![]() Apostle Paul by Valentin de Boulogne Don Howell's "Pauline Thought in the History of Interpretation" in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Howell presents the views of several influential scholars over the past century. Unfortunately, many scholarly interpretations of Paul since the Enlightenment era echo the allegorical hermeneutic of old, subjecting sacred works to a philosophy other than the one presented by the literary meaning of the text. Most of them deny the historicity of biblical accounts and the biblical works themselves, therefore denying the apostolic faith taught in Scripture and by the Church throughout history. The first is Baur, who argued that apostolic Christianity was marked by a radical cleavage between the church of Jerusalem and the churches of the Pauline mission by relegating all biblical books that do not reflect this cleavage to the second century (aka, non-canonical). Orthodoxy is thus a result of the Catholic Church ironing out the kinks. Bousset similarly denies the historicity of the bible, claiming that Paul was influenced by the Gnostics instead of it being the other way around (310). Hunter goes so far as to say that Paul “borrowed his gospel from the people among whom he worked” (310). Howell accurately accounts for these syncretistic claims as not accounting for the whole of Pauline thought (Galatians 1:6-11) and as one missionary analyzing another better explains parallels as contextualization since “linguistic analogy does not necessarily mean conceptual identity” (311).
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![]() I. Howard Marshall's chapter of Luke in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Marshall affirms all dogmas key to being “Christian.” The gospel of Christ is central, with repentance and lifelong discipleship to the Trinity as revealed in scripture. He shows that Jesus gave two options: to be or not to be His disciple, the former is costly, but far worse to give up and be the latter (136) and the greatest sin is failure to recognize and respond to God's message (142). While the historical assessment of Luke is postponed (130, 132), the idea that it is “historical fiction” is denounced and Bultmann's existential view is denigrated, positing that the Synoptic Gospels only have force if they are “salvation history” (141, ftnote). However, scripture could be lauded more. The Mission of God is rightly seen as the integrating motif. Marshall bluntly states that Jesus' “mission is summed up as that of the shepherd who goes out to look for and to rescue those who are lost” (138). Marshall even rightly prioritizes eschatological dualism (a Distinctive), questioning Hans Conzelmann's view that the realization of delay led to the church's later motivation to be effective witnesses of the church, instead seeing the early Christians theology as “salvation-historical” right from the start (145). Thus, from the songs of Mary and Zechariah “concerned with God's action for the sake of his people” and “salvation in terms of forgiveness and light” (131) to the passing of the baton at the Great Commission (140), “the character of the career of Jesus is best summed up as mission.” (149). Unfortunately, he seems to allude that this mission was recognized only after the transfiguration (134). Christologically, Jesus is seen as prophet, messiah, and king, with emphasis on prophet (146). Sadly the significance of the “Son of Man” title seems to be downplayed (147), but Marshall sums up Christ's many types and roles as being fulfilled simultaneously in an unimagined reshaping well (149). ![]() Don Howell's "God-Christ Interchange in Paul: Impressive Testimony to the Deity of Christ" in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Howell addresses the Biblical support within Pauline literature for the affirmation of Christ's deity, and subsequently his role within the Trinity. This is a Dogma level issue because it is crucial to the Gospel message God emplaced as part of his plan for the salvation of mankind. Since the paper largely provides scriptural evidence for orthodox Christology, the entire review could be considered under this category. However, since not all the evidence of Christ's divinity is necessary to proclaim it, the line between Dogma and Doctrine becomes blurred as some (and not always the same), but not all biblical evidence is necessary for God to save (for the sake of this review they will be treated below). Howell presupposes a high view of scripture since it is used almost exclusively to support each of the language-interchange categories presented into Pauline literature. ![]() I. Howard Marshall's chapter of Matthew in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Marshall largely affirms the crucial tenets of Christianity, but often flirts with non-orthodox ideas such as the concept of a “Historical Jesus” (which if seen as an ordinary man deified by history would undermine Salvation). However, Marshall approves of Christ's teaching of God as Father whose “relationship is spiritual rather than being based on creation” (100). He also affirms that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah, and third member of the Trinity (113-4) as promised in the Old Testament (116). This orthodox Christology is rounded out with Jesus' deity being pointed to by Jesus as Son in an exclusive relationship with the Father more fully developed in John (103). Marshall also confirms the exclusivity of Christ in stating that the Kingdom of Heaven is the only way (125). Ideas that derail God's plan of salvation, namely that the Great Commission was completed with just Israel in the book of Acts, are mentioned (102), but Marshall seems to tactfully dismiss them. ![]() Wonder where the band's name originated? Craig Blomberg's Degrees of Heavenly Reward in the Kingdom of Heaven? in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Blomberg does a fabulous job of revealing the dangers that “heavenly rewards” poses to the essentials of Christianity. He not only asserts salvation by faith in Christ alone (159) in this life (172) but also that Heaven will not open for those who “flagrantly repudiate Christ without subsequent repentance” (163). Blomberg rightly warns that the threat is not contingent upon whether one believes in “heavenly rewards,” (165), but that one's profession of faith may prove to be entirely vacuous, thus excluding them from Heaven because they thought that the lack of fruit in their lives indicated the absence of future rewards, not the absence of their salvation (172). “Saving faith does over time lead to a visible transformation in lifestyle and to growth in holiness” (172) for a tree is recognized by its fruit! The “prosperity gospel” is a false gospel, for health and wealth supplant Christ crucified. ![]() I. Howard Marshall's chapter of Mark in terms of Dogmas, Doctrines, Distinctives, and Details.