Everything in Christ

 The divisions created at Babel were meant to be temporary from the beginning, and from the moment of Israel’s Exodus they began to be erased. 

When Israel left Egypt, they were accompanied by a “mixed multitude” of people, those who were not of Israel (Exodus 12:38).

From the Exodus on there were always Gentiles who, seeing the God of Israel was the one true God at work in the world, sought to join themselves to Israel and her God. “The terror of you has fallen upon us,” Rahab told the two spies. The nations knew that the one true God was Yahweh, because of the mighty works He did for Israel. As long as Israel remained faithful, God worked victory for them, and the nations could see it.

Rahab and Ruth were both in the lineage of our Lord. Racial segregation was never the point of God’s setting apart of Israel.

By the end of Israel’s exile, the lineage of some had become so lost that they could not tell for sure that they were of Israel (Nehemiah 7:61-64). Any racial unity that existed in Israel was gradually being torn apart by the sovereign hand of God Himself. 

Through the mouths of the prophets, God called the nations to account for their sins. This was in preparation for the coming of the Messiah.

The goal from the beginning was not that the Gentiles might merely “eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table” (Mt. 15:27), but that all the nations might sit with Israel and feast together at the table of the Lord. All things and peoples were to be gathered together into Christ (Eph. 1:10).

The Antioch Declaration

 I’ve read the Antioch Declaration. I’ve also listened to Jon Harris’s podcast on it. I understand some people looking in from the outside and not understanding all of it. But for those roughly within the Reformed world who have been following the conversations on theological, cultural, and political matters the past few years, I don’t understand what is ambiguous about it. And when you’re talking about a whole host of young men within this movement, I don’t see why individuals need to be named. 

As a side note, in the Reformed world we have a history of seeing the Gospel as categories of soteriology within systematic theology - justification, sanctification, etc. While those things are there in Scripture, they are how the Gospel is applied to individuals. The Gospel itself is God saving the world - not just Jew, but Gentile as well - through the work of Christ. “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself”. The Gentile is brought to God in unity with the Jew - see Isaiah 40-66, and Ephesians 2. This is the Gospel. Therefore, trying to set back up barriers between people groups on the basis of race or ethnicity is a denial of the Gospel. No amount of appealing to covenant or cherry picking verses from Scripture is going to change that.

Arminian Man’s Sovereign Will

 The Arminian idea of Election: God looks down through the corridor of time, and sees that one day certain people will choose Him. And because of their choice of Him, He in turn chooses them.

I understand why a person might want to believe that. There was a time when I would have thought this was true. The problem with that, though, is that there isn’t a verse or passage in Scripture that suggests it. Scripture says God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. And we are told that it was according to “the good pleasure of His will” (Eph. 1:4-5), not according to our choosing of Him first. In Romans 9:11 we are told that Isaac, who is set forward as an example of salvation, was chosen before he could do any good or evil.

Then there are the attempts to suggest election is to sanctification or service. The problem with that, though, is that Scripture never separates these things from each other, but always treats them all as a part of the complete package I what it is to be saved. The elect man is justified, and sanctified, and serves God and neighbor. If one of these things is missing, they are all missing.

And so if we are to believe that we are chosen on the basis of our choice, it is an odd thing that God’s Word seems to go to such great lengths to suggest the exact opposite.

Herod the Pretender

 So why does the account of the beheading of John the Baptist sit where it does within the Gospel of Mark? From the beginning, Mark presents Jesus as a man of action. He enters the synagogues, and he goes about teaching and healing and feeding the people. In our one image of Herod in this passage, we see him as a man of sloth and indulgence. Whereas Jesus is a healer, Herod is a murderer. Whereas Jesus feeds the people, Herod sets up a feast for the rich and powerful. Whereas Jesus fears no man for the sake of truth, Herod is willing to go against the truth for fear of those at the feast. When the people came to Jesus, he had compassion on them, seeing that they were without a shepherd. Herod, who should have been the shepherd-king in the image of David prior to Bathsheba, was neglecting the people. Jesus instead had come as the true shepherd-king, the heir of the throne of David. He was Israel’s true rightful ruler.

