Theological Musings

his is a serious question being posed in this post, and is not meant to imply any attempt to stir anything up. I’m asking sincerely because I honestly have no clue what the answer is. I hope somebody can shed light on this.

First some background. As I’ve mentioned many times in the past, we have been reading through the Bible as a family. We’re not on any particular schedule or “reading plan”, but just reading a few chapters at a time. We’re just going in printed order (i.e., Genesis to Revelation, cover-to-cover).

Tonight, we finished 2 Chronicles. And as I read the last few chapters aloud, something jumped out at me that has me very baffled.

In 2 Chronicles 30, Hezekiah invites all Israel to the Passover. 2 Chronicles 30:21-26 tell us that the celebration of the Passover was so exciting that after the seven days of the feast, they decided to celebrate seven more days. Verse 26 sums up the amazing feast by saying that there was great joy because nothing like this had been done in Jerusalem since the time of Solomon.

Moving on, after Hezekiah’s death, his son Manasseh becomes king. And then Manasseh’s son Amon becomes king 55 years later. After just a two-year reign, Amon is assassinated, and his son Josiah is made king.

Josiah is Hezekiah’s great-grandson, according to the text. Just 57 years after the death of Hezekiah.

Now here’s where it gets confusing for me.

2 Chronicles 35 details a celebration of the Passover under Josiah’s reign. And 2 Chronicles 35:18 has this to say about it:

There had not been celebrated a Passover like it in Israel since the days of Samuel the prophet; nor had any of the kings of Israel celebrated such a Passover as Josiah did with the priests, the Levites, all Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

I have added some bold to show what confuses me. If just three generations earlier (and a mere five chapters in our text) we see a grand celebration of the Passover with Hezekiah, why are we now told that none of the kings of Israel ever celebrated the Passover like this? Hezekiah’s is said to be the grandest since the time of Solomon, but the mention of Josiah’s Passover takes it back even before Saul!

Am I missing something very obvious here? Can anyone shed any light on this for me? If you can, please comment below. I’m honestly very puzzled about this oddity.

Until next time,

steve

ell, I finally am getting around to sitting down to write some of my own thoughts on this topic. Thank you to all of you who contributed such insightful comments in response to my question.

Much of what I would like to say has been said in one form or another in the comments that were posted previously. This has the net effect of letting me know ahead of time that my thoughts won’t be overly controversial to everyone in the discussion! But seriously, it is refreshing to see such thought being given to this topic. I likely will not address everything that was written in the comments, but they are there for you to read for yourself. Instead, I want to share my thoughts, some of which will overlap the thoughts of others.

It is easy, I think, for us to agree that whatever Jesus meant when he prayed for our unity, we’re not fulfilling it. I don’t think I’ve ever come across anyone who says that the body of Christ is experiencing unity at the level that Jesus prayed for. Part of this is because we don’t even agree on what the unity is supposed to look like!

Some options of interpretation that I have come across in my time of examining this passage include:

• Unity = Unanimity — Unity can only come when we fully agree on everything that is believed, practiced, taught, etc.
• Unity = Consensus — Unity means that we “agree to disagree”
• Unity = Anything Goes — Unity means that every person’s belief is valid, and we should never “debate” or try to convince others of our viewpoints
• Unity = Eschatological Perfection — The unity that Jesus prayed for is only possible, and will only exist, when Jesus returns and we are made perfect.

With that in mind, I posed the question, “What is the unity that Jesus prayed for in John 17 and is it primarily (or even solely) eschatological in nature?”

Let me first of all give my thoughts on the eschatology aspect of the question. I think determining the eschatological import (if any) helps us determine what the unity actually is. It also impacts what we believe to be our responsibility toward the unity in question.

In other words, if the unity is primarily (or solely) eschatological, we can easily assume that it is not attainable in this lifetime, and we will generally feel like it’s not even worth trying. If, however, the unity is a present possibility and reality, we will understand our own response to the prayer of Jesus.

As some have already commented, I do not believe that the unity for which Jesus prayed is eschatological. Eschatological unity is almost a given. Why would Jesus take the time to pray for what is essentially a guaranteed part of the future kingdom?

But more importantly, the words of Jesus in John 17 give us ample evidence that eschatology is not in view during this prayer. Verse 21 tells us specifically that the prayer of Jesus for unity is for this purpose: “…so that the world may believe that You sent Me.”

Verse 23 expands on this by saying that the purpose of the unity is “…so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.”

In my opinion, these two statements of purpose that Jesus gave for his prayer for unity remove any eschatological implication from the prayer. The purpose of the unity is to demonstrate to the world that God sent Jesus and that God loves us.

