christ and true spirituality

What do visualization (Ignatian Examen or kataphatic prayer), silence, solitude, lectio divina, labyrinth prayers, Stations of the Cross, chanting, induced visions, centering prayer, centering down, and astral projection all have in common?  The answer is they are all forms of mysticism (spirituality) that has been flooding the evangelical world over recent years.  I can pretty well guarantee that if  you have not yet encountered these you soon will.

Now let me say up front that spirituality, or Christian experience of God, is very much part of what it means to be a Christian.  I am appalled by some today (such as Old Life Presbyterians) who have little or no time for Christian experience and dismiss it as mere emotionalism or pietism.  In fact, the pietistic movement in Germany in the C17 began as a healthy biblical reaction to the rigid dogma-driven orthodoxy of the Lutheran church married to a high ecclesiology that, not unlike modern old-lifers, discouraged devotional fervour in the faith of believers.

We must not dismiss Christian experience.  We are converted that we may know God, not merely know about him.  Salvation brings us not only into union with Christ but into communion with him.  We enjoy his presence.  We know what is to ‘dwell in God’.    We are called into the fellowship of the Father and Son, for all who love Christ and keep his word know what it is for the Father and Son to come and make their home in them (Jn 14:22).  Christian experience is abiding in God and God abiding in us (1 Jn 4:15,16).  This is much more than a proper standing, or a theological system, it is relationship and intimacy that brings us into all that God is.  Where the affections are not engaged Christianity is not realized.

However, while communion with God in Christ is what we are called to as Christians, like every other aspect of Christianity Satan is only too ready to corrupt and distort it.  C17 Pietism began well but in time was enticed into various spiritual experiences that had no roots in the gospel and belonged more  to mere mysticism with its emphasis on ecstatic visions of the soul and altered states of consciousness created by ‘spiritual techniques’ rather than beholding the glory of God in Jesus Christ (2 Cor 3).

Such mysticism did not originate in the C17.  It plagued the church from its inception.  We have been focussing in recent posts on various aspects of the heresy that harried the Colossian church.  We noted that this heresy was a hydran mixture of philosophy (human wisdom trumping revealed truth), Judaism (human religiosity and laws for holiness becoming a substitute for grasping what it means to have died with Christ to this world), and finally mysticism.  This mysticism was false and dangerous because it offered spiritual experience detached from a singular focus on the revealed Christ.

This danger Paul addresses in the Colossian church when he writes:

Col 2:18-19 (ESV)
Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

Some, it appears, were advocating religious experience through intermediaries (angels) and visionary states of consciousness, perhaps induced through bodily deprivation, that had nothing to do with looking at Christ.  However, these are man-made spiritualities.  They appear wise  but are really self-made religion (Col 2:23) for they are not about the simplicity of holding on by faith to the risen and reigning Christ.

The simple reality is, not all spiritualities are authentically spiritual.   Nowadays the desire for a Christian spirituality is leading some into rather strange places.  Modern mystics like Dallas Willard and Richard Foster promote forms of spirituality that have a lot more to do with Roman Catholic mysticism than genuine biblical faith.  Classic medieval mysticism was virtually unknown in Evangelicalism until popularised by Foster in his ‘Celebration of Discipline, the Path of Spiritual Growth‘.  Voted by Christianity Today as one of the ten best books of the C20, Foster introduced all kinds of dubious mystical techniques into the evangelical consciousness.

How do we stop genuine pursuit of God being corrupted by a false kind of mysticism?  Let me try to answer this question in terms of a few propositions.

true spirituality never divorces itself from objective truth

The Christian gospel is objective truth we are called to believe (Jn 20:31).  Indeed, we grow in the knowledge of God only as he has revealed himself in Jesus Christ (Jn 17:3).  There is a tendency in Christian mysticism to pay only lip-service to revealed truth.  As one writer observes,

The essence of mysticism lies in this, that the seat of authority is transferred in the mind of the mystic from the external Word of God to the spiritual consciousness — the “spiritual man” — internal to themselves. Homage of quite an orthodox kind may be verbally rendered to the Scriptures, and yet they may be largely displaced.  It has little or no restraining effect upon the flights of his imagination. He quotes it of course, but only as supporting or illustrating or adorning his own conceptions of truth. His conceptions become the primary thing on which the main emphasis must be laid. Scripture must be interpreted in the light of those conceptions, and its words become of secondary importance.

Evelyn Underhill, a leading Anglo-Catholic mystic of the early C20  confirms the truth of this criticism in saying,

“Mysticism, according to its historical and psychological definitions, is the direct intuition or experience of God; and a mystic is a person who has, to a greater or less degree, such a direct experience — one whose religion and life are centered, not merely on an accepted belief or practice, but on that which the person regards as first hand personal knowledge.”

Where quests to know God are not founded on what the God who has made himself known has objectively revealed for faith to grasp they soon wind-up as merely fanciful experiences. The subjective trumps the objective and the mystic becomes ‘puffed up with their sensuous mind‘ (Col 2).  The Quakers (or Society of Friends) are a classic example of where for many ‘inner light’ has replaced revealed truth; connection with the head is lost.

true spirituality focusses on an exalted Christ outside of self and not on Christ within

It is true, and wonderfully so, that Christ dwells in the heart of every believer by faith.  Yet it is equally true that we are told to focus on the exalted Christ outside of ourselves and not the Christ within.   The gospel does not encourage pre-occupation with what is happening inside of us.  Instead Paul exhorts,

Col 3:1-4 (ESV)
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

It is the risen and exalted Christ in glory who is the object of faith and adoration.  We look to Jesus who has triumphantly completed the life of faith and is now seated at the right hand of God. (Hebs 12:2).  Looking within merely leads to self-absorption the very opposite to the self-forgetfulness that the gospel creates.  The kind of mysticism that calls for navel-gazing is not biblical spirituality.

true spirituality has Christ as its object and not spiritual experience itself

The inclination of fallen humanity is to be self-absorbed.  Our human tendency is to make much of ourselves.  We like to be the centre of everything.  If we give in to this everything becomes false.  The flesh loves its own reasoning, its religious observance, and its own religious consciousness. The gospel, however, always takes the focus away from us and on places it on Christ.

False mysticism is interested in religious experience rather than Christ.  It deals largely with ourselves, and our own state and apprehension of the truth. It is occupied not with divine realities themselves, but with how we become conscious of those realities, and of the way they work out certain results in us.

Lectio Divina, meaning “sacred reading,” is a technique that moves beyond the normal reading the Bible. It aims at going beyond the objective meaning of the words  to that which transcends normal awareness.  One writer instructs,

‘As you attend to those deeper meanings, begin to meditate on the feelings and emotions conjured up in your inner self.’

Notice how the technique subtly turns us in on ourselves and our consciousness. It is not about God, it is about us.

Mysticism has about it an apparent profundity of thought and utterance. It promises a far greater depth of understanding, which is alluring, and especially to minds of a certain contemplative type, fundamentally disposed towards introspection and self-occupation.  We can be sure such self-occupation is not biblical spirituality.  As even the Roman Catholic writer G.K. Chesterton writes

‘If I were to say that Christianity came into the world specially to destroy the doctrine of the Inner Light, that would be an exaggeration. But it would be very much nearer to the truth… Of all conceivable forms of enlightenment the worst is what these people call the Inner Light. Of all horrible religions the most horrible is the worship of the god within. Any one who knows any body knows how it would work; anyone who knows anyone from the Higher Thought Centre knows how it does work. That Jones shall worship the god within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones… Christianity came into the world firstly in order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely recognised an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible as an army with banners’.

true spirituality is not merely aspirations after God in Christ but present enjoyment of him

A feature of much false mysticism is that it is about un-realised desire.  It pants for God but never seems to find him. It longs to know love but never experiences it.  Now we must be careful here for there is always that which is aspirational in faith.  Paul wishes to ‘know Christ’ and reaches out to what he has not yet attained, HOWEVER,  this is within the context of already knowing and enjoying Christ.  The love of God is already shed abroad in his heart (Roms 5).  He already ‘knows the love of Christ which is beyond knowing’ (Eph 3:19).  Yes we wish to be filled with all the fulness of God (Eph 3:20) but we are already ‘filled’ in Christ, the one in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwells (Col 2:9).

We not only desire Christ, we have Christ.  He is the present satisfying object of our love and adoration.  We delight in him, enjoy him, and are complete in him.  In the Spirit he is already for us a spring of water springing up to eternal life, eternally satisfying.

