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Although most theologians would be at pains to say that God’s plan of redemption in Jesus was conceived before the world was made, many people see it as a kind of plan B necessary to save a world which failed at plan A namely obedience to God’s Law. Is the New Covenant really a breaking of God’s original plan whereby one was saved by obedience and can now be saved by “easy” beliefs? Paul’s vision in Romans is grander, both are by grace and both require obedience. Read the rest of this entry »
Have you ever wondered if everyone but the Christian Church is damned to hell? The Reformation gave us back something quite valuable by reminding us that the Bible teaches no hierarchy amongst believers. While some are apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors or teachers all are called to love and serve each other as brothers, in the face-to-face manner of Jesus, a great man yet who walked amongst men as friends and washed their smelly feet.
While it is clear that all followers of Jesus are called to mission, it is far from clear, from Jesus’ teaching, that only his followers would be saved. Let us set aside our black-and-white conception of the world divided into saved Christians and damned non-Christians and consider Jesus’ own words which, as will be plain, contained other categories. What emerges is an inclusive picture of people entering the Kingdom based not on religion or beliefs but on a multitude of other factors. Read the rest of this entry »
Amazing Grace how sweet the sound,
that saved a wretch like me
I once was lost but now am found,
was blind but now I see.
Grace is indeed amazing because it is God acting to transform humans. Much has been said about the contrast between humans working and God working. Typically Christians would hold that salvation is God’s doing, a free gift we can only receive. This great truth has however sometimes obscured several necessary and active elements of reception namely: repentance, trust and obedience. Read the rest of this entry »
Wright’s Understanding of Justification of Faith
Most people understand the Pauline doctrine of “justification by faith” to mean one is justified because of faith in Jesus. Though this is probable, N.T. Wright has argued in his Commentary on Romans (New Interpreters Bible, Vol. X) that “by” does not mean “because of” but “as evidenced by”. One has been justified and this is evident by one’s faith. As Wright is a Calvinist, faith is not something one produces but a gift of God (Eph 2:8) and this surely influence his interpretation.
Wright argues that faith is the true badge of justification (inclusion in God’s family) over and against the badge of circumcision (works of Torah). This is radically different from the common interpretation as the following example demonstrates: Read the rest of this entry »
It should strike us as odd that the greatest (professing) Christian nations are so immoral. Either Christianity is a sham or those calling themselves Christians are missing something of their calling. Surely the blame for this phenomena lies at the doorsteps of those who preach Easy-Believism where a quick prayer is enough to guarantee a ticket to heaven regardless of moral behaviour. Can we recover the Biblical message of salvation without diminishing Jesus work and God’s grace?
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I remember how visibly shocked an atheist friend of mine was when I told him that the core message of Christianity was NOT a moral one. Perhaps you are shocked and are sure that Christianity’s chief concern is our morality. Perhaps you are well past personal moral striving (self-righteousness) and into justification by faith but still sure that the whole point is our moral dilemma before God and that Jesus is the solution for our guilt as a result of our immorality. I hope to offer a glimmer of a much bigger plan which Jesus announced and is still being unveiled.
Doctrinally speaking, the church is in a mess. This worries conservatives, for whom doctrine is all-important, as much as it does liberals for whom doctrine is divisive and dangerous. On the whole, it damages our credibility when the world sees our doctrinal divisions and thinks: Why would a God permit such confusion and division? Why do some Christians teach this and others that? Best to stay agnostic!
The more I study doctrines and the Bible, the more I see that no doctrine captures and can account for the entire message and spirit of scripture. Doctrines try to make the Bible answer questions it doesn’t and we forget that the Bible is not a work of Systematic Theology designed to be a handy reference to all questions about God.
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I’ve been listening to Romans 6 and 7 repeatedly over the past couple of weeks and it really is an interesting way of absorbing a message being able to hear, pause and replay the same content over an over again without the effort of actually paging and reading. These 2 chapters are about Sin, the Law and how believers relate to these things and are incorporated into Jesus death and resurrection. Paul draws many interesting antitheses out of these themes which, I think, shed light on what actually happened on the cross and how we tend to mix up themes which for Paul, are separate and symbolic.
I’ve been looking at what Jesus’ death means for Paul and what sense it makes today. My conclusion was that we have perhaps overemphasised one aspect of Jesus’ death, perhaps even, mutated Paul’s meaning, in thinking that Jesus death was the penalty and payment for our sins. We often hear that Jesus died the death we sinners should have died but Paul speaks a different language and we often and unfortunately read his writings through reformed spectacles designed to correct 15th century mistakes thereby systematically missing Paul’s message.
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After what was a somewhat frightening journey through the workings of substitutionary atonement and an intensive study of Romans, Galatians and Philippians I have reached the following conclusions:
- “Atonement”, in the NT, means reconciliation and not “appeasement”
- God does not demand punishment of (or on behalf of) repentant believers
- Jesus death was the final blood sacrifice for those under Mosaic law (Torah)
- The cross was where God symbolically condemned sin and ended Torah
- Jesus blood was the pledge and beginning of the new covenant
- The new covenant is in spirit not in flesh (or blood)
