It was as if living in Russia (2000-2002) had provided the snag in my garment the fabric of which began to unwind at increasing rates. We arrived in Russia believing that it was only an exceptional case for a Russian Orthodox person to be a Christian. We left having met many Russian Orthodox who were irrefutably beautiful Christians, reveling the anemic nature my own Christian faith. Now we were presented with the possibility of weaving a new and more beautiful garment out of the same golden thread.

Herman Bavinck has a well known quote that begins the second volume of Reformed Dogmatics, which nevertheless has resonated with me since the first moment I heard it quoted by Rev. Dr. David McWilliams at WTS:

Mystery is the lifeblood of dogmatics. To be sure, the term “mystery” (μυστηριον) in Scripture does not mean an abstract supernatural truth in the Roman Catholic sense. Yet Scripture is equally far removed from the idea that believers can grasp the revealed mysteries in a scientific sense. [1]

At that time, it was precisely my modern enlightenment approach to Christianity that explicitly and implicitly attempted to reduce the faith to the confines of a mental spreadsheet. While I’m not convinced that modern Roman Catholics, particularly Thomists, would recognize themselves in Bavinck’s description of their own approach to mystery; it is the balanced sense of wonderful mystery represented in this quote that imbibed a way forward for me in autumn of 2002.

[1] Herman Bavinck, God and Creation, ed. John Bolt, trans. John Vriend, 3 vols., Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 2 (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2004), 29

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Translation

4 For the whole house is built by someone, but the one who built all things is God. 5 On the one hand, [1] Moses was faithful, as servant, in all his [2] house for a testimony of the things to be spoken later; 6 but on the other hand, Christ is faithful as Son, over his [3] house. We are his house if hold fast [4] the openness [5] and hope of which we boast. [6]

Commentary

[1] μὲν … δὲ If for some reason the contrast being made is not clear in English translations, the μὲν … δὲ construction is explicit in Greek.

[2] Ambiguity, does αὐτοῦ refer to Moses or God or Christ?

[3] The ambiguity of αὐτοῦ persists and now the question of how many houses are there. Is there one house, such that Moses and Christ were over this singular house at different times? Or are there two houses, one of Moses and one of Christ?

[4] κατάσχωμεν hold fast, faithfully retain (BAGD, 422). We find it used in 1 Thessalonians 5:21 when scripture teaches us πάντα δὲ δοκιμάζετε, τὸ καλὸν κατέχετε. But examine everything that you may hold fast to what is good (author’s translation).

[5] παρρησίαν openness, confidence. Jesus is marveled at because he spoke openly (παρρησία) in John 7:26, 11:54.

[6] The Byzantine Text adds μέχρι τέλους βεβαίαν, firm until the end (author’s translation). τέλος here has to do with the goal, perfection and completion of something, not merely arriving at the end of one’s own life.

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Introduction

What follows is a piece that I needed to write for myself and those around us who love us and pray for us. If you are hunting for polemic, I pray you will be greatly disappointed here. Rather, this is a personal reflection about personal reasons that my family and I joined the Episcopal Church. It is an attempt to articulate these reasons which have led me away from pastoral ministry in the vibrant Presbyterian Church of America (PCA) to pursuing holy orders in The Episcopal Church (TEC) which is at the best in dire tumult.

Our confirmation in the Episcopal Church on June 1, 2008 was the culmination of a complicated process that started while we were serving in Russia from 1998-2002, flowed through Westminster Theological Seminary (WTS) and was tutored by John Calvin and other pre-modern scholastic reformers. This is a short documentary of self-realization and pilgrimage. It is one with which you will likely find all sorts of inconsistencies and yet it is my journey, together with my wife and daughter. I hope you will also find a sincere pursuit of the Lord Jesus who lives and reigns with the Father and Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

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Ancient-Future Worship is a decent introduction to the liturgical world. The book is directed to Evangelicals who are perhaps weary of over-programmed church-growth oriented church life. Its aim is to call Christians to a worship that “discloses the work of Jesus Christ.”[1]

The book is divided into two parts, preceded by an introduction that serves as a summary to the book as a whole. The first part, Rediscovering God’s Story in Worship, seeks to inform the reader of the scriptural and historical basis for the four pillars of worship in Webber’s paradigm. Worship is the reenactment of God’s redemptive work in space and time and in this sense worship does God’s story. Worship also remembers the past and anticipates the future works of God in the present. Consequently, the fullness of worship encompasses the fullness of the biblical witness in both the Old and New Testaments.

