New Book: The Gospel of the Kingdom.

I got my last book from the amazon gift card I received for my birthday today.

George Eldon Ladd. The Gospel of the Kingdom: Scriptural Studies in the Kingdom of God. Eerdmans, 1959.

That this book is still in print says a lot of its contents and its author. It is an important book and still makes it on pre-reading list for various doctoral programs around the country and probably around the world. The Kingdom of God is an integral concept in Biblical Studies and Gordon Fee is credited as having once said something to the effect of “If you misunderstand the nature of the Kingdom of God you will risk misunderstanding the nature of the Christian faith.” I have know about this book a while and just could not put it off any longer.

still yet more on spiritual warfare

This is in response to a post by ElShaddai Edwards and somewhat in response to Peter Kirk (whose comments I appreciate).  

My reason for point out Heibert’s theory of the flaw of the excluded middle was to point out why many westerns tend to have a problem with ideas such as spiritual warfare. For westerners things can be explained either in terms of science or the supernatural (ultimate life issues) – but not necessarily because of devils and demons, etc. We’re too sophisticated for all that. Devils and demons are things one hears about in third world countries, not in the western world – we’ve move beyond all that – catch my drift?

So I am not trying to categorize things per se (or put them in boxes) but just point out why we westerners don’t understand certain things like devils and demons. Yet our world is plagued with them or signs of their influence: alcoholism, drug abuse, pornography, sexual promiscuity, domestic abuse, sexual abuse, Clergy moral failures (and general moral failures leading to broken relationships, divorce and more), millions of abortions, murder, high prison rates, corporate or government corruption, political corruption, etc the list goes on and on and on.  

Yet we won’t attribute it to demonic influences but rather there is some sociological or scientific explanation – alcoholism is no longer a result of sinful behavior but now it is a “disease.”  Homosexuality is no longer an abnormality as it used to be listed in the DSM-III or earlier but now it is just an alternative life style.  Drug abuse has some sociological explanation instead of it being a result of sin and brokenness in the human heart and a possible type of demonic oppression.  

As to physical sicknesses I see it can be the result of living in a fallen world (if I eat a poorly cooked piece of meat or fish or chicken I’ll probably get food poisoning or some other sickness – babies are sometimes born with disabilities. I don’t know why this happens.  We live in a fallen world and some things are hard to understand).  But physical sickness could also be a spiritual issue (as you noted in your post, either God allowing it to slow us down or its a spiritual attack in opposition to kingdom living to keep us from accomplishing God’s Kingdom purposes).  

How do we know the difference?  As I’ve been trying to say – I think it depends on the timing and circumstance of the event and that we need to pray about it and ask the Lord.   Often spiritual attacks come as opposition to the Gospel and Christian living – so it might not be uncommon to have some spiritual attack come after some spiritually enriching event (gospel preaching, witnessing, spiritual retreat, significant prayer time, or some other spiritually significant event).   But if one just goes out on a date and has bad pizza and is up all night with heartburn is that a spiritual attack?  Hard to say, maybe, maybe not.  

I am going to end this post before things get too subjective or questionable.  

New Books

The final two books from my Amazon gift card came in the mail – well they came Saturday but I had to wait until now to get them!  It was a long rough weekend!

Rob Bowman and Ed Komoszewski. Putting Jesus in His Place: The Case for the Deity of Christ.  Kregel Publications, 2007. 

Abraham Heschel.  The Prophets.  Hendrickson Publishers, two volumes in one, first Hendrickson Publication, 2007

They look like they are going to be good reads!  

More on Spiritual Warfare

I appreciate the comments in the last post on Spiritual warfare – it’s nice to know I am not a quack.  

I want to add to the “What to do about it?” part of my post.  I said, first, pray about it.  This is a key factor in the who deal with spiritual warfare – it is not just one of the weapons of warfare, it is what we do in the midst of battle and contending against the wiles of the devil.  

Next, we need to recognize and acknowledge the reality of spiritual beings and spiritual warfare. Knowing is half the battle.  The first rule in warfare is to “know thy enemy.” If you don’t know what is going on, you will get beat up!  Don’t be ignorant and don’t refuse to see that spiritual powers exist for our demise and for the demise of God’s purposes in this world.  It needs to be acknowledged that the devil and his cohorts scheme and plan evil against God’s people at all times.  Paul talks about this in a couple of his letters.  

