While In Ireland Amy and I visited the Drogheda Catholic Church - Here is the carving on the altar of The Last Supper (with Mary Magdelene next to Jesus?!)

Understanding and Owning Christian Theology

Week 11 (Oct 16): The Lord’s Supper – Why It Matters

The Sunday School Class was recorded and can be heard here: The Lord’s Supper – Why It Matters 

Baptism = Covenant initiation/washing/union with Christ, once for all; Communion = Covenant continuance; ongoing participation with Christ and His body; weekly and for all the baptized.

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Tags: Bible Classes, Church, Communion, James Jordan, Paedo-Communion, Peter Leithart, Reformation Covenant Church, Sunday School, The Lord's Supper

Peter Leithart

In an article published in First Things called Solicitous Nation, Peter Leithart recently wrote of The United States of America:

“We are founded on principles, not nationality, and the founding principles, we claim, are universal ones. “All men are created equal” and all are endowed by the Creator with natural rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If we take the Declaration of Independence at all seriously, we cannot remain neutral if rights are ignored and infringed. For better or worse, we are a democratic republic with universal ambitions, a very strange species indeed.”

“No particular policy prescriptions immediately follow from this insight into the contradictory dynamics of our national institutions, ideals, and character. What should follow instead is a more realistic assessment of who we are. America’s aspiration to be a “Redeemer Nation” has risen and fallen. Americans have not always been seething with crusading zeal. But solicitude for all humanity has marked our relations with the world from the beginning , and this solicitude was inevitable from the moment the ink dried on the Declaration. Indifference has never been an American option. The truth is, we cannot not care.”

That we continue to have this impulse toward universal salvation and peace is remnant of our Christian heritage. For us to continue this impulse without perversion and selfish ambition will require a return to submission to Jesus the Savior, the Prince of Peace.

Tags: Peter Leithart

Defending Constantine

Christians today know that something has changed in our relation to the world in the last couple of centuries. We know that we no longer are in a position of leadership or even broad influence in the broader culture. But we are torn as to why this is true, or even if this is a good or bad thing. Is it even a part of our mission as the Church to lead culture in an explicitly Christian manner, or has Christ instructed us to be content with being a sub-culture within a culture?

Peter Leithart’s, Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom, is an attempt to address these questions in a manner that takes seriously the Great Commission, the history of the last two thousand years, and the ongoing theological reflections of various Christian thinkers on the subject.

Since Constantine was the first (in a long line) Christian ruler that tried to rule as a Christian, historians, theologians, political philosophers and social scientists begin with him. Among most academics today (both Christian and otherwise), Constantine has become an almost iconic symbol of all that has been wrong about Christian involvement and leadership society, and is now associated with what is called “Constantiniansm.” Leithart’s aim is to not only provide a fresh look at Constantine in his historical context (biography), but to present a polemic to the prevailing negative attitude toward Constantine and the Christendom that follow in next thousand years (and into the modern period). One of his aims is to “contribute to the formation of a theology that does not simply inform but is a social science.” His final and most important purpose is very practical: “I have found that, far from representing a fall for the church, Constantine provides in many respects a model for Christian political practice” [and general cultural engagement by Christians].

One of the fascinating things that Leithart demonstrates is that the ancient world, from beginning to end, was bound up with sacrifice (both animal and human). With Constantine, the world was forced to come to grips with the Gospel (i.e. good news) of Christ and the implications of the finality of His self-sacrifice. Only the sacrifice of Christ and our participation in that sacrifice can free the world of the tyranny of paganism.

I’m not one to read the end before the beginning – but I can, in good conscience, recommend that people may want to read the last two chapters first so as to be assured of the value of reading such a careful and academic work. For, indeed, the journey through Defending Constantine is well worth the time and effort it is to get to the end.

Of note is the fact that one of those whom Leithart takes to task in the book, Stanley Hauerwas, has written a very positive review of Defending Constantine. Hauerwas wrote:

“Leithart has written an important book that does more than help us to better understand the complex human being who bore the name Constantine…Leithart has done his historical homework. As far as I can judge, he uses the best scholarship available to develop an engaging biography of Constantine as emperor and human being…I am primarily interested in Leithart’s primary interest- which is to provide a critique of Yoder in the hope that Christians will recognize that they have a more robust political theology than Yoder could provide.”

The review is available here: http://www.faqs.org/periodicals/201010/2172849851.html

I cannot possibly recommend this book too highly. It is a must read for anyone serious about Church history, the theology of Christian mission and involvement in society.

Tags: Constantine, history, pacifism, Peter Leithart, socialogy, Stanley Hauerwas

Christ the Conqueror - Christ the Savior

As a follow up to my post on The Gospel In All Its Forms, I wanted to make all seven of my blog followers aware of a great post by Peter Leithart Good news in which he show how the Greek word for “gospel” is use in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament). The Gospel takes on new dimensions when the word is studied in its wider Jewish context, dimensions that are helpful to us as we consider what good news we are to announce in our modern world.  I quote it in full:

” The Septuagint uses the word-group euaggel- primarily in military and political contexts to describe the proclamation of victory.    This is not invariable (cf. Jeremiah 20:15).

The Philistines cut off Saul’s head and strip his gear so that they can carry the “good news” to idols and people (1 Samuel 31:9).  In his lament over Saul and Jonathan, David warns Israel not to evangelize Philistia with the news of the fall of Israel’s heroes (2 Samuel 1:20).  When David later describes what he did to the Amalekite who thought that the death of Saul would be “good news” to David, he uses the same term (2 Samuel 4:10).  2 Samuel 18, where David awaits news of the battle with Absalom, is studded with the word (vv. 19, 20, 22, 25, 26, 27, 31).