John 4:13-14 (ESV)
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Desire and love are not exactly the same.  Desire is never satisfied.  It does not possess the object of desire, but love does.  Love supposes that we have full possession of the object of our desires.  Love does not so much desire as delight in the one loved.  Mysticism, absorbed as it is with self and feelings, never gets beyond desire; while simple Christianity, giving the knowledge of salvation, puts us into full possession of the love of God.  I know that I am loved and I know the one I love.  Indeed, my very love is self-forgetful, for that is what true love is. Desire turns one in on oneself while love takes one out of oneself and rests on the object loved.

In Christianity, I dwell in love, divine love.  In peace, I contemplate this love, and I adore it in Christ. I dwell in Him and He in me.  In God, and contemplation of him, I am deeply and completely filled and satisfied.  He satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry with good things (Ps 107:9).  Love, peace, joy and unspeakable glory are not elusive but enjoyed realities in Christ.  Yes, I long for more, but I do so from one who is satisfied.  He has already filled the hungry with good things (Lk 1:53).  This biblical tension is important to maintain.

true spirituality is not technique-driven but simply adores God in the risen Christ

A criticism that can be rightly levelled at many spiritualities ancient and modern (for the modern are only the ancient resuscitated) is the degree to which they are technique-driven.  All involve processes to create transcendence.  Now this immediately rings alarm bells, firstly because there is something contrived and manipulated about such techniques, and, secondly, because these ‘techniques’ are hard to find in Scripture.  Sometimes verses are cited in support but often these are asked to deliver much more than they are able.  We have to ask of many of these ‘techniques’ why they are not plainly exhorted in Scripture.

On so-called ‘centering prayer’ (focussing on a single word like ‘love’ or ‘God’ to clear the mind of other thoughts) Tony Campolo comments,

‘In my case intimacy with Christ has developed gradually over the years, primarily through what Catholic mystics call ‘centering prayer.’ Each morning, as soon as I wake up, I take time-sometimes as much as a half hour-to center myself on Jesus. I say his name over and over again to drive back the 101 things that begin to clutter up my mind the minute I open my eyes. Jesus is my mantra, as some would say.’

Letters to a Young Evangelical Pg 20

Henri Nouwen the late Roman Catholic mystic popular in Evangelical circles explains,

“The quiet repetition of a single word can help us to descend with the mind into the heart … This way of simple prayer … opens us to God’s active presence” (The Way of the Heart, p. 81)

Yet we are obliged to ask where such a technique is commended in Scripture?  Notice too, Nouwen, is taking us into ourselves rather than outside ourselves.  This is deadly, for immediately we ‘lose connection with the head’ (Col 2).

True spirituality or Christian mysticism is that which contemplates the truth of God revealed in the gospel of Christ.  It is firmly anchored in objective truth and arises from it.  It recognises that in holding fast to the head is the way of spiritual experience and reality.  Faith and love look without and not within.

More observations could be made.  We could consider the suspect role of spiritual directors in mysticism.  However, I hope what has been said so far gives cause for caution and reflection before buying into the ‘spiritualities’ on offer in the evangelical world at the moment.  Never fail to ask what is the central concern and focus – religious consciousness or the revealed and reigning Christ?

I suggest for further reading an article by D A Carson written some years ago.  Below are his opening paragraphs.

The current interest in spirituality is both salutary and frightening.
It is salutary because in its best forms it is infinitely to be preferred over the assumed philosophical materialism that governs many people, not only in the western world but in many other parts as well. It is salutary wherever it represents a self-conscious rebellion against the profound sense of unreality that afflicts many churches. We speak of “knowing” and “meeting with” and “worshiping” the living God, but many feel that the corporate exercises are perfunctory and inauthentic, and in their quietest moments they wonder what has gone wrong.

 
It is frightening because “spirituality” has become such an ill-defined, amorphous entity that it covers all kinds of phenomena an earlier generation of Christians, more given to robust thought than is the present generation, would have dismissed as error, or even as “paganism” or “heathenism.” Today “spirituality” is an applause-word—that is, the kind of word that is no sooner uttered than everyone breaks out in applause. In many circles it functions in the spiritual realm the way “apple pie” functions in the culinary realm: Who is bold enough to offer a caution, let alone a critique?

Carson is just the man to do so.

lent…or the ashes of judaism that deface christianity

intro

Lent is the forty days before Easter in the Christian liturgical Calendar.  It starts with Ash Wednesday and ends on Holy Thursday.  It is traditionally celebrated in the West by Roman Catholics, Lutherans, and Anglicans.  Until fairly recently, for most evangelicals, the very hint of liturgical calendars and days like ‘Ash Wednesday’ and ‘Holy Thursday’ would have been enough for them to run a million miles.  No longer.  Liturgical calendars are de rigueur.  Evangelicals are outing as ‘liturgy-men’ and proud of it.  Celebrating Lent is where it is at in modern spirituality.  A cursory glance at many evangelical websites will make this plain.   Goodness, even Michael Horton has jumped on the bandwagon.  Everyone’s loving lent.

Have conservative evangelicals got it wrong all these years?  Have they been too strict, too stuffy, and too legalistic (an ironic claim in this context if ever there was one)?  Do we need to invest in the ‘Big Tradition’ and rediscover these disciplines?  I guess, my tone in writing so far will reveal where I stand on this issue.  I am appalled at how casually evangelicals are buying into traditions that are essentially Judaistic and sub-Christian.  At best these are a pointless distraction but the reality is much worse; they are actually an indulgence of ‘fleshly’ religion which draws away from Christ.  Strong words, I know.  Not likely to please many.  Such sentiments will be castigated as intolerant and narrow-minded for sure.

Let me say, at the outset, I don’t mean to be unkind or harsh.  As Brian McLaren would protest, how can a mild-mannered guy like me ever be misunderstood in this kind of way?  In fact, if Lenten-men were simply those who have observed it for centuries then I probably would have said nothing.  However, when those who were traditionally free from this kind of childishness (a word I shall later justify), even slavery (another word I shall endeavour to defend), begin to lapse into religious shadows that in Christ are fulfilled and abandoned, I feel compelled to protest.  I am jealous that Christ is being lost in the paraphernalia of human religiosity.  Indeed, all who grasp what it is to be a believer who has died and risen with Christ ought to be jealous for Christ’s glory and care deeply when they see believers submitting to what Scripture calls ‘weak and worthless elements‘  and being enslaved by them (Gals 4:8).

Paul writes, in a context closely allied to the matter in question (rites, rituals and regulations),

Gal 3:1-5 (ESV)
O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain-if indeed it was in vain? Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith.

The Galatian Judaizers were advocating Christ plus the Mosaic Law, and especially its emphasis on rites (Gals 5:2, 6:12), purity laws (Gal 2: 11), and liturgical calendars (Gal 4:10).  For Paul, the whole methodology and minutiae of the Law, symbolised in circumcision, was addressed to man in the flesh and not the Spirit; it is a methodology (a religion) for flesh (Gals 3:3, 4:21-31; 6:12) that is fulfilled and finished in Christ.  It is my conviction that adopting liturgical calendars, special festivals, dietary laws, symbols of penance and self-humiliation, and bodily self-denial rites as an end in themselves or as part of a religious calendar is to embrace the old covenant of law as a means of relationship with God and is seriously regressive in our walk with God (whatever protests are made to the contrary).  When the Christians of Galatia are tempted to do this, Paul says, ‘I am afraid I have laboured over you in vain‘ (Gals 4:11).  In accepting these principles of law ‘Christ will be no advantage to them‘ (Gals 5:2).  Thus the Galatians are urged,

Gal 5:1 (ESV)
For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery

Of course, those evangelicals who advocate Christian Calendars are at pains to point out that liturgical observances do not save.  They do not affect our justification or standing before God.  Nor are they to be imposed as a rule upon the church, but are a matter of Christian freedom.  Indeed, the legalist, it seems, is someone like me who opposes rites and rituals, certainly any promotion of them. I am apparently denying freedom in Christ to those who wish to worship and serve as they wish.  The irony is rich.  For, of course, it is precisely those who promote such practices that Paul regards as legalists.  Indeed it must be so, for they are promoting OT law not NT gospel; if you promote law you are ipso facto a legalist.

no nt mandate

Show me one text from the NT epistles teaching that Christians should live by religious calendars, or dietary laws, or observe special feasts, or abstain from foods, and so on.  It cannot be done.  Such rules and regulations in the NT are conspicuous by their absence, which is singularly odd because one would expect that if such disciplines are so helpful  the NT would be replete with exhortations to pursue them.  But it is not, for they are not (helpful).  The silence of Scripture here is deafening.

