More than a Potter (1)
A reader has asked me to address the following objection against the biblical doctrine of divine sovereignty:
"If God determines all that we do so that we are not free from him in any sense, then we are nothing more than robots and puppets."
This is one of the most common objections against the teaching of divine sovereignty. Popular Calvinism answers it by attributing to man some kind of freedom or power of "self-determination," alleging that this is somehow "compatible" with God’s control over all things. Some Calvinists (e.g. A. A. Hodge, R. L. Dabney, etc.) answer the objection in a way that sounds dangerously close to open theism. They say that since God knows the dispositions of his creatures, he is able to "control" their decisions and actions by manipulating their surrounding circumstances, and thus "inducing" them to "freely" think and act in ways that are in accordance to God’s plans.
But many of these Calvinists also realize that this explanation of God’s "control" over the decisions and actions of man is in fact logically incompatible with their alleged belief in God’s sovereignty. So after some initial explanations and evasions, they finally have to call it a "paradox" and a "mystery." It will save everyone a lot of time if they will just admit the self-contradiction at the beginning, and call it a "paradox" and a "mystery" from the start. This way everyone can go home early.
Since I reject compatibilism and human freedom in any sense relative to God, it also follows that my answer to the objection is different. Instead, I affirm that God is sovereign and man is not free. This position provides the only biblical and rational answer, which also happens to be the simplest and boldest response against the challenge. And since I have already extensively explained and defended the biblical teaching of divine sovereignty elsewhere,1 I am not going to repeat all of that here. What follows will be an application of what I have already written about divine sovereignty to the above objection.
We begin by noting that the objection is incomplete. It fails to specify what exactly it is about robots and puppets that would make them relevant. Why would we be like robots and puppets if God indeed determines all our thoughts and actions? What would be the similarities? Then, the statement fails to even become an actual objection by neglecting to note why it would be a problem for us to be robots and puppets. Would it mean that Christianity is false if we are robots and puppets? The objection does not explain. Would it undermine moral responsibility if we are robots and puppets? The objection fails to prove or even mention this.
We must not allow our opponents to get away with making lazy and half-baked objections. They assume that they understand the issues and that their objections are unanswerable. One of the things that we must do in defending the faith is to show that our opponents are not nearly as intelligent and careful as they think, so that rather than challenging the teachings of Scripture, they ought to humble themselves before the wisdom of God.
The competent apologist should be able to show that no objection against biblical revelation ever makes any sense. After showing that the opponent fails to issue a challenge that demands an answer, since the challenge itself is unintelligible and the opponent himself never knows what he is really asking, the apologist can then address the topic from a position of knowledge and authority.2 That is, we answer objections not because our beliefs are so apparently problematic that we must awkwardly put out fires left and right, but we first humiliate the spiritual rebels, showing that they speak nonsense even in their protests, and now we pronounce to these defeated foes what God is saying to them through the Scriptures — to repent and believe the truth.
Notes
1 See Vincent Cheung, Systematic Theology, Commentary on Ephesians, The Author of Sin, and Ultimate Questions.
2 See Vincent Cheung, Ultimate Questions, Presuppositional Confrontations, and Apologetics in Conversation.
(to be continued)
Recommended
Vincent Cheung, Systematic Theology
Vincent Cheung, Commentary on Ephesians
Vincent Cheung, The Author of Sin
Vincent Cheung, Ultimate Questions
Vincent Cheung, Presuppositional Confrontations
Faith is a Gift of God
The following comes from my Commentary on Ephesians. I am posting this because of its relevance to the previous entry, Justification by Christ Alone.
The excerpt deals with 2:8–10, and appears on p. 70–72 of the PDF version.
— // —
Then, in verses 8-10, Paul states the theological implication and summary of what he has said in verses 1-7. He writes:
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.
For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
In short, Paul says that God's power and grace effected our justification and sanctification, and because justification is "not by works," and even the works of our sanctification have been "prepared in advance," the conclusion is that "no one can boast" about any part of our salvation.