In 2 Corinthians 2:10-11 he writes, “If you forgive anyone, I also forgive him. And what I have forgiven—if there was anything to forgive—I have forgiven in the sight of Christ for your sake, in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.” Interesting, forgiveness is an act of spiritual warfare?  Who would have thought that?  It’s true though – intentionally living the Christian life through forgiving and loving others we are foiling the schemes of the Devil – don’t be ignorant of the fact that it is wholly possible that unforgiveness, bitterness, anger, etc are all attitudes the devil tries to plant in people’s hearts to cause strife and division in the body of Christ rendering them ineffective for the mission of the Kingdom! 

Paul also charges the believer in Ephesians 6:11 to “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”  This is where prayer comes in, we can seek God for direction and protection against the wiles of the devil – we need to work to outsmart him and his comrades.  So, again, knowing is half the battle.  We do need to be careful here.  We don’t want to confuse coincidence with causation – sometimes it really was the bad pizza from last night and not always a Spiritual attack.  Again, this is where prayer will be helpful.  

Paul Heibert, a missiologist out of TEDS talks about the “flaw of the excluded middle.”  The flaw of the excluded middle suggests that Western culture created a two-tier view of realty that neglects the realm of this-worldly spiritual beings and forces which exists between the natural and the supernatural and instead seeks to elevates rationalism and science – looking instead to answer life issue from a scientific point of view and refusing a supernatural answer.  We don’t think the supernatural exists or that there are really evil spirits (an early example of this would be Thomas Jefferson’s Bible that leaves out all supernatural occurrences – or Bultmann’s deal with his tendency toward anti-supernaturalism, it has carried over to the present).  What we have then is a two-tiered view of reality when the rest of the world has a three-tiered view of reality.

What is the two-tier view of reality?  On the top there is religion in which consists of faith and the sacred, miracles, other-worldly problems, etc.  On the bottom there is Science which consists of secular thinking, sight and experience, natural order, this worldly problems, etc.  So, on the one hand we can address supposed ultimate life questions in theistic terms (God and the after life) and on the other hand, we try to address daily life issues in a scientific rational way.  If a person gets sick – its the common cold, or bad pizza, food poisoning, poor diet and lack of exercise, etc., instead of the possibility (in some cases though not all) of some this worldly spiritual cause (ie. oppression from evil spirits).  

What’s the middle level?  A belief in the presence of this worldly supernatural powers (ie. evil spirits, ghosts, ancestors, gods and goddesses that live in parts of the world.  

Why have we excluded this part?  We’re too intelligent for all that jibberish – we’re enlightened now.  We know better than to be so foolish.  We don’t think it really exists!  We prefer to deal with here and now realities, things we can see – we insist on being realist!  It we can’t touch it or explain it scientifically, it doesn’t exist!  No?  

Heibert addresses the issue missiologically because many westerners find themselves ineffective in ministering to folks in the three-tiered world and not addressing their real life needs (problems with this worldly spiritual powers) – thus the problem with folk religions and syncretism (blending of Christianity with traditional religions).   So, while a few folks in Nepal might go to church on Sunday, because their needs are not being met in the middle level (the world of spiritual realities) they might visit the shaman during the week for a sickness or other problem.  This is a shame since the gospel message has the answers people need for not only afterlife issues but also this-worldly issues and daily life.  

So, shed the two-tier view of reality and include the middle level – once you do I think the various dynamics of spiritual realities and spiritual warfare will become more clear to you.  

Regarding Spiritual Warfare

Thanks to those who prayed for Debbie and I the other night.  We appreciate it.  We made it through Saturday night and all day Sunday with no problems but then Sunday night I had to take Debbie to the ER because something harsh was going on with her stomach.  So, one of us still got sick.  Please consider keeping up prayer for us as we work to reach the seasonal and international workers here at the Canyon. I am not one who is quick to see demons behind every tree – but when one begins to see certain patterns of events, like us getting sick after ministering to the Thai students, one has to wonder – I think we get attacked spiritually through sicknesses, a type of strike back for encroaching enemy lines.  We are missionaries, we are going to attempt to reach the lost, especially those from the various unreached nations of the world.  Because of this spiritual attacks are going to happen.  But I think we can attempt to counteract these attack by calling for prayer cover.  