Ephesians and Dominion

 Paul’s emphasis in Ephesians on Jesus’s kingship over all things, originating from His throne in heavenly places, makes sense in light of Paul’s status as a prisoner of and in Rome. The one true King is Jesus, and Caesar owes Him his allegiance. Psalms 2 and 110 loom in the background of the letter.

It’s worth noting how Paul continued working to take dominion for Christ, even though he was in prison (Phil. 4:22). The fact that Paul was Christ’s prisoner was more powerful than any claim Rome tried to lay on him (Eph.3:1, 4:1). And the same is true for all of us bound to one another in Him in the “bond (fetters) of peace” (4:3). Jesus ascended into the heavenly places and took captivity captive (4:8). Even though he was physically bound in Rome, Paul was still truly bound only to Christ, and thereby free from all others. No matter who we find ourselves “bound” to, Jesus alone is King, and we serve Him alone.

As a side note, I understand James Jordan’s idea of Ephesians 6 being about the High Priest, but I am not convinced by it. There’s no doubt that worship is warfare. But what is described in the passage is broader than corporate worship and applies to the whole Christian life. Paul’s emphasis in the letter is the working of Christ’s kingship first of all in the Church, but then also spreading beyond the walls of the local church building and beyond the relationships between members of the Church (chs. 5 & 6). What all believers are called to is spiritual warfare for Christ’s kingdom, everywhere and anywhere they go.

Jesus and the Exodus

 Matthew 8:18-27 is a repetition of Israel’s crossing the Red Sea in Exodus 14. This had never occurred to me before today. You have the same reticence and fear expressed in the Matthew passage as you do from Israel in the Exodus passage. In both passages, God is leading his people across the Red Sea. In both passages, God controls the sea to create a safe passage for them. Jesus is Yahweh, leading his disciples, who are Israel. And in both passages, Yahweh’s mighty power in spite of his people’s lack of faith is displayed. Jesus is the same God who saved his people out of Egypt.

Biblical Male Headship

 With regard to the ongoing debate over “patriarchy”: if one wants to quibble over the term, then use another term. Call it what I was taught growing up. Call it “Male Headship”. It simply goes back to the Biblical teaching that godly men are intended by God to be the ones leading in the Church, in the family, and in the broader society.

Any attempt to subvert this teaching using the Deborah episode in Judges ignores the broader context of Judges itself, that Israel was in a state of being given over to the consequences of their sin for failing to take dominion as God had commanded them. Rather than subverting the doctrine of Male Headship, the Deborah episode confirms it and reinforces it.

We are in the state we are in in America today because we all - both men and women - have failed to obey God in this area. And no amount of trying to justify feminism or trying to make it work is going to change that. Society and its relationships will continue to suffer so long as we keep trying to do things our way rather than God’s.

The Parable of the Sower, Matthew 13

 Mt. 13

A.) Seed by the wayside

B.) Seed on stony places

C.) Seed among thorns

C’.) Some a hundredfold 

B’.) Some sixty

A’.) Some thirty

Jesus is emphasizing the antithesis here and throughout the chapter, between those of His Kingdom and those of the wicked one, those who are righteous and those who are evil, those bear fruit and those who do not, those who persevere in faith and those who fall away. But vss. 8 and 23 only make sense when seen as mirrors of the three types of people who do not persevere in faith in the first part of each section (vss. 3-8 & 18-23). The focus is on how far each category of person progresses in relation to the word of the kingdom, i.e. the gospel.

Jesus’ movement through this section echoes an often repeated flow one sees in the Psalms: the wicked and their behavior, followed by the righteous and their behavior in contrast.

And the application? Jesus gives a narrow application within the context of the parable itself. Those multitudes to whom he spoke were those who heard the word of the kingdom, and did not understand it (vss. 13 & 19). Jesus contrasts them here specifically with His disciples (vss. 11, 16-17). More broadly, it applied to all those of Israel who would not receive Christ and His kingdom, paving the way for the end of the Old Covenant and the destruction of Israel in 70 AD, as prophesied and prefigured in the Old Testament. As such, this passage continues what we see throughout Matthew’s Gospel, Israel’s rejection of Jesus. The movement, in other words, is from Old Covenant to New Covenant, Israel to Church, “this age” to “the age to come”.

