Theological Digest Online

A Lutheran View of Sanctification - Gerhard Forde

2009-06-17T12:00:00.000-04:00

Below is an article by Gerhard Forde. The original article can be found at god-centered.com.

Here is an essay by Gerhard Forde, former Professor of Theology at Luther Seminary, now with the Lord. He represents the Lutheran view in the book, Christian Spirituality: Five Views of Sanctification (Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1988). This is a riveting piece by Forde that I believe is must reading for everyone. Props to Danny O for bringing this to my attention, because the weight of what Forde is saying and its implications are earth-shattering. May God cause you to read with grace, joy, and freedom in the promise of God through Jesus Christ. Please post your feedback too!

SANCTIFICATION, IF IT IS TO BE SPOKEN OF AS SOMETHING other than justification is perhaps best defined as the art of getting used to the unconditional justification wrought by the grace of God for Jesus’ sake. It is what happens when we are grasped by the fact that God alone justifies. It is being made holy, and as such, it is not our work. It is the work of the Spirit who is called Holy. The fact that it is not our work puts the old Adam/Eve (our old self) to death and calls forth a new being in Christ. It is being saved from the sickness unto death and being called to new life.

In German there is a nice play on words which is hard to reproduce in English. Salvation is Das Heilâ€”which gives the sense both of being healed and of being saved. Sanctification is Die Heiligungâ€”which would perhaps best be translated as “being salvationed.” Sanctification is “being salvationed,” the new life arising from the catastrophe suffered by the old upon hearing that God alone saves. It is the pure flower that blossoms in the desert, watered by the unconditional grace of God.

Sanctification is thus simply the art of getting used to justification. It is not something added to justification. It is not the final defense against a justification too liberally granted. It is the justified life. It is what happens when the old being comes up against the end of its self-justifying and self-gratifying ways, however pious. It is life lived in anticipation of the resurrection.

As such, sanctification is likely not the kind of life that we (old beings!) would wish, much as we might prattle piously about it and protest about how necessary it is. For the most part we make the mistake of equating sanctification with what we might call the moral life. As old beings we get nervous when we hear about justification by grace alone, faith alone, and worry that it will lead to moral laxity. So we say we have to “add” sanctification too, or we have to get on to what is really important, living the “sanctified life.” And by that we usually mean living morally.

Now, living morally is indeed an important, wise and good thing. There is no need to knock it. But it should not be equated with sanctification, being made holy. The moral life is the business of the old being in this world. The Reformers called it “civil righteousness.” Sanctification is the result of the dying of the old and the rising of the new. The moral life is the result of the old being’s struggle to climb to the heights of the law. Sanctification has to do with the descent of the new being into humanity, becoming a neighbor, freely, spontaneously, giving of the self in self-forgetful and uncalculating ways. “But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you” (Mt 6:3-4). Sanctification is God’s secret, hidden (perhaps especially!) even from the “sanctified.” The last thing the sanctified would do would be to talk about it or make claims about achieving it. One would be more likely, with Paul, to talk about one’s weaknesses.

No, sanctification is not the kind of thing we would seek. I expect we don’t really want it, and perhaps rarely know when it is happening to us. It is the work of the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life. It is given to us in the buffeting about, the sorrows, the joys, the sufferings and the tasks of daily life. As Ernest Becker rightly put it in his classic work (that ought to be read by everyone interested in the question of “salvationing” today) The Denial of Death, the hardest thing is not even the death, but the rebirth, because it means that for the first time we shall have to be reborn not as gods but as human beings, shorn of all our defenses, projects and claims.1 Can flowers bloom in this desert? Can we survive and get used to justification? Can we live as though it were true? That is the question.

The Argument

Talk about sanctification is dangerous. It is too seductive for the old being. What seems to have happened in the tradition is that sanctification has been sharply distinguished from justification, and thus separated out as the part of the “salvationing” we are to do. God alone does the justifying simply by declaring the ungodly to be so, for Jesus’ sake. Most everyone is willing to concede that, at least in some fashion. But, of course, then comes the question: what happens next? Must not the justified live properly? Must not justification be safeguarded so it will not be abused? So sanctification enters the picture supposedly to rescue the good ship Salvation from shipwreck on the rocks of Grace Alone. Sanctification, it seems, is our part of the bargain. But, of course, once it is looked on that way, we must be careful not to undo God’s justifying act in Christ. So sanctification must be absolutely separated from justification. God, it seems, does his part, and then we do ours.

The result of this kind of thinking is generally disastrous. We are driven to make an entirely false distinction between justification and sanctification in order to save the investment the old being has in the moral system. Justification is a kind of obligatory religious preliminary which is rendered largely ineffective while we talk about getting on with the truly “serious” business of becoming “sanctified” according to some moral scheme or other. We become the actors in sanctification. This is entirely false. According to Scripture, God is always the acting subject, even in sanctification. The distinction serves only to leave the old being in control of things under the guise of pious talk.

On the level of human understanding, the problem is we attempt to combine the unconditional grace of God with our notions of continuously existing and acting under the law. In other words, the old being does not come up against its death, but goes on pursuing its projects, perhaps a little more morally or piously, but still on its of the old subject and the resurrection of a new one, not the continuous existence of the old. Unconditional grace calls forth a new being in Christ. But the old being sees such unconditional grace as dangerous and so protects its continuity by “adding sanctification.” It seeks to stave off the death involved by becoming “moral.”

Sanctification thus becomes merely another part of its self-defense against grace. Justification is rendered more or less harmless. Talk about sanctification can be dangerous in that it misleads and seduces the old being into thinking it is still in control. We may grudgingly admit we cannot justify ourselves, but then we attempt to make up for that by getting serious about sanctification.

Even under the best of conditions, talk about sanctification in any way apart from justification is dangerous. It has a tendency to become a strictly verbal exercise in which one says obligatory things to show one is “serious about it”â€”but little comes of the discussion. Perhaps one feels sanctified just by talking impressively about it. The result of such talk is what I like to call “the magnificent hot-air balloon syndrome.” One talks impressively about sanctification, and we all get beguiled by the rhetoric and agree. “Yes, of course, we all ought to do that,” and the balloon begins to rise into the religious stratosphere solely on the strength of its own hot air. It is something like bragging about prowess in love and sex. It is mostly hot air and rarely accomplishes anything more for the hearers than arousing anxiety or creating the illusion that they somehow can participate vicariously. We got started in that direction even in the above exercise in this thesis when we talked about how sanctification is “spontaneous,” “free,” “self-forgetful,” “self-giving,” “uncalculating” and all those nice things. Dangerous talk. Dangerous because, like love, none of those things can actually be produced by us in any way. Theology indeed obligates us to talk about them, to attempt accurate description, but unless we know the dangers and limitations of such descriptions, it leads only to presumption or despair. So let the reader beware!

And so at the very least, we can say that sanctification cannot in any way be separated from justification. It is not merely a logical mistake, but a spiritually devastating one. In fact, the Scriptures rarely, if ever, treat sanctification as a movement distinct from justification. In writing to the Christians at Corinth, for instance, Paul refers to them as “those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ”; and later, he refers to the God who chooses what is low and despised in the world, even the things that are not, as the source of our life in Christ Jesus, “whom God made our wisdom, our righteousness and sanctification and redemption,” so that whoever boasts should boast in the Lord (1 Cor 1:2, 28-31 RSV).

To the Thessalonians Paul writes that they have been chosen by God from the beginning “to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth” (2 Thess 2:13). Hebrews says that “we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Heb 10:10 RSV). Sanctification appears in Scripture to be roughly equivalent to other words for the salvation wrought by God in Christ, a phrase which designates another facet or dimension of sanctification, but never calls it something distinct or logically different from justification. J. K. S. Reid is right when he concludes, “It is tempting for the sake of logical neatness to make a clean division between the two [justification and sanctification] but the temptation must be resisted, if in fact the division is absent from Holy Scripture.”2

It is difficult to escape the suspicion that the distinction between justification and sanctification is strictly a dogmatic one made because people got nervous about what would happen when unconditional grace was preached, especially in Reformation times. Doesn’t justification do away with good works? Who will be good if they hear about justification by faith alone? So the anxious questions went. Sanctification was “added” as something distinct in order to save the enterprise from supposed disaster. But dogmatic distinctions don’t save us from disaster. More likely than not, they only make matters worse.

Justification by Faith Alone

It becomes clear, then, that we cannot talk about sanctification without first saying something about justification. The difficulty we have arises because justification by faith alone, without the deeds of the law, is a mighty breakup of the ordinary schemes of morality and religion; a mighty attack, we should say, on the theology of the old being. The fact that we are justified before Godâ€”the eternal Judge, Creator and Preserver of all lifeâ€”unconditionally for Jesus’ sake and by faith alone, simply shatters the old being’s entire system of values and calculations.

As old beings we don’t know what to do with an unconditional gift or promise. Virtually our entire existence in this world is shaped, determined and controlled by conditional promises and calculations. We are brought up on conditional promises. We live by them. Our future is determined by them. Conditional promises always have an “if-then” form.3 If you eat your spinach, then you get your pudding. If you are a good girl, then you can go to the movies. If you do your schoolwork, then you will pass the course. If you do your job, then you will get your pay. If you prove yourself, then you will get a promotion. And so on and so on, endlessly until at last we die of it, wondering if we had only done this or that differently, perhaps then. . . . Though such conditional promises are often burdensome and even oppressive, they are nevertheless enticing and even comforting in their own way because they give life its structure and seem to grant us a measure of control. If we fulfill the conditions, then we have a claim on what is promised. We have what we call “rights,” and we can control our future, at least to a certain extent.

So, as old beings, we hang rather tenaciously onto these conditional promises. As a matter of fact, that is what largely characterizes our being in this world as old. We hang desperately onto the conditional promises, hoping to control our own destiny. We live “under the law” and cannot get outâ€”because we really don’t want to. We prefer to go our own way even up to the last barrier: death. And there we must either hope that the conditionality ends and all account books simply close, or perhaps we make the fatal mistake of thinking that we can extend our control under the conditional promise even into the beyond. We think we have a claim on heaven itself if the proper conditions are met. Religion is most often just the attempt to extend this conditionality into eternity and to gain a certain measure of control even over the eternal itself.

But the saving act of God in Jesus Christâ€”comprehended in justification by faith aloneâ€”is an unconditional promise. Unconditional promises have a “because-therefore” form. Because Jesus has overcome the world and all enemies by his death and resurrection, therefore (and only for that reason) you shall be saved. Because Jesus died and rose, therefore God here and now declares you just for Jesus’ sake (not even for your sake, but for Jesus’ sake). Because Jesus has borne the sin of the whole world in his body unto death and yet conquered, therefore God declares the forgiveness of our sins.

Now, of course, as old beings we have a desperately difficult time with such an unconditional promise. It knocks everything out of kilter. We simply don’t know how to cope with it, so we are thrown into confusion. Is it really true? Can one announce it just like that? No strings attached? Don’t we have to be more careful about to whom we say such things? It appears wild and dangerous and reckless to us, just as it did to Jesus’ contemporaries. The best we can do is to try to draw it back into our conditional understandingâ€”so all the questions and protests come pouring out. But surely we have to do something, don’t we? Don’t we at least have to make our decision to accept? Isn’t faith, after all, a condition? Or repentance? Isn’t the idea of an unconditional promise terribly dangerous? Who will be good? Won’t it lead perhaps to universalism, libertinism, license and sundry disasters? Don’t we need to insist on sanctification to prevent the whole from collapsing into cheap grace? Doesn’t the Bible follow the declaration of grace with certain exhortations and imperatives? So the protestations go, for the most part designed to reimpose at least a minimal conditionality on the promise.

It is crucial to see that here we have arrived at the decisive point which will entirely determine how we look at what we call sanctification. It is true, you see, that as old beings we simply cannot understand or cope with the unconditional promise of justification pronounced in the name of Jesus. ‘What we don’t see is that what the unconditional promise is calling forth is a new being. The justification of God promised in Jesus is not an “offer” made to us as old beings; it is our end, our death. We are, quite literally, through as old beings. To use the vernacular, we have “had it.” All the questions and protests that we raise are really just the death rattle of the old Adam and Eve who sense that their kingdom is under radical and final attack. No doubt that is why the defense is so desperate, and why it even quite innocently takes such pious and well-meaning forms.

But isn’t the unconditional promise dangerous? Of course it is! After all, look what happened to Jesus! It is the death of us one way or another. Either we stick in our conditionality and go to that death which is eternal, or we are put to death to be raised to new and eternal life in the one who lives eternally. The point is that when we come up against the danger and radicality of the unconditional promise, the solution is not to fall back on conditionality but simply to be drawn into the death and resurrection of Jesus. The old being cannot survive the promise, the promise which makes new beings out of nothing. God is the one who calls into being that which is from that which is not. The new being finds its center now not in itself, but in Jesus.

One has only to follow out the argument in Romans to see Paul clearly developing this point. The law, the conditional promise, did not stop sin; it only made it worse. As a matter of fact, the law was given to show sin as sinful beyond measure, a bottomless pit, an endless hall of mirrors. But where sin abounded, grace abounded all the more! But isn’t such argument terribly dangerous? Aren’t all the careful barriers built against sin suddenly destroyed? Doesn’t one come perilously close to saying that sin is somehow presupposed by or even necessary for grace? Couldn’t one then justly say, “Well then, shall we not sin the more that grace may abound?” It is a serious question and one that has to be raised. As a matter of fact, if the question isn’t raised, one probably hasn’t yet grasped the radical hilaritas, the joy of grace. No doubt, it is the old being’s last question prior to its death. But what is the answer? It does not lie in returning to the law, to conditionality, but rather in the death of the old.

Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sinâ€”because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. (Rom 6: 1-11)

Actually, all evangelical treatment of sanctification should be little more than comment on this passage. The end to sin is death, not following the law, not moral progress, not even “sanctification” as the old Adam or Eve thinks of it. To sin the more that grace may increase is, of course, absurd and impossible precisely because of the death. To do so would mean to will to return to sin in order to get more grace. That would be like a lover desiring to return to the state of unloving in order to experience falling in love again. Quite impossible! How can one who has died to sin still live in it? The movement is simply irreversible if one catches a glimpse of what the grace is all about.

Furthermore, it is crucial to note that Paul does not tell his readers that they have to get busy now and die. He announces the startling and unconditional fact that we have died. It is not a task to be accomplished. All who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death, so that out of that death may come newness of life, just like and as sure as the resurrection of Christ. Sin is a slavery from which we escape only through that death. Only one who has died is free from sin. There’ is no other way. The old self has been crucified so that the sinful body might also be destroyed and we might at last be set free. There is no continuity of the old self to be carried over here. Christ now becomes our life.

Just the sheer and unconditional announcement “You have died!”â€” the uncompromising insistence that there is nothing to do now, that God has made his last moveâ€”just that, and that alone, is what puts the old being to death, precisely because there is nothing for the old being to do. The God who says, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy,” has decided to do just that through the death and resurrection of Jesus. There is no way for the old being to do anything about such grace. The unconditional justification, the grace itself, slays the old self and destroys its “body of sin” so as to fashion a new one. It is all over! Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. One can’t go back and repeat it. He died to sin once for all, and now he lives to God. Conclusion? You can now only consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus!

So, when we come to the decisive and crucial point about justification and the unconditional promise of grace, it is imperative to see that God is at work making new beings through this (to us) shocking act. The answer to all our questions, to the “death rattle” questions of the old Adam or Eve, lies not in falling back on conditionality, but in learning to cope with death and resurrection. All the questions must therefore be answered with a confident yes.

Do you mean to say we don’t have to do anything? Yes! Just listen! Do you mean to say that even faith is not a condition, nor is making our decision, nor repentance? Yes! Faith is a gift. It comes by hearing. It is the Spirit’s work. It is a being grasped by the unconditional promise, a being caught by the sheer newness and joy of it, a being carried by the Word of Grace. But is not such unconditional promise dangerous? Yes, I suppose it is in this evil age. After all, Jesus got killed for it! But God has apparently decided to take the risk, and sealed it by raising Jesus from the dead. “Wake up, 0 sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you” (Eph 5:14).

But do you mean to say we can’t say no? That kind of question is, of course, the trickiest of the old Adam or Eve. But in spite of everything, it must be answered with a confident yesâ€”from the point of view of the new being. The old Adam or Eve will, of course, only say no, can really only say no. The old Adam or Eve wants to remain in control of the matter and so says no even while wanting to say yes.

So saying no is not an option? Perhaps the best answer would be, “What do you want to do that for?” It would be like arriving at the altar for the wedding and answering the big question. “Do you take…” with, “Do you mean to say I can’t say no?” If we see at all what is going on, we would see that even here the answer finally has got to be yes: “Yes, I don’t see how you can say no!” The new being by definition is one who says yes. One is not forced here, one is made new, savedâ€”heart, soul, mind. One is sanctified in the truth of the unconditional promise of God.

The answer to the persistent questions of the old Adam or Eve is therefore always yes, yes, yes, until at last we die of it and begin to whisper, “Amen! So be it Lord!” Sanctification is a matter of being grasped by the unconditional grace of God and having now to live in that light. It is a matter of getting used to justification.

Simultaneously Just and Sinner

But now we must look a bit closer at how the unconditional promiseâ€”justification by faith aloneâ€”works in our lives if we are to arrive at an appropriate understanding of what we might call sanctification. The first thing to grasp is, of course, that the unconditional promise works quite differently from a conditional one. The unconditional promise, the divine decree of justification, grants everything all at once to the faith it creates. We are simply declared just for Jesus’ sake. But that means simultaneously that we are revealed to ourselves as sinners. The sin revealed is not just a misdeed, but it is precisely our lack of faith and trust over against the incredible goodness of God. The sin to be ultimately expelled is our lack of trust, our unbelief. All our impetuous questions are shown for what they are: unbelief, our reservations over against the God of grace, our fear of being made new.

And still we ask, Don’t we have to do something? You see, that is all we really planned to doâ€”just a little something! We hadn’t counted on being made new! Just that, you see, is the sin exposed! Nevertheless, God simply declares us to be just for Jesus’ sake because that is the only thing that will help. That act of God itself finally exposes us as sinners, desperately in need of saving. So then, for the time being, we are, as Martin Luther said, simul justus et peccator, simultaneously just and sinner. It is the unconditional grace of God that makes us so. In that, we see the truth. And it is in the truth that we are sanctified. The first step on the way of sanctification is to realize that.

This is radically different from our usual, conditional thinking. Conditional thinking is wedded to the schemes of law and progress characteristic of this age. Sin is understood primarily as misdeed or transgression of such a scheme. “Sanctification” is the business of making progress in cutting down on sin according to the scheme. Holiness or righteousness could not be said to exist simultaneously with sin in the same scheme. Righteousness and sin would simply exclude each other. The more righteousness one gains, the less sin there would be. This would be measured by what one does or doesn’t do. It would be a matter of works. Grace would then have to be understood as the power to do such works, to achieve such righteousness. The logic would then be that with the help of grace one progressively gains more and more righteousness and thus sins less and less. One strives toward perfection until, theoretically, one would need less and less grace or perhaps finally no more grace at all.

But such conditional schemes pose all sorts of problems for one who wants to think and believe “in the fashion of Scripture,” as Luther called it.4 In the first place, it doesn’t fit with the divine act of justification by grace alone, by faith alone. There is no real place for justification in the scheme. If it comes at the beginning of the scheme, it makes the subsequent progress unnecessary. Why work at becoming just if you are already declared to be so? On the other hand, if justification comes at the end of the scheme, it becomes unnecessary. You don’t have to be declared just if you have already become so.

The systematic problem is that both justification by faith alone without the deeds of the law and such a scheme of sanctification cannot possibly coexist together. The tradition no doubt recognized this when it insisted on making a sharp and complete distinction between the two, at least in theory. In actual practice, however, one or the other of them generally comes to be regarded as more or less fictional or dispensable. And more likely than not, it will be justification that is so regarded. It comes to be looked upon as a decree contrary to actual fact, a kind of “as if” theology. We are regarded “as if” we were just. Or perhaps it is a kind of “temporary loan” granted until we actually earn our way. Sanctification according to this scheme takes over the center of the stage as the real and practical business of the Christian.

But this leads only to a further, more personal problem in the life of faith if one becomes honest before God. What if the scheme just doesn’t seem to work? This is the much celebrated problem of the “anxious conscience” that bothered Martin Luther. What if one is honest enough to see that one is not actually making the kind of progress the scheme proposes? I am told that grace gives the power to improve, to gain righteousness and overcome sin. I am told, furthermore, that grace is absolutely free. But what if I go to church to “get grace” and then get up the next morning and see the same old sinner, perhaps even a little bit worse, staring back at me through the mirror? What then? I am told that grace is free, and that there is nothing wrong with the “delivery system.” Not even a bad priest, minister or a faulty church can frustrate or limit the grace of God. But I don’t seem to get better. If I am in any way serious, I can only become more and more anxious. I am told that grace gives one the power to love God. But as a matter of fact I only become more and more resentful of a God who sets up such systems and makes such demands. I don’t seem to grow in love of God. I begin to hate him! The magnificent hot-air balloon bursts.

Now I face the really desperate question: Whose fault is it if the scheme doesn’t work? There are two possibilities. Either I have not properly responded to or cooperated with the free divine grace, or most frightening of all, the God of election who presides over such grace has decided, in my case, not to give it. The scheme leaves me either depending on my own abilities to respond, to remove all obstacles to grace, to “let myself go” and so forth, or it leaves me with the terrors of predestination. Usually, of course, we recoil in horror from the very thought of predestination. We piously wouldn’t want to lay the blame on Godâ€”and besides, we would then lose all control of the matter!

So all things considered, we would rather take the blame for the breakdown of the scheme on ourselves. If it didn’t work, it must be because we didn’t do something right. We didn’t repent sincerely enough; we didn’t really and truly seek him; we didn’t wholly give our hearts to Jesus; and so on. But in that case, the more we talk about “free grace” the worse it gets. When the system doesn’t work, “grace is free” turns out to mean that there is no way we can put the blame on grace. But then no matter how much we talk about the grace of God, absolutely everything then depends on us, on our sincerity, our truthfulness, the depth of our feeling, the wholeheartedness of our confession and so on. The system simply turns against us. While we live as old beings in this age, we simply cannot escape the law.

So it is impossible to put God’s unconditional act of justifying sinners for Jesus’ sake alone together with our ideas of progress based on conditions. It doesn’t work either logically or in the life of faith. That is why Martin Luther came to see that we must take a radically different approach. In place of all ordinary understandings of progress and sanctification, the true Christian life begins when we see the simultaneity of sin and righteousness. God begins with us simply by declaring us to be righteous because of Jesus. We begin to see the truth of the situation when we realize that because God had to do that, we must have been at the same time sinners. God would be wasting his breath declaring people to be righteous if they were not actually and wholly sinners! Indeed, as Paul put it, “if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!” (Gal 2:21).

And there can be no cheating here. Since the declaration of God is total, and depends totally on what Jesus has accomplished for us, the sin simultaneously exposed is total. All the dreams, schemes and pretensions of the old Adam or Eve are unmasked in their totality. Sin, as a total state, can only be fought by faith in the total and unconditionally given righteousness. Anything other than that would lead only to hypocrisy or despair. If there is to be anything like true sanctification, it must begin with these considerations.

If our righteousness depends totally on Jesus, and is appropriated only in the relationship of trust (faith), then we can begin to see that God has two problems with us. The relationship can be broken in two ways. The first would be by our failure, our immorality, our vices. Since we lack faith and hope in God’s cause, the relationship is threatened or broken; we go our own way. That problem is usually quite obvious. But the second problem is not so obvious. It is precisely our supposed success, even our “morality,” our virtuesâ€”the relationship with God is broken to the degree that we think we don’t need the unconditional justification, or perhaps even to the degree that we think we are going to use God to achieve our own ideas of sanctity. The relationship is broken precisely because we think it is our holiness.

The first problem, our failure and immorality, is usually most easily recognized and generally condemned because it has consequences, both personally and socially. But the second problem, while generally approved in human eyes because it is advantageous and socially useful, is more dangerous before God (coram deo, as Luther put it) precisely because it is praised and sought after. It is the kind of hypocrisy Jesus criticized so vehemently in the gospels: “like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean” (Mt 23:27). No matter how good and useful such virtue is in the world (and we must not fail to see that it is really so and does have its place), it cannot be counted as sanctification. Those who blow their own horns when they give alms so as to be seen and admired by the public do indeed have their reward: the praise of others. But that is all they get. True sanctification is God’s secret (Mt 6:2-4).

So the first step on the way to sanctification is to see that, before the judgment of God as it comes through the crucified and risen Jesus, we are rendered totally just at the same time as we are exposed totally as sinners. Sanctification is thus included in justification as a total state. True sanctification is at the outset simply to believe that God has taken charge of the matter. ‘Where can there be more holiness than where God is revered and worshiped as the only Holy One? But God is revered as the only Holy One where the sinner, the real and total sinner, stands still and listens to God. There the sinner must realize that his or her ways are at an end. The final assault is under way. There the sinner begins to realize that neither virtue nor vice, morality nor immorality, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything before God, but what matters is the new creation (Gal 6:15). Sanctification is not a repair job. God is after something new. He wants his creation back as new as when it came from his hand.

Progress in Sanctification: The Invasion of the New

But is there not such a thing as growth in sanctification, progress in the Christian life? No doubt there is a sense in which we can and even should speak in such fashion. But when we do, we must take care, if everything we have been saying up to this point is true. If justification by faith alone rejects all ordinary schemes of progress and renders us simultaneously just and sinners, we have to look at growth and progress in quite a different light.

That brings us back to our thesis: sanctification is the art of getting used to justification. There is a kind of growth and progress, it is to be hoped, but it is growth in graceâ€”a growth in coming to be captivated more and more, if we can so speak, by the totality, the unconditionality of the grace of God. It is a matter of getting used to the fact that if we are to be saved it will have to be by grace alone. We should make no mistake about it: sin is to be conquered and expelled. But if we see that sin is the total state of standing against the unconditional grace and goodness of God, if sin is our very incredulity, unbelief, mistrust, our insistence on falling back on our self and maintaining control, then it is only through the total grace of God that sin comes under attack, and only through faith in that total grace that sin is defeated. To repeat: sin is not defeated by a repair job, but by dying and being raised new.

So it is always as a totality that unconditional grace attacks sin. That is why total sanctification and justification are in essence the same thing. The total sinner comes under the attack of the total gift. That is how the battle begins. How then can we talk about the progress of the battleâ€”the transition, let us call itâ€”from sin to righteousness, old to new?

There are, I believe, two aspects of this transition we need to talk about. The first is that since we always are confronted and given grace as a totality, we find ourselves always starting fresh. As Luther put it, “To progress is always to begin again.”5 In this life, we never quite get over grace, we never entirely grasp it, we never really learn it. It always takes us by surprise. Again and again we have to be conquered and captivated by its totality. The transition will never be completed this side of the grave. The Christian can never presume to be on the glory road, nor to reach a stage, which now forms the basis for the next stage, which can be left behind. The Christian who is grasped by the totality of grace always discovers the miracle anew. One is always at a new beginning. Grace is new everyday. Like the manna in the wilderness, it can never be bottled or stored. Yesterday’s grace turns to poison. By the same token, however, the Christian never has an endless process of sanctification to traverse. Since the totality is given, one knows that one has arrived. Christ carries the Christian totally.

Looked at from Luther’s point of view of “always beginning again,” the transition is therefore not a continuous or steady progress of the sort we could recognize. It is rather more like an oscillation between beginning and end in which both are always equally near. The end, the total gift, is constantly and steadily given. But to grasp that we have constantly to begin againâ€”we never can get over it! It is like lovers who just can’t get over the miracle of the gift of love and so are constantly saying it over and over again as though it were completely new and previously unheard of! And so it constantly begins again.

The second aspect of the transition of the Christian from old to death to life, is that all our ordinary views of progress and growth are turned upside down. It is not that we are somehow moving toward the goal, but rather that the goal is moving closer and closer to us. This corresponds to the eschatological nature of the New Testament message. It is the coming of the kingdom upon us, not our coming closer to or building up the kingdom. That is why it is a growth in grace, not a growth in our own virtue or morality. The progress, if one can call it that, is that we are being shaped more and more by the totality of the grace coming to us. The progress is due to the steady invasion of the new. That means that we are being taken more and more off our own hands, more and more away from self, and getting used to the idea of being saved by the grace of God alone. Our sanctification consists merely in being shaped by, or getting used to, justification.

Getting used to justification means that the old Adam or Eve is being put to death, and thus, as Paul put it, “being freed from sin.” How might we conceive of this? Here we must be careful lest in our attempts to describe the matter we once again get seduced into inflating the magnificent hot-air balloon. Being freed from sin by the unconditional promise means that the totality of it begins to overwhelm and destroy our fundamental scepticism and incredulity, our unbelief. Lord, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief?” becomes our prayer (Mk 9:24). We can see light at the end of the tunnel. We begin to trust God rather than ourselves. When Martin Luther talked about these things, he began to talk more about our actual affections than lists of pious things to do.

Under the pressure of the total gift, we might actually begin to love God as God, our God, and to hate sin. Think of it: We might actually begin to dislike sin and to hope for its eventual removal. Ordinarily we feel guilty about our sins and fear their consequences, but we are far from hating them. I expect we do them, in spite of all fears and anxieties, because we like them. Sanctification under the invasion of the new, however, holds out the possibility of actually coming to hate sin, and to love God and his creation, or at least to make that little beginning. It is not that sin is taken away from us, but rather that we are to be taken away from sinâ€”heart, soul and mind, as Luther put it.6 In that manner, the law of God is to be fulfilled in us precisely by the uncompromising totality and unconditionality of the grace given.

Sanctification always comes from the whole, the totality. Whether it takes place in little steps, in isolated actions against particular sins, in those tender beginnings, it is always because of the invasion of the new. Always the totality is intensively thereâ€”the total crisis, the entire transition, the dying and becoming new.

What is the result of this? It should lead, I expect, to something of a reversal in our view of the Christian life. Instead of viewing ourselves on some kind of journey upward toward heaven, virtue and morality, our sanctification would be viewed more in terms of our journey back down to earth, the business of becoming human, the kind of creature God made. Our problem is that we have succumbed to the serpent’s temptation, “You shall not die, you shall be as gods.” Creation is not good enough for us; we are always on our way somewhere else. So we even look on sanctification in that lightâ€”our “progress” toward being “gods” of some sort. If what we have been saying is true, however, our salvation, our sanctification, consists in turning about and going the other way, getting back down to earth. The trouble we have is that it is a long way back for us. To get there we must learn to trust God, to be grasped by the totality of his grace, to become a creature, to become human.

What might that look like? When I think about such sanctification, I think about several things: spontaneity, taking care, vocation and attaining a certain elusive kind of truthfulness and lucidity about oneself. Perhaps I can end by saying a few words about these things.

Spontaneity

What is a truly good work, one that might qualify as the fruit of sanctification? One, I think, that is free, uncalculating, genuine, spontaneous. It would be like a mother who runs to pick up her child when it is hurt. There is no calculation, no wondering about progress, morality or virtue. There is just the doing of it, and then it is completely forgotten. The right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing. Good works in God’s eyes are quite likely to be all those things we have forgotten! True sanctification is God’s secret.

Taking Care

If we are turned around to get back down to earth by grace, then it would seem that true sanctification would show itself in taking care of our neighbor and God’s creation, not exploiting and destroying either for our own ends, religious or otherwise. It would mean concern for the neighbor and society, caring for the other for the time being. Here one should talk about the place of morality and virtue and such things. Although we do not accept them as the means by which we are sanctified, they are the means by which and through which we care for the world and for the other. This is what the Reformers meant when they insisted that good works were to be done, but one was not to depend on them for salvation.

Vocation

How does the one who has died and is being made new, the one who has been taken off his or her own hands, enter into the battle in this world? The answer comes in the concept of carrying out one’s vocation as a Christian in the tasks and occupations of daily life. We always get nervous about what we are to do, it seems. The magnificent hot-air balloon syndrome seduces us into thinking our sanctification consists in following lists of pious dos and don’ts. That always seems more holy. But it is in the nitty-gritty of daily life and its tasks that our sanctification is hammered out.

Precisely because of the totality of the gift, the new being knows that there is nothing to do to gain heaven. Thus the Christian is called to the tasks of daily life in this world, for the time being. Students, for instance, are sometimes very pious and idealistic about “doing something,” and so get caught up in this or that movement “for good.” It never seems to dawn on them that perhaps for the time being, at least, their calling is simply to be a good student! It is not particularly in acts of piety that we are sanctified, but in our call to live and act as Christians.

Truthfulness and Lucidity

In many ways, this essay has been an appeal for more truthfulness in our talk about the Christian life and sanctification. I think that should be the mark of sanctification as well. As Paul put it, we are not to think of ourselves more highly than we ought (Rom 12:3).

The talk of progress and growth we usually indulge in leads us all too often to do just that. But if we are saved and sanctified only by the unconditional grace of God, we ought to be able to become more truthful and lucid about the way things really are with us. Am I making progress? If I am really honest, it seems to me that the question is odd, even a little ridiculous. As I get older and death draws nearer, it doesn’t seem to get any easier. I get a little more impatient, a little more anxious about having perhaps missed what this life has to offer, a little slower, harder to move, a little more sedentary and set in my ways. It seems more and more unjust to me that now that I have spent a good part of my life “getting to the top,” and I seem just about to have made it, I am already slowing down, already on the way out. A skiing injury from when I was sixteen years old acts up if I overexert myself. I am too heavy, the doctors tell me, but it is so hard to lose weight! Am I making progress? Well, maybe it seems as though I sin less, but that may only be because I’m getting tired! It’s just too hard to keep indulging the lusts of youth. Is that sanctification? I wouldn’t think so! One should not, I expect, mistake encroaching senility for sanctification!

But can it be, perhaps, that it is precisely the unconditional gift of grace that helps me to see and admit all that? I hope so. The grace of God should lead us to see the truth about ourselves, and to gain a certain lucidity, a certain sense of humor, a certain down-to-earliness. When we come to realize that if we are going to be saved, it shall have to be absolutely by grace alone, then we shall be sanctified. God will have his way with us at last.

Notes

1 Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death (New York: Free Press, 1973), p. 58.

2 Alan Richardson, ed., A Theological Wordbook of the Bible (New York: Macmillan, 1960), p. 218.

3 Eric Gritsch and Robert Jenson, Lutheranism: The Theological Movement and Its Confessional Writings (Philadelphia, Pa.: Fortress, 1976), pp. 8, 42.

4 Martin Luther, Lectures on Romans, trans. and ed. Wilhelm Pauck, The Library of Christian Classics, vol. 15 (Philadelphia, Pa.: Westminster, 1961), p. 128.

