader to struggle through the options.
• Dynamic Equivalence: Translations that seek to translate thought for thought. Examples: NIV, TNIV, NRSV, etc. Not quite as good for deep study, but usually better for reading and memorization. Dynamic equivalence translations make good pulpit or teaching Bibles.
• Paraphrase: Translations that seek to use common language and idioms to get the basic point across in a very readable way. Examples: Message, Philip’s Translation, NLT, GNB, etc. While paraphrases are not good for study or memorization, they are very readable and cause you to read the text differently than you normally would. In this respect, they have great value.

Most of the translations can be found here at BibleGateway.

My suggestion is to have some of each. I recommend the NIV, ESV, NET, NAS, and the Message. The NET, in some ways, is the best of all worlds as it contains many study notes that explain when a passage should be translated differently. I guess the NET translation methodology could be called an eclectic (that is why I could not place it on the above chart–it may need its own category!). While I believe the NET is the best study Bible available on the market today, because of its unconventional translation philosophy, it is not very smooth in its reading and, therefore, does not make a good memorization or pulpit Bible.

Finally, what good would this post be without a chart? Continue Reading »

There are many words and concepts in theology that suffer from misunderstanding, mis-characterization, and misinformation. “Predestination,” “Calvinism,” “Total Depravity,” “Inerrancy,” and “Complementarianism”, just to name a few that I personally have to deal with. Proponents are more often than not on the defensive, having to explain again and again why it is they don’t mean what people think they mean.

The concept of “free will” suffers no less with regard to this misunderstanding. Does a person have free will? Well, what do you mean by “free will”? This must always be asked.

Do you mean:

1. That a person is not forced from the outside to make a choice?
2. That a person is responsible for his or her choices?
3. That a person is the active agent in a choice made?
4. That a person is free to do whatever they desire?
5. That a person has the ability to choose contrary to their nature (who they are)?

Calvinists, such as myself, do believe in free will and we don’t believe in free will. It just depends on what you mean.

When it comes to the first three options, most Calvinist would agree that a person is not forced to make a choice, is responsible for their choices, and is the active agent behind those choices. They would reject the forth believing that a person is not free to do whatever they desire (for example, no matter how much one desires, he or she cannot read the thoughts of another person, fly without wings, or transport from one location to another just by thinking about the desired location). Continue Reading »

Three types of Christian scholarship:

1. Exegetes (study) - Level one studies 

original research; learning; data; facts

 These are the type of people who are continually doing research. They primarily involve themselves in first hand resources. In biblical studies, they are concerned with original language, backgrounds, historical criticism, and textual issues. They are often (though not always) very timid to take theological stands due to their realization of the complexities of the issues involved. Because of this, they are sometimes accused of “academic agnosticism.” They are very precise thinkers and normally find it difficult to teach because they are always qualifying everything.  More often than not they limit their studies to very particular areas.

They find all the pieces of the puzzle.

Viewpoint: TREES

• Why they might dislike theologians: “They often lack the precise information and are sloppy with the facts.”
• Why they need theologians: To process the data and come to conclusions from a broader understanding.
• Possible problems with exegetes: Truth often dies the death of a thousand qualifications. They can lack common sense. Their precise studies can blind them to the obvious.

2. Theologian/Philosopher (think) – Level two studies

systematize; reflect; theories

 Theologians are the thinkers. They are not so much concerned about researching and discovering original data, but with the bigger picture of what the data means and exploring original ideas. They spend their time reflecting on issues and coming to conclusions about truth. They systematize the data in order that creeds can be reasoned, established, and defended. They are much broader in their thinking and studies, having to be familiar with many areas of scholarship in order to provide a systematic understanding of the complete truth. They are concerned with biblical studies, history, philosophy, psychology, sociology, logic, and the like.

They put the puzzle together.