They do not ‘save’, their evangelical protagonists agree.  Yet, if this is so, and it is, why commend them?  If I can grow in my Christian life fully without religious rules and rituals, and I clearly can since the NT never advocates them, then what is their purpose?  Moreover, we should not be so confident that these ‘disciplines’ will remain a matter of ‘freedom’ in the consciences of those who embrace them.  The witness of history and Scripture is against this.  What begins as voluntary soon becomes established tradition and finally binding truth.  Whatever we give ourselves to we become slaves to (Roms 6:16).

It is little wonder Paul is so opposed.  He has great patience and sympathy with people who have been converted from legalistic religion.  He bears with weak consciences in Jewish converts who cannot feel free to eat certain meats etc.  He knows it can take time for these consciences to find their full freedom in the gospel (Roms 14,15).  Yet he is in no doubt that these consciences are ‘weak’.  They are not gospel-trained consciences fully aware of their freedom (from religious legalistic observances) in Christ.  However, while he bears with weak consciences, he has no patience for those who promote and teach the value of ritualism to others.  He is opposed to this root and branch and challenges any teaching that suggests or imposes such practices.  There is simply no freedom given in the NT to promote and champion Judaistic practices however ‘Christianized’.  The reality is, that there is no such thing as ‘Christianized’ Judaism (or at least the only version is its fulfilment and finish in Christ) only ‘Judaized’ Christianity.

Some of the above is contention I have not yet proved.  Let me regroup before engaging.

I am opposing religious calendars, man-made rules, and religious rites for holiness for two reasons:

• because the NT nowhere recommends or suggests them for the life of godliness.
• because the NT actually opposes them and suggests they deflect us from Christ.

I have made the case for my first contention, follow me as I now make the case more fully for my second contention: the NT actually opposes them and suggests they deflect from Christ.

colossians 2:1-3:4

The key NT text refuting calendars and man-made religious disciplines for holiness is Colossians 2/3.  I urge you to read this text carefully and prayerfully.  It is a clear and powerful criticism of all attempts to introduce religious ritualism into Christianity.  Below, I want to outline its main thrust and thesis.

christianity is christ

Paul’s central and vital point in this chapter  (and in Colossians as a whole) is that Christianity is essentially a relationship with Christ by faith.  Everything that matters is found in Christ alone.  Christ is supreme (Col 1:15-21).  God’s great revealed secret, hidden in the past (in OT events, figures etc) is Christ (2:2).  In Him, lie all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (2:3).  Further this revealed secret is that Christ lives in God’s people (1:27).  This union between Christ and his people is the sum of what the gospel and Christianity is all about.  As Paul writes,

Col 2:6-7 (ESV)
Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught…

Living in our union with Christ is the be-all-and-end-all of Christianity.  We are ‘filled’  or ‘complete’ in Him, the one in whom God’s fullness dwells (2:9,10).  We have no more than Christ and need no more than Christ.  Indeed there is no more than Christ (Col 1:15-19).  Paul reminds us too that this union is a union of death and resurrection.  That is, to be united to Christ is to participate (by faith and through the Spirit) in the death and resurrection of Christ (2:8-11).  Like Christ we have died to this world (and so, as we shall see, to all its religious observances) and live in resurrection life to God.  Our ‘life is hid with Christ in God’ (Cols 3:3).  This means that Christ in heaven is the source, story and raison d’etre of our life.  We find and enjoy life as we set our affections on Christ in heaven.  As we put to death what is earthly (living for the things of this world as well as the sins of this world) and set our minds and hearts on the invisible world perceived only by faith we triumph in faith.  This, and this alone, enables us to grow in grace.  In this way alone ( looking to Christ in heaven and putting to death what is earthly) are we, ‘filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,  so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.’ (Col 1:9,10).

This is what it means to be ‘connected to the head’ (Cf 2:19).  To live other than by the faith union that puts to death what is earthy and lives by a heart absorbed with Christ in heaven is to fail to ‘hold fast to the head’ (2:19) and results in being ‘disqualified’ (2:8); or, in Galatian language,in being ‘severed from Christ’ (Gals 5:4).  It should be obvious that if we look elsewhere other than to Christ as the source of our life and power we are cutting the link of faith.   Only by a conscious living in, looking at, and living for Christ can we become ‘mature in Christ’ (Col 1:28).

false routes

Paul does not urge that the Colossians live in Christ in a vacuüm.  He writes because some were teaching otherwise.

Col 2:4 (ESV)
I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments...

syncretism

What precisely the Colossian heresy was need not concern us here.  Scholars delight in discussing such matters but rarely reach final conclusions.  In any case, the main components are clear and it is these that interest us.  It was a mixture of philosophy (2:8), mysticism (2:18) and Judaism (2:8, 11, 14, 16,17).  Singly, and as a whole Paul is opposed to these influences on Christian life and practice.  He says they ‘delude’ (2:4) for they are based on ‘plausible arguments’ (2:4).  They appear to promote sanctity (2:23) yet are merely ‘empty deceit… human tradition… elemental spirits of the world… having an appearance of wisdom… self-made religion… things on earth… not according to Christ’ and more  (Col 2:8, 20-23, 3:2).  Paul will have no syncretism of Christ and anything else.

Now, we should underline that what Paul is dismissing is not merely philosophy (what has Athens to do with Jerusalem) and mysticism (what has Eleusis to do with Jerusalem) but also Judaism or the Law (what has Sinai to do with Jerusalem, or better, the New Jerusalem ).  For many this dismissal of Law in Christianity is a bridge too far.  I confess, I do not really understand why.  Paul is consistent and clear in his proclamation that Christians are not ‘under law’ (Roms 6:15; 7:1-6; Gals 4:21; 5:18; 1 Cor 9:20).  While Christians can learn from the Old Covenant as we see how it points to Christ, we are in no way obligated to it.  It has no rights over us or claims upon us.  We are not called to obey it, nor to adopt it in any way.  In fact, we are told that there is a basic incompatibility between the forms of Judaistic Law and Gospel Christianity.  Jesus makes it clear that the gospel cannot be contained in the old forms of religion that belonged to law.

Mark 2:21-22 (ESV)
No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the patch tears away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins-and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.” 

passé

This is vital to grasp.  Paul tells us the difference is profound; the law belongs to the old age and old world while the church belongs to the new age and new world.  It is those ‘alive in this world’ to whom the rules and regulations of law (moral, religious or otherwise) are of any relevance (Col 2:20). But Christians are not ‘alive’ in this world they have ‘died’ (2:11, 3:3) and they live in an age beyond this age and a world beyond this world.  They ought not to ‘submit’ (whether voluntarily or involuntarily) to regulations that belong to human religion (2:20) for they belong to an age which is passé.

earthly

This temporal distinction between the present and the future is tied into a spacial distinction between what is ‘earthly’ and what is ‘heavenly’ in Scripture.  This latter distinction is one that many modern evangelicals are reluctant to admit.  Yet it is clear and vital.  It is part of the distinction between the old and the new, the law and the gospel.  Jesus is ‘from above‘ and brings in a reality that is ‘from above’ (Jn 3:31; 8:23).  ‘Earthly’ things were revealed in the OT but as the one from heaven he reveals ‘heavenly things‘ (Jn 3:12).  Because he is from heaven he returns to heaven and on his return unites his people to him there.  We find our identity not in the earthly Adam but the heavenly Christ, not in the natural but the spiritual (1 Cor 15:45-49).  As a result we are a ‘heavenly people’ (Eph 1:20; 2:6) and our interests are to do with the realm where Christ our life is found (Gals 4:26; Col 3:1,2; Hebs 3:1; 11:6; 12:2).  The Law and its forms are ‘earthly’ and part of the elementary principles of ‘this world’.  They are merely an earthly copy or shadow of heavenly things (Hebs 8:5; 9:23). Thus they have nothing to do with the believer who is not ‘alive in this world’ but shares the resurrection life of Christ, a spiritual and heavenly life (Col 2:8-11).  This distinction is wrongly dismissed as dualistic and gnostic by some who should know better.  It is not.  It is the plain teaching of Scripture.  Ritual and rite are not merely passé but also unable to lift the soul above this world.  They cannot remove us from the realm of ‘flesh’.

fleshly, childish, enslaving, and inadequate

The law is Judaism. It belongs to the first creation, the earthly, the natural, this world.  It is called by Paul ‘the elemental spirits of the world’ (2:8).  Paul similarly describes the law in Galatians. He writes,

Gal 4:1-5 (ESV)

I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

His point is that Law, as a religion, functions much like a ‘disciplinarian’ or ‘nanny’.  These are hired to oversee children and in the past were expected to do so with firm discipline; they did not so much teach as control.  Law as the above text points out treated those under it as infants, as childish.