5 Ibid., p. 370.

6 Ibid., p. 194.

Sane Faith by David Powlison

2009-06-15T13:35:00.000-04:00

This article was originally taken from the Boundless Webzine website.

Sane Faith

David Powlison

Sane Faith, Part 1
by David Powlison

We've invited Dr. David Powlison to begin a discussion on counseling from a biblical perspective by writing a series of articles for Boundless. This is a conversation starter: We believe that thoughtful discussion of significant issues is crucial to the flourishing of the body of Christ.

Focus on the Family does not promote one particular model of Christian counseling, but earnestly seeks that we all grow in wisdom together. As with any article on Boundless, publication is not meant to be taken as an endorsement of its content. It is our hope that you are challenged to consider the relevance of Scripture, the importance of balance in the counseling process, and to better understand the Lord's concern and power when it comes to understanding the real life problems that we all struggle with.

* * *

Garrett, 23, is a recent college grad. When some little thing frustrates him or he doesn't get his way, he explodes in anger. It goes way over the top. In college he was an episodic binge drinker, but he's started to drink regularly and heavily over the past year. The effects of alcohol in him are unpredictable. Sometimes booze mellows Garrett out, but most times it lowers his threshold for volatile hostility. In addition to his growing drinking problem, he routinely turns to online pornography for a "fix." His friends don't know about that, but they fear for his future, wondering if he will self-destruct with his drinking and violent temper.

Official diagnosis and current street wisdom? "Garrett suffers from intermittent explosive disorder (IED) and is an addictive personality — and Garrett is all about Garrett, and has control issues, big-time."

Sarah, a 29-year-old single woman, has become increasingly preoccupied with her looks, her calorie intake, and her exercise regime. She often "feels fat," at 5'9" tall and weighing only 103 pounds, She's relentless in her activities and self-care, competitive, always trying to prove herself. Her roommates and family have become more and more concerned. Sarah seems joyless, and has been detaching herself from normal social interactions. She seems nervously self-preoccupied most of the time, so she has little time, energy, or attention for anything or anyone besides herself.

Diagnosis and current wisdom? "Sarah has anorexia — and she's a perfectionist with low self-esteem."

Lise, 32 and married, with a toddler, has felt down ever since she had the baby. Lise has had a tendency to wallow in self-reproach ever since childhood, but lately it's gotten worse. She's mired in loops of self-condemning thoughts, endlessly rehearsing and bemoaning her faults, both real and imaginary. She has developed elaborate "quiet time" rituals that help her feel some sense that her life is OK. She never feels like God loves her. Her husband worries that Lise's ritualistic habits and "sticky thoughts" about personal failings interfere with her ability to raise their child. Her brooding casts a pall over their relationship, too. The simplest question — "How was your day?" — often turns into a dark spiral of complaint and despair. He walks on eggshells: "What can I do? What can I say?"

Diagnosis and current wisdom? "Lise has a case of clinical depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) — and she sets impossible standards for herself."

Chandra, 21, a senior in college, has battled intense anxiety feelings ever since adolescence. She gets tongue-tied if she's put on the spot in a social interaction. She increasingly avoids social situations, and only goes to gatherings or events if she has a friend with her to run interference and carry the ball conversationally. She hasn't been out on a date since a couple of ill-fated attempts in high school when she "almost had a panic attack" trying to figure out what to talk about. Chandra medicates her anxiety with daytime TV, Netflix and chocolate ice cream.

Diagnosis and current wisdom? "Chandra suffers from social anxiety disorder — and she's shy, gets glued to the tube, and needs her chocolate fix."

Do you recognize any of your friends in these people? I do. Do you recognize something of yourself in any of their problems? I do, too.

And do you also notice how each diagnostic label simply takes what we already know and then restates it in quasi-medical-sounding language? The actual experiences of life-lived get turned into a depersonalized "condition." Problems get viewed exclusively as something a person "has," rather than the array of things a person feels, thinks and does.

It's curious. The labels don't actually add any information to what we already know. Yet they somehow alter the entire way we perceive a person. They even alter how people perceive themselves. The story and the struggle get lost in translation.

Hold onto that thought, and we'll come back to it later. First we're going to climb into the story and the struggle.

We're all in these stories

Let's start with the common ground we feel with other people's stories. These problems are garden-variety human struggles ... amped up to very destructive levels. They beset each one of us to a greater or lesser degree. Of course, for the four people described, these tendencies have taken on life-dominating power.

Perhaps you can't identify with just how badly another person flounders. But can you identify with worry? Getting angry? Overindulging in food or drink? Immoral thoughts? Self-preoccupation? Feeling guilty and despondent? Breeding unrealistic hopes? Escape into TV or music or web surfing? Bickering and gossip? Feeling anxious around people? Blanking out on God? All the different ways of being loveless, and joyless, and restless? We can each identify with aspects of what these people do.

Each of these four stories describes a person who needs help in order to face up, to deal, to change. But these people aren't in a completely different category from the rest of us. They aren't weird, as if the rest of us were normal. Think about it this way. They dial up the volume, but we all play the same kinds of music. These are our friends ... and ourselves.

It's no surprise, then, that the Bible engages the varieties of chaos, confusion and trouble that mere humans experience. Our stories interweave with God's story at every point. God intends that we understand what exactly goes wrong — and how exactly he goes about making it right.

In his letter to people who know Jesus, James alerted us to something about personal and interpersonal chaos. Wherever you find "confusion and bad stuff" (James 3:16 paraphrase), you'll find two underlying problems. First, "bad zeal" wants the wrong things too much. Second, "selfish ambition" organizes life around all-about-Me.

James is unblinking about what's wrong, but he never gives the mess last say: "God gives more grace" (4:6). More than what? His goodness is more than all that goes wrong inside us. Confusion and bad stuff is exactly what he goes to work on.

Of course, the particular details of our four friends' stories have a 21st century flavor. But once you scratch the surface, they simply give new spin to old problems. These struggles are variants on the typical confusion and bad stuff of people everywhere. Almost 2000 years ago, Paul said "the works of the flesh are obvious." He gave fifteen examples: "sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these" (Galatians 5:19-21). Anyone can see that this is not the way life is meant to be. All forms of self-preoccupation are the opposite of love, joy, and peace. Paul rounded off his list by pointing far beyond the examples he chose to mention. "Things like these" include the 21st century problems of our four friends and people like us.

So our friends' chaotic ways of living fit the category "works of the flesh." These lifestyles show up on the MRI of Scripture. God sees them for what they are, and he teaches us how to see through his eyes.

God also looks behind the externals into the inner reasons. Galatians 5:16-17 names the motor for a destructive lifestyle: the "desires of the flesh." That's Paul's phrase for bad zeal and selfish ambition. The things people want seem so instinctive and plausible. But our desires become monsters and dictators. We want the wrong things too much, and approach life as if it's all-about-Me.

Garrett's way of life is "my way or the highway." No wonder he gets so angry. Sarah worships an ideal of thinness that even supermodels can't attain. No wonder she's so unhappy. Lise lives by a principle of self-attained standards of performance, and goes snow-blind to the mercies of God towards her. No surprise, she has no sense of peace. Chandra craves approval (and panics about possible rejection). She's so worried about how other people treat her that she has no thoughtful kindness to give to them.

God sees what's operating on the inside, as well as what's oozing out for all to see. He sizes it up for what it is, and then helps us to understand life the same way he does.

These patterns of inner motivation are what the Bible calls your "heart." We generate substitutes for God. The false masters are "little gods" that become I GOTTA HAVE THAT! Our blind, misplaced devotion enslaves us. We express our submission to little gods by destructive lifestyles, by our emotions, thoughts, words, and choices that the Bible calls foolish. God wants us to see our hearts the way he sees us. Inside and out, this is exactly what Jesus came to forgive and aims to transform.

Jesus died to overthrow the dictatorship of the flesh
Jesus died so that you won't die clinging tight to your idols
Jesus died so you won't waste your life massaging and refining self-preoccupation
Jesus lives to become your true Master

Here's the whole message in a sound bite: "He died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for Him who for their sake died and was raised" (2 Corinthians 5:15). Jesus can liberate Garrett from the stranglehold of self-will, so he actually begins to care about other people. Jesus can bring Sarah to her senses, so that she comes to love the beauty of Jesus rather than obsessing over an impossible and empty ideal. Lise can rebuild her life on a new foundation. Chandra can find safe refuge and the courage to reach out.

Christ overthrows dictatorial desires. The fruit of His Holy Spirit — Galatians 5:22-23 — makes for a life worth living.

Of course, the freedom is never all-at-once, one-and-done. But Jesus creates new conditions for life. In our lives now, He begins to make right all that goes so wrong. He sets about the long, hard answering of the complex questions. He begins a lifelong freeing process.

Two ways of doing life

From Jesus' point of view, there are two fundamentally different ways of doing life. One way, you're connected to a God who's involved in your life. Psalm 23 is all about this: "The Lord is my shepherd ... and his goodness and mercy surely follow me all the days of my life." The other way, you're pretty much on your own and disconnected. Let's call this the antipsalm 23: "I'm on my own ... and disappointment follows me all the days of my life." We'll look first at the antipsalm way of doing life.

Antipsalm 23

I'm on my own.
No one looks out for me or protects me.
I experience a continual sense of need. Nothing's quite right.
I'm always restless. I'm easily frustrated and often disappointed.
It's a jungle — I feel overwhelmed. It's a desert — I'm thirsty.
My soul feels broken, twisted, and stuck. I can't fix myself.
I stumble down some dark paths.
Still, I insist: I want to do what I want, when I want, how I want.
But life's confusing. Why don't things ever really work out?
I'm haunted by emptiness and futility — shadows of death.
I fear the big hurt and final loss.
Death is waiting for me at the end of every road,
but I'd rather not think about that.
I spend my life protecting myself. Bad things can happen.
I find no lasting comfort.
I'm alone ... facing everything that could hurt me.
Are my friends really friends?
Other people use me for their own ends.
I can't really trust anyone. No one has my back.
No one is really for me — except me.
And I'm so much all about ME, sometimes it's sickening.
I belong to no one except myself.
My cup is never quite full enough. I'm left empty.
Disappointment follows me all the days of my life.
Will I just be obliterated into nothingness?
Will I be alone forever, homeless, free-falling into void?
Sartre said, "Hell is other people."
I have to add, "Hell is also myself."
It's a living death,
and then I die.

The antipsalm tells what life feels like and looks like whenever God vanishes from sight. As we hear about Garrett and the others, each story lives too much inside the antipsalm. The "I'm-all-alone-in-the-universe" experience maps onto each one of them. The antipsalm captures the driven-ness and pointlessness of life-purposes that are petty and self-defeating. It expresses the fears and silent despair that cannot find a voice because there's no one to really talk to.

Our four friends are spinning out of control. They might implode. Something bad gets last say when whatever you live for is not God.

And when you're caught up in the antipsalm, it doesn't help when you're labeled a "disorder," a "syndrome" or a "case." The problem is much more serious: The disorder is "my life." The syndrome is "I'm on my own." The case is "Who am I and what am I living for?" when too clearly I am the center of my story.

But the antipsalm doesn't need to tell the final story. It only becomes your reality when you construct your reality from a lie. In reality, someone else is the center of the story. Nobody can make Jesus go away. The I AM was, is and will be, whether or not people acknowledge that.

When you awaken, when you see who Jesus actually is, everything changes. You see the Person whose care and ability you can trust. You experience His care. You see the Person whose glory you are meant to worship. You love Him who loves you. The real Psalm 23 captures what life feels like and looks like when Jesus Christ puts his hand on your shoulder.

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside quiet waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil, for you are with me.
Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil.
My cup overflows.
Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Can you taste the difference?

You might want to read both antipsalm and psalm again, slowly. Maybe even read out loud. The psalm is sweet, not bitter. It's full, not empty. You aren't trying to grab the wind with your bare hands. Someone else takes you in His hands. You are not alone.

Jesus Christ actually plays two roles in this most tender psalm. First, He walked this Himself. He is a man who looked to the Lord. He said these very words, and means what He says. He entered our predicament. He walked the valley of the shadow of death. He faced every evil. He felt the threat of the antipsalm, of our soul's need to be restored. He looked to his Father's care when He was cast down — for us — into the darkest shadow of death. And God's goodness and mercy followed Him and carried Him. Life won.

Second, Jesus is also this Lord to whom we look. He is the living shepherd to whom we call. He restores your soul. He leads you in paths of righteousness. Why? Because of who He is: "for His name's sake."

You, too, can walk Psalm 23. You can say these words and mean what you say. God's goodness and mercy is true, and all He promises will come true. The King is at home in his universe.

Jesus puts it this way, "It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom" (Luke 12:32). He delights to walk with you.

Part 2
We've invited Dr. David Powlison to begin a discussion on counseling from a biblical perspective by writing a series of articles for Boundless. This is a conversation starter: We believe that thoughtful discussion of significant issues is crucial to the flourishing of the body of Christ.

This is the second article in a 3-part series. We encourage you to read part 1 if you haven't done so already.

* * *

In the first article of this series, I introduced you to four people who struggle with typical "problems." If you haven't read that article, do go back and start there. This article builds on what was said earlier.

Each of the four lifestyles earned a label for a person: addictive personality, eating disorder, OCD, and so forth. But we saw how each one of us can identify with the things they do, think and feel. You and I might be different in degree from Garrett and Sarah, but we aren't different in kind. Lise and Chandra are fellow strugglers, not bizarre aliens. We noticed how the Bible "normalizes" the seemingly abnormal, reinforcing awareness of our common humanity.

And, finally, we took Psalm 23 and turned it upside down. The "antipsalm" mapped into the four lifestyles – and captured the madness in each of us. But the real Psalm takes us by the hand and walks with us into sanity.

The Awkward Problem of Evil

If you've followed me so far, you might feel a question nagging at the back of your mind. Why don't we hear more of this refreshing and realistic way to think about people? What's the purpose of tagging people with diagnostic labels, of piling on the heavy freight of "disease" and "syndrome"?

Why doesn't the therapeutic establishment use human and humane terms to describe Garrett and the rest of our friends? Their stories describe things we can all understand and identify with. Why does God explain behavior, emotion and the human heart in such a different way from the labels? And why do the therapeutic answers never offer anything remotely like the intimacy of Psalm 23?

The answer to these questions is complicated. But it boils down to two things.

First, if you face our problems for what they actually are, then you have to acknowledge the problem of evil. What's wrong is much more serious than a sickness or syndrome. Evil operates on the inside – bad zeal and selfish ambition. And evils come at us from the outside: betrayal, false values, poor role models, shallow relationships, a body going out of sync, injury, aging, death. Both sin and suffering characterize the problem of evil.

But the diagnostic labels (and street wisdom, and even our four friends) never mention the E-word: evil. What distorts our lives? Evil. What breaks our lives. Evils, both inside and out. Something very dark and very complex is going on. Bad stuff comes at you, and bad stuff is an operating system inside you.

No one can fail to see evidence of evil. You feel it. You participate. But people don't want to name it for what it is. We might admit the evil of a Hitler or a suicide bomber killing innocent children. We fail to see the evils operating in normal problems.

Second, if you acknowledge the scope of the problem of evil, then you realize you need a Savior. If evil infects us all, then someone not under the power of evil must bring light and life from outside the system of darkness and death. That person is Jesus Christ.

Garrett's consuming "I insist on my way" is a sin of the heart against God, who alone is King, whose will is that we love Him utterly. Garrett needs what only Jesus can give, comprehensive forgiveness and a complete turnaround. Sarah's endless striving up the ladder of idolatrous slenderness is a sin of the heart against God, who calls her to love Him with all her heart. She needs powerful mercy. And so it is with Lise and Chandra, each putting their own spin on our need for God.

Like all human beings, they are by nature lost in the antipsalm. We need Him to save us from the inner logic of our hearts. We need Him to save us from suffering and death.

If Garrett manages his temper a little better, if Sarah eats a bit more healthily, they've barely dented the surface of their problems and their need. They need mercies. They need a change of heart, a different Savior, a different Lord. They need Psalm 23. We all do.

But if you don't want to need Jesus Christ, then you must deny the depth and scope of the problem of evil.

The Relevance of Christ

We sought to make sense of these four stories through God's eyes. We approached people with troubles in the light of God's mercies and power in Christ. His love is candid, patient, and effective. He intends that we each know our need, and find Him true. Then we, too, grow more candid, patient and effective in our love for other strugglers.

The persuasive voices in modern culture look through different eyes. The diagnostic system now in vogue makes problems seem smaller and solutions seem easier. It explains problems as genetics plus the social environment, with a nod in the direction of how you talk to yourself: "nature + nurture + self-talk." It sounds so appealing. With just the right medication, the right kind of friends and the right affirmations to boost your self-confidence, you can fix your kind of syndrome. The Savior of the world plays no part in the solution, because alienation from God plays no part in the problem.

There's a wide gap between medical-sounding labels and the Bible's straightforward teaching. There's a wide gap between therapeutic solutions and self-sacrificing love. Why the gap?

It's hard to face reality.

In T.S. Eliot's words, "Human kind cannot bear very much reality." Here's a longer answer, again in T. S. Eliot's words. When the Church tells of Jesus, she tells people

... of Life and Death, and of all that they would forget.
She is tender where they would be hard, and hard where they like to be soft.
She tells them of Evil and Sin, and other unpleasant facts.
They constantly try to escape
From the darkness outside and within
By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good.
But the man that is will shadow
The man that pretends to be.
– "Choruses from 'The Rock,'" part VI

The man that is shadows every pretense. Goodness is our greatest need. There is darkness both outside and within. There is tender mercy where we least expect it. And there is the hard reality that without such mercy, you die. Jesus calls for change of heart.

How much the perfect systems would like to forget all that.

Part 3

This is the final article in a 3-part series. We encourage you to read part 1 and part 2 if you haven't done so already.

* * *

We've seen how the therapeutic worldview disconnects from reality. People with problems are treated less seriously than they deserve. They are given Band-Aid therapies for questions that call for an organ transplant. Let's think carefully through a series of implications.

1. The facts are the facts — but what do they mean?

Notice that nobody disputes the facts. Mental health practitioners, friends and family, you, me, and the God of the Bible agree that Garrett (see part 1 of this series) is narcissistic, has a bad temper, drinks too much and uses porn. He tries to control his world because he thinks it's his world. All agree that Sarah starves herself, works out relentlessly, and puts in a lot of mirror-time. She demands perfection on her own terms.

Nothing I'm saying questions any of these facts. These are facts that call for explanations and call out for help.

The question is how to interpret the facts. What do these problems mean? Why do our four friends live like this? Whyare they ruining their lives?

Does each of them "suffer from" a quasi-medical-sounding disorder that actually explains his or her problems? Do they "have" diseases or conditions that the labels correctly name?
Or are they "doing" extremely disorderly things for extremely confusing reasons? Are they living out lifestyles that God correctly names?

In other words, is the final explanation for our problems something bad happening to us? Or is it something bad about us? God's interpretation is the second one, and He gets last say. A true interpretation sees the problem of sin concretely, right in the details of people's lives and problems.

It's crucial, by the way, to understand sin accurately. Most people think that to identify something as "sin" means saying that the person consciously chose to do some bad action. The person also has the power to Just Say No.

But the Bible comes at sin from the opposite direction. We do many wrong, unloving things without even knowing what we're doing or why. Most sin is not a matter of conscious choice. The "high-handed" sins are conscious. But much of what we do, think and feel expresses that we are blind, self-deceived, metaphorically drunk or sleepwalking, calloused, acting like brute beasts, walking in the dark. So we do not have the power to Just Say No.

That's why we need a Savior from ourselves. Sin actually tends to make us more unconscious ("blind") and more compulsive ("enslaved"). I am what I am, and do what I do, even if it's self-destructive and destroys my relationships.

Furthermore, sin is an interpersonal offense and insult — to God first. He calls us to love him utterly ... but we are self-preoccupied in a thousand ways. Most people view "sin" as an item from a select list of heinous behaviors that hurt others. God sees much further. I can't accurately see myself until God makes me self-aware of what I look like to Him.

And, still further, grace targets sin. Jesus comes for sin. Mercy and compassion are given for sin. Forgiveness buries sin.

Most people think that the word "sin" only implies judgment, condemnation, self-righteousness and moral exhortations to try harder. That's the obvious thing to think. But God is not so obvious. He forgives people who are not righteous, and self-righteousness is a heinous sin. Christ does what none of us can do. Jesus' blood and righteousness and resurrection set us free from sin's guilt and punishment. Christ's Spirit progressively frees us from sin's power. The Lord's return will free us from sin's presence. God directly applies His mercy and power, changing us into the image of His glory.

We're objecting to the misinterpretations placed on troubled and troublesome lifestyles. We aren't denying the trouble. Jesus came for the trouble.

2. Quasi-medical labels are mislabels

Think a bit more about those verbs "suffers from," "has," "is" and "has a case of." We use these passive verbs to describe our experience of a true medical problem. You suffer from cancer or have a broken leg. You are a diabetic or have a case of hives. None of these true medical conditions describes your behavior, your motives, your lifestyle. They describe something bad that's happening to you.

Of course, your lifestyle and choices can affect whether or not you develop a medical problem. Smoking might cause lung cancer. Dirt-bike racing might cause a broken leg. But smoking cigarettes and riding dirt bikes are things you do — just like drinking too much, or worrying what people think, or obsessing in front of the mirror. I hope we'd never say, "He has a bad case of dirt-bike syndrome, and suffers from a smoking disorder"!

Notice that the descriptions of our four troubled friends consistently portray what they do, how they think, how they react emotionally, how they treat other people. Lise broods relentlessly on her failings, and is so preoccupied that she's inattentive to her daughter. Chandra worries that she'll be rejected, and hides from people. And each of them lives as if God were a non-factor.

The truth is that they do their lives; they don't suffer from their syndromes. By definition, a human being is an "active verb," not a passive verb. We want and fear, love and believe, do and say, act and react. You don't "have a case of" the way you do life.

3. What people do affects relationships.

Notice that in each of the four stories, what a person does affects other people. Our four friends do not have private pathologies. They are not the only ones suffering; their closest relationships suffer as well. Other people worry about them, or feel hurt by them, or get angry at them.

This is because outbursts of anger, drunkenness, extreme dieting, relentless self-recrimination, escapism, instability, and social anxiety intrinsically threaten relationships. By definition, doing such things isolates you from God and people. You can't live this way and at the same time trust God and love people. These are four different ways of being devoutly self-absorbed. It's significant that friends and family sense this. They're troubled by the distance and relationship breakdown caused by self-preoccupation. They have good reasons for their concern.

Consider the contrast between this and a purely medical problem. Friends and family will be deeply concerned for you if you have a broken leg or suffer from cancer. But trauma or illness don't automatically separate people and jeopardize relationships. In fact, usually sickness provides a context in which people come together and feel closer. Friends and family rally to support you. You appreciate the love and concern they show. Medical problems often draw people together in love and appreciation.

Your kith and kin will be concerned for you when you're sick. They want your body to get well. But they'll be concerned about you when you're devoutly self-absorbed. They want you to become a different kind of person. That's one more evidence that the deepest problem for all four is some form of sin.

Again, remember some things we mentioned earlier. "Sin" doesn't always mean consciously chosen badness. Most sins express how what I love has become disordered and dictatorial. When my core love turns away from God, I blindly attach myself to something else — anything else. I then live out the implications by making selfish choices.

And to name your problem as "sin" does not mean that others should scold, moralize or condemn you, or that you should beat yourself up with self-recrimination and trying harder. Jesus Christ comes "so that we may receive mercy and grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16). Mercy and helpfulness specifically target sin. So identifying how sin operates opens a wide door to God's mercy, patience and power. God's mercy restores all the relationships that sin threatens, reconciling us to God and equipping us to reconcile with people.

4. Quasi-medical labels artificially separate people

As we've seen, lifestyle problems harm relationships. But harm can come from the other direction, too. To put a diagnostic label on a person harms your relationship with that person. It creates artificial distance. We should be able to identify with each other, but if I think that you are sick and I am well, I artificially divide us.

A true medical problem creates an objective experiential distance between people. Let's say I get in a car accident and suffer a broken leg. My doctor and my friends do not have broken legs. I hurt a lot and need crutches. They feel perfectly fine and walk normally. Their experience and mine are fundamentally different. I am not well. They are well. I definitely need their help. They can help me precisely because they are not all laid up with broken legs!

But if you use quasi-medical labels for what I do, think and feel, it creates artificial distance between us. If I struggle with anxiety or irritation or escapism ... well, so do you. So does everybody. But if you label my struggle as a "disorder," then that means you are normal, but I am sick. That's an artificial distance, because none of us gets anger, fear and pleasure-seeking exactly right.

I might be having a much bigger problem than you. But our actual differences are matters of degree. I may be stuck and blind, while you've grown wise in an area of life. That matters for your ability to help me. But at the most basic level of human experience, you know that you and I have the same general tendencies and temptations. We come in very different flavors and intensities, but we are more alike than different. Our underlying commonality is fundamental. That's why you see so much of yourself in Garrett and Lise and the others.

You can help people precisely because you do have first-hand understanding of the basic human struggles: "There is no temptation that overtakes you that is not common to all" (1 Corinthians 10:13). You can help people precisely because you do know the grace of God at work in you, and that's exactly what others need: "God comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction" (2 Corinthians 1:4). Because we are in it together we can help each other.

Medical doctors don't ever need to have the same problems as their patients. But brothers and sisters always have the same kinds of problems as their fellow strugglers. Therefore we share the same essential cure, which always involves some form of faith working through love, by the grace of God in Christ. There's no artificial distance, because we have a real commonality.

5. How do we weigh the various contributory "factors"?

I've focused on the heart, the gospel and our identification with each other. But how should we weigh all the other variables that affect us? No one disagrees that genetics might contribute a "tendency," and that the social environment abounds with "triggers." Countless factors "influence" us.

But what is the final cause of how you live? Of course, you are your final cause. That said, let's look briefly at the many contributing factors.

What goes on in your body has an influence. When you experience allergies or sleepless nights, premenstrual hormones or chronic pain, Asperger's or Alzheimer's, your mood, thinking and actions are affected. You're tempted in different ways than when you feel fine.

Similarly, it's obvious that each of us comes wired from birth with a different temperament. Some people are more prone to anger, others to anxiety, others to getting discouraged, others to pleasure-addictions, and so forth. Our bodies affect us in many ways. It's likely that Lise's post-partum hormones color her moods.

But does the body give the decisive, underlying explanation for their personal problems? No; no more than it gives the decisive explanation for their good and loving choices. The body is a contributory factor, an influence. It's not the final cause of either your faith or your idolatry, your kindness or your selfishness.

What the people around you do also has an influence on you. Like "nature," "nurture" plays a role. Every one of us lives in a world filled with competing values, a variety of hardships and many enticements. You implicitly absorb the categories of thought provided by your native language, and the values of your native culture.

For example, Sarah lives in a society that glamorizes unreally thin women. Garrett's father was a poor role-model for how to handle frustration, and his bad example "discipled" his son into temper and drinking. We live in a world where betrayals of trust occur. Chandra lives among a group of peers who might (and have) hurt her.

But do those experiences provide the decisive explanation for their struggles? No. These are significant and impacting, but not determinative. Your surrounding environment influences you in countless ways, but it never determines whether your life orients in the direction of Christ or twists in on yourself.

In fact, countless factors "influence" you. Weather and seasons? You may feel gloomier during three cloudy weeks in January than you do during three bright weeks in July. The project due next week in school or on your job? The current state of your personal finances? World politics before and after 9/11? Immediate traffic conditions and whether you'll be late? What's on TV tonight? Whether your football team is winning or losing?

Any of these can affect you. But does any one decisively determine how you will react?

No. You are always in the mix.

In fact, the Bible teaches that God actually arranges the stage on which you live. He is the Lord of history, including your local time and place, and your personal history. Your particular matrix of influences provides the context in which your faith (or your self-will) plays out, in which He meets you (or you shirk Him).

This awareness frees you. You can seek to understand any contributory influence as just that, as a factor and not the cause. You won't grant them too much credit, morphing them into root causes and excuses for your sins. But you also won't dismiss them as irrelevant, ignoring the actual situations and difficulties in which you need practical wisdom and practical mercies.

How you live comes out of your heart. "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life" (Proverbs 4:23). The heart is you, not something that happens to you. Jesus says that when wrong actions appear, that wrong comes "from within, out of the heart of man" (Mark 7:21). Something about who you are and what you live for sets your trajectory in life and shapes every choice.

Deep down, everyone knows this is true.

That's why every sort of treatment or therapy involves taking some responsibility for your life. It's odd, when you think about it. According to the therapeutic outlook, you have no real responsibility for causing your problems. Your syndrome, disorder or disease was caused by genetics, hormones or how people treated you. But you are given final responsibility for solving what's wrong. You can get a grip; you can make better choices; you can choose to heal; you can change your self-talk.

Here's the logic: "You are definitely NOT a sinner. But you definitely ARE your savior."

God sees things the other way around. You definitely ARE a sinner, and you are definitely NOT your Savior.

When this merciful Father gets a grip on you, you take hold of Him. As the patient Spirit changes you, He enables you to make more loving choices. Because the good Shepherd restores your soul, you flourish. This most personal God teaches you how to talk with Him, so you stop talking to yourself so much.

We're tangled up, and we also live in tangled bodies amid a tangled world. C. S. Lewis vividly captured the profoundly humbling self-awareness this reality creates:

Man's love for God must always be very largely, and must often be entirely, a Need-love. This is obvious where we implore forgiveness for our sins or support in our tribulations. But in the long run it is perhaps even more apparent in our growing — for it ought to be growing — awareness that our whole being by its very nature is one vast need; incomplete, preparatory, empty yet cluttered, crying out for Him who can untie things that are now knotted together and tie up things that are still dangling loose. (The Four Loves, chapter 1)

Many things will influence you. The whole world is knotted up and dangling loose. But you are still your biggest problem. You need what God alone can give. It's no accident that Jesus begins here: "The poor in spirit are blessed" (Matt. 5:3). It's no accident that Paul heard God address his fundamental human weakness: "My grace is sufficient for you, because power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Cor. 12:9). It's no accident that most of the psalms cry for help. It's no accident that Jesus is who He is, and does what he does. It's no accident that God freely gives what you most need — the mercy to change your relationship with Him, and the power to change you.

Coming home to sanity

When we see how deeply the "madness in our hearts" (Ecclesiastes 9:3) infects us and our friends, then we see how deeply the love of God in Christ applies to our deepest problems. The real Psalm 23 and all the rest of God's wisdom lead us home.

Jesus Christ actually lived and died to rescue us. He now lives specifically to rewire our core insanity and to overcome our inevitable isolation. Best of all, His answer to self-absorption is not just a bunch of great ideas. The Lamb of God is a real person. The Shepherd calls you into a talking, listening, long-term, committed relationship. He's good, and good for you.

Supralapsarianism & Infralapsarianism by Herman Bavinck

2008-12-15T08:00:00.000-05:00

Below is an article by Herman Bavinck. Click here to view the article's source.

Herman Bavinck

C. The supralapsarian and infralapsarian interpretation of the decree:

(1) Points of agreement. Both agree:
(a) That God is not the Author of sin (supra as well as infra).
(b) That Scripture (not philosophy) is the only source of our knowledge of God's decree (supra as well as infra).
(c) That man's fall and punishment is not merely the object of God's foreknowledge but of his decree and foreordination (infra as well as supra).
(d) That faith is not the cause of the decree of election, neither sin the cause of the decree of reprobation (infra as well as supra).

(2) Points of disagreement:
(a) In general, supralapsarianism places the decree of predestination proper above (supra) the decree to permit the fall (lapsus); while infralapsarianism places the decree of predestination proper below (infra) the decree to permit the fall (lapsus). Hence:
Supralapsarianism:
predestination
fall
Infralapsarianism:
fall
predestination
(b) From this general differentiation it becomes clear that supra and infra differ in regard to their presentation of the order in the elements of God's plan. The logical order according to supra:
1. a decree determining the purpose of all things, namely, the revelation of God's virtues; specifically, the revelation of his mercy in the salvation of a definite number of possible men; and the revelation of his justice in the perdition of another definite number of possible men
2. a decree to create the men thus elected and reprobated.
3. a decree to permit them to fall.
4. a decree to provide a Mediator for the elect and through him to justify them, and to condemn the reprobate.
The logical order according to infra:
1. a decree to create man in holiness and blessedness.
2. a decree to permit man to fall.
3. a decree to elect some out of this fallen multitude and to leave others in their misery.
4. a decree to bring about the salvation of the elect through Christ. See II, F.
(c) From this again it is apparent that according to supra men viewed as possible or creatable and fallible are the objects of the decree; while, according to infra men viewed as fallen are objects of the decree.
(3) Objections:
(a) To infra:
1. God's justice does not explain the decree of reprobation. The ultimate ground of reprobation is God's sovereign will.
2. In order to maintain reprobation as an act of God's JUSTICE infra places reprobation after the FALL as if in the decree of reprobation God figured only with ORIGINAL sin and not also with ACTUAL sins.
(b) To supra:
1. Supra is correct when it maintains that God's glory is the final goal of all God's works, but the manner in which that goal will be realized is not thereby given; it is incorrect to say that in the eternal perdition of the reprobate God reveals his justice only and that in the eternal salvation of the elect he reveals his mercy exclusively.
2. According to supra the decree of predestination has for its object possible men and a possible Redeemer; but just how are we to conceive of a decree concerning possible men whose actual future existence has not even been determined? 3. Supra makes the damnation of the reprobate the object of the divine will IN THE SAME SENSE as the salvation of the elect. This position is not sustained by Scripture.
(c) To both infra and supra:
1. It is incorrect to define the final goal of all things as the revelation of God's mercy in the elect and of his justice in the reprobate.
2. It is incorrect to represent the lost condition of the reprobate in hell as an object of predestination.
3. Predestination unto eternal death should not be coordinated with predestination unto eternal life, for while certain Individuals constitute the object of reprobation, the human race under a new Head, even Christ, is the object of election.
4. Both supra and infra err when they regard the various elements of God's counsel as subordinately related to each other.
5. Both are one-sided: supra emphasizing God's sovereignty; Infra, God's righteousness, holiness, and mercy.
(4) The author's conclusion in regard to the whole matter: “God's decree should not be exclusively described . . . as a straight line to indicate a relation merely of before and after, cause and effect, means and goal; but it should also be viewed as a system the several elements of which are coordinately related to one another. . . . As in an organism all the members are dependent upon one another and in a reciprocal manner determine one another, so also the universe is God's work of art, the several parts of which are organically related.”

