“Of course God will forgive me; that’s His job.”

I have found more than one possible source for that quotation. I originally ran into it in a Christian writing that dealt with the utterly destructive lie that there is salvation to be found with God outside of Jesus Christ. But on the web one can find this quotation offered as an inspirational aphorism.

The fact that people believe this lie so widely makes our calling as Christians rather difficult. We have to tell people some really bad news for them to be willing to accept the good news. Even humble people who acknowledge that they are evil and who trust a good creator God to forgive their sin are in fact under God’s wrath and curse. Why? Because they are not Christians. Only those who entrust themselves to Jesus, who belong to him and thus are covered by his atonement, are the recipients of forgiveness. While there are all sorts of real problems found in nonchristian religions and positions, their ultimate problem is that they are not Christianity. God has sent His Son to us and he demands that all people everywhere entrust themselves to him. Outside of Christ there is no grace of forgiveness and final glory.

But while our God-given job is made difficult by this fact, we make it much more difficult when we refuse to deal with people as they are. I remember reading in some primary sources from Medieval Byzantium. They would write about this or that people they were dealing with and there would be an endnote in my Penguin edition telling me that, in fact, the tribal name the author was using was centuries out of date. That nation was long dead and another tribe now lived in the region. But the Byzantines simply couldn’t acknowledge change–at least not the Byzantine ruling class. They kept using labels they got from their ancient books.

Since that point, I have always considered the habit of seeing present people as nothing more than reiterations of a past age to be the reflex of a dying culture. Thus, it really bothers me when we obstruct our evangelistic efforts with the illusion that everyone, in their hearts, is a medieval monk trying to do enough righteous works to win God’s favor. That is not the only possible form of unbelief, and I doubt it is the prominant one. There are plenty of people who trust God is willing to overlook their sins and bless them out of pure mercy.

We are called and commissioned to preach the Gospel to every creature. We are not told to pay special attention to all the people whose mindsets come nearest to that of Luther before his tower experience. When confronted directly with the issue, every Evangelical Christian knows that the problem of a God who forgives everyone and loves everyone salvifically is a huge widespread form of unbelief. Yet all too ofen, the key to the Gospel as opposed to the world is made out to be grace versus earning standing by one’s moral behavior. Why is this?

I have no experience in the primary sources for Bultmann, so take this with a grain of salt. But my understanding is his entire explanation for the Christianity was to make it an abstract system of “authenticity”–something pretty close to faith and grace in his own mind. The point was to make Christianity worth “following” without any need to believe in a real person who was both God and man and who rose again from the grave. All of that could be overlooked, “dymythologized,” because a principle was all that mattered.

Thus, Bultmann heavily favored some of the most charicatured (and, it turns out, completely inaccurate) stereotypes of first-century Judaism as a religion devoid of any real belief in God’s grace. The Jewish ethic was built entirely upon gaining credit by obeying enough and thus winning by their own efforts a place with God.

In other words, for Bultmann, making out Judaism into a form of earning or meriting standing was essential to his strategy of rationalizing his unbelief. The person and work of Jesus could be dispensed with and a residual philosophy of authenticity (that Jesus allegedly taught or practiced at some level) could be retained as the essence of modern faith.

Of course, modern unbelief isn’t some sort of monolith. Bultmann’s portrayal eventually provoked a reaction, the most prominant of which was E. P. Sanders Paul & Palestinian Judaism. While many may have received the impression that this book was set against a “traditional Lutheran” interpretation of first-century Judaism, it actually barely mentions Luther and devotes a great deal of attention to Bultmann. Since Sanders is no more a believer than Bultmann was, no Evangelical can subscribe to his thought. Still, it is helpful to meditate on Sander’s contention that Paul’s problem with Judaism was that Judaism was not Christianity. While Sanders requires correction and refutation, his point against Bultmann and others like him is quite valuable.

For some great Evangelical responses to Sanders, see Frank Thielman’s From Plight to Solution and the works of N. T. Wright.

PART ONE / PART TWO / PART THREE / PART FOUR

I should probably make something about the connection between election and eschatology and justification and covenant more explicit. What we have in the first century is a double problem. The original problem is that there is sin in the world and the world needs redemption. God chose Isreal and called her to somehow bring redemption to the world. But it was widely recognized that there was a second problem. Israel was herself in need of rescue. Israel was, to a great extent, lost in her sins. Despite her founding and covenant, Israel had demonstrated that the nation was in the old creation still, in Adam.