Viewpoint: FOREST Continue Reading »

There would certainly be little quibble from someone who suggested that doctrine develops. There would also be no problems when someone suggests that earlier writers of the Old Testament knew less than later writers. The idea here is doctrinal development within the canon, often referred to as the doctrine of progressive revelation.

For example, we understand that Abraham did not have access to any of the Old Testament. His sources for theological inquiry had to come from other places. David, on the other hand, had much of the Old Testament to draw from, including the story of Abraham. We would assume that David’s understanding of the Gospel was more fully developed than Abraham’s. Abraham’s was most certainly more developed than Adam. Isaiah’s was more developed than any of these. Why? Because he had a fuller complement of understanding, both from time and the fuller complement of God’s revealed word. Yet Daniel had even more than Isaiah! You see where I am going.

So far so good?

Now let us move to the New Testament. I am sure that you would not have any problems with assertions that the Apostles in training while under the tutelage of Christ were less theologically astute and aware than the post-resurrection Apostles. No one would dare immortalize Peter’s rebuke of Christ’s revelation of his impending crucifixion (Matt. 16:21-23), believing it to be correct and Christ in error. We understand that the Apostle Peter was wrong and, with regard to the theology of the Gospel, a novice. We give him grace. We understand that Peter’s sermon in Acts 2 presents a bold and corrective advancement in his theology. We allow for this kind of development.

Normally, people would assume that after the resurrection and the receiving of the Holy Spirit early in Acts that everything the Apostles said and believed was not only correct, but representative of the fullness of the truth. We often assume that, at this time, there was no further need for any development in their understanding.

However, I am not completely convinced of this. In fact, I believe that, like with the authors of the Old Testament, the New Testament authors developed in their theology. In fact, I don’t necessarily believe that any of them, even Paul, had it all figured out the way we often suppose. I think that we sometimes read into their thoughts and writings a theology that, while correct, is not fully representative of the way they would have understood it, much less expressed it.

Why would we start with such an assumption? What need is there? We don’t do so with the Old Testament, why do we with the New Testament?

What kind of doctrine develops?

Let us start with something easy. I think that all of us would be willing to admit that, in Acts, there is a belief that Christ is coming in the lifetime of the Apostles. In Acts 1 the Apostles ask if it is now that Christ is restoring his kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6). Christ tells them, essentially, that they are not going to know the timing of his kingdom. Therefore, should we not expect them to speak with some degree of ignorance about this throughout the book of Acts and in other letters? In Acts 3:19, it seems that Peter had an expectation of immediate eschatological fulfillment of the coming of the Lord. Paul often seems to express the same expectation. For example in Romans 13:11-12, Paul exhorts the Romans to righteous living based upon this expectation: ” Do this, knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed. 12 The night is almost gone, and the day is near. Therefore let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light (NAU). As well, notice in 1 Cor. 7:29 that Paul exhorts virgins not to get married because, in his opinion (? see 1 Cor. 7:25), “the time has been shortened” (v. 29). Peter, in 1 Pet. 4:7, says “the end of all things is at hand.” However, we don’t notice much development beyond this. Obviously, at the time of the Apostles death, they developed to the point that they knew the coming of Christ was not going to be in their lifetime! Continue Reading »

1. Preunderstanding fallacy: Believing you can interpret with complete objectivity, not recognizing that you have preunderstandings that influence your interpretation.

There is no such thing as a “white-coat” interpreter. In other words, there is no one who comes to the text as a scientist who objectively interprets the data. We all are influenced by many things including our upbringing, culture, personality, and others preunderstandings. Once we recognize this, we are better equipped to interpret the text honesty. Otherwise, our preunderstanding will always rule over our interpretation.