Adonijah expects Jonathan the son of Abiathar to bring him good news (1 Kings 1:42), but he doesn’t.  The lepers who find the Aramean camp abandoned realize after eating their fill that they shouldn’t keep the “good news” from the rest of the people in the city (2 Kings 7:9).

This meaning is in the background of the more “theological” uses elsewhere in the LXX.  The “new song” of Psalm 96 is the “good news” (v. 2) of Yahweh’s s salvation, which comes when He judges the world in righteousness (v. 13).  Good news comes because Yahweh the Divine Warrior gains His victory.  The same goes for the good news of Yahweh’s reign announced in Isaiah 40:9, 52:7.  The good news that the Spirit-anointed servant brings to the afflicted is good news of rescue and deliverance, liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners (Isaiah 61:1).  The good news is good news of peace (cf. Nahum 1:15; 2:1 in LXX), a peace gained by righteous victory.”

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, March 29, 2011 at 4:21 am  http://www.leithart.com/2011/03/29/good-news-2/

What most people conceive of as “the gospel” seldom contains an image of the Lord as Divine Warrior. And yet, the New Testament does (Rev. 19). To truncate the good news to ‘Jesus died to save sinners’ is to so compartmentalize and minimize what God has and will do in the world to make it almost no news at all to the hearts and minds of moderns.

How small has become our view of what Jesus came to do, what He accomplished, and what He has promised to do in our world. Do we have the faith to believe, let alone to announce, that our God, Jesus, is progressively judging the world in righteousness? Is our confidence in God’s word sufficient that we can take for granted as true, and declare openly, that the reign of King Jesus does in fact bring “rescue and deliverance, liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners?” Do we true believe that the only hope and good news for a world in turmoil (you name the turmoil: international finacial meltdown, terrorism, the impact of the collapse of middle-eastern governments, etc) is Jesus?  Or is that just a little too simplistic to say outloud? Isn’t it possible that all of these culamities are in fact part of the work of God to gain the victory on behalf of His people? Is that too much to believe? Is it a bit too religiously edgy to actually tell someone that the good news is that God is using all of these things to bring salvation to the world?

Anything short of this kind of conception of the gospel does an injustice to what God has done through our Lord Jesus.

Tags: evangelism, gospel, LXX, Old Testament, Peter Leithart, Septuagint

I will be preaching from 1 John 2:15-17 on June 6^th and I have been meditating a little on this text for the last week or so.

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.

There are those what would tell us that love of God precludes loving anything that is in the world because it would be a replacement of God for any of our affections. Thus, while we can appreciate and be thankful to God for good things in this world, we can never love anything in this world.

Interestingly, John 3:16 tells us that God loves the world. Does this mean that we are not to love what God loves? Peter Leithart in his commentary on the Epistles of John, From Behind The Veil, writes:

“We need to specify what John means both by “love” and “world.” In some places, “world” refers to humanity or creation that is the object of God’s love (John 3:16). In this sense, we are to share in the love of the Father for the world, which expresses itself in self-sacrifice for the salvation of the world…John is not saying that we should despise creation. We should love daffodils and chipmunks and sunsets and waves on the ocean. Our love for the world should extend to cultural products as well. John doesn’t condemn our love for Japanese gardens and the Taj Mahal and Moby Dick and the Goldberg Variations. Even pop culture is not specifically in his sights: we not necessarily loving the world if we love Coca Cola and video games and 24 [Lost???] and U2. In themselves, all these things come from the hand of God and are to be received with thanksgiving and joy.”

Doug Wilson, in a recent blog post entitled, A Full Tank of Gas and Lots of Wyoming Ahead, disagrees a bit with some of the things his friend John Piper wrote in When I Don’t Desire God (a book I have not read). Piper says:

“So the question must be faced: How do we use the created world around us, including our own bodies, to help us fight for joy in God? In God, I say! Not in nature. Not in music. Not in health. Not in food or drink. Not in natural beauty. How can all these good gifts serve joy in God, and not usurp the supreme affections of our hearts” (p. 178).

“Gratitude is occasioned by a gift, but is directed to the giver” (p. 186).

Doug commented:

And this brings us to the heart of the problem — the relationship between Giver and gift.

The temptation we have is that of treating all this as a zero-sum game, assuming that any time spent on the gifts is necessarily time away from the Giver. But though this sometimes happens, it does not need to happen. Rightly handled, a gift is never detached from the one who gave it. Wrongly handled, a gift can be the occasion of selfishness, which is a common problem. But it can also be the occasion of a higher form of selfishness, one which pretends to be above the whole tawdry field of “gifts in themselves.”

Picture a particularly “pious” little child who was impossible to give gifts to, because he would always unwrap it, abandon it immediately, and run up to his parent and say, “But what really counts is my relationship with you!” A selfish child playing with a toy ungratefully is forgetting the giver. This pious form of selfishness is refusing to let the giver even be a giver.

From one perspective – failure to love what God has given to us in the world is a failure to love God properly. How can my loving heavenly Father be displeased with me when I properly love His gifts? I love and joy in God best when I love and take joy in His expressions of love to me.  I love my loving heavenly Father all the more for the gifts that he has given me to love.

Doug & Amy Happily in Central Part

I love my dear wife more than anything in this world – and for the opportunity to love her and be loved by her I praise my loving Father.

I love my children and grand-babies.

I love fishing, and reading wonderful books.

Happy Fishing!

I love entertaining friends and family in my back yard, and listening to music, and great food. Unapologetically I love God’s gifts in this world.

To learn what I think John is saying in 1 John 2:15-17 – you’ll just have to wait!

Tags: 1 John, Doug Wilson, Peter Leithart