tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584612856426917622024-03-05T13:12:41.518-06:00 Jeff MeyersJeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.comBlogger660125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-79626240198763240012013-03-02T20:27:00.000-06:002013-03-02T20:28:10.830-06:00How Jesus Saved the World, Part 2<a href="http://trinityhouseinstitute.com/how-jesus-saved-the-world-part-1/" target="_blank">Continued from Part 1</a><br />
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By arresting, torturing, and killing Jesus, the authorities thought that they were securing well being and peace again in their society by means of the tried and true method of a single-victim scapegoat. Everyone’s thirst for violence will be satisfied and we can get on with the business of everyday life.<br />
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Once they decided on this violence, they were all unified. Everyone’s anger and frustration and hatred converged on a single victim. If we don’t understand this process we will just be baffled by the bizarre unity achieved in John 18–19. The escalation of the rivalries and the advent of violence always witness the strangest about-faces and the most unexpected regroupings: Pharisees and Herodians; Zealots and Sadducees. The bodyguards of the High Priests and the Roman Cohort garrisoned in Jerusalem. Judas and Peter. Caiaphas, Annas, and Pilate. Religious leaders cooperated with political. Barrabas was accepted by the Jews. Jews and Romans learned to work together! “Herod and Pilate became friends with each other that very day, for before this they had been at enmity with each other” (Luke 23:12).<br />
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We have a united kingdom—one society, one kingdom, a kingdom of this world unified in their hatred and violence. They all conspire together against the Lord and his anointed (Psalm 2).<br />
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And here is Jesus, the innocent victim, the scapegoat. “My kingdom is not of this world, Governor Pilate.”<br />
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Continue reading on the <a href="http://trinityhouseinstitute.com/how-jesus-saved-the-world-ii/" target="_blank">Trinity House blog</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-33806129060324740742013-02-23T08:33:00.001-06:002013-02-23T08:33:32.237-06:00Where have all the Presbyterians gone?This is a thoughtful post by Bill Evans from his blog the Ecclesial Calvinist.<br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">A while back my friend Anthony Bradley posted an insightful and provocative <a href="http://bradley.chattablogs.com/archives/2012/06/what-happened-t.html" style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">blog piece</a> asking why the popular influence of conservative Presbyterians prominent a few decades back (e.g., Jim Boice, R. C. Sproul, Sinclair Ferguson, and John Frame) seems to have waned in comparison to Baptists of a broadly Reformed soteriological persuasion. I posted an extended comment at the time, and thought I would expand on it here.</span> </blockquote>
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"></span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">There are at least two big issues in play—the Baptistic Reformed success as driven by institutions (e.g., Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, the Founders’ Movement) and gifted individuals (e.g., Don Carson, Al Mohler, Mark Dever, Mark Driscoll) on the one hand, and the apparent Presbyterian decline on the other. As a Presbyterian I’m not particularly well equipped to comment on the first, but I think I have something to offer about the second.</span> </blockquote>
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);"></span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Of course, the Presbyterian and Reformed tradition has been declining as a percentage of the American population since the nineteenth century. But statistics available in resources like ARDA and the <i style="border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches</i> indicate that some of the NAPARC denominations are plateaued or in decline. This is worrisome, and the reasons are doubtless complex, having to do with social as well as theological factors. Below are five general observations from the “for what it’s worth department.”</span></blockquote>
Read the rest of the post <a href="http://theecclesialcalvinist.wordpress.com/2013/02/21/how-conservative-presbyterianism-lost-its-mojo/">here</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-66469033365802236282013-02-21T10:35:00.000-06:002013-02-21T10:37:22.660-06:00Evangelical Superstars Should Keep Quiet When They Don't Know What They Are Talking AboutSometimes it's hard to categorize stuff. Is it about guns and shooting or theology and the Bible? In this case it's both.<br />
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<span style="color: #783f04;">I hesitate to write this post. But I just can't seem to restrain myself. As most of you know, I am a Presbyterian minister. I'm not a pastor in the mainline liberal or progressive Presbyterian church. That organization is scarcely identifiable as a Christian church any more. I am a member of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). We broke off from the United Presbyterian church back in 1973 because of rampant unorthodoxy and modernist progressive social dogmatism in their seminaries. But I digress. </span></blockquote>
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<span style="color: #783f04;">All of that to say that I identify with a tradition of straight-taking, tough-minded Calvinists that do not view the world through rose-colored, liberal glasses.</span></blockquote>
Read it all at <a href="http://www.simplyshooting.net/2013/02/pious-nonsense.html">Simply Shooting</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-15558739917514652332013-02-20T17:25:00.002-06:002013-02-20T17:25:51.952-06:00How Jesus Saved the World, Part 1<br />
We are too used to reading the Gospels’ stories of Jesus’ arrest, trial, condemnation, and death from a devotional perspective and so we miss a lot of what’s going on. We actually have a difficult time trying to figure out the meaning of the details of the story. Of course, we will defend the historicity of the details of the story against unbelieving academics and liberal churchman. But why these details? Why any details at all?<br />
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John has already wonderfully summarized things in chapters 1 and 3. “Behold the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world” and “God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son.” But what does God’s provision of a lamb for the sins of the world have to do with this long story of what happens to Jesus the night before he dies? What does God loving the world have to do with the machinations and conspiracies of Judas, the High Priests, Pilate, and the Jewish crowds? A great deal, truly, but we will have to learn to read the Passion accounts a bit differently.<br />
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You see, here in the narrative of Jesus’ arrest and trial and condemnation we have a somewhat surprising perspective. It does not contradict or compete with the other apostolic explanations of Jesus’ death; rather, it complements and enriches them. Remember, the meaning of the death of Jesus is far richer than we are often used to acknowledging. When we look at the details of the text—what events and characters and words John has carefully chosen to weave together from the story of Jesus’ last few days—we can get a pretty good idea of what he is trying to communicate. This is not fiction, but history. Nevertheless, narrating history is never simply a matter of reproducing what has happened. Out of a million and more little details one must pick and choose just what to record.<br />
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Read the rest here at <a href="http://trinityhouseinstitute.com/how-jesus-saved-the-world-part-1/">Trinity House</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-27897265991680863262013-02-15T08:00:00.000-06:002013-02-15T08:13:25.051-06:00Young Communicants & Voting<b>On Interviews & Testimonies, Part VI</b><br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2013/02/on-interviews-and-testimonies-part-iv.html" target="_blank">Continued from Part V</a><br />
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<b>Q. Should these young children vote? If they are full communing members of the church, how can they be forbidden the right to vote? Should children admitted to the table become voting members as well?</b><br />
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No, young children should not vote. They can <i>eat</i> at the Table, but they don't participate in <i>ruling</i> the church. Surely one can discern the significant differences between <i>eating</i> at the Lord’s Table and <i>passing judgments</i> in the church’s council. What happens in your families? Children are invited to the family table to eat, but they are not invited to participate in the family’s decision-making process. Why? That duty belongs to the father and mother since they have the prerequisite wisdom and experience to make wise judgments about the family finances, plans, etc. <br />
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Therefore, we must make provision for a two-fold distinction within the membership of the church: 1) members that do not vote (baptized children or new Christians who partake of the Lord’s supper but are not old enough or mature enough to vote); and 3) the adult communing and voting members.<br />
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Maturity is needed for <i>voting</i>, not for <i>eating</i>; for making complicated decisions, not for feeding on Jesus. Jesus feeds all, but not everyone is qualified to make decisions that bear upon the doctrine and government of his church. Every baptized member of the church is part of the family of God, but not necessarily mature enough to pass judgment in the assembly. This means that the proper place for training and extensive examinations is at the time when the young man or woman prepares to take on the responsibilities and privileges of voting membership!<br />
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The distinction between communing and voting can be biblically sustained, even if the Bible does not really talk about “voting” as we practice it in America. In the Bible, every circumcised member of the community and his entire family ate at the Passover and participated in the festival meals (Ex. 12:48), but only those who had reached a certain age could go to war and be counted in the census (Num. 1:3). Oftentimes, modern Christians are more interested in avoiding any criticism of being “undemocratic” than genuinely thinking through the implications of nine-, ten-, or even 16-year-old children voting on pastoral calls, church by-laws, or building programs. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me,” not “Let the little children participate in the community's decision making process.” <br />
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In our homes we practice this distinction regularly. Small children are acknowledged by the parents as being part of the family, as having a right to participation in the full life of the family, especially when this is manifest at the family dinner table. Parents feed their children, they regularly provide them with all the tokens and symbols of their incorporation and membership in the family. At the same time, parents recognize that until the child grows in knowledge and experience he will not be capable of making judgments about the leadership and direction of the family. Children are not given responsibility for keeping the budget, nor do we call together the entire family and vote on the weightier matters that parents must consider in ruling the family. Maturity and experience are needed to make such decisions. Thus, we must make a fundamental and important distinction between communing and voting members, between partaking of the dinner with which Jesus feeds us and making informed judgments about the administration and direction of the church.<br />
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Nothing in the PCA <i>Book of Church Order</i> forbids the Session from establishing a voting age for communing members. One of the former stated clerks of the PCA once noted that it is, in fact, the prerogative of the Session to establish a voting age if it so desired. Members of the original committee that wrote the PCA <i>BCO</i> have expressed their desire to keep the language ambiguous so that each Session would have liberty in this area.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-27842121303521093282013-02-14T08:56:00.000-06:002013-02-14T08:58:09.793-06:00A Simple Church Year Catechism – Lent & EasterAsh Wednesday (the beginning of Lenten Season) is February 13. The season of Lent lasts for 40 days (not including Sundays). It ends on Easter Sunday (March 31).<br />
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The word “Lent” comes from the Middle English <i>lente</i> (“spring”) and from the Old English <i>lengten</i> (“to lengthen’), referring to the time of lengthening daylight from Christmas (around the Winter solstice) to Easter (Spring equinox). The Lenten season lasts 40 days, a time of preparation in anticipation of the great events of Good Friday and Easter.<br />
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During Lent we are encouraged to examine ourselves anew in the person and work of Jesus Christ. We follow his example and seek for forty days to wage a more earnest struggle against the world, the flesh, and the devil. Our desire in this is increased sanc- tification and growth in Christian maturity and obedience.<br />
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At the heart of any worthy Lenten observance is a cultivated attitude of repentance. True repentance means a genuine change in heart and mind, a change of disposition wherever in our lives we need to return to God. That is why true repentance and a true Lent can never be satisfied by mere external observances, no matter how rigorous they may be.<br />
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Lent is not merely a time to remember and think about the history of our Lord’s suffering and death, but is intended primarily as an opportunity for serious self-examination and repentance, even fasting (Luke 5:34-35). The high point of Lent is reached on Good Friday, when we remember that our sins led to the crucifixion of Christ.<br />