2. Incidental fallacy: Reading incidental historical texts as prescriptive rather than descriptive.

While the Bible teaches us truths, not every incidental detail is meant to teach these truths. Much of the Bible is made up of information that is important to the overall story, but is not important in isolation to the rest. We must understand the difference between ”prescriptive” and “descriptive” material.  Prescriptive: information that provides the reader with principles that they are to apply to their lives. Descriptive: incidental material that describes the way something was done but is not necessarily meant to encourage the reader in the same action. A good example of this is the Apostles casting lots to elect a new Apostle to replace Judas in Acts 1. This is not meant to teach us how to elect church leaders, it is just the way it was done at that time.

3. Obscurity fallacy: Building theology from obscure material.

Much of the Bible is very clear and understandable. Some of it is very difficult to understand. Do not build theology and doctrine from passages of Scripture that are not clear. For example, it is very difficult to understand what Christ was talking about in John 3:5 where He mentions being “born of water.” “Jesus answered, ‘I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born of water and spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.’” Because of its obscurity, one should not build a theology that places too much weight on what being “born of water” means. The Bible speaks clearly on many issues concerning salvation in other places. It is best to take the obscure passages and interpret them in light of the clear passages. In doing so, the interpreter can create an interpretive framework upon what these obscure passages cannot mean, even if discovery cannot be made with certianty about what they, in fact, do mean.

Obscure passages can be the most dangerous teachings in Scripture. Sadly, it is often the case that many people and traditions take obscure passages and pack their theology into them since there is no definitive way to say that they are wrong in their interpretation. This is a common fallacy committed among “Christian” cults. In other words, there simply is no more fertile ground for cults and false teaching than obscure passages of the Bible. 

4. Etymological root fallacy: Looking to the root etymology of a word to discover its meaning.

The problem with this is that etymology can often be deceiving, such as in the English word “butterfly” taken from “butter” and “fly.” An etymological study of this word only confuses the current usage. The same can be said of the word “good-bye,” which is taken from the Anglo-Saxon, “God be with you.” When someone says “good-bye,” it does not necessarily (if ever) mean that they are calling a blessing of God’s presence to be with you.

From D.A. Carson’s Exegetical Fallacies:

“One of the most enduring fallacies, the root fallacy presupposes that every word actually has a meaning bound up with its shape or its components. In this view, meaning is determined by etymology; that is by the roots of a word.  How many times have we been told that because the verbal cognate of apostolos (apostle) is apostello (I send), the root meaning of “apostle” is “one who is sent.”?  In the preface of the New King James Bible, we are told that the literal meaning of monogenes is “only begotten.”  Is that true?  How often do preachers refer to the verb agapao (to love), contrast it with phileo (to love) and deduce that the text is saying something about a special kind of loving, for no other reason than that agapao is used?

All of this is linguistic nonsense.  We might have guessed as much if we were more acquainted with the etymology of English words. Anthony C. Thistleton offers by way of example our word ‘nice’, which comes from the Latin nescius, meaning “ignorant.”  Our “good-by” is a contraction for Anglo-Saxon “God be with you.” It is certainly easy to imagine how “God be with you” came to be “good-by.”  But I know of no one today who in saying that such and such a person is “nice”  believes that he or she has in some measure labeled that person ignorant because the “root meaning” or “hidden meaning” or “literal meaning” of “nice” is ‘ignorant’.”

Continue Reading »

My sincere thanks to Michael for inviting me to guest post this series.  I manage the Evangelical Portal at Patheos (you can see the Vision for the Portal here, and you can check out a great sample article , an interview with a Christian professor at Harvard Law School with terminal cancer).

Every now and then, the course of history hinges upon a a single person, a single event, a single year.  Such is the case with Martin Luther and his theological disputation in the city of Heidelberg in the Spring of 1518.  Martin Luther inverted the theological method of his day, and the consequences for the history of western thought have proven nothing short of revolutionary.

In the first installment of this series on Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation, I described the significance of the Disputation in the unfolding of Luther’s life and thought.  In contrast to the better known ­Ninety-Five Theses, which focused on the selling of indulgences and other abuses of papal power, the Heidelberg Disputation of 1518 offers a more expansive vision of the relationship between man and God.