The word “predestination,” has been used in more than one sense: it has been given a broad and a narrow meaning. According to Pelagianism it is merely the decree whereby God, on the ground of foreseen faith and perseverance on the part of some, and foreseen sin and unbelief on the part of others, has determined to give to the former eternal salvation and to the latter eternal punishment. According to this conception, creation, the fall, Christ, the proclamation of the Gospel and the offering of grace to all, persevering faith and unbelief precede predestination and are not included in it but excluded from it; the decree of predestination is no more than the assignment to eternal life or eternal punishment. In this way the most restricted meaning is given to the word predestination, which is then made entirely dependent upon “the bare foreknowledge of God,” is a matter of uncertainty, and is not worthy of the name predestination. In that case not God but man is the maker of history and the arbiter of its destiny. This error has been sufficiently refuted in the former paragraph. The important difference between infra- and supralapsarianism. however, must be given more detailed discussion. At bottom this difference consists in a broader or a more restricted definition of the concept “predestination.” Augustine accepted a twofold restriction of this concept: in his system the decree of predestination follows that concerning creation and the fall, and he generally used the term “predestination” in the favorable sense, as a synonym for “election,” while he gave the preference to the term “foreknowledge” to indicate reprobation: predestination, then, is what God does, namely that which is good; while “foreknowledge” refers to what man does, namely evil. In general, scholasticism, Roman Catholicism, and Lutheranism, accepted this interpretation of the term predestination. Also in the writings of Reformed infralapsarian theologians the decree of creation and of the fall precedes that of election and of reprobation; but while most of them were willing to look upon reprobation as a part of predestination — just so the decree of predestination follows that of the fall — and to speak of a twin or double predestination, others considered it better to conceive of predestination as a synonym for election, and to discuss reprobation separately and under a different name. Now, if the term “foreknowledge” is not used in a Pelagian sense, and if the decree of reprobation is not withdrawn from the province of the will of God, as was done by later Roman Catholic and Lutheran theologians, the difference is not essential but merely verbal. But it. is characteristic of infralapsarianism that, in the decree, creation and the fall precede election and reprobation; while supralapsarianism's concept of predestination is broad enough to include creation and the fall, which are then looked upon as means to an end: the eternal destiny of rational creatures. In the Reformed Church and in Reformed theology equal recognition has always been given to both supra- and infralapsarianism, viewed as interpretations of the decree of predestination. To be sure, the Dutch confessional standards are infralapsarian; nevertheless, no ecclesiastical assembly, not even the Synod of Dort, has ever troubled the supralapsarians. The Lambeth articles of Confession, purposely leave the question unanswered. Reformed theologians have always granted charter privileges to both conceptions. Spanheim used to say that in the cathedra he was supra, but when he was teaching his congregation he was infra. On the one hand, supralapsarians as well as infralapsarians teach that God is not the Author of sin, but that the cause of sin lies in the will of man. Though, as the Omnipotent One. God predestined the fall, and though, as Supreme Ruler, he executes his plan even by means of sin; nevertheless, he remains holy and righteous; of his own accord man falls and sins: the guilt is his alone. “Man falls according to the appointment of divine providence, but he falls by his own fault.” Also, the supralapsarians did not arrive at their conception by means of philosophical speculation, but they presented their view because they considered it to come closer to the teaching of Scripture. just as Augustine arrived at the doctrine of predestination through his study of Paul, so Calvin became convinced of the truth of supralapsarianism by means of his reflection on the Scriptural doctrine of sin. According to his own statement he was not giving a philosophy but the truth of God's Word. On the other hand, Reformed infralapsarian theologians are fully agreed that man's fall, sin, and the eternal punishment of many was not the object of “bare foreknowledge” but of God's decree and foreordination. Hence, the difference does not concern the content of God's counsel. Both infra- and supralapsarianism deny the freedom of the will, reject the idea that faith is the cause of election and that sin is the cause of reprobation, and thus oppose Pelagianism; both in the final analysis pay homage to God's sovereignty. The difference concerns only the order of the decrees. Infralapsarians prefer the historical, causal order; supralapsarians defend the ideal, teleological order. The former give a more limited meaning to the concept predestination, and exclude from it a preceding creation, fall, and providence; the latter subsume all the other decrees under predestination. The former emphasizes the manyness, the latter the oneness, of the decree. With the former each of the several decrees has significance by itself; with the latter all the preceding decrees are subordinate to the final decree.

The problem is not solved by means of an appeal to Scripture. Whereas infralapsarianism is supported by all those passages in which election and reprobation have reference to a fallen universe, and are represented as deeds of mercy and of justice, Deut. 7:6-8; Matt. 12:25, 26; John 15:19; Rom. 9:15, 16; Eph. 1:4-12; II Tim. 1:9; supralapsarianism seeks its strength in all those texts that declare God's absolute sovereignty, especially with reference to sin, Ps. 115:3; Prov. 16:4; Is. 10:15; 45:9; Jer. 18:6; Matt. 20:15; Rom. 9:17, 19-21. The fact that each of the two views leans for support on a certain group of texts without doing full justice to a different group indicates the one-sided character of both theories. Though infralapsarianism deserves praise because of its modesty — it abides by the historical, causal order — and though it seems to be less offensive and though it shows greater consideration for the demands of practical life, it fails to give satisfaction. It is just as difficult to conceive of reprobation as an act of God's justice as it is thus to conceive of election. Faith and good works, to be sure, are not the cause of election, but neither is sin the cause of reprobation; God's sovereign good pleasure is the cause of both; hence, in a certain sense, the decree of reprobation always precedes the decree to permit sin. Moreover, if in the divine conscious ness the decree of reprobation follows that to permit sin, the question cannot be suppressed, “Then why did God permit sin?” Did this permission consist in a “bare foreknowledge” and was the fall in reality a frustration of God's plan? But no Reformed theologian, even though he be an infralapsarian, can ever or may ever say this. In a certain sense he must include the fall in God's decree; he must conceive of it as having been foreordained. But why did God “by an efficacious permission” foreordain the fall? Infralapsarianism can answer this question only by referring to God's good pleasure, and then it agrees with supralapsarianism. Reprobation cannot be explained as an act of God's justice, for the first sinful deed at any rate was permitted by God's sovereignty. Reasoning backward, infralapsarianism finally arrives at the position of supralapsarianism; in case it should be unwilling to admit this, it would have to resort to foreknowledge. Add to all this the fact that infra places the decree of reprobation after the fall, but just where? Is original sin the only sin that is taken into account by the decree of reprobation, and in making this dreadful decree does God leave actual sins entirely out of consideration? If, as infra insists, reprobation must be referred to God's justice, then instead of placing this decree immediately after the entrance of original sin, why not place it after the complete accomplishment — respectively by each reprobate person — of all actual sins? This is exactly what was done by Arminius — who also included the sin of foreseen unbelief — but such a procedure would never do on the part of a Reformed theologian. Reprobation would then become dependent upon bare foreknowledge, i.e., upon man; man's sinful deeds would then become the final and deepest cause of reprobation; hence, in order to avoid this error the decree of reprobation was placed immediately after the fall. But by doing this infra becomes supralapsarian with respect to all actual sins: reprobation does not precede original sin, but it does precede all other sin. At first glance infralapsarianism seems to be more moderate and less offensive than supralapsarianism, but deeper study reveals the fact that appearances deceive.

Accordingly, supralapsarianism undoubtedly has in its favor the fact that it refrains from every attempt to justify God, and that both with respect to reprobation and with respect to election it rests in God's sovereign, incomprehensible, yet wise and holy good pleasure. Nevertheless, it is at least just as unsatisfactory as is infralapsarianism, and perhaps even more so. It wishes to pass for a solution, but in no sense whatever does it give a solution of even a single problem. In the first place, to say that the manifestation of all God's excellencies is the final goal of all of the ways of God is indeed correct; but when supra includes in that goal the manner in which the divine glory will be revealed in the eternal destiny of rational creatures, it errs. For, the eternal state of salvation or of perdition is not in itself the goal, but one of the means employed in order to reveal God's excellencies in a manner suited to the creature. It would not do to say that God would have been unable to manifest his glory by saving all men, if this had been his pleasure. Neither is it correct to say that in the eternal state of the reprobate God reveals his justice exclusively, and that in the eternal state of the elect he manifests his mercy exclusively. Also in the church, purchased with the blood of the Son, God's justice is revealed; and also in the place of perdition there are degrees of punishment and sparks of divine mercy. The final goal of all God's work's must needs be his glory, but the manner in which that glory will shine forth is not thereby given, but has been determined by God's will; and although there were wise and holy reasons why God purposed the perdition of many and not the salvation of all, nevertheless these reasons, though known to him, are not known to us: we are not able to say why God willed to make use of this means and not of another. A further objection to supralapsarianism is the fact that according to this view the objects of the decree of election and reprobation are men considered merely as possibilities and — as Comrie added — a Christ viewed as a mere possibility. To be sure by some this element has been eliminated from the supralapsarian scheme. But the principle which gave rise to this error still remains. Logic requires that a possible Christ should be added to possible men as the object of election, for in the decree of election the church and its Head, i.e., the saved and the Savior cannot be separated.

But even aside from this, the decree of election and reprobation which has for Its object “creatable and fallible men” is not the real, but merely a tentative decree. In the end supralapsarianism is forced to proceed to the infralapsarian order in the elements of the decree. For, following the decree concerning the election and reprobation of these possible men comes the decree to create them and to permit them to fall, and this must be succeeded by another decree respecting these men, who are now no longer viewed as mere possibilities but as realities — even in the decree — viz., to elect some and to reprobate others. The logic of the supralapsarian scheme is very weak, indeed. Supralapsarianism really differs from infralapsarianism only in this respect, viz., that after the manner of Amyraldism, it prefixes a decree concerning possibilities to the infralapsarian series of decrees. But just how are we to conceive of a decree respecting possible men, whose actual future existence has as yet not been determined? In the consciousness of God there is an infinite number of “possible men,” who will never live. Hence, the decree of election and reprobation has for its object “nonentities,” not definite persons known to God by name. Finally, there is this difficulty connected with supra, viz., that it makes the eternal punishment of the reprobates an object of the divine will in the same manner and in the same sense as the eternal salvation of the elect; and that it makes sin, which leads to eternal destruction, a means in the same manner and in the same sense as the redemption in Christ is a means unto eternal salvation.

Now Reformed theologians all agree that the entrance of sin and punishment was willed and determined by God. It is perfectly true that words like “permission” and “foreknowledge” do not solve anything. The difficulty remains the same, and the same questions arise; viz., why, if God foreknew everything, did he create man fallible, and why did he not prevent the fall? Why did he allow all men to fall in Adam? Why does he not grant to all men faith and the blessing of hearing the Gospel? In brief, if God foreknows and permits something, he does this either “willingly” or “unwillingly.” The latter is impossible. Accordingly. only the former remains: God's permission is an “efficacious permission,” an act of his will. Nor should it be supposed that the idea of permission is of any force or value over against the charge that God is the Author of sin; for he who permits or allows someone to sin and to perish in his sin although he was able to prevent him from sinning is just as guilty as he who incites someone to sin. On the other hand, however, all agree that although sin is not “excluded” from the will of God it is, nevertheless, “contrary” to his will; that it is not merely a means to the final goal, but a disturbance in God's creation; and that Adam's fall was not a step ahead but a fall in the real sense of the word. It is also a fact that admits of no doubt that, however much logical reasoning may demur, no one is able to suggest other and better words than “permission, foreknowledge, preterition, dereliction,” etc. Even the most outspoken supralapsarian is not able to dispense with these words, neither in the pulpit nor in the cathedra. For, although it be admitted that there is a “predestination unto death,” no Reformed theologian has ever dared to speak of a “predestination unto sin.” Without any exception all (i.e., Zwingli, Calvin, Beza, Zanchius, Gomarus, Comrie, etc.) have rejected the idea that God is the Author of sin, that man was created unto damnation, that reprobation is the “cause” of sin, and that sin is the “efficient cause” of reprobation; and all have maintained, that the inexorable character of God's justice is manifest in the decree of reprobation, that reprobation is the “accidental cause” of sin, and that sin is the “sufficient cause” of reprobation, etc. Accordingly and happily, supralapsarianism is always inconsistent: it begins by making a daring leap, but it soon retreats and returns to the previously abandoned position of infralapsarianism. This is very evident from the works of supralapsarians. Nearly all of them hesitate to place the decree of reprobation in its entirety and without any restriction before the decree to permit sin. The Thomists differentiated between a “negative and a positive reprobation”; the former was made to precede creation and fall, the latter was made to follow them. This same distinction, be it in a modified form, recurs in the works of Reformed theologians. Not only do all admit that reprobation should be distinguished from condemnation, which is the execution of that decree, takes place in time, and has sin for its cause; but in the decree of reprobation itself many differentiate between a preceding, general purpose of God to reveal his excellencies, especially his mercy and justice, in certain “creatable and fallible men”; and a subsequent, definite purpose to create these “possible men,” to permit them to fall and to sin, and to punish them for their sins.

Accordingly, neither supra- nor infralapsarianism has succeeded in its attempt to solve this problem and to do justice to the many-sidedness of Scripture. To a certain extent this failure is due to the one-sidedness that characterizes both views. In the first place it is incorrect, as we stated before, to define the “final goal” of all things as the revelation of God's mercy in the elect, and of his justice in the reprobate. God's glory and the manifestation of his excellencies is, to be sure, the final goal of all things; but the double state of salvation and damnation is not included in that final goal, but is related to it as a means. No one is able to prove that this double state must of necessity constitute an element in the final goal of God's glory. In all his “outgoing works” God always has in view his own glory; but that he seeks to establish this glory in this and in no other way is to be ascribed to his sovereignty and to nothing else. But even aside from this, it is not true that God manifests his justice only in the damnation of the reprobate, and his mercy only in the salvation of the elect, for also in heaven God's justice and holiness shines forth, and also in hell there is a remnant of his mercy and compassion. Secondly, it is incorrect to represent the lost condition of the reprobate in hell as an object of predestination. To be sure, sin should not be referred to “bare foreknowledge and permission”; in a certain sense, the fall, sin, and eternal punishment are included in God's decree and willed by him. But this is true in a certain sense only, and not in the same sense as grace and salvation. These are the objects of his delight; but God does not delight in sin, neither has he pleasure in punishment. When he makes sin subservient to his glory, he does this by means of the exercise of his omnipotence, but to glorify God is contrary to sin's nature. And when he punishes the wicked, he does not take delight in their sufferings as such, but in this punishment he celebrates, the triumph of his virtues, Deut. 28:63; Ps. 2:4; Prov. 1:26; Lam. 3:33. Accordingly, though on the one hand, with a view to the all-comprehensive and immutable character of God's counsel, it is not wrong to speak of a “twofold predestination” (gemina praedestinatio); nevertheless, on the other hand, we must be careful to keep in mind that in the one case predestination is of a different nature than in the other. “Predestination is the disposition, goal and ordination of the means with a view to a goal. Since eternal damnation is not the goal but merely the termination of a person's life, therefore reprobation cannot properly be classified under predestination. For these two things are in conflict with each other: to ordain unto a goal and to ordain unto damnation. For by reason of its very nature, every goal is the very best something, the perfection of an object; damnation, however, is the extreme evil and the greatest imperfection; hence the expression `God has predestinated some men unto damnation' is incorrect.” Hence, no matter how often and clearly Scripture tells us that sin and punishment were ordained by God, nevertheless, the words “purpose” (prothesis), “foreknowledge” (prognosis) and “foreordination” (proorismos) are used almost exclusively with reference to “predestination unto glory.” In the third place, there is still another ground for the assertion that those err who coordinate “predestination unto eternal death” with “predestination unto eternal life,” and view the former as a goal in the same sense as the latter; while it is true that certain individuals constitute the object of reprobation, the human race under a new Head, namely Christ, is the object of election; hence, by grace not only certain individuals are saved, but the human race itself together with the entire cosmos is saved. Moreover, we are not to suppose that merely a few of God's virtues are revealed in this salvation of the human race and of the universe, so that in order to reveal God's justice the state of eternal perdition must needs be called into being; on the contrary, in the consummated Kingdom of God all of God's virtues and excellencies are unfolded: his justice and his grace, his holiness and his love, his sovereignty and his mercy. Hence, this “state of glory” is the real and direct end of creation, though even this goal is subordinate to the exaltation of God. In the fourth place, both supra and infra err when they regard the various elements of the decree as standing in subordinate relation to each other. Now it is true, of course, that the means are subordinate to the final end in view, but from this it does not follow that they are subordinate to one another. Creation is not a mere means toward the fall, neither is the fall a mere means toward grace and perseverance, nor are these in turn merely means toward salvation and perdition. We should never lose sight of the fact that the decrees are as rich in content as the entire history of the universe, for the latter is the unfoldment of the former. The history of the universe can never be made to fit into a little scheme of logic. It is entirely incorrect to suppose that of the series: creation, fall, sin, Christ, faith, unbelief, etc., each constituent is merely a means toward the attainment of the next, which as soon as it is present renders the former useless. As Twissus already remarked, “The different elements of the decree do not stand to one another in a relation merely of subordination, but they are also coordinately related.” It is certainly wrong to suppose that the sole purpose of creation was to produce the fall; on the contrary, by means of God's creative activity a universe that will remain even in the state of glory was called into being. The fall took place not only in order that there might be a “creature in the condition of misery,” but together with all its consequences it will retain its significance. Christ not merely became a Mediator, which would have been all that was necessary for the expiation of sin, but he was also ordained by God to be the Head of the church. The history of the universe is not a mere means which loses its value as soon as the end of the age is reached, but it has influence and leaves fruits, for eternity. Moreover, here on earth we should not conceive of election and reprobation as two straight and parallel lines; on the contrary, in the unbeliever there is much that is not the result of reprobation, and in the believer there is much that should not be ascribed to election. On the one hand, both election and reprobation presuppose sin, and are deeds of mercy and of justice, Rom. 9:15; Eph. 1:4; on the other hand both are also deeds of divine right and sovereignty, Rom. 9:11, 17, 21. So, Adam even before the fall is a type of Christ, I Cor. 15:47ff.; nevertheless, in Scripture the fact of the incarnation always rests upon the fall of the human race, Heb. 2:14ff. At times Scripture expresses itself so strongly that reprobation and election are coordinated, and God is represented as having purposed eternal perdition as well as eternal salvation, Luke 2:34; John 3:19-21; I Pet. 2:7, 8; Rom. 9:17, 18, 22, etc.; but in other passages eternal death is entirely absent in the description of the future; the victorious consummation of the kingdom of God, the new heaven and earth, the new Jerusalem in which God will be all and in all is pictured to us as the end of all things, I Cor. 15; Rev. 21, 22; the universe is represented as existing for the church, and the church for Christ, I Cor. 3 :21-23; and reprobation is completely subordinated to election.

Accordingly, neither the supra- nor the infralapsarian view of predestination is able to do full justice to the truth of Scripture, and to satisfy our theological thinking. The true element in supralapsarianism is: that it emphasizes the unity of the divine decree and the fact that God had one final aim in view, that sin's entrance into the universe was not something unexpected and unlooked for by God but that he willed sin in a certain sense, and that the work of creation was immediately adapted to God's redemptive activity so that even before the fall, i.e., in the creation of Adam, Christ's coming was definitely fixed. And the true element in infralapsarianism is: that the decrees manifest not only a unity but also a diversity (with a view to their several objects), that these decrees reveal not only a teleological but also a causal order, that creation and fall cannot merely be regarded as means to an end, and that sin should be regarded not as an element of progress but rather as an element of disturbance in the universe so that in and by itself it cannot have been willed by God. In general, the formulation of the final goal of all things in such a manner that God reveals his justice in the reprobate and his mercy in the elect is too simple and incomplete. The “state of glory” will be rich and glorious beyond all description. We expect a new heaven, a new earth, a new humanity, a renewed universe, a constantly progressing and undisturbed unfoldment. Creation and the fall, Adam and Christ, nature and grace, faith and unbelief, election and reprobation — all together and each in its own way — are so many factors, acting not only subsequently to but also in coordination with one another, collaborating with a view to that exalted state of glory. Indeed, even the universe as it now exists together with its history, constitutes a continuous revelation of God's virtues. It is not only a means toward a higher and richer revelation that is still future, but it has value in itself. It will continue to exert its influence also in the coming dispensation, and it will continue to furnish material for the exaltation and glorification of God by a redeemed humanity. Accordingly, between the different elements of the decree — as also between the facts of the history of the universe — there is not only a causal and teleological but also an organic relation. Because of the limited character of our reasoning powers we must needs proceed from the one or from the other viewpoint; hence, the advocates of a causal world and life-view and the defenders of a teleological philosophy are engaged in continual warfare. But this disharmony does not exist in the mind of God. He sees the whole, and surveys all things in their relations. All things are eternally present in his consciousness. His decree is a unity: it is a single conception. And in that decree all the different elements assume the same relation which a posteriori we even now observe between the facts of history, and which will become fully disclosed in the future. This relation is so involved and complicated that neither the adjective “supralapsarian” nor “infralapsarian” nor any other term is able to express it. It is both causal and teleological: that which precedes exerts its influence upon that which follows, and that which is still future already determines the past and the present. There is a rich, all-sided “reciprocity.” Predestination, in the generally accepted sense of that term: the foreordination of the eternal state of rational creatures and of all the means necessary to that end, is not the sole, all-inclusive and all-comprehensive, purpose of God. It is a very important part of God's decree but it is not synonymous with the decree. God's decree or counsel is the main concept because it is all-comprehensive; it embraces all things without any exception: heaven and earth, spirit and matter, visible and invisible things, organic and inorganic creatures; it is the single will of God concerning the entire universe with reference to the past, the present, and the future. But predestination concerns the eternal state of rational creatures, and the means thereto: but not all things that ever come into being nor all events that ever happen can be included in these means. Hence, in a previous paragraph we discussed “providence” as a thing by itself, although the relation between it and predestination was clearly shown. In the doctrine of God's decree common grace should receive a much more detailed discussion than was formerly the case, and should be recognized in its own rights. Briefly stated, God's decree together with the history of the universe which answers to it should not be exclusively described — after the manner of infra- and supralapsarianism — as a straight line indicating a relation merely of before and after, cause and effect, means and goal; but it should also be viewed as a system the several elements of which are coordinately related to one another and cooperate with one another toward that goal which always was and is and will be the deepest ground of all existence, namely, the glorification of God. As in an organism all the members are dependent upon one another and in a reciprocal manner determine one another, so also the universe is God's work of art, the several parts of which are organically related. And of that universe, considered in its length and breadth, the counsel or decree of God is the eternal idea.

Author

Born on December 13, 1854, in Hoogeveen, Drenthe, Holland, Herman Bavinck was the son of the Reverend Jan Bavinck, a leading figure in the secession from the State Church of the Netherlands in 1834. After theological study in Kampen, and at the University of Leiden, he graduated in 1880, and served as the minister of the congregation at Franeker, Friesland, for a year. According to his biographers, large crowds gathered to hear his outstanding exposition of the Scriptures.

In 1882, he was appointed a Professor of theology at Kampen, and taught there from 1883 until his appointment, in 1902, to the chair of systematic Theology in the Free University of Amsterdam, where he succeeded the great Abraham Kuyper, then recently appointed Prime Minister of the Netherlands. In this capacity — an appointment he had twice before declined — Bavinck served until his death in 1921.

"What is a Dispensation?"

2008-10-02T14:35:00.000-04:00

The article below was taken from this site. It is actually a chapter from Ryrie's book, "Dispensationalism".

There is no more primary problem in the whole matter of dispensationalism than that of definition. By this is meant not simply arriving at a single sentence definition of the word but also formulating a definition/description of the concept. This will require an examination of the scriptural use of the word, a comparison of the word dispensation with related words such as age, a study of the use of the word in church history and some observations concerning the characteristics and number of the dispensations.

To say that there is a great lack of clear thinking on this matter of definition is an understatement. Both dispensationalists and nondispensationalists are often guilty of lack of clarity. Many from both groups are satisfied to use the well-known definition that appears in the notes of the original Scofield Reference Bible: "A dispensation is a period of time during which man is tested in respect of obedience to some specific revelation of the will of God. Seven such dispensations are distinguished in Scripture."[1] Dispensationalists use this definition without thinking further of its implications in relation to age, for instance, and without ever examining its basis or lack of basis in the scriptural revelation itself. Nondispensationalists use it as a convenient and useful scapegoat simply because it does not (and could not in two sentences) convey all that is involved in the concept of a dispensation. If this concise definition were all that Scofield had to say about dispensations, then it would be fair to concentrate an attack on it, but if he has more to say (which he does) then it is not.

The New Scofield Bible, though beginning the note on dispensations with the same sentence as the original Scofield, continues with four paragraphs of elaboration. Among other matters those added paragraphs focus on the concepts of (1) a deposit of divine revelation, (2) man's stewardship responsibility to that revelation, and (3) the time period during which a dispensation operates. Also it is made quite clear that dispensations are not separate ways of salvation; rather, there is only one way of salvation -- "by God's grace through the work of Christ . . . on the cross."[2] More recent nondispensationalists seem to prefer not to interact with this expanded definition/description in their discussions about dispensationalism.[3]

To draw an analogy in another doctrinal area, a conservative, when pressed for a concise statement of his theory of the Atonement will answer, "I believe in substitutionary atonement." This is entirely accurate and probably the best concise answer that could be given. But liberals are well known for using this simple statement as a means of ridicule, for they point out that the work of Christ cannot be confined to a single aspect like substitution. That is true, and the conservative recognizes that the entire work of Christ cannot be fully expressed by the single word substitution. Nevertheless, all the work of Christ is based on His vicarious sacrifice.

In like manner, the nondispensationalist points out some lack in the old Scofield definition and with a wave of the hand dismisses dispensationalism on the basis of the weakness of the definition! Perhaps the earlier definition does not distinguish dispensation from age, but such failure does not mean that they cannot be distinguished or that they have not been distinguished by others. And it certainly does not mean that the entire system is condemned. John Wick Bowman resorts to this stratagem when he declares, "The word translated 'dispensation' in the Greek Bible . . . never means nor does it ever have any reference to a period of time as such, as Scofield's definition demands."[4] Though the accuracy of Bowman's statement may be questioned by the references in Ephesians 1:10 and 3:9, in making such a charge against Scofield's definition, Bowman attempts to discredit the entire system.

The popularity of the Scofield Reference Bible has focused considerable attention on the definition in its notes and has made it a prime target for attack by nondispensationalists. However, scholars who are critical of dispensationalism should recognize that Scofield is not the only one who has defined the word, and, if there are lacks in his definition, they ought to recognize that his revisers and others have offered definitions that are more expanded. At any rate, any scholarly critique should certainly take into account several definitions if the system is to be represented fairly For instance, L. S. Chafer did not emphasize the time aspect of a dispensation in his concept,[5] and long ago the present writer defined a dispensation entirely in terms of economy rather than age.[6] Any critique ought to take into account such definitions as well as ScofieId's.

THE ETYMOLOGY OF THE WORD DISPENSATION

The English word dispensation is an Anglicized form of the Latin dispensatio, which the Vulgate uses to translate the Greek word. The Latin verb is a compound, meaning "to weigh out or dispense."[7] Three principal ideas are connected to the meaning of the English word: (1) "The action of dealing out or distributing"; (2) "the action of administering, ordering, or managing; the system by which things are administered"; and (3) "the action of dispensing with some requirement."[8] In further defining the use of the word theologically, the same dictionary says that a dispensation is "a stage in a progressive revelation, expressly adapted to the needs of a particular nation or period of time. . . . Also, the age or period during which a system has prevailed."[9] It is interesting to notice, in view of the usual criticism of Scofield's definition, that in this dictionary definition dispensation and age are closely related.

The Greek word oikonomia comes from the verb that means to manage, regulate, administer, and plan.[10] The word itself is a compound whose parts mean literally "to divide, apportion, administer or manage the affairs of an inhabited house." In the papyri the officer (oikonomos) who administered a dispensation was referred to as a steward or manager of an estate, or as a treasurer.[11] Thus, the central idea in the word dispensation is that of managing or administering the affairs of a household.

SCRIPTURAL USE OF THE WORD DISPENSATION

The Usage of the Word

The various forms of the word dispensation appear in the New Testament twenty times. The verb oikonomeo is used once in Luke 16:2, where it is translated "to be a steward." The noun oikonomos appears ten times (Luke 12:42; 16:1, 3, 8; Rom. 16:23; 1 Cor. 4:1, 2; Gal. 4:2; Titus 1:7; 1 Peter 4:10) and is usually translated "steward" or "manager" (but "treasurer" in Rom. 16:23). The noun oikonomia is used nine times (Luke 16:2, 3, 4; 1 Cor. 9:17; Eph. 1:10; 3:2, 9; Col. 1:25; 1 Tim. 1:4). In these instances it is translated variously ("stewardship," "dispensation," "administration," "job," "commission").

The Features Displayed

Before attempting any formal definition, it might be useful to note some of the features connected with the word itself as it appears in the New Testament. These are not necessarily features of the dispensational scheme but are simply observable connections in which the word is used. In Christ's teaching the word is confined to two parables recorded in Luke (12:42; 16:1, 3, 8). In both cases the parables concern the management of a household by a steward or manager, but the parable recorded in Luke 16 gives some important characteristics of a stewardship, or dispensational, arrangement. These characteristics include the following:

1 Basically there are two parties: the one whose authority it is to delegate duties, and the one whose responsibility it is to carry out these charges. The rich man and the steward (or manager) play these roles in the parable of Luke 16 (v. 1).

2 There are specific responsibilities. In the parable the steward failed in his known duties when he wasted the goods of his lord (v 1).

3 Accountability, as well as responsibility, is part of the arrangement. A steward may be called to account for the discharge of his stewardship at any time, for it is the owner's or master's prerogative to expect faithful obedience to the duties entrusted to the steward (v 2).

4 A change may be made at any time unfaithfulness is found in the existing administration ("can no longer be steward").

These four features give some idea of what was involved in the concept of a dispensational arrangement as the word was used in the time of Christ.

The other occurrences of the word are all in the writings of Paul except for the reference in 1 Peter 4:10. Certain features of the concept are evident from these usages.

1 God is the one to whom men are responsible in the discharge of their stewardship obligations. In three instances this relationship to God is mentioned by Paul (1 Cor. 4:1 -- 2; Titus 1:7).

2 Faithfulness is required of those to whom a dispensational responsibility is committed (1 Cor. 4:2). This is illustrated by Erastus, who held the important position of treasurer (steward) of the city (Rom. 16:23).

3 A stewardship may end at an appointed time (Gal. 4:2). In this reference the end of the stewardship came because of a different purpose being introduced. This reference also shows that a dispensation is connected with time.

4 Dispensations are connected with the mysteries of God, that is, with specific revelation from God (1 Cor. 4:1; Eph. 3:2; Col. 1:25).

5 Dispensation and age are connected ideas, but the words are nor exactly interchangeable. For instance, Paul declares that the revelation of the present dispensation was hidden "for ages," meaning simply a long period of time (Eph. 3:9). The same thing is said in Colossians 1:26. However, since a dispensation operates within a time period, the concepts are related.

6 At least three dispensations (as commonly understood in dispensational teaching) are mentioned by Paul. In Ephesians 1:10 he writes of "an administration [dispensation, KJV] suitable to the fullness of the times," which is a future period. In Ephesians 3:2 he designates the "stewardship [dispensation, KJV] of God's grace, which was the emphasis of the content of his preaching at that time. In Colossians 1:25 -- 26 it is implied that another dispensation preceded the present one, in which the mystery of Christ in the believer is revealed.

It is important to notice that in the first two of these instances there can he no question that the Bible uses the word dispensation in exactly the same way the dispensationalist does. Even Bowman admits that: "Actually, of all seven dispensations accepted by Scofield and his colleagues, there are but two (Grace and the Fullness of Time) in connection with which the word 'dispensation' is ever used at all."12 The negative cast of Bowman's statement must not obscure the importance of this point. The Bible does name two dispensations in the same way that dispensationalists do (and implies a third). Granted, it does not name seven, but, since it does name two, perhaps there is something to this teaching called dispensationalism.

Almost all opponents of dispensationalism try to make much of their claim that the Scriptures do not use the word dispensation in the same theological and technical sense that the dispensational scheme of teaching does. Two facts should be pointed out in answer to this charge. The first has already been stated in the preceding paragraph: Scripture on at least two occasions does use the word in the same way the dispensationalist does. Thus, the charge is simply not true.

Second, it is perfectly valid to take a biblical word and use it in a theological sense as long as the theological use is not unbiblical. All conservatives do this with the word atonement. It is a word that is never used in the New Testament, yet theologically all use it to stand for what is involved in the death of Christ. Biblically, the word atonement is not used in connection with the death of Christ, but, since it is used of the covering for sin in the Old Testament, it is not unbiblical to give it a theological meaning that is in reality more inclusive than its strict biblical usage. The dispensationalist does a similar thing with the word dispensation. The usage of the word and the features of the word, as outlined above, prove conclusively that the dispensationalist has in no way used the word in an unbiblical sense when he uses it as a designation for his system of teaching. Even Daniel Fuller admits this: "It is this latter sense which gives rise to the perfectly valid theological usage of the word 'dispensation' to denote a period of time during which God deals with man in a certain way."[13]

Definitions

As far as the use of the word in Scripture is concerned, a dispensation may be defined as a stewardship, administration, oversight, or management of others' property. As we have seen, this involves responsibility, accountability, and faithfulness on the part of the steward.

The theological definition of the word is based on the biblical usage and characteristics. Scofield's definition has been quoted: "A dispensation is a period of time during which man is tested in respect of obedience to some specific revelation of the will of God." As has been seen, the usual criticism leveled against this definition is that it is not true to the meaning of oikonomia since it says nothing about a stewardship but emphasizes the period of time aspect. Yet note that Fuller admits the validity of practically the same definition, namely that the word may be used "to denote a period of time during which God deals with man in a certain way "[14] However, there is a certain justification to the criticism, for a dispensation is primarily a stewardship arrangement and not a period of time (though obviously the arrangement will exist during a period of time). Age and dispensation are not synonymous in meaning, even though they may exactly coincide in the historical outworking. A dispensation is basically the arrangement involved, not the time involved; and a proper definition will take this into account. However, there is no reason for great alarm if a definition does ascribe time to a dispensation.

A concise definition of a dispensation is this: A dispensation is a distinguishable economy in the outworking of God's purpose. If one were describing a dispensation, he would include other things, such as the ideas of distinctive revelation, responsibility, testing, failure, and judgment. But at this point we are seeking a definition, not a description. In using the word economy as the core of the definition, the emphasis is put on the biblical meaning of the word itself. Economy also suggests that certain features of different dispensations might be the same or similar. Differing political and economic economies are not completely different, yet they are distinguishably different. Communistic and capitalistic economies are basically different, and yet there are functions, features, and items in these opposing economies that are the same. Likewise, in the different economies of God's running the affairs of this world certain features are similar. However, the word distinguishable in the definition points out that some features are distinctive to each dispensation and mark them off from each other as different dispensations. These are contained in the particular revelation distinctive to each dispensation.

