Theological

Christological Monotheism

Jonathan Dodson — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 22:36:15 +0000

In doing some research to preach on Colossians 2:6-7, I have consulted some great resources for Christological monotheism. The idea that Paul was placing Jesus into the identity of YHWH, by using his name “Lord”, was a real epiphany for me during seminary. I get so excited about the profound christology embedded in this now empty and rather pedestrian phrase—Jesus is Lord!

Communicating the insights of Christological monotheism and their implications for the church has been a struggle and a joy. I was surprised to discover two missional books take up CM. Missiologist Alan Hirsch devotes an entire chapter to it in his book The Forgotten Ways, drawing out the implications for following Jesus in all spheres of society (echoes of Kuyper). In Promoting the Gospel, John Dickson refers to CM as “the Bible’s most basic doctrine.” He reminds us that because Jesus is Lord our mission is doxological and our doxology should be missional. Indeed, the fact that Jesus is Lord affects the whole of the christian life and mission of the church in the world! What would our churches, our neighborhoods, our cities, our countries look like if we began to grasp the all-encompassing, integrative, redemptive, implications of the lordship of Jesus Christ?

Here are some helpful resources on the topic of Christological Monotheism:

N.T. Wright, Climax of the Covenant
Richard Bauckham, God Crucified (expanded)
Larry Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ; cf. At the Origins of Christian Worship and entry in Dictionary of Paul and His Letters
Alan Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways
John Dickson, Promoting the Gospel

Culture: To Redeem or Not to Redeem?

Jonathan Dodson — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 19:17:47 +0000

Much has been written about the extreme Christian postures towards culture–fundamentalist judgmentalism (Christ Against Culture) and emergent syncretism (Christ of Culture)—but is redeeming the culture the biblical middle? D. A. Carson doesn’t seem to think so.

Carson on Culture

D. A. Carson recently cautioned against using “redemption” language when engaging culture. He wrote: “Redemption terminology in the NT is so bound up with Christ’s work for and in the church that to extend it to whatever good we do in the broader world risks a shift in focus.” I love Carson’s commitment to the Bible, and he is correct that redemption terminology is often bound up with Christ’s work for and in the church. However, redemption is also bound up with creation and culture in the New Testament. Apparently, Tim Keller has been affected by Carson’s caution. His comment during a Q&A session at the Dwell Conference revealed sympathy for Carson’s position. Is redeeming culture wrong-headed? Let’s consider this question from Colossians:

Colossians on Culture

“and through him (Jesus) to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” Col 1:20

The emphasis of this verse is upon the reconciling work of Christ, a subset of redemption, accompished through Jesus death on the cross. It accomplishes peace, shalom, restoration. The scope of the redemptive, reconciling, shalom promoting effects of the cross are universal. When it comes to people, they are reconciled by faith or by force. When it comes to all other things they are reconciled in fact. That fact is breaking into the present through the Church. All things then, including creation and culture, are affected by the already-not-fully redemptive work of Jesus on the cross. The church is the embodiment of the redemptive gospel to and in the world, which is made plain by the rest of Paul’s letter to the Colossians. The implications of this culture redeeming posture are spelled out in Paul’s ethical exhortations regarding society and vocation. He tells the church to produce counter-cultural, redeemed forms of:

1. marriage and family, a social institution:
2. work and slavery, cultural norms and ills
3. social, economic, and ethnic prejudice and barriers
4. how we spend our time, a rather sweeping category that applies to everything!

“Conduct yourselves wisely toward outsiders, making the best use of (literally “redeeming”) the time.” Colossians 4:; cf. Eph 5:14

Redemptively Engaging Culture

This sweeping command to redeem the time, explicitly through conversations, but implicitly through everything we do warrants redemptive engagement with culture. Perhaps there is something wrong with Carson’s definition of “culture” or maybe we need to clarify what we mean by “redeeming”? Provisionally, I am thinking of gospel-motivated critique and change of cultural forms and content. Nevertheless, the gospel compels us to redemptively engage both peoples and cultures. How? To redeem places—where you gather as a church, where you live in a neighborhood or condo or apartment complex. To redeem cultural products—films you watch, music you listen to, art and advertisement you take in, games you play. To redeem bad political practices—voting for certain propositions, supporting certain policies. To redeem domains like education—to raise the quality of education offered, to promote theological perspectives alongside secular perspectives, to advocate better salaries for teachers.

These are a few ways (here’s more on that) we can redemptively engage culture, which are warranted by Christ on the cross, by Paul from prison, by the Bible as a whole, a document that is, itself, redemptive literature that has affected the writing of novels, short stories, journalism, history, and so on. Should we redeem culture? I think so, but we must be careful not to call the creation of Christian sub-culture redemption of culture; that, of course, is often just bad culture creation and Andy Crouch recently has helped us out with that. I say, redeem, but redeem wisely!