Commentators disagree as to whether the words "and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God" are referring to "faith," or to something else, such as the whole idea of salvation by grace. The disagreement arises because whereas "this" is neuter in the Greek, "faith" is feminine, and some contend that the neuter pronoun cannot refer to the feminine noun.
This discussion is important at least because some Arminians take advantage of the disagreement to assert that faith is not something sovereignly given by God, but that it is something that we decide to have by our own free will. However, this verse does not help Arminianism for at least the following reasons.
First, I have argued earlier in this commentary and in other books that biblical faith is not something by which we obtain salvation from God, but it is the means by which God applies salvation to us. Also, Scripture explicitly testifies that it is something that God sovereignly gives us, and not something that we produce in our minds by our own free will, with free will being something that we do not have in the first place.
Second, it is wrong to think that a neuter pronoun can never refer to a feminine noun in Greek. But even if "this" does not strictly refer to "faith" in this case, but rather refers to the whole idea of salvation by grace, it does not exclude faith – it simply refers to something more than, but including, faith. Also, even if the words "this not from yourselves" do not directly refer to "faith," we cannot go beyond what the verse does say and impose upon the word "faith" what the verse does not say. That is, the verse never says, "this faith is from yourselves, it is not a gift of God."
Third, other than a grammatical argument, there is reason to believe that "this" refers to "faith" in verse 8. Again, the verse says, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God." Since the divine "grace" in salvation is by definition something that God gives and exercises, and is not at all something produced or exercised by us, it would appear redundant and unnecessary to say that the "grace" is "not from yourselves."
On the other hand, since faith is something that happens in our minds instead of in God's mind, it is much easier to mistake it as a product of our own will and power, thinking that we have faith because we decide to believe by our own "free will." Since sinful man tends to think that faith is a product of his own will, but since faith is in fact a gift from God, then it makes sense for the apostle to clarify it here, so that we do not mistakenly think that grace comes from God (which again, is true by definition), but that faith comes from us.
Fourth, even if we altogether ignore the Greek and all other parts of Scripture, the immediate context of the verse (2:1-10) forbids the idea that man has any positive role in his own salvation.
Verses 1-3 describe our spiritual depravity before conversion, saying that we were dead in transgressions and sins, that we follow after the flesh, the world, and the devil. Then, verses 4-7 teach that it is by God's initiative – his love, grace, and kindness – that he has raised and seated us with Christ. We see expressions like, "his great love for us," "God…is rich in mercy," "[God] made us alive with Christ," "God raise us up with Christ," "[God] seated us with him," "that…he might show…his grace," "…expressed in his kindness to us," and so on. Verses 8-10 continue from the above and are clearly intended to ascribe all the power and initiative to God in our salvation. These verses include expressions like, "by grace you have been saved," "this not from yourselves," "it is the gift of God," "not by works," "so that no one can boast," "we are God's work," "created in Christ Jesus to do good works," "which God prepared in advance for us to do."
The entire passage stresses our depravity and inability, and then God's grace and God's work – that we were altogether sinful and impotent, and that every spiritual good produced in us comes from God's sovereign grace and power. So how do we get a faith that comes from "free will" all of a sudden? It would be completely inconsistent with the content and intent of the entire section.
Therefore, even if we cannot settle the grammatical disagreement, it makes no theological difference. The point is that every facet and every stage of salvation is wholly "the gift of God" and "not from yourselves." Whether we are speaking of grace or faith, or any other aspect of salvation, none of it comes from us, so that "no one can boast."
Justification by grace through faith does not lead to licentiousness, but rather to sanctification, since God "created [us] in Christ Jesus to do good works." And if we cannot boast about our justification, neither can we boast about our sanctification, because the very good works that we are to do have been "prepared in advance for us to do." In his sovereign grace, God has foreordained all things in salvation, including both our faith and our works.