If this is correct (and obviously, I believe it is), then this greatly impacts our understanding of what that unity is and whether or not we should actively be pursuing it. Since it is not a future unity (any eschatological implications must come from outside the text), there must be a present unity for which Jesus prayed.

Within this prayer, Jesus gives some indication as to what the unity should be. Namely, it should be a mirror of the unity that Jesus and the Father share. He compares the unity of us with his unity with the Father in verse 21:

…they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us….

Would we say that the unity of Jesus and the Father is manifest in “you go your way and I’ll go mine and we won’t bother each other”? Yet this is frequently what ends up happening among Christians.

You believe in infant baptism? Then I can’t fellowship with you. You believe in speaking in tongues? You’ll have to have church across town. You believe that the Genesis account of creation is metaphorical? I have nothing in common with you.

This cannot be what Jesus prayed for.

And with that, I will have to hold off on the rest of my thoughts because I am out of time. Comments are open, and I will return with a further post at some point.

Until next time,

steve

’m going to do something out of the ordinary for this blog.  Instead of writing out a whole bunch of thoughts on a subject and then getting your responses, I’m going to open up a question and let the discussion run before I post my thoughts.

I may not be around much on the blog over the next few days, but will try to follow along as much as possible.  I’ll hopefully post my thoughts early next week.

The question: What is the unity that Jesus prayed for in John 17 and is it primarily (or even solely) eschatological in nature?  (In other words, is it a future promise of unity in eternity?)

Thoughts?

hil Hawkins has been doing some excellent commenting here on this blog of late. And sometimes comments are just too good to stay buried in the comments section of the blog. While I don’t seek to exalt any one person above another on this blog (save Jesus!), I just had to put this comment in its entirety up here on the front page for all to read.

To my dear brothers who are involved in the institutional church, please don’t read this so much as an “institutional vs. simple” dichotomy. But prayerfully weigh Phil’s words here and see what points of agreement might be had. Of course, dissenting opinions are welcome in the comments following this post, if one feels it necessary.

Without further ado, then, in my “Wish I Had Written This!” category comes this profound comment from (unwitting) guest blogger Phil on the recent “How (Not) to Judge Someone’s Orthodoxy” post:

Looking back at this whole discussion, I come back to this basic question–What is Christianity? Is it
(a) a set of activities in a sacred place on Sunday morning, with a list of tenets to be subscribed to as a condition of participation, coupled with rules for behavior, enforced by the official leadership

or

(b) a way of living, every day, 24/7, in relationship with Jesus Himself, and with others who also are in relationship with Him.

Going through the words of Jesus Himself in the Gospels, I cannot find anything that leads to (a); in fact, he often rebuked the leaders of the (a) system of the day. I grew up in churches, have been in churches all my life, and my conclusion now is that in most situations, the more of (a) you have, the less you have of (b); in fact, (a) tends to replace and eliminate (b)!

How did “Abide in me” come to mean “Be at the church building every time the doors are open”?

If you want to improve your relationship with someone, say your wife, do you go off to an auditorium and sit while someone who claims to know her better than you do lectures for half an hour? Or would the time be better spent going somewhere alone with your wife and conversing with her for half an hour? Which really builds the relationship with her?

I’m afraid most humans are too lazy for their own good. We’d rather have a list of rules to keep than try to walk in the Spirit. We want a doctrinal statement to assent to rather than trying to learn to hear His voice ourselves. The Hebrews started it at Mt. Sinai–they wanted Moses to hear God for them.

And for those who would say “It’s some of each, both (a) and (b)” my question is How can it be both, when (a) eliminates (b)? I think, and I suspect [frequent commenter] ded would agree (based on what he’s written here), that they are two different things, coming from two different sources. If God meant it to be a symbiosis, it would be a stable symbiosis, not constantly drifting in one direction.

To look at it another way: What has been the “fruit” of (a) in this country? Do we have a vibrant church that is transforming its culture? Are non-believers coming to Christ in droves? Are believers “turning the world upside down”?

Or is the picture more like this: “Our bookshelves are full of Christian books and videos. We have churches on every major street, more staff workers than ever before, large Sunday school departments, cell systems, mega- and meta-church seminars. We have Christian bumper stickers, political action groups, huge parachurch ministries–and in the midst of it all, we have lost every major city in North America.” Back in 1999, Wolfgang Simson included that quote from Ted Haggard in his book “Houses that Change the World”.

Maybe we do need to lay aside everything that’s been written since and go back to the New Testament for our original instructions.

Way to go, Phil! And a hearty “amen” to that.

