Spirit-Baptism:  Glossolalia or Judgment?

“And He, when He comes,

will convict the world

concerning sin and righteousness and judgment”

(John 16:8, NASB)

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In Filling The Temple:  Finding A Place For The Holy Spirit, I define “baptism in the Holy Spirit” differently than what is common.  The usual definition latches onto tongue-speaking.  So any person who is so supernaturally overwhelmed by the Spirit and this personal experience results in glossolalia (tongue-speaking) may be said, by definition, to have received Spirit baptism, or baptism in the Holy Spirit.

This is an incorrect definition!  In the first place, nowhere in the Bible is glossolalia put forward as the virtual equivalent, or as the actual definition, of Spirit-baptism.  The closest passage to this is Acts 11:16, and even this Scripture need not be read as though it offered a definition.  To be sure, Peter is noting the profound similarity of experience between this first Gentile convert and his apostolic (and very Jewish) companions on the day of Pentecost.  He is noting the similarity, but even in his own Pentecostal experience, Peter understood a different definition for Spirit-baptism other than tongues.

In the context of the opening chapters of Acts, and against the backdrop of prophetic predictions in Luke’s Gospel (by both John the Baptist and by Jesus), and in keeping with the prophecy of Joel which Peter explicitly quotes in order to explain Pentecost, it makes much better sense to work with another definition.  Spirit-baptism was a judgment.  Pentecost worked the dividing of Spirit-filled Christians from Spirit-less unbelievers, all based on one’s response to the Cross of Jesus.  It was a judgment upon “all flesh”.

And if “judgment” be accepted as the essential definition, it follows that some other place must be found for glossolalia.  If not the definition of Spirit-baptism, then what is the function of tongues?  Essentially, tongues were a “sign” of Spirit-baptism.  They functioned this way because they were a visible spectacle, and a sign was needed because much of what happens following the crucifixion of Jesus and following the Pentecostal outpouring of Spirit is, otherwise, invisible:

·        The judgment itself was invisible.  God can see the indwelling Spirit as His seal of ownership (2 Cor. 1:22; Eph. 1:13).  We cannot see that, and so we need a “sign”. 

·        The attending blessings that come with the very beginning of Christianity, forgiveness of sins and indwelling Spirit, are invisible.  Anyone could make such promises and, apart from some sign, who would know if the promise meant anything?

·        The authority of the apostles, given by the risen and now departed Christ, was also invisible.  The “sign” of tongues was given not only attendant to conversion/baptism, but at the laying on of the hands of the apostles.  This gave plain indication that the apostolic message or “gospel” was to be listened to and believed.

All of this is explained more thoroughly in Filling The Temple, and I encourage you to read it.  The purpose of this discussion is to bring another Scripture into the mix.  In John 16, Jesus is preparing for His own departure from His beloved disciples by promising them “another Comforter”.  He had become their solid security and buffer against the world’s hostility.  But now He was leaving them!  In addition to the other remarks I made on this passage in my book, I wish I had picked up on the way this passage also links “the Spirit” and “judgment.”  By the way, this book is a “cracking good read” and probably the only place where you will find Spirit-baptism correctly defined.  Nearly all other treatments are so hypnotized by tongues that they walk blindly past the glaring notions of judgment that attend the first Pentecost.

It takes a certain re-mapping of the mind to replace glossolalia, as the definition of Spirit-baptism, with “judgment.”  Paradigm-shifts are hard work, and when they force us to think differently that we are accustomed, we often have to force ourselves to think in the new way.  Specifically, we probably do not naturally associate “Spirit” with “judgment.”  If we are to understand the Scriptures, we shall have to change our thinking.

John 16:8 is a difficult passage.  I find that D. A. Carson has handled the exegesis quite deftly in his commentary (The Gospel According to John, Grand Rapids, MI:  Eerdmans, 1991).  But even a simple reading of the opening words is particularly stunning:   “And He [the Spirit, or Comforter, or Advocate], when He comes, will convict the world.”  We are so used to associating the Spirit with blessings and gifting that it might take some effort to force our minds to also get a grip on the Spirit working to convict the world!

Before going further, it might be helpful to remind ourselves that this association is not something that should shock a Bible reader, not something that we as Bible readers should find foreign or strange.  Isaiah 42:1-3 are quoted by Matthew (12:18ff.) as pertaining to Jesus:      

“Behold, My Servant whom I have chosen;

My Beloved in whom My soul is well-pleased;

I will put my Spirit upon Him,

And He shall proclaim justice to the Gentiles.”

 

The word given a rather positive translation of “justice” can also be translated as “judgment”.  Frederick Dale Bruner (Matthew, A Commentary, Volume 1:  The Christbook, Matthew 1-12, Grand Rapids, MI:  Eerdmans, 2004, p. 556) notes that the word always means “word of judgment” (except in 23:23).  Thus, while the meaning may be that Jesus will bring a positive expression of justice in favor of the Gentiles, the meaning of God’s “verdict” or “ethical decision” is also possible.  This would also associate the Spirit-bearing Jesus with judgment.

Likewise, the prophecy of Joel which Peter quotes in Acts 2 regarding the “pouring out” of God’s Spirit plainly expresses judgment.  Read all of Joel, and see if judgment is not the overriding expression of the book!