Although our faith is rightly said to be "our" faith, in the sense that it happens in our minds, it is in fact a gift of God – he is the one who produces this faith in our minds. The same is true in sanctification. Although our works are rightly said to be our works, since we are the ones who perform them, still, God is the one who grants both the will and the action in our good works. Therefore, Paul writes, "continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose" (Philippians 2:12-13).
Justification by Christ Alone
The doctrine of justification by faith alone does not imply that you are justified before God because you managed to work up enough faith in and by yourself to believe in Christ, which is impossible in the first place. Rather, the doctrine contrasts faith against works, emphasizing that we are justified by God through faith apart from works. This faith is itself not a work — that is, not a work of man, but a work of God in man.
Faith is a gift of God purchased by Christ for all those whom God has chosen for salvation. It is a gift even though it has been purchased by our Mediator because it is God who sovereignly decreed to save us through this Mediator in the first place. It is God who has sovereignly chosen those whom he would save by his grace through Christ, so that all of salvation is a gift of God — it is a sovereign gift of God, unmerited by man, that at the same time fully satisfies divine justice, since it has been merited by Christ. Thus salvation is from the grace of God alone, through the work of Christ alone, and by means of faith alone (that is, in contrast to works).
Therefore, when discussing the doctrine of justification by faith, we must not portray faith as a condition for salvation that God requires from us, as if we could produce faith in and of ourselves prior to regeneration and apart from the Spirit’s power. So, although it is correct to speak of faith as our necessary response to the gospel, this "response" of faith is in fact one of the very things that Christ’s atonement purchased for his elect, and that God bestows upon his chosen ones by his Spirit. In other words, God is the one who produces this response of faith in his elect.
When Scripture says that salvation is by faith and not by works, it is not throwing out works just to make faith a condition that man must fulfill in order to obtain salvation from God, although this is precisely how the doctrine is frequently but mistakenly portrayed, either by explicit statements or by implication. Faith is not a good work or a condition for salvation that God requires from us before he would do anything to save us; instead, God has already decreed and performed all that is necessary to secure the salvation of his chosen ones, and faith in the gospel is precisely one of those things that he has secured for the elect by the work of Christ, and that he sovereignly produces in their minds when he commands them to believe and summons them to himself by the gospel. There is therefore no place for boasting. Salvation comes from God through Christ alone. We cannot even boast about our faith, since it is a sovereign gift of God, merited by Christ for the elect.
— // —
Below are several related quotations from my books.
(1) From Systematic Theology:
The legal nature of justification means that the righteousness credited to the elect is an IMPUTED RIGHTEOUSNESS rather than an INFUSED RIGHTEOUSNESS. God sent Christ to pay for the sins of the elect, then he grants faith to the elect as the means by which to legally credit the positive righteousness of Christ to them. The righteousness bestowed upon the elect is thus not one that they have earned or produced by themselves, but one that has been generated by Christ and given to them as a gift. Therefore, when we affirm that justification is by faith alone, we are in fact affirming that justification is not by our own efforts, which can never attain justification, but that our justification is by Christ alone, who has attained justification for us.
(2) From Commentary on Philippians:
Since the time of Adam, God has been saving his chosen ones by means of giving them faith in Christ, and salvation comes only from God, who saves only by Christ. Justification is by faith not in the sense that you can save yourself by your faith; rather, the doctrine teaches that you can do nothing to save yourself, but that you must totally depend on someone else to save you. Therefore, the doctrine is teaching justification not by faith as such or by itself, but it is teaching that justification is by Christ alone. It is Christ who saves you, and not faith itself. Faith has a role because it is Christ who saves you by means of giving you faith in him (Ephesians 2:8-9; Hebrews 12:2).
(3) From Commentary on Ephesians:
In addition, Scripture never teaches that faith is something that we must conjure up by ourselves in order to obtain God's blessings; rather, it depicts faith as precisely one of those blessings obtained by Christ's redemptive work for those whom he redeemed. In other words, you do not benefit from the atonement because you have faith; rather, you have faith because it is a benefit of the atonement. That is, faith is not something by which you obtain the benefits of the atonement, but faith is something by which God applies the benefits of the atonement to you. Moreover, faith itself is "a gift of God" (Ephesians 2:8) in the first place; it is something that God gives you, and not something that you just decide to produce.