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The color for Lent is purple or violet—a rich color made with the costliest dyes in the ancient world. It appropriately symbolizes deep, heartfelt, and therefore costly repentance.<br />
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The following catechism is something I wrote for the children of the church. It's a continuation of what is posted for A<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2007/12/simple-church-year-catechism-advent.html" target="_blank">dvent, Christmas, & Epiphany</a>.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Q. 21. How should we pray during Lent?<br />
A. During Lent we confess our sins and ask God to help us change our ways.<br />
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Q 22. Why does the church call this season “Lent”?<br />
A. Lent is an old English name for Springtime.<br />
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Q 23. Why does the season of Lent last 40 days?<br />
A. Because in the Bible God often tests people for 40 days or years and gives them a chance to repent and change.<br />
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Q 24. What are two important examples of this time of testing in the Bible? A. Israel was tested for 40 years in the wilderness before they entered the Promised Land and Jesus was tested for 40 days in the desert.<br />
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Q 25. Why does God test us?<br />
A. God tests our faith to make us steadfast and mature Christians (James 1:2-4).<br />
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Q 26. Why did the church choose Springtime to celebrate the death and res- urrection of Jesus?<br />
A. During Spring the days lengthen and the light and warmth begins to over- come the darkness and cold of winter. This is a fitting symbol of Christ’s death and resurrection because he brought light and life to the world.<br />
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Q 27. What does the word “Easter” mean?<br />
A. The word “Easter” is an old word for “Springtime”<br />
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Q 28. Why is Jesus’ resurrection celebrated in the Spring?<br />
A. Because when the cold, dark winter gives way to warmth, light, and new life in Spring this reminds us of the resurrection of Jesus.<br />
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Q. 29. Why do we use the color white for Easter?<br />
A. The color white reminds us that Jesus’ resurrected, glorified body was pure and bright.<br />
(Second & Third Grade)<br />
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Q 30. Why is the resurrection of Jesus so important?<br />
A. The resurrection of Jesus means that all who trust in him will themselves be raised from the dead, publicly vindicated, and glorified at the end of history.<br />
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Q 31. Can we deny the resurrection of the dead and still be Christians?<br />
A. No. If we deny the resurrection of Jesus, there is no forgiveness of sins and no hope for a new heavens and new earth.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-92218549125550102372013-02-07T11:14:00.002-06:002013-02-07T19:14:22.891-06:00Learning the Bible!For years I've complained that churches don't teach the Bible. That seminaries don't effectively teach Bible content! That endless topical sermons in our churches are contributing to an epidemic of biblical illiteracy in the Christian community. Here is some good stuff on this topic my Michael Bull.<br />
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“Pastor, if the local atheist knows the Bible and understands its basic implications for morality, society, politics, education, economics, history and science better than the people you instruct every week, and most likely he does, you are failing them.”</blockquote>
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It seems to me that good Christians go off to Bible college and seminary little suspecting that these institutions are places where they teach you how not to read a book. </blockquote>
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Certainly, an understanding of the original languages and cultures is helpful, but somehow the modern mind takes a book that is far more than the sum of its parts and teaches it as parts. For a start, we don’t read any book like that. If we, as Christians, believe that the Bible has a single author, why would an intelligent, committed and passionate minister of the gospel tell me that Jesus’ crown of thorns has nothing to do with the thorns in Genesis 3? Why? Was it because he was taught that the Bible was written by idiots, or was it because he was taught by idiots? Please note that this man is not an idiot. He, like just about all ministers today, has been trained in a tradition that takes young heads, cuts off their ears and gouges out their eyes. They come out deaf and colorblind. They are not qualified to teach the Bible as it really is.</blockquote>
Read the entire article <a href="http://www.bullartistry.com.au/wp/2013/02/07/planet-gnarnia/" target="_blank">here</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-34787178028556576022013-02-02T15:01:00.002-06:002013-02-15T08:13:10.601-06:00Young Child Communion & the Westminster Standards<b>On Interviews & Testimonies, Part V</b><br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2013/02/on-interviews-and-testimonies-part-iv.html" target="_blank">Continued from Part IV</a><br />
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<b>Q. Doesn't admitting young children violate the Westminster Standards? Shouldn't we only admit mature believers who can understand what is happening at the Table?</b><br />
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Is young child communion consistent with the Westminster Standards? Yes, I believe so. First, consider the Westminster Confession of Faith (hereafter WCF). No mention is made (wisely) of <i>ages</i> or <i>intellectual capacity</i> in either chapter 14 “On Saving Faith” or chapter 15 “Of Repentance unto Life.” Furthermore, paragraph 3 of chapter 14 shows that the Westminster divines were sensitive to the fact that <i>mature</i> faith ought not to be made the criteria for <i>genuine</i> faith since saving faith “is different in degrees, weak or strong, may be often and many ways assailed and weakened, but gets the victory; growing up in many to the attainment of a full assurance through Christ, who is both the author and finisher of our faith.” Surely it would be wrong to insist that a young covenant child give evidence of a <i>mature</i> faith before we count them as a <i>genuine</i> believer! Genuine faith may be present in covenant children, not having as yet grown up into “the attainment of a full assurance through Christ.” Why should such faith—weak and immature as it may be—serve as a barrier to the covenant child’s participation in the Lord’s communion meal?<br />
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The mention of assurance ought to remind us of another statement in the Confession which teaches that <i>lack of the conviction of the assurance</i> of faith is not necessarily evidence of the <i>absence</i> of saving faith. The Confession does indeed hold out to us the goal of attaining full assurance since those believers who “truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love him in sincerity, endeavoring to walk in all good conscience before him, may in this life be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace” (18.1), but the divines are also quick to remind us that “This infallible assurance does not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties, before he be partaker of it” (18.3).<br />
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It is important to keep in mind that <i>true faith may exist without the assurance of salvation</i> because little children often have not attained to the full assurance of salvation— and rightly so, given their limited experience with their own sin nature and the world. (Unfortunately, many older covenant children mistakenly interpret their experience of coming to full assurance—which usually occurs in their high school or college years—with their <i>conversion</i>.) Thus, when a young child is asked “If you died today, do you believe that you would go to heaven,” he often gives a negative answer, not because he is not a believer, but because his faith is weak and immature. It is for this very reason that he ought to eat dinner with Jesus at the Lord’s table—one of the purposes of the Lord’s Table being to <i>assure</i> us of God’s love and Jesus’ promise to nourish and take care of us as members of his family. Children need this means of grace and assurance as much, if not more than adults do.<br />
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In WCF chapter 29, “Of the Lord’s Supper,” the confession defines “worthy receivers” as those who “outwardly partaking of the visible elements in this sacrament, do then also inwardly by faith . . . receive and feed upon Christ crucified”(29:7). The <i>prerequisite for partaking worthily is faith</i>. It is not knowledge or maturity or intellectual capacity or experience—it is <i>faith</i> that qualifies one to come to the Table worthily. Are we willing to deny that our little ones have faith? Of course, someone may say that we can’t be absolutely sure that a four-year-old’s faith is genuine. Well, neither can we be absolutely sure of a thirty-year-old’s faith! What counts as evidence of faith? What do we expect from adults when they are interviewed by the elders but a credible profession of their faith in Jesus Christ according to their maturity level. We don’t establish a certain level of maturity or knowledge of theology as a prerequisite to coming to the Table. We hear them say things like “I believe that my sins were forgiven because of Jesus death” or “I have no hope of heaven but that which is based on what Jesus has done for me” or simply “I believe Jesus died for my sins.” We don’t look for a certain kind of experience or a predetermined level of knowledge. We look for a simple profession of faith. We should do the same with our young covenant children.<br />
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The next paragraph (“Of the Lord’s Supper,” 29.8) then excludes “ignorant and wicked men” from receiving the outward elements. For either of these two classes of men to come to the Table would be truly an “unworthy coming” and plunge them into all sorts of divine judgments, temporal and eternal. Consider the first class. Who are the “ignorant”? They are those outside of the church, who <i>know</i> not Jesus Christ. No mention is made of a specific level of knowledge, but they are simply said to be ignorant. Thus, they are ignorant of the Gospel and of the person and work of Jesus Christ. Are our young covenant children ignorant in this sense? Hardly. They may not have attained unto the degree of knowledge at which some in the congregation have arrived, but they are certainly not ignorant of the Gospel and of Jesus Christ. <br />
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The second class of people forbidden to receive the elements, according to WCF 29.8, are “the wicked.” This refers to both unbelievers outside of the church as well as those hypocrites inside the church who feign faith and who live licentiously. The latter are those who have been excluded from the Table for disciplinary purposes. Individual young covenant children may indeed be hypocritical and live licentiously, but they can hardly be categorized as a whole as “wicked” and therefore excluded from the Table. Our covenant children are, of course, sinners. Sinners just like we are. <br />
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I often hear people say that children should not come to the table until they learn to behave, as if childishness should exclude them from partaking of this means of grace! Sure, children act childishly. Their sins are childish and often very visible. A four-year-old child may manifest his own sinful heart by running through the isles of the sanctuary after church. His parents or an elder may have to reprimand him repeatedly. This is sinful behavior. The question is: should such sinful behavior bar the child from the Table? Well, maybe if it continues with no repentance or evidence of change. But as adults we better think hard about this. What about our persistent sins as adults. We’ve learned to hide them from people. We’ve learned to hide our sins from <i>ourselves</i>! Should we be barred from the Table because we sin weekly? Should adults who act childishly be restricted from coming to the Table? There's no need for such drastic measures if we confess our sins each week and seek the grace of repentance in the worship service. The lesson is this: we should be very careful about prohibiting our little ones from coming to the Communion Table merely because they manifest themselves as little sinners.<br />
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In summary, we have seen that the Westminster Confession of Faith recognizes<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
1) that no age limit or intellectual capacity may be used as a criteria for saving faith,<br />
2) that faith exists in varying degrees of maturity in Christians,<br />
3) that the assurance of faith does not belong to the essence of faith,<br />
4) that the assurance of faith exist in various degrees and may grow,<br />
5) that worthy receivers are those who possess faith,<br />
6) and that those outside of the church who are ignorant of the gospel and who lead wicked lives are not to be admitted to the table. </blockquote>
So far we have discovered nothing in the WCF that would prevent small children who confess their faith in and love for Jesus from being admitted to the table.<br />
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Turning now to the Westminster Catechisms, we find more explicit guidelines with regard to the sacrament of communion. Question #168 of the Westminster Larger Catechism (WLC) echoes the WCF. If one communes (this is equivalent to the older word “communicates”) worthily, then the sacramental elements of bread and wine truly administer what they symbolize: “they that worthily communicate feed upon his body and blood, to their spiritual nourishment and growth in grace.” After describing how the Supper is to be administered by the ministers and how the body and blood of Christ nourish the communicants, the catechism then takes up the question of preparation for the sacrament: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
