Category: Book Excerpts

G.K. Beale’s “Three Angles of Assurance”

~ Bob Hayton

I’m almost finished making my way through G.K. Beale’s A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New (Baker Academic, 2011). It has truly been a rewarding experience in so many ways. Some may question the sanity of reading through a 1,000 page theology book. I have found Beale’s work, however, to be not only intellectually stimulating but also spiritually moving. He unpacks the soul-thrilling message of both testaments of Scripture and like a master jeweler, brings out the innate beauty of the Gem of the Bible in all its brilliance and power. Reading Beale is reading the big picture of Scripture.

Beale also repeatedly brings application and pastoral concerns to bear. He is a theologian with a pastor’s heart, and he never fails to provide the takeaways and connect the dots from theology to Christian living. A perfect example of this is his treatment of assurance. The graphic pictured below is my attempt to reproduce a drawing on pg. 867, in an excursus on assurance, which I found incredibly helpful. I hope my readers will as well.

Beale's 'Three Angles of Assurance'

[Since] Christians do not reach perfection and they sin to varying degrees and in varying ways, and even the most righteous saints become increasingly aware of how sinful they are, how can they be assured that they have a true saving relationship with God? There is no simple answer to this, but there is what may be understood as a cumulative answer that comes from different angles of consideration. We may view the believer’s assurance from three angles, with each angle contributing to an aspect of assurance.

Each point of the [above] triangle represents a truth about how a Christian receives assurance.

Trust in God’s Promise of Salvation through Christ

First, God promises throughout the NT that those who place their faith in Christ and his redemptive work will receive an inner assurance that they have truly benefited from Christ’s work (the top of the triangle). [Beale goes on to discuss 1 John 5:9-15 in support of this point and continues] in this passage from 1 John assurance of true faith comes from (1) the internal witness of the Spirit; (2) the reliability of God’s word that he will give life in the Son to those who believe; (3) the confidence that God hears and answers the faithful prayers of those who ask for salvation in the Son. In fact, the purpose of the entire epistle of 1 John is to give this assurance (v. 13).

Good Works

The role of “good works” is a second angle from which to view the nature of assurance (the bottom left part of the triangle). As we have seen, one who has truly been resurrected (Eph. 2:4-6) and thus becomes a part of the new creation will inevitably and increasingly be characterized by good works (Eph. 2:10) instead of behaving like “dead people” in bondage to “trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1-3). Likewise 2 Pet. 1:3-4 explains that Christians possess God’s “divine power” and reflect God’s image (the “divine nature”), and on this basis they are to grow in the fruits of godliness (vv. 5-8). [Beale goes on to discuss verses 10-11 and concludes that] assurance of one’s “calling and choosing” and final “entrance into the eternal kingdom” increases with growth in doing godly things.

Accordingly, believers’ assurance of truly being part of the new creation comes as they look back at their former life and see the changes that have come about since they became Christian. Those who may have grown up from an early age as a Christian may not have such radical differences between their past and present. Nevertheless, they should not be characterized by the kinds of sins that Paul lists in 1 Cor. 6:9-10. Such people also gain a degree of assurance from this recognition. All Christians, to one degree or another, ought to be able to look back and see that they have progressed in godliness during the course of their Christian lives (recalling also that as such growth occurs, ironically so does increasing awareness of remaining sin). This observation ought to bolster Christians’ confidence that they are genuine.

Given time, if confessing believers have not changed the ungodly lifestyles of their former believing lives, then such people should not be given assurance that they have truly believed. Perhaps they are true Christians, but they should not have affirmation that they are…. Possibly, such a lack of assurance might shock them either into the reality of their faith, so that they change, or shock them into truly believing for the first time.

Conviction by the Spirit

The presence of the conviction of sin within professing Christians is a third angle from which to understand assurance… When Christians think or do unholy things, there should be immediate conflict and dissonance with the indwelling Holy Spirit, who is in the process of causing the believer to reach the goal of complete end-time righteousness. Those who are accordingly convicted about their sin will express repentance and change their sinful ways. Those who have no conviction about indwelling sin should have no conviction that they are genuine saints.

Therefore, faithful, growing Christians should receive multiple assurances from these three angles, which have a cumulative force, enhancing the overall sense of confidence about the reality of their Christian experience. What if a Christian is inconsistent in progressing in good works, and an area of life is not under submission to the Lord of the new creation? Such a person should be under great conviction about this sin, and if so, it is a good sign that the Spirit is really in the person, bringing about conviction. Such a person should not doubt knowing God, unless as time goes on the conviction over sin does not issue into repentance, a turning away from the sin being committed.