Although God-given, it was given to man in the ‘flesh’ (Roms 7:1-6; Gals 3:3; Cf Hebs 7:16; 9:13,14).  It was a ‘religion’ that attempted to curtail and curb human behaviour by external rules and religious regulations but it could dig no deeper.  It could not change hearts.  It could not give life (though it promised it for obedience) and it could not produce holiness.  When Israel was exiled the failure of law to influence flesh was proved.  This is why Paul says of law and all religion that is about undertaking rules, regulations, ritualistic restrictions that it are ‘of no value in preventing the indulgence of the flesh‘.  Mark these words well for they are very important.  However, holy and virtuously self-denying many rites and rituals seem to be THEY ARE OF NO VALUE IN PREVENTING THE INDULGENCE OF THE FLESH.   They may deny the body but they could not curb ‘the flesh’, that Adamic nature we have so opposed to God.  This is true of the rites not only of the law or Judaism but of every other religion.  In fact, from this perspective, Paul puts the Law or Judaism on the same level playing field as all other religions.  They all are elementary or rudimentary.  Paul tells the gentile Galatian believers who are being encouraged by Judaizers to embrace the Jewish Law that they would be as well going back to their old pagan religions for the law was no more effectual than they.

Gal 4:8-11 (ESV)
Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? You observe days and months and seasons and years! I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain. 

Let the force of this sink in.  In Galatians, Paul uses two plural pronoun groups, ‘we’ and ‘you’.  ‘We’ applies to Jewish believers and ‘you’ to gentile believers.  In Ch 4:1-5 he speaks of ‘we’.  We Jews, he observes, were enslaved to the law (the elemental principles of the world). In 4-8-11 the gentiles were enslaved to their false religions; however, if having being freed from these they now embrace the Law then this is tantamount to a return to their old religions; they are turning back to ‘weak and worthless elementary principles of the world’ and to slavery once again.  Paul’s comparison shocks and is intended so to do.

It is impossible to read Gals 3:21 – 4-11 and avoid the conclusion that those who submit (freely or otherwise) to the law and its ordinances are regressing to what is childish and enslaving.  They believe they are embracing something new and exciting, something progressive and fresh, something that may help them to be holy and godly, but actually they are embracing what is weak, worthless and inferior.  Satan’s sardonic irony as he deludes is keen.

Neither human philosophy nor religious mysticism, nor rites, nor ascetic practices enable us to grow in grace.  None enables us to know God.  It’s no good claiming that these regulations were Jewish rather than Christian rules and regulations.  Jewish regulations and rites were God-ordained religious observances (indeed the only God-ordained ones) and pointed to Christ but they were merely shadows not the substance (2:17).  The substance was Christ.  If we want shadows of the gospel rather than the substance then Jewish ceremonies is the way to go.  None we invent improves on those God gave.  But Paul’s criticism is not of this or that particular liturgical calendar.  It is not specific Jewish days, months and sabbaths to which he objects (though sabbaths clearly shows these were law-based since none but Jews had sabbaths).  It is not certain diets and ascetic techniques he objected to.  He objects to the whole methodology per se.  The methodology was passé, earth-bound, childish,enslaving and inadequate.  Methodologically these rituals were of no value in preventing the indulgence of the flesh.  Indeed, they did the very thing that was the problem – they focussed on the flesh.  Law in any shape or form does not deny flesh, it excites it and promotes it (Roms 7).

Law and all human religion focus on the flesh and have confidence in it (Phil 3:3,4)  This is Paul’s constant criticism of the Judaizers.  They focussed on flesh, whether its status (Phil 3:2-5) or its performance (Phil 3:6).  Circumcision (the symbol of the Judaizers) was all about the flesh (Phil 3:2; Gals 6:12).  For Paul, circumcision epitomised the flesh because it was circumcision of the body and not the heart.  It is what a man did to himself and for himself.  In this circumcision was an appropriate symbol of law which was essentially a covenant of works, of human achieving.  The gospel, by contrast, is ‘circumcision without hands‘ that is, it is by and of God not man (Col 2:11).  The circumcision of the gospel happens at the cross when we die with Christ to the law and its ordinances (Col 2:14).   It is an act of God that removes all human involvement and so all human boasting.

We need to see that self-denial programmes of ‘touch not, taste not and handle not’ are fusty and futile.  The Law and Judaism was full of such prohibitions at certain times in the religious calendar yet they did no good whatever; the nation that had the law crucified its Messiah.  Indeed, Messiah himself teaches that it is not what goes into a man (the food he chooses to eat or not to eat) that defiles but what comes out of his heart (Matt 15:1-20).

Artificially imposed times and programmes of repentance and ascetic self-denial and the like all focus on self.   If we succeed they puff us up with pride and if we fail we feel defeated.   Nowadays they tend to be about giving up chocolates or alcohol or some other luxury related to the body.  For those more serious about their faith they may mean self-imposed severe bodily deprivation.  But whether the dilettante denials of the modern evangelical or the more serious denials of the older ascetics the result is the same – no effect in restraining the indulgence of the flesh, merely a means of focus on it (Cols 2:23).  Flesh (fallen human nature) loves to act piously (and to be seen to do so either by others or self).  It loves to appear humble and focus on its achievements, religious or otherwise. So rather than subduing the flesh these ‘ordinances’ satisfy the flesh. Thus they are not merely passé, earth-bound, infantile and futile, but counter-productive.  In addition,and perhaps most damning of all, they utterly fail to come to terms with the position of a believer in Christ.   Those who promote them have not grasped that growth in holiness is not by looking at self and undertaking various ascetic disciplines but by looking away from self and focussing on an exalted reigning Christ.

christianity is christ

What draws me away from the world and focus on self is not my body on earth but Christ in heaven.  As I love him, look at him, live in him (and he in me) then I have the power to put to death what is earthly.  It is the expulsive power of a new affection.  Christ, and only Christ, is our wisdom, justification, sanctification, and redemption (1 Cor 1:29).  Holding fast to the head is the only means of grace (Col 2:19).  The moment I put something else between, whatever shape this may assume, I am not holding fast to the head.  The hallmark of the ‘true circumcision’ is simply this- ‘it rejoices in Jesus Christ and makes no provision for the flesh‘ (Phil 3:3).  The question for all of us is simply, is Christ all?.  If Christ is not all then there is no maturity, only flesh.  Fathers in the faith (the spiritually mature) are recognised by this – they ‘know him who is from the beginning’ (1 John 2:14).  Paul’s cry of spiritual maturity is for Christ and yet more of Christ (Phil 3:8-16).  He did not want types and shadows, rules and religious observances; he wanted Christ.  He recognised in Christ he had everything and without him he had nothing.  The heart of a believer is satisfied and enraptured only by Christ.  In him, we have, ‘all things that pertain to life and godliness‘ (2 Pet 1:3).  Toplady is one among many who has expressed this in hymn.

Compared with CHRIST, in all beside

No comeliness I see;

The one thing needful, dearest LORD,

Is to be one with Thee.

Whatever else Thy will withholds,

Here grant me to succeed!

O let Thyself my portion be,

And I am blest indeed!

 

Loved of my GOD, for Him again

With love intense I burn;

Chosen of Thee ere time began,

I choose Thee in return!

Less than Thyself will not suffice

My comfort to restore;

More than Thyself I cannot have;

And Thou canst give no more.

to summarise

Allow me to once again briefly regroup.

Liturgical calendars with their special seasons and ceremonies are not progress but regress.  They represent a spiritual nose-dive.  Far from maturing, they are a regression to the childish and enslaving.  They do not lead to Christ but detract from Christ.  They are for those in the flesh and not life in the Spirit.  They limit our horizon to earth and do not raise our gaze to heaven.  I have every sympathy for believers raised in churches where Judaistic rites and rituals are taught.  Their consciences should be sensitively considered.  However, I have little sympathy with those who should know better.  I have little patience for evangelicals who have been free of such bondage yet now in the conceit of what they fondly call Christian freedom wish to promote and encourage what is weak and enslaving.  Such teaching receives stiff opposition from Paul (Col 2) and ought to be opposed by all who love freedom in Christ.

Let me say again that freedom in Christ does not mean freedom to worship as we please. Freedom in Christ is freedom to worship in spirit and truth.  It is freedom to live in Christ not shadows. There are forms of worship that are neither helpful nor appropriate for they lead us away from Christ; they disconnect us with the head.  They do not lead us into freedom in Christ but into slavery.  Such forms are neither commanded, commended nor condoned by the NT (Col 2).  That some who profess to be teachers of God’s people do not see this is culpably irresponsible.  We may rightly ask them as Jesus did Nicodemus: are you a teacher in Israel and do not know this?

