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Some help for reading the Old Testament
Sometimes reading the Old Testament is confusing to us because we expect, when we come to stories in the Bible, to find good examples to follow. And sometimes, of course, we do find them. Men Like Daniel and Joseph offer consistent pictures of godly lives. But then we find lots of people (like, the whole book of Judges) who are no kind of example at all. And then, most confusingly, we find people who we know are supposed to be examples of godliness, but who do things we just know can’t be right. Abraham and David top the list here. The other day I found this list which helps us with some of these issues. These are good things to remember when reading the narratives of the Old Testament:
Ten Principles for Interpreting OT Narrative:
- A narrative usually does not directly teach a doctrine but rather illustrates a doctrine or doctrines taught propositionally elsewhere.
- A narrative records simply what happened, not necessarily what should have happened or what should happen every time.
- We’re not always told at the end of the narrative what was good & bad; narratives invite reflection and thoughtful pondering based on other teachings.
- The things that happen in a narrative are not necessarily a positive example for us, even if the person is a positive figure by and large.
- Most people are far from perfection; so are their actions.
- All narratives are incomplete and selective in details; sometimes what is left out is as important as what is included (what is important is that we know everything the inspired author intended of us to know).
- A narrative is not written to answer all our theological questions and they are misinterpreted if we come with our questions, rather than the questions the narrator wants to answer.
- God is the real ‘good’ character and the hero of all biblical narrative; he is the only one always worthy of emulation.
- The historical narratives are always to be interpreted by the teaching material.
- Always remember that Jesus told us the story is about him; you haven’t finished understanding the narrative as a Christian until you see how it helps you to understand and know and love him.
– By Julian Freeman
A Weekend in Prayer: October 5-7
We had a blessed time at both our weekend of prayer last October and our weekend in the word in the Spring. This year we’ve got the first weekend in October to head back to the Camp at Old Mill for a couple days of prayer and looking into God’s word together.
The weekend will consist of prayer, times of worship in song, and group study of God’s word. We’ll have time for individual private prayer, prayer in small groups, and corporate prayer with our whole group. I’m hoping to integrate some of what we did as we studied Colossians over a weekend in the Spring. Maybe we’ll go slowly through Romans 8 together or something.
In addition to letting the word of God guide us in our prayers, we’ll have ample time to seek the Lord for the issues in our personal lives, as well as family and our social contexts, the wider world, and whatever else the Spirit leads us to ask for. Come ready for a focused time of actively pursuing God. Please join us to experience the blessing of Christian community centered around God’s presence and word.
You can pick up a registration form in the back of the auditorium on Monday nights or download one here.
Hymns by Wayfarer
Music recommendations will be few and far between here, but Justin Grow turned me on to this, and it’s definitely worth passing along.
Wayfarer describe themselves this way: “We’re Wayfarer from Seattle. We play repurposed hymns and spiritual songs. Modern music, classic words.” If you like the neo-folk stuff that’s been going around, these guys are for you. I’ve grown in appreciation for their thinking the more I’ve listened.
You can get a free download of their five song EP here: http://wayfarerseattle.bandcamp.com/
Or, here’s a preview…
Knowing Things by the Holy Spirit: Notes from Last Night
Last night we finished our look into how we as Christians justify our claim to know things by looking at how the Holy Spirit is the revealer of the the things God wants us to know. Here are the notes:
A Christian Epistemology, Part 4: The Holy Spirit and Our Knowledge
1 Corinthians 2:1-8 – There is a wisdom and knowledge which is not understood by the current age.
1 Corinthians 2:9-16 – But God gives us this knowledge by His Spirit.
So what is going on here?
- First, remember that, as we saw in the first study of this series, all knowledge is personal. See Proverbs 1:7. To truly know anything (especially the truths Paul’s discussing in 1 Corinthians), we must be rightly related to the One who has all knowledge.
- But, we all have a broken relationship with Him. Sin is the thing that causes this disconnection.
- The story of Scripture is the story of how He repairs that break and restores the relationship.