One metaphor for the Christian life (among others) is that of the Christian life as Spiritual Warfare.  Typically when people hear the term spiritual warfare they think of casting out demons, bizarre exorcism rituals, praying loudly or talking loudly to the devil, etc.  However, spiritual warfare is much broader than that and in fact really a way of characterizing the Christian life and the common struggles we face to live rightly for God on a daily basis.  Like it or not, a simple fact Christians need to realize is that spiritual warfare and opposition to the gospel are real.  There is a real devil, who is the enemy of our souls, and there are real demons, who are agents of the devil, who seek to intimidate and oppress Christians so as to deter them from living for God as they should.    

Clinton Arnold in his book, 3 Crucial Questions about Spiritual Warfare (Baker Books, 1997) writes: 

Spiritual warfare is all encompassing.  It touches every area of our lives-our families, our relationships, our church, our neighborhood, our communities, our places of employment.  There is virtually no part of our existence over which the evil one does not want to maintain or reassert his unhealthy and perverse influence. Conversely, Jesus longs to reign as Lord over every area of our lives.  This is the locus of intense struggle for all believers.  And it is a power struggle.  pg. 27

This is not to say there is a demon behind every tree but we need to realize there are certain spiritual realities that exist in this world whether we believe it or not.  Paul tells us in  Ephesians 6:12: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (I believe Ephesians to be the Spiritual warfare manual of the Bible).  Peter tells us in 1 Peter 5:8 “Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.”  Jesus tells us in John 10:10 “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”  I think it is fair to say the “thief” here is none less than Satan.  John the Revelator shares a vision in Revelation 12 in which he sees that ”the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war against the rest of her offspring—those who obey God’s commandments and hold to the testimony of Jesus“ (12:17).  I think this is right now and has been since Jesus ascended to heaven and cut off Satan’s access to heaven.  Since then Satan has been enraged and turned to destroy the people of God and will keep trying until he himself is destroyed in the fires of hell.  

So what do we do?  How might we know more intense acts of spiritual warfare is taking place?  Some Christians have ignored spiritual warfare altogether and others have gone way over the top.  I think we need to recognize it exist and in so doing know that no matter what, God is with us and always will be.

First, pray about it.  Simply ask God if it is an act of spiritual warfare – he will confirm it to our hearts or he will not.  We won’t know until we ask.  Also, prayer is a key weapon in spiritual warfare.  Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 ”The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”  This is what happens when we pray – through prayer we can demolish strongholds and those attempts that keep you from living effectively for God.  So I think prayer is key.  This is what we’ve been doing with our situation, we’ve been praying for discernment.  

I will write more later.  What do you all think about this so far? 

Prayer Request

Hi.

If you all happen to read this sometime over the next couple of hours (PST) please consider praying for Debbie, Mercy and I as we spend the evening ministering to some Thai students who live and work here at the Canyon – it always seems that when we spend time with them (either the Thais or other International Students) either before or after the time one of us gets sick, really sick. Please pray too for tonight that we may make an impact in their lives as they leave back to Thailand next week – also pray we get a good nights rest and have a good church service tomorrow!

Thanks in advance for your prayers!

Brian, Debbie and Mercy!

New Book: Aspects of the Atonement

Well the first of books I selected for my birthday Amazon gift card arrived today.  

I. Howard Marshall’s Aspects of the Atonement: Cross and Resurrection in the Reconciling of God and Humanity. Authentic Media, 2007, Paternoster, 2008. 137 pages. 

Product Description: 

The Christian understanding of the meaning of the death of Jesus Christ and its relationship to the salvation of sinful humanity is currently the subject of intense debate and criticism. In the first two chapters Howard Marshall discusses the nature of the human plight in relation to the judgment of God and then offers a nuanced defense of the doctrine of the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ for sinners. The third chapter examines the place of the resurrection of Christ as an integral part of the process whereby sinners are put in the right with God. In the final chapter Marshall argues that in our communication of the gospel today the New Testament concept of reconciliation may be the most comprehensive and apt expression of the lasting significance of the death of Christ. The papers are expanded versions of the 2006 series of Chuen King Lectures given in the Chinese University of Hong Kong.  (bold italics mine)

I know there was a flurry of debate in the last year (or so) on the blogshpere and among bibliobloggers over various aspects of the Atonement with most folks critiquing the long held Penal-Substitutionary-Atonement (PSA) theory, which many are abandoning (or have long since abandoned) for the currently more popular Christus Victor (CV) theory of the Atonement.  As I understand it, the Bishop of Durham has lead the way in this new exodus.  