My heart-felt appeal to my brothers and sisters in Christ is – do not be ‘bewitched’ by them.

a final comment

What then are we to make of fasting?  Doesn’t the NT promote fasting?  And for that matter, what about baptism and the Lord’s Supper?  Are not these ordinances?  These are good questions and I hope to address them.  But not in this post.  This post is already far too long.  I will try to address these questions in the next post.  For the moment, let me say simply this: whatever our questions, don’t allow these to undermine or relativize the plain NT teaching we have explored so far.  To exhort in a specific context: do not choke the living flame of the gospel with the Lenten ashes of Judaism.

on why the reformation is not over

Since recently it was ‘Reformation Day’, Michael Jensen of Moore Theological College has 20 theses why ‘The Reformation is NOT over’.  He writes:

Whereas: -
1. Continued division between Christians who hold to the orthodox faith is deplorable and regrettable and we should work to heal it;
2. Insisting on division based on mere prejudice against Roman Catholics, or cultural snobbery, or ethnicity, or sectarianism  is deplorable and should be repented of;
3. Hyped-up and largely loveless Protestant rhetoric and sabre-rattling for the love of mere aggression must be eschewed;
4. It is a matter of great rejoicing that Roman Catholic priests and lay people have discovered the Scriptures anew in recent years;
5. A person is not saved by assenting to justification by grace through faith alone;
6. Evangelical Christians have much to learn from the tradition of the Christian church over two millennia (as the Reformers themselves taught);
7. Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI are in many respects admirable, even extraordinary men;
8. We are increasingly needing to stand together with Roman Catholics on issues of social justice and religious freedom;
9. We have common cause with Roman Catholics against the New Atheism and the other forms of intellectual secularism;
10. I rejoice in a number of Christian friendships with Roman Catholics whom I happy to call brothers in Christ and from whom I have learnt much;

it is still the case that: -
11. The Roman Catholic Church still insists that the authority of Scripture is subject to the interpretation of the Church, and indeed is a creation of the Church;
12. The Roman Catholic Church still asserts the supremacy of the Bishop of Rome in the Church – however carefully this is nuanced – and his infallibility in matters of faith;
13. The Roman Catholic Church, despite lengthy and peaceful deliberations with Lutherans and Anglicans on the matter, still holds a semi-Pelagian view on the doctrine of justification – that is, the believer in whatever small way, still is able to co-operate with the grace of God and earn the rewards of heaven;
14. Roman Catholics still determine to define faith as ‘assenting to doctrines’ rather than ‘personal trust’, and therefore put the emphasis on love;
15. Justification by grace alone is in practice denied by a view of the sacraments as the operative vehicles of God’s grace;
16. Despite modifications to Roman Catholic teaching on the afterlife in recent years, purgatory is still an official teaching of the Church;
17. The Roman Catholic Church still affirms as dogmas several non-Scriptural (and I would argue, contra-Scriptural) teachings: namely, the perpetual virginity of the Mary, her immaculate conception and her assumption;
18. Devotion to and prayer to the saints is still very much part of Roman Catholic spirituality and teaching;
19. The Roman Catholic Church maintains that Christians who are not members of the Church of Rome are at best ‘separated brethren’ and are not admitted to the Lord’s Table;

And thus:
20. There is still need to maintain a separation between the Church of Rome and the churches of the Reformation.

I agree with most  (I would dispute a few in the ‘whereas’ section).  I may be tempted to add a few.  Do you agree with his theses?  Would you add or subtract any?

PS

For those who may wish to know my own views on this question you can find them here.

imputed active obedience (IAO), a must or a misdirection? (3)

This series of blogs is considering the validity of the claim that IAO (imputed active obedience of Christ) is a necessary expression of the biblical gospel and evangelical orthodoxy.  In the view of the writer it is neither.  IAO could possibly be correct but it is neither an assured teaching of Scripture that it is nor is it intrinsic to evangelical orthodoxy.

That Christ is our righteousness is gospel truth.  That righteousness is imputed to the believer in justification is gospel truth. That salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, to God’s glory alone is gospel truth.  All this is certain and all this evangelicals assert; but that a Christian’s righteousness is the law-keeping obedience of Christ in life transferred to his account is a belief that is not easily sustainable from Scripture and so cannot be part of gospel orthodoxy.  In fact, in my view, as an understanding of what happens in justification, it is at best inadequate and probably incorrect.

Yet it is the prevailing orthodoxy among conservative evangelicals at the moment.  Why is this?  In the last blog I suggested that one reason was the need to put imputation back on the evangelical agenda due to Catholic and Evangelical dialogue.  One area of clear water between Catholics and Evangelicals is the nature of justification.  For Catholics justification means inherent righteousness, righteousness imparted: for Evangelicals justification means credited righteousness, righteousness imputed.

Thus imputation as a necessary part of gospel orthodoxy is being stressed with fresh vigour by evangelicals.  The problem is that it is not simply imputation that is being stressed but a particular brand or construct of imputation, namely imputation construed as IAO.  Why is this understanding of imputation so prevalent?

Let me suggest two reasons.

It provides an easy to understand summary of the gospel.

Many Christians know next to nothing about imputation but they are likely to have heard the following: ‘what happens to you when you become a Christian is a ‘great exchange’, your personal sin is transferred to Jesus and his personal righteousness is transferred to you‘.  There is an attractive symmetry to this explanation.  Plus it  is beguilingly simple and memorable.  It is little wonder it has gained currency among preachers and become for many the gospel in a nutshell.    This would be fine if it were accurate but it’s not, so it isn’t (fine).   Much as we might not like to let truth get in the way of a fine tagline, regrettably we must.  The truth is I’m afraid more complicated and however much our lazy modern minds may prefer the soundbite  to Scripture, nevertheless it is with Scripture we must grapple and its constructs we must teach even if they will not yield to simple aphorisms .

The upsurge in the last 30-40 years of a reformed soteriology.

In Britain reformed thinking experienced a renaissance in the 1950′s onwards under M Lloyd-Jones, J I Packer and, to a lesser extent, J R W Stott (and at a scholarly level F F Bruce).  The Evangelical Church benefitted greatly from this.  Serious robust theology was once again fueling evangelical life.  Many young evangelicals were influenced by reformed soteriology in particular and a clearer grasp of the gospel resulted.  Given this gospel was fired by the puritanism that inspired both Lloyd-Jones and Packer it is hardly surprising that both stressed IAO for IAO has a strong reformed and puritan heritage (more of this in a later blog).  John Owen a leading Puritan said of justification:

Notwithstanding that there was no wrath due to Adam yet he was to obey if he would enjoy eternal life. Something there is moreover to be done in respect of us, if after the slaying of the enmity and the Reconciliation made shall enjoy life; being reconciled by his death: we are saved by that perfect Obedience which in this life he yielded to the Law of God. There is a distinct mention made of Reconciliation, through a non-imputation of sin as Ps. 32:1; Luke 1:77; Rom. 3:25; 2 Cor. 5:19; and Justification through an imputation of Righteousness, Jer. 23:6; Rom. 4:5; 1 Cor. 1:30; although these things are so far from separated that they are reciprocally affirmed of one another; which as it doth not envince an Identity, so it doth an eminent Conjunction: and this last we have by the life of Christ.

This is fully expressed in that Typical Representation of our Justification before the Lord, Zech. 3: 3, 4, 5; two things are there expressed, to belong to our free Acceptation before God. 1. The taking away of the guilt of our sin, our filthy robes; this is done by the death of Christ. Remission of sin is the proper fruit thereof; but there is more also required, even a collation of Righteousness, and thereby a right to life eternal; this is here called change of raiment; so the Holy Ghost expresses it again, Isa. 61:10, where he calls it plainly the garment of salvation, and the robe of Righteousness: now this is only made ours by the obedience of Christ, as the other by his death.

Owen was not stepping outside mainstream reformed thinking in advocating IAO he was reiterating what many (though not all)  Reformers and many (though not all) Protestant Confessions said before him.  At this time, Banner of Truth publications was set up (guided by Lloyd-Jones) and published many reformed and puritan works of the past influencing the theology of young pastors and preachers.

Thus IAO became accepted orthodoxy among the new British Calvinists.  It was I think a few years before this Reformed resurgence took a similar grip in the States.  People like R C Sproul and others (Al Martin) were committed to a reformed soteriology and promoted it.  Now, probably spearheaded by the likes of R C Sproul and John Piper (influenced by Jonathan Edwards), Al Mohler and others reformed thinking is undergoing a revival among young (and not so young) American conservative  evangelicals.  And I have no hesitation in saying that predominantly this is a good thing.  I personally owe a great deal to all these names I’ve cited. My own thinking has been shaped greatly by their insights.  I am most reluctant to criticise these men for they are giants in the gospel.  Yet even giants trip up and every system, including the reformed system, can be found wanting.   My conscience (and yours I hope) is subject to the Word of God and not ultimately to the words or systems of men, a principle lying right at the heart of any orthodox reformed thinking.