- The Old Testament tells, through recounting the history of Israel, of a cycle of sin and exile. But God begins to promise something which will fix it: The New Covenant. See Ezekiel 36:25-28, Jeremiah 31:31-34, Luke 22:20
- The New Covenant is God’s way of repairing the relationship. He puts His own Spirit in our hearts so that we love Him, and have the desire and power to please Him. This puts us back in right relation to Him. (See Romans 8:15-16, John 3:19-21)
- Once we’re in right relation to Him, He gives us knowledge again.
1 Cor 2:6-8
What is this wisdom of God? See 1:18-25. It is the message of God’s way of saving people: through the crucifixion of Christ. His wisdom is to provide the one thing we needed. In human thinking however, we were fine without Him. (Hence, Genesis 3). God’s way of doing it seems foolish to us. This fundamental bit of knowledge is the thing we can’t figure out on our own. (see Matthew 11:25)
1 Cor 2:9-12
God’s Spirit knows God’s thoughts. When He is in us, He reveals God’s thought to us. Then we can know the things God has decided we should know.
1 Cor 2:13
When we talk about these things with people, we are not simply giving our opinions, we are speaking the God has given to us.
1 Cor 2:14-16
But these things cannot be embraced by the person who insists on thinking without God’s help. Only those who admit their need get it. We have the mind of Christ!
Challenges:
- Are we submitting to God? Are we in right relation to Him?
- Are we allowing our minds to be submitted to Him? Do we allow knowledge to come from Him, or are we insisting on thinking autonomously?
- Are we cultivating our walk with Christ, so that we are receiving the life of the Spirit in constant supply?
The Holy Spirit, Our Teacher. (A preview of tonight).
Tonight I plan on finishing our look at Christian Epistemology with a bible study looking at something we briefly touched on last week–how the Holy Spirit is essential in a Christian’s ability to know things. While studying, I was reminded of this post from last January.
It’s William Lane Craig explaining the difference between how we as believers in Christ know Christianity is true versus how we show others that it is true. The difference can help you in sharing your faith and preaching the gospel. One other thing to notice is that even a guy like Dr. Craig struggles with doubt, and it’s when his spiritual life is weak: “The Christian who is not filled with the Spirit may often be wracked with doubts concerning his faith. I can testify personally that my intellectual doubts seem most poignant when I am in a carnal position.” If you didn’t catch the post, here it is…
We’ve seen that in answering the question “How do I know Christianity if true?” we must make a distinction between knowing that it is true and showing that it is true. We know Christianity is true primarily by the self-authenticating witness of God’s Spirit. We show Christianity is true by presenting good arguments for its central tenets.
What, then, should be our approach in using apologetics with an unbeliever? It should be something like this:
My friend, I know Christianity is true because God’s Spirit lives in me and assures me that it is true. And you can know that it is true, too, because God is knocking at the door of your heart, telling you the same thing. If you are sincerely seeking God, then God will give you assurance that the gospel is true. Now, to try to show you it’s true, I’ll share with you some arguments and evidence that I really find convincing. But, should my arguments seem weak and unconvincing to you, that’s my fault, not God’s. It only shows that I’m a poor apologist, God still loves you and holds you accountable. I’ll do my best to present good arguments to you. But ultimately you have to deal, not with arguments, but with God himself.”
The foregoing discussion has profound practical application both in our Christian walk and in our evangelism. With regard to our Christian walk, it helps us to have a proper assurance of the truth of our faith. A student once remarked to me after class, ‘I find this view so liberating!’ He had struggled for some time to sort out the relationship between faith and reason, but without success. Christians often fall into the extremes of fideism or theological rationalism. But the view just expounded enables us to hold to a rational faith which is supported by argument and evidence without our making that argument and evidence the foundation of our faith. It is tremendously liberating to be able to show an unbeliever that our faith is true without being dependant upon the vagaries of argument and evidence for the assurance that our faith is true; at the same time we know confidently and without embarrassment that our faith is true, as can the unbeliever as well, without our falling into relative subjectivism.