However, no confidence should exist in those who profess to believe in Jesus but who reflect no discernible change for the good in their lifestyles and who have no conviction about changing their sinful ways.

Generally, the closer people get to God as faith grows, the more such people will desire to please God by what they do, and the more they will be convicted by the remaining sin in them. As a result, they will have even greater assurance as they progress in their Christian lives. [excerpted from pp. 867-870]

I find Beale’s advice to be both important and encouraging. Even our awareness of failure can encourage us, and the very fight against sin is an evidence of being a legitimate child of God (see my post on Heb. 12 on that point). For more on the Biblical teaching on perseverance see any of the following articles:

You can purchase Beale’s book at any of the following retailers: Westminster Bookstore, Monergism Books, Christianbook.com, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or direct from Baker.

Our Divine Playwright

~ Bob Hayton

I’ve been making my way through Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology again recently, since our pastor is teaching a systematic class for our mid-week Bible studies. I found Grudem’s discussion of divine providence to be especially helpful. In my teaching on Reformation doctrine for adult SS, we’re getting into this area of God’s sovereignty, providence and predestination, too. The following illustration of God as our divine playwright, has been especially helpful in thinking through the area of God’s sovereignty and man’s free will. I thought I would share it here for the benefit of my readers.

It seems better to affirm that God causes all things that happen, but that he does so in such a way that he somehow upholds our ability to make willing, responsible, choices, choices that have real and eternal results, and for which we are held accountable. Exactly how God combines his providential control with our willing and significant choices, Scripture does not explain to us. But rather than deny one aspect or the other (simply because we cannot explain how both can be true), we should accept both in an attempt to be faithful to the teaching of all of Scripture.

The analogy of an author writing a play may help us to grasp how both aspects can be true. In the Shakespearean play Macbeth, the character Macbeth murders King Duncan. Now (if we assume for a moment that this is a fictional account), the question may be asked, “Who killed King Duncan?” On one level, the correct answer is “Macbeth.” Within the context of the play he carried out the murder and is rightly to blame for it. But on another level, a correct answer to the question, “Who killed King Duncan?” would be “William Shakespeare”: he wrote the play, he created all the characters in it, and he wrote the part where Macbeth killed King Duncan.

It would not be correct to say that because Macbeth killed King Duncan, William Shakespeare did not kill him. Nor would it be correct to say that because William Shakespeare killed King Duncan, Macbeth did not kill him. Both are true. On the level of the characters in the play Macbeth fully (100 percent) caused King Duncan’s death, but on the level of the creator of the play, William Shakespeare fully (100 percent) caused King Duncan’s death. In similar fashion, we can understand that God fully causes things in one way (as Creator), and we fully cause things in another way (as creatures).

Of course, someone may object that the analogy does not really solve the problem because characters in a play are not real persons; they are only characters with no freedom of their own, no ability to make genuine choices, and so forth. But in response we may point out that God is infinitely greater and wiser than we are. While we as finite creatures can only create fictional characters in a play, not real persons, God, our infinite Creator, has made an actual world and in it has created us as real persons who make willing choices. To say that God could not make a world in which he causes us to make willing choices (as some would argue today; see discussion below), is simply to limit the power of God. It seems also to deny a large number of passages of Scripture.

~ Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Zondervan: 1994), pg. 321-322

A friend at church commented on this analogy along the lines that we have a greater confidence in our God because he has written the script for everything that happens. And He has written in several times where he steps into the play himself. I agree, and want to stress that this whole concept of God being “our divine playwright,” should give us confidence in God and his power and an ability to endure suffering knowing He is on the throne. It should also make us humble and trusting, not proud and boastful. With tomorrow’s holiday on the mind, it should make us incredibly thankful. Thankful that God would intervene and care enough to craft “his story” – history – to include each of us and that He would work all things together for our good (Rom. 8:28).

Tim Keller on Underadapting to Culture

~ Bob Hayton ~ 7 Comments

Tim Keller is one of leading voices in church planting today. He has thought long and hard about how to do gospel ministry in today’s urban contexts, and is the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church, a thriving ministry in the heart of New York City. Redeemer has helped mentor other church planters in New York and beyond through Redeemer City to City, a ministry which has helped launch over 200 churches in 35 global cities so far.