So we again affirm with Scripture, that salvation is really and wholly from God, from start to finish (Hebrews 12:2). Biblical faith is not something that comes by our own decision or by our own power, but it is a "faith that comes through him" (Acts 3:16). Luther writes that faith is "a special and rare gift of God." Therefore, we unyieldingly affirm that Christ's blood atonement is perfect, complete, final, actual, effective, and particular, and that faith itself is a gift that he obtained for us by his sacrifice, so that there is no room for boasting, except in what Christ has done.
(4) From Commentary on Ephesians:
We need to know that we can never attain true righteousness by our own good works; rather, it must be imputed to us by God. Paul states that righteousness is a gift (Romans 5:17) that God grants to his elect through faith: "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). The Bible teaches that "a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law" (Romans 3:28). Jesus had committed no sin, but "the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6), so that "whoever believes on him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16). However, if God has not granted you faith to trust Jesus Christ for salvation, then you are not righteous: "Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son" (John 3:18).
Scripture urges us to "draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience" (Hebrews 10:22). The Christian is a righteous person, not because of his own good works, but because he has been justified by God through faith in the work of Jesus Christ. This knowledge gives us the basis from which we can resist anything that seeks to undermine our confidence in approaching God in worship and prayer.
Determinism vs. Pantheism
NOTICE:
This is an outdated and unofficial item. It may be removed at any time without notice.
The article was released as a draft/preview to The Author of Sin. For the current and official version, please download the book from the online library.
Below is a portion of the article "Determinism vs. Fatalism" that I revised for the book, The Author of Sin. In that article, I answer the charge that my consistent and absolute view of divine sovereignty is in fact fatalism. I show that those who use this objection have no idea what fatalism means.
Then, some people also assert that a view of divine sovereignty in which God actively and exhaustively controls everything amounts to pantheism. For example, R. L. Dabney and A. A. Hodge raised this objection against Jonathan Edwards. Since my view of divine sovereignty and providence is even stronger than that of Edwards, the same objection has been leveled against me. I have answered it in the original version of "Determinism vs. Fatalism," but I have revised and extended my response.
I am posting this here because many of you have already read the original article, and thus might not read the revised version published in the book. As for you new readers, please take time to read those articles that you have missed (see the "recommended" section below) — they are important. Or, better yet, download and read The Author of Sin.
Here it is:
While I am at it, there are those who charge that my determinism and occasionalism amount to pantheism.22 But this is also stupid and ignorant. If pantheism affirms that "all is God," then it means that when God acts on any object, he is always acting only on himself. But this is far from what I affirm. Rather, I affirm that God has created spiritual and material entities that are other than himself, but that he nevertheless completely sustains and controls. To say that God completely controls X is very different from saying that God is X.
In fact, for my opponents to charge me with pantheism because I affirm God's direct and total control over all things implies that they believe, under theism, God cannot have direct and total control over anything that is not himself.23 But then, since the created universe is not God, by implication they must affirm that God has no direct and total control over anything in the created universe.
That is, by their accusation against me, they imply that God is identified with anything over which he has direct and total control. Then, since they deny my teaching that God has direct and total control over all things, and since they at the same time deny that God is identified with the universe, it follows that they believe God has no direct and total control over anything in the universe.24 And if this is what they believe, then they are not even Christians.
This is the implication of what they believe from their accusation against me. Of course, I am not actually accusing them of believing this, but it is the logical implication, and the charitable conclusion is that they are at least inconsistent.
In any case, as with the charge of fatalism, these people have no idea what pantheism means, and to accuse me of explicitly or implicitly teaching pantheism is nothing but slander.