This meant that to pray for the salvation of the world required one to pray for the restoration of Israel and, conversely, to hope for the restoration of Israel was to long to see God bring salvation to the world.

It is important to realize that this eschatology for Israel was not simply equated with the Final Judgment. Isaelites knew God would be faithful to his covenant to grant the land to true Israelites. They also know of many faithful martyrs who had gone to their deaths out of loyalty to God. This meant that their had to be a resurrection. At some point God would give his people new life so that he could fulfill his promises to them.

While this future resurrection, and the Final Judgment, when it took place, would be related to God’s rescue of Israel, it wouldn’t necessarily be at the same time. This is important because we tend to read statements about the sun turning black and stars falling into the sea as if they were meant to be literal descriptions of physical reality. Wright argues that this is a mistake. Eschatology does not mean the end of the physical cosmos, but the imagery is a way of showing the cosmic significance of the geopolitical judgments that God makes in history.

While variouis groups had different ideas of what was wrong with Israel–or of what would solve what was wrong–they all agreed that Israel was in trouble. I mentioned earlier that Paul’s doctrine that not all Israel is really Israel was probably one of the most widespread beliefs among all Israel. What I didn’t mention is that everyone knew that at least some Israelites were being unfaithful because Israel was obviously under a curse. Pagan Romans and Edomite Kings under them were ruling the Land. They were under the power of the nations. Most were convinced that they also had a corrupt and unfaithful priesthood controlling the Temple. This could not possibly be an accident of history. They were being judged by God for their sins. The day God rescued them from Roman oppression and cleansed the Temple would be his public declaration that he had forgiven their sins.

The exception to some of the above would be the Saducees who were kept in power over the Temple system by the Roman Empire. As those benefitting from the status quo, they did not believe in the resurrection hope. They liked life as it was.

The Pharisees, on the other hand, desired intently to be found faithfully waiting for and expecting the coming kingdom. This meant they needed to ensure they never became essentially indistinguishable from their pagan neighbors…

TO BE CONTINUED

It fits quite comfortably within his doctrine of cosmic redemption in Jesus Christ alone. Jesus

is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven (Colossians 1.18-23).

Jesus has reconciled all things and therefore he has reconciled you also if you believe the Gospel being preached to all creation.

Is this unclear? Is it questionable from anything else in the Pauline writings?

This originally appeared in The Reformed Church Messenger as a weekly series from March 2 to June 2, 1870

CHAPTER 1

My Childhood and Early Youth

Having been called upon to furnish the necessary material for some account of my life, to be given to the world in permanent form, it seems to me best, on the whole, that I should do it in the way at once of a general self-biography, using the first person rather than the third; the more especially so, because it has been desired that the sketch in question should take in something at least of my inward life along with its merely outward facts.

I was born on the 20th of February, 1803, of respectable parentage, in Franklin County, Pennsylvania. My father’s mother was a Williamson, sister to the distinguished Hugh Williamson, LL.D., one of the framers of the U. S. Constitution, and a man otherwise prominent during the period of the Revolutionary War, who held a high place afterwards also, in the world of letters, as the author of the History of North Carolina, and Essay on Climate, and other publications. The family, in its coat of arms and otherwise, has always claimed descent (how truly I pretend not to say) from the celebrated Scottish chieftain, Sir William Wallace. Another brother lived and died as an Episcopal clergyman in England; where he is honorably represented by descendantes mostly of the third generation. A third brother, Capt. John Williamson, became a successful and wealthy merchant, in Charleston, S. C.; and it was as namesake to him in particular, that I got my own middle name of Williamson–the only proper Christian name,in fact, with which I was ever known or spoken of in my early years.

Being of what is called Scotch-Irish extraction, I was by burth and blood also, a Presbyterian; and as my parents were both conscientious and exemplary professors of religion, I was, as a matter of course, carefully brought up in the nuture and admonition of the Lord, according to the Presbyterian faith as it then stood. I say with purpose as it then stood; for I cannot help seeing and feeling, that a very material change has come upon it since, and this in a way not without serious interest for my own religious life.

