Theology Central
Theology Central exists as a place of conversation and information for faculty and friends of Central Baptist Theological Seminary. Posts include seminary news, information, and opinion pieces about ministry, theology, and scholarship.Active and Passive Obedience
Justin Taylor offers a discussion of the active and passive obedience of Christ. It’s worth a read.
Though some critics of Reformed theology critique the distinction as extrabiblical, I think the New Testament clearly teaches both aspects: the lifelong passive obedience of Christ (his penalty-bearing work of suffering and humiliation) and the lifelong active obedience of Christ (his will-of-God-obeying work) culminate in the cross. Those who trust in him and are united to him do not just have his active obedience credited to their account; nor do they just have his passive obedience credited to their account. The Bible doesn’t divide his obedience up in this way. Rather, believers are recognized as righteous through the imputation of the whole obedience of Christ (the reckoning of Christ’s complete work to our account).
While I am dispensational and not Reformed, I would nevertheless affirm the importance of Christ’s active obedience for the justification of the believer. While Gentile Christians were never under the demands of the Law of Moses, and while the Law of Moses must not be imagined as a mechanism for sanctification, all humans always have been under God’s moral requirements–His Moral Law. Christ perfectly fulfilled these requirements, and is the one human ever to have the right to appear before God in His Own righteousness. That righteousness is credited to us when we believe.
Evangelicals Much More Accepting of Immorality
A recent poll by PRRI shows that American evangelicals have changed dramatically in their view of whether immorality affects an individual’s ability to serve in public office. Here’s a synopsis:
No group has shifted their position more dramatically than white evangelical Protestants. More than seven in ten (72%) white evangelical Protestants say an elected official can behave ethically even if they have committed transgressions in their personal life—a 42-point jump from 2011, when only 30 % of white evangelical Protestants said the same. Roughly six in ten white mainline Protestants (60%) and Catholics (58%) also believe elected officials can behave honestly and ethically in their public roles regardless of their personal behavior. In 2011, only about four in ten white mainline Protestants (38%) and Catholics (42%) held this view. Notably, religiously unaffiliated Americans have remained constant in their views; six in ten (60%) believe elected officials who behave immorally in their personal lives can still perform their duties with integrity, compared to 63% in 2011.
When Bill Clinton was running, immorality mattered to evangelicals. When Donald Trump is running, immorality doesn’t.
There’s a word for this.
Hypocrisy.
There is no reason to suppose that a candidate who violates a marriage oath will uphold an oath of office.
E. D. Hirsch Objects to “Common Core”
Dispensationalists know E. D. Hirsch best for his work in hermeneutics, where he is a major contributor. Most of the world, however, knows him better for his book Cultural Literacy, in which he argued for the importance of background knowledge as an important key to learning. While Hirsch is personally a liberal, his views on education have become important to many conservatives. They were also important to the people who developed the so-called “Common Core” being used in schools across the country.
Now Hirsch has published a book in which he is sharply critical of the common core. A long-form article at Education Week explores Hirsch’s work and his objections. It’s worth a read.
He calls the reading standards “empty” and “deeply flawed” because they teach all-purpose reading-comprehension strategies rather than facts and information. An entire chapter of his new book is devoted to what he refers to as “the tribulations of the common core.”
Frontline on Convergence
One of the best periodicals coming out of Fundamentalism these days is Frontline Magazine, the official publication of the Fundamental Baptist Fellowship, International. The current issue is devoted to discussing “convergence,” by which the editors mean the apparent convergence between some versions of fundamentalism and some versions of conservative evangelicalism. The editors do not see convergence as an entirely good thing.
If you think of yourself as a fundamentalist, or if you’re interested in fundamentalism, you ought to be reading Frontline. It is one of the most important voices within fundamentalism today.
The Split Between Stott and Lloyd-Jones
You need to know this bit of history because of the important ecclesiological issues that were at stake. Thanks to Justin Taylor, you can.
[Stott’s and his allies’] arguments took three forms:
(1) Historically, they argued that the constitutional basis of the Church of England was Protestant and Reformed, seen in the Reformation formularies like the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion and the Book of Common Prayer. So evangelicals held the legal “title deeds” to the Church of England, and the liberals and catholics should get out, not them.
(2) Biblically, they argued that many New Testament churches were doctrinally confused or morally compromised, like the church in Corinth which was muddled about the resurrection, or the church in Sardis which numbered only “a few” godly people (Revelation 3:4). But believers in those churches are told to hold fast to the gospel, and to fight against false teachers, not to leave the church and set up a new one.