22 See A. A. Hodge, Outlines of Theology
23 Otherwise, they would not charge me with teaching pantheism when I affirm that God directly and totally controls all things.
24 With Scripture, I say that the potter has direct and total control over the clay, but they say that this is pantheism. This implies that they believe the potter can have direct and total control over the clay only if the potter is the clay, and if the potter is not the clay, then the potter does not have direct and total control over the clay. Since it is indeed true that the potter (God) is not the clay (creation and creatures), it follows that they believe that God has no direct and total control over creation and creatures.
In other words, the objection betrays the assumption that God is (identified with) whatever he completely controls. And because Vincent Cheung teaches that God completely controls everything, including all human thoughts and decisions, and including all corporeal and incorporeal objects and the relationships and interactions between them (so that one moving object has no inherent power to move another object when the former strikes the latter, but that it is God who actively and directly controls them both, and that a "secondary cause" can at best be a relative term that cannot attribute any inherent causative power to any created object, etc.), then Vincent Cheung must be teaching pantheism.
Now, after pointing out the unjustified assumption (that God is whatever he completely controls), and after pointing out that I reject this assumption, it remains that this is their assumption, on the basis of which they formed their accusation against me. It is at this point that the objection backfires. Because their assumption is that God is identified with whatever he completely controls, this means that if they believe that God completely controls anything at all, then God must be identified with that object, and this makes them at least modified or partial pantheists. Holding constant their assumption, the only logical alternative is for them to deny that God completely controls anything in his creation, but then they are not even theists anymore.
Therefore, logically speaking, those who use this objection affirm either partial pantheism or finite godism, neither of which allows them to consistently call themselves Christians. On the other hand, I affirm that God completely controls everything about everything that is anything, and that this does not imply that he is identified with those things that he controls; rather, his creation is something other than himself, but it is nevertheless something that he completely controls.
RECOMMENDED
— Blog —
Almost all of the following have been revised and published in Vincent Cheung, The Author of Sin.
Creatures Cannot Initiate Motion
The "Sincere Offer" of the Gospel, Part 1
The "Sincere Offer" of the Gospel, Part 2
Comments on "Why I am not a Calvinist"
— Articles —
David Engelsma, Is Denial of the "Well-Meant Offer" Hyper-Calvinism?
David Engelsma, He Shines in All That’s Fair
Herman Hanko, Is the Denial of the "Well-meant Offer" of the Gospel "Hyper-Calvinism"?
Vincent Cheung, The Problem of Evil
— Books (PDF, printed here) —
Vincent Cheung, Systematic Theology
Vincent Cheung, Commentary on Ephesians
Vincent Cheung, The Author of Sin
Vincent Cheung, Ultimate Questions
Vincent Cheung, Presuppositional Confrontations
— Books (printed) —
Gordon Clark, Christian Philosophy
Gordon Clark, Predestination
Gordon Clark, God and Evil
Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will
Herman Hoeksema, The Clark-Van Til Controversy
David Engelsma, Hyper-Calvinism and the Call of the Gospel
David Engelsma, Common Grace Revisited
Herman Hoeksema and Henry Danhof, Sin and Grace
Complex Motives in God
Below is a footnote that I added to my article on the "sincere offer" of the gospel when I revised and published it in the book, The Author of Sin. I am posting it here because many of you have already read the article as it originally appeared on this blog, and might not read it again in the book.
Scripture teaches that God decrees what he desires – that is, his "good pleasure" – and what he desires, he decrees and makes certain. Dabney tries to preserve the "sincere offer" by asserting that there are complex motives in God, so that although God might genuinely desire the salvation of the non-elect from one perspective, another stronger motive or reason in him overrides such a desire, and this is why he has not chosen to save the non-elect. It seems to Dabney that this explanation preserves both his belief in divine election of only some for salvation, and God's genuine desire to save everyone in one sense. However, even if we accept what Dabney says about complex motives in God, at the point of the divine decree of only some for salvation and then at the point of the preaching of the gospel, the stronger motive to select only some for salvation has already overridden the genuine desire to save all (that is, assuming that this desire exists at all), so that neither the divine decree nor the preaching of the gospel any longer expresses or allows for any desire in God to save all. In other words, even if God's motives are complex, the decree and the preaching are not complex, but the decree and the preaching are precisely what we are talking about. Therefore, even if Dabney is right about complex motives in God, it is irrelevant to our discussion.