Until next time,

steve

n the past, we have had some discussion here on this blog about the Westminster Confession of Faith. In a recent question about bibliolatry raised on Kamp Krusty (a very insightful and quite humorous blog), I got into a discussion with Scott Roche about the statement that the WCF gives about Scripture.

Here is the statement that Scott quoted from the WCF:

Although the light of nature and the works of creation and providence manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, to such an extent that men are without excuse, yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and of his will which is necessary for salvation. Therefore it pleased the Lord, at various times and in diverse ways, to reveal himself and to declare his will to his church; and afterward—for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh and the malice of Satan and of the world—to commit this revelation wholly to writing. Therefore the Holy Scripture is most necessary, God’s former ways of revealing his will to his people having ceased.

This sparked some interesting back-and-forth, and Scott and I agreed to talk through this on our blogs. To that end, Scott has posted an introduction to the topic, and then his fuller thoughts about it. I’d like to take some time to respond to Scott here in this post.

First of all, I have to commend Scott for his tremendous graciousness in this conversation. No matter the outcome of this conversation, or whether or not one of us becomes persuaded by the other’s position, it’s just a joy to have this type of discussion with someone who seasons his disagreement with grace and love. Thanks, Scott!

There are things that Scott and I both do agree on, as has been established in the conversation that has already taken place. For one, we both believe that the Bible reveals Jesus to us. We also both agree that Jesus is the object and focus of our faith. That’s enough, in my opinion, to give us plenty of room to fellowship together.

There are a couple of points that Scott made, however, that I would like to shed a different light on. Similar to how I believe that the WCF makes some statements as “fact” that maybe aren’t able to be fully determined (and therefore, in my opinion, should probably be left as opinions), I think Scott may possibly be overstating some points.

While God used a variety of means to communicate to people over the ages it always got written down, at least so far as we know.

I’m actually not sure that this can be stated, even with the disclaimer of “at least so far as we know.” I’ve used some examples in the past that seem to refute this. For example, King Saul (before he’s anointed king) joins a group of prophets and begins prophesying. Yet nothing is recorded as to what he, or any of the other prophets in that group, prophesied.

Likewise, the New Testament records that Anna (in the temple when Jesus was dedicated) was a prophetess (indicating activity prior to her entrance into the story), yet none of her statements prior to the appearance of Jesus are recorded.

And perhaps the most compelling to me is the fact that Paul took a lot of time to instruct the Corinthians in the proper use of prophecy, yet to our knowledge, none of the canonical writings were penned by anyone in the church in Corinth.

So, at best, I think it’s an overstatement to say that God always put his words down in writing. That statement seems to set up a foundation for Scott’s development of his thoughts. If, in fact, that foundation is overstated, then we have to consider the conclusions as potentially suspect or distorted.

Scott also goes on to discuss the statement in the WCF which says that the former ways of God revealing his will to us have ceased.

This is, for me, the most troubling statement in the above-quoted portion of the WCF. Troubling because it seems to serve as the justification for the stated view of scripture (the complete revelation of God to us).

We know from scripture (Hebrews 1:1-2) that God spoke in the past through prophets, and then chose to speak to us through Jesus. This is, to me, very significant, because of what it doesn’t say. Even though some of the prophecies were written down for preservation, and even though some of the words of Jesus have been written down for us, this verse doesn’t say that God spoke through writing and then continues to speak through writing.

Even Jesus said a lot of things (according to John) that weren’t written down. So the speaking to us through Jesus goes beyond words on a page. God seems to want something much more personal than written communication alone.

When God first brought the Israelites out of Egypt, he asked all of them to come to the mountain so he could speak to them. The Israelites refused, out of fear, and asked Moses to mediate for them. So, while Scott points out that the 10 commandments were written down for us, was that because that was how God desired to communicate? Or was it because Moses had to convey to the Israelites what God wanted to tell them personally?

I have long contended that what God originally created in Eden and what he consistently sought to restore after the fall of Adam and Eve was a personal relationship. Hence the eventual appearance of Jesus — Emmanuel, God with us.

So with regard to whether or not God’s methods of revelation have ceased, necessitating complete revelation being written down, I think we would have to say that the answer is that God’s methods of communication have become more and more personal over time. God spoke through Moses, spoke through the prophets, spoke face-to-face in the person of Jesus, then indwells us with his Holy Spirit. There is a progression from separation to intimate relationship. That’s the beauty of the Gospel message that Jesus came to preach!

See, it’s not even an issue of cessationism vs. continuationism. It’s not a charismatic or non-charismatic issue. It’s an issue of asking what type of relationship God desires with us, and how he has chosen to enact that relationship.

Any thoughts in response?

Until next time,

steve