(3) Pragmatically, Stott and his friends argued that the Church of England provided many gospel opportunities for evangelicals, and that it would be a dereliction of duty to hand over their pulpits to unbelieving clergy. What then would become of their congregations?
Neo-Kuyperianism vs the Two Kingdom Theory
Here is an older blog post by Kevin DeYoung, but still well worth reading. It nicely summarizes the strengths and weaknesses of two major Reformed approaches to culture. Baptists incline toward the two-kingdom theory, but occasionally a bit of Neo-Kuyperianism shows up.
It should be noted that two-kingdom theorists don’t necessarily take culture any less seriously than Neo-Kuyperians; indeed, they sometimes take it more seriously.
If you haven’t thought about the difference before, DeYoung’s short post will give you a nice introduction.
Paganism and the Charismatic Movement
John MacArthur comments:
In much of the world, the Charismatic Movement indiscriminately absorbs the pagan ideas of local false religions into its theology. For example, in Africa, a traditional obsession with witchdoctors, demonic spirits, and ancestor worship has been largely assimilated by Pentecostal churches there. The resulting hybrid calls itself “Christian” but is actually rooted in tribal paganism.
MacArthur, John F. Strange Fire: The Danger of Offending the Holy Spirit with Counterfeit Worship (p. 264).
Dignity and Degradation
Can we restore dignity to our degraded times? So asks Bruce Frohnen at The Imaginative Conservative.
The very notion of infidelity as a wrong seems outdated today. Presidential candidates of both parties dismiss the thing-in-itself as meaningless or, at most, a private concern. Its only relevance, for the political classes, seems to be related to its implications, in specific cases, to one’s “attitude toward women.” And even here outrage seems more a matter of political calculation than moral sense. People have natural drives, so they must act on them. The only question is how best we can manipulate the public’s perception of the circumstances of our opponent’s activities. Moral outrage, being the product of mere conditioning, on this view, should be used, especially against those people of faith who retain the capacity to disapprove the thing-in-itself. Moral outrage is for liars and for suckers.
Timothy George Writes about J. I. Packer
The essay is “Packer at Ninety,” and you’ll find it at First Things.
It has been my privilege to know and work closely with Jim Packer for the past thirty-five years, only a fraction of his long and still amazingly productive career. I have seen him buffeted by adversity, and criticized unfairly, but I have never seen him sag. His smile is irrepressible and his laughter can bring light to the most somber of meetings. His love for all things human and humane shines through. His mastery of ideas and the most fitting words in which to express them is peerless. Ever impatient with sham of all kinds, his saintly character and spirituality run deep. I love to hear him pray. Again and again, he has reminded us that we live our lives coram deo and in the light of eternity. He has taught us that theology is for doxology and devotion, that theology is always at its best “when it is consciously done under the eye of the God of whom it speaks, and when it is singing to his glory.”
MacArthur on Spirit Filling
He’s responding to the Charismatic theory.
As the New Testament makes clear, being a “Spirit-filled” Christian has nothing to do with uttering mindless gibberish, crashing to the carpet in a hypnotic trance, or any other mystical encounter of supposed ecstatic power. Rather, it has everything to do with submitting our hearts and minds to the Word of Christ, walking in the Spirit and not the flesh, and daily growing in love and affection for the Lord Jesus unto the service of His whole body, the church.
MacArthur, John F. Strange Fire: The Danger of Offending the Holy Spirit with Counterfeit Worship (p. 212).
McDonalds at the Vatican?
McDonald’s would like to open a franchise just off St. Peter’s Square in Rome. Some Cardinals don’t like the idea. How they would feel about a Starbucks we don’t know.
Religious Freedom or Religious Liberty?
They’re not the same thing, according to Stephanie Russell-Kraft at Religion Dispatches. And conservatives are tilting more and more toward liberty.
Political theorist Hanna Fenichel Pitkin, in her 1988 essay “Are Freedom and Liberty Twins?”, wrote that freedom “is more likely to be holistic, to mean a total condition or state of being,” whereas liberty “is more likely to be plural and piecemeal.” Another way of putting it: freedom is the capacity to do things in the world, while liberty is the absence of external institutional constraints.
In the era of the American Revolution, liberty reigned supreme. For the founders, liberty was the “fundamental American value,” and liberty remained the dominant word in the country’s political lexicon until the 20th century, according to Geoffrey D. Nunberg, a linguist who teaches at the UC Berkeley School of Information. Even today, liberty still has 18th century connotations. “It’s a word that wears a three-corner hat,” said Nunberg.