RECOMMENDED
The Author of Sin
The Author of Confusion
Why God Created Evil
Compatibilist Freedom
Augustine and Compatibilism
"Soft" Determinism
Determinism vs. Fatalism
Creatures Cannot Initiate Motion
Preservation and Providence
The "Sincere Offer" of the Gospel, Part 1
The "Sincere Offer" of the Gospel, Part 2
"Forced to Believe" (1)
"Forced to Believe" (2)
"Forced to Believe" (3)
"Forced to Believe" (4)
The Problem of Evil
Systematic Theology
Commentary on Ephesians
The Author of Sin
Ultimate Questions
Presuppositional Confrontations
Earnest Seeking, Even After Conversion
As you desired me to send you in writing some directions as to how to conduct yourself in your Christian course, I would now answer your request…
1. I would advise you to keep up as great a striving and earnestness in religion as if you knew yourself to be in a natural state and were still seeking conversion. We advise persons under conviction to be earnest and violent for the kingdom of heaven; but when they have attained to conversion, they ought not to be any less watchful, laborious, and earnest in the whole work of religion, but the more so; for they are under infinitely greater obligations. For want of this, many persons, in a few months after their conversion, have begun to lose the sweet and lively sense of spiritual things, and to grow cold and dark, and have pierced themselves through with many sorrows, whereas, if they had done as the apostle did (Philippians 3:12–14), their path would have been as the shining light, that shines more and more unto the perfect day.
2. Do not leave off seeking, striving, and praying for the very same things that we exhort unconverted persons to strive for, and a degree of which you have already had in conversion. Pray that your eyes may be opened, that you may receive sight, that you may know yourself and be brought to God’s footstool, that you may see the glory of God and Christ and be raised from the dead, and have the love of Christ shed abroad in your heart. Those who have most of these things have need to still pray for them; for there is so much blindness and hardness, pride and death remaining that they still need to have that work of God wrought upon them, further to enlighten and enliven them, that shall bring them out of darkness into God’s marvelous light, and be a kind of new conversion and resurrection from the dead. There are very few requests that are proper for an impenitent man that are not also, in some sense, proper for the godly.
Jonathan Edwards, "A Letter to a Young Convert,"
To the Rising Generation (Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 2005), p. 157–158.
Edwards uses some misleading expressions here, but the general principle is correct — we must continue to earnestly seek God even after we have been converted, just as diligently as before our conversion, and in fact even more.
Recommended:
The Biblical Approach to Evangelism
The "Sincere Offer" of the Gospel, Part 2
http://www.intoutreach.org/seeking.html
http://members.aol.com/jonathanedw/Seeking.html
Vincent Cheung, Presuppositional Confrontations, chapter 2
New Paperback: "Captive to Reason"
The paperback edition of Captive to Reason is now available. As always, we forgo all royalties for our books to minimize the costs to our readers.
You can purchase this and other paperback titles here.
Or, you can download the PDF version of this book for free here.
New Paperback: "The Author of Sin"
The paperback edition of The Author of Sin is now available. As always, we forgo all royalties for our books to minimize the costs to our readers.
You can purchase this and other paperback titles here.
Or, you can download the PDF version of this book for free here.
New Paperback: "Doctrine and Obedience"
The paperback edition of Doctrine and Obedience is now available. As always, we forgo all royalties for our books to minimize the costs to our readers.
You can purchase this and other paperback titles here.
Or, you can download the PDF version of this book for free here.