What I mean, will appear at once, when I state that the old Presbyterian faith, into which I was born, was based throughout on the idea of covenant family religion, church membership by God’s holy act in baptism, and following this a regular catechatical training of the young, with direct reference to their coming to the Lord’s table. In one word, all proceeded on the theory of sacramental, educational religion, as it had belonged properly to all the national branches of the Reformed Church in Europe from the beginning. In this respect the Reformed Churches of Switzerland, France, Germany, Holland, and Scotland were of one mind; and this mind still ruled, at the time of which I now refer, the Presbyterianism of this country. True, there was no used here of the right of confirmation in admitting catechumens to full communion with the Church; but there was, what was considered to be substantially the same thing, in the way they were solemnly received by the church session. The system was churchly, as holding the Church in her visible character to the the medium of salvation for her baptized children, in the sense of that memorable declaration of Calving (Inst. iv. c. 1, s. 4), where, speaking of her title, Mother, he says: There is no other entrance itno life, save as she may conceive us in her womb, give us birth, nourish us from her breasts, and embrace us in her loving care to the end.

This was the system of educational religious in which it was my privilege to grow up, through the first years of my life, under the best sort of parental care, in the vulnerable old Presbyterian church of Middle-Spring. I was baptized by Dr. Robert Cooper, the retired former pastor of the congregation, just about the time that the vacant charge passed into the hands of his successor, the Rev. John Moodey; who also became Doctor of Divinity many years after–a deserved distinction, which I had the pleasure myself of obtaining for him from the Trustees of Marshall College, then at Mercersburg. His pastorate continued for half a century; in the course of which time a great change came over the Presbyterian Church at large, that brought with it in the end no small change also, in the character of this old country charge. But during my childhood and boyhood all was still, in the life and spirit of the congregation, as it had been from the beginning. The Scotch regime was in full force. Pastoral visitation was a business, as much as preaching. The school was held to be of right auxiliary to the church; and the catechism stood in honor and use everywhere, as the great organ of what was held to be a sound religious education. Every Sunday evening, especially, was devoted to more or less catechization of the family. I was put on simply Bible questions as soon as I could speak. Then came the Mother’s Catechism, as it was called; and then the Assembly’s Shorter Catechism–hard to be understood, but wholesome for future use. The same inttruction met me again in the common school; where it was usual for the master, in those days, to examine his scholars once a week in the Catechism. All this as part of the established church system, and only to make room for its full operation in a higher form, where the work fell into the hands of the pastor himself, and was understood all round to form a main portion of his proper pastoral trust.

There were two modes, in which such higher church instruction was carried forward; the practice varying from one to the other in different years. In one year, it was by the pastor’s visiting one family after another, and catechizing each household separately; while in another year, it would be by bringing whole neighborhoods before him at some central place, where then, in the presence of one or more of the elders, an examination was held in a public and solemn way. On these occasions, the children were examined first; but after them the grown people also, on some portion of the Larger Westminster Catechism previously assigned for the purpose.

With this all comprehensive catechetical system corresponded the general church life of those days. It was staid, systematical, and grave; making much of sound doctrine; sonderfully bound to established forms; and not without a large sense for the objective side of religion embodied in the means of grace. There was much of this especially joined with the use of the holy sacraments. Each communion season was a four days’ meeting, where all revolved around the central service of the Lord’s table on the Sabbath; which a real, and not simply nominal humiliation and fast going before, on Friday, n the way of special preparation for such near and solemn approach to God.

This was fifty years ago, Such was the general order of religion then with all the Presbyterian churches of the Cumberland Valley. But what had become of it since? Wonderful to think of, it has almost entirely passed away. Not only Rouse’s Psalms–to which I seem to listen still as a found echo borne in upon my soul from the old stone church at Middle-Spring–have passed away with the whole generation that sung them; but the old catechetical system also is gone, and along with it the general scheme of religion to which it belonged, and which it served to hold together. A very great revolution in fact; which, however, has been brought to pass in so gentle and noiseless a way, that it is difficult now for the present generation to understand it, or to make any proper account of it whatever.

I look upon it as another important part of my training, worthy of note, that I was brought up on a farm, in the midst of a people of simple and plain manners; and that I became early familiar also, with the scenes and employments of country life; being put myself in fact to all sorts of farm work, just as soon as far as I was found to have any power of being useful in that way.