Leithart and Wilson on the Church
Not long ago Peter Leithart asked whether Protestantism had a future. Douglas Wilson didn’t like his answer. The exchange provides some valuable insight as to the nature and boundaries of the church. As Baptists, we would say some different things and say other things differently, but this is the kind of conversation we can learn from.
Here’s Leithart:
By “catholic” I do mean, first of all, universal. The future of Protestantism is to be, and to acknowledge itself to be, part of a global catholic communion of communions. Protestant churches will be one with all the rest of the churches, and contribute their gifts to the good of the whole. A catholic future for Protestantism means a future of unity with other families of churches.
And here’s Wilson:
At the beginning of Mere Christianity, Lewis describes the Christian faith as a large mansion with many rooms. He describes the rooms as various communions, and he includes Rome, which is distressing to some ardent Protestants. Why do they get a room? But it is equally distressing to any Roman Catholic who knows his onions. Why aren’t they considered the whole house?
Gerald McDermott on the SBL and IVP
Gerald McDermott is an Anglican professor at Alabama’s Beeson Divinity School. He weighs in on the banning of InterVarsity Press by the Society for Biblical Literature in an essay entitled, “Stranger than Fiction.”
Perhaps you notice the disconnect between SBL’s declaration of “tolerance” and its threat not to tolerate the age-old teaching of Christian marriage. Or the contradiction between claiming to want “unhindered critical discourse” but now threatening to hinder discourse by banning arguments for a particular position. Or “respect for diversity” while not wanting intellectual diversity in discussions of the most debated ethical issue of our day.
Michael Bird Responds to SBL Leadership over IVP
While we have not yet seen a formal announcement from the Society of Biblical Literature, their leadership is supposed to have banned IVP over its recent clarifications on human sexuality. Michael Bird has responded to the SBL leadership in an open letter
Fifth, and somewhat baffling, is what you [John Kutsko] wrote to IVP. You said that SBL was committed to: “a variety of critical perspectives … diversity of participation and unhindered critical discourse … free inquiry and expression.” John, mate, I don’t want to be confrontational, but can you explain to me how does banning a publisher from the annual conference increase the diversity, free inquiry and expression of SBL? It does the opposite, it cabines diversity, it censures certain elements of belief, and inhibits free expression. Let me be clear, to ban IVP from the annual convention does not safeguard the academic freedom of SBL members, it amounts to censorship, which many of us are very, very sensitive about..
Mind and Heart
According to the Scriptures, neither our emotions nor our experiences provide an adequate foundation for the Christian life. Only the truths of Scripture, understood with the mind and communicated through doctrine, can provide that sure foundation upon which we should establish our beliefs and behavior as well as determine the validity of our emotions and experiences. The mind is not the enemy of the heart, and doctrine is not an obstacle to devotion.
–Paul Washer. The Truth About Man – Biblical study of the Doctrine of Man (Kindle Locations 138-142). HeartCry Missionary Society.
China Gets Serious about Religious Enforcement
The government has a new reporting system on religious activities that is aimed at teachers and parents. Read about it here.
Do We Need Rhetoric?
Joel Zartman says that we do, partly because we cannot trust ourselves. Read the whole thing at Unknowing.
Which is why you need rhetoric. You have to be conscious of it if you want to do it at all well, unless you naturally do it well. It requires consideration, and consideration beyond what you considering can come up with. And even if you naturally do it well, it is well to consider what is proper and improper not only in the aesthetic realm—which is important—but in the moral realm. If you don’t think about whether you ought to achieve things by one or another effect, if you don’t label certain approaches and understand clearly what you are doing, how will you confront your deceitful heart when you are proceeding by sensationalism, fearmongering, omitting crucial details and such unscrupulous means?
It’s Not Just Evangelicals
Two nuns in Italy have entered a same-sex civil union. Pope Francis is reported to be disappointed.
Tozer on the Thought Life
Make your thoughts a clean sanctuary. To God, our thoughts are things. Our thoughts are the decorations inside the sanctuary where we live. If our thoughts are purified by the blood of Christ, we are living in a clean room no matter if we are wearing overalls covered with grease. Your thoughts pretty much decide the mood and weather and climate inside your heart, and God considers your thoughts as part of you. Thoughts of peace, thoughts of pity, thoughts of mercy, thoughts of kindness, thoughts of charity, thoughts of God, thoughts of the Son of God—these are pure things, good things, and high things.
–Tozer, A. W. How to Be Filled with the Holy Spirit (Kindle Locations 510-514).
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