This view also underlines the vital importance of cultivating the ministry of the Holy Spirit in our lives. For though all Christians are indwelt by the Spirit, not are all filled with the Spirit. The New Testament teaches that we can grieve the Holy Spirit by sin (Eph. 4:30) and quench the Spirit by repressing His working in our lives (1 Thess. 5:19). The Christian who is not filled with the Spirit may often be wracked with doubts concerning his faith. I can testify personally that my intellectual doubts seem most poignant when I am in a carnal position. But when a Christian is walking in the Spirit, then, although his intellectual questions may remain, he can live with those questions, without their robbing his faith of its vitality. As the source of our assurance that our faith is true, the Holy Spirit’s ministry in our lives needs to be cultivated by spiritual activities that help us to walk close to God, such as Bible Study, prayer, devotional reading, inspirational music, evangelism, and Spirit-filled worship.
In evangelism, too, this view enables us to give the unbeliever rational arguments and evidence for the truth of the gospel, instead of challenging him to ‘just have faith.’ I have met many non-Christians who came from conservative Christian backgrounds and who were turned off to the gospel by having their honest questions squelched and being told to just believe. By contrast, I recently received the following note from a Canadian student with whom I had chatted after one of my lectures:
I wish to thank you for speaking with me and for putting time into your busy life in order to converse with a second-year university student. I also with to thank you for never once bringing the word faith into the conversation. I’ve always felt that as soon as the word is brought up as an argument, the conversation can no longer continue, as it is an inarguable point. You were able to intelligently debate using logical points without resorting to the use of the informal logical fallacies. In return, I truly hope I was able to provide the same sort of intelligent debate.
At the same time, however, this view reminds us that unbelief is at the root a spiritual, not an intellectual, problem. Sometimes an unbeliever will throw up an intellectual smoke screen so that he can avoid personal, existential involvement with the gospel. In such a case, further argumentation may be futile and counterproductive, and we need to be sensitive to moments when apologetics is and is not appropriate. If we sense the unbeliever’s arguments and questions are not sincere, we may do better to simply break off the discussion and ask him, ‘If I answered that objection, would you then really be ready to become a Christian?’ Tell him lovingly and forthrightly that you think he is throwing up an intellectual smoke screen to keep him from confronting the real issue: his sin before god. Apologetics is thus most appropriate and effective when the unbeliever is spiritually pen and sincerely seeking to know the truth”
(from Reasonable Faith, p. 58-59).
The Vision of the Godhead
Here’s a way to contemplate the Trinity–sing about Him. Mike Focht turned me on to this hymn by Frederick William Faber:
Unchanging and Unchangeable, before angelic eyes,
The Vision of the Godhead in its tranquil beauty lies;
And, like a city lighted up all gloriously within,
Its countless lustres glance and gleam, and sweetest worship win.
On the Unbegotten Father, awful well-spring of the Three,
On the Sole Begotten Son’s coequal Majesty.
On Him eternally breathed forth from Father and from Son.
The spirits gaze with fixed amaze, and unreckoned ages run.
Myriad, myriad angels raise
Happy hymns of wondering praise,
Ever through eternal days,
Before the Holy Trinity,
One Undivided Three!
Still the Fountain of the Godhead giveth forth eternal being:
Still begetting, unbegotten, still His own perfection seeing,
Still limiting His own loved Self with His dear coequal Spirit,
No change comes o’er that blissful Life, no shadow passeth near it.
And beautiful dread Attributes, all manifold and bright,
Now thousands seem, now lose themselves in one self-living light;
And far in that deep Life of God, in harmony complete,
Like crowned kings, all opposite perfections take their seat.
And in that ungrowing vision nothing deepens, nothing brightens,
But the living Life of God perpetually lightens;
And created life is nothing but a radiant shadow fleeing
From the unapproached lustres of that Unbeginning Being;
Spirits wise and deep have watched that everlasting Ocean,
And never o’er its lucid field bath rippled faintest motion;
In glory undistinguished never have the Three seemed One,
Nor ever in divided streams the Single Essence run.
There reigns the Eternal Father, in His lone prerogatives,
And, in the Father’s Mind, the Son, all self-existing, lives,
With Him, their mutual jubilee, that deepest depth of love,
Lifegiving Life of two-fold source, the many gifted Dove!
0 Bountiful! 0 Beautiful! can Power or Wisdom add
Fresh features to a life, so munificent and glad?