Nowadays many of the more conservative books from the USA or Britain dealing with gospel issues are likely to espouse IAO and often forcefully.  Thus IAO gains momentum.  Leading conservative systematics of the past 50 years have supported IAO.  One significant way it is promoted is through the  ESV Study Bible. The notes of the Bible  in many ways  an excellent study resource often introduce IAO even when there is no obvious suggestion in the text under discussion.

S McDonough’s notes on Phils 3:9 say,

Phil. 3:9 Found in him means being spiritually united to Christ and therefore found not guilty before God as divine judge. Paul had trusted in a righteousness of my own based on obedience to the law rather than the right standing before God that comes through faith in Christ. God “imputes” Christ’s lifelong record of perfect obedience to the person who trusts in him for salvation; that is, he thinks of Christ’s obedience as belonging to that person, and therefore that person stands before God not as “guilty” but as “righteous.” This is the basis on which justification by faith alone is considered “fair” in God’s sight.

Notice that although the passage makes no mention of IAO S McDonough includes it anyway.  In this way ideas get imprinted in the mind.  He omits any specific reference to the cross and sin-bearing as the basis of righteousness though it is to the cross that the NT continually refers.

T Schreiner on Romans 3:21-28 faithfully develops Paul’s argument.

Rom. 3:23 No one can stake a claim to this righteousness based on his or her own obedience, for all people have sinned and fall short of what God demands (see 1:21).

Rom. 3:24 Therefore, all are justified (declared not guilty but righteous by the divine Judge) only by God’s grace (unmerited favor). The word redemption reaches back to the OT exodus and the blood of the Passover lamb (see Exodus 12–15), by which the Lord liberated Israel from Egypt; the exodus likewise points forward to the greater redemption Jesus won for his people through his blood by forgiving them their sins through his death on the cross (cf. Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14). On justification, see note on Gal. 2:16.

Rom. 3:25 Jesus’ blood “propitiated” or satisfied God’s wrath (1:18), so that his holiness was not compromised in forgiving sinners. Some scholars have argued that the word propitiation should be translated expiation (the wiping away of sin), but the word cannot be restricted to the wiping away of sins as it also refers to the satisfaction or appeasement of God’s wrath, turning it to favor (cf. note on John 18:11). God’s righteous anger needed to be appeased before sin could be forgiven, and God in his love sent his Son (who offered himself willingly) to satisfy God’s holy anger against sin. In this way God demonstrated his righteousness, which here refers particularly to his holiness and justice. God’s justice was called into question because in his patience he had overlooked former sins. In other words, how could God as the utterly Holy One tolerate human sin without inflicting full punishment on human beings immediately? Paul’s answer is that God looked forward to the cross of Christ where the full payment for the guilt of sin would be made, where Christ would die in the place of sinners. In the OT, propitiation (or the complete satisfaction of the wrath of God) is symbolically foreshadowed in several incidents: e.g., Ex. 32:11–14; Num. 25:8, 11; Josh. 7:25–26.

Rom. 3:26 Paul repeats again, because of its supreme importance, that God has demonstrated his righteousness, i.e., his holiness and justice, at the present time in salvation history. In the cross of Christ, God has shown himself to be just (utterly holy, so that the penalty demanded by the law is not removed but paid for by Christ) but also the justifier (the one who provides the means of justification and who declares people to be in right standing with himself) and the Savior of all those who trust in Jesus. Here is the heart of the Christian faith, for at the cross God’s justice and love meet.

Rom. 3:27 Since salvation is accomplished through Christ’s atoning death, all human boasting … is excluded. The word law in this verse probably means principle, though some think that a reference to the OT law is intended. If righteousness came through works, then human beings could brag about what they have done. But since salvation is through faith, no one can boast before God.

So far so good.  Schreiner has been true to the text; it is in the cross  God’s saving righteousness is revealed. Yet amazingly, in his comments on the following verse he introduces a concept that is quite absent from the argument of the previous texts.  Suddenly IAO is in the mix.

Rom. 3:31 overthrow … uphold. Justification by faith does not nullify the law but establishes it. That is, the law itself points to the fact that human obedience to the law cannot save and that righteousness can be achieved only through faith in Christ; Christ has achieved this righteousness on behalf of all who believe in him, through his perfect fulfillment of the law and his atoning death on the cross for the salvation of all who believe

Notice, ‘Christ has achieved this righteousness… through his perfect fulfilment of the law and his atoning death’. The death of Christ plus IAO.  Where has IAO come from?  Not from the previous verses.  Schreiner himself has not found it there.  He has plucked it from the ether.  How is the Law upheld?  In the context it is in its witness to the righteousness of God revealed in the sacrifice of propitiation.  In Schreiner’s words, ‘In the cross of Christ, God has shown himself to be just (utterly holy, so that the penalty demanded by the law is not removed but paid for by Christ) but also the justifier (the one who provides the means of justification and who declares people to be in right standing with himself) and the Savior of all those who trust in Jesus. Here is the heart of the Christian faith, for at the cross God’s justice and love meet.’ Why then is IAO, a concept alien to the passage, introduced?

Again, Frank Thielman’s notes on 1 Cor 6:11 read

God has already declared the Corinthian Christians to be ‘righteous’… God was able to do this because the ‘righteousness’ that belongs to Christ due to his perfect life has become ‘our… righteousness’.

No mention of the cross and sin-bearing atonement, only IAO.

It is not hard to see how IAO seeps into the Christian consciousness almost by default if you read the ESV study notes as many do.  Books aimed at a more popular reading market will have a similar effect.

Two examples, taken almost at random and  likely to be popular and influential both stress IAO.

S Ferguson in his book ‘By Grace Alone’ writes

‘The only righteousness with which I am righteous is Jesus Christ’s righteousness.  It is as if he said to me: “Here is my righteousness.  Wear it; it is yours.  It fits your needs perfectly and completely”.  As I stand in God’s presence and he looks at me I hear him say, “Where have I seen that righteousness before?  Come near, I recognise you now.  That is my Son’s righteousness you are wearing.  Enter!  You are welcome -and safe-here.” ‘

Greg Gilbert (9Marks) in his little book ‘What is the gospel?”, a book which is apart from the following a very helpful summary of the gospel and accessible to all, writes:

What exactly are we relying on Jesus for?  To put it simply, we are relying on him to secure for us a righteous verdict from God the judge, rather than a guilty one….

How do we secure this righteous verdict?… If God is ever to count us righteous he will have to do it on the basis of something other than our own sinful record.  He’ll have to do it on the basis of someone else’s record, someone who is standing as a substitute for us.  That’s where faith comes in.  When we put our faith in Jesus, we are relying on him to stand as our substitute before God, in both his perfect life and his penalty-paying death for us on the cross.  In other words we are trusting that God will substitute Jesus’ record for ours, and therefore declare us righteous (Roms 3:22).

… When we trust Jesus to save us, we become united to him, and a magnificent exchange takes place.  All our sin, rebellion, and wickedness is imputed (or credited to ) Jesus and he dies because of it (1 Pet 3:18).  And at the same time, the perfect life Jesus lived is imputed to us, and we are declared righteous.  God looks at us, and instead of seeing our sin, he sees Jesus’ righteousness.

This is what Paul means when he writes in Romans 4 that God ‘counts righteousness’ to us apart from our works… God declares us righteous because by faith we are clothed with Christ’s righteous life.’

And so, when we take into account dialogue with Roman Catholics, an ascendancy of Reformed theology and the percolation through at grass-roots level via easy symmetry of ‘the great exchange’  and popular books, it is not hard to see how IAO is pervasive in current orthodoxy and simply assumed.

When I watch naturalist programmes on television I am regularly irked by the way evolutionary assumptions are simply stated as if beyond question, as if gospel.  To a lesser extent I feel the same about IAO.  It too is stated as if gospel.  In fact we are told it is gospel and to deny it is to deny the gospel.  I wonder if, like evolution, it makes claims too grand for itself.

imputed active obedience (IAO), a must or a misdirection? (2)

This series of blogs is intended to question the view that probably currently prevails among conservative evangelicals (especially those influenced by reformed thought) namely that integral to justification and any orthodox confession of it is the view that without the imputed earthly life Christ to a believer there is no justification.

In my view (and the view of many others more godly and able than I otherwise I would not dare believe it far less express it) this view is mistaken.  At worst it is wrong and at best it expresses imputation clumsily and needs nuanced.