The phrase "the outworking of God's purpose" in the definition reminds us that the viewpoint in distinguishing the dispensations is God's, not man's. The dispensations are economies instituted and brought to their purposeful conclusion by God. The distinguishing features are introduced by God; the similar features are retained by God; and the overall combined purpose of the whole program is the glory of God. Erich Sauer states it this way:

A new period always begins only when from the side of God a change is introduced in the composition of the principles valid up to that time; that is, when from the side of God three things concur:
1. A continuance of certain ordinances valid until then;
2. An annulment of other regulations until then valid;
3. A fresh introduction of new principles not before valid.[15]

To summarize: Dispensationalism views the world as a household run by God. In His householdworld God is dispensing or administering its affairs according to His own will and in various stages of revelation in the passage of time. These various stages mark off the distinguishably different economies in the outworking of His total purpose, and these different economies constitute the dispensations. The understanding of God's differing economies is essential to a proper interpretation of His revelation within those various economies.

Before leaving the subject of definitions, it may be helpful to append several other useful definitions of a dispensation. W Graham Scroggie, a noted Scottish writer and pastor, gave this helpful definition:

The word oikonomia bears one significance, and means "an administration," whether of a house, or property of a state, or a nation, or as in the present study the administration of the human race or any part of it, at any given time. Just as a parent would govern his household in different ways, according to varying necessity yet ever for one good end, so God has at different times dealt with men in different ways, according to the necessity of the case, but throughout for one great, grand end.[16]

Harry Ironside, prince of dispensational preachers, defined it this way: "An economy is an ordered condition of things. . . . There are various economies running through the Word of God. A dispensation, an economy then, is that particular order or condition of things prevailing in one special age which does not necessarily prevail in another."[17]

Clarence E. Mason, Jr., dean for many years at Philadelphia College of Bible, includes descriptive features of dispensations in his definition:

The word dispensation means literally a stewardship or administration or economy. Therefore, in its Biblical usage, a dispensation is a divinely established stewardship of a particular revelation of God's mind and will which brings added responsibility to the whole race of men or that portion of the race to whom the revelation is particularly given by God.
Associated with the revelation, on the one hand, are promises of reward or blessing for those responding to the obedience of faith, while on the other hand there are warnings of judgment upon those who do not respond in the obedience of faith to that particular revelation.
However, though the time period (age) ends, certain principles of the revelation (dispensation or stewardship) are often carried over into succeeding ages, because God's truth does not cease to be truth, and these principles become part of the cumulative body of truth for which man is responsible in the progressive unfolding revelation of God's redemptive purpose.[18]

Another definition also includes descriptive elements:

A dispensation is God's distinctive method of governing mankind or a group of men during a period of human history, marked by a crucial event, test, failure, and judgment. From the divine standpoint, it is a stewardship, a rule of life, or a responsibility for managing God's affairs in His house. From the historical standpoint, it is a stage in the progress of revelation.[19]

The differentiation of viewpoints in this definition is a helpful distinction. A dispensation is from God's viewpoint an economy; from man's, a responsibility; and in relation to progressive revelation, a stage in it.

The more recent movement that calls itself progressive dispensationalism includes some important differences from normative dispensationalIsm. Though its adherents do not wish to be restricted by a sine qua non, they acknowledge the straightforward meaning of the word; namely, "The word dispensation refers to a particular arrangement by which God regulates the way human beings relate to Him."[20] However, they distance themselves from classic dispensationalists by describing themselves as understanding "the dispensations not simply as different arrangements between God and humankind, but as successive arrangements in the progressive revelation and accomplishment of redemption."[21] These differences will be discussed in chapter 9.

THE RELATION OF THE DISPENSATIONS TO PROGRESSIVE REVELATION

Progressive revelation is the recognition that God's message to man was not given in one single act but was unfolded in a series of successive acts and through the minds and hands of many men of varying backgrounds. It is, so to speak, a theistic view of revelation rather than a deistic view. The pages of the Bible present "not the exposition of a revelation completed, but the records of a revelation in progress. Its parts and features are seen, not as arranged after their development, but as arranging themselves in the course of their development, and growing, through stages which can be marked, and by accessions which can be measured, into the perfect form which they attain at last."[22]

The principle of progressive revelation is evident in the Scriptures themselves. Paul told his audience on Mars Hill that in a former day God overlooked their ignorance, but now He commands repentance (Acts 17:30). The majestic opening of the book of Hebrews emphatically outlines the various means of progressive revelation (Heb. 1:1 -- 2). One of the most striking verses that shows the different ways of God's dealing with mankind is John 1:17: "For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ." Other examples may be found in John 14:16 -- 17; 14:26; and 16:24. God's truth was obviously not given all at one time, and the varying stages of revelation show that He has worked in different ways at different times. The Bible interpreter must observe carefully this progressiveness of revelation, and dispensationalism helps promote accuracy in this regard.

In this matter of the correct observation and interpretation of the progress of revelation we see the close connection between dispensationalism and hermeneutics. A standard text on hermeneutics, which first appeared in 1883 and which has no dispensational ax to grind, says, "With each new series of generations some new promise is given, or some great purpose of God is brought to light."[25] It is the marking off of these stages in the revelation of the purpose of God that is the basis for the dispensational approach to the interpretation of the Scriptures. Even Bernard Ramm, who later moved from a dispensational position, admitted that a clearer realization of progressive revelation has been largely due to the "beneficial influence of dispensationalism."[24]

Nondispensational interpreters (of the covenant theology school) have been guilty of reading back (and sometimes forcing) the teaching of the New Testament into the Old, especially in an effort to substantiate their doctrine of salvation in the Old Testament. Dispensationalists, on the other hand, sometimes make such hard and fast distinctions between the ages and characteristics of the various dispensations that they, for instance, have said very little about grace in the Old Testament. However, the covenant theologian's faulty interpretation is a result of a basically inherent defect in his system (because he subsumes everything since the Fall under the one covenant of grace), whereas the dispensationalist's lack is not in the system but in the expounding of it. Covenant theology allows for and even demands this reading back of the New Testament into the Old. Dispensational theology, while recognizing definite and distinguishable distinctions, asserts the basic unity of the unfolding plan of God in the Scriptures.

Nevertheless, dispensationalists have not always asserted this unity as they might have, and therefore it has become a common thing to indict dispensationalism on this matter. "Dispensationalism destroys the unity of the Bible" is the cry Because of the dispensational scheme, one writer declares, "The Bible ceases to be a selfconsistent whole."[25] "This theory," charges Louis Berkhof, "is also divisive in tendency dismembering the organism of Scripture with disastrous results."[26] More popularly this objection is expressed by the charge that dispensationalists see no value in the Sermon on the Mount or that they will not pray the Lord's prayer.[27]

An interesting historical fact: In the second edition of the Scofield Reference Bible (1917, and retained in the New Scofield, 1967) a new section entitled "A Panoramic View of the Bible" was added to "show the unity of the Book," which listed seven marks of this unity.

Even though dispensationalists may not have clearly communicated the teachings of their system along these lines, it must be remembered that the system is not at fault. Dispensationalism alone has a broad enough unifying principle to do justice to the unity of the progress of revelation on the one hand and the distinctiveness of the various stages in that progress on the other. Covenant theology can only emphasize the unity and, in so doing, overemphasizes it until it becomes the sole governing category of interpretation. Any seeming disunity in the dispensational scheme is superficial, and in reality one feels that the much publicized supposed conflicts of dispensationalism exist in the minds of the covenant theologians and are aggravated by their own unwarranted and forced unified approach to the Scriptures. Variety can be an essential part of unity. That is true of God's creation; it is also true of God's revelation; and only dispensationalism can adequately account for the variety of distinguishable economies or dispensations in (not apart from) the outworking of God's purpose.

To summarize: Progressive revelation views the Bible not as a textbook on theology but as the continually unfolding revelation of God given by various means throughout the successive ages. In this unfolding there are distinguishable stages of revelation when God introduces new things for which man becomes responsible. These stages are the economies, stewardships, or dispensations in the unfolding of His purpose. Dispensationalism, therefore, recognizes both the unity of His purpose and the diversity in the unfolding of it. Covenant theology emphasizes the unity to the point of forcing unwarranted, inconsistent, and contradictory interpretations of the Scriptures. Only dispensationalism can maintain unity and diversity at the same time and offer a consistent system of interpretation

CHARACTERISTICS OF A DISPENSATION

Primary Characteristics

What marks off the various economies in the outworking of God's purpose and distinguishes each from the other? The answer is twofold: (1) the different governing relationship with the world into which God enters in each economy; and (2) the resulting responsibility on mankind in each of these different relationships.

These characteristics are vitally bound up with the different revelations God gave throughout history and show again the link between each dispensation and the various stages in the progress of revelation. Without meaning at all to prejudge the question of how many dispensations there are, let us see if this answer is valid, using several unquestioned dispensations as illustrations.

Before sin entered at the fall of man, God's governmental relationship with Adam and Eve was direct. Their responsibility was to maintain that direct fellowship with Him, and this involved specifically caring for the garden and abstaining from eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. After sin entered at the Fall, God's relationship was no longer always direct, for a barrier had come between Him and man.

At the giving of the law to the Israelites through Moses, God's government was mediated through the various categories of the law This does not mean that He never spoke directly but it does mean that His principal mode of government was the Mosaic code, which was a new thing Introduced at that time. It also means that the responsibility upon mankind was conformity to that code -- again a new responsibility, for prior to the giving of the law people were obviously not held responsible for something that did not exist.

After the coming of Christ, God's governing relationship with mankind was no longer through the Mosaic Law. The rent veil and the end of approach to God through the sacrificial system show this. Witness, too, the distinguishable difference in relation to justification as summarized by Paul in his sermon at Antioch in Pisidia: "Through Him everyone who believes is freed [justified] from all things, from which you could not be freed [justified] through the Law of Moses" (Acts 13:39). Here is unquestionably a distinguishable and different way of running the affairs of the world regarding man's responsibility in relation to the most important area of justification. Whatever his responsibility was under the Mosaic Law may be left unspecified at present (see chapter 6), but with the coming of Christ the requirement for justification became faith in Him. This, too, is obviously a distinctive stage in the progress of revelation. Therefore, we conclude that a new dispensation was inaugurated, since the economy and responsibility changed and the new revelation was given.

Thus, the distinguishing characteristics of a different dispensation are three: (1) a change in God's governmental relationship with man (though a dispensation does not have to be composed entirely of completely new features); (2) a resultant change in man's responsibility; and (3) corresponding revelation necessary to effect the change (which is new and is a stage in the progress of revelation through the Bible).

Secondary Characteristics

Thus far nothing has been said about the usual characteristics listed for a new dispensation: namely, a test, a failure, and a judgment. The test is practically the same as the human responsibility. Obviously, whenever God gives revelation concerning His method of running the affairs of the world, there is also given a corresponding responsibility or test to people as to whether or not they will align themselves with God's economy and the revelation of it. Opponents of dispensationalism, who insist that such testing on God's part makes Him little more than an experimenter apparently not knowing how things will turn out, in reality fail to understand the purpose of testing in general.[28] After all, a dispensational test is no different essentially from the tests spoken of by James in chapter 1 of his epistle. Such tests are not for the purpose of enlightening God but for the purpose of bringing out what is in people, whether faith or failure.

In one sense every dispensation contains the same test: Will a person respond favorably toward the responsibility of the particular economy under which he is living? Specifically, this general test is particularized in each dispensation by the nature of the revelation God gave in each instance concerning man's responsibility Actually, every part of the revelation belonging to each dispensation is a part of the test, and the totality of the revelation is the test. Dispensationalists have often in their writings tried to isolate the particular test of each dispensation. Whereas this may be helpful to the student, it can only be at best a partial statement of the entire responsibility.[29]

Is failure a necessary part of each dispensation? It is a fact of biblical history that mankind has failed throughout all the ages of time. Each dispensation is filled with failures simply because history is. The failures are in at least two realms -- the realm of governmental economy and the realm of salvation. In both areas not all people have failed, but in both realms most have. Sin often seems to come to a climax at certain points in human history, and such climaxes mark the end of the various dispensations. The crucifixion of Christ was the climax of rebellion of the nation that had been given the privilege of the law and the service of God. It also marked the end of a dispensation. The present age will be climaxed by rebellion and a turning away from God in force. The millennial kingdom will be climaxed by widespread rebellion against the personal reign of Christ the king (Rev 20:7 -- 9).

Does each dispensation have a judgment? Actually each may have many judgments, just as it may have many testings and failures. But if there is a climactic failure, then there is also a climactic judgment. Though the matters of testing, failure, and judgment are not the basics that mark off the dispensations, they seem to be part and parcel of them. If, however, there were no decisive test, there still could be a dispensational arrangement. If there were no climactic failure and judgment, there still could be a change in the dispensational arrangement. The presence of a test, failure, and judgment is not the sine qua non (absolute essential) of a dispensational arrangement.

Objections

Do not these characteristics seem to dissect history and compartmentalize its eras? From one viewpoint dispensationalism does appear to do so. This cross-sectional perspective of the dispensational scheme is the view usually presented in dispensational charts. Although there is nothing erroneous about it, it is not the whole story. There is also what may be called the longitudinal or spiral perspective in dispensationalism.[30] This includes the continuing principles through all dispensations that give coherency to the whole course of history. The distinctive governmental arrangement that distinguishes the various dispensations in no way conflicts with the unities of Scripture.

The longitudinal perspective, for example, emphasizes the fact that God is, has been, and will be, a God of grace. The crosssectional perspective emphasizes the administration of grace that prevails today The longitudinal perspective is that of the progress of revelation; the cross-sectional is that of any given point of time. Both perspectives are not only valid but necessary in understanding God's revelation.

Thus, it is an unwarranted objection to say, "If . . . God is always gracious, then it is confusing to distinguish a particular age by a term that characterizes all ages."[31] One might ask if God has not always been a God of law? And if so, is it wrong to delineate a period called the Law? Does not God Himself through John make these distinctions (John 1:17)? The objection is based on a false premise that Fuller reveals in this further statement: "It is impossible to think of varying degrees of grace, for God either is or is not gracious."[32] The fact is that there are varying degrees of the revelation of God's grace, even though when there is less revelation God Himself is not less gracious than when there is greater revelation of His grace. Otherwise, God could be construed not to be very holy and righteous and just whenever He delays or defers immediate and justifiable judgment. He simply reveals His wrath more specifically at certain times in human history than at others. But periods of silence do not make Him less righteous any more than a veiled revelation of grace makes Him less gracious. Only dispensationalism with its cross-sectional and longitudinal/spiral perspectives can recognize the wealth, mobility, and complexity of the history of God's running the affairs of this world.

Before either the covenant or dispensational systems had been developed, Calvin wrote these appropriate words:

It is not fitting, they say, that God, always self-consistent, should permit such a great change, disapproving afterward what he had once commanded and commended. I reply that God ought not to be considered changeable merely because he accommodated diverse forms to different ages, as he knew would be expedient for each. If a farmer sets certain tasks for his household in the winter, other tasks for the summer, we shall not on this account accuse him of inconstancy or think that he departs from the proper rule of agriculture, which accords with the continuous order of nature. In like manner, if a householder instructs, rules, and guides his children one way in infancy, another way in youth, and still another in young manhood, we shall not on this account call him fickle and say that he abandons his purpose. Why, then, do we brand God with the mark of inconstancy because he has with apt and fitting marks distinguished a diversity of times?[33]

Covenant theology with its all-encompassing covenant of grace glosses over great epochs and climaxes of history lest they disturb the "unity of Scripture" and introduce something so distinguishable that a dispensation might have to be recognized. Especially is this true in connection with the church as a new entity. The crosssectional view emphasizes the distinctive importance of each event in its historical setting and for its particular purpose; the longitudinal view places all events in their proper relationship in the total progress of revelation. Dispensationalism avoids confusion and contradiction and at the same time unites all the parts into the whole.

The distinguishable yet progressive character of dispensational distinctions prohibits that they should be intermingled or confused as they are chronologically successive. But it has been alleged that these characteristics of test, failure, and judgment form a repeated cyclical pattern of history like that of the pagan Greeks. For instance, Kraus says, "The philosophy of history is essentially the Greek concept of cycles, each cycle ending in apostasy and judgment. God is not represented as working out His plan in the historical process, but as appearing intermittently, as it were, to begin a new cycle by supernatural intervention."[34] Chapter 1 pointed out that only dispensationalism presents a properly optimistic philosophy of history. Furthermore, the charts notwithstanding, the dispensational pattern does not only form a repetitive cyclical picture but also an ascending spiral. Erich Sauer, whose books combine so ably both the cross-sectional and the longitudinal perspectives of dispensationalism, summarizes the matter in this way:

But a fresh Divine beginning is never merely a return to the old. In each reformation born out of collapse lay at the same time the seed of a life-program for the future. Revelation and development are in no case opposites but belong together. In the sphere of the Bible, as elsewhere, there is an ascent from lower to higher, from twilight to clearness.[35]

This spiral concept is readily seen by imagining the confusion of inverting the dispensational order and placing the Millennium first. Just as illogical would be the reversing of Law and Grace (or whatever names you wish to attach to that which came through Moses and that which was revealed through Christ). Dispensationalism reveals the outworking of God's plan in the historical process in a progressive revelation of His glory. It magnifies the grace of God, for it recognizes that true progress can come only from God's gracious intervention in human society. If there were not "cyclical" interventions, then the course of history would be only downward and entirely pessimistic.

To summarize: The principal characteristic of a dispensation is the economic arrangement and responsibility that God reveals in each dispensation. Such responsibility is a test in itself. Most men fail the test, and then judgment follows. The dispensational scheme has two perspectives: a cross-sectional aspect (which is sometimes misconstrued as cycles but which is in reality a spiral) and a longitudinal aspect (which emphasizes the unfolding progress of revelation and continuing principles throughout the ages of the dispensations).

THE SINE QUA NON OF DISPENSATIONALISM

What marks off a person as a dispensationalist? What is the sine qua non (the absolutely indispensable part) of the system? Even though certain later discussions must be anticipated in order to answer that question, it seems appropriate to give an answer at this point.

Theoretically, the sine qua non ought to lie in the recognition of the fact that God has distinguishably different economies in governing the affairs of the world. Covenant theologians hold that there are various dispensations (and even use the word) within the outworking of the covenant of grace. Charles Hodge, for instance, believed that there are four dispensations after the Fall -- Adam to Abraham, Abraham to Moses, Moses to Christ, and Christ to the end.[36] Berkhof writes, as we have seen, of only two basic dispensations -- the Old and the New, but within the Old he sees four periods and all of these are revelations of the covenant of grace.[37] In other words, a person can believe in dispensations, and even see them in relation to progressive revelation, without being a dispensationalist.

Is the essence of dispensationalism in the number of dispensations? No, for this is in no way a major issue in the system, as will be discussed in the next chapter. It is not that Scofield taught seven dispensations and Hodge only four that makes the former a dispensationalist and the latter not.

Perhaps the issue of premillennialism is determinative. Again the answer is negative, for there are those who are premillennial who definitely are not dispensational. The covenant premillennialist holds to the concept of the covenant of grace and the central soteriological purpose of God. He retains the idea of the millennial kingdom, though he finds little support for it in the Old Testament prophecies. The kingdom in his view is markedly different from that which is taught by dispensationalists, since it loses much of its Jewish character due to the slighting of the Old Testament promises concerning the kingdom. Many covenant premillennialists are also posttribulationalists, and that seems to be a logical accompaniment of the nondispensational approach.[38] At any rate, being a premillennialist does not necessarily make one a dispensationalist. (However, the reverse is true -- being a dispensationalist makes one a premillennialist.)

What, then, is the sine qua non of dispensationalism? The answer is threefold.

1 A dispensationalist keeps Israel and the church distinct. This is stated in different ways by both friends and foes of dispensationalism. Fuller says that "the basic premise of Dispensationalism is two purposes God expressed in the formation of two peoples who maintain their distinction throughout eternity"[39] A. C. Gaebelein stated it in terms of the difference between the Jews, the Gentiles, and the church of God.[40] Chafer summarized it as follows:

The dispensationalist believes that throughout the ages God is pursuing two distinct purposes: one related to the earth with earthly people and earthly objectives involved which is Judaism; while the other is related to heaven with heavenly people and heavenly objectives involved, which is Christianity ... Over against this, the partial dispensationalist, though dimly observing a few obvious distinctions, bases his interpretation on the supposition that God is doing but one thing, namely the general separation of the good from the bad, and, in spite of all the confusion this limited theory creates, contends that the earthly people merge into the heavenly people; that the earthly program must be given a spiritual interpretation or disregarded altogether.[41]

This is probably the most basic theological test of whether or not a person is a dispensationalist, and it is undoubtedly the most practical and conclusive. The one who fails to distinguish Israel and the church consistently will inevitably not hold to dispensational distinctions; and one who does will.[42]

Though God's purpose for Israel and God's purpose for the church receive the most attention in Scripture, God has purposes for other groups as well. He has a purpose and plan for the angels, which in no way mixes with His purposes for Israel or the church (2 Peter 2:4; Rev. 4:11). He has a purpose for those who reject Him, which also is distinct from other purposes (Prov. 16:4). He has a plan for the nations, which continues into the New Jerusalem (Rev. 22:2), and those nations are distinct from the bride of Christ. God has more than two purposes even though He reveals more about His purposes for Israel and His purpose for the church than He does about the other groups.

Progressive dispensationalists seem to be blurring this distinction by saying that the concept is not in the same class as what is conveyed by the concepts of Gentiles, Israel, and Jews. What this means is not completely clear. (See the more complete discussion in chapter 9.) However, it does seem to imply that the classic Israel/church distinction is less clear.

2 This distinction between Israel and the church is born out of a system of hermeneutics that is usually called literal interpretation. Therefore, the second aspect of the sine qua non of dispensationalism is the matter of historical-grammatical hermeneutics. The word literal is perhaps not as good as either the word normal or plain, but in any case it is interpretation that does not spiritualize or allegorize as nondispensational interpretation often does. The spiritualizing may be practiced to a lesser or greater degree, but its presence in a system of interpretation is indicative of a nondispensational approach.[43]

Consistently literal, or plain, interpretation indicates a dispensational approach to the interpretation of Scripture. And it is this very consistency -- the strength of dispensational interpretation -- that seems to irk the nondispensationalist and becomes the object of his ridicule.[44] To be sure, literal/historical/grammatical interpretation is not the sole possession or practice of dispensationalists, but the consistent use of it in all areas of biblical interpretation is.. This does not preclude or exclude correct understanding of types, illustrations, apocalypses, and other genres within the basic framework of literal interpretation.

3 A third aspect of the sine qua non of dispensationalism is a rather technical matter that will be discussed more fully later (see chapter 5). It concerns the underlying purpose of God in the world. The covenant theologian, in practice, believes this purpose to be salvation (although covenant theologians strongly emphasize the glory of God in their theology), and the dispensationalist says the purpose is broader than that; namely the glory of God. Progressives have a Christological center, apparently to undergird their emphasis on the Davidic covenant and on Christ as the already reigning Davidic ruler in heaven.

To the normative dispensationalist, the soteriological, or saving, program of God is not the only program but one of the means God is using in the total program of glorifying Himself. Scripture is not man-centered as though salvation were the main theme, but it is God-centered because His glory is the center. The Bible itself clearly teaches that salvation, important and wonderful as it is, is not an end in itself but is rather a means to the end of glorifying God (Eph.. 1:6, 12, 14). John F. Walvoord, Chafer's successor at Dallas Theological Seminary, puts it this way: "The larger purpose of God is the manifestation of His own glory To this end each dispensation, each successive revelation of God's plan for the ages, His dealing with the non-elect as with the elect . . . combine to manifest divine glory."[45] In another place he says:

All the events of the created world are designed to manifest the glory of God. The error of covenant theologians is that they combine all the many facets of divine purpose in the one objective of the fulfillment of the covenant of grace. From a logical standpoint, this is the reductive error -- the use of one aspect of the whole as the determining element.[46]

The essence of dispensationalism, then, is the distinction between Israel and the church. This grows out of the dispensationalist's consistent employment of normal or plain or historical-grammatical interpretation, and it reflects an understanding of the basic purpose of God in all His dealings with mankind as that of glorifying Himself through salvation and other purposes as well.

NOTES

[1]. Scofield Reference Bible (New York: Oxford, 1909), 5.
[2]. New Scofield Reference Bible (New York: Oxford, 1967), 3.
[3]. E.g., John H. Gerstner, Wrongly Dividing the Word of Truth Brentwood, Tenn.: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, 1991), 152, 270.
[4]. John Wick Bowman, "The Bible and Modem Religions: II. Dispensationalism," Interpretation 10 (April 1956): 174.
[5]. L. S. Chafer, Dispensationalism (Dallas: Seminary Press, 1936), 8 -- 9.
[6]. Charles C. Ryrie, "The Necessity of Dispensationalism," Bibliotheca Sacra 114 (July 1957): 251.
[7]. W W Skeat, An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language (Oxford: Clarendon, 1946), 174.
[8]. Oxford English Dictionary (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1933), 3:481.
[9]. Ibid.
[10]. W F. Arndt and F. W Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1957), 562.
[11]. J. H. Moulton and George Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949), 442 -- 43.
[12]. Bowman, "The Bible and Modern Religions: II. Dispensationalism, 175.
[13]. Daniel P Fuller, "The Hermeneutics of Dispensationalism (Th.D. diss., Northern Baptist Theological Seminary, Chicago, 1957), 20.
[14]. Ibid.
[15]. Erich Sauer, The Dawn of World Redemption (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1951), 194.
[16]. W Graham Scroggie, Ruling Lines of Progressive Revelation (London:
Morgan & Scott, 1918), 62 -- 63.
[17]. H. A. Ironside, In the Heavenlies (New York: Loizeaux Bros., n.d.), 67.
[18]. C. E. Mason, Jr., "Eschatology" (mimeographed notes for course at Philadelphia College of Bible, rev. 1962), 5 -- 6.
[19]. Paul David Nevin, "Some Major Problems in Dispensational Interpretation" (unpublished Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary 1963), 97.
[20]. Craig A. Blaising and Darrell L. Bock, Progressive Dispensationalism (Wheaton, Ill.: Victor, 1993), 14.
[21]. Ibid., 48.
[22]. T D. Bernard, The Progress of Doctrine in the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, n.d.), 20.
[23]. Milton S. Terry, Biblical Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, nd.), 568.
[24]. Bernard Ramm, Protestant Biblical Interpretation, rev. ed. (Boston: Wilde,
1956), 158.
[25]. Oswald T Allis, "Modern Dispensationalism and the Law of God," Evangelical Quarterly 8(15 July 1936): 272.
[26]. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1941), 291.
[27]. For example, T A. Hegre, The Cross and Sanctification (Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship, 1960), 6. Cf. the entire chapter entitled "Have You Lost Your Bible?" which devotes two pages to the disastrous effects of liberalism on the Bible and five pages to the "damaging" results of dispensationalism!
[28]. Bowman, "The Bible and Modern Religions: II. Dispensationalism, 176.
[29]. C. l. Scofield, Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth (New York: Revell, nd.).
[30]. H. Chester Woodring, "Grace Under the Mosaic Covenant" (unpublished Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary 1956), 33 -- 38.
[31]. Fuller, "The Hermeneutics of Dispensationalism, 164.
[32]. Ibid.
[33]. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (London: Wolfe & Harison, 1561), II, XI, 13.
[34]. C. Norman Kraus, Dispensationalism in America (Richmond: John Knox, 1958), 126.
[35]. Sauer, The Dawn of World Redemption, 54
[36]. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1946), 2:373-77.
[37]. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 293-300.
[38]. H. Phillip Hook, "The Doctrine of the Kingdom in Covenant Premillennialism (unpublished Th.D. diss., Dallas Theological Seminary 1959). Cf. Fuller, "The Hermeneutics of Dispensationalism, 363-64.
[39]. Fuller, "The Hermeneutics of Dispensationalism, 25.
[40]. Arno C. Gaebelein, The Gospel of Matthew (New York: Our Hope, 1910), 1:4.
[41]. Chafer, Dispensationalism, 107.
[42]. There can be rare exceptions, as with C. E. B. Cranfield (Commentary on Romans [Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1979], 448 n. 2), who rejects the teaching that Israel has been replaced by the church.
[43]. Cf. George E. Ladd, The Blessed Hope (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956),
126 -- 34. Even though Ladd believes in a future for the nation Israel (cf. "Is There a Future for Israel?" Eternity [May 1964], 25 -- 28, 36), that does not mean that he is a dispensationalist, for he fails to meet the criterion concerning the consistent use of the literal principle of interpretation. In this same article (p. 27) he declares that "although the Church is spiritual Israel, the New Testament teaches that literal Israel is yet to be saved." In other words, he distinguishes the church and Israel in the future millennial age, but he does not distinguish them in the present age. Since Israel and the church are not kept distinct throughout God's program, Ladd fails to meet this test of dispensationalism.
[44]. Arnold B. Rhodes, ed., The Church Faces the Isms (New York: Abingdon, 1958), 95.
[45]. John F. Walvoord, "Review of Crucial Questions About the Kingdom of God, by George E. [add," Bibliotheca Sacra 110 (January 1953): 3-4.
[46]. John F. Walvoord, The Millennial Kingdom (Findlay, Ohio: Dunham, 1959), 92.

Salvation of Old Covenant Saints: Hermeneutical Differences

2008-09-17T15:35:00.000-04:00

The article below was taken from faithalone.org.

THE SALVATION OF BELIEVING ISRAELITES

PRIOR TO THE INCARNATION OF CHRIST

SIDNEY D. DYER

Greenville, South Carolina

Editor’s note: The views of the author are not in all cases those of JOTGES. However there is much excellent and original material in this article. Dr. Dyer gives us much to think about.

I. Introduction

The title of Walter Kaiser’s book Toward Rediscovering the Old Testament shows that there is a tendency to neglect the first three fourths of the Bible. Kaiser’s book appeared back in 1987. The propensity to give greater attention to the last fourth of the Bible is still with us today. A contributing factor is undoubtedly a misunderstanding concerning the salvation of believing Israelites prior to Christ coming in the flesh. Demonstrating the unity of salvation before and after the incarnation facilitates a better appreciation for and usefulness of the Old Testament.
There has always been only one way of salvation. Both covenant theologians and dispensationalists agree on this point. Both explain that throughout the history of mankind salvation has been by grace through faith. There is, of course, disagreement on specific points.In this article I will argue that believers before the incarnation of Christ heard the same gospel, looked to the same Savior, were members of the same Church, and enjoyed the same blessings of salvation that believers do today.

II. They Heard the Same Gospel

The gospel existed before Jesus’ birth. Revelation 14:6 contains the expression "the everlasting gospel." Some argue that the absence of the article in the Greek means that John is not referring to the gospel, but to a gospel. Paul, however, refers to the gospel without the article in Romans 1:1. Some have also argued that the content of the everlasting gospel is given in 14:7 where men are commanded to fear, give glory to, and worship God because the hour of His judgment has come. It would seem better, however, as Ladd does, to understand that the angel had the everlasting gospel of which the content of v 7 is a part. Two other texts support the idea that the gospel in Rev 14:6 is eternal in the fullest sense of the term. Revelation 13:8 presents Christ as the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world. Revelation 17: 8 speaks of those whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world. This text, of course, implies that names were recorded in the Book of Life prior to creation. If the eternal gospel of Rev 14:6 is understood in it fullest sense, then the Book of Revelation teaches that the gospel, the death of Christ, and the people of God are eternal concepts. Thus, the Provider, the people, and the proclamation of salvation existed in the mind of God before the foundation of the world.
After Adam and Eve fell, God placed them under a curse that left them and their descendants in a state of sin and misery. He also proclaimed the eternal gospel to them. In Gen 3:15 God says to the serpent, "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel." This verse presents the essence of the gospel. It is a gospel proclamation of the coming Provider of salvation. The gospel was expanded further in the Abrahamic Covenant where the people of God’s redemptive plan are restricted to the posterity of one man (Gen 17:1-8). In this covenant God makes several promises to Abraham. He promises Abraham a seed in Gen 22:18, "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed." Paul in Gal 3:16 explains that the seed in Gen 22:18 ultimately points to Christ, "Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ." In Gen 17:8, God promises Abraham a land, which ultimately points to the new earth. For example, Rom 4:13 reads, "For the promise that he would be the heir of the world was not to Abraham or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith." In Gen 17:7, God also promises Abraham a special relationship between Himself and Abraham’s seed. This ultimately points to the inclusion of the Gentiles who are the spiritual seed of Abraham. In Gal 3:29, Paul explains to Gentile believers that "if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise." Finally, God promises Abraham that his seed would exercise dominion over their enemies in Gen 22:17 where the LORD said to Abraham, "and your descendants shall posses the gate of their enemies." This promise ultimately points to the triumph of Christ’s kingdom, "for He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet" (1 Cor 15:25). The rest of Scripture is an unfolding of the Abrahamic Covenant, which is an unfolding of the gospel.
The gospel demonstrates an organic development in the Bible. Geerhardus Vos correctly describes the organic development of revelation in his Biblical Theology: Old and New Testaments . When an acorn is planted in the soil, it contains an oak tree. The acorn sprouts, pushes through the soil, sends out branches and leaves, and continues to grow into a mighty tree. Throughout the growth process the oak is the same oak. In the same way, the gospel as it unfolds in the Scripture remains the same gospel. The author of the book of Hebrews explains in 4:2 that "the gospel was preached to us as well as to them." The "them" in this verse refers to the generation of Israelites who departed from Egypt with Moses. They heard the gospel. Believers today, of course, enjoy that same gospel with greater clarity, fullness, and glory (2 Cor 3:10-11).
It must be remembered, however, that the organic development of revelation refers to inscripturated revelation. Believers who lived before the incarnation undoubtedly possessed revelation that was transmitted orally. There is evidence in the New Testament that believers before the incarnation had a more comprehensive knowledge of the gospel than is indicated in the Old Testament. Take for example Jude’s statement about Enoch in vv 14 and 15 of his epistle. Here Jude quotes Enoch saying, "Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him." Since Enoch knew about the second coming of Christ and prophesied concerning it, is it not logical to conclude that Enoch also knew about His first coming? Even though believers were not called Christians until they were given that name in Antioch, is it really an anachronism to say that the name appropriately belongs to Enoch? Consider also the statement made by the author of Hebrews in 11:26 where he states that Moses esteemed "the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt." This statement shows that Moses possessed a fuller knowledge of the gospel than is indicated in the Pentateuch. Even though we do not know the exact content of the oral Bible used by the Israelites, we know that it was more comprehensive than is indicated in the Old Testament Scriptures.