They that receive the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper are, before they come, to prepare themselves thereunto, by examining themselves of their being in Christ, of their sins and wants; of the truth and measure of their knowledge, faith, repentance; love to God and the brethren, charity to all men, forgiving those that have done them wrong; of their desires after Christ, and of their new obedience; and by renewing the exercise of these graces, by serious meditation, and fervent prayer (Q. 171). </blockquote>
Are small children <i>incapable</i> of any of these religious acts? They may not be able to perform them <i>as thoroughly</i> or <i>to the same degree</i> that a mature adult might, but they are in no way <i>unable</i> to engage in any of these activities. Admittedly, an infant probably could not meet any of these catechetical prescriptions and so our Westminster Standards exclude them from the table. There is no need to quote at length the next two questions, which discuss the duty of those during and after the reception of the sacrament. Nothing listed in these answers would exclude a small child from partaking of the sacrament. We need to be careful lest we require more from our children than we would from a new convert or an intellectually “challenged” adult!<br />
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Some have taken WLC Q. 173 to prohibit small children from coming to the table, claiming that they fall into the category of the “ignorant” (especially Francis Nigel Lee in his articles on this subject). But the substance of the answer to Q. 173 deals with <i>discipline</i> cases, not with children: “Such as are found to be ignorant or scandalous, notwithstanding their profession of the faith, and desire to come to the Lord’s supper, may and ought to be kept from that sacrament, by the power which Christ has left to his church, until they receive instruction, and manifest their reformation” (emphasis mine). Confessing Christians may be barred from the Table because of their ignorance or sin (see WCF 30.4). This refers to the church's action through the elders—what we call suspension or excommunication. Of course, communing children are liable to suspension and even excommunication for the same reasons. But this passage does not forbid “knowledgeable” and “godly” little children from coming to the table of the Lord. The fact that they have not acquired <i>mature</i> knowledge or <i>abstract</i> theological competence ought not to bar them from the table, just as the absence of mature knowledge does not bar the adult new convert from the Communion Table. Some adult believers never achieve competency in abstract theological knowledge. Are they to be barred from the table? What about the mentally retarded? The elderly or senile? Do we take the sacrament away from the elderly when they begin to lose some of the mental capacity?<br />
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Question 177 asks “Wherein do the sacraments of baptism and the Lord supper differ?” The answer speaks to the question at hand in that it notes that baptism is to be applied “even to infants,” but the Lord’s supper “only to such as are of years and ability to examine themselves.” This is the most explicit reference in either the Confession or the Catechism to the question of small child communion. Yet even here no age limit is set, no definitive level of knowledge is laid down; the answer simply does not concern itself with age or level of knowledge. <br />
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In conclusion, we should note that the Catechism does not make <i>maturity</i> a prerequisite for coming to the Table. It is true that many of the Puritans, especially as time went on, looked for evidence of a certain kind of conversion experience or required a specific level of knowledge before admitting people to the Table, but the fact is that this passage only requires that children be “of years and ability to examine themselves” as the prerequisite for admission to the sacrament of communion. <br />
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Can young covenant children examine themselves? The answer to this question depends on what level and depth of examination will be required of them. Surely, four- and five-year-old children are able to examine themselves at some level. After all, parents punish children at this age and expect them to be able to examine themselves and understand why they are being punished.<br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2013/02/young-communicants-voting.html" target="_blank">Continued in Part VI</a></div>
Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-46946046003774265022013-02-01T15:07:00.000-06:002013-02-02T15:03:34.229-06:00On Interviews and Testimonies, Part IV<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2013/01/on-interviews-testimonies-part-iii.html" target="_blank">Continued from Part III</a><br />
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<b>Questions About Interviewing Young Children</b><br />
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Let me take some time now to answer some common questions. Remember, I am a pastor in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). We don't practice paedocommunion. I believe it is biblical. I have taken exception to the Westminster Standards on this point. What our church does practice is young child communion. This is the closest we can get and still be true to our PCA church order. What this means is that young children are admitted to the Table by the session when they give evidence of a credible, age-appropriate profession of faith. I say all this because the questions that will be addressed in the next few posts will all relate to this practice—that is, interviewing young children.<br />
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What follows, then, is largely advice to fellow pastors and elders who practice some form of "young child" communion. <br />
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<b>Q. My five-year-old daughter is not mature enough to sit before nine blue-suited elders and answer probing questions. She will freeze up. Should she be denied the table for this reason?</b><br />
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This is a great question. Why should Christ’s little ones be denied the benefits of the Table simply because they might be too shy to answer questions under the intense scrutiny of a room full of older men? After all, most adults are often quite intimidated when they meet with the full session of the church. In the case of most interviews with adults for membership the Session is not examining for knowledge, but a credible profession of faith. But when our young children come before us we interrogate them with questions about their knowledge of the Bible, the sacraments, etc. We seldom, if ever, do this in membership interviews with adults! Why should there be two standards—one for adults and another for our covenant children? Isn’t it enough that our children confess their simple faith and trust in Jesus for the forgiveness of their sins and their hope of heaven? I would argue that such a confession is sufficient, and that most of our four-year-old children would have an easier time before the elders if they knew that it wasn’t going to be an “examination.” Our Lord made it easy for the little one’s to come to him. When he saw his disciples making it difficult for parents to bring their little ones to him “he became indignant and said to them, ‘Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God’” (Mark. 10:14). Therefore, the first way that we could deal with this problem is to drop the insanely intense oral examination that we often require of our children before they are allowed to come to the Table.<br />
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Secondly, this question impacts on the way in which the Session should examine small children. There must be a difference between the examination of knowledgeable adults and children. But the distinction should not be pushed too far. A newly baptized adult, being examined by the Session will likely have about as much doctrinal knowledge about the faith and about what happens at the Lord’s Table as a five-year-old covenant child. In fact, the covenant child may know more! But neither the intellectual capacity nor the amount of accumulated theological knowledge possessed by the newly baptized adult convert will exclude him from the Table of the Lord as long as he makes a credible profession of his trust in Jesus alone for his salvation. Surely, my point is obvious. A young child will not have reached intellectual theological maturity (many adults never do, largely because that is not their calling) and he may not have a large amount of theological sophistication, but if he believes in Jesus and knows that Jesus loves him, shall we exclude him? Never.<br />
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Thirdly, I think it might be advisable for churches to reflect carefully on their interview procedures procedures with these issues in mind. The intimidation factor should be taken into account. We should try our best as elders to provide an interview environment for covenant children that would be most conducive to their opening up to us. Instead of ushering the child into a small room that has elders in blue suits circling the child, we should adopt our methods to the capacity of the children we are interviewing. I suggest that a commission of one or two elders would be sufficient. They would meet with the parents and the child(ren) either at home—in the warm, comfortable environment of a family room—or in the child’s Sunday School at church. There the child could sit with his parents. The parents could also be brought into the interview process as well. If an elder asks a question that the child does not understand, then the father or mother might be able to clarify for the child. Such a procedure would also allow the elders to inquire into both the child’s progress in Bible memorization, catechism, and sanctification, as well as the Parents’ faithfulness in nurturing their covenant children. By all accounts, such a family meeting would be much more beneficial than forcing little children to adapt to our standard adult membership interview process.<br />
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Fourth, I want to stress something important. I just mentioned that other matters might be discussed at a typical elder-parent-child meeting. Those issues concern the discipleship and training of the child. They are significant pastoral concerns, to be sure. But I do not mean to suggest that admittance to the Table depends on the child’s performance in any of those areas. The actual interview for Table fellowship need only last a few minutes and will be concerned largely with hearing the child make a very simple, age-appropriate profession of faith in Jesus. The children need to know that their admittance was not a reward because they succeeded in jumping through some catechetical hoops or because they heroically memorized lots of Bible passages. We need to avoid at all costs tempting our covenant children to think that they have <i>achieved</i> a seat at the Table because of their <i>performance</i> on a test, written or oral.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-3495395523393331522013-01-31T20:19:00.000-06:002013-02-01T15:08:59.524-06:00On Interviews & Testimonies, Part III<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2012/11/more-in-interviews-testimonies.html" target="_blank">Continued from Part II.</a><br />
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It's been so long since I wrote the first two essays on this topic that I had to go back and read them again to remember what I had written. What I am trying to do here is work through some of the problems I have encountered when well-meaning Christian leaders conduct "interviews" designed to determine the spiritual condition of a candidate. The candidate might be a child being interviewed for a place at the Lord's Table or church membership or enrollment in a Christian school. Adults are also interviewed for the same reasons. There are any number of situations in which churches, schools, presbyteries, etc. seek to determine the spiritual status of another person.<br />
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I have observed that we tend to get stuck in a few well-worn ruts in these interview sessions. There seems to be a "tradition" of Christian interviewing that has developed over the years. Interviewers are looking for the right words and phrases. When we hear them, we relax and move on. If we don't hear them, we become very concerned. And not only are there distinctive phrases we are hoping to hear, there are also words that set off flashing red lights and alarms. <br />
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In Part II we saw that at the Last Judgment (the final interview) the authenticity of every professing Christian's faith will be judged based on his life and work. As I said last time, this does not mean we are saved by our works. Nor does it imply that somehow our good works will have to outweigh our sins. There will be no righteousness/sins balance sheet. What it does mean is that everyone who says, "I love Jesus" or "I love God" or "I was saved at age 16" or "Jesus died for my sins" or even "I'm saved by grace alone" will have the authenticity of his orthodox verbal profession either certified or invalidated by his life.<br />
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What are the implications for the interview process? A couple of things. First, we should rely more on the references of people who know the candidate. If we get good reports about the child from his parents, that should be given more weight than his nervous answers to questions hurled at him from a room full of older men. If the parents we are interviewing for our school don't have all their theological ducks in a row, then we should give due weight to the testimony of other's about their marriage, work, and general life in church community. <br />