Let me be clear: that Christ is our righteousness is not in dispute, nor that justifying righteousness is imputed to us through faith alone, nor that believers have a whole Christ including his life on earth as part of their salvation.  The precise question is a simple one: do we need an ‘earned’ righteousness to be gifted eternal life, even if that righteousness is ‘earned’ by another?  Or, to put it another way, must there be a ‘works righteousness’ to enter heaven?  Is righteousness ‘by faith’, in the final analysis, a ‘works righteousness’ or ‘law righteousness’ achieved by Christ on our behalf, or is it righteousness of a different kind and principle? Is imputed righteousness the imputed life obedience of Christ?  This (or these) alone is (are) the issue(s).

How did we get here?

Undoubtedly the imputation of the active obedience of Christ (henceforth IAO) is strongly championed today and is understood by many current evangelicals particularly over the past 20 years or so to lie at the heart of justification and to be vital to gospel orthodoxy.

Let me attempt to give a little background to its present insurgence as I understand it.

Imputation, Catholics, and Evangelicals.

In 1974 the First International Congress on World Evangelization headed by Billy Graham took place in  the city of Lausanne, Switzerland. A statement was drafted by John Stott to outline the essential nature of the Gospel and the importance of evangelizing.  The Lausanne Covenant was agreed upon by 2,300 people from 150 nations from all branches of the Christian church in the space of ten days. On the nature of evangelism and of the gospel the Covenant reads:

“To evangelize is to spread the good news that Jesus Christ died for our sins and was raised from the dead according to the Scriptures, and that as the reigning Lord he now offers the forgiveness of sins and the liberating gifts of the Spirit to all who repent and believe. Our Christian presence in the world is indispensable to evangelism, and so is that kind of dialogue whose purpose is to listen sensitively in order to understand. But evangelism itself is the proclamation of the historical, biblical Christ as Saviour and Lord, with a view to persuading people to come to him personally and so be reconciled to God. In issuing the gospel invitation we have no liberty to conceal the cost of discipleship. Jesus still calls all who would follow him to deny themselves, take up their cross, and identify themselves with his new community. The results of evangelism include obedience to Christ, incorporation into his Church and responsible service in the world.

Some years later at Manila (1989) a further Lausanne gospel definition was affirmed.

“We rejoice that the living God did not abandon us to our lostness and despair. In his love he came after us in Jesus Christ to rescue and remake us. So the good news focuses on the historic person of Jesus, who came proclaiming the kingdom of God and living a life of humble service, who died for us, becoming sin and a curse in our place, and whom God vindicated by raising him from the dead. To those who repent and believe in Christ, God grants a share in the new creation. He gives us new life, which includes the forgiveness of our sins and the indwelling, transforming power of his Spirit. He welcomes us into his new community, which consists of people of all races, nations and cultures. And he promises that one day we will enter his new world, in which evil will be abolished, nature will be redeemed, and God will reign forever.”

Notice neither gospel definition mentions IAO.  The good news is ‘that Jesus Christ died for our sins and was raised from the dead according to the Scriptures, and that as the reigning Lord he now offers the forgiveness of sins and the liberating gifts of the Spirit to all who repent and believe’ and focuses on‘…the historic person of Jesus, who came proclaiming the kingdom of God and living a life of humble service, who died for us, becoming sin and a curse in our place, and whom God vindicated by raising him from the dead. To those who repent and believe in Christ, God grants a share in the new creation.’

I think it is fair to say that for most of the C20 definitions of the gospel that the majority if not all evangelicals could in conscience subscribe to focussed on the saving death and life-giving resurrection of Christ.  IAO was not part of evangelical gospel orthodoxy.

In 90’s a new and significant event took place.  Early in the decade a few Evangelical and Catholic leaders met to see what gospel they could commonly affirm.  This group was called Evangelicals and Catholics Together (ECT).  Vatican II Council opened up the way for dialogue between Catholics and other Christian bodies.  ECT was one example of such dialogue.  ECT, however, framed some fairly weak gospel definitions rightly viewed with suspicion and strongly criticised by a number of evangelical leaders. In short, these leaders believed that the distinction between imputed righteousness (a righteousness outside themselves credited to believers as justifying) and imparted righteousness (a righteousness given to believers inside themselves, an inherent righteousness, considered justifying) was fudged.  This mattered, because the historic and critical distinction between Catholic and Protestant (evangelical) lay just precisely here.  Imputed righteousness lay at the heart of the Protestant gospel while imparted righteousness lay at the heart of the Roman Catholic gospel.  The question is, as R C  Sproul (unfortunate initials) expressed it:

“Is our justification based on the righteousness of Christ in us or the righteousness of Christ for us?

Sproul was rightly observing that Evangelicals in line with their Protestant tradition and the plain teaching of Scripture have always affirmed imputed righteousness.  That is, that justification is based on what God has done for us in Christ not what he is doing in us through Christ.

Because of Catholic rapprochement imputation became (rightly and necessarily) a part of gospel definition.

Thus a 1999/2000 document entitled, The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebration (signed by many leading Evangelicals including Hybels, Hayford, MacArthur, Robertson, McCartney, Swindoll, Piper, Lucado, Stott, Ankerberg, Neff, Stowell, Stanley, etc.) surfaced as a direct reaction and response to ECT definitions.  Concerning it Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president R. Albert Mohler states:

“The statement’s carefully crafted affirmation of the doctrine of justification may be its most significant achievement in light of current controversies. The drafters insist that the righteousness of Christ alone is imputed to believers by God’s legal declaration ‘as the sole ground for our justification.’ Further, our justification and adoption are by grace alone, through faith alone, achieved by Christ alone, ‘while we were yet sinners.’

Imputed righteousness  was at the heart of ‘Celebration’ and indeed its raison d’être.  The document is magisterial and is in most respects a wonderfully lucid and comprehensive statement of the gospel.

Concerning justification it states:

‘God’s justification of those who trust him, according to the Gospel, is a decisive transition, here and now, from a state of condemnation and wrath because of their sins to one of acceptance and favor by virtue of Jesus’ flawless obedience culminating in his voluntary sin-bearing death. God “justifies the wicked” (ungodly: Rom. 4:5) by imputing (reckoning, crediting, counting, accounting) righteousness to them and ceasing to count their sins against them (Rom. 4:1-8). Sinners receive through faith in Christ alone “the gift of righteousness” (Rom. 1:17, 5:17; Phil. 3:9) and thus become “the righteousness of God” in him who was “made sin” for them (2 Cor. 5:21).

This confession all evangelicals surely affirm.  In its summing affirmations and denials, it goes on to state:

We affirm that Christ’s saving work included both his life and his death on our behalf (Gal. 3:13). We declare that faith in the perfect obedience of Christ by which he fulfilled all the demands of the Law of God in our behalf is essential to the Gospel.

We deny that our salvation was achieved merely or exclusively by the death of Christ without reference to his life of perfect righteousness.

This too, standing alone, all evangelicals affirm.  No evangelical denies that the perfect life of Christ is what gives virtue and value to his saving death.  But warning bells are beginning to surface.  ‘Celebration’ lays great stress on the role of the life of Christ in justification. However, that the life of Christ is what gives virtue to his justifying death is not what the document is not what the document is affirming.  Nor is it prepared to leave undefined just how righteousness is imputed.  It is affirming something much more exact.  It is stating that imputation is the righteous life of Christ imputed (transferred) to the believer  as the basis of  his righteous standing before God.  Justification is not righteousness reckoned by the death of Christ but by the life of Christ.  We need Christ’s law-keeping life as our righteousness in addition to his sin-bearing death.

Earlier the document said,

As our sins were reckoned to Christ, so Christ’s righteousness is reckoned to us. This is justification by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness.

It is just possible that even these statements need not be read as IAO, yet IAO is undoubtedly what is intended.  This is IAO language albeit judiciously expressed.   Robert Gundry, a prominent and able American theologian,suspected this and wrote a public letter regarding the document in Books and Culture.

He wrote:

‘It all began innocuously. Someone handed me “The Gospel of Jesus Christ: An Evangelical Celebration” in advance of its first publication in Christianity Today (June 14, 1999, pp. 51-6;) and asked for my opinion. I examined it without knowing the names of any of its drafters or endorsers and therefore had to interpret it in a vacuüm. Designed as it says to unify evangelical Christians doctrinally for the new millennium, “Celebration” (as I shall call it from here on) contains much that I affirm; and it seems to me that much of what “Celebration” contains needs reaffirmation in view of currently noticeable tendencies to water down, if not wash down the drain, certain features of the evangelical tradition that are rooted in Scripture.