Finally, in Acts 17, Paul is discussing with the Athenians the perspective God takes upon the nations:  “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to all people everywhere that they should repent.”  This is in keeping with Luke’s thematic emphasis that, since the Resurrection and since the Pentecostal outpouring, a judgment has fallen upon “all flesh.”

Now, back to John 16:8-11.  The Spirit is going to “convict” the world regarding sin (and righteousness and judgment).  Carson (p. 534) writes, “The focus rather in classical Greek is on putting to shame, treating with contempt, cross-examining, accusing, bringing to the test, proving, refuting.”  We should be open to the possibility that this discussion of the Spirit shows an activity that most of us would not expect.  The Spirit is active in judgment.  Carson goes on to note that in all 18 occurrences in the NT, the meaning “has to do with showing someone his sin, usually as a summons to repentance.”

What is a bit more difficult is understanding how the “convicting” activity of the Spirit relates to “sin, righteousness, and judgment.”  Carson takes these three items as precisely the areas in which the world is guilty. 

·        Of “sin” because they do not believe in Jesus (v. 9).  This is a willful disbelief.

·        Of righteousness, because Jesus goes to the Father (v. 10).  While here with us, Jesus exposed the attempts of worldly people to claim righteousness as fraud and folly.  Now that Jesus departs, the Spirit will resume this conviction.

·        Of judgment, because Satan has been judged (v.11).  The world carries the influence of Satan, and the resulting judgments it makes have been shown up by the Spirit as false.

As I note in Filling The Temple, one reason the “judgment” aspect of the activity of the Holy Spirit is easily missed is that the positive side of that judgment gets the stress and emphasis.  John, while predicting a single judgment, declared it in terms of “baptism in the Spirit” and also in terms of “baptism in fire” (Luke 3:16)!  Our modern minds more easily glom onto “wheat gathered into the granary” than onto notions of “chaff burned with unquenchable fire” (v. 17).  In perhaps every other Biblical judgment, the emphasis is on the negative, on the outpouring of God’s righteous wrath against sin.  Always, the expression is one of immediate wrath and, perhaps, a following of deferred blessing (especially since the righteous often suffer judgments from God along with the wicked).  God will, one day, restore the blessings to the righteous that were snatched away when God acted in wrath and vengeance, when judgment was outpoured.

But in Spirit-baptism, falling precisely on that first Pentecost, the emphasis is reversed:  here we have immediate blessing and the wrath that is bound up in this judgment is deferred!  The day is coming when those on the wrong side of the judgment will pay a terrible penalty; but right now—there are blessings flowing from the Spirit in profuse abundance! 

Spirit-baptism was a judgment.  That judgment fell on Pentecost and has been outworking ever since, dividing humanity into two groups—one marked out for blessing and another marked out for cursing.  All of this is from God.  All of it turns on the dying and rising of Jesus, and the response these Gospel events achieve or fail to achieve in every human being, in “all flesh.”

I would suggest that once this notion is planted in our thinking, once we open ourselves to seeing “judgment” as a key activity of the Holy Spirit, more passages of Scripture will be illuminated before our eyes.  And once we come to see this—rather than glossolalia—as the definition of Spirit-baptism, we will be afforded a greater view into the working of Father, Son, and Spirit.  While the Spirit convicts the world of sin, our Comforter is also working to “sanctify” the saints of their sin.  All of this is the outworking of “judgment.”

 

 

 

Jesse P. Sewell, The Gospel Preacher, and the Fluff-Preacher

Preachers come in great variety, and that's a good thing.  "It's a good thing that all of us are not exactly like any one of us!" quipped one attendee (Charles Hodge, perhaps) at a preacher's dinner at Harding University's lectureship.  In my preacher training program, there was a general spectrum.  Some of us were drawn to social interaction.  And, some of us (like me) were drawn to study.  I believe that God probably found a place of useful service for most of us, and carefully suited us to various assignments in the Kingdom.

I for long had misplaced a quote by Jesse P. Sewell (1876-1969).  It was a framed quote given to us by Harding's School of Biblical Studies.  It reads:

A gospel preacher is a man, redeemed by grace through faith, standing in Christ's' stead, by his authority, and in obedience to his command; proclaiming, illustrating, making clear and urgent God's word; so that responsible men and women may accept it unto life; or reject it unto death--all of this; because he loves God, Christ, the Church, and the souls of men.

As definitions go, Sewell's has much to commend it.  While there are and should be preachers of many varieties, it would nonetheless be valid to say that each and every one of them should be, indeed must be, nothing less than what is set forth here.  And a great many who mount pulpits would rightly be scrutinized as being less than gospel preachers--even if they should act the part, keep a Bible on the podium, and claim authority for themselves.  Less than this, and he (or she) is not a gospel preacher.

My attraction to the quote lies in Sewell's recognition that true preaching forces a choice, a decision, and culminates therefore in either life or death (2 Cor. 2:14ff.).  His emphasis is purely evangelistic.  And the insight helped me in a formative way to frame more precisely my role as a preacher.  Safely outside of that frame will be the modern "fluff-preachers."  They speak to crowds for obviously different motivations, and listening to them would not prompt any listener to a decision that would tend them toward Heaven or towards Hell.  What the fluff-preacher offers is simply not gospel, so it lacks the power to move people that way.