III. They Looked to the Same Savior

In John 8:56, Jesus says to the Pharisees, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it, and was glad." Jesus was telling them that He was a contemporary of Abraham. They understood that this was what He was saying, so they ask Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and You have seen Abraham?"
His answer informs them that not only did He see Abraham, He existed before the patriarch. He says in v 55, "Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM." But when did Abraham see Christ? Consider first, that in John 1:18 the apostle explains that "No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him." The One called God in this verse is God the Father. The First Person of the Trinity has remained unseen by men throughout history. Only the Second Person has been visible to men. Thus, the verses in Genesis that tell of the LORD’s appearing to Abraham refer to the appearance of the Son of God (15:1; 17:1; 18:1). For example, in Gen 18:1, Moses specifically says that "the LORD appeared to him." Also, in Gen 15:1, Moses tells us that the LORD appeared to the patriarch in a vision. Thus, when Gen 15:6 declares that Abraham believed God and He counted it to him for righteousness, the object of Abraham’s faith was undoubtedly the Son of God, the preincarnate Christ. Is it not appropriate therefore to say that Abraham was a Christian?
The prophet Isaiah is another example of one who had faith in Christ before the incarnation. In Isa 6:1-8, the prophet saw a glorious vision of Jehovah and received his commission. According to the Apostle John, Isaiah actually saw the glory of Christ (John 12:37-41).
Charles Hodge, in his Systematic Theology, describes the Son of God as the "manifested Jehovah, who led his people under the Old Testament economy." This is a significant description of the Christ before His incarnation. If Christ truly is the manifested Jehovah of the Old Testament, it means that Christ is not merely seen in the Old Testament types, shadows, and prophecies, but also in the awesome acts of Jehovah. There are occurrences of the name Jehovah that must refer to God the Father. In Ps 110:1, for example, Jehovah speaks to the Messiah. Thus, Jehovah in this verse must refer to God the Father. Also, in Isa 61:1, it is said that Jehovah will anoint the Messiah. In Zech 2:10-11, one Jehovah is presented as sending another Jehovah. See also Ps 16:5-10 and Isa 48:13-16. These exceptions show that the name Jehovah does not exclusively refer to God the Son. But the Bible does demonstrate that the name Jehovah primarily refers to the Second Person of the Trinity and that it always refers to the Second Person when He is manifested to His people.
Peter declares in Acts 2:16-21 and 33 that Jesus, in fulfillment of Joel 2:27-28, poured out the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, and Joel 2:27 declares that Jehovah said He would pour out His Spirit. John (John 1:3) and Paul (Col 1:16), declare Christ to be the Creator, and Moses (Exod 31:17), Isaiah (Isa 40:28), and Jonah (Jonah 1:9), declare Jehovah to be the Creator. John (John 12:39-40) declares that Isaiah saw Christ’s glory and Isaiah (Isa 6:1-5) says that he saw Jehovah. John’s statement that no one has seen God the Father (1:18, cf. 6:46) shows that the One who appeared as Jehovah to men in the Old Testament must have been the Second Person of the Trinity. Jehovah appeared to Abraham (Gen 18:1-2, 10, 13), Isaac (Gen 26:1-5), Jacob (Gen 28:10-15), Moses (Exod 3:2, 4, 16, 18-23), and other Old Testament saints. This Jehovah was Christ.
These examples are sufficient to show that believers before the birth of Christ were saved by believing in Him. It is commonly said that Old Testament saints were saved by looking forward to the cross and we today are saved by looking back to the cross. This is in part true. The emphasis in Scripture, however, is not that salvation is by faith in what would or did happen, but by faith in Christ. The saints who lived before Christ’s incarnation are appropriately called Christians because they were saved by faith in Him, who was the manifested Jehovah of the Old Testament.

IV. They Are Members of the Same Church

In Heb 3:1-3 the author teaches that Christ built the house of which Moses was a part:

Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was faithful in all His house. For this One has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as He who built the house has more honor than the house.

The word "house" in the Old Testament means "family" and the building of a house refers to the founding of the family as is seen in Ruth 4:11. Thus, it was Christ, not Moses, who established the people of God under the Old Covenant. In v 6 the author says that we belong to the same house if we remain firm in our faith.
Paul describes the people of God as an olive tree in Rom 11:16-24. The unbelieving Jews are represented as domestic branches of the tree that were broken off because of unbelief. Gentile believers are represented as wild olive branches that have been grafted into the olive tree. Christ has only one olive tree, only one Church.
In Eph 2:12, Paul describes Gentile believers before their conversion as "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world." In v 13 he declares that they have now been brought near. In v 14 he refers to the middle wall around the temple and says that Christ has broken it down. Paul is using figurative language to teach the union of Gentile and Jewish believers. But notice that the middle wall was not broken down to let the Jews out, but to let the believing Gentiles in. The Apostle’s point is that Gentile believers have been joined to Israel and her covenants. This shows once again that Christ has only one people, one believing remnant of Israel, one Church.
Paul refers to the Church as the Israel of God in Gal 6:16. Some argue that he only refers to Jewish believers within the Church. Paul, however, writes in Gal 3:28 that in Christ "There is neither Jew nor Greek." Therefore, it is inconceivable that Paul would have made a distinction between Jewish and Gentile believers at the end of a book in which he had stressed the unity of believers in Christ.

V. They Enjoyed the Same Blessings of Salvation

There are those who minimize and outrightly deny the regeneration of Old Testament saints. For example, Lewis Sperry Chafer, former president of Dallas Theological Seminary, wrote:

With respect to regeneration, the Old Testament saints were evidently renewed; but as there is no definite doctrinal teaching relative to the extent and character of that renewal, no positive declaration can be made…If the first law of interpretion is to be observed—that which restricts every doctrinal truth to the exact body of Scripture which pertains to it—it cannot be determined that this spiritual renewal known to the Old Testament, whatever its character may have been, resulted in the impartation of the divine nature, in an actual sonship, a joint heirship with Christ, or a placing in the household and family of God.

In this statement Chafer stops just short of actually denying that Old Testament saints were regenerated. Richard C. Trench was one who did deny the regeneration of Old Testament saints. According to him

Christian new birth was not till after Christ’s birth, as men were not new-born, till Christ was born (John 1:12). As their regeneration did not go before, but only followed his generation; so the word could not be used in this its highest, most mysterious sense, till that great mystery of the birth of the Son of God into our world had actually found place.

An appropriate place to affirm that the Old Testament saints were indeed regenerated is in John 3 where Jesus speaks to Nicodemus about the need for being born again. When Nicodemus expresses ignorance concerning this doctrine, Jesus responds in v 10 by saying, "Are you the teacher of Israel, and do not know these things?" Our Lord’s rebuke shows that Nicodemus should have known what He meant by being born again. The implication is that the Old Testament Scriptures are sufficient for understanding this doctrine. Regeneration is the infusion of spiritual life by the Holy Spirit. The Old Testament does not mention regeneration explicitly, but it does refer to the reviving work of God within the believer. The initial reviving experienced by Old Testament believers is regeneration. A significant text in the Pentateuch is Deut 30:6. In this text, Moses declares that the LORD would circumcise the heart of His people in order that they might love Him. Thus the text presents the need for the LORD’s inward act of cleansing a man’s heart in order for him to love God. There are numerous prayers in the Psalms for revival (Ps 85:6; 119:25, 37, 40, 88, 107, 149, 154, 156, 159). The necessary implication is that revival in the soul of a believer assumes that an initial revival must have taken place. Another expression in the Old Testament used for regeneration is the law of God in or on the heart. In Jer 31:33, the LORD promised that He would put His laws in the minds of His people and write it on their hearts. In Isa 51:7, the LORD describes the faithful in Isaiah’s day as those "in whose heart is My law."
The Old Testament does not explicitly teach that believers before Christ were regenerated. Their regeneration, however, is a necessary inference. It is an inference Nicodemus should have made, and Jesus rebuked him for not making it.
The Scriptures clearly teach that the Old Testament saints were justified. Paul argues in the book of Romans that men are justified by faith rather than works and he uses two examples from the Old Testament to prove his point: Abraham and David. In Rom 4:3, Paul quotes Gen 15:6 where it states that Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Then in v 6 he quotes David from Ps 32:1-2 where he "describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works." Revelation 13:8 refers to Christ as the Lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world. The death of Christ has always been the basis for the forgiveness of sins, fellowship with God, and the hope of heaven. Thus believing Israelites who lived prior to the incarnation enjoyed justification by faith even as believers do today.
It should be pointed out that the animal sacrifices offered under the Mosaic Covenant did not serve as a temporary basis for justification as some teach. O. Palmer Robertson, in his excellent book The Christ of the Covenants, states that "the constant renewal of sacrifices for sins under the old covenant gave clear indication of the fact that sin actually was not removed, but only was passed over." This statement contradicts Ps 103:12, which reads, "As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us." The animal sacrifices were not like credit cards that were used to make temporary payment for sin until the actually payment was made. Abraham was justified without a sacrifice 430 years before the sacrificial system was instituted under Moses (Gen 15:6; Gal 3:17). When the author of Hebrews writes that "it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins," (10:4) he is referring to the forensic taking away of sins. He is not teaching that the animal sacrifices accomplished nothing. Otherwise he would be contradicting those statements in Leviticus, such as 4:20, which show that through the sacrifices atonement was made and forgiveness was granted. The animal sacrifices actually represent the same type of forgiveness expressed in 1 John 1:9. This verse teaches that the condition for forgiveness is confession of sins. Leviticus 5:5 and 16:21 connect the confession of sin with the animal sacrifices.
The Bible teaches two types of forgiveness. One may be called judicial and the other paternal. Consider the table of comparison on the following page. Judicial forgiveness expresses the relationship of the believer to God as Judge. Paternal forgiveness demonstrates the relationship of the believer to God as Father. Romans 3:24 and 1 John 1:7-9 show that both types are based on the sacrifice of Christ. The judicial type of forgiveness is not repeated, but the paternal is.

A COMPARISON OF THE TWO TYPES OF FORGIVENESS

______________________________________________________________________
Judicial Forgiveness Paternal Forgiveness
________________________________________________________________________

Given by God as our Judge (Heb 12:23) Given by God as our Father

(Luke 11:2, 4)

Based on the sacrifice of Jesus Based on the sacrifice of Jesus

(Rom 3:24)                                                       (1 John 1:7- 9)
3. Not repeated (Ps 103:12)                 Repeated (1 John 1:9-10)
4. Appropriated by faith                        Appropriated by confession
(Gen 15:6; Rom 5:1)     (1 John 1:9)

Not achieved by animal sacrifices Achieved by animal sacrifices

(Heb 10:4) (Lev 5:5, 10; 16:21)

6. Brings us into fellowship with God Restores us to fellowship with God (Rom 5:1-2) (1 John 1:3-9)

7. Keeps us from being separated from             Keeps us from being separated from
God in hell        God on earth
(Rev 20:11-15) (Ps 66:18)
8. Related to justification                                               Related to sanctification
(being declared righteous) (being made righteous)
________________________________________________________________________
Failure to recognize the existence of judicial and paternal forgiveness can result in serious error. If a person recognizes paternal forgiveness but fails to recognize judicial
forgiveness, he may believe that if he dies with unconfessed sin he will go to hell. If a person recognizes judicial forgiveness but fails to recognize paternal forgiveness, he may
believe that it does not matter how he lives because his sins have been judicially forgiven.
It is essential for believers to recognize both types of forgiveness to fully experience the benefits of the Christian life. A believer is not repeatedly granted forensic forgiveness, but he is repeatedly granted paternal forgiveness. Old Testament believers enjoyed both types of forgiveness, even as New Testament believers do.
Old Testament believers also enjoyed the blessing of sanctification. In the New Testament God the Father, Christ, and the Holy Spirit are presented as the sanctifiers of believers (John 17:17; Rom 15:16; Eph 5:26). There are several references in the Old Testament which speak of God as the sanctifier of His people. For example, in Lev 20:8 we read, "I am the LORD who sanctifies you." See also Exod 31:13, Lev 21:8, and Ezek 20:12. Thus sanctification is still another example of believers before and after the incarnation enjoying one of the same benefits of salvation.
The ultimate and final aspect of sanctification is glorification. When a believer dies his soul is transformed so that he is perfect in holiness. His body remains in the grave until Christ’s return when it will be transformed into perfected humanity. Believers before the birth of Christ anticipated the glorification of both soul and body. In Ps 73:24 David addresses the LORD saying, "You will guide me with Your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory." Daniel described the glory of the resurrection in his book. He wrote:

And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament, and those who turn many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever (Dan 12:2-3).

Thus believers living before the incarnation enjoyed regeneration, justification (which is judicial forgiveness), paternal forgiveness, and sanctification, and they anticipated glorification even as those living after the incarnation did and do.

VI. Conclusion

The Bible teaches only one way of salvation. It is by the grace of God through faith in Christ. Believers before the birth of Christ heard the same gospel, looked to the same Savior, were members of the same Church, and enjoyed the same blessings of salvation as we who believe today. The more we recognize the unity of the salvation of Old Testament saints with our own, the more we will recognize the unity of the Scriptures and the usefulness of the Old Testament. Martin Luther said long ago, "It is the intention of all the apostles and evangelists in the New Testament to direct and drive us to the Old Testament, which they call the Holy Scriptures proper." Even though we acknowledge this, may we not treat the Bible as though it is a book in which three fourths of it is merely the introduction.

No Church, No Problem"?

2008-08-11T12:55:00.001-04:00

Click here for the original source of this article.

By Michael S. Horton

How many times have you heard that the church is not a place but a people? Across the board, from more traditional to more experimental approaches to ministry, the dominant perspective seems to be that we gather on the Lord's Day primarily in order to do something for God and each other rather than first of all to receive something from God. Drawing on Darrell Guder, Emerging church leader Dan Kimball has recently argued that in its emphasis on the "marks of the church" (preaching and sacrament) the Reformation inadvertently turned the focus away from the church-as-people who do certain things to the church-as-place where certain things are done.

But there's nothing inadvertent about it. With Scripture itself, the Reformers were very explicit about the fact that we come to church first of all because the Creator of the universe has summoned us to appear before him in his court. Entering as his covenant people, we invoke the name of Christ for our salvation, God addresses us again in judgment and forgiveness, and we respond with our "Amen!" of faith and thanksgiving for who God is and what he has done for us. The gifts of the Father in the Son by the Spirit come first; our action is a response to God's action.
Why We Need the Church

Because the church is first of all a place where God does certain things, it becomes a people who do certain things. We cannot take God's action for granted or assume that it has been done in the past. Christ, both Lord and Savior of his church, appointed an official ministry (including officers) so that he could continue to serve his covenant people and extend his kingdom of grace to the ends of the earth by his Spirit. Even in the present-every time we gather-it is God who summons us in judgment and grace. It is not our devotion, praise, piety, or service that comes first, but God's service to us. This is why we must assemble at a place where the gospel is truly preached, the sacraments are administered according to Christ's institution, and there is a visible form of Christ's heavenly reign through officers whom he has called and sent.

Pastors, teachers, and elders are not "life coaches" who help us in our personalized goals for spiritual fitness, but gifts given by the Ascended Lord so that the whole church might become mature and less susceptible to being spiritually duped (Eph. 4:1-16).
From "Every-Member-Ministry" to "Self-Feeders"

The reigning paradigm of churches today, however, seems to be quite different. Two characteristics especially stand out when we think of American Christianity: activism and individualism. Known for our self-confidence, Americans do not like to be on the receiving end. Even when we are receiving something, we prefer to think of it as something we deserve rather than an outright gift.

We're also individualists. We do not like to be told who we are and what we need by someone else-even God-but would much rather decide who we are or will be and determine our own felt needs accordingly. Our emphasis on choice in this culture collides with the biblical emphasis on God's electing, redeeming, and calling grace as well as the covenantal, communal, and corporate nature of our growth in Christ. Even when we come to church, it is often as individual consumers of spiritual experiences, with opportunities for self-expression in worship and "finding our ministry" in the church rather than being beneficiaries of God's gifts to us through servants whom he has called to be our shepherds under Christ (see Eph. 4:1-16).

Not surprisingly, ministers today are regarded more as "life coaches" who facilitate our self-transformation than as ambassadors of Christ, devoted to the Word of God and prayer, so that they can spread a feast on behalf of the King for his people in this world. If the focus of our message falls on our "willing and running" rather than on God's mercy (Rom. 9:16), it will follow that our methods will concentrate almost exclusively on finding the best techniques for transforming ourselves and others. It is a simultaneously activistic and individualistic approach. Yet this subverts God's whole intention on the Lord's Day. He comes not to help you "become a better you," but to kill you and raise you together with Christ as part of his redeemed body.
God's Service Creates a Redeemed People on Pilgrimage in This Present Age

Churches of the Reformation have always agreed that the true church is found wherever the gospel is truly preached and the sacraments are administered according to Christ's institution. But this means that the public ministry provided on the Lord's Day is primarily God's ministry to us. We are not individuals who come together simply for fresh marching orders for transforming ourselves and our culture, but sinners who come to die and to be made alive in Christ-no longer defined by our individual choices and preferences (the niche demo-graphics of our passing age), but by our incorporation into Christ and his body.

Even the purpose of our singing is not self-expression (witnessing to our own piety), but is to "teach and admonish one another in all wisdom" so that "the word of Christ [may] dwell in you richly" (Col. 3:16), "giving thanks to God the Father at all times and for everything in the name of Jesus Christ" (Eph. 4:20). We come to invoke the name of our Covenant Lord, to hear his law and receive his forgiveness. Only then are we able to receive his gifts with the "Amen!" of faith and repentance, with a heart full of thanksgiving toward God and love toward our neighbors.

But if "church" is primarily about what individuals do (even if they happen to do it in the same building), then it stands to reason that our services will focus on motivating us for action rather than ministering to us God's action here and now in the Spirit, through Word and sacrament, that which he has already accomplished for us objectively in Jesus Christ. The liturgy will be replaced with various announcements of church programs; the songs will simply be opportunities for self-expression; the preaching will largely consist of tips for transformation; baptism and the Supper will afford opportunities merely for us to commit and recommit ourselves rather than serve as means of grace.

Before long, it will be easy for churches to imagine that what happens on the Lord's Day is less important than what happens in small groups or in the private lives of individual Christians. In fact, this is explicitly advocated today.

In a fairly recent study, Willow Creek-a pioneer megachurch-discovered that its most active and mature members are the most likely to be dissatisfied with their own personal growth and the level of teaching and worship that they are receiving. From this, the leadership concluded that as people mature in their faith, they need the church less. After all, the main purpose of the church is to provide a platform for ministry and service opportunities to individuals rather than a means of grace. As people grow, therefore, they need the church less. We need to help believers to become "self-feeders," the study concluded. (1)
The Ultimate in "Self-Feeding"

How far can this trajectory take us? Evangelical marketer George Barna gives us a good indication. Like the recent Willow Creek study, Barna concludes that what individual believers do on their own is more important than what the church does for them. Barna, however, takes Finney's legacy to the next logical step. A leading marketing consultant to megachurches as well as the Disney Corporation, he has recently gone so far as to suggest that the days of the institutional church are over. Barna celebrates a rising demographic of what he calls "Revolutionaries"-"millions of believers" who "have moved beyond the established church and chosen to be the church instead." (2) Since "being the church" is a matter of individual choice and effort, all people need are resources for their own work of personal and social transformation. "Based on our research," Barna relates, "I have projected that by the year 2010, 10 to 20 percent of Americans will derive all their spiritual input (and output) through the Internet." (3) Who needs the church when you have an iPod? Like any service provider, the church needs to figure out what business it's in, says Barna:

Ours is not the business of organized religion, corporate worship, or Bible teaching. If we dedicate ourselves to such a business we will be left by the wayside as the culture moves forward. Those are fragments of a larger purpose to which we have been called by God's Word. We are in the business of life transformation. (4)

Of course, Barna does not believe that Christians should abandon all religious practices, but the only ones he still thinks are essential are those that can be done by individuals in private, or at most in families or informal public gatherings. But by eliminating the public means of grace, Barna (like Willow Creek) directs us away from God's lavish feast to a self-serve buffet.

Addressing his readers in terms similar to the conclusions of the Willow Creek study cited above, Barna writes, "Whether you choose to remain involved in the congregational mold or to venture into the spiritual unknown, to experience the competing dynamics of independence and responsibility, move ahead boldly. God's perspective is that the structures and routines you engage with matter much less than the character and commitments that define you." Believers need not find a good church, but they should "get a good coach." If the gospel is good advice rather than good news, obviously the church is simply "a resource" for our personal development, as Barna suggests. (5)

If the local church is to survive, says Barna, authority must shift from being centralized to decentralized; leadership from "pastor-driven" to "lay-driven," which means that the sheep are primarily servers rather than served by the ministry. Further, ministry must shift from "resistance" to change to "acceptance," from "tradition and order" to "mission and vision," from an "all-purpose" to a "specialized" approach to ministry, "tradition bound" to "relevance bound," from a view of the people's role as receivers to actors, from "knowledge" to "transformation." (6)

"In just a few years," Barna predicts, "we will see that millions of people will never travel physically to a church, but will instead roam the Internet in search of meaningful spiritual experiences." (7) After all, he adds, the heart of Jesus' ministry was "the development of people's character." (8) "If we rise to the challenge," says Barna, America will witness a "moral resurgence," new leadership, and the Christian message "will regain respect" in our culture. (9) Intimate worship, says Barna, does "not require a 'worship service,'" just a personal commitment to the Bible, prayer, and discipleship. (10) His book concludes with the warning of the last judgment: "What report of your commitment to practical, holy, life-transforming service will you be able to give Him?" (11) The Revolutionaries have found that in order to pursue an authentic faith they had to abandon the church. (12)

This is finally where American spirituality leaves us: alone, surfing the Internet, casting about for coaches and teammates, trying to save ourselves from captivity to this present age by finding those "excitements" that will induce a transformed life. Increasingly, the examples I have referred to are what people mean by the adjective "missional."

Like the nineteenth-century revivalist Charles Finney, George Barna asserts that the Bible offers "almost no restrictions on structures and methods" for the church. (13) In fact, as we have seen, he does not even think that the visible church itself is divinely established. Nature abhors a vacuum and where Barna imagines that the Bible prescribes no particular structures or methods, the invisible hand of the market fills the void. He even recognizes that the shift from the institutional church to "alternative faith communities" is largely due to market forces: "Whether you examine the changes in broadcasting, clothing, music, investing, or automobiles, producers of such consumables realize that Americans want control over their lives. The result has been the 'niching' of America-creating highly refined categories that serve smaller numbers of people, but can command greater loyalty (and profits)." The same thing is happening to the church, Barna notes, as if it were a fate to be embraced rather than an apostasy to be resisted. (14)

However thin, there is a theology behind Barna's interpretation of Jesus as the paradigmatic "Revolutionary," and it is basically that of Finney. "So if you are a Revolutionary," says Barna, "it is because you have sensed and responded to God's calling to be such an imitator of Christ. It is not a church's responsibility to make you into this mold....The choice to become a Revolutionary-and it is a choice-is a covenant you make with God alone." (15) In this way, however, the work of the people displaces the work of God.
"Feed My Sheep"

The gospel is good news. The message determines the medium. There is a clear logic to Paul's argument in Romans 10, where he contrasts "the righteousness that is by works" and "the righteousness that is through faith." We were redeemed by Christ's actions, not ours; the Spirit applies this redemption to us here and now so that we are justified through faith apart from works; even this faith is given to us through the proclamation of Christ. Since this gospel is a report to be believed rather than a task for us to fulfill, it needs heralds, ambassadors, and witnesses.

The method of delivery is suited to its content. If the central message of Christianity were how to have your best life now or become a better you, then we wouldn't need heralds, but rather life coaches, spiritual directors, and motivational speakers. Good advice requires a person with a plan; good news requires a person with a message. This is not to say that we do not also need good advice or plans, but that the source of the church's existence and mission in this world is this announcement of God's victory in Jesus Christ.

Coaches can send themselves with their own suggestions, but an ambassador has to be sent with an authorized announcement. If the goal is to get people to go and find Christ, then the methods will be whatever we find pragmatically successful; if it's all about Christ finding sinners, then the methods are already determined. Simply quoting verses 13-15 reveals the logical chain of Paul's argument: "'For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?" The evangel defines evangelism; the content determines the methods of delivery; the marks of the church (preaching and sacrament) define its mission (evangelizing, baptizing, teaching, and communing).

The marks of the true church are the proper preaching of the Word, administration of the sacraments, and discipline. The mission of the church is simply to execute these tasks faithfully. Throughout the Book of Acts, the growth of the church is attributed to the proclamation of the gospel: "The word of God spread." Waking the dead, this gospel proclamation is not only the content but the method. Those who believed were baptized along with their whole household. They were not simply added to the conversion statistics, but to the church-the visible church, which is no more visible in this world than when it is gathered around the Lord's Table in fellowship with their ascended head. Furthermore, the apostles and elders-and, by Acts 6, the deacons-served the church as officers representing Christ's threefold office of Prophet, King, and Priest.

We find no dichotomy between the official ministry of the church as a historical institution and the Spirit-filled mission of reaching the lost. The mission expanded the church; it did not subvert it. Through this ministry, "The Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved" (Acts 2:47). So when evangelists today qualify their invitation to receive Christ by saying, "I'm not talking about joining a church," they are stepping outside of the mission established by Jesus Christ and evidenced in the remarkable spread of the gospel under the ministry of the apostles.

Christ has not only appointed the message, but the methods and, as we have seen, there is an inseparable connection between them. All around us we see evidence that churches may affirm the gospel of salvation by grace alone in Christ alone through faith alone, but then adopt a methodology that suggests otherwise. Christ has appointed preaching, because "faith comes by hearing the word of Christ" (Rom. 10:17); baptism, because it is the sign and seal of inclusion in Christ; the Supper, because through it we receive Christ and all of his benefits. In other words, these methods are appointed precisely because they are means of grace rather than means of works; means of God's descent to us rather than means of our ascent to God.

In this way, Christ makes himself not only the gift, but the giver; not only the object of faith, but the active agent, together with the Spirit, in giving us faith. And he not only gives us this faith in the beginning, but deepens, matures, and increases our faith throughout our lives. The gospel is not something that we need to "get saved" so that we can move on to something else; it is "the power of God unto salvation" throughout our pilgrimage. So we need this gospel to be delivered to us regularly, both for our justification and our sanctification.

We also need the law to guide our faith and practice. Christ not only saves, he rules. In fact, he rules in order to save. His sovereignty liberates us from oppression-not only the guilt and condemnation of our sins, but from the tyranny of sin. The gospel is not only enough for our justification; it is the source of our sanctification as we recognize that we are "dead to sin and alive to Christ." The gospel tells us that Christ has toppled the reign of sin; it no longer has any legal authority or determining power over us. It can no longer define us. The old "I"-who was married to sin-has died, and we are now wedded to Christ and righteousness. The gospel is big news indeed. We need it not merely to subdue our doubts and insecurity, but our indwelling sin.

Submitting ourselves not only to the life-creating gospel but to the life-guiding commands of Scripture, we recognize our need for the spiritual oversight of our pastors and elders and the service of deacons. Like any family, the church needs proper discipline and order so that our personal and corporate life together will imperfectly but truly reflect the fact that the church is an embassy of Christ and the age to come even in this present evil age. God's law, not our spontaneous sincerity, defines what we should do.

The individualistic emphasis of evangelicalism stands in sharp contrast to the covenantal paradigm that we find in Scripture. We are commanded not to become self-feeders who mature beyond the nurture of the church, but to submit ourselves to the preaching, teaching, and oversight of those shepherds whom God has placed over us in Christ. We read at the end of John's Gospel the account of how Jesus made breakfast for seven of his astonished disciples in his third appearance after his resurrection:

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Feed my lambs." A second time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Tend my sheep." He said to him the third time, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, "Do you love me?" And he said to him, "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Feed my sheep." (John 21:15-17)

As the passage goes on to relate, Jesus was preparing Peter for a difficult ministry that would culminate in his own crucifixion (vv. 18-19). Unlike the false shepherds who scattered his flock (denounced in Jeremiah 23), the Good Shepherd has laid down his life for them and united them together under his gracious rule (John 10). And now through his under-shepherds Jesus will continue to feed his sheep and lead them to everlasting pastures. The church's min-istry is exercised faithfully when the people are fed, not when the sheep are expected to become their own shepherds.

Christ does not deliver us from one tyrant only to leave us weak and isolated prey to weather, wolves, and our own wanderings. "Obey your leaders and submit to them," Scripture exhorts, "for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you" (Heb. 13:17-18).

Yet even this admonition is grounded in the gospel: submitting to the discipline of shepherds is an advantage to us because through it God promises all of his blessings in Christ.

Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near (Heb. 10:23-25).

1 [ Back ] Greg L. Hawkins and Cally Parkinson, Reveal: Where Are You? (South Barrington, IL: Willow, 2007).
2 [ Back ] George Barna, Revolution: Finding Vibrant Faith Beyond the Walls of the Sanctuary (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House, 2005), back cover copy.
3 [ Back ] Barna, 180.
4 [ Back ] George Barna, The Second Coming of the Church (Nashville: Word, 1998), 96.
5 [ Back ] Barna, The Second Coming of the Church, 68, 138-40.
6 [ Back ] Barna, The Second Coming of the Church, 177.
7 [ Back ] Barna, The Second Coming of the Church, 65.
8 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 203.
9 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 208.
10 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 22.
11 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 210.
12 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 17.
13 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 175.
14 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 62-63.
15 [ Back ] Barna, Revolution, 70.

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Michael Horton is the J. Gresham Machen professor of apologetics and systematic theology at Westminster Seminary California (Escondido, California), host of The White Horse Inn national radio broadcast, and editor-in-chief of Modern Reformation magazine. He is author of several books, including Power Religion, A Better Way, Putting Amazing Back Into Grace, God of Promise: Introducing Covenant Theology (Baker, 2006), and Too Good to be True: Finding Hope in a World of Hype (Zondervan, 2006).

Issue: "No Church, No Problem?" July/August Vol. 17 No. 4 2008 Pages 16-20

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The Kingdom, The Millennium, & The Escaton by Fred Zaspel

2008-07-10T09:56:00.001-04:00

A Brief Overview of New Testament Prophecy

published by Word of Life Baptist Church

Introduction

The Framework of NT Hermeneutics

One of the more startling aspects of the NT message is its repeated announcement that in Jesus Christ the future has come to the present. Our Lord Himself, His forerunner John the Baptist, and His apostles all announce and extrapolate on this theme.

The Baptist's announcement was, "The kingdom of heaven is at hand" (Mat. 3:2; cf. Mk.1:14-15). For the apostle Paul, Christ came "when the fullness of time was come," or more simply, when time had become full (Gal.4:4). Moreover, in Christ, Paul declared, God had come good on all His ancient promises (2Cor.1:20). And this was no mere opinion of the significance of the Lord Jesus taken up solely by His enthusiastic followers; our Lord spoke of Himself in these very terms.

"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill" (Mat. 5:17). "Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see: For I tell you, that many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them" (Lk.10:23-24). "The law and the prophets were until John; since that time the kingdom of God is preached" (Lk.16:16). ". . . the kingdom of God is come to you" (Mat.12:28).

Moreover, this is the very thing Jesus instructed His disciples to preach (Mat.10:7; cf. Mat.24:14; Lk. 10:9). Clearly, what had been the long hope of Israel had come in the Person of Jesus Christ. The promised realities of the eschaton have come. The kingdom of God is now.

This accounts for the eschatological nature of NT soteriology. For example, salvation is defined in such eschatological terms as "eternal life," "resurrection," and present entrance into the kingdom (e.g., Jn.5:24). In Paul the "justification" anticipated for the righteous as they would stand at the bar of God's judgment is in Christ a present reality, something enjoyed by faith ahead of time (e.g., Rom.5:1). The blessings of the New Covenant, which today's believer enjoys, are themselves (originally) cast in an eschatological context (cf. Jer.31:31ff; Ezek.36:22ff). Christ has already delivered us from "this present evil age" (Gal.1:4) and has placed us into His own kingdom (Col.1:13). We live even now "in the heavenlies" (Eph.2:6). In Christ the future is present; the eschatological kingdom is now.

But as with many areas of Biblical theology, eschatology is not that simple. A just as impressive list of NT statements indicate that the kingdom of God is not yet. We are instructed to pray, "Thy kingdom come" (Mat.6:10). Christ's kingdom is regularly associated with His second coming (Mat.25:34; Lk.19:11-15, etc.). To see Christ one day as He comes in His kingdom is the object of the Christian's hope.

Plainly, then, the kingdom -- the eschaton -- is both now and not yet. It is present in its spiritual and "mystery" form (Mat.13:1-52), but it awaits the return of the King for its full manifestation (e.g., 2Tim.4:1).

Eschatological Differences

With this much most amillennialists and premillennialists would agree. There is both a present and a future aspect to Christ's kingdom, a present realization and a future manifestation. The point of disagreement concerns the way in which the fulfillment is brought about in the eschaton. Amillennialism sees in the eternal state the full manifestation of the promises; this is ushered in immediately upon the return of Jesus Christ. Premillennialists see the kingdom promises fulfilled in history upon the return of Jesus Christ; this "inter-regnum" period issues in to the eternal state. Both agree to the present realization of the kingdom; the difference lies in the understanding of its character in the eschaton.

More specifically, to state the issue in the form of a question, does the Scripture speak of the eschatological kingdom as fulfilled in history? Perhaps better: Does the eternal state follow directly upon the return of Jesus Christ? Or does a kingdom period intervene?

Approach

At the end of the discussion, the decision will have to rest not on hermeneutical presuppositions, an assumption which has for too long been the excuse for failure to complete the more difficult task of exegesis. We have already seen that our Lord has left us with a hermeneutic of considerable tension, and there have been interpretive errors made on both sides. There have been those who see virtually no fulfillment of the kingdom promises in this present age; for them, kingdom truth is wholly a concern of the future. Their's is an over-literalized eschatology. Others, however, ignoring the "not yet," have presented what we may rightly call an over-realized eschatology. For them, virtually all of prophecy is already fulfilled, and the Bible is all but silent on the future. But the hermeneutic which our Lord gave us is one of now and then.

The question of this further manifestation of the kingdom prior to the eternal state, however, is a question not of hermeneutics but of exegesis. The basic framework given by our Lord could feasibly allow for either. What must be examined specifically are those passages which provide a chronological framework for the future. What is offered here are some miscellaneous thoughts from these passages. Perhaps more details will be taken up at a later time.

Revelation 20

Perhaps we should begin with Rev.20, the crux interpretum and focus of the most heated debate. This passage presents a period of time, designated as a thousand years (hence, millennium), during which Satan is bound and cast into the abyss and thus unable to deceive the nations (vv.1-3). At the beginning of this period is a "resurrection" of the faithful (vv.4-5). Following the thousand years is the release of Satan and a final rebellion (vv.7-9), the final destruction of Satan (v.10), and the second resurrection (vv.5-6; 13). These are the basic facts with which we must work.