Here, I will consider the first 7 of Luther’s 28 theological theses.  The preface is also significant:

“Distrusting completely our own wisdom, according to that counsel of the Holy Spirit, “Do not rely on your own insight” (Prov. 3:5), we humbly present to the judgment of all those who wish to be here these theological paradoxes, so that it may become clear whether they have been deduced well or poorly from St. Paul, the especially chosen vessel and instrument of Christ, and also from St. Augustine, his most trustworthy interpreter.”

Luther makes clear from the beginning that the theological case he presents is not to be judged by its persuasiveness to ordinary human reasoning, but solely by its fidelity to scripture.  The implication is that worldly wisdom will be offended by the essential “paradoxes” of Christian theology.  This will be a major theme of the Disputation.  The theology of his day, Luther believed, had become an intellectual form of works righteousness.  If God were best encountered in the elaborate edifices of the philosophers and theologians, then knowing God would be a matter of intellectual achievement, and a cause for pride—and our relationship with God would have all the passion of a relationship with a philosophy textbook.  Thus God revealed Himself such that only the humble can receive him.  The wise must become fools, and the mighty meek, if they would know a God who gave Himself as a humiliated and crucified carpenter.

Thus we come to the theological theses.  The fundamental question of the Disputation is implicit in the first: what is the “way to righteousness”? Continue Reading »

I am not a charismatic.  It is hard for me to describe myself as a traditional cessationist either. I refer to myself as a “de facto” cessationist. What does this mean? Essentially, when it comes to the so-called supernatural sign gifts such as gifts of tongues, prophecy, workers of miracles, etc, I have never seen anything which would convince me that there are modern day manifestations of these gifts. There certainly could be, I just have not seen them. (I have written about it here.)

Concerning the gift of prophecy (the idea that one can speak on behalf of God in a “thus-says-the-Lord” type way), I have never seen this either. I would love to have God speak to me, or better, through me, in such a way, but he never has. I have never heard the voice of God and have never been his spokesperson other than through my interpretation of Scripture. Although, I must admit, I had a strange occurence twenty years ago. I had a drunk I gave a ride to in downtown Oklahoma City tell me that God told him I was going to be a preacher. At that time in my life, it was a joke to think such. It was not enough for me to think much of, and the guy was drunk!

I could not make a very strong argument that God has stopped sending prophets or stopped speaking directy to people. My theology does not demand such. I have simply just never seen one. However, there is an argument out there that more traditional cessationist’s (those who’s theology argues that the supernatural sign gifts have ceased in the first century, usually with the death of the last Apostle or the completion of Scripture) make to argue their case. It is an argument that I think is very weak and fails to understand the nature of prophecy and the nature of what constitutes Scripture. It goes like this:

If the gift of prophecy is still being given and there are people out there who speak directly on behalf of God, then the canon is still open.

What this means is that if God is still speaking in any way, whatever is spoken, by virtue of it being God’s words, needs to be added to Scripture. Maybe a new book, letter, Psalm, or just a page added to the end of the Bible, this argument insists that a belief in modern day prophecy demands an open canon.

I disagree.

Here is the basic problem I see with such an argument: It misunderstands the nature of prophecy and the nature of the canon. Continue Reading »

Dave Burke, a well-known Christadelphian, and I will be debating the doctrine of the Trinity for six weeks beginning Sunday, April 11, 2010, here on Parchment and Pen. Over a thousand people voted for Dave to be the non-Trinitarian in this debate. He and I have agreed to limit our weekly statements to 5,000 words apiece (down from the 10,000 stated in the “challenge” post back in November).

In this post, I will list books and articles that are generally supportive of the approach I take to defending from the Bible the doctrine of the Trinity, as well as the books and articles that Dave recommends as generally supportive of the approach he takes in defending his non-Trinitarian theological position. Continue Reading »