I also appreciate Sewell's insistence on an authority set upon the gospel preacher's ministry, and authority not given by any person or group of persons, but by Christ Jesus himself.  That authority results from the preacher's relationship to the Lord in which the message is actually "God's word" and the activity of preaching is an act of obedience to the Crucified One, and truly places the gospel preacher "in Christ's stead"--that is to say, the Gospel preacher is encountered instead of Christ, and yet Christ Jesus is no less present in the encounter.  On more than one occasion, the apostle Paul made this insistence that what he preached was not his message and did not originate with him (1 Thess. 2:13, 4:8; Gal. 1:11-12).  His audience heard God as Paul preached.  Like His Lord before Him, Paul spoke as one with authority.  The gospel preacher does the same.

In contrast, the fluff-preacher has no authority.  He is not preaching God's word, and to listen to the fluff-preacher is by no means the equivalent of listening to the Lord.  Much as Satan has no legitimate authority, but has entered a position of authority only because people have given to the devil what is properly due to God, the insipid audience of the fluff-preacher is the only basis on which authority may be claimed.  But, when the blind lead the blind, they both are destined for the Pit.  The devil and the fluff-preacher are empowered only by people.

I also appreciated Sewell today for his steady voice and clear understanding as I heard news of yet another "mega-church pastor" inflicting great damage on people while claiming to be a preacher.  I'll gladly and gratefully lend my ear only to a gospel preacher.
 

The Sinner's Prayer: The Evangelical Surrogate-Imposter for Baptism

The Sinner’s Prayer:  Evangelical Surrogate-Imposter for Baptism

And all the people when they heard, and the publicans, justified God,

being baptized with the baptism of John.

But the Pharisees and the lawyers

rejected for themselves the counsel of God,

being not baptized of him.

Luke 7:29-30 (ASV)

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Well, who can deny it?  Evangelicals, swept-up in the thought-stream descending from the Protestant Reformation, have a strong aversion against baptism.  They refuse for baptism a salvific role, as the culminating event in Christian conversion.  But that rejection of the “counsel of God” has left a void that could not remain empty.  People need a “finish line” to tell them when they have arrived at the place of salvation and full entrance into the kingdom of God.  Otherwise, the “right comforting doctrine” of Calvin leaves them in discomforting anguish:  one minute full of assurance, and the next, worried that maybe they are still coming short.  Baptism would happily meet this need.  But baptism has been rejected, and evangelicals generally accept baptism only in modified form—once it has been stripped of its function as “salvific finish line.”  In its place, they offer an imposter as a substitute.  That imposter, most commonly, is the Sinner’s Prayer.

David Platt recently (April 11, 2012, Verge 2012 Conference) made a strong statement on the danger of the Sinner’s Prayer.  He spoke the truth, and was nearly brought to tears as he spoke.  I believe David was shaken because he felt the full weight of the fraud being perpetrated, realizing that a significant number of modern believers accept the Sinner’s Prayer as Gospel—literally!  His message, then, was not only a warning, but a rebuke.  And the people under his rebuke were his people, his church.  Here is what he said:

And I’m convinced many people in our churches are just simply missing the life of Christ, and a lot of it has to do with what we’ve sold them as the Gospel—i.e. pray this prayer, accept Jesus into your heart, invite Christ into your life.  Should it not concern us that there is no such superstitious prayer in the New Testament?  Should it not concern us that the Bible never uses the phrases, “accept Jesus into your heart,” or “invite Christ into your life”?  It’s not the Gospel we see being preached; it’s modern evangelism built on sinking sand and it runs the risk of disillusioning millions of souls.  It’s a very dangerous thing to lead people to think that they are a Christian, when they have not Biblically responded to the Gospel.  If we’re not careful, we will take the Gospel—the lifeblood—out of Christianity and we’ll put Kool-Aid in its place, so that it will taste better to the crowds.  It’s not just dangerous; it’s just damning!

Unfortunately, David Platt backed down from this statement when he was later called to address the concerns of the Southern Baptist Convention.  They had made a resolution to actually defend the use of the Sinner’s Prayer, and Platt himself buckled under the pressure and voted in favor of it.  I can hardly contain my disappointment.  It is said that a “middle-of-the-roader” is someone who gets dirt kicked on him from both sides.  David cannot be right when he speaks so equivocally, first against and then in advocacy of the Sinner’s Prayer.  I understand the urge to keep unity, but to unify on false doctrine that carries the weight of millions of souls who stand, if David’s early criticism is right, to be defrauded of salvation when Gospel is replaced by superstition.  He had an audience of people who had probably done the Sinner’s Prayer thing themselves, and will be responsible for continuing the horrible tradition.  David could have made a stand like the one Martin Luther made at Worms almost 500 years ago:

Since your majesty and your lordships desire a simple reply, I will answer without horns and without teeth.  Unless I am convicted by scripture and plain reason--I do not accept the authority of popes and councils for they have contradicted each other--my conscience is captive to the Word of God.  I cannot and I will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe.  Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, God help me.  Amen.