New PDF: "The One Thing Needed"
"The One Thing Needed" is now available as a PDF at:
http://www.vincentcheung.com/other/onething.pdf
The One Thing Needed (10)
Our passage is not only or even mainly about female piety, but it has a lot to do with it. In a marriage relationship, the husband's position is analogous to that of Jesus' here, having the authority to either encourage or hinder the woman's spiritual progress, and to pursue a normal course of discipleship.
The husband's first duty is to love the wife, and this is expressed by imitating the way that Christ loves his church, in sanctifying her by the word of God. That is, as a husband, you must love your wife by helping her progress in sanctification, in knowledge and in holiness. Therefore, to imitate Jesus' example in our passage, you must defend and protect her right to learn as a disciple of Christ, hearing and obeying the word of God.
This has a number of practical implications. For example, it might mean that when your wife wishes to serve you or the home in a particular way that she considers as part of her duty, you should sometimes encourage her to read a systematic theology or biblical commentary instead. But does it not remain that some things in the home must get done? This is true, so you go do them.
The point is that you must assist your wife to grow as a disciple of Christ, in both thought and conduct, in knowledge and in holiness, even if this entails making some sacrifices on your part. You must acknowledge that she is a fellow-heir to eternal life (1 Peter 3:7), that she is just as much a disciple as you are, and then you must act like it. This is the fruit of true love, as Christ loves his Church, and also your duty as a husband.
(end of series)
The One Thing Needed (9)
Some parents think that they are spiritual heroes if they have succeeded in teaching their children the Shorter Catechism by the time they are around fourteen or fifteen. I might agree with this if these children (or the parents!) have Down's Syndrome or something like that (but even then I wonder); otherwise, these parents have failed miserably in fulfilling their duty.
If children can be taught evolution by their teachers before they reach the third grade; if they can understand the adultery, sodomy, rape, murder, theft, and perjury portrayed on television and video games; and if they can grasp and apply the concepts of courage, revenge, death, demons, and the supernatural assumed in many children and teen novels, then surely they can understand much more theology than what most parents and ministers give them credit for.
As it is, many parents let the world indoctrinate their children first, starting in kindergarten, in the hopes that they will then turn everything around by teaching them biblical doctrines and ethics later, perhaps by the time they enter high school. Some segments of the Church are better than others in this area, but still too many tend to think that theology is a rather "adult" subject. But the time to start learning is the moment a child begins to understand language.
If a child can attend a theology class without being disruptive, then he must be admitted. The church must accept him into the class, or make some appropriate accommodation for him. Children must be given the chance to excel, to read theology books and biblical commentaries, and to ask the ultimate questions. Some of us might have been extraordinarily slow, but this is no reason to hinder those who are normal, and there might be several who are geniuses. Never measure your child's potential by your own limitations and failures.
From this perspective, I oppose dividing classes into different levels according to age and gender, although it is appropriate to divide them into levels (beginning, intermediate, etc.) regardless of age and gender, at least so that the teachings are not completely unintelligible to the beginners, whether children or adults. Some churches, sometimes for very legitimate reasons, insist on dividing their programs by gender. This is fine, but do not begin by teaching the women to sew and cook – teach them basic theology and exegesis first. Make them disciples – make their service to God a rational service, and help them build their lives on biblical understanding.
(to be continued)
The One Thing Needed (8)
Most sermons and commentaries on this passage are careful to warn us against Martha's misguided priorities and to set up Mary's example as one worthy of emulation. However, a large number of them fail to note that Jesus also serves as an example that is directly relevant to many Christians.
It is true that Jesus is unique, and no one else can occupy his exact position in any situation. Yet, many of us play various roles in our lives that are analogous to the role that Jesus plays in this episode. That is, some of us are in positions to defend and protect the spiritual rights of the "Marys" in our lives, and to encourage the "Marthas" to imitate the "Marys." People who are in such positions include ministers, teachers, husbands, and parents.
Our passage teaches the minister to enforce a program of discipleship that emphasizes hearing and doing, instead of just doing, and to preach a spiritual gospel that is founded on faith that produces good works, rather than a merely social gospel. Churches should offer theology classes before lunches and picnics. Or, at least they should have lunches and picnics for the purpose of preaching and discussing the word of God.