In the context (19:11ff) our Lord is portrayed as coming to earth in triumphal glory and taking vengeance upon His enemies. That John intends for us to understand this millennium to be following this return seems evident from his repeated use of the chronological kai ("and") used throughout (cf. 19:11, 17, 19; 20:1, 4, etc.). Whatever details and meanings are involved in the symbolism which John employs, the stated order of events is,

1) Return of Christ in victory (19:11-21)

2) Destruction of the evil triumvirate (the beast, the false

prophet, and Satan) in which Satan is deposed to the abyss

(19:19-20:3)

3) First resurrection (20:4)

4) 1,000 year kingdom ( ebasileusan . . . basileusousin, 20:4-6)

5) Release of Satan and a final rebellion (20:7-9)

7) Final destruction of Satan, who now is cast into the lake of

fire where the beast and false prophet have been (20:10)

8) Second resurrection & final judgment (20:11-15)

The entire passage, so it seems at first glance at least, reads as one continuous narrative. In modern theological jargon, Christ's return here is premillennial. He comes and personally brings His kingdom to its consummation.

Many, however, have understood the events of chapter 20 as a "recapitulation," describing events actually prior to our Lord's return. These interpreters often take refuge in the fact that much of the book of Revelation is symbolic and not to be taken literally. But whatever the significance of the symbolic language employed, the chronological framework of the passage -- Christ's coming, Christ's Kingdom, the eternal state -- leaves us with premillennialism. Moreover, explicit exegetical support for the recapitulation theory is sadly lacking; it is difficult to demonstrate any compelling reason which would make necessary such an inversion of the order of the events which John describes. It is a theological proposition, and it is one which at least appears to run against John's own chronological casting of the passage. It is a hermeneutical consideration placed upon the text; it is not derived from the text itself. And there is exegetical necessity for saying so.

The Binding of Satan

First, the binding of Satan is said to have a specific purpose: "so that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished" (v.3). That is, during this time Satan's activity is terminated. Now it has been suggested that this pictures this gospel age in which Christ's work proceeds more or less unhindered by the "strong man" who by Him is now "bound" (cf. Mat.12:28-29). Satan, so this theory goes, is not allowed today to successfully hinder the gospel. Further support is often gleaned from Rev.12:7ff where Satan is seen as "cast out" of heaven (v.9).

But the parallel is not as obvious as it might at first appear. Is the binding and fall of Satan in Mat.12 and Rev.12 the same as that of Rev.20? And how can we know? The text itself should provide some clues. Interestingly enough, a comparison of Rev.12 and Rev.20 demonstrates not a parallel but a contrast.

Most agree that Rev.12 speaks of this age, whether the church age as such or the tribulation period. Can Rev.20 be the same? Here is the data with which we must work toward our decision:

1) In Rev.12 Satan's time is "short" (v.12), but the time frame in Rev.20 is "a thousand years."

2) In Rev.12 he is cast from heaven to earth, but in Rev.20 he is cast from earth to the abyss.

3) In Rev.12 he frantically carries out a furious rampage over the earth, but in Rev.20 he is confined to the abyss.

4) Still more significantly, in Rev.12:9 Satan, on the loose, "deceives ( planao) the whole world"; but in Rev.20:3 it is precisely this deception ( planao) that is denied and disallowed (v.3).

Now plainly, if both passages speak of the same age, we have a contradiction. But if Rev.12 speaks of this age and Rev.20 speaks of the age to come, the tension is resolved. Indeed, chapter 20 is most easily seen as the happy answer and conclusion of the events described in chapter 12. There is obvious contrast, not identity.

Furthermore, when amillennialists ask us to equate the binding of Satan described in Rev.20 with descriptions of his defeat in places such as John 12:31 -- that is, that this be understood in a gospel sense, a work accomplished on the cross -- we must ask, Then in what sense will this binding be over at the end of the "thousand years"? The victory of Christ over Satan in His death and resurrection was final, once and for all. It is impossible to understand that as having only a thousand year duration, whatever may be symbolized by the numerical term.

Note again, the approach here does not rest on presuppositions, prior assumptions about literary genre, or the meanings of symbols in the passage. Nor does it import ideas from outside the text itself. Further, it must be admitted that if this observation is correct -- that Satan's inability to deceive the world in Rev.20 is a different time frame from that of his active deception in Rev.12 -- then we are left with premillennialism.

Still there is more to be said on this point. Whatever symbolism is involved, Satan "bound" with a "chain," "shut up" and "sealed" in the abyss does not speak of a mere curtailing of his activity; it plainly represents its cessation. Satan is incarcerated; he is not on parole. It has often been said in jest that if Satan is bound now, he is on an awfully long chain! But plainly, the text does not allow for a long chain. His activity is brought to a halt: he is bound, and he is caged.

Satan's four titles are mentioned to emphasize this further: "He laid hold of the dragon, that old serpent, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years" (v.2). That is to say, all the activities which these names imply will then be suppressed.

However, the NT everywhere pictures Satan in this present day as on a rampage, as does Rev.12:9 (above). He "walks about seeking whom he may devour" (1Pet.5:8). He "takes men captive at his will" (2Tim.2:26). Satan is the "god of this world" who "blinds the minds" of those who are lost (2Cor.4:4). Paul's own gospel enterprise was hindered by Satanic opposition (1Th.2:18). In this "mystery" stage of the kingdom Satan is permitted to snatch away the gospel seed that is sown, as a bird taking seed from the wayside (Mt.13:4, 19). It is a strange hermeneutic which allows statements such as these to fit within the picture presented in Rev.20:1-3. And it is fair to say in criticism that it does not appear that the motivation behind it is an exegetical one.

The Resurrections

Then there is the issue of the resurrections (Rev.20:4-5). Amillennialists suggest that the first is spiritual (regeneration) and only the second is physical. But how can we know? Spiritual resurrection is clearly a reality for all who are Christ's (e.g., Jn.5:25). The question, however, is what the language of this passage (Rev.20:4-5) requires. Again we are at a loss to find any indication in the text itself that this "first resurrection" is a spiritual one. The Greek term here for "resurrection" ( anastasis, vv.5-6) is never used in a spiritual sense anywhere in the NT. Nor is there any interpretive clue, such as the "now is" in Jn.5:25, which would indicate spiritual resurrection. Nor is there definition given which would point us in this direction. To the contrary, these who are raised to life are "those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshipped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands" (v.4). The stated contrast is physical death, and the very obvious indication is that the resurrection is a physical one also. It is equated with the resurrection of "the rest of the dead" (v.5), which all sides admit is physical. There is exactly no evidence within the text itself which would indicate a change in the meaning of words, no hint at all that the two resurrections spoken of are of a different nature. Much to the contrary, to shift in mid-stream without express warrant from the text is exegetical chaos. Further, the term ezesan (v.4, "they lived, they came to life," ingressive aorist) elsewhere in the book of Revelation refers only to bodily resurrection (2:8; 13:14), and never is it used in a spiritualized sense. Moreover, the resurrection of these in verse 4 is said to follow, not precede, their faithfulness -- a consideration which allows only a physical resurrection. Once again, the amillennial interpretation, here, rests on presuppositions imported to the passage and that against the most natural reading of the text; it is not grounded in exegesis. And again, if it is wrong at this point, we are left with premillennialism.

Reigning

Then there is the matter of "reigning" and the consideration that this period has a specific time of duration -- one thousand years. Premillennialists assert that the "reigning" of those of the first resurrection is one that involves rule over the lost. It is an authority exercised over rebellious men. This fits well with Rev.2:25-27, where a "rod of iron" is promised to the faithful when Christ returns (cf. 19:15). An iron rod is necessary only in a world of sin. For the amillennialist, on the other hand, the reigning is a spiritual one only, in either of two senses: 1) in the sense of a heavenly vindication of some kind in the intermediate state, or 2) in the sense of the believer's spiritual reigning "in Christ." Neither idea, however, is allowed by the text. 1) The term translated "they came to life" ( ezesan) is nowhere in the NT used to describe the continued life of the soul in heaven after the death of the body. Never. It speaks of life after death only in resurrection. It indicates the final state, not the intermediate. Furthermore, the picture presented in Rev.6:9-11 of the saints in heaven during the intermediate state is far from that of "reigning": they are crying out to the Lord for vengeance to be executed upon their oppressors still on earth. In response they are told to "rest" and be patient until the number of martyrs is complete. The situation in chapter 20, however, is the answer to this: when Christ comes in His kingdom, only then will they be raised to reign with Him. Finally, now, their time of vindication has come. And 2) while the term is used outside of the book of Revelation in a spiritual sense (e.g., Jn.5:25), we must ask, In what sense can spiritual reigning be said to last only a thousand years? Will that kind of reign not continue forever? And is it not so that we should expect suffering today and reigning only tomorrow (2Tim.2:12)? Again, the amillennialist suggestion seems neither to rise from nor fit the demands of the passage.

John's Use of the OT

Finally, there is the observation which concerns John's use of the OT. It is often alleged that premillennialists derive their doctrine from the OT and not the NT, and that the NT writers treat the OT kingdom prophecies only in a spiritual way. Yet John's description of the kingdom here is clearly informed by the prophet Ezekiel. And his treatment of the older prophet is not at all a spiritualized one; it is, rather, strikingly parallel. In Ezek.36-37 there is the resurrection of Israel and her restoration to the land under the leadership of the Davidic king (cf. Rev.20:4-6). In chapters 38-39 there is the rebellion of Gog and Magog (cf. Rev.20:7-9). And in chapters 40-48 there is the new Jerusalem dwelling safely and enjoying its restored temple (cf. Rev.21-22). John's handling of the Ezekiel passage is remarkably literal.

So also is his treatment of Dan.7. The multiplicity of "thrones" given to the saints, "seated" thereupon in "judgment" and sharing in the rule of the Son of Man (Dan.7:9, 10, 22) are for John matters of very real expectation.

Conclusion

The famous admonition of Henry Alford concerning arbitrary interpretation in Rev.20 merits repeating here:

As regards the text itself, no legitimate treatments of it will extort what is known as the spiritual interpretation now in fashion. If, in a passage where two resurrections are mentioned, where certain psychai ezesan ["souls came to life"] at the first, and the rest of the nekroi ezesan ["dead came to life"] only at the end of a specified period after the first, -- if in such a passage the first resurrection may be understood to mean spiritual rising with Christ, while the second means literal rising from the grave; -- then there is an end of all significance in language, and Scripture is wiped out as a definite testimony to anything.

Alford's criticism is a valid one. It is demonstrably evident that the interpreter who admits no inter-regnum period prior to the eternal state in Rev.20 approaches the passage with preconceived notions and leaves with the same; he gains from the text "neither the exact sense nor the value."

First Corinthians 15:20-28

1 Cor.15:20-28 is another passage which provides a chronological framework for the end times. Here Paul asserts that Christ's resurrection is the first of the escathological resurrections. This is more of our now/not yet hermeneutic: Christ's resurrection is part and parcel of the resurrection of the last day, the "firstfruits" (vv.20, 23). His resurrection is not a mere resuscitation to mortal life; it is the resurrection that is yet to come.

Analysis

But it is the order of subsequent events that is significant for our question. There is an "order" to the resurrections: "Christ the firstfruits, afterward those who are Christ's at His coming" (v.23). That is, first there is the resurrection of Christ, then there is the resurrection of the just when Christ returns. So far the parallel to Rev.19-20 is exact.

Verse 24 continues: "Then comes the end." At this point many amillennialists have pronounced the matter settled. "Christ comes, then the end! That's it." But we must insist that Paul does not end his sentence at this point. He continues,

Then ( eita) comes the end when ( hotan) he delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when ( hotan) He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death. . . . Now when ( hotan) all things are made subject to Him, then ( tote) the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all" (vv.24-28, italics added).

Paul's language here is not difficult, although it is complex. And we must be careful to understand the meanings of the terms as he used them. The first word of eschatological significance and which provides a chronological indicator is the word which in verse 24 is translated "then" ( eita). Interestingly, in Paul's usage this word does not speak in terms of immediate succession (cf. tote, "at that time"). This is evident from its use in verses 5 and 7, as well as the use of the related term, epeita, in verses 6, 7, and 23; a simple examination of any standard Greek concordance will bear this out further. The word is sometimes translated "afterward." It implies an intervening period of time. It speaks to the next in an order of specified events but does not specify the issue of lapses of time between. Nineteen hundred years have already elapsed between the resurrection of Christ and His return ( epeita, "afterward," v.23), but this is the elasticity of the term -- a common phenomenon in the prophetic Scriptures. So three distinct stages are put forward: 1) the resurrection of Christ; after that ( epeita, how long after?) 2) the resurrection of the just at Christ's return; and after that ( eita; how long after? A thousand years, perhaps?) 3) the end.

Further, the apostle outlines an order of coming events. Christ's kingdom, Paul specifies (v.24), is subsequent to His return (v.23). Moreover, this "rule" will involve some period of time ( basileuein, present tense; "until," v.25) -- a time marked by the systematic destruction of His enemies. The "end" ( telos) will come only "when" ( hotan, "whenever") Christ personally brings His kingdom to its full consummation. Plainly put, Christ's "reign" or "kingdom" will be marked by the gradual destruction of His enemies. This, in turn, is specifically said to follow His return and precede the consummation. This is premillennialism.

The grammar is still more compelling. The aorist subjunctive ( katargese, "puts an end, destroys," v.24) is the functional equivalent of a future perfect: "when He shall have put an end." Used as it is with the second hotan ("when") places Christ's destruction of all opposition prior to His "delivering the kingdom to God the Father" in the first hotan clause. We could even translate, "Then comes the end, when He delivers up the kingdom to God and the Father, after having put an end to all rule and all authority and power." The "end" does not come immediately upon the return of Christ. It comes at some time after ( eita) His return, "when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when he shall have put an end to all rule and all authority and all power."

This is made even more plain by Paul's explanatory ( gar) assertion that after Christ returns "He must reign until ( achri) He has put all enemies under His feet" (v.25). Christ's reign is said to follow his return, and it is said to be in order to put down opposition. And this, he says, will take time.

More completely, Paul's picture of the future is as follows:

1) The resurrection of Christ (v.23a)

2) Christ's return, at which time the dead in Christ are raised (v.23b)

3) Christ's kingdom (vv.24-25, ten basileian . . . basileuein)

4) Christ's destruction of death (v.26 = second resurrection?)

5) The consummation / eternal state (vv.24a, 28)

It is significant, further, that the word for "then" which does indicate concurrent events ( tote) is used by Paul in this passage only in verse 28. There he points out that at some time following Jesus' return (v.23), "when all things are made subject to Him, then ( tote) the Son Himself will also be subject to Him who put all things under Him, that God may be all in all." That is to say, the eternal state follows immediately not when Christ returns but when after His return He has brought His kingdom to its consummation. Again, it is the terminology itself which leaves us with premillennialism.

Further, Paul specifically states that all the dead will be raised, but "each one in his own order" (v.23). The word translated "order" is tagma, which is a sort of military term and means something like "detachment" or "division." That is, the dead will be raised selectively, according to some kind of rank or regiment. He then specifies that order: 1) the resurrection of Christ, 2) the resurrection of the just. This leaves only, 3) the resurrection of the unjust (cf. v.26). The plain statement is that the dead in Christ are raised separate from the rest (cf. Rev.20:4-6). The final "destruction of death" (v.26) implies 1) the rescue of all men from the domain of death. Death's prey must be loosed; hence, the universal resurrection of all men. And 2) Death will be rendered powerless, unable to again take new victims.

Conclusion

So Rev.20 is not unique. It alone specifies the thousand years, but the basic framework is shared in common with Paul. The resurrection of the dead is in two stages, that of the righteous at His return and that of the wicked at the consummation of His rule. Christ returns in order to bring His kingdom to fruition by systematically destroying each and every enemy. And only then will He present His kingdom to the Father as finally accomplished. All this rules out the postmillennial scheme, which sees Christ as coming after this period of kingly rule. It also rules out the amillennial scheme, which sees Christ coming in order to immediately usher in the eternal state. But it describes the premillennial scheme exactly, which sees Christ as coming to bring His kingdom to consummation and then to usher in the eternal state.

Miscellany

Here are some other passages which provide some chronological data for us to consider.

Luke 19:11-27

Luke offers the interpretive clue to this familiar "parable of the pounds" at the outset. Jesus spoke it "because they thought the kingdom of God would immediately appear" (v.11). To correct such misguided thinking concerning the timing of the kingdom, Jesus tells them about a nobleman who went to another country far away in order to receive for himself a kingdom and then to return with his official power to reign. The reference to Archelaus, who had several years earlier travelled to Rome to receive his official power is unmistakable. But it is this that Jesus likens to His own return. Yes, there is a spiritual aspect to the kingdom; and this is precisely what these people had overlooked. We must "occupy until He comes" (v.13), and this is clearly the point of the parable. The fullness of the kingdom will not come immediately; it will come only after the King has gone away for a time. But it will come. And when it does come, His faithful ones will share with Him, in greater or lesser capacities, in His rule over the world (vv.17, 19).

The historical allusion in the story is to Archelaus. But the theology of the kingdom contained in it seems to be informed by Dan.7 or the prophets in general in their anticipation of just such a kingdom. And this anticipation Jesus expressly endorses.

Acts 1:6-7

Just prior to our Lord's ascension, He had been teaching His disciples about this matter of the kingdom (v.3). He then spoke of the soon coming of the Spirit (vv.4-5), an eschatological theme common among the OT prophets and closely associated with the kingdom. It was natural, then, for the disciples to ask, "Will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" (v.6). The "restoration" ( kathistemi; cf. apokatastasis) anticipated was a common one, a hope born out of the OT prophets themselves. Jesus' response was simply that it was not for them "to know the times ( chronos) or seasons ( kairos)" for all this; this is the Father's secret and sovereign will (v.7). Their concern, instead, must be for the intervening period, when they would witness for Him in the Power of the Spirit (v.8).

It is significant that Jesus did not in any way deem the question unwarranted. He did not suggest that they were still blinded by Jewish ideas about a nationalistic kingdom. There is no indication whatever that this hope of theirs should be abandoned. Much to the contrary, Jesus confirms their hope by His affirmation that the timing of the kingdom's restoration to Israel is a matter known only by the Father. Further, it is difficult to miss the final answer to their question provided by the angel: "This same Jesus will return just as you saw Him leave" (v.11). The kingdom will be restored, but not until Christ returns.

This understanding of the passage seems to be the simplest. And it is strengthened by Peter's interpretation of it in Acts 3:19-21. The "times ( kairos) of refreshing" (v.19) and the "times ( chronos) of restoration ( apokatastasis)" (v.21) are expressly linked to the return of Christ (v.20). Peter's continued understanding seems to have been that the kingdom would indeed be restored to Israel when Christ returns.

Romans 11

Next, in Rom.11 Paul speaks at length of the return of Israel to her Messiah. She is set aside for now, but only temporarily (v.11a). The purpose of her temporary set-back is that the gospel may now go to the Gentiles (v.11b). So, Paul reasons, if Israel's temporary rejection means blessing to the world, what measure of blessing will result from her restoration (v.12)? Then he characterizes the situation of the world following Israel's "acceptance" as "life from the dead" (v.15). Some interpreters have taken this to be literal resurrection, and if that is so then premillennialism would fit the scenario better. However, it seems easier to understand Paul's language as metaphorical. But if so, then what is he implying? The program, he says, is 1) Jewish hardening/Gentile blessing; 2) Jewish jealousy/conversion; and 3) unprecedented worldwide blessing ("life from the dead"). This does not fit very well into an amillennial scheme, but it does sound very much like the premillennial one. It sounds like he is describing a universal kingdom in which righteousness dominates. And that, in turn, sounds like Paul's renewed earth anticipated in 8:18-23.

Then there is the further observation that Paul is dealing here with God's purpose in history. This seems to just lie on the surface of chapter 11. The passage speaks of history's restoration, how that history itself will come to glorious fruition. In verse 15 he describes a time of unprecedented world-wide blessing, something we must define in terms of gospel advance at the very least. This (as also the consideration in the preceding paragraph) fits well in either a pre- or a postmillennial scheme. However, verses 25-26 place this restoration after the coming of Christ; hence, premillennialism. But for the amillennialist, this age is never restored but simply ended -- as some have said, "like throwing a brick through a television screen" -- and righteousness will prevail only in the eternal state. This is not at all Paul's outlook; he envisions a happy conclusion to history.

The Resurrections

Then there is the question of the number of future resurrections. Will the just and the unjust be raised together? Or are there separate resurrections for each? As we have seen, both Rev.20 and 1Cor.15 indicate a distinction. But there is more to consider. Dan.12:2 is generally considered the primary OT passage which speaks of the doctrine of resurrection. And here the prophet specifies plainly of distinction. "Many ( rabbim) from (partitive min) those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, these ( 'elleh) to everlasting life, and those ( 'elleh) to shame and everlasting contempt" (my translation). Notice that Daniel specifically states that the resurrection of that day is but partial: "many." Further, it is selective: "many from those who sleep." And it is "these" who go into everlasting life. Granted, the prophet does not here provide any information as to how much time intervenes between the two resurrections, but his statement that the resurrections are separate is plain.

Phil.3:11 presents a similar picture. Paul speaks here of his ambition to "attain to the resurrection of the dead." It would seem on the face of it that if the apostle held to a general resurrection these words are meaningless; his ambition is to be part of the resurrection of the righteous dead.

But there is more. His terminology is precise. Very literally translated, Paul is seeking to attain "the out-resurrection out of the dead" ( ten exanastasin ten ek nekron). The language is without meaning if the resurrection is to be merely a general one. Paul anticipates a selective resurrection, one in which he will be taken "out -- out from among the dead (ones)." The idea of Rev.20:4 cannot be far away.

Conclusion

There are many secondary issues that remain unanswered: the place of Israel, the land, the temple and its sacrifices, etc. But the broad strokes of NT prophecy are clear enough. At Christ's return, He will raise to life those who are His. He will then proceed to bring His kingdom to glorious fruition. When all opposition is finally put down, He will present the perfected kingdom to the Father, and history then will give way to eternity.

Copyright 1996 Fred Zaspel

Amillennialism by Anthony Hoekema

2008-04-17T12:39:00.001-04:00

My discussion of the amillennial understanding of the millennium will include the following topics: the interpretation of the book of Revelation, the interpretation of Revelation 20:1-6, a look at two Old Testament passages commonly viewed as predicting an earthly millennial kingdom, a brief sketch of amillennial eschatology and a summarizing statement of some of the implications of amillennial eschatology.

A word should first be said about terminology. The term amillennialism is not a happy one. It suggests that amillennialists either do not believe in any millennium or that they simply ignore the first six verses of Revelation 20, which speak of a millennial reign. Neither of these two statements is true. Though it is true that amillennialists do not believe in a literal thousand-year earthly reign which will follow the return of Christ, the term amillennialism is not an accurate description of their view. Professor Jay E. Adams of Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia has suggested that the term amillennialism be replaced by the expression realized millennialism.¹ The latter term, to be sure, describes the “amillennial” position more accurately than the usual term, since “amillennialists” believe that the millennium of Revelation 20 is not exclusively future but is now in process of realization. The expression realized millennialism, however, is a rather clumsy one, replacing a simple prefix with a three-syllable word. Despite the disadvantages and limitations of the word, therefore, I shall continue to use the shorter and more common term, amillennialism.

The Interpretation of the Book of Revelation

To see the background for the amillennial view of the millennium, we should first of all concern ourselves with the question of the interpretation of the book of Revelation. Let us assume, for example, that the book of Revelation is to be interpreted in an exclusively futuristic sense, referring only to events that are to happen around or at the time of Christ’s Second Coming. Let us further assume that what is presented in Revelation 20 must necessarily follow, in chronological order, what was described in chapter 19. We are then virtually compelled to believe that the thousand-year reign depicted in 20:4 must come after the return of Christ described in 19:11. But if we see Revelation 20:1-6 as describing what takes place during the entire history of the church, beginning with the first coming of Christ, we will have an understanding of the millennium of Revelation 20 which is quite different from the one just mentioned. For this reason it will be necessary first to say something about the way in which the book of Revelation should be interpreted.

The system of interpretation of the book of Revelation which seems most satisfactory to me (though it is not without its difficulties) is that known as progressive parallelism, ably defended by William Hendriksen in More Than Conquerors, his commentary on Revelation.²According to this view, the book of Revelation consists of seven sections which run parallel to each other, each of which depicts the church and the world from the time of Christ’s first coming to the time of his second. The first of these seven sections is found in chapters 1-3.

John sees the risen and glorified Christ walking in the midst of seven golden lampstands. In obedience to Christ’s command John now proceeds to write letters to each of the seven churches of Asia Minor. The vision of the glorified Christ together with the letters to the seven churches obviously form a unit. As we read these letters we are impressed with two things.

First, there are references to events, people and places of the time when the book of Revelation was written. Second, the principles, commendations and warnings contained in these letters have value for the church of all time. These two observations, in fact, provide a clue for the interpretation of the entire book. Since the book of Revelation was addressed to the church of the first century A.D., its message had reference to events occurring at that time and was therefore meaningful for the Christians of that day. But since the book was also intended for the church through the ages, its message is still relevant for us today.

The second of these seven sections is the vision of the seven seals found in chapters 4-7. John is caught up to heaven and sees God sitting on his radiant throne. He then sees the Lamb that had been slain taking the scroll sealed with seven seals from the hand of the one who was sitting on the throne. The various seals are broken, and various divine judgments on the world are described. In this vision we see the church suffering trial and persecution against the background of the victory of Christ.

The third section, found in chapters 8-11, describes the seven trumpets of judgment. In this vision we see the church avenged, protected and victorious.

The fourth section, chapters 12-14, begins with the vision of the woman giving birth to a son while the dragon waits to devour him as soon as he is born—an obvious reference to the birth of Christ. The rest of the section describes the continued opposition of the dragon (who stands for Satan) to the church. This section also introduces us to the two beasts who are the dragon’s helpers: the beast out of the sea and the beast out of the earth.

The fifth section is found in chapters 15-16. It describes the seven bowls of wrath, thus depicting in a very graphic way the final visitation of God’s wrath on those who remain impenitent.

The sixth section, chapters 17-19, describes the fall of Babylon and of the beasts. Babylon stands for the worldly city — the forces of secularism and godlessness which are in opposition to the kingdom of God. The end of chapter 19 depicts the fall and final punishment of the dragon’s two helpers: the beast out of the sea, and the false prophet, who appears to be identified with the beast out of the earth (see 16:13).

The seventh section, chapters 20-22, narrates the doom of the dragon, thus completing the description of the overthrow of the enemies of Christ. In addition, it describes the final judgment, the final triumph of Christ and his church, and the renewed universe, here called the new heaven and the new earth.

Note that though these seven sections are parallel to each other, they also reveal a certain amount of eschatological progress. The last section, for example, takes us further into the future than the other sections. Although the final judgment has already been announced in 1:7 and has been briefly described in 6:12-17, it is not set forth in full detail until we come to 20:11-15. Though the final joy of the redeemed in the life to come has been hinted at in 7:15-17, it is not until we reach chapter 21 that we find a detailed and elaborate description of the blessedness of life on the new earth (21:1-22:5). Hence this method of interpretation is called progressive parallelism.

There is eschatological progression in these seven sections, not only regarding the individual sections but also regarding the book as a whole. If we grant that the book of Revelation depicts the struggle between Christ and his church on the one hand and the enemies of Christ and the church on the other, we may say that the first half of the book (chapters 1-11) describes the struggle on earth, picturing the church as it is persecuted by the world. The second half of the book, however (chapters 12-22), gives us the deeper spiritual background of this struggle, describing the persecution of the church by the dragon (Satan) and his helpers. In the light of this analysis we see how the last section of the book (chapters 20-22) falls into place. This last section describes the judgment which falls on Satan, and his final doom. Since Satan is the supreme opponent of Christ, it stands to reason that his doom should be narrated last.

The Interpretation of Revelation 20:1-6

We are now ready to proceed to the interpretation of Revelation 20:1-6, the only passage in the Bible which speaks explicitly of a thousand-year reign. Note first that the passage obviously divides itself into two parts: verses 1-3, which describe the binding of Satan; and verses 4-6, which describe the thousand-year reign of souls with Christ.

The premillennial interpretation of these verses sees them as describing a millennial reign of Christ on earth which will occur after his Second Coming. And it is true that the Second Coming of Christ has been referred to in the previous chapter (see 19:11-16). If, then, one thinks of Revelation 20 as describing what follows chronologically after what is described in chapter 19, one would indeed conclude that the millennium of Revelation 20:1-6 will come after the return of Christ.

As has been indicated above, however, chapters 20-22 comprise the last of the seven sections of the book of Revelation and therefore do not describe what follows the return of Christ. Rather, Revelation 20:1 takes us back once again to the beginning of the New Testament era.

That this is the proper interpretation of these verses is clear not only from what has been developed above, but also from the fact that this chapter describes the defeat and final doom of Satan. Surely the defeat of Satan began with the first coming of Christ, as has already been clearly spelled out in chapter 12:7-9. That the millennial reign described in verses 4-6 occurs before the Second Coming of Christ is evident from the fact that the final judgment, described in verses 11-15 of this chapter, is pictured as coming after the thousand-year reign. Not only in the book of Revelation but elsewhere in the New Testament the final judgment is associated with the Second Coming of Christ. (See Revelation 22:12 and the following passages: Mt. 16:27; 25:31-32; Jude 14-15; and especially 2 Thess. 1:7-10.) This being the case, it is obvious that the thousand-year reign of Revelation 20:4-6 must occur before and not after the Second Coming of Christ.

Let us now look closely at Revelation 20:1-6 itself. We begin with verses 1-3, reproduced here from the New International Version:

And I saw an angel coming down out of heaven, having the key to the Abyss and holding in his hand a great chain. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. He threw him into the Abyss, and locked and sealed it over him, to keep him from deceiving the nations any more until the thousand years were ended. After that, he must be set free for a short time.

In these verses we have a description of the binding of Satan. The dragon, here clearly identified as “the devil, Or Satan,” is said to be bound for a thousand years and then cast into a place called “the Abyss.” The purpose of this binding is “to keep him from deceiving the nations any more until the thousand years were ended.”

The book of Revelation is full of symbolic numbers. Obviously the number “thousand” which is used here must not be interpreted in a literal sense. Since the number ten signifies completeness, and since a thousand is ten to the third power, we may think of the expression “a thousand years” as standing for a complete period, a very long period of indeterminate length. In agreement with what was said above about the structure of the book and in the light of verses 7-15 of this very chapter (which describe Satan’s “little season,” the final battle and the final judgment), we may conclude that this thousand-year period extends from Christ’s first coming to just before his Second Coming.

Since the “lake of fire” mentioned in verses 10, 14 and 15 is obviously a description of the place of final punishment, the “Abyss” mentioned in verses 1 and 3 must not be the place of final punishment. The word Abyss should rather be thought of as a figurative description of the way in which Satan’s activities will be curbed during the thousand-year period.

What is meant, then, by the binding of Satan? In Old Testament times, at least in the post-Abrahamic era, all the nations of the world except Israel were, so to speak, under Satan’s rule. At that time the people of Israel were the recipients of God’s special revelation, so that they knew God’s truth about themselves, about their sinfulness, and about the way they could obtain forgiveness and salvation. During this same time, however, the other nations of the world did not know that truth, and were therefore in ignorance and error (see Acts 17:30) — except for an occasional person, family or city which came into contact with God’s special revelation. One could say that during this time these nations were deceived by Satan, as our first parents had been deceived by Satan when they fell into sin in the Garden of Eden.

Just before his ascension, however, Christ gave his disciples his Great Commission: “Go and make disciples of all nations” (Mt. 28:19, NIV). At this point one can well imagine the disciples raising a disturbing question: How can we possibly do this if Satan continues to deceive the nations the way he has in the past? In Revelation 20:1-3 John gives a reassuring answer to this question. Paraphrased, his answer goes something like this: “During the gospel era which has now been ushered in, Satan will not be able to continue deceiving the nations the way he did in the past, for he has been bound. During this entire period, therefore, you, Christ’s disciples, will be able to preach the gospel and make disciples of all nations.”

This does not imply that Satan can do no harm whatever while he is bound. It means only what John says here: While Satan is bound he cannot deceive the nations in such a way as to keep them from learning about the truth of God. Later in the chapter we are told that when the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations of the world to gather them together to fight against and, if possible, to destroy the people of God (verses 7-9). This, however, he cannot do while he is bound. We conclude, then, that the binding of Satan during the gospel age means that, first, he cannot prevent the spread of the gospel, and second, he cannot gather all the enemies of Christ together to attack the church.

Is there any indication in the New Testament that Satan was bound at the time of the first coming of Christ? Indeed there is. When the Pharisees accused Jesus of casting out demons by the power of Satan, Jesus replied, “How can one enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man?” (Mt. 12:29). Interestingly enough, the word used by Matthew to describe the binding of the strong man is the same word used in Revelation 20 to describe the binding of Satan. One could say that Jesus bound the devil when he triumphed over him in the wilderness, refusing to give in to his temptations. Jesus’ casting out of demons, so he teaches us in this passage, was evidence of this triumph. One could counter that the binding of Satan mentioned here is reported in connection with the casting out of demons rather than in connection with the preaching of the gospel. But I would reply that the casting out of demons is an evidence of the presence of the kingdom of God (Mt. 12:28) and that it is precisely because the kingdom of God has come that the gospel can now be preached to all the nations (see Mt. 13:24-30, 47-50).

When the seventy returned from their preaching mission, they said to Jesus, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” Jesus replied, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven” (Lk. 10:17-18, NIV). These words, needless to say, must not be interpreted literally. They must rather be understood to mean that Jesus saw in the works his disciples were doing an indication that Satan’s kingdom had just been dealt a crushing blow — that, in fact, a certain binding of Satan, a certain restriction of his power, had just taken place. In this instance Satan’s fall or binding is associated directly with the missionary activity of Jesus’ disciples.

Another passage which ties in the restriction of Satan’s activities with Christ’s missionary outreach is John 12:31-32:

“Now is the time for judgment on this world; now the prince of this world will be driven out. But I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself’” (NIV). It is interesting to note that the verb here translated “driven out” (ekballo) is derived from the same root as the word used in Revelation 20:3, “He [the angel] threw [ballo] him [Satan] into the Abyss.” Even more important, however, is the observation that Satan’s being “driven out” or “cast out” (RSV) is here associated with the fact that not only Jews but men of all nationalities shall be drawn to Christ as he hangs on the cross.

We see then that the binding of Satan described in Revelation 20:1-3 means that throughout the gospel age in which we now live the influence of Satan, though certainly not annihilated, is so curtailed that he cannot prevent the spread of the gospel to the nations of the world. Because of the binding of Satan during this present age, the nations cannot conquer the church, but the church is conquering the nations.³

We go on now to verses 4-6, the passage dealing with the thousand-year reign. In the New International Version, these verses read,

I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years. (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy are those who have part in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years.