On an initial reading of “Celebration,” however, some of its statements struck me as questionable, some as objectionable; and both I and others to whom I have talked in the meantime got the impression of a document strongly Reformed in tone and substance…

Now all evangelical Protestants would agree to justification by faith alone through Christ alone, and would deny the traditional Roman Catholic doctrine of justification by an infusion of Christ’s righteousness. But “Celebration” goes on to demand no fewer than three times the contribution of Jesus’ life as well as death to Christian believers’ reconciliation to God and justification by him: (1) “Yet God in grace took the initiative to reconcile us to himself through the sinless life and vicarious death of his beloved Son” (p. 52, col. 2); (2) “God’s justification of those who trust him, according to the Gospel, is a decisive transition, here and now, from a state of condemnation and wrath be cause of their sins to one of acceptance and favor by virtue of Jesus’ flawless obedience culminating in his voluntary sin-bearing death” (p. 53, col. 1); and (3) “We affirm that Christ’s saving work included both his life and his death on our behalf (Gal. 3:13). We declare that faith in the perfect obedience of Christ by which he fulfilled all the demands of the Law of God in our behalf is essential to the Gospel. We deny that our salvation was achieved merely or exclusively by the death of Christ without reference to his life of perfect righteousness” (p. 55, col. 1).

The equation of Christ’s obedience with his life of perfect righteousness prior to dying then links up with repeated and explicitly emphasized statements defining justification in terms of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness:

As our sins were reckoned to Christ, so Christ’s righteousness is reckoned to us. This is justification by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. … We affirm that the doctrine of the imputation (reckoning or counting) both of our sins to Christ and of his righteousness to us, whereby our sins are fully forgiven and we are fully accepted, is essential to the biblical Gospel (2 Cor. 5:19-21). … We affirm that the righteousness of Christ by which we are justified is properly his own, which he achieved apart from us, in and by his perfect obedience. This righteousness is counted, reckoned, or imputed to us by the forensic (that is, legal) declaration of God, as the sole ground of our justification (p. 53, col. 1, and p. 55, cols. 1- 2).

Certainly evangelicals affirm that Jesus had to live a life of perfect righteousness if he was to qualify as the bearer of our sins. But the demand that Jesus’ life of perfect righteousness prior to his death constitutes an indispensable part of the righteousness that “Celebration” presents as imputed to sinners who believe in him puts on “Celebration” a Reformed stamp that many evangelicals cannot knowingly endorse. For they believe that reconciliation and justification derive from Jesus’ “one act of righteousness,” which contrasts with Adam’s “one transgression” (to use the phraseology in Rom. 5:18) and therefore refers solely to Jesus’ propitiatory death on the cross. So a legitimate question arises: Does the wording of “Celebration” keep such evangelicals outside the fold?’

Reactions demonstrated that Gundry’s suspicions were indeed correct ( John Piper’s book ‘Counted Righteous in Christ’ which strongly argues for IAO  was written in response to Gundry), though I do wonder if all the signatories understood the implications of the wording just as clearly as Gundry (or Piper). Incidentally, Grundy also points out that ‘Celebration’ is very circumspect in its comment on eternal punishment.  It simply speaks of ‘eternal retributive punishment’ thus allowing for annihilation views.  Presumably this is why someone like Stott was able to sign it.

Such caution is not evident, however, on the matter of imputation.  ‘Celebration’ was right to emphasize imputed righteousness in the light of Catholic/evangelical dialogue.  But it was wrong insisting (assuming) that imputed righteousness means IAO.  It was also misguided in asserting or assuming that such an understanding of imputation is evangelical orthodoxy.  Evangelicals of a very orthodox mould have long had differences of opinion regarding how imputed righteousness ‘works’ and IAO is only one understanding.

Yet Gundry’s warning that this definition was too partisan has largely gone unheeded. If anything the ante has been upped.  The fact that N T Wright, an extremely influential evangelical theologian with some suspect ideas has openly rejected IAO and that some Reformed Federal Vision folks have questioned it has only served to fuel stridency.  Numerous books have been written supporting IAO and to varying degrees insisting it is both biblical and vital to orthodoxy.  IAO is still being foisted on the evangelical conscience as the only true gospel; to question it lays a question mark at your gospel loyalty and orthodoxy.

The stand by ‘Celebration’ and others for imputation in the light of Catholic/Evangelical dialogue is a cause for celebration. That imputation is construed as IAO and any alternative definition is outlawed as heterodox is a cause for sorrow not celebration; this partisan definition prevents the very evangelical gospel unity the otherwise excellent document aims to create.

Why these leaders who signed ‘Celebration’ understand imputed righteousness in terms of IAO must wait for a future blog.  This blog and the next is simply an attempt to explain the current IAO hegemony in evangelical theology.

the ugley vicar and the pope

The Ugley Vicar on the recent Pope’s visit here.  Well worth reading.

christianity is not judaism, though few would know it

Judaism is religion in the proper sense.  It is the only God-given religion.  In saying it is religion in the proper sense, I mean it represents the only God-ordained means of earning salvation.  Its basic promise was, ‘Do this and live’ (Lev 18:5; Roms 10:5; Gals 3:12).  It addresses humanity ‘in the flesh’ and offers a way to gain eternal life by self-effort, that is, by ‘the flesh’ (Roms 7:1-5;  Gals 3:1-4).  It presents ‘life’ as the reward for doing ‘the works of the Law.

In Judaism too, the civil and the religious are in close union.  The civil gives patronage to the religious.  Civil and religious are both the Kingdom of God.

It is suited to ‘flesh’ for it is highly sensory.  It is a religion of magnificent temples, exact rituals, aesthetic beauty evident in the smorgasbord feast of the temple with its savoury sacrifices, visceral bloody sacrifices, pungent incense, rich and heavenly robes and vestments, stirring music etc.  It was a God-given religion placing great emphasis on externals.

Christianity is of course the opposite.  It is not a religion in the sense that it is not about self-effort to gain acceptance with God.  It is not built on a principle of ‘doing’ but of ‘believing’.  It does not address humanity ‘in the flesh’ but ‘in the Spirit’ (Roms 8).  It is not about the outward and sensual but about the inward and spiritual.  It is not about the seen but the unseen.  We look in vain in the NT church for grand temples, extensive ritual and rite, and sensory stimulation.   We look in vain too for any union with civil authorities; Christ’s kingdom is not of this world.   It is a faith where all that is concrete and tangible belongs to a world to come and is appropriated by faith.

It is all the more ironic and tragic that the Christian church today resembles more the religion of Judaism than it does the new creation of Christianity.  Cathedrals old and new are the landscape of the church.  In many denominations ritual and ceremony abound.  Church leaders dress like OT high Priests.   Electronic sensory stimulation is the order of the day as musical prowess swamps church life.  The sensual and aesthetic dominate.  And the gospel of grace is increasingly drowned out by the Judaistic gospel of self-help packaged and preached in one form or another.  Judaism has all but occluded Christianity.

The way of faith is a narrow road and hard road.  It does not pander to the flesh.  It is not ostentatious.   It is not full of pageantry and posturing.  It does not mistake the aesthetic for the spiritual.  It is not patronised by the powers that be.  It does not preach ‘because you’re worth it’ or ‘seven steps to a more effective life’.  Yet it is the road that leads to life while all others lead to destruction.

May God help the Church to discard the entrails of Judaism and embrace the new life of ‘the gospel of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ’.  May we live as ‘new creation’ and not as ‘old religion’; may we live ‘according to the Spirit’ and not ‘according to the flesh’.

holy ground

Chris Castaldo, a converted Roman Catholic who has written a book, ‘Holy Ground – Walking with Jesus as a Former Catholic’ is interviewed by Doug Phillips at his blog. Here is an extract where Chris expresses his concerns about the average Roman Catholic.

‘Of more immediate concern to me is the penetration of the biblical gospel—the message of divine grace accessed through faith alone—into the hearts of Catholic people who haven’t a clue why Jesus died, much less how salvation is appropriated. Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft describes this problem:

“There are still many who do not know the data, the gospel. Most of my Catholic students at Boston College have never heard it. They do not even know how to get to heaven. When I ask them what they would say to God if they died tonight and God asked them why he should take them into heaven, nine out of ten do not even mention Jesus Christ. Most of them say they have been good or kind or sincere or did their best. So I seriously doubt God will undo the Reformation until he sees to it that Luther’s reminder of Paul’s gospel has been heard throughout the church” (Peter Kreeft. “Ecumenical Jihad.” Reclaiming The Great Tradition. Ed. James S. Cutsinger. [Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1997]. 27).’

Given that the Roman Pontiff is planning a visit to Scotland we should bear in mind the spiritual darkness Catholicism instils in its converts and be less than excited.  Something is clearly, seriously wrong in Catholicism.