The second part of the book deals primarily with the application of the rediscovery of Part One to the tripartite transforming worship of the Christian Church (i.e., Word, Eucharist and Prayer). Webber explains that the role of the Word of God in worship is to transform participants by implicating them into the Divine Narrative in History. The Eucharist transforms worshipers as they participate in the presence of God. The section on prayer seeks to return the reader’s paradigm towards public prayer. “The story of God,” Webber writes, “is the substance of the inner content that shapes the outer form of public prayer. Worship prays God’s story.”[2]

In his conclusion, Webber informs the reader of the primary and secondary sources that have impacted him in his journey towards “Ancient-Future Worship.” Church Fathers such as Ignatius and Athanasius have composed the ancient component of Webber’s sources, while his contemporary influences are almost exclusively Eastern Orthodox. Last, the Appendix is a call to Evangelicals to turn away from the modern and cultural trappings that “camouflage God’s story or empty it of its cosmic and redemptive meaning.”

Each chapter employs a reader friendly layout, using headings and including summary sections at the conclusion of each chapter.

The recapitulation of redemptive history is set forth as a core purpose of worship. As such, an emphasis on Trinitarian worship comes to the fore. Redemptive history entails God’s work in the Garden of Eden to Christ Jesus’ Second Advent bringing Paradise with Him. Consequently, worship is the convergence of the past and the future into the present, concentering divine transcendence and immanence.

There is iterative concern for the fullness of God’s story being brought to bear upon Christian worship. Webber reflects on why congregants may struggle with liturgical worship saying, “one reason is because we tend to be New Testament Christians rather than Bible Christians.” [3] To put it another way, embracing the entire Christian metanarrative in Sunday worship is an exercise of implicating oneself (participating) in God’s story and shaping one’s worldview for worshiping the Lord in the mundane.

Related to the Christian metanarrative in Scripture is a welcomed emphasis on the objective nature of worship. This objective worship is embodied not merely propositional, a corporate endeavor not a private enterprise, a weighty calling not comfortable entertainment. “The primary focus of worship then and now is not me, the worshipper, but God, who redeems the world.”[4]

This reader deeply appreciates the concern given to the worship of God in Ancient-Future Worship. Webber circumscribes the liturgical question of how form relates to content and provides constructive avenues for Christians concerned about historical worship to traverse.

While the discussion and interaction with the Divine Liturgy of the Eastern Orthodox Church is fruitful, Webber’s more or less exclusive commitment to the Eastern Liturgy seems arbitrary and at times dismissive of the Western Tradition, which ironically shares much of the same liturgical traditions. This is especially true in Western Rite Orthodox and Eastern Rite Catholics.

Evangelicals from a certain Reformed perspective more oriented to Redemptive History may inadvertently feel a bit slighted. The emphasis on the Christian metanarrative has historically been central to theologians like John Calvin, Gerhardus Vos, and more recently in the field of worship, Hughes Oliphant Old.

Overall, Ancient-Future Worship is worth the read. Its irenic tone will engage the reader in a much needed conversation with the self, the contemporary culture, and the Church as God’s people have worshiped the incarnate-risen-and-exalted Christ throughout the centuries.

[1] Robert E. Webber, Ancient-Future Worship : Proclaiming and Enacting God’s Narrative (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2008), 108.

[2] Ibid., 151.

[3] Ibid., 67.

[4] Ibid., 97.

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If you’re a blogger, I think you will be wowed by the improvements in WordPress 2.5 and blown away by what they just released in 2.6.

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This passage in Isaiah seems to be at least one of Jesus’ sermon texts in his Sermon on the Mount, namely in his introduction we commonly call the Beatitudes. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be satisfied (Matthew 5:6, author’s translation).

If the questions posed by Isaiah 55 affect you; if they thud off the emptiness that I believe we all have when we consider the lusts of our own flesh; then, I believe Jesus’ words have a most merciful weight for us.