And why have evangelicals rejected God’s Word on this matter?  It is because they are still mired in the “old perspective on Paul.”  Martin Luther’s experience in conflict with Catholicism dominates Evangelicalism.  It has long been (wrongly) assumed that Martin Luther’s battle was the spiritual equivalent of Paul’s battle with “Judaizers.”  As the medieval Catholics were employing “works” as a way of attaining “self-righteousness” though “legalism”, it was assumed that Paul battled the same dark counterpart as the antithesis to the Gospel of Christ.  That was not the same battle that Paul faced, and Bible scholars should have been made aware of this from the late 1970’s.

The confusion, in part, is understandable.  Luther was troubled by the way “works” were used to corrupt spirituality; and Paul was also troubled by “works” also.  The trouble is, Paul and Luther were not talking about the same thing when they used the identical terminology of “works.” 

For Luther, “works” were attempts to earn salvation by human effort.  A person confident of good moral living might even think their efforts/works to be so successful that a Savior is not even needed!  Such “works” might bring “self-righteousness”.  Additionally, in Reformation perspective, this concern insisted that the credit for the “work of salvation” be clearly assigned.  God had to be given full credit, and by corollary this necessitated that the human convert must claim no credit and could be offered no credit.  God’s sovereignty over such matters was seen to be so thorough that human self-initiative could play no role in either salvation or damnation.  The sovereign God determined which individuals (the “chosen few”) would be saved and which would be sent to Hell.  In this perspective, salvation becomes a “tug-o-war” between the efforts of God and the efforts of humans.  If humans were thought to exert any effort, this implied “legalism” and “works-salvation”—attempts to meet the demands of God’s Law by one’s own effort.  What Reformation perspective demanded was a totally passive convert, who made no contribution to God’s work in salvation.

The obvious problem that derives from Protestant perspective is that the central concern of Christian salvation and conversion is “relational”!  And relationships require two active partners if they are to find success, not just One.  It is jarringly disruptive, once a relational understanding is realized, to place the two relationship partners into conflict by demanding that only one of them be active.  And the first clue that the Reformation is off-track should be that the NT Scriptures everywhere expect an “active convert.”  For whatever depravity and wickedness grips them, unbelieving sinners are still assumed to have the capability to either accept or reject the Gospel for themselves.  They are given commands to accomplish certain requirements of salvation:

·        Hear and believe the Gospel

·        Repent of sins

·        Confess (declare) the Lordship of Jesus

·        Call upon the name of the Lord

·        Be baptized

Indeed, the writers of the NT were not embarrassed to insist that those coming to Christ Jesus for salvation must “obey the Gospel” (2 Thess. 1:8; 1 Peter 4:17) pursuant to salvation!  Clearly, these writers understood salvation in relational terms and so expected active, “working” converts.  When the converts obeyed such commands, they were not earning anything for themselves.  They were attending to the relational concerns that were prerequisites to reconciliation with God.  And as they obeyed, neither were they already saved.

As baptism itself was forced to convert from its Biblical meaning to one that fit with Reformational sensibilities, a similar conversion was forced upon the Holy Spirit.  Since God had to get all the credit, He had to have the active role throughout the conversion process—start to finish.  It was not enough to be the provider and initiator of salvation by sending His sin-bearing Son to the Cross.  God also had to work the responses for actionless converts:  He created the response of faith/belief (for some, but not for others), God made people repent, made them confess the Lordship, made them call upon the Name.  And the person of the Trinity thought to be active here was the Holy Spirit. 

This brings a second clash with the Bible description of salvation.  In Biblical conversion the Spirit is given/received as a gift only at the finish or culmination of conversion.  In fact, that gift is given in the culminating event of baptism (Acts 2:38), in the “new birth” of “water and Spirit” (John 3:3-5).  Paul did not say the Spirit was given to make us sons/daughters/children of God; he said the Spirit was given because (hence after we had become) God’s children:    “And because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father” (Gal. 4:6, ASV).

In my recent book, Filling the Temple:  Finding A Place For The Holy Spirit, I set forth four avenues of Scripture that offer baptism as the insertion-point for the Holy Spirit in a Christian:

--the development from the baptism in the ministry of John the Baptist to the baptism in the ministry of Jesus prior to Pentecost (both were immersions for the remission of sins, but did not convey the Spirit, for the Spirit had not yet been given).  Then after Pentecostal outpouring of the Spirit upon “all flesh”, the Spirit is received in baptism.  This final stage of development makes the Christian’s baptismal-reception of the Spirit parallel to that experienced by Jesus, accompanied by Heavenly Voice and descending Dove.  This baptism, which remits sin and imparts Spirit, is the “one baptism” of Ephesians 4:5.

--the Johannine baptism “of water and Spirit” (John 3:3-5).

--the twice-told telling of Israel’s historical experience, from bondage under the Law to redemption in Jesus.  In the first telling (Gal. 3:22ff.), the culminating experience that brings Israel liberation is BAPTISM.  In the second telling of the same historical sequence (Gal. 4:1ff.), the culminating experience is the reception of the HOLY SPIRIT.  This “co-incidence” would suggest another avenue leading to the same place as the other Scriptural avenues:  baptismal reception of Spirit.