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But even when we do get pristine pure Evangelical testimonies, that doesn't mean that the candidate is automatically acceptable. One must also carefully consider their life and reputation. Paul advises that a candidate for the presbytery "must be well thought of by outsiders," and that deacons must be "tested first" and "prove themselves blameless" (1 Tim. 3:7, 10). A widow who is being evaluated by the church for special care must have "a reputation for good works: if she has brought up children, has shown hospitality, has washed the feet of the saints, has cared for the afflicted, and has devoted herself to every good work" (1 Tim. 5:10). It seems to me this wisdom applies to every situation where we are trying to ascertain the authenticity of a profession of faith. <br />
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Second, we should be very careful not to accuse a candidate of "salvation by works" simply because they talk about their obedience or faithfulness. Let's say that a child is asked if he believes he will go to heaven when he dies. The child responds:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Yes, I believe so.<br />
Interviewer: That's wonderful. How do you <i>know</i> that you are going to heaven?<br />
Child: Well, I've been baptized and I believe in Jesus.<br />
Interviewer: But how do you <i>know for sure</i> that you are going to heaven?<br />
Child: Well, I also am obedient to my parents and try to live like a Christian.<br />
Interviewer: Okay, but will <i>that</i> get you into heaven? When you get to heaven and God asks you why he should let you in, what will you say?<br />
Child: I will say I'm a Christian and have tried to be obedient.<br />
Interviewer: But how can you be <i>sure</i> you are going to heaven?<br />
Child: I'm not sure what you are asking. I'm sorry.</blockquote>
Now the child is just confused and the interview has tanked. The interviewer was looking for the child to say something about Jesus dying for his sins. But he was asking questions that confused the little boy. He was not asking questions about the basis of his forgiveness, like: why is God able to forgive your sins? Or what did Jesus do for us that our sins might be forgiven. Rather, the interviewer was asking questions about <i>assurance</i>. How can the child <i>know</i> he is going to heaven? Questions about assurance are sometimes answered in the Bible by reference to our lives. <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments" (1 John 2:3)<br />
"If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love" (John 15:10).</blockquote>
A faithful, obedient life (not sinless) helps assure us that we are truly the Lord's. It's not "works righteousness" for a child to find some comfort in his obedient relationship with his parents. It's not evidence of the heresy of "justification by works" for an adult candidate to point to his faithful life and service in the church when asked about the genuineness of his faith. <br />
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There's a lot more to say about this. I'd like to give some more examples of interviews gone wrong with an analysis of the reasons for the failure. But that will have to wait until next time.<br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2013/02/on-interviews-and-testimonies-part-iv.html" target="_blank">Continued in Part IV</a>Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-51019441961573216702013-01-29T10:14:00.000-06:002013-01-29T12:22:29.536-06:00Homosexual HorrorThis week the Boy Scouts of America announced that <a href="http://www.kmbc.com/news/kansas-city/Scouts-consider-retreat-from-no-gays-policy/-/11664182/18312338/-/m7rfnd/-/index.html">they are considering dropping the ban</a> on homosexual scouts and leaders. <br />
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Let me tell you a story.<br />
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In the 80's a field-grade Army officer in our church came out of the tent. Not the closet. The tent. A Boy Scout tent. He came to the leadership of the church and we heard his horrific confession. For decades he had, as Scout leader, been seducing young boys at Scout camp outs. He was married with children himself. He was a respected leader in the church. He was a homosexual predator in secret. <br />
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What was most chilling about his confession to us was his description of how widespread this was in the Scouts at the time. There was even surreptitious collaboration among homosexual Scout leaders about which boys were most vulnerable. Crap like that makes your skin crawl. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. He was by his own confession quite successful in grooming boys fairly quickly. It is often claimed that "grooming" a boy normally takes a long time. That's true in ordinary, day-to-day life. But on campouts and extended retreats it can be done quickly because men and boys are together for long stretches of time and because the stressful challenges of the campout or retreat help to break down a boy's normal defenses, making him more vulnerable to intimate male "companionship."<br />
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This man was never caught. He could have continued to seduce young scouts for years. He was good at it. But God wouldn't let him rest. His conscience goaded him to come clean. <br />
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I vowed then and there that if the Lord blessed me with a boy, he would <i>never</i> be a Scout. <br />
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If I'm not mistaken, there was some sort of crackdown on this in the late 90's and early 00's. I think it was in conjunction with the pedophilia scandals in the Roman church, but I'm not sure.<br />
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So now we have the oh so wonderful news that the Boy Scouts of America may openly admit homosexual leaders and scouts some time soon. But no one has to worry because local units could continue to exclude homosexuals. Right. For how long?<br />
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The idea that local clubs will be able to make their own decisions is worse than useless. Forget about sending your boys to any kind of overnight function that includes other units. You may have all the safeguards in the world in place in your local club, but all bets are off when your boy packs up for a regional or national summer camp out.<br />
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Just think about it. <br />
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Back in 1982, I read Enrique Rueda's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0815957149/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0815957149&linkCode=as2&tag=jefmey-20">The Homosexual Network</a>. At that time the homosexual "rights" movement was just a blip on the horizon. Reuda was prescient. He saw what was coming. <br />
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I plan to aggregate articles related to this topic that you may find helpful:<br />
<br />
Matthew J. Franck – <a href="http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/29/the-boy-scouts-and-neuhauss-law/" target="_blank">The Boy Scouts and Neuhaus' Law</a> (First Things)Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-60944777562719399952013-01-09T09:23:00.000-06:002013-01-09T09:23:30.415-06:00ReadingsIn his <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0800698851/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=jefmey-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0800698851">Introduction to Christian Liturgy</a>
Senn has a quick, but fascinating summary of the development of lectionary readings:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
No complete lectionary systems exist before the seventh century, althought there are references in the writings of the church fathers to certain readings being read on certain days. For example, we learn from Augustine's commentary on John that dhe book of Genesis was read duriing Lent, the books of Job and Jonah during Holy Week, the Gospel Passion narratives on Good Friday, the resurrection narratives on Easter, and the book of Acts during Easter season.</blockquote>
Nothing too surprising here. But then there's this:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
In fact, only with the development of a church-year calendar with specific days and seasons would a lectionary with pericopes even be needed; otherwise biblical books were read continuously. The earliest extant lectionaries are Bibles with marginal markings indicating the beginnings and endings of readings (p. 65).</blockquote>
Now just because the <i>lectio continua</i> is earlier than the pericope system doesn't necessarily make it right. Once the church started multiplying memorial events in the life of Jesus and then adding saints days the pericope system became inevitable. I believe that some combination of the two is best. Use the pericope system during Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, and Easter, but between these read through whole books of the Bible. It may even be advantageous to take a year off of the pericope system now and then. Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-10215146406855626582012-12-27T11:01:00.003-06:002012-12-27T11:02:32.735-06:00The Apostolic Succession of Suffering, Part III<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-apostolic-succession-of-suffering_20.html">Part II</a> noted how Christ's vicarious suffering is a model for Christian behavior, especially for the ministry. Jesus suffered and died for us so that the kingdom might come. We suffer and die for others so that the fullness of the kingdom comes. Think about the book of Acts from this perspective. Peter, John, Stephen, James, Paul, and the entire church had to suffer so that the kingdom of Jesus could grow and advance. Every time someone suffers or dies in the story of Acts, the kingdom expands in some way or another.<br />
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And although this sounds odd to our ears, these sufferings are for the world. In other words, they are in some deep, mystical sense <i>vicarious</i>. According to Colossians 1:24, the kind of suffering that Paul rejoices in is substitutionary. Suffering on behalf of others, in exchange for others. Paul makes this very clear: “I rejoice in my suffering for you . . . for the sake of his body, the church." He suffers in exchange for the sufferings that the Colossians might have had. His suffering means that the Colossians do not have to suffer as much as they might have. <br />
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Now, we usually reserve that word “substitutionary” for the sufferings of Christ for us on the cross. He took the punishment we deserved. He suffered for our sins. But that's not the only way one can "substitute" for another.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>To talk about our suffering as vicarious is just a striking way of fleshing out what the Apostolic Scriptures clearly teach:<br />
<blockquote>
Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6:2).
"This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends" (John 15:12-13).
By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren (1 John 3:16).
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another (1 John 4:11).
Greet Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who risked their own necks for my life (Rom. 16:3-4).
And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma (Eph. 5:2).
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her (Eph. 5:25).</blockquote>
If you understand “sanctification” or personal holiness primarily as the self-centered cultivation of spiritual disciplines or virtues, then you are radically off track. This is one of Satan’s deceitful traps. He distorts the message of personal holiness such that Christians turn in on themselves and obsess over their own individual purity. We then become self-centered pharisees who set ourselves apart from other Christians as being more holy and righteous in our own minds. And all the while we are curving in on themselves, retreating from the church and from real holiness which is always primarily other directed. When Jesus commands, "Take up your cross and follow me," he is not talking about self-flagellation or self-inflicted regimens of suffering we impose on ourselves to attain holiness. He's asking us to follow his lead and learn to bear the burdens (crosses) of others.
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Let’s put flesh and bones on this. Suppose you are asked to help someone in the church. Let's take a simple example. A family in the church is in distress and needs someone to deliver them a couple of meals. You are asked to help. But when you consider this, you know it will involve some measure of sacrifice (suffering) on your part. Not much, but some. You've come to a crossroads. What will you do? Will you give up some of your time and money and suffer a bit for this other family. And it's not just you, but the kingdom of God in this community is at a crossroad. Every time a member of the community makes a decision to suffer the kingdom of God advances and we experience it's fullness.
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Let’s take another example: Suppose someone sins against you, someone in the church.
Another crossroads. What will you do? Will you get on the phone and foment dissension and bitterness by talking about it to someone else? It will make you feel better. You can feel superior. You can promote your own advanced spirituality. Or will you suffer the wrong as God has done for you?
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He who covers a transgression seeks love, But he who repeats a matter separates friends (Prov. 17:9).
And above all things have fervent love for one another, for "love will cover a multitude of sins" (1 Peter 4:8).
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You see, what is love but suffering for others? That’s exactly what forgiveness is all about. Absorbing the penalty yourself. Not holding it against the other person. Not making him pay. Rather, you pay. You eat the costs. You release him from the liability by absorbing it yourself. This is what Christ has done for you. Substituted for you. Will you substitute for your brothers and sisters who sin against you? Isn't this what we pray in the Lord's Prayer? “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive others." If we don't forgive others, the manifestation of the fullness of Christ kingdom is stalled because of our self-centered sinfulness.
Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-52018384514978820672012-12-25T10:09:00.001-06:002012-12-25T11:26:45.221-06:00Christmas, Mortality, & ResurrectionProvidence Reformed Presbyterian Church<br />
Christmas Eve – December 24, 2012<br />
Texts: 1 John 1:1-4; 4:1-3; and Isaiah 53:3-4<br />
Title: Surely He Has Borne Our Griefs<br />
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"He was. . . a man of pains and acquainted with infirmity. . . surely he has borne our pains and carried our infirmities" (Isa. 53:3-4).<br />
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Humanity has two big problems. One, we are liable, guilty for our transgressions against God and his gracious law. We are rebels that deserve his just punishment. That’s the first problem. We might call this first problem “judicial.” We have a judicial sentence against us.<br />
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The second problem is not unrelated. We are mortal. Our humanity is damaged, weak, subject to sickness, injury, and ultimately death. And our pathetic mortal condition is the result of the fall. We brought it on ourselves. We have been afflicted with a death nature. We could call this second problem “constitutional,” because it is about our makeup, our constitution.<br />
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God graciously sent his Son into the world, born of the virgin Mary, united to our human nature, in order to solve for us both of these problems, the judicial and the constitutional, our guilt and our mortality.<br />
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Tonight we should all remember that in his suffering and death on the cross as an innocent man Jesus bore the just punishment we deserved. He took upon himself the judicial sentence against us. Therefore, humanity’s first problem is solved. The judicial problem. We can be forgiven. The sentence, the punishment against us is lifted. We are no longer liable for our sins. And we experience that <i>now</i>, in this life. As Paul says in Ephesians chapter one: “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.” This is one of chief reasons God the Son became a man. He was born to die. The angels said to Joseph, “You shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins" (Matt. 1:22).<br />
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But that leaves the second “constitutional” problem—mortality. As believers we are justified—which means forgiven and righteous in God’s sight because we are united to Jesus by faith—but we are still mortal. Our human existence is fractured and broken. <br />
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<a name='more'></a>I had been thinking about this recently, and so I was struck—bowled over may be a better way to describe it—this week when I visited Jane Doe in the elderly care facility. It’s been a few years or more since I’ve needed to visit one of these residential care facilities for the elderly infirm. It moved me. Perhaps because I am getting older myself and can no longer keep the thought of old age at arm's length. This is the end of all flesh. We break down. We collapse, physically and mentally. Dilapidation, deterioration, decay . . . this is our future, the destiny of mortal humanity.<br />
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Jane’s Parkinson’s disease has worked havoc in her mind and body. She is just a shell of her previous self. She retired as an English teacher with the Lindbergh school district. I probably had her for English in High School, but I don’t’ remember. I try to forget everything about High School. But just ten years ago Jane was still sharp and ready to offer me constructive grammatical criticisms on my sermons. Now she remembers me, but that’s about all. And her husband Dick has always been a strong, athletic outdoorsman. An avid hunter. Now he visits Jane with a walker, unable to reign in and conquer his own mortal flesh.<br />
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But we don’t have to visit an elderly care facility to own up to our own mortal condition. I’m sure that this year has brought to each of you some renewed appreciation for our mortal existence, as the bodies and minds of our family and friends at Providence provide us with more evidence of our powerlessness and decay—cancer, MS, heart disease, lung disease, mental illness, Alzheimer's, loss of sight, and all those disorders that we really cannot even explain—fibromyalgia, mysterious muscle deterioration, unexplained chronic pain, and more. And this is to say nothing about and all those minor infirmities that regularly dog us all.<br />
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So what does the message of Christmas say to us who mourn our mortal estate, who long to be free, not from the body per se, but from these mortal bodies, this miserable condition? <br />
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This. The eternal Son of God united himself to our mortal human nature in order to fix us. <br />
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The Athanasian Creed has us recite that Jesus was “God of the substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds; and man of substance of His mother, born in the world.” Man of the substance of his mother Mary. And Mary was a member of mortal humanity. She was no unfallen godess. Jesus united himself to the same mortal humanity as us. He became one of us. Jesus’ human nature was not fashioned afresh from the dust of the ground like Adam’s. He did not get a pristine, pre-fall human mind and body. He took to himself our dilapidated, cursed, infirm, broken human existence. And he lived with the same weaknesses, injuries, sicknesses, and dangers that we do. “He has come in the flesh,” as John says.<br />
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Isaiah prophesied, "Surely he has borne our griefs [pains] and carried our sorrows [infirmities]; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted" (Isa. 53:3). We rightly apply that prophesy to Jesus on the cross. Taking the judgment on himself that we deserved. “Stricken, smitten, and afflicted see him dying on the tree." But there’s another sense in which he as afflicted.” One that began with his conception and birth. Jesus was stricken with mortality. He united himself to afflicted flesh, if you will. He was sinless, to be sure. But he was not pain-less or trouble-free.<br />
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“. . . since the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things. . . he had to be made like his brothers in every respect. . . because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. . . for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses" (Heb. 2:14-18).<br />
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Once again at Christmas we are reminded of the character of God. He is not adverse to mixing it up with our actual material existence. He is not too high, holy, and aloof to experience or pain and sorrow. The Son of God was not the Teflon man, gliding over and around all the pain and troubles of this mortal life. Not at all. <br />
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But the Son did not unite himself to our mortal, weak flesh merely to sympathize with us, or even just to reveal something of his true divine character; he became man so that he might “raise our fallen state,” as the hymn puts it. The eternal Son united with our mortal flesh in the womb of the virgin Mary with the full intention of bringing that human nature through death and resurrection, and into a new immortal existence. The Son didn’t become man for a time. The incarnation was not temporary. There was no exit strategy. The Son assumed our mortal, cursed humanity in order to work deliverance for us “from the inside.” He was not only born to die, he was born for the resurrection. And the Son is now united to a completely renovated, transfigured and transformed humanity, the firstfruits of a new creation.<br />
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Surely he has borne our pains and carried our infirmities, and not simply to empathize but to bear them away, to carry them off, to bring in a new creation, a renovated humanity,<br />
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Because of Christmas there will be a resurrection. The life we now experience as perishable, dishonorable, and weak will be replaced by a transfigured human nature that will be imperishable, glorious, and powerful. Paul: “Just as we have born the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven" (1 Cor. 15).<br />
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At the end there will be a loud voice from heaven: “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. . . He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. And he that was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Rev. 21).Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-89633567135032456582012-12-23T16:43:00.000-06:002013-01-29T12:23:35.448-06:00Mass Murder & National RepentanceJames Dobson has used the Newtown shooting to call for <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/philosophicalfragments/2012/12/21/callous-theology-of-james-dobson/">national repentance</a>. But Peter Wehner thinks t<a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/philosophicalfragments/2012/12/21/callous-theology-of-james-dobson/">hat's all wrong</a>. <br />
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I'm not sure what to think about this. On one level I agree with Wehner's concerns. On another level, I find it puzzling that evangelical Christians cannot be allowed to speak prophetically to American Culture without political conservatives crying foul. I fear that this criticism has something to do with the Christian faith being reduced to personal, private "religion" (a thoroughly modernist turn). I think the author is probably right to resist using this particular incident as a symbol of God's judgment.<br />
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But surely our American culture/civilization is being "given over" by God to widespread ungodliness, to a "culture of death," if you will. Yeah, gun violence is down. It's not about guns per se (you knew I'd say that). The Christian faith teaches that God has expectations not just for individuals, families, and churches, but also for social behavior and cultures. And our "culture of death" factors into these kinds of events. Exactly how we present this is touchy, but it must be done. I find it disconcerting that a Jew like <a href="http://spectator.org/archives/2012/12/17/god-help-us">Ben Stein</a> is able to speak more prophetically than Evangelical Christians are often comfortable with.<br />
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Another thought: was Jesus being callus when he responded to a mass murder and and tragic "accident" in Luke 13:1-5?<br />
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There were some present at that very time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”</blockquote>
And remember, he was speaking to the nation/culture of Israel, not simply to individuals, as is clear from the parable of the "fig tree" and the "vinedresser" that immediately follows this exchange.<br />
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Don't take my comments as some sort of blanket endorsement of Dobson on this or any other issue. The piece just got me thinking, that's all.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-41887651920763159202012-12-21T09:55:00.000-06:002012-12-22T13:07:46.109-06:00Christmas Heresy<blockquote>
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life—the life was made manifest, and we have seen it, and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us—that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. And we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete (1 John 1:1-4)</blockquote>
All of us have wondered if what the Church has labeled as heresies might just be nit-picky obsession about little details. For example, the dividing line between heresy and orthodoxy in one controversy is the addition of a single Greek letter. You are okay if you confess that Jesus was <i>homoousios</i> with God the Father, but you are literally damned if you believe that he was only <i>homoiousios</i>. One Greek letter – <i>iota</i>. <br />
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But of course, that one letter changes the meaning of the word entirely. Either you believe that the Son and the Father are of the <i>same</i> divine essence or you think they have only “similar natures.” So what appears to be just an iota of a difference is in truth the difference between two entirely different confessions of God and therefore two radically different conceptions of the world, life, and the future.<br />
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But it’s not just little details in doctrinal disputes. Christians claim that ostensibly “little events” make all the difference in the world. It’s kind of like the little parts without which a machine could not operate. Or like putting together a Christmas gift for your children. Let's say you don’t read, or you ignore the instructions, dismissing early on a small part here or the orientation of something little there. You get to the end and the bicycle doesn’t work or the final pieces don’t line up. And all because you got something seemingly small wrong near the beginning of the process. It is not difficult to envision the same kinds of problems when engineers and carpenters build buildings. What might appear to be a small mistake near the foundation could end up ruining the entire project.<br />
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Even though toys and buildings are often forgiving with many mistakes, there are some omissions and errors that are systemic and spoil everything. So it is with life, and God’s world, and the Kingdom God—Christian civilization. There are certain practices and beliefs that we all forgive in one another and make adjustments—different views on church government, or about the mode of baptism, etc. But there are others—what might appear to outsiders to be minuscule puzzle pieces—that are the corners and straight edge sides without which there would be no completed image. And they are game changers, culture crushers, eternally significant. <br />
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Damnable heresies.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>What I’m saying here this Christmas is that a great deal depends on what actually happened in that young girl’s womb. A great deal. As we sing every year, in this little town of Bethlehem “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.” Consequently, most heresies manifest themselves in their mangling of the Christmas story.<br />
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But why should the world care about what happened in the womb of a teenage girl named Mary in a village in Palestine about 2000 years ago? Why? Because of what we confess actually happened: God himself personally and permanently joined himself to our human nature in that little woman’s womb. Or not.<br />
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I am convinced that every year it is supremely beneficial for Christians to be brought again to the manger and forced to look—Behold, this is your God! No other. What Jesus is, God is. What Jesus does, God does. Here is the meaning of the word “God.”<br />
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All of the birth narratives rub our noses in this essential fact: this baby is your God. Worship him. This infant is nothing less that “God with us”—Emmanuel. “God among us.” Worship him.<br />
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Matt. 1:23, “"Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel," which is translated, "God with us."<br />
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Matt. 2:11, And when the wise men from the East had come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His mother, and fell down and worshiped Him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.<br />
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Luke 1:35, “And the angel answered and said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God.”<br />
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Luke 1:76 (Zechariah’s Song about his Son, John the Baptizer): “"And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Highest; For you will go before the face of the LORD [Yahweh] to prepare the way for him, (Luke 1:76).<br />