* Dogmas. Although Marshall values Higher Criticism, he denounces the idea that the gospels are a random spattering of stories collected from Jesus' life and ministry strung together as each gospel writer attempted in vain to recall the exact ordering of events. Instead, he points out why each gospel is different (ex. available space to record, limited access to all information, and authorial situational context). So while Marshall may not hold to inerrancy, he still values scripture's authority by accounting for differences as each author promoting a theological message and desired response. Overview:
The meaning of the word "love" has seemingly been lost in our post-modern age and culture has rushed in to fill the void. However, there is a biblical understanding of the term, at least when it is used in Scripture. So when 1 John 4:7-12 says that "God is Love" it's quite clear that John means that "Jesus Christ on the cross as the propitiation for our sins" is the natural overflow of God's character. Leave Feedback! A sermon I preached for a Homiletics class. I'm still growing as a preacher, so please leave some constructive feedback in the comments! Click "See More" for example feedback: ![]() Psalm 139:7-12 (ESV) - Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. If I say, "Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night," even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you. ![]() Azariah prompts Asa's reforms, Bible Historiale 2 Chronicles 15:1-2 (ESV) “The Spirit of God came upon Azariah the son of Oded, and he went out to meet Asa and said to him, 'Hear me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin: The LORD is with you while you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.'” ![]() Excerpt of Covenant sections Terrien points to the differences in interpretation, worldview, and religion between Judaism and Christianity to state that the term “biblical” is ambiguous (22)1. To support this claim, he shows that national Israel herself had a diverse response to her own divine history, instead of a homogeneous understanding of the Hebrew covenant, by claiming that each new covenant in the Old Testament was a mythical re-envisioning of God's prerogatives based on outside cultural influences. Further, Terrien claims that most Hebrews did not think in terms of Covenant since the term is absent from many of the Old Testament books. ![]() from "The Tabernacle Experience" Exodus 40:1-7. “The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 'On the first day of the first month you shall erect the tabernacle of the tent of meeting. And you shall put in it the ark of the testimony, and you shall screen the ark with the veil.' 34-36 Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tent of meeting because the cloud settled on it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. Throughout all their journeys, whenever the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the people of Israel would set out.” ![]() “The Kingdom of God” has fallen out of favor amongst modern scholars as the primary or sole theme of the Old Testament. However, Patrick still sees the Kingdom of God theme as a valid solo theme. He opens by disagreeing with the argumentation that the Kingdom theme should displaced by, or combined with, other themes simply because the exact phrase “Kingdom of God” has minimal usage within the Old Testament. Instead, Patrick argues that the idea of the Kingdom of God clearly pervades the Scriptures despite the lack of the term itself. To make his argument that the Kingdom of God should remain as the primary theme, Patrick points to the teachings of Jesus' in the NT, stating that this should raise the Kingdom theme to the level of a heuristic and that the antecedents of this heuristic can be clearly traced to the Old Testament. ![]() Isaiah 6:1 (ESV) In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. (6:4) And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. (6:5) And I said: "Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!" (6:8) And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" Then I said, "Here I am! Send me." ![]() Ezekiel's Preaching - Gustav Dore In warfare during the Ancient Near East (ANE), warring states typically also meant warring religions due to local gods and tribal deities. Thus, the victory of a certain people was often translated into the victory of their god over the vanquished people's god as well. With this background in mind, Luc argues that Ezekiel did not see the impending Babylonian exile as a political problem, but a theological problem. Ezekiel was concerned first and foremost with God's name and that Israel's history resulted from God's concern for His own name. Luc demonstrates that Israel only survived many bouts of apostasy because God withheld His wrath “for the sake of my name” and “...to keep his name from being profaned 'in the yes of the nations'” (Luc, 138). ![]() Michelangelo's David 2 Samuel 7:3-5 (ESV) And Nathan said to the king, "Go, do all that is in your heart, for the LORD is with you." But that same night the word of the LORD came to Nathan, "Go and tell my servant David, 'Thus says the LORD: Would you build me a house to dwell in? (7:11b) Moreover, the LORD declares to you that the LORD will make you a house.” 