--The shared experience of “anointing” between Jesus and Christians.  In Luke’s Gospel and Acts, Jesus was clearly anointed with the Holy Spirit at His baptism by John.  You can’t miss this after reading the baptism episode followed by Luke’s commentary in 4:1; 14, the incredible self-declaration made by Jesus in His “first sermon” at Nazareth (4:16ff.), and finally by the reporting of Peter’s sermon by Luke:  “that saying ye yourselves know, which was published throughout all Judaea, beginning from Galilee, after the baptism which John preached; even Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him”  (Acts 10:37-38, ASV).  With this as background, consider Paul’s statement regarding the “anointing” experienced by Christians:  “Now he that establisheth us with you in Christ, and anointed us, is God; who also sealed us, and gave us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts” (2 Cor. 1:21-22, ASV).  Is it hard to see that “anointing” essentially describes baptismal reception of the Holy Spirit?  The connection must have been well-established in the early church, for it is also witnessed in several passages of 1 John.

In conclusion, then, let me raise a question to which only David Platt knows the answer:  did David perhaps back-off from an easy annihilation of the Sinner’s Prayer because he was unaware that the only fit replacement is baptism, in which sins are remitted and in which the Spirit is received??  Or, was he aware of this, yet conscious of the theological collision this would have rammed him into with the “old perspective” members of the Southern Baptism Convention?

I so desperately crave the unity, concern for which apparently drove David, after speaking one way, to then speak another.  I would like to call him my brother in Christ.  I would like to call the Baptists my brothers/sisters in Christ.  You see, as long as I hold on to the Scriptural role for baptism as the place of salvation’s birth and the place of the Spirit’s reception, I have to carry the discomfort that David avoided.  I have to endure false slurs such as legalist, works-theology, water-salvation, etc.  I will remain theologically isolated, with the only Biblical ground for unity rejected through the “old perspective” which has been demonstrated to be in error.  And it is plain, at least to me, that if this unity is to be achieved, it will be when baptism—not the Sinner’s Prayer—is commonly recognized, and no longer rejected, for its place in the counsel of God.

 

 

 

 

Filling the Temple: Finding A Place For The Holy Spirit

This is to announce the publication of my new (and first) book!  The back-cover reads as follows:

Filling The Temple is a ring full of keys…. The study of the Holy Spirit is broad in scope, deep in meaning, and plural in dimension. Filling The Temple provides keys that unlock the meanings that are foundational to a fulfilling study. Students of Scripture have long recognized the value of establishing meanings that are center-core to build a framework for the more obscure and elusive meanings. Here is a ring of keys for unlocking the center-most doctrines regarding the Third Person of the Trinity. The Holy Spirit’s role in Christian spirituality cannot be grasped without understanding what happened on Pentecost—“the baptism in the Holy Spirit.” The meaning set forth here, from a close reading of the Scriptures, is largely missed in popular understanding. Likewise, the Scriptures inextricably link the reception of the Spirit to water-baptism. The connections are set forth here in utter plainness. Filling The Temple generates such helpful access to the theology of the Spirit, that readers will surprise themselves to have overlooked insights so clearly visible in the Bible. There is a special application here for churches of Christ, heirs of the American Restoration Movement. Some in our fellowship do not believe in an actual indwelling of the Spirit, suggesting instead that the Spirit indwells us “only through the Word?” Those from other circles will benefit from looking-in on this conflict within our Restorationist fellowship. The book ends with hope that the Spirit will break down walls of denominational division and accomplish the Restoration of unity that, so far, we have failed to achieve. Filling The Temple provides the keys to finding a place for the Holy Spirit.

 

Of course, I encourage you to read.  But I especially encourage those who read to post a review on Amazon.  Your review could be the first!

Galatians 2:16

The last post ended with the promise to take-up the notions of “works of the law” and of “faith somehow related to Jesus” as competing options by which to be justified.  Justification has often been understood as the rough equivalent of “to be declared sinless or pure.”  To understand Galatians, it is unfortunately necessary to “unlearn” what we have been taught in order to hear Paul authentically.  The reader is urged to see “justification” and “righteousness” (the words are close-kin to one another) as expressions of a covenant relationship.  And I have earlier posted on this blog a series of lessons that explain covenant relating.

God is righteous, by which we mean that God is wholesome and reliable in the way He relates to His covenant partners.  It is a solemn responsibility and an uncommon privilege to be selected as someone’s covenant partner—especially God’s!  One does not grant this kind of personal access to everyone met on the street.  It is reserved for people who accord the relationship with the highest honor.  So when God, the righteous God, admits covenant partners, He “justifies” them.  He declares them to be acceptable to join Him in covenant.

I’m thinking now of the Parable of the Wedding Banquet.  A king sends out invitations, basically to anyone who will accept and respond.  When the first round of invitations doesn’t yield enough responses, the king sends out his servants again.  They are to carry the call of invitation not only to the thoroughfares and main roads, but down the alleys and side roads, with the goal of bringing-in anyone and everyone.  At the event, a fellow is spotted not wearing clothing appropriate to the occasion.  He is unceremoniously cast out.  The message is that the New Covenant relationship carries a wide invitation, but a narrow acceptance limited only to those appropriately attentive to the solemnity of relational responsibility.  Many are called, but few are chosen.