But there is an even broader application to be made, as emphasized later in Romans and Hebrews. The warning is given to all those of the kingdom, both Jew and Gentile: only those who bear fruit and persevere will be saved. True faith always produces faithfulness.

Perseverance in Hebrews

A friend on Facebook raised the question of whether Eternal Security/Perseverance of the Saints is something new to the New Covenant and therefore foreign to the Old. But this seems clearly to contradict the central point of the Book of Hebrews.

The large point of the Book of Hebrews is that the New Covenant is the fulfillment of the Old Covenant by Christ, and is therefore better. And for that reason, the warnings against apostasy are intensified, not lessened. Eternal security is always conditioned on eternal election manifested in true faith accompanied by faith-filled works. The whole point is that there is no difference between the two covenants in this. Those who persevere are saved, those who don’t, aren’t saved, and won’t be saved.

Wherever salvation exists, Perseverance must exist as well, the flip side of it being, as Dr. Sproul put it, God preserving us or persevering with and in us. One might argue that, based off of the failure of the Old Covenant, there was less persevering during the Old. This is a point of those holding to New Covenant Theology, and it is to a degree a fair point. The Old was insufficient in itself, not having the work of Christ, but merely foreshadowing. But in the ebbs and flows of Israel’s relationship with God, we see countless of those in whom salvation was real. This is the focus of Hebrews 12:1-13:1, after all. Abraham, as Paul says, was justified by faith, as were all those after him walking in his faith. Salvation is always at its core the same - to persevere is to be saved.

The Israel That Isn’t Israel

 Dispensationalism has always taught that Israel cannot be reassembled until the Church is raptured, because this is still the Dispensation of the Church, and God will not deal with Israel during this dispensation. God is working through the Church alone right now. None of the prophecies that supposedly still apply to Israel will be fulfilled during this age. And so all those verses that Dispies continue to meme out about Israel? They are irrelevant, according to their own system of interpretation. What everybody keeps calling “Israel” isn’t Biblical Israel, per Dispensationalism. This is a basic teaching of the system.

This “Israel” that’s been gathering since 1948? It isn’t Israel.

I find it strange that people who have sat under this teaching for decades still don’t understand this. But often I find even the pastors and teachers teaching it don’t understand it either.

Living in the New Jerusalem

 If we’re currently living in Babylon rather than Jerusalem, then it’s amazing how well the Gospel, Scripture, and the Church have spread throughout Babylon over the past two thousand years. I would have expected more failure.

It’s John MacArthur syndrome, a disconnect between soteriology and eschatology. It’s acting as if Total Depravity was the beginning and the end of the thing, and ignoring the other four points of Calvinism.

“All authority in heaven and on earth have been given to Me.” It’s not as if He was vague in that. Unbelief, faithlessness, pessimillennialism, anti-intellectualism, sloth, laciviousness, plain old erroneous theology - that’s what has brought us the failure we see. But this generation’s failure won’t stop God’s final conquest.

When Moses lowered his arms, the battle turned against Israel. But when he obeyed God and kept his arms raised, Israel saw victory. Stop lowering your arms. Stop expecting failure. This world belongs to Jesus. He bought it with His blood. Act like it.

9/11 and Our Continuing Apostasy

 Immediately after 9/11, the churches in America were flooded with people seeking answers. Special prayer services were held. But since then, the churches are more empty than ever. We’ve opened the doors to unrestrained immigration. Drugs pour across the border and usage is out of control. Human trafficking continues. We have Muslim communities, mosques, the Islamic call to prayer going out multiple times a day in places in the West, and Muslim politicians. And we have innumerable lives permanently changed or ended due to a twenty year war we lost after we simply walked away from it, leaving millions of dollars of equipment behind.

No matter how much we remember, we seem to have learned nothing. We have not repented and returned to the Lord.