We Become What We Worship: Review – I

Jonathan Dodson — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 23:16:17 +0000

Greg Beale‘s biblical-theological acumen is remarkable. Although a self-proclaimed maximalist (24), Beale leaves no stone unturned whether he is tracing an exegetical arguments or redemptive-historical themes. His latest book We Become What We Worship: a biblical theology of idolatry is no exception. The seeds of this book were sewn through several of his seminary courses, including his Use of the OT in the NT, which proved quite challenging my first year of seminary. It required a working knowledge of Hebrew and Greek, and I only had Greek at the time. I eventually dropped the 10 day course. However, I recall spending considerable time in Isaiah 6 tracing its influence on the NT and its description of “sensory organ malfunction,” the pattern of Gentiles and Jews being rendered spiritually blind, deaf, and dumb. Beale makes this text the seminal starting point for a biblical theology of idolatry in WBWWW.

In chapter one, Beale takes Martin Luther’s definition of idolatry and slightly tweaks it: “whatever your heart clings to or relies upon, that is your God; trust and faith of the heart alone make both God and idol.” Beale adds “whatever your heart clings to or relies on for ultimate security.” (6) This is an excellent definition of idolatry, both heart-focused and God-centered, perceiving idolatry to be a matter of heart not just action. The rest of the chapter outlines Beale’s hermeneutic, which is a good, concise introduction on how to do biblical theology. WIthout wading into the frey of sensus plenior debate, Beale notes his hermeneutical preferences summarizing his position as canonical, gentic-progressive, and intertextual. Typical Bealian verbosity!

Chapter Two lay the biblical-theological groundwork for his thesis: “we resemble what we revere, either for ruin or for restoration.” Isaiah 6 portrays Israel as deaf and blind, like the idols they worship. Their idolatry has rendered them idol-like, a judgment for idolatry. We become like what we worship. Beale convincingly traces this dynamic throughout the rest of Isaiah. Chapter three extends this examination to the rest of the OT, overtuning a host of exgetical gems through rigorous biblical digging. In particular, Beale notes the prominence of the Golden Calf rebellion in Deuteronomy 29 as programmatic for idolatry themes and dynamics in the rest of Scripture. Chapter four continues tracing the become what you worship dynamic through Judaism, with chapter five turning the corner into the New Testament. It is in the Gospels that we begin to see the resemble what we revere for restoration more prominently. I will pick up with the review here in the next post.

For another review, see Josh Otte’s blog.

Alexander’s From Eden to the New Jerusalem

Jonathan Dodson — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:28:28 +0000

Desmond Alexander’s From Paradise to Promised land was a great biblical theology of the Pentateuch. He has followed that work up with his newest work, From Eden to the New Jerusalem. From the Table of Contents, it looks like a great introduction to Biblical theology.

My Many Conversions

Jonathan Dodson — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:27:41 +0000

I have had many conversions since I was converted to the lordship of King Jesus at age 6. Here are a few:

Conversion to Missions
Conversion to Sexual Purity
Conversion to the Doctrines of Grace
Conversion to Christian Hedonism
Conversion to Kuyperian Thought and Practice
Conversion to Renewal as a Way of Life (Richard Lovelace)
Conversion to Biblical Theology
Conversion to knowing the Trinity
Conversion to Church Planting
Re-conversion to the Church

Theology of Mediation – II

Jonathan Dodson — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 13:40:43 +0000

In Colossians Paul tells us that Jesus is the Agent of creation: “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities- all things were created through him and for him.” Paul goes out of his way to use three prepositions to denote Christ’s work in creation, which he repeats in vss. 19-20. How should these texts shape our theology of Mediation? Why the close attention and repetition of prepositions?

Greek Philosophy

I believe that Paul is deliberately engaging Greek philosophy and turning it on its head. In Greek philosophy there was this preoccupation with creation being made from something, some agent. With the Thales it was water. Everything was made from water. Then came Heraclitus who said that everything was made from the logos, which was some kind of fiery, fluctuating thing. Then came along, Plato. And Plato was more sophisticated than the Pre-Socratic philosophers. He didn’t think that the world came from stuff, it came from some metaphysical principle which he called the Forms. The Forms were these eternal realities that determined what finite created things would look like. But the point is that everything came from the forms, and if you read Plato closely, you might see that he posits this thing called a Demi-urge, but either way there is this Agent or substance that does the creating.

Trinitarian Creation

When it comes to Paul, we discover that God needs nothing to create. He creates ex nihilo, out of nothing. God creates in Jesus, a Person, not a substance. Together with the what St Irenaeus called this the “two hands of the Father” God created all things. This is important because, contrary to a lot of Greek philosophy and early Christian theology, God isn’t bound up with his creation. He is not to be confused with the rocks and the trees. There is ontological distance between God and creation, so he can freely and lovingly relate to us and our world and we need not worship the world. God isn’t in the rocks and trees. He made those things with his two hands, Son and Spirit. This is not pantheism—God is in everything. The rocks and trees aren’t meant to be worshipped; they are to point us their sovereign and free Creator for worship. See, God creates as a Trinity, out of his boundless self-sufficiency and pleasure and creativity. He doesn’t need anything and isn’t compelled by anything, like some eternal substance.