2 Samuel 7:12-16 “When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men, but my steadfast love will not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away from before you. And your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me. Your throne shall be established forever.'” ![]() Ark of the Covenant After the Fall, God's relationship with people has been expressed, and governed through covenants and laws. Since in the Old Testament the covenant rests on God's promise and lies at the heart of the biblical notion of history (Dyrness, 113), the interplay of covenant and Law play a crucial role within Israelite history, and therefore modern Christianity despite their “antiquated” feel to modern readers. Dyrness quickly dismisses conclusions of the Documentary Hypothesis theory that Covenants were developed later and read back into the final composition of the Law using history to show “It was seen very early that the idea of covenant was an extremely important means of regulating behavior between peoples, especially in the area of international relations” (114). ![]() God's Suzerain-Vassal Treaty Exodus 19:1-3 (ESV) On the third new moon after the people of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. They set out from Rephidim and came into the wilderness of Sinai, and they encamped in the wilderness. There Israel encamped before the mountain, while Moses went up to God. The LORD called to him out of the mountain, saying, "Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel:...” Exodus 20:1 “And God spoke all these words, saying, 'I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. "You shall have no other gods before me." ![]() Kaiser continues to promote the Promise Plan of God as the constant theme of scripture throughout the prophetic books. While few words or phrases consistently characterize the promise theme throughout all the prophets as was the case in earlier Old Testament works, Kaiser reveals how the “both/and” nature of prophecy actually integrates with God's promise-plan of redemption. For prophecy was not so much prediction as it was embracing “...the historical means employed for keeping that purpose [promise] alive over the centuries while it awaited the final fulfillment” (Kaiser, 153). That is to say, prophecy was a melding of the promise, the means, and the result. ![]() clouds of heaven...one like a son of man (7:1) “In the first year of Belshazzar king of Babylon, Daniel saw a dream and visions of his head as he lay in his bed. Then he wrote down the dream and told the sum of the matter. Daniel 7:13-14 (ESV) "I saw in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven there came one like a son of man, and he came to the Ancient of Days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed.” ![]() (9:3) [Israelites] stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the LORD their God for a quarter of the day; for another quarter of it they made confession and worshiped the LORD their God. (9:5) Then the Levites...said, "Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise. Nehemiah 9:7 (ESV) “You are the LORD, the God who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and gave him the name Abraham. You found his heart faithful before you, and made with him the covenant to give to his offspring the land of the Canaanite, ...And you have kept your promise, for you are righteous." ![]() Pierce argues that if an ethic and national future exists for the state of Israel, then it isn't based upon God's “unconditional” covenants with Abraham and David (the traditional Dispensational view). Based upon his exegetical study, he argues that none of the covenants in fact are unconditional. Instead, each of the covenants is presented in a three-fold pattern where: ![]() Kaiser promotes that the Promise Plan of God is the constant theme of scripture and begins by showing the origin of that theme in the primeval prologue of Genesis. There it is revealed that in the theology of the Torah, the word “blessing” (which appears in the book of Genesis 88 times alone) represents the promise. Kaiser points out that the God's plan of blessing was universal in nature even before the Genesis 12:3 announcement that “...the role of the patriarchs and their offspring would play in carrying out this mission for 'all the families of the earth'” (Kaiser, 36). ![]() The March of Abraham, by József Molnár Genesis 12:1-4 (ESV) “Now the LORD said to Abram, 'Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.' So Abram went, as the LORD had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.” ![]() Christopher Wright, an Old Testament scholar and author, has written an excellent book studying Jesus as found in the Old Testament. Here an overview will be presented of each chapter in the book:
![]() Religion How does Man receive salvation? This has been the primary question of every culture since Man can remember. Thus, every religion provides a way to save ones self, except Christianity, which states humans cannot save themselves and require a savior. ![]() Faith in Jesus Christ The Gospel Message. Who is saved? While this is not a question Christians should be asking, it is probably the question most frequently asked. The answer is those who've heard and truly responded to the Gospel. The Gospel appears throughout Scripture as it is contextualized for various cultures (Luke 24:44-49; Acts 2:14-39; Acts 17:22-31; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11) and can all be distilled to these basic tenets: Every person has broken their relationship with God due to sin and the punishment for sin is physical and spiritual death (Romans 6:23). However, God's mission has been to seek all humans in order restore His relationship with them. Thus, God became a man, His son Jesus Christ, to take the penalty for sin and offer His right standing so that whoever has faith that Christ took their sin and repents will receive forgiveness for their sins. Those who have been saved are called to proclaim the Gospel to all others. Accepting the Gospel is a spiritual transaction, not an assent of belief, opinion, or understanding. Hence, anyone the transaction has been conducted for is saved, even if their theology of the process is deficient. |
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