We noted previously that verses 1-3 speak of a “thousand-year” period. We now observe that verses 4-6 also refer to a period of a thousand years. Though it is possible to understand the “thousand years” of verses 4-6 as describing a period of time different from the “thousand years” of verses 1-3, there is no compelling reason why we should do so. We may therefore safely assume that verses 1-3 and verses 4-6 concern the same “thousand-year” period. That period, as we saw, spans the entire New Testament dispensation, from the time of the first coming of Christ to just before the time of Christ’s Second Coming.

Let us now take a closer look at verse 4: “I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge.” The first question we must face here is, Where are these thrones? Leon Morris points out that in the book of Revelation the word “throne” is used forty-seven times and that all but three of these thrones (2:13; 13:2; 16:10) appear to be in heaven.⁴When we add to this consideration the fact that John sees “the souls of those who had been beheaded,” we are confirmed in the conclusion that the locale of John’s vision has now shifted to heaven. We may say then that whereas the thousand-year period described in these six verses is the same throughout, verses 1-3 describe what happens on earth during this time, and verses 4-6 depict what happens in heaven.

John sees those who had been given authority to judge (literally, those to whom judgment had been given) sitting on thrones. The book of Revelation is much concerned about matters of justice, particularly for persecuted Christians. It is therefore highly significant that in John’s vision those sitting on thrones are given authority to judge. John’s description of them as “sitting on thrones” is a concrete way of expressing the thought that they are reigning with Christ (see the last part of v. 4). Apparently this reigning includes the authority to make judgments. Whether this means simply agreeing with and being thankful for the judgments made by Christ, or whether it means that those sitting on the thrones are given the opportunity to make their own judgments about earthly matters, we are not told. In any event the reigning with Christ described here apparently includes having some part in Christ’s judging activity (see Dan. 7:22).

We ask next, Who are seated on these thrones? The answer is given in the rest of the verse: “And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Jesus and because of the word of God.” Since John tells us that he saw “the souls of those who had been beheaded,” it is quite clear that he is not talking about people who are still living on the earth. Sometimes, to be sure, the word here rendered “souls,” psuchai, may be used to describe people who are still living on the earth — as, for example, in Acts 2:41: “And there were added that day about three thousand souls.” But in Revelation 20:4 this meaning of the word psuchai will not work. One cannot translate tas psuchas ton pepelekismenon as “the people of those who had been beheaded,” or as “the men of those who had been beheaded.” Here the word psuchai must denote the souls of people who had died. This text is, in fact, a kind of parallel to an earlier passage in Revelation 6:9: “When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained.”

If one should ask how John could see the souls of those who had died, the answer is, John saw all this in a vision. One could just as well ask, How could John see an angel laying hold of the devil and binding him for a thousand years?

John sees the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Jesus and because of the word of God. In other words, he sees the souls of the martyrs — believers who had suffered martyrs’ deaths because of their faithfulness to Christ. When John wrote Revelation, many Christians were being martyred for their faith. Needless to say, the vision here recorded would bring great comfort to the relatives and friends of these martyrs: John sees their souls as now sitting on thrones in heaven, taking part in the work of judging.

“They had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands.” The New International Version renders these words as if they were a further description of the martyrs referred to in the preceding clause. There is, however, another possibility — the possibility conveyed by the translation found in the American Standard Version: “and such as worshiped not the beast, neither his image, and received not the mark upon their forehead and upon their hand.” Earlier in the book unbelieving opponents of Christ and his kingdom were described as those who worship the beast or his image and who receive the mark of the beast on their foreheads or on their hands (see 13:8, 15-17; 14:9-11). Conversely, believers who remained faithful to their Lord are described as those who were victorious over the beast (15:2) or who did not worship the beast or his image (13:15). I take it, therefore, that in the clause we are now considering John is describing a wider group than just the martyrs. By “those who had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received his mark” John means all Christians who had remained true to Christ and had resisted anti-Christian powers — all Christians, in other words, who had remained faithful to the end. Those who had died a martyr’s death would constitute a part of this group but not the whole group. (Though John does not here specifically speak of “souls,” we may safely assume that he is still talking about the souls of believers who have died, since he began by speaking about the souls of the martyrs who had been slain.)

Now follow the most controversial words in the passage: “They came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years.” Premillennial interpreters, whether dispensational or non-dispensational, understand these words as referring to a literal resurrection from the dead, and therefore find in this passage proof for a thousand-year reign of Christ on earth, after his Second Coming. Is this the correct interpretation of the passage?

It must be granted that the Greek word rendered “came to life,” ezesan, can refer to a physical resurrection (see, for example, Mt. 9:18; Rom. 14:9; 2 Cor. 13:4; Rev. 2:8). The question is, however, whether this is what the word means here.

That John is speaking of a kind of resurrection here is apparent from the second sentence of verse 5: “This is the first resurrection” — words which obviously refer to the living and reigning with Christ of verse 4. But is this “first resurrection” a physical resurrection — a raising of the body from the dead? Obviously not, since the raising of the body from the dead is mentioned later in the chapter as something distinct from what is described here (see vv. 11-13). Only if one believes in two bodily resurrections — one of believers at the beginning of the millennium and another of unbelievers after the millennium — will one be able to understand the ezesan of verse 4 as referring to a bodily resurrection. Since the Scriptures elsewhere clearly teach only one bodily resurrection which will include both believers and unbelievers (see Jn. 5:28-29; Acts 24:15), what is described in the last clause of verse 4 must be something other than the physical or bodily resurrection which is yet to come.

What is meant, then, by the words “they came to life and reigned with Christ a thousand years”? The clue has already been given in verse 4a. There John said, “I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge.” The rest of the verse makes plain that those sitting on the thrones were the souls of people who had died — martyrs for the faith and other Christians who had remained true to Christ to the very end of their lives. This is the group which John sees as “living and reigning with Christ.” Though these believers have died, John sees them as alive, not in the bodily sense, but in the sense that they are enjoying life in heaven in fellowship with Christ. This life is a life of great happiness (see Paul’s words in Phil. 1:23 and 2 Cor. 5:8). It is a life in which they sit on thrones, sharing in the reign of Christ over all things, even sharing in his judging activity! This heavenly reigning is a fulfillment of a promise recorded earlier in the book: “To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne” (3:21, NIV).

We can appreciate the significance of this vision when we remember that in John’s time the church was sorely oppressed and frequently persecuted. It would be of great comfort to those believers to know that though many of their fellow Christians had died, some even having been cruelly executed as martyrs, these deceased fellow believers were now actually alive in heaven as far as their souls were concerned — living and reigning with Christ. This living and reigning with Christ, John goes on to say, shall continue throughout the thousand years — that is, throughout the entire gospel era, until Christ shall come again to raise the bodies of these believers from the grave.

There is no indication in these verses that John is describing an earthly millennial reign. The scene, as we saw, is set in heaven. Nothing is said in verses 4-6 about the earth, about Palestine as the center of this reign or about the Jews.⁵ The thousand-year reign of Revelation 20:4 is a reign with Christ in heaven of the souls of believers who have died. This reign is not something to be looked for in the future; it is going on now, and will be until Christ returns. Hence the term realized millennialism is an apt description of the view here defended — if it be remembered that the millennium in question is not an earthly but a heavenly one.

The next sentence, verse 5a, is of a parenthetical nature, and is therefore properly put between parentheses in the New International Version: “The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.” I have already given the reason why I do not believe that these words describe a bodily resurrection which is to take place after the millennium. The word ezesan (“lived” or “came to life”) as it is used in this sentence must mean the same thing that it meant in the preceding sentence. John is here speaking about the unbelieving dead — the “rest of the dead,” in distinction from the believing dead whom he has just been describing. When he says that the rest of the dead did not live or come to life, he means the exact opposite of what he had just said about the believing dead. The unbelieving dead, he is saying, did not live or reign with Christ during this thousand-year period. Whereas believers after death enjoy a new kind of life in heaven with Christ in which they share in Christ’s reign, unbelievers after death share nothing of either this life or this reign.

That this is true throughout the thousand-year period is indicated by the words, “until the thousand years were ended.” The Greek word here translated “until,” achri, means that what is said here held true during the entire length of the thousand-year period. The use of the word until does not imply that these unbelieving dead will live and reign with Christ after this period has ended. If this were the case, we would have expected a clear statement to this effect. (For an example of this kind of statement, see Rev. 20:3.) Rather, what happens to the unbelieving dead after the thousand years have ended is what is called in verse 6 “the second death.” When it is said in verse 6 that the “second death” has no power over the believing dead, it is implied that the “second death” does have power over the unbelieving dead. What is meant by “the second death”? Verse 14 explains: “This is the second death, even the lake of fire” (ASV). The second death, then, means everlasting punishment after the resurrection of the body. As far as the unbelieving dead are concerned, therefore, there will be a change after the thousand years have ended, but it will be a change not for the better but for the worse.

Now John goes on to say, “This is the first resurrection.” These words depict what has happened to the believing dead whom John was describing at the end of verse 4, previous to the parenthetical statement just discussed. In the light of what was said above, we must understand these words as describing not a bodily resurrection but rather the transition from physical death to life in heaven with Christ. This transition is here called a “resurrection” — an unusual use of the word, to be sure, but perfectly understandable against the background of the preceding context. The expression “the first resurrection” implies that there will indeed be a “second resurrection” for these believing dead — the resurrection of the body which will take place when Christ returns at the end of the thousand-year period.

John now says, in verse 6, “Blessed and holy are those who have part in the first resurrection.” The next words give the reason for this blessedness: “The second death has no power over them.” The second death, as we saw, means eternal punishment. These words about the second death imply that the “first resurrection” which John has just mentioned is not a bodily resurrection. For if believers should here be thought of as having been physically raised, with glorified bodies, they would already be enjoying the full and total bliss of the life to come, and it would not need to be said that over them the second death has no power.

“But they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years” (v. 6b). During this entire thousand-year period, therefore, the believing dead shall worship God and Christ as priests and shall reign with Christ as kings. Though John is here thinking only about the thousand-year period which extends until Christ returns, the closing chapters of the book of Revelation indicate that after Christ’s return and after the resurrection of the body these believing dead shall be able to worship God, serve God and reign with Christ in an even richer way than they are now doing. They shall then worship and serve God throughout all eternity in sinless perfection with glorified bodies on the new earth.

This, then, is the amillennial interpretation of Revelation 20:1-6. So understood, the passage says nothing about an earthly reign of Christ over a primarily Jewish kingdom. Rather, it describes the reigning with Christ in heaven of the souls of believers who have died. They reign during the time between their death and Christ’s Second Coming.

The Interpretation of Old Testament Prophecy

There is a basic difference in the method of biblical interpretation employed by premillennialists and amillennialists. Premillennialists, particularly those of dispensationalist persuasion, are committed to what is commonly called the “literal’ interpretation of Old Testament prophecy. John F. Walvoord, a prominent spokesman for the dispensational premillennial viewpoint, defines the hermeneutical method of this school of interpretation:

The premillennial position is that the Bible should be interpreted in its ordinary grammatical and historical meaning in all areas of theology unless contextual or theological reasons make it clear that this was not intended by the writer.¹

In his discussion of this principle Walvoord admits that sometimes an Old Testament passage contains indications that certain parts of it are not to be interpreted literally but figuratively — for example, the “rod of his mouth” with which Christ is said to smite the earth in Isaiah 11:4.²

Amillennialists, on the other hand, believe that though many Old Testament prophecies are indeed to be interpreted literally, many others are to be interpreted in a non-literal way.³In the abstract, an amillennialist might agree with the definition of the premillennial hermeneutical method given by Walvoord. The difference between an amillennial and a premillennial interpreter comes out when each tries to indicate which prophecies must be interpreted literally and which prophecies are to be interpreted in a non-literal sense. On this question there would be wide divergence of opinion.

There is no space in this short chapter to go into these differences of interpretation in depth. It will be helpful, however, for us to take a brief look at two Old Testament passages which are commonly understood by premillennialists as picturing a future earthly millennial reign. When we do so we shall see that the premillennial interpretation of these two representative passages is by no means the only possible one.

Let us look first of all at Isaiah 11:6-9 as rendered by the New Scofield Bible:

The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together. And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the nursing child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the adder’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.⁴

In the New Scofield Bible of 1967 the heading above Isaiah 11, which covers verses 1-10, reads, “Davidic kingdom to be restored by Christ: its character and extent.” A footnote to verse 1 reads, “This chapter is a prophetic picture of the glory of the future kingdom, which will be set up when David’s Son returns in glory.” It is obvious, therefore, that the New Scofield Bible interprets this passage as describing the future millennial age.

John F. Walvoord, a representative contemporary premillennialist, shares this interpretation of the chapter:

Isaiah 11 paints the graphic picture of the reign of Christ on earth, a scene which cannot be confused with the present age, the intermediate state, or the eternal state if interpreted in any normal literal sense. As presented it describes the millennial earth. . . . The description [found in this chapter] . . . describes animals such as wolves, lambs, leopards, kids, calves, young lions, all of which are creatures of earth and not of heaven, and further pictures them in a time of tranquility such as only can apply to the millennial earth.’⁵

It can easily be understood that if a person believes in a future earthly millennium, he will see that millennium described in these verses. Such an interpretation is, however, by no means the only possible one. We know that the Bible predicts that at the end of time there will be a new earth (see, for example, Is. 65:17; 66:22; Rev. 2 1:1). Why may we not therefore understand the details found in these verses as descriptions of life on the new earth?⁶ This is particularly likely in view of the sweeping panoramic vision conveyed by verse 9: “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.” Why should these words have to be thought of as applying only to a thousand-year period preceding the new earth? Do they not picture the final perfection of God’s creation?

The other Old Testament passage I should like to adduce in this connection is Isaiah 65:17-25, also quoted from the New Scofield Bible:

(17) For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. (18) But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy. (19) And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people; and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying. (20) There shall be no more in it an infant of days, nor an old man that bath not filled his days; for the child shall die an hundred years old, but the sinner, being an hundred years old, shall be accursed. (21) And they shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. (22) They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat; for like the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands. (23) They shall not labor in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of the LORD, and their offspring with them. (24) And it shall come to pass that, before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. (25) The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock, and dust shall be the serpent’s food. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.

In the New Scofield Bible the heading above verse 17 reads, “New heavens and new earth.” The heading above verses 18-25, however, reads, “Millennial conditions in the renewed earth with curse removed.” It would appear that the editors of this Bible, while compelled to admit that verse 17 describes the final new earth, restrict the meaning of verses 18-25 so as to make them refer only to the millennium which is to precede the final new earth. Walvoord, in similar fashion, understands Isaiah 65:17-19 as describing the eternal state⁷ and verses 20-25 of this chapter as describing conditions during the millennium.⁸

Once again it may be observed that if one does not believe in a future earthly millennium, he will certainly not be compelled to accept it by the reading of these verses. If, however, one does believe in such a millennium, he may very well find it described here. But in order to do so he will have to overcome a rather serious exegetical obstacle.

One can find a description of the millennium in this passage only by deliberately overlooking what we find in verses 17-18. Verse 17 speaks unambiguously about the new heavens and the new earth (which the book of Revelation depicts as marking the final state). Verse 18 calls upon the reader to “rejoice forever” — not just for a thousand years — in the new heavens and new earth just referred to. Isaiah is not speaking here about a newness which will last no longer than a thousand years but about an everlasting newness! What follows in verse 19 is linked directly with the preceding: “And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people; and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of crying” (see Rev. 21:4). There is no indication whatever that at this point, or at either verse 18 or 20, Isaiah is suddenly shifting to a description of a millennial age preceding the creation of the new heavens and new earth!

In verse 25, in fact, we have a description of the animal world which reminds us of the picture of the final state found in Isaiah 11. At the end of this verse we hear an echo of what is found in 11:9, “They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.”⁹ Truly a beautiful description of the new earth! One will see a millennium here only if he has previously put on his millennial glasses!

Brief Sketch of Amillennial Eschatology

A common criticism of amillennial eschatology is that it is too negative, spending its strength primarily in opposing and refuting eschatological systems with which it does not agree. Leaving aside the question of whether this criticism is true or false, I would like at this point to counteract the negativism of some amillennial eschatologies by sketching briefly some positive affirmations made by amillennialist theologians. In this way we shall be able to see amillennial eschatology in its totality, rather than just as a certain interpretation of the millennium of Revelation 20.

This sketch will cover two areas: first, what amillennial eschatology teaches with regard to inaugurated eschatology, and, second, what it teaches with reference to future eschatology. By inaugurated eschatology I mean that aspect of eschatology which is already present now, during the gospel era. The term inaugurated eschatology is preferred to realized eschatology because, while the former term does full justice to the fact that the great eschatological incision into history has already been made, it does not rule out a further development and final consummation of eschatology in the future. When we speak of “inaugurated eschatology” we are saying that for the New Testament believer significant eschatological events have already begun to happen while other eschatological occurrences still lie in the future.

As regards inaugurated eschatology, then, amillennialism affirms the following:

1. Christ has won the decisive victory over sin, death and Satan. By living a sinless life and by dying on the cross as the sacrifice of atonement for our sin, Christ defeated sin. By undergoing death and then victoriously rising from the grave, Christ defeated death. By resisting the devil’s temptations, by perfectly obeying God, and by his death and resurrection, Christ delivered a deathblow to Satan and his evil hosts. This victory of Christ’s was decisive and final. The most important day in history, therefore, is not the Second Coming of Christ which is still future but the first coming which lies in the past. Because of the victory of Christ, the ultimate issues of history have already been decided. It is now only a question of time until that victory is brought to its final consummation.

2. The kingdom of God is both present and future. Amillennialists do not believe that the kingdom of God is primarily a Jewish kingdom which involves the literal restoration of the throne of David. Nor do they believe that because of the unbelief of the Jews of his day Christ postponed the establishment of the kingdom to the time of his future earthly millennial reign. Amillennialists believe that the kingdom of God was founded by Christ at the time of his sojourn on earth, is operative in history now and is destined to be revealed in its fullness in the life to come. They understand the kingdom of God to be the reign of God dynamically active in human history through Jesus Christ. Its purpose is to redeem God’s people from sin and from demonic powers, and finally to establish the new heavens and the new earth. The kingdom of God means nothing less than the reign of God in Christ over his entire created universe.

The kingdom of God is therefore both a present reality and a future hope. Jesus clearly taught that the kingdom was already present during his earthly ministry: “But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Mt. 12:28, NIV). When the Pharisees asked Jesus when the kingdom of God was coming, he replied, “The kingdom of God is not coming with signs to be observed; nor will they say, `Lo, here it is!’ or `There!’ for behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you” (Lk. 17:20-21). But Jesus also taught that there was a sense in which the kingdom of God was still future, both in specific sayings (Mt. 7:21-23; 8:11-12) and in eschatological parables (such as those of the Marriage Feast, the Tares, the Talents, the Wise and Foolish Virgins). Paul also makes statements describing the kingdom as both present (Rom. 14:17; 1 Cor. 4:19-20; Col. 1:13-14) and future (1 Cor. 6:9; Gal. 5:21; Eph. 5:5; 2 Tim. 4:18).

The fact that the kingdom of God is present in one sense and future in another implies that we who are the subjects of that kingdom live in a kind of tension between the “already” and the “not yet.” We are already in the kingdom, and yet we look forward to the full manifestation of that kingdom; we already share its blessings, and yet we await its total victory. Because the exact time when Christ will return is not known, the church must live with a sense of urgency, realizing that the end of history may be very near. At the same time, however, the church must continue to plan and work for a future on this present earth which may still last a long time.

Meanwhile, the kingdom of God demands of us all total commitment to Christ and his cause. We must see all of life and all of reality in the light of the goal of the redemption not just of individuals but of the entire universe. This implies, as Abraham Kuyper, the renowned Dutch theologian and statesman, once said, that there is not a thumb-breadth of the universe about which Christ does not say, “It is mine.”

This total commitment further implies a Christian philosophy of history: All of history must be seen as the working out of God’s eternal purpose. This kingdom vision includes a Christian philosophy of culture: Art and science, reflecting as they do the glory of God, are to be pursued for his praise. The vision of the kingdom also includes a Christian view of vocation: All callings are from God, and all that we do in everyday life is to be done to God’s praise, whether this be study, teaching, preaching, business, industry or housework.

A common source of tension among evangelicals today is the question of whether the church should be primarily concerned with evangelism or social and political action. A proper kingdom vision, it seems to me, will help us to keep our balance on this question. Needless to say, evangelism — bringing people into the kingdom of God — is one of the essential tasks of the church. But since the kingdom of God demands total commitment, the church must also be vitally concerned about the implementation of Christian principles in every area of life, including the political and the social. Evangelism and social concern, therefore, must never be thought of as options between which Christians may make a choice; both are essential to full-orbed kingdom obedience.

3. Though the last day is still future, we are in the last days now.

This aspect of eschatology, which is often neglected in evangelical circles, is an essential part of the New Testament message. When I say, “we are in the last days now,” I understand the expression “the last days” not merely as referring to the time just before Christ’s return, but as a description of the entire era between Christ’s first and second comings. New Testament writers were conscious of the fact that they were already living in the last days at the time they were speaking or writing. This was specifically stated by Peter in his sermon on the day of Pentecost when he quoted Joel’s prophecy about the pouring out of the Spirit upon all flesh in the last days (Acts 2:16-17). He was thus saying in effect, “We are now in the last days predicted by the prophet Joel.” Paul made the same point when he described believers of his day as those “upon whom the end of the ages has come” (1 Cor. 10:11). And the Apostle John told his readers that they were already living in “the last hour” (1 Jn. 2:18). In the light of these New Testament teachings, we may indeed speak of an inaugurated eschatology, while remembering that the Bible also speaks of a final consummation of eschatological events in what John commonly calls “the last day” (Jn. 6:39-40, 44,54; 11:24; 12:48).

The fact that we are living in the last days now implies that we are already tasting the beginnings of eschatological blessings—that, as Paul says, we already have “the first fruits of the Spirit” (Rom. 8:23). This means that we who are believers are to see ourselves not as impotent sinners who are helpless in the face of temptation but as new creatures in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17), as temples of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 6:19) and as those who have decisively crucified the flesh (Gal. 5:24), put off the old self and put on the new (Col. 3:9-10). All this involves having an image of ourselves which is primarily positive rather than negative. It also involves seeing fellow Christians as those who are in Christ with us and for whom we should therefore thank God.¹

4. As far as the thousand years of Revelation 20 are concerned, we are in the millennium now. Earlier in the chapter evidence was given for the position that the thousand years of Revelation 20 extend from the first coming of Christ to just before his Second Coming, when Satan will be loosed for a short time. The amillennial position on the thousand years of Revelation 20 implies that Christians who are now living are enjoying the benefits of this millennium since Satan has been bound for the duration of this period. As we saw, the fact that Satan is now bound does not mean that he is not active in the world today but that during this period he cannot deceive the nations — that is, cannot prevent the spread of the gospel. The binding of Satan during this era, in other words, makes missions and evangelism possible. This fact should certainly be a source of encouragement to the church on earth.

Amillennialists also teach that during this same thousand-year period the souls of believers who have died are now living and reigning with Christ in heaven while they await the resurrection of the body. Their state is therefore a state of blessedness and happiness, though their joy will not be complete until their bodies have been raised. This teaching should certainly bring comfort to those whose dear ones have died in the Lord.

As regards future eschatology, amillennialism affirms the following:

1. The “signs of the times” have both present and future relevance. Amillennialists believe that the return of Christ will be preceded by certain signs: for example, the preaching of the gospel to all the nations, the conversion of the fullness of Israel, the great apostasy, the great tribulation and the coming of the Antichrist. These signs, however, must not be thought of as referring exclusively to the time just preceding Christ’s return. They have been present in some sense from the very beginning of the Christian era²and are present now.’³ This means that we must always be ready for the Lord’s return and that we may never in our thoughts push the return of Christ off into the far-distant future.

Amillennialists also believe, however, that these “signs of the times” will have a climactic final fulfillment just before Christ returns. This fulfillment will not take the form of phenomena which are totally new but will rather be an intensification of signs which have been present all along.

2. The Second Coming of Christ will be a single event. Amillennialists find no scriptural basis for the dispensationalist division of the Second Coming into two phases (sometimes called the parousia and the revelation), with a seven-year period in between. We understand Christ’s return as being a single event.

3. At the time of Christ’s return, there will be a general resurrection, both of believers and unbelievers. Amillennialists reject the common premillennial teaching that the resurrection of believers and that of unbelievers will be separated by a thousand years. They also reject the view of many dispensationalists that there will be as many as three or four resurrections (since, in addition to the two resurrections just mentioned, dispensationalists also teach that there will be a resurrection of tribulation saints and a resurrection of believers who died during the millennium). We see no scriptural evidence for such multiple resurrections.⁴

4. After the resurrection, believers who are then still alive shall suddenly be transformed and glorified. The basis for this teaching is what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:51-52: “Listen, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed—in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed” (NIV).

5. The “rapture” of all believers now takes place. Believers who have just been raised from the dead, together with living believers who have just been transformed, are now caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air (1 Thess. 4:17). That there will be such a “rapture” the Bible clearly teaches. But I have put the word rapture between quotation marks in order to distinguish the amillennial conception of the rapture from the dispensationalist view. Dispensationalists teach that after the rapture the entire church will be taken up to heaven for a period of seven years while those still on earth are undergoing the great tribulation.

Amillennialists see no scriptural evidence for such a seven-year period or for a transference of the church from earth to heaven during that period. Risen and glorified bodies of believers do not belong in heaven but on the earth. The word translated “to meet” in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 (apantesis) is a technical term used in the days of the New Testament to describe a public welcome given by a city to a visiting dignitary. People would ordinarily leave the city to meet the distinguished visitor and then go back with him into the city.⁵ On the basis of the analogy conveyed by this word, all Paul is saying here is that raised and transformed believers are caught up in the clouds to meet the descending Lord, implying that after this meeting they will go back with him to the earth.

6. Now follows the final judgment. Whereas dispensationalists commonly teach that there will be at least three separate judgments, amillennialists do not agree. The latter see scriptural evidence for only one Day of Judgment which will occur at the time of Christ’s return. All men must then appear before the judgment seat of Christ.

The purpose of the final judgment is not primarily to determine the final destiny of men since by that time that final destiny has already been determined for all men except those still living at the time of Christ’s return. Rather, the judgment will have a threefold purpose: First, it will reveal the glorification of God in the final destiny assigned to each person; second, it will indicate finally and publicly the great antithesis of history between the people of God and the enemies of God; and third, it will reveal the degree of reward or the degree of punishment which each shall receive.

7. After the judgment the final state is ushered in. Unbelievers and all those who have rejected Christ shall spend eternity in hell, whereas believers will enter into everlasting glory on the new earth. The concept of the new earth is so important for biblical eschatology that we should give it more than a passing thought. Many Christians think of themselves as spending eternity in some ethereal heaven while the Bible plainly teaches us that there will be a new earth. When the book of Revelation tells us that the holy city, the new Jerusalem, will come down from heaven to the new earth (21:2), that God will now have his dwelling with men (21:3) and that the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the new Jerusalem (22:3), it is teaching us in figurative language that in the life to come heaven and earth will no longer be separated but will have merged. In the final state, therefore, glorified believers will be both in heaven and on the new earth, since the two shall then be one.

When one keeps the vision of the new earth clearly in mind, many biblical teachings begin to form a significant pattern. As we have seen, the resurrection of the body calls for a new earth. The cosmic significance of the work of Christ implies that the curse which came upon creation because of man’s sin (Gen. 3:17-19) shall some day be removed (Rom. 8:19-22); this renewal of creation means that there will indeed be a new earth. The Bible also contains specific promises about the new earth. We have already looked at Isaiah’s prediction of the new earth in 65:17 (see 66:22). Jesus promised that the meek shall inherit the earth (Mt. 5:5). Peter speaks of new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness shall dwell (2 Pet. 3:13). And the elders and living creatures whom John sees in the heavenly vision recorded in Revelation 5 sing a song of praise to the victorious Lamb which includes these words, “You have made them [those whom you purchased with your blood] to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth” (Rev. 5:10, NIV).⁶

In the light of biblical teaching about the new earth, many Old Testament prophecies about the land of Canaan and about the future of the people of God fall into place. From the fourth chapter of the book of Hebrews we learn that Canaan was a type of the Sabbath-rest of the people of God in the life to come. From Paul’s letter to the Galatians we learn that all those who are in Christ are included in the seed of Abraham (Gal. 3:29). When we read Genesis 17:8 (“And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land of thy sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God” [ASV]) with this understanding of the New Testament broadening of these concepts, we see in it a promise of the new earth as the everlasting possession of all the people of God, not just of the physical descendants of Abraham. And when, in the light of this New Testament teaching, we now read Amos 9:15 (“And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be plucked up out of their land which 1 have given them, saith Jehovah thy God” [ASV]), we do not feel compelled to restrict the meaning of these words to national Israel and the land of Palestine. We understand them to be a prediction of the eternal dwelling of all God’s people, Gentiles as well as Jews, on the new earth of which Canaan was a type. Amillennialists therefore feel no need for positing an earthly millennium to provide for the fulfillment of prophecies of this sort; they see such prophecies as pointing to the glorious eternal future which awaits all the people of God.

When premillennialists therefore charge amillennialists with teaching a future kingdom which is only spiritual and which has nothing to do with the earth, they are not representing the amillennial view correctly. Amillennialists believe that Old Testament prophecies which predict that the land of promise shall be the everlasting possession of the people of God, that the wolf shall dwell with the lamb and that the earth shall be as full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea, shall be fulfilled not just for a thousand-year period but for all eternity! This interpretation, we believe, gives us a richer, wider and more relevant understanding of those prophecies than that which restricts their meaning to a description of an earthly millennium which shall precede the final state.

Some Implications of Amillennial Eschatology

What, in conclusion, are some of the implications of amillennial eschatology for our theological understanding? Let me mention four of them:

1. What binds the Old and New Testaments together is the unity of the covenant of grace. Amillennialists do not believe that sacred history is to be divided into a series of distinct and disparate dispensations but see a single covenant of grace running through all of that history. This covenant of grace is still in effect today and will culminate in the eternal dwelling together of God and his redeemed people on the new earth.

2. The kingdom of God is central in human history. That kingdom was predicted and prepared for in Old Testament times, was established on earth by Jesus Christ, was extended and expanded both in New Testament times and during the subsequent history of the church, and will finally be consummated in the life to come.

3. Jesus Christ is the Lord of history. This means that all of history is under Christ’s control and will ultimately prove to have been subservient to his purpose. We must therefore be concerned not just with enjoying the blessings of our salvation but also with joyfully serving Christ as Lord in every area of our lives.

4. All of history is moving toward a goal: the total redemption of the universe. History is not meaningless but meaningful. Though we are not always able to discern the meaning of each historical event, we know what the ultimate outcome of history will be. We eagerly look forward to the new earth as part of a renewed universe in which God’s good creation will realize finally and totally the purpose for which he called it into existence: the glorification of his name.

All this implies that regarding world history, amillennialists adopt a position of sober or realistic optimism. Belief in the present rule of Christ, in the presence of God’s kingdom and in the movement of history toward its goal is accompanied by a realistic recognition of the presence of sin in this world and of the growing development of the kingdom of evil. Amillennial eschatology looks for a culmination of apostasy and tribulation in the final emergence of a personal Antichrist before Christ comes again. Amillennialists do not expect to see the perfect society realized during this present age.

Yet, since we know that the victory of Christ over evil was decisive and that Christ is now on the throne, the dominant mood of amillennial eschatology is optimism — Christian optimism. This means that we view no world crisis as totally beyond help and no social trend as absolutely irreversible. It means that we live in hope — a hope that is built on faith and that expresses itself in love.

Amillennial eschatology, therefore, gives us a realistic, yet basically optimistic world-and-life view. It is an eschatology which is exciting, exhilarating and challenging. It is an eschatology which gives us an inspiring vision of the lordship of Christ over history and of the ultimate triumph of his kingdom.

Issues in Hermeneutics - The Conservative Defense of Redaction Criticism: entry #6

2008-04-14T13:07:00.002-04:00

The following article in full appeared in the Protestant Reformed Theological Journals of April and November, 1990, and April and November, 1991. Prof. Herman C. Hanko is professor in the Protestant Reformed Seminary in Grandville, Michigan.

The question is: How do those who support this method of biblical interpretation square it with their commitment to infallible and inerrant inspiration?

While repeatedly assuring us that they indeed do believe in infallible inspiration, a discussion of this question is not easy to find in their writings. The answer we give, therefore, is, at least in part, our own deductions from what they write.

The argument goes something like this. The church has, from a time very early in the history of the New Testament period, adopted what has been called the "grammatico-historical" method of exegesis. It was first developed by the school in Antioch, practiced by such great preachers as Chrysostom with more or less consistency, firmly maintained by the Reformers and followed by all the great preachers in the Presbyterian and Reformed traditions. It was a method of exegesis which was developed out of the character of Scripture itself. Scripture is, though divinely inspired, a book which was written in human language (the Hebrew of the nation of Israel and the Greek spoken in the world of Christ and the apostles) by human authors for particular and definite purposes. The Psalms were written to be sung in the worship of God in the temple; the letters of Paul were written to historical churches or persons with problems which Paul ad-dressed. Galatians, e.g., was written to the churches in Eastern Asia Minor to combat errors of Judaism which threatened the truth of salvation through the cross of Christ alone. Not only was the language used the common language of the people of the time in which Scripture was written, but the whole setting of Scripture reflects the culture of these times. For example, Jesus, in His parable of the four kinds of soil, spoke of broadcasting seed as it was then done, not as it is done today with tractors and multi-row planters. Furthermore, because God used men to write the Scriptures. God used men in such a way that their own personality was indelibly impressed upon their writings. Isaiah's soaring prophecies reflect his personality; Paul's close argumentation differs markedly from John's intuitive gifts; David's poetic soul produced poetry of unparalleled beauty, and it is inconceivable that he could write the down-to-earth prophecy of Amos, the herdsman from Tekoa.

And there is more. The men whom God used were not mere automatons who simply wrote by dictation, almost always penning ideas and stories of which they had no knowledge other than through divine inspiration. John was, as he himself testifies, an eyewitness of everything which he wrote. Matthew could very well have consulted the genealogies in the records of Bethlehem in order to construct the genealogy of our Lord which he included in his gospel account. Luke who had no firsthand knowledge of the events of Jesus' life may very well have received some knowledge of the events which he records from others.

Because all this is true, so the argument goes, it is not only legitimate but very essential to know and understand all these things in order to come to a proper understanding of Scripture. One can hardly preach, e.g., on the text, "Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean" (Psalm 51:7) unless he has also some knowledge of the hyssop plant which was native to Palestine. The grammatico-historical method of exegesis, so long in use in the church and accepted by every orthodox theologian throughout the entire new dispensation, implies that Scripture be interpreted by taking all these things into account. Redaction criticism, if rightly understood and not abused by those who are not committed to destructive criticism which denies infallible inspiration, is nothing else but a more exact application of what is meant by the time-honored method of exegesis called the grammatico-historical method.