My father, however, though only a common farmer, was himself a man of liberal education, a graduate of Dickinson College, in the days of Dr. Nesbit–one who delighted in books, and who was honored fare and wide for his superior intelligence, as well as for his excellent charecter generally; and under his auspices, therefore, my country training was made to look from the beginning toward a course of full college learning. At an early day the Latin Grammar was pout into my hands, and my father himself became my teacher. My lessons were studied irregularly–sometimes in the barn, and sometimes in the field–and I had no fixed times for recitation. But the course was full, and the drell severe; first in Latin, and afterwards also, in Greek; being worth more to me in truth, as I camee to know at a later day, than all I learned of these languages subsequently passing through college.

CHAPTERS TWO THROUGH FOUR

Last four episodes of season one of Veronica Mars if you must know. Wow See you in the morning.

Believe in your heart that silence on your part is an admission of guilt.

PART ONE / PART TWO / PART THREE

The second major bullet point for Israel’s theology and worldview, after Creational monotheism, would be eschatology. Wright says “the problem of evil” was not considered so much an apologetic challenge but a basis for certain hope that God was going to solve the problem. Whatever might be the reason for a good God to allow sin and death in his creation, he can be trusted not to leave it there. God would deliver the world.

Which brings us to the third point: election. God chose Abram of Ur of the Chaldees to be the one through whom this deliverance would somehow come. Thus, God made a covenant with Abraham and his descendents that they should be his kingdom of priests.

This means that Israel is God’s new creation. Wright shows that, in Genesis, after Adam and then Noah are commissioned to “be fruitful and multiply,” God then promises Abraham in key covenantal passages that he will make him fruitful and multiply him (with that background, Jacob, who is to become the father of the twelve is given the identical command that Adam and Noah received). Isreal, in short, is God’s new Adam.

But everyone knows that “not all Isreal is truly Israel.” There has, once again, been unfaithfulness in Eden and in the sanctuary. Paul’s view in Romans 9 is, apart from the christocentric reference point, the common view of all the Jewish sects (which they all used to condemn the others). We can diagram the issue. God sent Israel to bring salvation through the world

God>>–Israel (deliverance)–>>World

But Israel’s commission is derailed by various compromisers. So now God has to do somthing about Isael if the original plan is to succeed. Here would be one version of the story.

God>>–Pharisaical program–>>Israel

But the Christians had a different idea. (Of course, the bedrock committment would be that God initially equipped Israel with the Torah for them to fulfill their commission.)

What this means is that there are strong disagreements about whom, when God finally acts and brings about the Judgment and salvation, will be confirmed as God’s true people. The pharisees, for example, have questions (at least) about what will happen to the non-pharisees. In their view, the true people of God who will be vindicated (i.e. justified) in the future are those who show in the present that they truly belong to him by following the Pharisaic holiness program.

TO BE CONTINUED

PART ONE / PART TWO

Wright’s public conversation about which god, if any, is the true God who made and is responsible for the world centers from beginning to end on the New Testament documents and how they can possibly be accounted for.

N. T. Wright introduces his subject by retelling the parable of the wicked tenants and the vineyard. The NT documents are the vineyard and the question is who are the proper tenants, who the proper landlord, and what the proper rent. (BTW, this is all massively based on memory; I simply don’t have time to do serious book reviews these days.) He spends a large part of the book dealing with philosophical issues regarding scholarship in general and the history of first-century Palestine in particular. He advocates “critical realism.” “Critical” refers to the fact that there are no “neutral” observers of brute data, contrary to the enlightenment myth of rational scholarship. “Realism” refers to the contention that the world really exists and that we all live in it and can, in principle, talk about it and even be challenged by one another. The consequence of “critical” is that we must not only allow, but expect, a scholar’s basic values and commitments to affect his perceptions and conclusions. The consequence of “realism” is that it is still worth talking to him about what really happened to Jesus.

There is some great stuff here about worldviews and how stories are basic to them, but I don’t trust myself to summarize it.

Wright’s basic question is, given what we know about ancient Christianity and ancient Judaism, how do we account for the birth of the Church? The idea is to work back to Jesus as a middle term between first-century Judaism and late-first century Christianity. Wright, thus spends a great deal of time analyzing the basic similarities and differences between Judaism and the Church.

One of Wright’s most helpful points is his summarizing of the Jewish worldview. He is able to reduce it to a few points without at all seeming reductionistc. The basic points are creational monotheism, eschatology, and election.

Creational monotheism distinguishes Israel’s theology from pantheism and polytheism. There is one God who created and is responsible for all things.

Several points strike me as memorable and worth passing on here.

First, this is a political slogan as much as a theological doctrine (think of the riot in Ephesus and the chant, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians”). Monotheism means God is king and Caesar is not. (Thus the similarity and difference with the Church’s gospel, which is, “Jesus is Lord” and Caesar is not.) For Israel in the first century this entailed a variety of disputes, riots, outlaw bandits, and outbreaks, and ultimately outright war with the pagan world empire Rome (another note of dissimilarity: while we see similare accusations on the part of Rome against Christians, we see a much differnet view of social ethics).

Second, God’s unity never precluded the possibility of Trinitarian theology. It was a unity over against all other powers, real or imagined, not a unity within God’s substance or personality.

Third, it entails comprehensive providence. While God could do obvious miracles Wright shows that all Jews viewed ordinary events in history as also God’s work, including both natural occurences and human decisions.

Fourth, it entails that God is committed to doing something about the presence of evil in the world, which leads us to the next part of Israel’s world view.

TO BE CONTINUED

Though I don’t recommend reading them in order, I’ll start with the first in Wright’s series “Christian Origins and the Question of God.”

Earlier, I claimed that every literate Christian will want to read N. T. Wright, specifically his series of “big books.” The reason for this is because Wright takes on modern unbelief, as represented particularly in the Jesus Seminar, with a great deal of success. Reading Wright allows you to immediately converse with the person who goes to Barnes & Noble and reads books from the religion section. He does this way that is a model of courteous Christian debate with nonchristian worldviews.

When I first discovered him, reading Wright was like being shown a hidden room in my house containing hi-tech weaponry (Hello, Homeland Security agent; this is only a metaphor). I have loved Biblical Theology for many years, but I had never realized what power it offered me for apologetics. When you think about it, however, modern unbelief has a great deal to do with fragmenting the text. Showing that the text of Scripture has real unity could not fail to have apologetic value. Wright woke me up to what I had not understood. He carefully and cogently shows how the text makes sense on its own terms nad vindicates traditional Christianity while, at the same time, offering us all challenges to be further conformed to the Word of God.

One oddity in Wright’s series is that he does not capitalize the word, “god.” The reason for this, he explains, is that the whole debate is over who God is. To act like we are all talking about the same person would be deceptive and confusing.

TO BE CONTINUED

As a Presbyterian, I have been helped by many scholars associated with the Anglican Church. The ministry of C. S. Lewis, for example, goes back to early childhood in my Baptist home. I have also been greatly helped by Austin Farrer, as anyone who reads my commentary on Mark’s Gospel will see.

Of course, both Lewis and Farrer have problems. Lewis managed to write a basic intro to the Christian Faith (Mere Christianity) that remains agnostic about how one should understand the atonement (though I’m told his personal convictions were better than this). Farrer I am sure had his own problems. I never bothered to find out much, but simply mined his Bible study for all the riches that could be found in it.

But better than both, I believe, because he is more orthodox, more insightful, and more contemporary, is the Jesus and Pauline scholar N. T. Wright, presently the bishop of Durham.

I began reading Wright in seminary-his two “big books” first. His New Testament and the People of God was absolutely astounding. I admit to getting slightly bored with the philosophical material (though it fit well with my “presuppositional” understanding of knowledge), but his New Testament introduction was simply riveting. No one had ever used the “background” material in so useful a way. It suddenly went from being something I had to learn to something I wanted to learn.

Of course, since Wright was “a British Evangelical,” I viewed him with a good deal of suspicion. I assumed his view of Scripture would be horrible and that he would have a great many other problems. Farrer had insisted that the Bible did not teach propitiation, for example, so I was prepared for Wright to also join him and argue for expiation. Surely

In my opinion, the first two books in his “Christian Origins and the Question of God” series should be read by just about everyone who reads books and is a Christian in the twenty-first century. But my reasons for this will have to await a later post.

TO BE CONTINUED