I decided to get Marshall’s book so I could learn from a premier NT scholar on the Atonement and see what I can learn from it.  It is a thin book (137 pages-Amazon is wrong on this) so it should not take too long to read and I trust it will be a blessing. 

The Chapters are as follows: 

1. The Penalty of Sin – this chapter discusses issues of judgement, wrath, and punishment interating with Henri Blocher and Alan Mann.  He also confronts Steve Chalke’s claims of “cosmic child abuse.”
2. The Substitutionary Death of Jesus – this chapter discusses the nature of the atonement and interacts with P. T. Forsyth.  
3. “Raised for our Justification” – this chapter discusses the place of (and theology of) the resurrection in the atonement seeking to contribute to this infrequently discussed but important topic interacting with Richard Gaffin and M. D. Hooker.
4. Reconciliation: It’s Centrality and Relevance – this chapter discusses the issue of reconciliation in light of the atonement interacting with Peter Stuhlmacher and Ralph P. Martin.  

I really look forward to the read and will review as able.  

re: comments

gosh, I hadn’t realized I was writing such boring uninteresting posts….no comments in several days… guess I better go back to posts on how to read a book – that’s been not an unpopular topic. even Dave Black linked it!

Can one be a Pentecostal Calvinist?

Indeed this is an interesting question.  James K. A. Smith, Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Calvin College writes on this topic as he shares his own thinking and experience on the issue in this Christianity Today Article: Teaching a Calvinist to Dance.  

Here is an excerpts to get your curiosity going: 

There, in that Pentecostal church in Stratford, Ontario—once home to Aimee Semple McPherson—God showed up. Encountering him in ways I hadn’t experienced or imagined before, God shook my intellectual framework and rattled my spiritual cage at the same time.

But let me add one more layer to this story: Just as I was being immersed in the Spirit’s activity and presence in Pentecostal spirituality and worship, I started a master’s degree in philosophical theology at the Institute for Christian Studies, a graduate school in the Dutch Reformed tradition at the University of Toronto. So my week looked a bit odd: Monday to Friday I was immersed in the intellectual resources of the Reformed tradition, diving into the works of Calvin, Kuyper, and Dooyeweerd.

Then on Sunday we’d show up at the Pentecostal church where, to be honest, things got pretty crazy sometimes. It was a long way from Toronto to Stratford, if you know what I mean—about the same distance from Geneva to Azusa Street.

For a lot of folks, that must sound like trying to inhabit two different space-time continuums. But I never experienced much tension between these worlds. Of course, my church and academic world didn’t bump into one another. Dooyeweerd and Jack Hayford don’t often cross paths. But in a way, I felt that they met in me—and they seemed to fit. I experienced a deep resonance between the two. In fact, I would suggest that being charismatic actually makes me a better Calvinist; my being Pentecostal is actually a way for me to be more Reformed.

Oooh… Juicy stuff! Looks like has some books I might want to think about reading and some blogs to think about adding to my blogroll (perhaps not a true blog since the comments are turned off).   

Let me know what you think! 

 

Senator Kennedy’s brain tumor

I’ll be honest, I am not too keen on Senator Edward Kennedy – but it is disheartening to hear he has a brain tumor – right now it is cast as malignant glioma – but this is only an initial diagnosis – what kind of tumor it is specifically can be found through a biopsy.  The sad thing is, I am willing to bet it is more than is realized – well, let’s put it this way, it’s big enough that it caused a seizure.  He hasn’t had another yet, so it may not be too bad but I am pessimistic by nature.  

My older brother David died last July 8th of a brain tumor (gliomatosis cerebri) and it was a long hard road to go down in coming to his impending death.  Only about 5% or less of people survive these types of tumors (of the glioma types – most common in adults).  I pray the Lord will some how comfort the Kennedy family as they go through this process – yes, I know he is not dead yet, its just the prognosis of a tumor doesn’t leave much room for hope oftentimes.  I pray God’s grace will be upon Senator Kennedy and his family.