In fact, so the argument goes, if you repudiate redaction criticism or literary-historical criticism, you are ipso facto committing yourself to a theory of inspiration which denies the great truth that God used men in writing of this magnificent book. You are committing yourself to a dictation theory of inspiration which fails to do justice to what kind of a book Scripture actually is. And, worst of all, you are becoming guilty of the horrendous sin of bibliolatry.

Because, therefore, the grammatico-historical method of exegesis has a long and noble history, because every orthodox theologian of all time has used it, because it alone does justice to the obvious character of Scripture as written by human men, it is that method of biblical interpretation which leads to a correct understanding of Scripture. Redaction criticism is no different essentially from the grammatico-historical method of exegesis. It simply applies the revered grammatico-historical method in some detail. Redaction criticism is the only justifiable way to engage in biblical interpretation.

So goes the defense of redaction criticism.

Appropriate Words

2008-04-08T14:14:00.004-04:00

Appropriate Words

Originally taken from the Girl Talk Blog.

We've been studying words this week from a message my dad gave on Ephesians 4:29 entitled "Encourage." We've learned that we are to put away all corrupting talk and instead speak edifying words. But not only should our words be edifying, they should also be "appropriate" or as it says in verse 29: "as fits the occasion."

As women, we generally give due attention to our dress. When invited to a party, dinner, or event, we take great pains to ensure we are wearing proper attire. We would never attend a formal event in sweats, or waltz into a pool party in high heels.

However, I am not always nearly so careful with my words. I don't stop to consider whether or not they "fit the occasion." And yet, unlike my dress, words are of the greatest significance. For "death and life are in the power of the tongue" (Prov. 18:21)

That's why Ephesians 4:29 is a much needed reminder to stop and listen before I speak. Proverbs 18:13 says: "If one gives an answer before he hears, it is his folly and shame." And all to often I play the fool. Instead, I must consider the person to whom I am speaking. And I must choose the precise words that would serve them in that particular conversation.

First Thessalonians 5:14 is the "dress code" for our words. It tells us what words are appropriate for what occasion. "And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all."

So let's ask ourselves: does our child need to be admonished or forgiven? Does our friend need to be warned or comforted? Does our husband need to be counseled or encouraged?

We take great pains to dress appropriately for our own reputation, and yet when we speak appropriately, we bring honor and glory to God and bless those who hear.

"To make an apt answer is a joy to a man, and a word in season, how good it is!" (Prov. 15:23).

Posted by Janelle Bradshaw on April 07, 2008 at 04:58 PM | Permalink

Issues in Hermeneutics- Redaction Criticism: entry #5

2008-04-04T07:58:00.002-04:00

As we noticed in the last issue of the Journal many theories have been proposed as ways to interpret Scripture. We are not now interested in the more liberal views which have been held by Bible critics over the years, views which blatantly and openly deny infallible inspiration; we are concerned about the views of those who claim to hold to a conservative position on Scripture, i.e., a position which affirms the inspiration of Scripture and its infallibility, but who adopt some kind of biblical criticism and claim that this is not incompatible with Scripture's infallible inspiration. 9

Before we proceed with our discussion, it might be well to define some terms.

One form of biblical criticism currently in favor is called "redaction criticism." Redaction criticism is of particular interest because it embraces many other types of criticism as well.

In the October 18, 1985 issue of Christianity Today, a symposium was published on redaction criticism in which five scholars participated and in which the whole idea of redaction criticism was thoroughly discussed. The participants were Kenneth Kantzer, dean of the Christianity Today Institute and professor of biblical and systematic theology at Trinity Divinity School who moderated the forum; D. A. Carson, professor of New Testament at Trinity Divinity School; Harold W. Hoehner, professor of New Testament literature and exegesis at Dallas Theological Seminary; Vern S. Poythress, then associate professor of New Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia; and David M. Scholer, professor of New Testament and dean of Northern Baptist Theological Seminary in Downers Grove, Illinois.

A definition of redaction criticism was offered as follows:

A synonym for redacting is editing. Someone who redacts a piece of writing edits it, as a newspaper editor polishes a reporter's news story.

"Criticism" in this case means a study of what these early "editors" did.

Thus redaction criticism is the study of how editing has been done. It's the attempt to ascertain the viewpoint of a gospel writer/editor: How did he select his material? How did he arrange his material? How did he phrase the material and direct it toward particular themes or purposes? Note that we're not talking about the editor creating new material. We're talking about selection and focus (p. 2-1).

One of the participants in the symposium related redaction criticism to other forms of criticism and demonstrates that various forms of criticism are not incompatible with each other; all can be used in the one process of redaction criticism.

Text criticism looks at what happens after the completion of the final product, the actual book of the Bible.

Redaction criticism explores the step before that final editing.

Source criticism looks at the step previous, where the author chooses his sources, usually written.

Form criticism looks at the oral stage in back of that (p. 3-1)

While warning against the excesses and wrong applications of redaction criticism, all the members of the symposium agreed that there was a proper use of this tool in biblical interpretation. For example, the moderator of the symposium writes:

…it is not principles distinctive of redaction criticism that have led to these objectionable conclusions but rather their faulty presuppositions and invalid applications (p. 11-1).

And in the course of the discussion it was observed:

Some critics say that the method of redaction criticism itself is wrong. What's really wrong are some of the presuppositions some redaction critics start with (p. 6-1).

It is striking, however, that one major plea for the use of redaction criticism was the insistence that only in this way can evangelicals effectively communicate with other scholars. In response to the suggestion that, instead of "trying to reclaim the term for use by evangelical scholars," it might be well to "do away with it altogether and use another," the following reactions were given.

I don't think that works.

The term redaction criticism is simply too broadly used in biblical scholarship to try to mount a campaign to do away with it. It's better to define responsible redaction criticism.

If you want to influence liberal scholarship, you must be able to communicate -- and that means using their terms, but defined so we can accept them. If you don't, communication becomes almost impossible (p. 6-1).

It is clear that all the participants agreed to a proper use of redaction criticism with all that implies, even though issuing words of caution. 10

The viewpoint of redaction criticism (which includes form criticism, source criticism, literary and historical criticism) approaches Scripture from a distinctive viewpoint. It argues that, because God was pleased to use men in the writing of the Scriptures, the proper understanding of Scripture involves a careful and detailed analysis of how they did their writing. This careful analysis involves many different aspects. It involves determining what sources the secondary authors of Scripture used: what written sources and oral sources. It involves determining how Matthew and Luke, e.g., put the material they collected together. It involves how the gospel writers depended upon each other's writings (the so-called synoptic problem). It involves the purpose each had for writing -- which consideration in turn includes those to whom a particular book of the Bible was addressed and what problem in that group was the chief consideration in writing. It involves a careful analysis of the type of literature they used: whether they used poetry, letter-form, narrative, or prophecy. It involves all the final work and editing which Mark (or any other writer) did in order to put his document in its final form. It is a lengthy and involved study to learn the history of a document and to subject it to careful literary and historical analysis. Without finding answers to all these questions, it is impossible to come to a clear and definite answer to the meaning of Scripture.

Issues in Hermenuetics- Modern Views in Hermeneutics: entry #4

2008-04-03T07:35:00.003-04:00

Modern Views in Hermeneutics

Before we discuss specific views of more modern times in the field of Hermeneutics, there are a couple of things which must be understood.

In the first place, the views which we are about to discuss range over a broad spectrum of thought. They can be placed on a line, the one end of which is very modern and liberal Hermeneutics which basically denies the divine character of Scripture altogether; and the other end of which is the more "conservative" view of Hermeneutics which holds to Scripture as the Word of God in whole or in part. That they together belong to destructive higher criticism is my thesis. I am not unaware of the fact that many "conservative" Bible scholars would deny this and insist that they believe in inspiration and, in fact, the infallible inspiration of Scripture. In spite of these claims, it is my firm conviction that they belong to destructive criticism for all that and that they must be repudiated by one who holds to Scripture as God's Word. Their disclaimers are not persuasive, and we do not hesitate to characterize their views as being rationalistic approaches to Scripture which destroy Scripture's fundamental character and rob God's Word of its final authority.

The second point which needs to be made is that one need not necessarily pick out one of the views which we are about to discuss as being the preferable way to interpret Scripture. One can hold to several of these views at the same time.

It is one of the striking features of modern Hermeneutics that every year brings different theories forward concerning methods of biblical interpretation. One can hardly keep up with them all. Each new pet theory is another way which is supposed to offer us insight into biblical interpretation and becomes another tool in the hands of the interpreter of God's Word to help explain Scripture. But the proposing of a new theory does not necessarily mean that older ones have been abandoned. Those who promote, e.g., Form Criticism may at the same time hold to literary and historical criticism. The views overlap. More than one can be used.

With this introductory note, we turn to a brief discussion of some of these views.

On the more liberal end of the spectrum we find several such views which are rather common today even though proposed many years ago.

A very commonly held idea and one which has gained wide acceptance is Form Criticism. While there are variations of this view, basically it holds that especially the New Testament books of the Bible must be interpreted in terms of writing down what were originally oral traditions. The idea goes something like this. During the years of our Lord's ministry, gradually gospel stories and sayings of the Lord were formulated as people told others about what they had seen and heard, or what they had received from others. These stories, as stories have a way of doing, became somewhat stereotyped so that they took on a fairly fixed form.

After the Lord died and went to heaven, these stories and sayings circulated as separate units --in various Christian communities as the gospel spread throughout the world. Some of them were even written down in old documents, no longer available to us, but lying at the basis of the gospel narratives. Such documents are supposed to be the explanation for the similarities between the gospel narratives. An investigation of all this is the method used to solve the so-called "synoptic problem," which addresses itself to the question of why there are similarities but also differences between Matthew, Mark, and Luke.4

These units of oral tradition entered their twilight period during the years A.D. 30 - 60. Gradually they were altered and embellished under the influences of the beliefs in different Christian communities mainly for the purpose of being used effectively for communicating the gospel to others outside the church, and they were finally put into fixed form by the gospel narrators.

The result is basically four layers in the gospel narratives. The lowest layer is Jesus' own words and the authentic memories of His deeds. The next layer is the contributions made by the Post-Easter community. The third layer is the contributions of the Hellenistic community. And the final layer is the contributions of the evangelists themselves as they put all these traditions into their final form.

It is the task of the critic to discover in the gospel which parts are truly original and authentic.

It is clear that the efforts to discover what elements in the gospels are original and authentic are going to be determined by one's presuppositions. Hence, very liberal critics find very little which is truly reliable. One critic went so far as to say that when we finally penetrate all the layers and discover what is really authentic, we can conclude only that there once lived a man who was called Jesus. More conservative critics find much more that is authentic and are even willing to concede that most, if not all, we find in the gospels can be relied upon as trustworthy.

Another view, somewhat related to Form Criticism, is the approach to Scripture called Gemeinde Theologie or, Church Theology. This view holds to the notion that the church at the time Scripture was written formulated her beliefs concerning Christ which she incorporated into various documents. These beliefs were the response of the church to all God's speech. Scripture is the record of the believers' reaction to what God has said in Christ. Scripture is a kind of confession which the church makes concerning her faith. And this is, of course, something in which the church still engages.

A distinction was often made also between Historie and Geschichte. While both German words can be translated by the one word "history," the idea of the distinction is this: Historie refers to the facts of history itself; Geschichte emphasizes the mutual encounter of persons as they participate in and personally interpret Historie. This Geschichte involves various "encounters." It involves the original encounter of a person or persons with the facts of history, the encounter of the recorder who sets about recording such data, and the encounter of the interpreter. Other aspects of such an encounter can be added. The idea of calling all this "encounter" is that through the entire process one encounters Christ Who comes through the kerygma, i.e., the proclamation of Christ.

Bultmann developed this idea further when he spoke, e.g., of the resurrection of Christ as being the Geschichte of the Historie of the cross.

It might be well to pause for a moment and examine this, for there are a couple of interesting elements about it. For one thing, it is an example of the deception of some higher critical studies. If, e.g., one would ask a man whether he believed that the resurrection of Christ was history, his answer could (and, perhaps, would) be: Yes, but he would mean this in the sense of Geschichte and not Historie since both words mean the same thing. Thus by means of the distinction the historical reality of the resurrection is denied, for the resurrection narrative is only in mythical form. What the church believed concerning the cross; i.e.. that the dead Messiah continues to live in the life and consciousness of the church.

Bultmann was the one who also proposed a de-mythologizing of Scripture in order to get at what was authentic and historically factual. He interpreted a myth as being anything which was contrary to the modern scientific world-view of our time. This included a denial of the concept of a three-story universe with hell below earth and heaven above. It included also a denial of the intervention of supernatural powers including devils and angels. And it included the possibility of miracles. All these are contrary to science and cannot be accepted by the modern man. All in Scripture, therefore, which speaks of these things must be considered as myth. And the only way to understand Scripture is to de-mythologize it. What we have left when all the myths have been stripped away is the notion that the cross and resurrection of Christ mean that judgment is brought into the world with the possibility of a new life opened for man.

Another rather popular method proposed is the Sitz im Leben theory of inspiration which must be taken into account in Bible interpretation.5 The idea of this view, although more involved than we can explain here, is that the biblical writers were influenced by their own "situation in life so that their own cultural viewpoints were incorporated into their writings. This has become increasingly popular in our day as the view that the biblical writers were culturally conditioned in their writings. The statements of Paul, e.g., which deny the right of women to hold ecclesiastical office are only his cultural conditioning and not to be accepted today as normative for the life of the church.

Many different techniques are applied to Scriptural interpretation in modern Hermeneutics. Form Criticism, e.g., concentrates upon the literary form in which Scripture comes to us. Redaction Criticism emphasizes that the final products of Scripture which we have in our possession are the work of editors who assembled traditions, writings, and other available material in one coherent document. Source criticism makes an effort to determine the sources which the biblical writers used whether they were rabbinical writings, Old Testament writings, apocryphal writings, genealogies, early forms of the gospels, or whatever.

All of these belong, more or less, to what is commonly known as literary-historical criticism. This form of criticism examines the documents of Scripture to determine such things as their literary genera and their historical setting. So popular has this become in our day that there is scarcely to be found anyone in the major Seminaries of the country who does not hold to this view of biblical interpretation.

A striking example of this is to be found in Tremper Longman III's book, Literary Approaches to Biblical Criticism. 6 Tremper Longman Ill is professor of Old Testament in Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. He is, therefore, a "conservative" Bible scholar who would undoubtedly claim to hold to the infallible inspiration of Scripture. After discussing in Chapter 1 Source, Form, and Redaction Criticism, he devotes his book to a study of the problem involved in literary criticism. 7

He speaks first of all of the fact that the writer may be an editor or a redactor and that he may have used sources. In considering this aspect of Scripture one must take into account the writer's purpose in writing as well as his cultural milieu.

Secondly, one must consider the narrator in the writing who is usually different from the writer. Sometimes he is a real person, sometimes fictional. One must determine his purpose in speaking and his cultural milieu, taking into consideration the fact that he may be omnipresent and omniscient. One must also take into consideration the narratee within the story and how he hears. But even then one is not finished. One must reckon with the person or persons to whom the writing is addressed; the reader, not always the same as the one to whom the writing is addressed; and later readers.

Thirdly, one must consider the setting of a writing, the genre (whether poetry, narrative, prophecy, etc.), the figures of speech; the devices used (e.g., Matthew makes an analogy between Christ's life on earth and Israel's forty years of wandering); 8 and, finally, the plot.

Now apart from any other consideration, one wonders how in all God's world it is possible for even a trained exegete, much less an untrained child of God, ever to discover what Scripture means if all these things are necessary. Not only is the process much too long and complicated for anyone to apply it successfully, but most of the information that has to be gained by this method in order to understand the biblical text is sheer speculation and almost totally unavailable to us. The whole structure is a house of cards which tumbles by its own weight. Every man has his own idea of who the narrator (whether real or fictional) is; of who the narratee and the addressee are. The simple fact of the matter is that Scripture is not pleased to reveal this to us in many instances, quite obviously because all this stuff is not necessary to understand the Word of God.

The difficulty is that Longman and others who take this same approach justify it on the grounds that this is really nothing more than an application of the old and traditional grammatical and historical method of exegesis. This method goes back to the early church and the School of Antioch; it was used by the great fathers in the church with more or less consistency; it was the method of the Reformers; it continues to hold a treasured place in the life of the church to this day.

But the question is: is this appeal justified? We shall have to give an answer to this question in a later article, an answer which will give us opportunity to discuss various other aspects of the problem.

For the present, we may draw several conclusions. In the first place, it is not difficult to trace many contemporary views in Hermeneutics to rationalistic philosophy. That ought to give us pause. The approach of these modern methods of Hermeneutics is the approach of rationalism, and rationalism stands directly opposed to faith. It is the antithesis of faith vs. unbelief, of Christ vs. Belial. In the second place, wherever on the spectrum of higher criticism one may stand whether towards the liberal end or towards the conservative end -- it is fundamentally all of one piece. Even such a brief survey as we have offered demonstrates clearly how many modern views in Hermeneutics share a common ground with suggestions and ideas promoted by the early philosophers who applied the principles of rationalistic philosophy to Bible studies. In the third place, one cannot doubt even for a moment that all such views ultimately make biblical interpretation impossible for the untrained believer.

And this is, after all, what we are most concerned about. To apply the principles of Hermeneutics outlined in our survey necessarily forces one to take one of two positions. He must either admit that the Bible is in whole or in part not the Word of God, or he must fall back on the old Medieval distinction between two levels of meaning in Scripture: one level that of the simple meaning open to any child of God; the other a deeper level of meaning available only to the expert. And that accursed notion also effectively takes God's Word out of the hands of His people.

Issues in Hermeneutics- Higher Critics: entry #3

2008-03-29T22:59:00.004-04:00

Higher Critical Views in Hermeneutics

We must say something concerning various theories which have been proposed in Hermeneutics, if for no other reason than that it will help us to see what others have done to destroy any proper interpretation of God's Word, so that we may avoid these evils like the plague.

All views of higher criticism have their roots in modern philosophy.

Modern philosophy, beginning with Descartes, was rationalistic; i.e., it appealed to the human mind as the standard and arbiter of the truth. In reaction to the synthesis philosophy of the Scholastics, it made a distinction between philosophy and theology. Philosophy was the domain of reason; theology was the domain of faith. Philosophy answered the basic questions of the universe, of man and of his ability to know; theology dug its material out of the Bible.

The earlier philosophers of the modern period maintained, at least outwardly, their orthodoxy and did their philosophizing in a separate area from their theologizing. They held, as it were, to two bodies of truth: one acquired from their reason as it probed the mysteries of the universe, the other acquired through a study of Scripture. It was hoped that the two would never conflict, that in fact philosophy could serve as a bulwark for theology, a foundation for faith, a rational justification for biblical truth. But conflict between the two did not overly bother them.2

This could not continue. It was a false dichotomy in knowledge. The questions of philosophy concerned ultimate things necessarily involving theological questions. And most of the time the conclusions of reason were in direct conflict with the theology of Scripture. And so some kind of solution had to be found. No man can, ultimately, live with such conflicts and be serious about what he believes.

The philosophers began, therefore, to turn their attention to theological matters. But the viewpoint, the perspective, the approach was one of reason, for the philosophers were committed to the autonomy of human reason. Whether these were the continental rationalistic philosophers or the empiricists of England, reason was the criterion of truth. That which met the standards of man's reason could be accepted; that which failed the test of man's reason had to be rejected. And it was inevitable that as efforts were made to square theology with philosophy, philosophers would turn their attention to Scripture and the doctrine of inspiration.

The sad part of all this is that their views found ready acceptance in the church. The insidious influence of rationalism devastated the church, partly because these rationalists professed orthodoxy in matters of faith, and partly because the church itself had in the latter part of the 17th and in the 18th centuries entered a period of dead orthodoxy which made them vulnerable to rationalism.

A few of these early ideas are worth mentioning.

Deism, which arose chiefly in England but spread to the continent, spoke of the universe as a closed system, operating under its own laws. It was, so to speak, a mechanism created by a divine Creator much like a watch-maker manufactures a watch which is able to run by itself after it is wound. So God created the universe with its own laws by which it operated so that no longer was any divine interference necessary. All the phenomena of creation could be explained in terms of the laws by which it ran.

It is evident that this excludes much of the Christian faith. The Deists attacked Scripture's accuracy, therefore, in the historical facts and the miracles of which Scripture spoke, for they were incompatible with the assumptions of Deism. It is not hard to see that the theistic evolutionists, if such they may be called, are basically deistic in their reliance upon scientific observations as an explanation for the origin of the universe.

Also in the 18th century a school of thought arose which posited the notion of a natural religion. Leibnitz and Christian Wolff spoke of such a natural religion which was independent of Scripture and based upon scientific observation and proof. It was a religion, not formulated by a study of Scripture, but simply expressing what elements of deity were to be found in a study of the universe. Lessing in Germany carried this idea a bit further and spoke of the fact that all religions in the world were evidences of this natural religion and thus have value for us today. And Herder included in the history of this natural religion, the Bible which recorded the ancient religions of the Jewish people especially. The evil of this position was that it denied the truth of revelation and refused to believe that the origin of the religion of the Jewish people and the church had its origins in divine revelation.

Immanuel Kant, the influential German philosopher from Koningsburg, had more influence on higher criticism than any other individual. He spoke of the human intellect as being limited in its acquisition of knowledge by time and space so that it was incapable of knowing anything at all beyond this present creation and the time and space which bound it. He was an intellectual agnostic and ruled out any knowledge of spiritual things. Yet, although he pushed God out of the front door of the universe, he attempted to drag God back in through the back door. He spoke of the fact that all men could know God through the "Thou shalt" of God's moral law. The result of this was the notion that religion is nothing but morality. The incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ, e.g., is nothing more than the personalization of the moral idea as it is in God. And the church is a moral society to train men to live morally upright lives. Scripture is not the written record of God's revelation but a lesson in morals which has come down to us from ancient peoples in their own superstitious beliefs.

Hegel and Schleiermacher followed these ideas of Kant to a certain extent. Hegel was a philosophical idealist and a theological pantheist. In his thinking. Christ was nothing but the highest God-consciousness which could be found among men. History is the absolute being of God relativized in creation and returning to the absolute. Consciousness is the highest reality, God coming to consciousness in man and especially in the Lord Jesus Christ. Schleiermacher held that God is essentially unknowable to the mind, but comes to be known through the feelings, particularly the feeling of dependence. Man has an indestructible sense of dependence upon a higher being, and this is essentially all religion. Inspiration is really holiness which comes through contact with the one holy Being. Scripture is a divine-human book which is the best of all Christian writings, but a product of the church in past years and of the general spirit in the church which arises from a collective consciousness of God. No longer must Scripture be considered of divine origin; it is only divine insofar as it expresses the sense of divinity in the church as the community of believers in every age made a record of their experiences in religion as they expressed their dependence upon a higher Being.

From all these notions which prevailed in the 18th century, it soon became necessary to explain how Scripture could include in its records of miracles and supernatural events. How was it, e.g., that the church came to believe that Christ, was born of a virgin that He suffered and died for sin, and that He arose again from the dead? David Frederick Strauss set about explaining that. He studied under both Hegel and Schleiermacher and wrote his Das Leben Jesu (The Life of Christ) in 1835. In this influential book he set forth what became known as the mythical theory of biblical interpretation. The church expressed her faith in the form of myths as being an acceptable mode of speaking, conducive to conveying their beliefs to the age in which they lived. That which is miraculous in Scripture is nothing but a mythological way of expressing one's faith. Christ was, therefore, a mere man who wanted to reform his nation. Gradually He became persuaded that He was the Messiah of which the Old Testament Scriptures had spoken. At first He was alarmed at the thought, but gradually He came to accept it with such fervency that He was willing to die for it. So He was a man of such high moral caliber that He was willing to give His life for what He believed.

Two important schools arose during this same period. The first was the Tubingen School of F.C. Baur. Concentrating especially on the New Testament, it explained the New Testament in terms of basic differences between the Pauline and Petrine parties in the church. The Petrine party stood for close reliance upon the Old Testament laws, while the Pauline party wanted a newer and more radical doctrine. The whole history of the apostolic church was to be interpreted in terms of this conflict and its final resolution. The result was that each book of the New Testament was examined closely to determine what role each played in the conflict. And, quite understandably, most of Paul's epistles were rejected as being authored by the apostle to the Gentiles. It is not difficult to see that such an interpretation of Scripture has nothing to do with its divine origin.

The other school was the Graf-Kuenen-Welhausen School which concentrated especially on the Old Testament. Special attention was given to the Pentateuch; its Mosaic authorship was denied; and it was explained as basically the work of editors who put it together from four separate documents which had survived many hundreds of years of Israel's history. These documents were called by the letters, J, E, D, and P. 3

These views laid the groundwork for all of modern Hermeneutics.

Issues in Hermenuetics- The Need for Hermenuetics: entry #2

2008-03-24T09:00:00.005-04:00

From a certain point of view, the child of God needs no instruction in Hermeneutics. If Hermeneutics is the science of biblical interpretation, it follows from the very nature of Scripture itself that no formal instruction is necessary for a regenerated saint to be able to understand what God is saying in His Word. Countless saints over the centuries have read the Word of God without ever knowing the first thing about Hermeneutics, without even having heard the word. They have read Scripture, understood what God was saying to them with stark clarity, and have taken that Word into their hearts.

It is true that we teach Hermeneutics in Seminary as a required course for prospective ministers of the gospel. Students are obligated to learn the principles of biblical interpretation and to apply them to Scripture. But if they, with their acquired learning, think that by these studies they have gained an edge on God's people, they are sadly mistaken.

It has always been a principle of the Protestant Reformation over against Roman Catholicism that Scripture is easy to understand. Objectively, Scripture is perspicuous, i.e., clear and understandable by anyone who is able to read. Subjectively, the truth of the priesthood of all believers means that all God's people have the Spirit of truth in their hearts to lead them into all truth. Any child of God, therefore, is able to understand God's Word. It makes no difference what his age, education, or station in life is, he can know what the Spirit says to the church. He has no need of anyone telling him in a formal classroom setting what the principles of Hermeneutics are.

Why then talk about Hermeneutics at all? It seems redundant. And, let it be clearly stated that, in a sense, instruction in Hermeneutics is redundant. The child of God, led by the Spirit, knows, as it were instinctively, intuitively, without being able to give an account of it, what the Scriptures teach. If you should ask him what a given passage means, he will be able to tell you. If you should pursue the matter further and inquire of him how it is that he can understand the Bible, what principles of Hermeneutics he has applied to his study, he will not usually be able to tell you. The Bible is, from that point of view, like any other book. If he can read anything written in the language which he speaks, he can read the Bible. If he can understand what is being conveyed by the tongue he uses, he can understand what the Bible says. The Bible means what it says. The literal meaning of God's Word is the correct one, as we are wont to say.

All this does not mean that the Scriptures are not inexhaustible in their truth. They surely are. The perspicuity of Scripture, as we shall notice, does not mean that Scripture is shallow and devoid of content. Perspicuity is part of the wonder of the miracle of Scripture. This can be easily illustrated. One of the simplest passages of Scripture is Luke 2:7: "And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn." While a very little child is able to understand this passage of Scripture without difficulty, at the same time no theologian has ever been able to plumb its depths, and more books than can be counted have been written concerning this profound truth of the birth of Christ.

Why then do we study Hermeneutics?

The answer is a very limited one. All Hermeneutics really does is crystallize, systematize, and articulate principles which are intuitive to every child of God. When a child of God hears, perhaps for the first time, what the principles of Hermeneutics are, his response ought to be (and will be, if the Hermeneutics is correct), "I knew that all the time." It makes clear and brings to consciousness that which has all along been assumed. Hermeneutics has nothing new to say, no new thing to communicate, no new insights to give information to a man who has been a serious student of holy Scripture.

This is humbling -- as it ought to be. A mastery of a course in Hermeneutics does not give a man a position of superiority over God's people. It does not give him insights into Scripture which the man in the pew cannot gain on his own with careful and diligent attention to God's Word. It does not set him apart in a class by himself, as a possessor of a body of knowledge which God's saints cannot acquire without the same formal course. It does not put in his possession a key to unlock the treasure house of Scripture, which key no one else has who has not taken his postgraduate courses. If he thinks it does, he doesn't belong on the pulpit. He possesses an arrogance which makes him unfitted to be a teacher in Israel.

Every minister of the Word, even if he has gained a top grade in his course in Hermeneutics, had better listen to what God's people say when they tell him of their own understanding of God's Word. They will have something worthwhile to say, something that he can learn, something that will enrich his own understanding of what God has to reveal to the church.

This is especially true when we consider that so often the minister does his exegetical work in the ivory tower of his study and makes his work of explaining the Scriptures the object of intense intellectual activity. The people of God speak of what God's Word has meant to them in their life and calling. The Holy Spirit has sealed the truth upon their hearts in the distresses and sufferings of life. They know, know in a way which only a minister who lives with them, prays with them, suffers with them, can know. They know together, within the communion of the saints as they admonish each other, help each other along the difficult pathway of this life, and join together in praises to the God of their salvation.

Issues in Hermeneutics- Introduction: entry #1

2008-03-17T22:48:00.005-04:00

INTRODUCTION

Perhaps no single issue has dominated the agenda of the Reformed and Presbyterian church world today more than the issue of Hermeneutics. This is not only because various methods of interpretation have been proposed in the last few decades which have more or less made concessions to higher criticism, but many other issues which the church has faced are rooted to Hermeneutical approaches to Scripture. Evolutionism vs. Creationism, homosexuality, marriage and divorce, women in ecclesiastical office -- all these issues and more are at bottom hermeneutical. The answers which theologians and ecclesiastical assemblies have given to these questions have depended upon how Scripture is to be interpreted. The door has been opened wide to every heresy within the church; evolutionism has become almost the only way to teach science; women have been ordained into the offices of minister, elder, and deacon; homosexuality has been condoned and homosexuals have not only been permitted church membership, but have even been ordained into office; and all this has happened on the basis of specific and concrete theories of hermeneutics. The way in which one interprets the Scriptures has determined one's position in all these matters.

In many, if not most, seminaries in the country higher critical views of Scripture are taught, whether these seminaries stand in the Reformed or in the Presbyterian tradition. Concessions of every conceivable sort have been made to higher criticism and defended even by those who claim to hold to the doctrine of infallible inspiration.

And that is the root of the matter. One's hermeneutics is, after all, determined finally by the view one takes of inspiration. How did the Bible come into existence? That it is the Word of God almost no one within the mainstream of evangelical thought will deny. That God used men to write the Scripture is also too obvious from Scripture itself to contradict. But when the question arises concerning the relation between God's work and His use of men in writing the Scriptures, there is a great deal of disagreement. The larger the role given to the human instruments, the more reliance one places on higher criticism with its various techniques.

And yet one cannot help but gain the impression that the debate, in the final analysis, is not a debate over various techniques in Hermeneutics; one cannot escape the conclusion that not even the doctrine of inspiration is the real point at issue. One is constantly led to the conviction that when all else is said and done, the issue is a profoundly spiritual one. That is, the debates, while swirling around academic discussions concerning a proper biblical Hermeneutics and concerning the truth of inspiration, carry with them spiritual implications. By this I mean that the debate is finally one concerning the authority of Scripture.

Now that in itself is something of an academic question, of course. But the point is that when one begins to speak of the authority of Scripture, one is confronted with the fact that Scripture is unlike any other book. It does not come to us for verification. It does not present its case to be examined on evidence outside itself as to whether or not it ought to be believed. It is not a text on the philosophy of history which presents startling views on how one must explain history, views which are open to examination and questioning. It is the Word of God which comes to man with the "Thus saith the Lord." It carries with it the authority of the sovereign God Himself before which all men are required to bow in humility. Upon this hangs the issues of heaven or hell. It is this spiritual question which is the basic and underlying issue at stake. Will you bow humbly before the authority of God? To a certain extent, hermeneutical issues are smoke screens to cover the more basic issue. Or, to put it differently, various theories are proposed in the field of Hermeneutics and inspiration to escape the compelling and inescapable authority of the Word of God.

Our chief purpose in writing about these things is a positive one. Although some attention will have to be paid to modern higher critical views of Scripture, we are concerned about presenting principles of Hermeneutics which can be used by the child of God in studying God's holy Word.

This latter is important. If modern theories of hermeneutics are to be used in the study of Scripture, Scripture is effectively taken out of the hands of God's people as a book incapable of being understood except by those who are adept at applying, e.g., literary-historical criticism to biblical interpretation. This is a great evil and has been, at least in part, the cause of a disinterest in Bible studies among those who sit in the pew. Quite reasonably the people of God argue that if expertise is required to understand the Word of God, there is little point in taking the time and dissipating the energy required to turn to God's Word themselves. They are better off leaving these esoteric matters in the hands of the experts. If, e.g., Genesis 1 does not mean what it says, why read it to begin with? But this is a denial of the great Reformation truth of the priesthood of all believers.

Our intention of being primarily positive sets up some limitations in this study. Although we shall have to say some things about the doctrine of inspiration, we do not intend to examine this question in detail.1 Further, although we shall have a few things to say about modern theories of Hermeneutics, we do nor intend either to describe them in detail or analyze them completely. Insofar as we describe and discuss them, we do so only to demonstrate what such theories have done to Scripture's inspiration and to proper Hermeneutics.

There are many things which need badly to be said. If others would rise and say them, these articles would not have to be written. But the ecclesiastical press is strangely silent on these matters, and, insofar as they are discussed at all, they seem to be inadequate to answer the stinging attacks of higher criticism. Only occasionally and then from unexpected places can one find what is an acceptable answer to higher criticism and what constitutes a Hermeneutics which the man in the pew is able to use. It is in the interests of helping the man in the pew that we turn to this subject.

God's Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light upon our path. This is the song of the Psalmist in Psalm 119:105. Every child of God, whether a small child or an aged patriarch, whether a parent weighed down with the responsibilities of the home or a student studying in a college, whether a saint caught in the throes of persecution or battling false doctrine and the onslaughts of the evil one -- every child of God sings this song of the Psalmist triumphantly and joyously. If he cannot sing it. his life is reduced to despair. He must have the confidence to take God's Word with him wherever he goes, whether it be to the graveyard or his work place. He must be comforted when others seek to snatch God's Word from his hands. He must rest assured that he can understand the Bible as well as any theologian, for "the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him" (I John 2:27).

May God's people everywhere be persuaded that God's Word is truly the light they need on life's pathway, that it shines clearly and brightly for them, that no one need teach them, and that walking in the way of that Word there is joy and peace.