Justified by Works

 “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit. Brood of vipers! How can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth evil things. But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.” - Matthew 12:33-37

The latter half of the passage is especially interesting, in that it ties justification, works, and the final judgment together. The word for “justification” here is the same as in Romans as well as James. The Dispensational teaching of there being two (or more) final judgments, one for all people and one just for the Church according to works, is contradicted by this passage. That good and evil works are in view is clear, as is the fact that there are only two groups to consider, those with an inherent righteousness and those without. There is no third, “Carnal Christian” class to take into account. This judgment according to works is also not one that merely involves those who are saved. Some of the people here will be declared righteous, and some will be condemned, those who are evil.

As echoed in James, the internal state of the person as well as their works are taken into account in God’s judgment of them. But, in conjunction with Paul in Romans (Rom. 2:5-16), the declaration to the righteous here is the final declaration of justification, the end result of God’s original declaration of justification in time to the individual by grace through that person’s faith (Romans 4). God begins by regenerating the man dead in sin and gifting him with faith. And in response to that faith, God declares the man just, based on the righteousness of Christ alone. In so doing, God declares His own promise and intention to make that man into what he is not - a truly righteous man, filling the role of ruling the world which God originally intended for Adam (Romans 4:13-25, 8:18-25). It is the man justified by faith in his life who will be justified at the judgment at the end of this world.

Cultural Ignorance is Bliss

 Was listening to a talk by Kevin Vanhoozer in which he mentioned the need for the Christian to try to be culturally literate. So, I started scrolling through the TV and came across American Idol.

Look, I’m getting old. At this point, and in light of the state of our culture, I think I’d rather remain culturally illiterate from here on out. Somebody let me know if an actual enactment of Red Dawn happens or something. I’ll need to stock up on canned goods so I can survive while rewatching episodes of Andy Griffith.

Transcending the Moment

Controversial personalities are usually temporary in their fame. Ten years from now it is unlikely anybody will be talking about Andrew Tate, and the “controversy” over a Jason Aldean song will be long past. Even within the realm of culture, aim for those things that are long lasting, those things that show permanence. If people are still listening to J.S. Bach after hundreds of years, then you should probably be listening to J.S. Bach from time to time. It is those things that change people for good generation after generation that are the most worth pursuing.

Matthew 28:18-20

 Mt. 28:18-20

A.) Ἐδόθη μοι πᾶσα ἐξουσία ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς· 

B.) πορευθέντες οὖν μαθητεύσατε πάντα τὰ ἔθνη, 

C.) βαπτίζοντες αὐτοὺς εἰς τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ τοῦ υἱοῦ καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος, 

B’.) διδάσκοντες αὐτοὺς τηρεῖν πάντα ὅσα ἐνετειλάμην ὑμῖν· 

A’.)καὶ ἰδοὺ ἐγὼ μεθ’ ὑμῶν εἰμι πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας ἕως τῆς συντελείας τοῦ αἰῶνος.

A.) All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 

B.) Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, 

C.) baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 

B’.) teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; 

A’.) and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.

You have a command (B-C-B’) standing in the middle of a statement, one that ends in a promise. Notice that baptism stands at the center of Jesus’ statement. Baptism is not just “in” the name of the Holy Trinity, but “into” the name. It is baptism into union with the Triune God, which is baptism into His Church. It is a transition from a former state of being into a new state of being, and into a new set of relationships.

Jesus issues a threefold command, reflective of the triune God to which all true believers are united and which stands at the center of the command and of the chiasm.

The evidence for the chiasm exists not only in Jesus’ threefold command, but in the fact that the two verbs often translated “disciple” (μαθητεύσατε) and “teach” (διδάσκοντες) have essentially the same semantic range. The two phrases mirror one another. In addition, Jesus’ promise to forever be with His disciples points back to His first statement and to His authority everywhere and over all that exists. His disciples need not fear anything, because there is no place they can go where He is not King and in complete control.

The disciples are to “go” (πορευθέντες), and where they are to go is in the preceding word, the “world” or “earth” (γῆς). They are to leave Israel, to leave the Jewish people, and go to “πάντα τὰ ἔθνη”. Often translated “all the nations”, it simply means “all who aren’t Jews”, or “all the Gentiles”. The word for “nations” or “Gentiles” here has no implications for any particular structure of government. It does not support a modern nationalistic conception of country or government in any way. The passage is clear in its teaching, however, of Theocracy. Jesus is king over all people, all places, and of all things. And it is the duty of all creatures to submit to him.