Classes on theology and biblical studies must be opened to all kinds of individuals – men, women, the uneducated, the rich, the poor, and children of all ages. Contrary to the assumption of many, children who are only three to four years old are fully capable of understanding basic teachings on God, creation, sin, salvation, death, justice, punishment, heaven, and hell.
If not for the unfamiliar theological vocabularies, any child should have already read something on the level of Berkhof's Systematic Theology by the time they enter the first grade. The concepts are not difficult, but the words take time to learn. The solution is for the parents and ministers to teach them these things in simpler language. But in terms of content, there is no need for dilution at all.8
8 See my lecture series, "Great Expectations," on children's potential for early intellectual development, or as my position goes, their normal intellectual development.
(to be continued)
The One Thing Needed (7)
The problem exists in a different form even in those parts of the world in which women have been "liberated." In these parts of the world, it is assumed that women have the right to become disciples of Christ not because of the teachings of Scripture, but because this right has been "given" by society, just as it is withheld by other cultures. In neither case is the policy toward female discipleship dictated by divine revelation.
On the one hand, the women's right to become disciples is withheld by suppression; on the other hand, the women's right to become disciples is granted by insurrection, even against the very roles assigned to them by the Scripture, so that they will "hear" but not "do." While it is right and necessary to defy the social expectations that hinder us from following Christ's teachings, it is self-defeating to defy the word of God also in order to seize the right to hear the word of God.
The right of women to become disciples of Christ and to benefit from all the teaching programs that the Church has to offer comes from the declaration of Christ himself, that this "will not be taken" away from them. Just as we must disregard society's prohibition against anything that Scripture commands, we do not need society's permission to perform that which Scripture demands. Therefore, there is no conflict between granting women full access to all the biblical and doctrinal training available to men, while at the same time enforcing what Scripture teaches regarding their roles in the home and the church.
As stated, the passage uses a female disciple to make a point – it does not just make a point about female discipleship. This "point" is that Christ calls all the elect to become his disciples, to learn and follow his teachings, and that one's role as a disciple supercedes all his other roles in family and society. And this is why being a discipleship of Christ will often entail defying social expectations and restrictions. It would be a mistake to apply this only to women, but we must see that the full rights and duties of discipleship apply also to the uneducated, to the laymen, and even to children. They must also "hear and obey," and not just "obey."
(to be continued)
The One Thing Needed (6)
Many expositions of our passage fail to note its redemptive-historical context. On the other hand, it would be wrong to think that the grand purpose of this passage forbids us to derive from it some narrower lessons. In fact, it is these specific and practical implications that teach us how to daily operate as Christ's disciples in this world, and thus fulfill the broader concern of this passage. A correct approach, therefore, would keep both aspects in mind.
Christ calls his elect to become his disciples, and this means the same thing in our day as it did in Mary's day – we are to hear and obey the teachings of Christ, and to build our lives on his word. To become a disciple means that we are to give our Master and Teacher the priority in our lives. For us to become attentive to Christ's teachings implies that we cannot be equally attentive to other things at the same time. In other words, if our agendas and activities remain exactly the same as before, then there is no sign that we are his disciples at all.
Then, being his disciples will often require us to defy the expectations of others and the roles that they assign to us. Indeed, our passage uses a female disciple to make a point, and in doing so, it makes a point about female discipleship. Whatever roles society and even Scripture assign to women, our passage forever declares that women's first right and duty is to be disciples of Christ – that is, learners after Christ.
Some people may think that this is no longer an issue, at least in their parts of the world, but in many churches even today, while discipleship means "hear and do" for the men, it means just "do" for the women. Sometimes, this is not a policy that has been deliberately adopted, but simply assumed. But at other times, it is a philosophy that has been consciously adopted because of unrenewed thinking or a faulty theology.
(to be continued)