Most of us don’t strive after the unsatisfying because we really enjoy being unsatisfied. Sometimes we do not realize just how unsatisfied we really are. Other times we know that we’re unsatisfied, but don’t feel we have any better options. In even other situations, we cannot imagine how any of this matters because we’re operating in an economy of the world that uses completely different currency than the economy of life. It is as if we have fistfuls of cash we just printed out on our home computer, funny-money, and we cannot imagine why it buys us nothing.

It is not the rich that buy what Jesus offers. In fact what Jesus offers cannot be bought at all; it is received as a gift. We see that in Isaiah 55: Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. In the language of the Beatitudes, it is the poor who paradoxically trade in Christ’s economy, for theirs and theirs only is the kingdom of heaven. These are not the blissful poor, the ignorant poor. No, they are painfully aware of their poverty, such that they mourn it.

My wife and I have a really nice set of living room furniture that we could never have afforded to buy.  If you knew my wage, you would wonder how this furniture happens to be in my home at all. It is furniture that was given to us by a most gracious friend when we bought our home. So when people pay compliment to it when they visit our home, I am quick to mention that it was a fantastic gift. I cannot boast in myself or my provision, but in what the Lord has given us benevolently.

Ultimately the couch is going to disintegrate; but it is a figure of the way God’s gifts work in the divine economy. He gives us the greatest riches in such away that we may not point to it as a result of our own labor or merit or wealth; however, what God gives us is really ours to care for and walk in.  This gives the Christian the impetus for meekness.

Isaiah has asked us why we hunger and thirst for that which does not satisfy. Jesus proclaims that those who hunger and thirst for righteousness will be satisfied. We of ourselves will chase after all sorts of things, all the wrong things. Christ comes to us that our affections may be recalibrated and our appetites whet for what is glorious and truly wealthy.

Righteousness is a character trait of the Lord. God is not righteous because he does certain things. Rather he is simply righteous, in and of himself. We are created as the image of this righteous God and yet we have chosen a path that is most unlike him. We live in a way that is disharmonious with our status as image and this disjunction is the root of our dissatisfaction.

Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:10-11 that we are blessed when we are persecuted for righteousness sake, when we suffer on his account. In these two verses the grammatical parallelism identifies righteousness as Jesus himself.

And so we come full circle. God sees us buying everything but what will truly satisfy and grow us. He is not content to placate our “bentness,” to multiply our fists full of funny-money or nice furniture. Rather, he enters our economy with his own currency, himself. It is an infinite currency that has only one bill. In God’s economy there is Christ: Christ incarnate, Christ crucified, Christ risen and exalted, Christ the Lord. He alone is the righteousness of God. He alone is the one human being who has lived as the image of God also in his likeness. As such, fellowship with God has been restored for humanity (Colossians 1:15-20).

When we see what God offers all humanity in Jesus, how foolish are we to not seek the Lord while he may be found. He calls us to lay down the fistfuls of funny-money that we have printed off for ourselves and lay hold of Christ. Why, scripture asks, do you spend your money for that which is not bread.  Jesus will later ask why do you labor for bread that perishes, “for the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6:33)

Every Sunday this truth is proclaimed, reenacted, and received by faith. The Word of God is spoken, inviting all who thirst to the living waters. Every Sunday we celebrate the Word of God broken in which the bread of life is given to the eater that in mind and body, the whole person may be gratified with Christ, who alone satisfies. For it is Jesus who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. (2 Cor 4:6).

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That’s what the Christian seasons are all about. From Christmas to Easter and back again, the Church calendar is a reenactment of the redemptive narrative that God spoke in the person of Jesus Christ in which we participate today. Fr. Bob Corley, Curate at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Dallas, has written a short article on the Church Calendar that I think you might find informative and helpful.

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This is my first from the ground up Wordpress Theme, so it was fun to make and now share with you here. Thanks for reading. I hope you continue to enjoy this blog.

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Translation

3 For Jesus [1] is considered much more worthy of glory [2] than Moses, inasmuch as the one who built [3] the house has greater honor than the house itself.

Commentary

[1] οὗτος Greek, this one. The referent is clearly Jesus in the comparison so we have opted for clarification in the translation.

[2] οὗτος δόξης is found in the Byzantine Text as δόξης οὗτος.