Keller’s latest book is Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City (Zondervan, 2012) which is a manual for how to think about doing church. His aim is to explain how “theological vision,” as distinct from doctrine or methodology, should drive how we bring the message of the gospel to the communities we are called to serve. Just from reading through the introductory chapter, I know I am going to want to read through this manual in depth—highlighter in hand. Keller uses diagrams and sidebars, and yes, even some footnotes, to present his information in an understandable format. And what he has to say is definitely worth hearing. He talks about the inevitability of contextualizing and chides preachers who don’t intentionally think through how their church must speak to the culture around them.

This post is not going to be a full review. I’ll save that for after I’ve had time to examine this work at length. Instead I want to focus in on an excerpt from the introduction on how the Church should adapt to culture. As a former independent fundamental Baptist (IFB), I read these words with great interest:

We will show [in this book] that to reach people we must appreciate and adapt to their culture, but we must also challenge and confront it. This is based on the biblical teaching that all cultures have God’s grace and natural revelation in them, yet they are also in rebellious idolatry. If we overadapt to a culture, we have accepted the culture’s idols. If, however, we underadapt to a culture, we may have turned our own culture into an idol, an absolute. If we underadapt to a culture, no one will be changed because no one will listen to us; we will be confusing, offensive, or simply unpersuasive. To the degree a ministry is overadapted or underadapted to a culture, it loses life-changing power. (pg. 24, emphasis added)

I think there is a wealth of wisdom in this brief except. I particularly appreciated the section that I bolded. This seems to be the case with most conservative IFB churches I know. By and large, the wider culture looks at them with bewilderment. Their version of Christianity—complete with Stoic worship, an archaic Bible and outdated fashion—is totally foreign to the average citizen in the community. And the churchly phrases and Christian lingo confuse the message even more.

In a later section in the book, Keller talks of Anglo Christians who are “often culturally clueless”:

They don’t see any part of how they express or live the gospel to be “Anglo”—it is just the way things are. They feel that any change in how they preach, worship, or minister is somehow a compromise of the gospel. In this they may be doing what Jesus warns against—elevating the “traditions of men” to the same level as biblical truth (Mark 7:8). This happens when one’s cultural approach to time or emotional expressiveness or way to communicate becomes enshrined as the Christian way to act and live. (pg. 96)

Keller goes on to discuss how our culture shapes our view of individualism and community. He also decries how church planters or missionaries tend to reproduce the cultural methodology of ministries that have impacted them.

If they have been moved by a ministry that has forty-five-minute verse-by-verse expository sermons, a particular kind of singing, or a specific order and length to the services, they reproduce it down to the smallest detail. Without realizing it, they become method driven and program driven rather than theologically driven. They are contextualizing their ministry expression to themselves, not to the people they want to reach. (pg. 97, emphasis added)

Keller’s point should not be ignored. While we must not overadapt to culture and compromise the gospel, we nevertheless have a responsibility to analyze the culture we find ourselves in and seek to communicate in such a way, that the offense that arises in response to our teaching, is an offense directed at the gospel itself, and not our own idiosyncrasies and cultural traditions.

I recommend that pastors and church leaders everywhere pick up a copy of this important book from Tim Keller. The book is carefully written and the principles are clearly explained. Even if you disagree with some of what he has to say, his book will provide an opportunity to systematically walk through all of the issues related to doing ministry in a given culture. If we recognize that some sort of “theological vision” exists and undergirds what we do, then focusing on what that vision is and how it is developed will have lasting impact in how we do church in the twenty-first century.

You can learn more about Center Church at Zondervan’s Engaging Church Blog this week or from CenterChurch.com. You can see a book excerpt or watch a video trailer at Westminster Bookstore’s product page. Pick up a copy of the book at any of the following retailers: Monergism Books, Westminster Bookstore, Christianbook.com, Amazon, Barnes&Noble, or direct from Zondervan.

Disclaimer: This book was provided by Zondervan. I was under no obligation to offer a favorable review.

On Approaching Revelation Literally

~ Bob Hayton

I’ve been thinking about the relative merits of approaching the book of Revelation with the aim of taking all the visions and judgments literally as opposed to symbolicly. Rev. 1:1 does say that John has a message for us to know, but it says more than this. This message was “signified” to John (this is the alternate reading in the footnote of the NASB, the main text has “communicated”). The word for “signified” is semaino, which means to “communicate by symbols.” So John in effect is answering our question: he is telling us his book communicates via symbolism.

For more help on the question of how to approach Revelation I turned to Invitation to Biblical Interpretation by Andreas J. Köstenberger and Richard D. Patterson for help. Their book is endorsed by a wide assortment of conservative evangelical scholars and is the best work on hermeneutics I’ve ever read. (Read my reiew here.) I found their comments on this question insightful.