As Paul writes Galatians, the only people “justified” to be acknowledged as the people of God are Jews.  The rare exceptions in which Gentiles find acceptance is when they abandon their natural cultural and religious inclinations and bend in a Jewish direction.  They become “proselytes” who embrace Judaism and the God of Israel.  This understanding ensured that the Jewish “social map” was organized around the Torah, the covenant-law of Israel.  And for some time, for long centuries in fact, that social map was valid.  Jews were right to be exclusive, and to blur the lines of fellowship and justification would necessarily dishonor God.  The lesson here is not that exclusivity in the covenant was wrong, that people should be more accepting, or—in modern American perspective—should be more “multi-cultural.”

The careful marking of “one of us” from “one of them” was essential and appropriate, until Jesus died on the Cross and was resurrected to newness of life.  That Person, that Event, changed everything.  It necessitated a re-drawing of the longstanding social map.  On the Cross, Jesus demonstrated most thoroughly and most dramatically and most meaningfully the “faith” or “faithfulness” that He embraced all through His life.  The word “faith” (or “belief”) carries several meanings.  We who are children of the “scientific age” tend to use it as in the question, “Do you believe in Bigfoot?  Or, in UFO’s?  Or, the Loch Ness monster?”  In this sense, belief in Jesus means that one accepts as historically true His existence, perhaps even His miraculous activities and rising from the dead.  But “faith” can mean more and different things:

--trust.  When a friend makes a promise and you trust the friend to keep it, you are showing faith.

--faithfulness.  When one partner responds to another in a way that honors him/her and that honors the relationship itself, they are being faithful to one another.  They are “keeping faith” or “being true” to one another.  Btw, when Jesus declared, “The truth will set you free” (John 8:32), doesn’t it seem more likely that His meaning was not, “You will be set free when you realize these things are actually true.”  Instead, Jesus offered “freedom” to those who embrace the “truth” that one partner keeps for another partner.  The joys of faithful relationships unleash a freedom from a tortured inner spirit and psychology.

It is said that every potential meaning of the word “faith” is exhausted to the fullest by a martyr.  One who would accept death before dishonoring God and the relationship shared with Him demonstrates “faith(fulness).”  When Jesus took the Cross and martyrdom, He exhausted faith of its many meanings and ran each meaning to its fullest expression. 

In Ben-Hur, Charleton Heston is fastened by each hand to two teams of horses that pull in opposite directions.  Jesus faced similar stress when He held faithfully to God with one hand, and held faithfully to people with the other.  The demands and resulting stress were such that He would be forced to let go of one or the other, or find Himself destroyed and pulled apart.  Jesus might have been expected to continue a faithful grip on the Father God who had always been faithful to Him, while releasing His grip on sinful, faithless people.  Jesus would have been spared, and that would have been fair and just.  But, expressive of pure grace and breathtaking mercy, Jesus also refused to let go of us.  Those two obligations, met full-strength, forced Jesus through a trial in which not only His face, but His honor, was spat upon.  Refusing to let go then forced Jesus through whips and scourges, until His back was laid bare.  He might have quit, might have let go His grip, at any point.  But He held even when the resulting responsibility pulled His spirit from His body, killed Him, on the Cross.  That is “faith”, bearing meaning and carrying definitions that leave nothing short.

Let us return to Paul in Gal. 2:16.  “…yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.”  The first option here (which Paul denies flatly), by which one might find justification, is “by the works of the Law.”

Even though this possibility meets an unequivocal denial from Paul, we have to be sympathetic to the concerns of those who demand it.  Jewish people faced a struggle to maintain their traditional identity, religion, and faith that forced many of them to die as martyrs.  When Alexander the Great conquered the Mediterranean region under the domination of Greece, the various sub-cultures now dominated were forced to accept Greek culture and religion.  This was called Hellenization, and it was compulsory.  Of course, the Jewish people resisted and clung stubbornly to God and His Law.  And, they suffered terribly for keeping their allegiance and faithfulness.

It was important to identify “one of us” from “one of them” in such situation.  To identify themselves as faithful Jews to one another, they used “works of the Law.”  These were acts of compliance to Torah, the Old Covenant Law and each worked as a “badge” of identification.  The “works of the Law” consisted essentially of three Law-keeping obediences:

--circumcision.

--kosher-food diet.

--keeping Sabbath.

Think of the way Amish modes of dress and comportment serve to identify themselves with other Amish, and also distinguish them from others (“the English”).  The standard clothing styles are like uniforms, identifying their “soldiers” from enemies in the cultural and religious clash.  The “works of the Law” likewise enabled one to distinguish insiders from outsiders, the faithful from the corrupt.  And, as we have already said, these identifiers were meaningful and valid, until Jesus died in faith.

So, if not “works of the Law”, how might one be justified to be included among God’s people (and so find a seat at table)?  The phrase “by faith in (Jesus) Christ” can be translated from the Greek, and English Bibles traditionally and almost universally get it wrong.  The phrase can also be translated, “by the faith(fulness) of Jesus.”  In other words, justification comes not because we believe in Jesus, but because Jesus himself was faithful.  It is His faith, not ours, that brings justification.