Can even uncreated Love, ye angels! give a hue
Which can ever make the Unchanging and Unchangeable look new?
The Mercy of the Merciful is equal to Their might,
As wondrous as Their Love, and as Their Wisdom bright!
As They, who out of nothing called creation at the first,
In everlasting purposes Their own design had nursed,—
As They, who in their solitude, Three Persons, once abode,
Vouchsafed of Their abundance to become creation’s God,-
What They owed not to Themselves They stooped to owe to man,
And pledged Their glory to him, in an unimaginable plan.
See! deep within the glowing depth of that Eternal Light.
What change hath come, what vision new transports angelic sight?
A creature can it be, in uncreated bliss?
A novelty in God? Oh what nameless thing is this?
The beauty of the Father’s Power is o’er it brightly shed,
The sweetness of the Spirit’s Love is unction on its head;
In the wisdom of the Son it plays its wondrous part,
While it lives the loving life of a real Human heart!
A Heart that hath a Mother, and a treasure of red blood,
A Heart that man can pray to, and feed upon for food!
In the brightness of the Godhead is its marvellous abode,
A change in the Unchanging, creation touching God!
Ye spirits blest, in endless rest, who on that Vision gaze,
Salute the Sacred Heart with all your worshipful amaze,
And adore, while with ecstatic skill the Three in One ye scan,
The Mercy that hath planted there that blessed Heart of Man!
All tranquilly, all tranquilly, doth that Blissful Vision last,
And Its brightness o’er immortalized creation will it cast;
Ungrowing and unfading, Its pure Essence doth it keep,
In the deepest of those depths where all are infinitely deep;
Unchanging and Unchangeable as It hath ever been,
As It was before that Human heart was there by angels seen,
So is it at this very hour, so will it ever be,
With that Human Heart within It, beating hot with love of me!
Myriad, myriad angels raise
Happy hymns of wondering praise,
Ever through eternal days,
Before the Holy Trinity,
One Undivided Three!
Does the fact that the bible was written by humans mean it must contain errors?
One of the criticisms often leveled at the bible is that, since it was written by humans, it must (like all things humans produce) contain errors. John Frame responds to this well in The Doctrine of the Word of God:
It would be wrong to say that the media of revelation [that is, the way God reveals truth, such as, by writing] somehow detract from the power, authority, and divine presence of the revelation. The media are inseparable from the revelation. If they are defective, there is no way for us to reclaim an uncorrupted version of God’s truth. If we are to accept God’s revelation, we must accept what we hear and see through his media.
So we must never regard the media as barriers to God’s communication. God is never prevented by the limitations of creation, or the finitude of people, from saying what he wants to say to them. Rather, the media are God’s chosen instruments for bringing his absolute power, authority, and presence to the attention of finite hearers.
This is the fundamental answer to the question whether the “humanity” of revelation detracts from its divine character. It is often pointed out that God’s revelation through prophets, apostles, and biblical writers is human as well as divine. But human beings do make mistakes. So, the argument goes, we should expect mistakes in the revelation, not because of God, but because of the human instruments.
But note:
- Human beings do not necessarily err. Even unregenerate people sometimes speak the truth. So we should not think it impossible that God could reveal himself through human agents, keeping them from error, without violating their humanity.
- If humanity necessarily entails error, then all of God’s revelation in Scripture, every sentence, is erroneous, for all of it comes through human mediation. Nobody has ever argued such an extreme position.
- Christ was full human, but he did not speak error.
His next two points refer to other arguments in the book. His sixth point is especially important to ponder:
In general, the humanity of God’s word is not a liability, but a perfection. God’s intent in revelation is to communicate with people. To do that, he must speak their language so that they may understand it. This language, therefore, must be a fully human language. Scripture shows that God has indeed succeeded in putting his word into human words, words that human prophets, apostles, and biblical writers utter as their own. For that, he deserves praise, not suspicion.
Four evidences of knowing God.
Towards the beginning of his book Knowing God, J.I. Packer gives four evidences of a true knowledge of God. He says:
1. Those who know God have great energy for God.
2. Those who know God have great thoughts of God.
3. Those who know God show great boldness for God.
4. Those who know God have great contentment in God.
He gives scriptural back-up for each point on the list. t’s worth our time to contemplate each one.