[3] κατασκευάσας present active participle of κατασκευάζω, to build, construct or prepare (BAGD, 418). κατασκευάζω is used in Hebrews 11:7 in relating Noah’s construction of the Ark (κατεσκεύασεν κιβωτὸν) and in 1 Maccabees 15:3 with regard to preparing ships for war (κατεσκεύασα πλοῖα πολεμικά).

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Translation

1 From where, brothers and sisters, [a] holy participants [b] in a heavenly calling, contemplate [c] Jesus, [d] the apostle and high priest of our confession, 2 being faithful to the one who established [e] him as Moses was faithful to all in God’s [f] house.

Commentary

[a] ἀδελφοὶ here is being used in the generic sense and therefore is translated to reflect the full scope of the audience to which the book of Hebrews was addressed.

[b] μέτοχος the same word used for the anointing that God gave Jesus in Hebrews 1:9. There is a connection between Jesus calling and the calling of the saints here, as such those who are in Christ are those who participate in his heavenly calling, his anointing.

[c] κατανοήσατε to fix ones eyes upon something or someone in a spiritual sense, to contemplate, or consider (BAGD, 415). This is more than a call to intellectual contemplation; though, it is at least that. It is a call to behold Christ in all his splendor and is set forth as the first “application point” of this sermon, the epistle to the Hebrews. The NIV renders this “fix your thoughts on Jesus”; while the ESV and KJV give us “consider Jesus.” The pieces of the word (κατα + νοέω) communicate something like “according to thinking” or “according to the mind.”

[d] The Byzantine Texts add the title χριστόν, likely for clarification given that Ἰησοῦς (Jesus) is a common first century Jewish name.

[e] ποιήσαντι lit. “the one who made” or “the one who did.” This conceptually comes to us as the idea of establish (this translator’s preference) or appoint (KJV, ESV, NIV, NRSV). It is a poor understanding of the context of Hebrews and of the whole of scripture to think that a wooden rendering of ποιέω as “to make” would establish the long historically refuted idea that Jesus as the second person of the Trinity was created by the Father. Rather, it is the second person of the Trinity, who was made the apostle of the Trinity to be the high priest that would reunite a lost people to the Triune God.

[f] The Greek here is αὐτοῦ (of him, or his). This presents an ambiguity; however, given the context “his” would seem to make more sense with God as the antecedent rather than Moses, since Moses’ people are ultimately God’s people.

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Translation

17 Therefore, he was obligated [1] to become like his brothers in all ways, so that he might be a merciful [2] and faithful high priest in the things concerning [3] God, in order to be propitiation for the sins of the people. [4] 18 For in what [5] he himself had suffered being tempted, [6] he is able to come to the aid [7] of those who are being tempted.

Commentary

[1] ὤφειλεν (ὀφείλω) be obligated; with infinitive following: one must, one ought (BAGD, 598).

[2] ἐλεήμων or sympathetic. What God accomplishes in the incarnate Christ is both merciful, because he justly atones for our sins, and sympathetic because we have a High Priest who is in fact able to sympathize with our weakness (Hebrews 4:15).

[3] τὰ πρὸς τὸν θεόν that which concerns God (BAGD, 710).

[4] εἰς τὸ ἱλάσκεσθαι τὰς ἁμαρτίας τοῦ λαοῦ to expiate the sins of the people (BAGD, 375).

[5] ἐν ᾧ alternately, in that which, by that which.

[6] Πειρασθείς (πειράζω) enticement to sin, tempt (BAGD, 640).

[7] βοηθῆσαι to help, come to the aid of τινί someone (BAGD, 144).

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WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Bush administration has launched a “significant escalation” of covert operations in Iran, sending U.S. commandos to spy on the country’s nuclear facilities and undermine the Islamic republic’s government, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday. … [It is reported that] Congress has authorized up to $400 million to fund the secret campaign, …

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have rejected findings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Iran has halted a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb and “do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program,” Hersh said.

“They believe that their mission is to make sure that before they get out of office next year, either Iran is attacked or it stops its weapons program,” Hersh said.

… [read the whole article on CNN]

Do we really need a third front in the Middle East? Is it wise to start a war which one’s administration will not be able to oversee? How will we afford a three-front war when can’t afford the two-front one? I’m ready for a different theme, myself.

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