Put another way, justification comes through the action of God rather than through the action of people.  God was acting “in Jesus”, even through His crucifixion, to bring a new way by which people might find acceptance.  This translation is finally being brought up in new Bible translations, like the CEV (Common English Version).  Accepting it means that we accept the startling conclusion that Paul, nowhere in Galatians, presents Jesus as the object of human faith.

Of course, our faith is still essential once we accept the “faith of Jesus.”  What is required is that when we consider “saving faith” or “the faith that saves”, we should allow ourselves (or force ourselves, contrary to what we probably have always been taught) to think first of the faith of Jesus!  In other words, to think first of the Cross.  It is here, and in Him, that we find the faith that is of such exhaustive quality that it saves us.  And then, after this consideration of Jesus, we might consider our own faith that is responsive to His.

It is curious that the phrase “faith(fulness) of Christ” occurs in Paul’s writings only seven times, and it usually is coupled with a clear reference to human faith.  His faith and ours are conjoined (which is what we should expect in a conversation regarding covenant relating).  The seven places are Romans 3:21, 26; Gal. 2:16 (twice), 20; 3:22, and Phil. 3:9.  In the following quotations of these Scriptures, the bold text will show human faith, and the other references will be re-translated to the faith(fulness) of Jesus:

--“But now apart from the law a righteousness of God hath been manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God through [the faith(fulness) of Jesus Christ] unto all them that believe; for there is no distinction” (Romans 3:21-22, ASV).

--“yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through [the faith(fulness) of Jesus Christ], even we believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified [by the faith(fulness) of Christ], and not by the works of the law: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified” (Gal 2:16, ASV).

--“and be found in him, not having a righteousness of mine own, even that which is of the law, but that which is through [the faith(fulness) of Christ], the righteousness which is from God by faith” (Phil 3:9, ASV).

In each of these three references, Paul is speaking about the basis for our justification/righteousness.  And in each case, he conjoins the “faith of Jesus” with the faith of a Christian.  We will say more about this joining or “marriage” between His faith and ours later, but for now it is enough to see that for Paul there must be a re-drawing of the social map.  The necessity is obvious for anyone who understands the Cross.

The new social map will allow Gentiles to be accepted as “insiders.”  The old map did not.  And usually, that old map was drawn in the minds of Jewish people.  It became visible through who was, and who was not, allowed a seat at table.  And it also became visible in the Jerusalem Temple, where courts separated by boundary walls replicated the social map of Judaism.  The Gentiles (with surprising allowance of diversity) were allowed to enter the Temple grounds, but were restricted to their own area and were forbidden to enter the court reserved for Jewish men (Jewish women had their own court).  On the wall was a posting that declared just how serious the social map was regarded:  “No foreigner is to enter within the forecourt and the barrier around the sanctuary.  Whoever is caught will have himself to blame for his subsequent death.”  Jews are insiders; Gentiles are outsiders, and the barrier between them is solid.

But the map was being redrawn.  Some insiders would now be regarded as outsiders, and some outsiders now found acceptance.  When the Cross is made the new organizing center (instead of the Torah), Gentiles find a place inside.  They are justified or declared righteous.  Paul described this erasing/redrawing by making explicit reference to the Temple barrier:

“Wherefore remember, that once ye, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision, in the flesh, made by hands; that ye were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.  But now in Christ Jesus ye that once were far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ.  For he is our peace, who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in the flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace; and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby:  and he came and preached peace to you that were far off, and peace to them that were nigh:  for through him we both have our access in one Spirit unto the Father.  So then ye are no more strangers and sojourners, but ye are fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief corner stone; in whom each several building, fitly framed together, groweth into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for a habitation of God in the Spirit. (Eph 2:11-22, ASV)

You can bet that when Paul sees Jesus as the “chief corner stone” of this new fellowship, that bring both Jews and Gentiles inside the people of God, he see Jesus in such exalted and vital position by virtue of His “faith.”  This is the new, and now the only, means by which a person may be justified.

 

 

 

 

Galatians Two (vs. 11-16)

In 2:11, we encounter the famous showdown between two apostles, Paul and Peter (Cephas).  And again, if even they conflict, who are we to think we are above it?  What is crucial is to carefully note the fundamental issue and not let go of it as the conflict moves toward resolution.  The issue is "table fellowship."  It is about who, on the basis of common Jewish scruples (based on Torah/the Law), is able (or not able) to eat with whom???

It is also significant where this argument is located.  Antioch is famous for two things.  By the way, there are two places named Antioch.  The one here is Syrian Antioch, the one closest to Israel.  It is famous for being the first place at which disciples of Jesus were called "Christians."  And, it is famous for being the location of the first church that blended into a single fellowship both Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians.  Though we may scarcely raise our eyebrows at this, given our historical and cultural position, this was a monumental accomplishment!  It was so unprecedented that the "mother church" in Jerusalem sent an investigator to look-in and report-back.  His name was Barnabas, and he appreciated and approved of what he found at Antioch.  For whatever reason, he left here for Tarsus, the hometown of Saul (Paul), and brought him to Antioch.  Paul was a new Christian who, without a doubt, struggled to find a place inside the Christian fellowship that he had even recently persecuted.  In his official role in Judaism, Paul had imprisoned and even killed Christian Jews (like the martyr Stephen).  Now Paul and Barnabas are found at Antioch, and how interesting is it that they are joined by none other than the apostle Peter, who has the distinction of bringing the first "raw Gentile" (Cornelius) through a Christian conversion!