I particularly appreciated his comments about the first point:
1. Those who know God have great energy for God.
In one of the prophetic chapters on Daniel we read, “the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits” (11:32 KJV). The RSV renders it thus: “the people who know their God shall stand firm and take action.” In the context, this statement is introduced by “but” and set in contrast to the activity of the “contemptible person” (v. 21) who sets up “abomination that causes desolation” and corrupts by smooth and flattering talk those whose loyalty to God’s covenant has failed (vv.31-32). This shows us that the action taken by those who know God is their reaction to the anti-God trends which they see operating around them.
While their God is being defied or disregarded, they cannot rest; they feel they must do something; the dishonor done to God’s name goads them into action.
It is simply that those who know their God are sensitive to situations in which God’s truth and honor are being directly or tacitly jeopardized, and rather than let the matter go by default will force the issue on men’s attention and seek thereby to compel a change of heart about it – even at personal risk.
Nor does this energy for God stop short with public gestures. Indeed, it does not start there. People who know their God are before anything else people who pray, and the first point where their zeal and energy for God’s glory come to expression is in their prayers.
The invariable fruit of true knowledge of God is energy to pray for God’s cause – energy, indeed, which can only find an outlet and a relief of inner tension when channeled into such prayer – and the more knowledge, the more energy!
What We Can Know: Notes from Last Night
Last night we continued our look into how we as Christians justify our claim to know things, especially things about God. Here are the notes:
A Christian Epistemology, Part 3: What things can we know?
First, a little recap. Here are the questions we’re addressing: How can Christians claim to really know God? How can they claim to have a true knowledge of God, especially one that is more accurate than other concepts of God? How can we really know anything? Or maybe, how can we really know anything except by direct experience?
There are are least five assumptions behind questions like these, and were using these studies to address and examine them.
The assumptions behind all these questions:
- That the source of our knowledge is within—what we can figure out with our own brains. That our brains are limited, and that these limits are the limits of our knowledge.
- That if God exists, he could not give, or has not given, or would not give, information about Himself and the world. (…That God doesn’t exist in any meaningful way.) There has been no authoritative information given about the world or about God.
- That if a being such as God did give information, we could not understand it in any more than some partial, vague way. In other words, if God spoke, He would be unable to communicate truly and accurately to the minds that He made. He would be limited by our minds. So He can make us, but not communicate to us.
- That in order to know anything meaningfully, we must know exhaustively. Since we can’t know everything about God, we can’t claim to know anything about God.
- Since no one is there to explain the world to us, it is up to us to figure it all out using our minds. We do this by observing objects and analyzing data. In other words, knowledge is impersonal.
Last night we looked at assumption #4–That in order to know something meaningfully, we must know it exhaustively. Here are some implications of assuming this:
- Since we can’t know everything about God, we can’t claim to know anything about God.
- Since God is “beyond us” we can’t claim to know anything about Him with any clarity.
- Since we can’t know everything about the Bible, we can’t claim any certain knowledge of God’s communication.
Now, why should we assume this idea to be true? Is it true of any other thing we seek to know? What do we know exhaustively? Is this true of any relationship we have? Can we know another person exhaustively? Is this true of any communication we have? Do we ever know everything about what someone says to us?
The answer to each of these questions, of course, is no. Instead, we operate on knowledge which is incomplete, but accurate enough, and true. Here’s how it works: For Things, we learn enough to be able to use them as we need to. This is knowledge that leads to a correct use of the thing, without possessing all knowledge about the thing. For Relationships, we maintain a working, growing knowledge of that person which helps us understand them as much as we need to in order to carry on the given relationship. We revise what we claim to know about that person as we continue to be in relationship to them. But at every point in the timeline we could say that we have some true knowledge of the person. For Communication, we count on enough overlap in meaning of the words and sentences another person uses to be able to understand their speech. We count on the ability to question and clarify in order to continually refine our understanding of the person’s communication. (For written communication, we count on normal uses of language—the ability of an author to encode his or her thoughts onto the page, and our ability to decode those letters as we read to recreate the author’s intention. We depend on the author’s intelligence and effectiveness as a writer. If the author is an effective writer, we will be able to understand what he or she intended us to understand.)