Why is this important? Because God in Christ, through Christ with the Spirit is completely free and sovereign. There is no water, logos, forms or eternal matter or primordial gas that competes with his sovereignty and freedom to create. As firstborn in whom all things are made we discover that Jesus has priority over all things, nothing existed before him. As image of the invisible God, we find that Jesus has absolute preeminence over all things. Not only is he the rightful heir, number one, but he is also the sovereign ruler, the best.

Think of it like this. In many sports it is possible to be ranked #1 and not be the best team or player on the circuit. It is only the end of the season that we find out who is the best. Jesus not only has the priority of number one, but he also has the preeminence of being the best, most sublime, supreme creator and lord over all things. Why? Because all things were made in him and through him.

Theology of Mediation

Jonathan Dodson — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 17:26:21 +0000

I’ll be writing some posts in the weeks to come on a theology of mediation. Many are familiar with the need for Christ to mediate redemption to sinful humanity in order to reconcile us to God, but what of Christ’s mediation of creation? It is only with the development of the NT that we get a clear theology of mediation, particularly Christ’s role in creating all things. If Christ mediates creation for the good of all humanity, then doesn’t it follow that he would mediate redemption for the good of all humanity? If not, what is the difference between Christ’s mediating creation and redemption? J. van Genderen and W. H. Velema in their forthcoming Concise Reformed Dogmatics state:

Without knowledge of Christ, who is the Word made flesh, and without considering his glory, the evangelist would not have thus referred to the Word in the beginning. But this does not mean that creation by the Word and redemption through the Word incarnate should be identified with each other or thought to coincide in principle. Then there would be no distinction between creation and re-creation. Salvation in Christ would already be implicit in creation. In believing this, one would open the door to the “monism of grace” with far-reaching consequences in the direction of universalism.

Do you agree? Is there a distinction to be made between Christ’s mediating of creation and redemption? What is this distinction? How does his agency differ between the two? What difference does this make for our engagement with culture and people? Contra Barth et. al, van Genderen and Velema respond:

The Bible teaches us to retain the distinction between creation and redemption. Creation is theocentric; redemption, which was necessary on account of sin and made reality through grace, may be called christocentric. Creation does not rest on redemption or on the plan for redemption, but redemption presupposes creation and the fall into sin. Ontologically, creation has priority.

Richard Lints and Theology

Jonathan Dodson — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 22:14:42 +0000

Dr. Richard Lints has assumed David Wells’ Andrew Mutch Chair of Theology at Gordon Conwell theological Seminary. Some may know of Lints’ impressive work The Fabric of Theology. In addition to being a fine theologian, Lints is a very winsome man. I recently learned of two new writing projects he is finishing up.

The first is provisionally called image and idol and deals with human identity and idolatry. The second is deals with religious pluralism and democracy. Keep your eyes out for those.

Lints has also announced a 2009 conference devoted to the life and legacy of David Wells. This will be held in October of 09 at Gordon Conwell. Seems like some great things are coming from Gordon Conwell in the months to come, including three new professors: Peter Anders, Patrick Smith, & Adonis Vidu.

The Apostles Creed: Basic Belief for Membership

Jonathan Dodson — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 14:48:24 +0000

In an attempt to iron out where we will draw the doctrinal lines for partner, deacon, and elders at Austin City Life, I’ve been doing some research on the Early Church and Creeds. We’ve settled on the Apostles Creed as a requirement for partnership, which we explain in our Partners Class. We have chosen to affirm this creed for several reasons:

To align our church with historic, Christian orthodoxy. It is important that Austin City Life locate its identity in the flow of historic Christian faith, not in a Great Emergence that lays claims to revisionist Church History.
To emphasize that belief in doctrine is both a matter of the heart and the head. The first article of the creed intends both heart and head belief: “I believe in God the Father, Maker of heaven and earth.” Commonly referred to as a credo, this statement is creedal because it requires a head to say it and a heart to believe it. To “believe” is to exercise faith as well as confess one’s faith, both of which are in view here. (See Jaroslav Pelikan, Credo: Historical and Theological Guide to Christian Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition, 35.

History of the Creed

The Symbolum Apostolorum, also known as the Apostles Creed, was developed between the second and ninth centuries. It is the most popular creed used in worship by Western Christians. Its central doctrines are those of the Trinity and God the Creator.

Legend has it that the Apostles wrote this creed on the tenth day after Christ’s ascension into heaven. That is not the case, though the name stuck. However, each of the doctrines found in the creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period. The earliest written version of the creed is perhaps the Interrogatory Creed of Hippolytus (ca. A.D. 215). The current form is first found in the writings of Caesarius of Arles (d 542).

The creed was apparently used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Hence it is also known as The Roman Symbol. As in Hippolytus’ version it was given in question and answer format with the baptismal candidates answering in the affirmative that they believed each statement. Here is as modern version of the Creed:

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord,
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried;
he descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again;
he ascended into heaven,
he is seated at the right hand of the Father,
and he will come again to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. AMEN.

Information taken from: http://www.creeds.net/ancient/apostles.htm

Have You Been Converted Twice?

Jonathan Dodson — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 20:37:53 +0000

I briefly argue for two conversions here. Those with some ecclesiological acumen could really deepen this conversation through comments. Hope I get some bites.