What could be wrong with interpreting apocalyptic literature such as Revelation literally? The main problem with such an approach is that it inadequately considers that the literary genre of a given text establishes the rules for how it should be interpreted. Meaning is intrinsically bound up with genre.119 It follows that genre provides a context assigned by the author to communicate meaning. We have already shown that the genre of Revelation is prophetic-apocalyptic. The apocalyptic genre, by definition, is highly symbolic and not intended to be interpreted in a literal manner. For this reason, a rigid literal interpretation or literalism may actually obscure the author’s intended meaning rather than expose it. Kevin Vanhoozer correctly poses a distinction between the literal sense and literalism.120 If the interpreter is concerned with authorial intention, the literal sense must not be reduced merely to letters, langue, or locutions. Vanhoozer contends that “literalistic reading is less than fully ‘literal’–that it is insufficiently and only ‘thinly’ literal–insofar as it ignores the role of authorial intentions and communicative acts.”121 What Vanhoozer means by this is that the literal–but not the “literalistic”–sense is what the author intended to convey by a given text; this, in turn, is especially true for figurative and symbolic language. In other words, if Revelation is prophetic-apocalyptic in nature, ascribing literalism to its numbers, proper nouns, and other images may actually prevent a proper understanding of John’s intended meaning.122 A more profitable hermeneutical approach is to reverse the interpretive order by placing the symbolic in the foreground while shifting the literal into the background. Thus, rather than positing the dictum “When the literal makes sense, seek no other sense,” we suggest that a better maxim in interpreting apocalyptic is “Start out with the assumption that a given statement or image is figurative rather than literal.”

G.K. Beale makes a strong case for the primacy of the symbolic over straight one-to-one literal correspondence.123 He argues that semaino in Revelation 1:1 conveys the idea of “communication by symbols,”124 noting that the normal usage of semaino in Scripture implies some type of “symbolic communication.”125 Since Revelation is a symbolic means of communication, the literal approach for interpreting the “plain sense” of the image may actually distort the intended meaning of the text. Beale maintains, “Of course, some parts are not symbolic, but the essence of the book is figurative. Where there is lack of clarity about whether something is symbolic, the scales of judgement should be tilted in the direction of a nonliteral analysis.”126 For reasons such as these, the symbolic plane should be considered primary while care should be taken not to reduce the meaning of symbols to something exclusively spiritual.

(pg. 550-551)

Footnotes
119 Hirsch, Validity in Interpretation, 236.
120 Vanhoozer, Is There a Meaning in This Text?, 310.
121 Ibid, 311.
122 Carson, Exegetical Fallacies, 90.
123 Beale, Book of Revelation, 50-55.
124 Ibid, 52.
125 Ibid, 51. See the discussion of the allusion to Daniel 2:28-30 (LXX) in Revelation 1:1.
126 Ibid, 52.

The authors go on in their book to explain how Revelation itself, through John’s extensive use of the Old Testament (quoting and alluding to OT Scripture, as well as making use of well known OT symbols), helps us when it comes to discerning when and where symbolism exists and how to interpret it.

For my part, knowing that the author intended his book to “communicate by symbols” (Rev. 1:1) as an apocalyptic book, requires me to take this into account as I approach this great book.

Quotes to Note 34: A Puritan Gem on Preaching

~ Bob Hayton ~ 2 Comments

I came across a jewel of a quote in a biography of Matthew Henry that I was recently reading — Matthew Henry: His Life and Influence by Allan Harman (Christian Focus, 2012). Henry’s dad Philip, also a minister, kept a detailed diary and numerous papers.  In them, Philip Henry preserved some words from a Rev. Thomas Porter on preaching, that he sought to emulate.

Let your preaching be plain. Painted glass is most curious; plain glass is most perspicuous. Be a good crucifix to your people. Preach a crucified Saviour in a crucified style. Paul taught so plainly, that the Corinthians thought him a dunce. Let your matter be substantial; wholesome food; God and Christ, and the gospel, faith, repentance, regeneration. Aim purely at god’s glory and the salvation of souls. Study, as if there were no Christ; preach, as if there had been no study. Preach plainly, yet with novelty; preach powerfully, as Micah; — as Paul, in intension of spirit, not extension of voice. To this end get your sermons into your own souls. It is best, from the heart, to the heart. Preach prudentially, — as stewards, to give each their portion….