Paul confronts Peter with the charge of hypocrisy.  Previously, Peter would eat (share fellowship) with Gentile Christians.  In Acts, we recall that Peter's conversion of Cornelius came only after a three-times-repeated vision in which food animals notoriously outside of the "kosher" dietary limitations are set before Peter, and he is commanded:  "Kill and eat!"  Peter, like any good Jew, refuses, again and again.  But finally the message attending the vision is that he should, no longer, consider "unclean" what God has, now at last, pronounced to be "clean."  The message is two-fold.  The kosher food laws are now abrogated and taken off the books (recall that Jesus had settled this when he declared defilement to originate, not with what one might eat, but with whatever evil proceeded from the human heart.  Easing dietary restrictions was only part of the revelation; the other half of the message is that "unclean people" (again, unclean in reference to Jewish limitations) were now to be regarded as "clean".  That means that Gentiles are now fit to be "insiders" that take their place in fellowship with God's Jewish people! 

Peter understood all this, and the evidence is his conversion of Cornelius.  He preached the Gospel of Jesus to the Gentile household, and baptized them.  But, suddenly, Peter withdrew himself and would no longer eat with Gentiles who were insiders to the Christian fellowship.  Paul rightly perceived hypocrisy, and even Barnabas was taken-in by it!  What caused this reversal?  Certain men were sent from James in Jerusalem (just as Barnabas had been sent earlier).  These men were Christians, Jewish Christians, who still believed that the central organizing focus of God's people was the Torah, as it had been for centuries for the Jewish people in the theocratic nation of Israel, and as it now continued to be (they thought) for God's people in the church.  They were willing to admit Gentiles into the fellowship, but only insofar as they respectfully embraced Judaism.  Essentially, a Gentile could be accepted if he/she first became a Jew.

Paul takes careful aim with his first rebuke of Peter:  "But when I saw that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Cephas before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest as do the Gentiles, and not as do the Jews, how compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?" (Gal. 2:14, ASV).  Here Peter had set aside Jewish scruples and gave a place at his table to Gentiles.  In Jewish perspective, this was "living like a Gentile".  But now, to refuse such dinner guests is not only a social rejection, it implicitly carries pressure.  If the Gentiles, who formerly shared table with Peter, want to ever again take a seat at the table then they must comply with Jewish restrictions.  They would have to "live like Jews." 

Vs. 15 presents the "social map" marked out when Torah is the organizing feature.  It was the map, indicating insiders and outsiders, as recognized by Law-observant Jews.  The Gentiles were located in the sphere marked-out for "sinners", and this would then locate Jews in some different sphere, marked perhaps by "holiness" or "cleanness" or "righteousness."  The conflict arises because Paul does no longer accept this social map.  He once did, but no longer.  Paul now has a new map.

The key topographical feature on the competing "maps" is "righteousness" or "justification" (both English words stem from the same, identical Greek root).  You may have to set aside what you have been taught about these words, and may have to learn to think of their meaning in a new way.  What Paul is communicating is the basis on which a given person (Gentile or Jew) may "rightfully" or "justifiably" take his place as an insider among God's people (this has implications for the place then taken at table).  By tradition accumulated over centuries of history, a Jewish person would "justify" only those people located as God's on the "social map."  And since that map was organized around the Law as its focus, that meant only "Torah-honoring Jews" could be justified.  If a Gentile should seek inclusion, they would have to become one of those.

Paul used to think in these terms also, but since Jesus had been nailed to the Cross and resurrected, Paul could no longer do so.  What God did in Christ Jesus was so significant that, for anyone who understood it, it would mean a re-drawing of the social map.  The Cross had to become the new center, the new focal point, the new organizing feature that determined insiders and outsiders.  It was the new means of "justification."  Notice the contrast Paul offers:  "yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." (Gal 2:16, ASV).

We may need to change our thinking and change the definition of words that we have accepted.  Since the Protestant Reformation in the 1500's, "works" have often been understood as "works of merit" or "human accomplishments" that might be held up to God to earn one's salvation.  After all, this was the way Catholics in the days of Martin Luther used the word "works."  And ever since then, the common assumption is that Paul faced exactly the same "legalism" or attempts at "self-righteousness" that Luther faced in medieval Catholicism.  He did not.

Studies of the Judaism that existed in the times of Jesus and Paul (the era of "Second Temple Judaism") simply was not legalistic, in these terms.  Jews did not try to accumulate deeds that were moral or religious to "justify" themselves to God.  If you are thinking that this is what Paul argued against, you will not read Galatians.  You will mis-read Galatians, and never understand what Paul was saying.  By the way, the studies of Judaism that are now changing our thinking on these matters is called "the new perspective on Paul" and was touched-off by a scholar named E. P. Sanders.

What Paul meant by "works of the Law" and by its opposite "faith somehow referenced to Jesus" will be the subject of the next post.