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Luke 2:11, (to the shepherds) "For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. (Luke 2:11).<br />
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John 1:1, ‘In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. . . And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14). There you have it. We behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. God is most fully God when he is taking on human flesh in order to serve us.<br />
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1 John 1:1-2, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life-- the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us.”</blockquote>
If you and I insist on learning the meaning of the word “god” from somewhere other than Jesus himself, then our god will be a false one. This has always been the temptation for the church. To make over God according to how we think he ought to be. This is the essence of heresy.<br />
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This is the error of every major heresy in the early church. Most of the heretics meant well. They were all so very concerned to guard a pure conception of God and his nature. They thought they knew what God was like already, and so they just knew that this baby could not be fully God. This is well illustrated with the Arch Heretic—Arius, who denied the full divinity of the Son, of Jesus.<br />
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The reason why Arius would not say that Jesus was fully God was that he was so jealous to guard and protect the pure spirituality of God, as he understood it. Jesus just <i>had</i> to be something less than fully God—well, because, LOOK! He’s born an infant! He’s in full contact with flesh and material existence. He suffers and dies on a cross. God cannot, God <i>must not</i> be envisioned as submitting to these indignities. God is higher and holier and loftier and therefore above all of this. God is not able to be affected by the material world.<br />
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The Church, by God’s grace, did not give into these Greek conceptions of God as surgically removed from his creation, as allergic to material world. For all of the possible pitfalls, the church confessed what the Scriptures said:<br />
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Jesus was God. Jesus was man.<br />
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The Son is eternal. The Son was born of a woman.<br />
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Mary was the Mother of God, not just a man. </blockquote>
To call Mary the Mother of God or <i>Theotokos</i> (“God bearer”) was not originally intended to honor Mary, but glorify Jesus. God the Son came into the world, united to human nature <i>in utero</i> and passed through the birth canal like every other human. This was how God came to be among us! We cannot explain this. It makes us wince and causes us great intellectual angst, but it is what the Scriptures teach. Here we stand. We have no other God. And it has massive implications. For example, our understanding of godliness is directly related to our conception of God.<br />
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Let me address a mistake that continues to be perpetuated and it sounds so right because it is popularly repeated over and over again in apologetics and evangelism books, tracts, and sermons. The mistake is to think that the miracles that Jesus did proves that he was divine. That the clearest, most compelling outcropping of the divinity of Jesus was when he did miraculous works of power. No. Read the Bible carefully. In the Scriptures it is human prophets who do these kinds of things.<br />
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Moses was not God. He was a mighty prophet. And Moses discovered, too, that the magicians of Egypt could imitate these acts. Jesus himself knew and the author of Acts relates that other people were able to perform exorcisms and what not. Similar miracles were done by Elijah and Elisha, but they were not God. Haven’t you every thought it odd that the NT epistles of Paul and Peter and John make no mention of the miracles of Jesus as a proof of his divinity. That whenever they speak of Jesus as God they connect it with his incarnation and self-sacrificial death? As Peter says, “Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him.”<br />
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Rather, Jesus' divine nature and character are unveiled in his humble service to us in his birth, life, suffering, and death. The point is that what makes, what proves, if you will, that Jesus is God, is not his works of power and might, but his humble self-sacrifice. His self-effacing love and service for humanity. This is who God is. <br />
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The Good News is <i>not</i> that God made some external determination to forgive man, exercised his powerful divine will, snapped a disinterested divine finger, and sprinkled some medicinal salvation powder on the human race. What he did was penetrate the very depths of our mortal human existence and life, to restore the distorted and corrupt condition of man’s actual human existence. God genuinely united himself to human, creaturely existence.<br />
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God himself bore our infirmities and sins and the whole inheritance of judgment that lay against us—God himself, not merely in some extrinsic, detached way—but he personally bore all this in Jesus Christ our Savior. This is where we find God for us. Nowhere else.<br />
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The Angels knew where to direct the shepherds. The Apostle’s know where to guide the world to find life—to the heard, seen, touched, handled Word of Life! To Jesus.<br />
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Listen to the Angel: the Angel says, “You shall find him. . .” Where? The angel did not say, “You should find him in heaven!” The angel did not say you shall find him “within you.” The angel did not say, “You shall find him after much fasting and prayer so that you can transcend the distance between God and man.” The angel did not say, “You shall find him if you do great works of mercy and love.” The angel did not say, “You shall find him when you philosophically abstract from him all created attributes.” The angel said, “Unto you a Savior is born, he is Messiah Yahweh. You shall find him in Bethlehem, lying in a manger.”<br />
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Listen to the beloved Apostle John. “We proclaim to you the Word of Life” What word of life? John does not say you will discover it within you. He does not give a list of the attributes of divinity and ask you to hold all of these together in order to get your mind around God. He does not say, “You must understand now that God is quite spiritual and cannot have any contact with physical matter.” He does not attempt to take us down "the path of negation" so that we can rise above earthly, material things in order to make mental, purely internal contact with divinity. <br />
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No. He links what seems impossible to bring together: “That which was from the beginning” and “what we have seen, heard, and our hands have handled.” This is the Word of Life. This is the one “who was with the Father” (v. 2c) and has now appeared.<br />
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This little baby is your Creator and Savior. This is the glad tidings to be shouted on the mountain top, according to the prophet Isaiah: “O Zion, You who bring good tidings, Get up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, You who bring good tidings, Lift up your voice with strength, Lift it up, be not afraid; Say to the cities of Judah, “Behold your God!” (Isa 40:9).<br />
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This limp infant in the arms of a teenage mother is the Lord of the universe. This is why what happened in the womb of little Mary 2000 years ago is no insignificant event. The heretics all carefully insulate God from this young girl’s womb. The resulting heresies therefore give us a different God and consequently a different hope for the future.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-32857292165117503092012-12-20T15:51:00.000-06:002012-12-27T11:03:31.019-06:00The Apostolic Succession of Suffering, Part III ended <a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-apostolic-succession-of-suffering.html">Part I</a> wondering why books on the pastoral ministry typically don't include a chapter with a title like "Pastoral Care Through Vicarious Suffering." After all, that is an accurate description of a crucial dimension of the ministry. And this neglected feature of the pastor's vocation flows from the Apostles' foundational example and teaching, especially the Apostle Paul. But, of course, it is grounded ultimately in the Jesus' service for us. Oh wait, Jesus' service was the fulfillment of Israel's calling and vocation. And even deeper, Israel was a new Adam. So this is all about authentic human living, especially as social creatures. But let's not get too far ahead here. Back to Col. 1:24-26:<br />
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Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints (Col. 1:24-26).</blockquote>
You see, what Paul's words here mean is that <b>the fullness of the kingdom comes when ministers fill out the sufferings of Christ in service to the church and world</b>. Paul suffers so that the fullness of the kingdom might be experienced by the Colossian Christians. That is why Paul can "rejoice" in his sufferings. Because he knows What his tribulations will produce. As he says in Romans 5:3, ". . . we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces. . . "<br />
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<a name='more'></a>So what does it produce? Well, look at the positioning of Paul's suffering. In the text of Colossians 1 his suffering comes after the description of Jesus' preeminence as Lord of the new creation (1:15-20) and the hope that the Colossian Christians would experience the "riches," the "glory," the "full knowledge" of the mystery, "all wisdom," and "maturity" in Christ (1:25-29). Between the enthronement of Jesus and the experience of the fullness of the kingdom is Paul's suffering. This is true not just in the text, but also in the history of the early church. Jesus dies, rises, ascends, and takes his throne, but the expansion and development of his kingdom in the world hinges on the service of the Apostles, especially Paul. One cannot escape the pivotal place of the suffering of the Apostles in the Book of Acts. The kingdom breaks out and expands when the Apostle's suffer.<br />
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And they don't just suffer in the abstract or for some unknown reason. They suffer affliction for the church. They suffer on behalf of others, for the benefit of others. The kind of suffering that Paul rejoices Paul's heart is substitutionary. Paul makes this very clear: “I rejoice in my suffering<i> for you</i> . . . <i>for the sake of</i> his body, the church.” Paul rejoices because his sufferings are substitutionary (“for you” and “for the sake of his body”: both phrases use the preposition <i>huper</i>). His suffering means that the Colossians do not have to suffer as much as they might have.<br />
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Now, I know that sounds odd to our Presbyterian ears. Doesn’t it? We usually reserve that word “substitutionary” for the sufferings of Christ for us. But we don't need to be afraid of this. It's all over the Bible. This is simply a striking way of describing what other passages in the NT clearly teach:<br />
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Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ (Gal. 6:2).<br />
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"This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends" (John 15:12-13).<br />
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By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down [our] lives for the brethren (1 John 3:16).<br />
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And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma (Eph. 5:2).<br />
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Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her (Eph. 5:25).</blockquote>
Now, of course, Christ's substitutionary suffering and death has a unique, unrepeatable character. But his suffering and death are also exemplary: "Take up your cross and follow me." I'll have to flesh this out a bit later on. But for now we should note carefully how the love of God expressed in Jesus suffering and death exemplifies how we should relate to one another.<br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-apostolic-succession-of-suffering_27.html">Continued in Part III</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-51668943215933731682012-12-18T19:15:00.002-06:002012-12-27T11:04:11.561-06:00The Apostolic Succession of Suffering, Part I"Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints" (Col. 1:24-26).<br />
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Lots of Christians steer clear of this passage in Paul's letter to the Colossians. They are afraid that any discussion of what may be "lacking in Christ's sufferings" will water down our strong doctrine of the substitutionary atonement of Jesus for the sins of his people. But apparently Paul didn't think so. Otherwise he would have phrased this differently.<br />
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The place of suffering in the Apostolic ministry in the first century church needs more study. The apostles talk about suffering a lot, more than we are comfortable with. The Apostle Paul seems to have believed that his suffering in particular was pivotal in the progress and maturation of the developing church. Here in Colossians 1 he "rejoices in his sufferings. . . for the sake of his body, that is the church" (24). But he often rejoices in his afflictions and calls attention to his suffering as a model for ministry in the church.<br />
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For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake (Phil. 1.29).<br />
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For when we were with you, we kept telling you beforehand that we were to suffer affliction, just as it has come to pass, and just as you know (1 Thess. 3:4).<br />
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Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do (2 Tim. 1:8-12).<br />
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Indeed, we should say that Paul's suffering service was paradigmatic for the apostolic ministry. Consider what he says to pastor Timothy:
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Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus (2 Tim. 2:3).<br />
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As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry (2 Tim. 4:5).</blockquote>
Peter says something similar:<br />
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But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed (1 Peter 4:13).</blockquote>
When I was preparing to preach an ordination sermon for a friend of mine a few years ago, I scoured my books on "the ministry" looking for a discussion of the role of suffering in the service of a pastor. I found virtually nothing. I turned to Thomas Oden's very insightful book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Classical-Pastoral-Care-Counsel-Series/dp/0801067650">Classical Pastoral Care</a> for some help. His chapter headings hint at some great insights for "the ministry":<br />
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Pastoral Care through Preaching<br />
Pastoral Care through Prayer<br />
Pastoral Care through the Liturgy<br />
Pastoral Care through Baptism<br />
Pastoral Care through Communion<br />
Pastor as Educator of the Soul<br />
Pastoral Care through Enabling Support and Limiting Abuse</blockquote>
These are all wonderfully helpful chapters and deal with very foundational aspects of the pastoral ministry. But where is the chapter entitled<br />
<blockquote>
Pastoral Care Through Vicarious Suffering?</blockquote>
You see, for anyone who's served as a pastor for any length of time in any normal Christian church that would be a pretty accurate description of a crucial dimension of the ministry. So let me try to flesh out an outline of what Paul is getting at in Colossians 1:24-29 in the next few posts.<br />
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<a href="http://jeffreyjmeyers.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-apostolic-succession-of-suffering_20.html">Continued in Part II</a>.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-34318764565337928552012-12-13T12:08:00.005-06:002012-12-13T12:09:33.892-06:00Life is RoughI need to let this sink in. <br />
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<br />Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-69276213409449038452012-12-12T16:44:00.000-06:002012-12-12T16:44:46.324-06:00Some Thoughts on Status & Position in the GospelsI've preached through all four Gospels. It took me 16 years of morning sermons to go through them all paragraph by paragraph. After finishing them I want to go back and do it again. One of the reasons is that I now have a better grasp on them all. There's a great deal I could say about that. But what I want to call attention to in this post is the importance of reading the Gospels in the context of the early, Apostolic church.<br />
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I am convinced of the early church "Augustinian" view of the order the Gospels. The first Gospel to be written was Matthew's, then Mark's, then Luke's, then John's. The canonical order is the order in which they were composed. In fact, I'm pretty radical. I believe Matthew was written within a year or so of the church's formation in Acts 2. The apostles needed a "book" to ground what they were teaching on the life and words of Jesus. Mark was written about a decade later and reflects the intense persecution the church was experiencing at the hands of the Jewish leaders. That was already going on at the time of Matthew's Gospel, but it had increased in the 40's. Luke, of course, was written under the supervision of Paul and addresses the church's situation in the wider world, especially the inclusion of the Gentiles. John penned his Gospel in the late 60's when the old world was about to be deconstructed with the judgment against Israel and the destruction of the Temple.<br />
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During this time of transition (AD 30–70) the disciples of Jesus were in a precarious position. Having no status and position in the old world of Judaism, the challenge was to trust Jesus' promises that the church would one day be exalted and be at the center of a new civilization (= the Kingdom of God).<br />
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<a name='more'></a>A number of modern commentators have noted that there's a lot in the Gospels about "status" or "position." Jesus and his disciples are the poor, the meek, the humble, the despised and rejected. Those who enter the new kingdom are not the rich and the powerful. They are the marginalized and weak. The leaders of the Jews often mock Jesus and his disciples as unschooled and part of the "common" people. Do I need to cite references? Just look at what the Jewish leaders say to the apostles in Acts 4. These are code words used by those in power to marginalize the followers of Jesus.<br />
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Modern readers of the Gospel need to be careful not to universalize all of this stuff on position and status, making it some sort of absolute statement about economic or social status & the kingdom. Take Matthew's account of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. Matthew's Gospel has a context. And that context is the very early days of the Apostolic church. In fact, it could hardly be called a "church" as we understand it. As it turned out, all those who believed Jesus was the Messiah were marginalized, thrown out of the synagogues, and even demonized, persecuted, and executed. They were outcasts. But not necessarily economically.<br />
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Rather, we should remember that ecclesio-socio-political status among the Jews was tied to one's relationship to the establishment order, the curators being the chief priests, scribes, pharisees, and elders. The Jewish leaders were on the top; the disciples of Jesus were on the bottom precisely because of their new commitments to Jesus. This was also true in a real sense even before Jesus. The true believers were the little people--Mary, Joseph, Zechariah, Elizabeth, Anna, Simeon, etc. So I'm gonna argue that the application of this "status" talk in the Gospels is more about ecclesiastical status than economic or political position. Sometimes, of course, they are intertwined. But what we don't have in the Gospels is some universal commendation of poverty and powerlessness.<br />
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Think about the use of economic language in the New Testament. More often than not the "economic" language used in the Gospels has to do with "spiritual transactions" if you will. I'm not entirely comfortable with that language. But let me try to explain. When you get to the symbolic description of the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem in Rev. 18 the relationship between the nations and Jerusalem is described in symbolic "economic" language. Right? Buying and selling, cargo and merchandise. Jerusalem has an exalted status and position in relation to the nations from which she is removed. Her "religious" position is described in economic language. She was exalted as an exporter of "goods." Remember, too, that Jesus advises the church to "buy" from him "gold refined by fire, so that they may be rich" (Rev. 3:17). He wants the church to occupy the empty seats of power and use it as he has taught them. He wants the church to be "rich" in the sense of having "goods" to distribute to the nations.<br />
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Given the historical context of Gospels at the beginning of the new world, Jesus has no intention of leaving his disciples in the "status" and "position" in which they find themselves under the apostate leaders of Israel. He wants to "bring down the mighty from their seats and exalt those of low degree" (Luke 1). <br />
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If we absolutize these sayings in the Gospels Christians will never be able to accept exaltation and positions of cultural authority. This is the legacy of the anabaptist reading of Scripture—the perpetual fear of power and position. That kind of reading misses the point entirely. The kingdom of God that Jesus proclaimed and ushered in was a new way of organizing humanity under his Lordship. That necessarily means new people in positions of authority. So much of Jesus' instruction to the disciples in the Gospels is designed to insure that the kingdom he is ushering in avoids the "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" danger. We see this happening in the book of Acts. The old world leaders must be dethroned, as Mary prophesied in the Magnificat. But in the kingdom of Jesus authority flows to humble servant leaders—Peter, James, Paul, and those Christians that Paul leaves in the cities to fill the vacuum created by the lawless, evil Jews.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-47703548858867826342012-12-11T09:00:00.000-06:002012-12-11T13:02:24.912-06:00Seals Get OBLI just finished Mark Owen's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/0525953728">No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission that Killed Osama Bin Laden</a>. It's a pretty quick read. The first half of the book is a condensed autobiographical sketch of Owen's (not his real name) Seal training and missions. He doesn't reveal much detail, just very general outlines. Enough to drive you crazy. This is one of the major disappointments I have with books about Special Ops units and missions. They don't give you the really interesting stuff. I want to know about their training, especially with firearms. I want to know just how accurate and fast they are with the weapons they use. I want to know times and statistics and all the stuff that remains classified. Arrggghhh!<br />
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The same can be said about the account of the mission that killed OBL. It's great to have a first-hand account that clears up so much of the speculation that was splashed all over the cable news networks last year. But I want more pictures and video! You know they've got it. Someday maybe we'll see it. Maybe.<br />
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Thankfully, President Obama is not glorified in the account. He's not denigrated, but there's a lot of honesty about D.C.'s incompetence. One of the most political pages in the book has to do with the way Washington changed the way the war was being fought. Here's an example:<br />
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Everything in Afghanistan was getting harder. It seemed with every rotation we had new requirements or restrictions. It took pages of PowerPoint slides to get a mission approved. Lawyers and staff officers poured over the details on each page, making sure our plan was acceptable to the Afghan government. </blockquote>
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We noticed there were fewer assaulters on missions and more "straphangers," each of whom preformed a very limited duty. We now took conventional Army solders with us on operations as observers so they could refute any false accusations. </blockquote>
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Policy makers were asking us to ignore all of the lessons we had learned, especially the lessons learned in blood, for political solutions. For years, we had been sneaking into compounds, catching fighters be surprise. </blockquote>
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Not anymore. </blockquote>
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On the last deployment, we were slapped with a new requirement to call them out. After surrounding a building, an interpreter had to get on a bullhorn and yell for the fighters to come out with their hands raised. It was similar to what the police did in the United States. After the fighters came out, we cleared the house. If we found guns, we arrested the fighters, only to see them go free a few months later. Often we recaptured the same guy multiple times during a single deployment. </blockquote>
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It felt like we were fighting the war with one hand and filling out paperwork with the other. When we brought back detainees, there was an additional two or three hours of paperwork. The first question to the detainee at the base was always, "Were you abused?" An affirmative answer meant and investigation and more paperwork. </blockquote>
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And the enemy had figured out the rules. Their tactics evolved as fast as ours. On my earlier deployments, they stood and fought. One more recent deployments, they started hiding their weapons, knowing we couldn't shoot them if they weren't armed. The fighters knew the rules of engagement and figured they'd just work their way through the system and be back in their village in a few days.</blockquote>
Fortunately, these stupid RsOE were not enforced during the raid that killed OBL. Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-25295857510437988992012-12-10T11:15:00.000-06:002012-12-10T11:15:58.565-06:00Human TempleOne of the lectionary readings for the second Sunday of Advent was Malachi 3:1-4. The prophet prophesies that the Lord will "suddenly come to his temple" and that he will be "like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap." A couple of interesting things to note here:<br />
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First, the tabernacle and temple always stood for the people Israel gathered, organized around God’s special presence. When Peter talks about us being "living stones" he's not introducing something new. After all, did anyone expect Jesus to be scrubbing the stones on the physical temple with a soapy brush? Or blasting away at the gold and silver with a blow torch to purify the precious metals? Of course not. Jesus' cleansing the temple was all about reforming the people. The gold, silver, and stones of the temple represented various kinds of people. When Nebuchadnezzar raided the temple and took the gold and silver, at the same time he also snatched the best and brightest of Israel and brought them back to Babylon. And when he came again to destroy the temple, he destroyed and captured the rest of the people, thereby deconstructing the entire nation of Israel.<br />
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Second, the promise of the Lord coming to his temple also has a surprising fulfillment. The Son of God did not merely appear in the midst of his people as an angel or a theophany to deliver messages from heaven. And he did not simply cause his Glory to fill the old temple as in the past. The time for stone temples was past. Was a stone temple ever really a fitting dwelling place for God? Would God the Son come to his people to reside permanently in a stone house? No. Stephen makes this clear in his speech to the rulers of Israel. "The Most High does not dwell in houses made by hands" (Acts 7:48-49; quoting Isaiah 66).<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Every building is built to accommodate someone or something. If you are like me, when you drive by a new construction site you look for signs of who might be moving in. Will it be a store, a bank, a business, or someone’s home? We want to know who will dwell in that new building. Well, what we learn in the Christmas story is that our humanity was built to house the Creator and Lord of heaven and earth. The true temple of God is humanity. God the Son moves into his temple, his house, his palace when he unites himself to our humanity in the womb of the virgin Mary. The Father and Spirit construct a glorious house for the Son to dwell in. And God the Son has no "problem" uniting himself with us and dwelling with us as a man because we have been created for this very purpose.<br />
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The Son of God did indeed suddenly come to his temple. He cleanses and purified his new house through his suffering, death, and resurrection. The Lord is now permanently housed in this renovation of humanity. Unlike some folks on the TV show "Love it or List it," Jesus didn't give up on mankind and start over again in a new house. He didn't "list" us, so to speak. He loved us so much that he suffered, died, and rose again in order to transform our humanity into a fitting dwelling place for the Lord Most High.<br />
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Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-52389974911596075982012-12-05T12:42:00.003-06:002012-12-10T10:34:14.205-06:00Jesus Reveals God's True CharacterLet me briefly address a mistake that continues to be perpetuated and it sounds so right because it is popularly repeated over and over again in apologetics and evangelism books, tracts, and sermons.<br />
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The mistake is to think that the miracles that Jesus did proves that he was divine. That the clearest, most compelling evidence of the divinity of Jesus was when he did miraculous works of power. No. Read the Bible carefully. In the Scriptures it is <i>human</i> prophets who do these kinds of things. Moses was not God, but he performed great signs and wonders. He was a mighty prophet. And Moses discovered, too, that the magicians of Egypt could imitate these acts. Jesus himself knew and the author of Acts relates that other people were able to perform exorcisms and what not. Similar miracles were done by Elijah and Elisha, but they were not God. God did "extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul" (Acts 19:11). But Paul was not God.<br />
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Haven’t you every thought it odd that the epistles of Paul and Peter and John make no mention of the miracles of Jesus as a proof of his divinity? Rather, Peter says, “Jesus of Nazareth, a <i>Man</i> attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him" (Acts 2:22). <br />
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As it turns out, whenever the apostles speak of Jesus as God they connect it with his incarnation and self-sacrificial death? Jesus' divine nature and character are unveiled in his humble service to us in his birth, life, suffering, and death. The point is that what makes, what proves, if you will, that Jesus is God, is not his works of power and might, but his humble self-sacrifice. His self-effacing love and service for humanity. This is who God is. Jesus is the true revelation of God. And God turns out to be the Chief Servant of all, rather than the big, power-hungry God that pushes people around to show off his greatness.<br />
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Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-56994421899990261492012-12-04T09:45:00.002-06:002013-09-10T10:14:03.959-05:00On Leaven, Yeast, and the Lord's SupperI offer some biblical and theological thoughts on the question of what kind of bread to use in the Lord's Supper. This is not a polished essay. I'm just "casting my bread upon the waters," as Solomon advises (Eccl. 11:1).<br />
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1. The main thing to think about is that the unleavened bread is bread made without the old sour "starter" dough that contains the yeast. In normal situations the yeast comes from that starter "leaven." "Leaven" refers to the old, sour reserved dough that contains the yeast. Leaven contains yeast. Leaven is not the same as yeast. The NIV and other translations screw this up entirely. <br />
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2. When bread is being made, there are two sources for yeast. First, you can get yeast from the old leaven that you have "reserved." In fact, the yeast must be imported into the "leaven" at the start of the process. When the process begins yeast is cultivated from the lees of wine. Then the yeast is put into the dough. A portion of the dough is used to cook the first batch, but a larger portion is "reserved" in order have the yeast readily available for use in later loaves. This "starter" dough that is kept is what is called the "leaven." It's the old, sour dough used as a delivery mechanism for the yeast.<br />
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3. The second way to get yeast is to get it "fresh" when it's cultivated from wine. In the ancient world people knew how to rise bread without the sourdough lump (leaven). Technically, a fresh loaf of bread made with this newly cultivated yeast is not "leavened." What this means is that the first batch of yeasted, rising bread that is made with the new yeast is not leavened bread. It is yeasted, but not from the sour dough leaven. So you could say that a loaf made with yeast not from the reserved, sour leaven is still unleavened bread. It's new. It doesn't use the old, sour stuff. The bread we use for the Lord's Supper in our church is not sour dough bread. It is not leavened bread. It contains fresh yeast. It is yeasted, but not leavened. This is theologically and symbolically significant.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>4. There was theological symbolism involved in the use of unleavened bread when the Israelites made their flight from Egypt. They left behind the old, sour world of Egypt and began a new life. It was called "the bread of haste" because they had no time to cultivate new yeast. The process takes time. So they had to eat unleavened and un- yeasted crackers. Once they arrived in the promised land, they started over again with the yeast of God's new world. They would no longer get their "life" from Egypt, but now from the Lord's Spirit. They ate unleavened bread in the wilderness until they could get to the new land, harvest grapes, make wine, and also new yeast. Thus, the "old leaven" and the leavened bread made with it were associated with the old world, the old creation (1 Cor. 5). One cuts off Egyptian leaven and finds new yeast in the New Land. In between, one eats unleavened bread. The annual Feast of Unleavened Bread seems to be a week long return to the wilderness, the inbetween place. The association of yeast with the feast of Pentecost makes it clear that by that time new yeast has been found and is being used.<br />
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4-1/2. Of course, this does not mean that the word translated "leaven" or "yeast" in the Bible always refers to something negative. One has to understand the context and the story being told. Sometimes "leaven" is used to describe the delivery mechanism for the yeast (Matt. 13:33; Luke 13:21). At other times it is being used to describe something closer to the old, sour stuff that needs to be discarded (Matt. 16:6; Mark 8:15; 1 Cor. 5:6-8).<br />
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5. So the general question is whether in the New Covenant we must reenact the history of redemption weekly or annually, or whether that would be the same error as transubstantiationism? It seems to me that using unleavened bread for the Lord's Supper would be like doing animal sacrifices. It was part of what was done over and over until Jesus came and finished it. The new yeasted dough each year gradually fell back and became Egyptian sour leaven during the year and had to be cut off anew at Passover. They had to start over again, if you will, annually. But the New Covenant is ongoing, and cannot fall back, because it is guaranteed by the death of Jesus, not by the death of animals. The Spirit-yeast of Acts 2 does not fall back and become Egyptian. We eat risen, yeasted bread weekly on the day of Christ's resurrection.<br />
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6. Now, once the old leaven is thrown out and you are in haste to make bread, then it can be made without yeast. That apparently is what the Israelites did when they hurried out of Egypt. That's why that bread was called "the bread of haste." They left behind Egypt (the old leaven) and hurried out to cross the Red Sea. But there's nothing to suggest that we have to eat the bread of haste (unleavened and unyeasted bread) at the Lord's Table. In fact, Jesus reclined at table and we relax for the covenant memorial meal. The old leaven is gone, so we don't eat sour dough bread. But we do eat newly yeasted bread that represents Jesus new kingdom and the life he gives us at his Table.<br />
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7. You should note also that in Israel the bread eaten during the sacrifice of peace was leavened or yeasted. It is only Passover and the ensuing week that required unleavened bread alone be eaten, and that was not only during the special meal but at every meal for the week. After that, all the bread eaten, including at feasts and sacrifices, was yeasted and/or leavened. Yeasted bread was offered at Pentecost, and this newly yeasted leaven is thus associated with the coming of the Spirit, the divine Yeaster. We live after Pentecost. Check out Jack Collins's article "The Eucharist as Christian Sacrifice" in the Westminster Theological Journal where he argues that the Lord's Supper is the fulfillment of the sacrifice of peace (WTJ 66.1 [Spring 2004], pp. 1-23). The normal peace meal included yeasted bread. The one special one - Passover - did not in order to commemorate the Exodus and leaving the old Egyptian world (leaven) behind.<br />
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8. Oddly, we object to Romanists when they say (supposedly) that Jesus is in some sense re-crucified in the mass, but then by using unleavened bread we are really doing something similar: returning to Passover, to the Old Covenant, over and over again rather than worshipping in a post-Pentecostal way. Maybe that's pressing the analogy too much.<br />
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9. Remember, too, that the Lord's Supper is not the place for "afflicting ourselves" with bad tasting bread. There's an argument that relates the fasting that the Israelites did once a year with the Lord's Table. But that assumes, for one thing, that the Christian Table is simply an extensive of the Passover meal. It's not. But it also misses the fact that the Lord's Supper is a feast, not a fast. And the Table is most assuredly not the place in the Christian liturgy to "afflict ourselves" or "fast" from something that tastes good. The confession, mourning, affliction phase of the liturgy is at the beginning of the service. After the absolution we are forgiven and restored to happy fellowship with our heavenly Father. Making the Table into a place of mourning or affliction is just all wrong. <br />
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Besides, there's way too much fasting and mourning in the traditional church year. That has to be fixed some day. Now even Advent has become time of fasting. The Lord's Day is a day of joy and feasting. But in the Reformed world we are all about being "serious" about everything. The service has to be "serious" and the Supper has to be conducted with proper "seriousness." But why? When we get through the seriousness of confession and absolution we really don't want to keep coming back to our guilt and sin over and over again in the service, right?<br />
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The time for "seriousness" is at the beginning of the service when you confess your sins. Get serious then. Get it over with. On your knees. Confess your sins. Then rise and hear the declaration of forgiveness from the pastor. To dwell on your sin and guilt for the rest of the service is to fail to believe God has forgiven you in Christ. <br />
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People forget that we have a flow in the Divine Service. An order. A sequence. And that this sequence is psychologically satisfying, tuned to just what we need. The Supper is not ordinarily the place for seriousness. To think of it in terms of fasting is just weird. Here's an analogy that may help. What happens at the family table? The family dinner is the time to relax and enjoy one another, to eat and drink and be merry. If there's a need for "seriousness" in the family, it's dealt with before the supper in another room with a wooden spoon or a stern talk that ends with confession, forgiveness, and restoration of loving affection. When supper time comes, all that required "seriousness" has been dealt with. It should be the same way at the Lord's Table.<br />
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10. The Lord's Supper is not a continuation of the Passover. It's so much more than that. It's a fulfillment of all the covenant meals in the OT. Whenever God shared a meal with people it looked forward to the Lord's Supper and, of course, to the eschatological marriage Supper of the Lamb. To celebrate the Lord's Supper with unleavened crackers to reproduce the Passover is too anemic. The Lord's Supper is all the old world feasts and meals transformed and rolled into one ritual feast for the new people of God.<br />
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11. None of this is to say that using what is mistakenly called "unleavened" bread (crackers or matza) is evil or absolutely wrong. I just don't believe it's appropriate. I will say this as well: feasting on stale, tasteless "crackers" at the Lord's Table strikes me as less than desirable. We should be eating normal, tasty bread together and pleasant-tasting wine (or port) as well. Remember, unless you are using sourdough bread, normal bread is in fact "unleavened." But here's the bitter point: The atmosphere at the Table should be one of a friendly family meal. It's a table not a tomb. It's not a time to turn in on oneself and have an intensely private devotional experience. It's a common Table where we should acknowledge one another as members of the body of Christ. I believe using stale, hard crackers reinforces the mistaken notion that the Lord's Supper is a time of deep individual repentance and mourning for sins. That's just weird. That's not what happens normally at our dinner tables. And that's not what the climax of the Divine Service is about. Confession and forgiveness happened at the start of the service. The Supper at the end of the liturgy should be about relaxing, eating and drinking with the family of God, and enjoying our status as sons and daughters of the King of the universe.<br />
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Anyway, that's the basic argument.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-558461285642691762.post-20515111716819375862012-12-01T14:41:00.003-06:002013-06-23T08:37:31.193-05:00Private MassesCalvin: "I call it a private mass whenever there is no communion among believers in the Lord's Supper, even if a large crowd of people are otherwise present" (<i>Institutes</i> 4.8.7).<br />
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Calvin is talking about a priest doing the Eucharist with the gathered people not communing. It's "private" even if there's a lot of people in the room while it's being performed by the priest because no one but the priest is partaking of the bread and wine.<br />
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Of course, private masses are still performed for various reasons by Roman priests. But the Roman church has reintroduced communion in both kinds as well as regular congregational participation at the weekly Supper. The Reformation was pretty successful in dealing with the late medieval problem of the withdrawal of the laity from the Table.<br />
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But there's another problem with the way modern Christians celebrate the Lord's Supper that might be labeled as "private mass" or maybe just "private communion." The word "communion" refers not only to our communion with the resurrected Jesus through the bread and wine at the Supper. There's also a horizontal dimension to the Table that flows from union with Jesus. We are united with one another. We commune with Jesus <i>and</i> with one another. "Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of one loaf" (1 Cor. 10:17).<br />
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<a name='more'></a>But how is our communion with one another expressed at the Table? In most churches hardly at all. I would suggest that there's another kind of "private mass" going on. Everyone in the congregation curls up in his own little personal world to take communion. We don't look at anyone else. We don't talk to the person sitting next to us. We just work up private devotional thoughts and eat and drink by our lonesome. To extend Calvin's quote:<br />
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"I call it a private mass whenever there is no communion between believers at the Lord's Table, even if a large crowd of people are otherwise present"<br />
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The problem with this is that meals, even ritual meals are not simply about personal, private nourishment. They are social events. Think of the family meal. Do the individual members of the family simply gobble up the food and slurp down their drinks without acknowledging others at the Table? Of course not. We would judge any family to be quite dysfunctional if nobody said a word to anyone else at the dinner table. All meals are communal events. Take away the communal dimension of a meal and you are left with the private ingestion of nutrients. <br />
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So why don't Christian's acknowledge one another at the Lord's Table? Why don't we talk to one another? Why doesn't the Lord's Table have the same sort of communal conversation and joyous interaction as a healthy family meal? Why do Christians think that the Lord's Supper is the time for intense personal examination and private devotional thoughts? We have time for that sort of thing all week. What we don't experience at any time during a normal week is the presence of our brothers and sisters in Christ gathered as the body of Christ at the Communion Table.<br />
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The Reformation rightly corrected a certain kind of privatization of the Supper. But the way Communion is practiced in most churches today makes one wonder if we didn't just multiply private masses. It's not just the priest that communes alone; rather, now everyone at the Communion service thinks of the Table as his own private time. Think about it.Jeff Meyershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16934932107746619375noreply@blogger.com3