But to pull vs. 19 out of context, force a meaning on the translated  word “nations”, and begin to argue for, or even assume, a certain structure of government or country beyond this is bad scholarship. And given the modern usage of the word “nationalism”, the use of the word in relation to this passage is obfuscatory and unhelpful.

Mary, Mary

 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. And again he stooped down, and wrote on the ground. And when he did, lo, there didst from the crowd fly a single stone, and behold, the stone didst graze the woman caught in adultery upon her brow, sending her to the ground. And Jesus didst look, and behold, it was his mother Mary who didst hurl the stone. “Awww, mom!” he did exclaim as he arose. But he did not rebuke her, for lo, she was conceived without Original Sin.

  -- John 8, Revised Roman Catholic Version 

The Inevitable Failure of Nationalism

 The current push for nationalism belies a distrust in God’s ordained means of grace - the Word, prayer, and the sacraments. We grasp for power in the wake of our failure as a Church, only still failing to understand where our true strength comes from.

Nationalistic centralism failed in Europe, and it has failed here. A large national state will always be the Leviathan seeking to swallow up everything it can. It will always be a safe haven for those with a lust for power without real accountability.

Nationalism will forever be a a bane to local and traditional culture. And the idea that Christian Nationalists argue in the same breath for tradition is ironic. Once nationalism is created and let loose, in the end the only tradition you have left is a Statist one.

In nationalism, corporatism finds its greatest ally. The younger ones among us can’t remember a time when blatant advertising wasn’t emblazoned across every piece of clothing we wore. They don’t know a time when people didn’t define themselves by their devotion to a product or corporation. We buy products. But more than that, we have become the product. A centralized national government will always gladly sell us to the highest bidder. 

In nationalism, fascism is inevitable.

Nationalism will always tend toward atheism.

When Machen protested against a federal board of education, it was for good reason.

Heretic Hunting, Christian Nationalism, and Biblical Dominion

 Related to the ongoing “Christian Nationalism“ push and matters of Biblical Dominion:

“Those who work diligently at their God-ordained tasks will overcome those who grasp for power by force and deception. 

Notice, that throughout Scripture, implements of work are continually shown to destroy implements of war and intrigue.

Shamgar prevailed over an army of 600 Philistine warriors

with only an oxgoad (Judges 3:31).

Jael defeated the commander of the Canaanite army with a

tent peg (Judges 4:17-22).

Gideon led his tiny band of faithful men to victory against the

Midianite army with nothing more than empty pitchers, torches,

and trumpets (Judges 7:13-23).

Wicked Abimelech defeated every army he marched against,

but he was helpless against the millstone hurled upon his head by the woman of Thebez (Judges 9:50-54).

Samson destroyed 1,000 Philistines with nothing but the jawbone

of an ass (Judges 15:14-16).

The swordless, spearless, and spiritless brigade of Saul was

able to deliver Israel from the mighty Philistine army with only a

small, two-man diversion (1 Samuel 13:19-14:23).

And the young David overwhelmed the giant warrior Goliath

without armor, without a sword, and without shield or spear; he

had only his shepherd's staff and sling, along with five smooth

stones from a brook (1 Samuel 17:40-50).

Even Christ used ordinary tools, implements of work, when

He made a spectacle of the powers and the principalities: He nailed them to the cross (Colossians 2:13-15)!

Dominion comes through service. But it comes by work. Work is

the hand that plucks the golden fruit of God's very great and precious promises. Work will ultimately, inevitably overcome force and deception. The plowshare and the pruning hook will overcome the sword and the spear.“ -- George Grant, "In the Shadow of Plenty", pp. 50-51

I would add my own question: how many people promoting Christian Nationalism online or trying to correct the latest person deemed a heretic have visited a shut-in individual or a person in a nursing home in the past year? Internet debates give the illusion of glory; real loving sacrifice, that which follows the path of Christ all the way to the Cross, is often hidden from view, disdained by the World, and taken for granted by the Church.