Applying this to God:
Since we never know everything about anything, and yet we are able to operate very well in the world based on the knowledge we do have, why should we apply this criteria of knowledge to God, and to His communication to us, the Bible? To deny the ability to know God, we must deny the ability to know anything.
Christians make no claim to know God exhaustively, but we do claim to know God truly. This is the distinction we need to make when we speak with people. And, as we saw in the last study, we don’t claim to know God because we are superior in any way to anyone else, but simply because He has communicated to humanity in a way we can understand.
As for God’s communication, we do not claim to have exhaustive or perfect knowledge of what God has said. No one claims to know everything about the bible. And we all acknowledge our limitations when we read it. But since we believe in a God that made us and is able to communicate to our minds, we believe we can know truly and accurately the things He has communicated, as much as He has allowed us to know.
To sum this up: We believe we know God like we know any other person, as He communicates to us, and we live our lives relating to Him. We are able to maintain a growing knowledge of who He is, which at any time in our life, can be basically true.
Looking at the scriptures: See 1 Corinthians 2:7-16, 8:4, 13:9-12, 15:3-6, 15:58; and Ephesians 5:5
In Hebrews 11:6, we see that we can know, and must believe:
- God exists. (A certain God, the one in 1:1-2)
- God rewards those who seek Him. (see Gen 15:1) God is worth seeking.
Finally, here is a list of around 20 very basic affirmations about God and life which we as Christians can claim to know, with certainty, based on information God has communicated to us.
1. Things we can know about God.
He exists. (Gen 1:1)
He is only one. (Deut 6:4)
He is personal. (Deut 4:24)
He made everything. (Heb 11:3)
He speaks in a way we can understand. (Deu 5:24)
He has certain attributes. (Love, Holiness, Glory, Transcendence, etc…) (Exod 20:5)
2. Things we can know about Humanity.
We are made in God’s image. (Gen 1:27)
We have purpose in God’s plan (Gen 1:26)
We are marred through sin and condemned to death. (Gen 2:17)
We can be saved through Jesus. (Acts 16:31)
3. Things we can know about the Universe.
It was created by God. (Jer 10:12)
It is marred through sin. (Rom 8:20)
It displays His glory. (Psalm 19:1)
It is destined for destruction and eternal glory. (Rev 21:1)
4. Other things we can know.
Jesus existed. (John 1:14)
Jesus lived perfectly and did miracles. (Acts 10:38)
Jesus died on our behalf and rose again. (1 Cor 15:3-4)
Jesus is returning. (Acts 1:11)
Jesus is God. (Titus 2:13)
Faith in Him is necessary for salvation. (Acts 4:12)
Ignorance is not good news. Our culture preaches a message that must, logically and inevitably, lead to the admission of total ignorance. We preach that there is a God who exists and has made Himself known, so that we can know–Him, ourselves and our world.
Have Trouble Reading the Bible? Try Writing it.
Some of us struggle with scripture reading simply because we feel like we’re not good readers. We get distracted. We lose track of what’s going on after four or five words. We have to read and re-read stuff four or five times. One thing we all need is to develop strategies that help us with our particular struggles. We need to develop our muscles for reading, focusing, and thinking. Contrary to popular opinion, it can be done. But like any muscle development, it takes work. Work! At the end of last year I put together a document (which is also over on our resources page) which attempts to help. One of the suggestions I made there was to write out what you were reading. It helps you slow down your thinking, keeps you awake because you’re physically doing something, and involves more of your senses. I recently started a trip through the Psalms with a fresh unlined journal and the intention of writing out every Psalm. I want to use it as a tool for meditation, and make the actual writing reflect what I’m seeing as I read. (That’s my page for Psalm 2 pictured above.) A blank notebook works fine (my dad once sent my all of Philippians hand-written in one of those miniature steno-notebooks), but if you need more structure, there’s a new product out called Journibles, where they pre-print the page with verse numbers for the book of the bible you’re working through. You can see their website here. And here’s a video describing the product: