Category: Redemptive Historical

The Advance of God's Kingdom, Updated

~ fundyreformed

The Advance of God's Kingdom

About a year ago, I posted the pictures of a power point presentation my brother (Dave) had put together for a series of Sunday morning messages at his church. The series traces the covenants of Scripture and how they relate to the advance of God’s Kingdom. It is an excellent presentation and also serves as an excellent (albeit  simple)  introduction to covenantal theology (as opposed to dispensationalism).

Well lately I’ve received a few requests for the actual presentations themselves, rather than pictures of them, and so I updated the original post to include the power point files (which WordPress allows me to upload). The files actually take up much less memory than the pictures of each slide, and you are welcome to download them if you’d like.

Since I was updating the post, I thought I’d bring it back to the front page again as it really is one of my favorite posts of all time. If you’ve got the time, take a look at some of the presentations, just click on the picture above to go to that post.

Storms, Sleepers, and Substitutes–Jonah As a Type of Christ

~ fundyreformed ~ 4 Comments

I have finally started listening to the sermons from Desiring God’s recent conference (I blogged about that here). Well, toward the end of Tim Keller’s message he mentioned a parallel between Christ and Jonah I had never before considered. I thought it was a great example of the typographical element so often found in OT Scripture. The OT Scriptures are not written in a vacuum, but rather are part of an overarching scheme of a history of Redemption.

Jonah was asleep during a great storm which put the lives of the  ship’s crew in danger of destruction. He had to be awakened, and was rebuked for not caring about the potential  danger to everyone’s lives. Jonah was appointed by God as being the cause of the storm (through the use of lots), and Jonah owned up to his guilt. Jonah then asked to be thrown overboard since this would stop the storm. The sailors tried to make it on their own, but ultimately came to trust in Jonah’s offer as a last result. They threw him overboard and were gloriously saved from their terrible predicament. Destruction was averted.

Jesus, too was asleep in a great storm (Mark 4), during which the lives of the disciples, who were piloting the ship, were in danger of destruction. He had to be awakened, and was rebuked for not caring for his disciples’ plight. Jesus then calmed the storm, and miraculously the danger was averted.

Ah, but the parallel is more than this. Jesus was ultimately sacrificed, just like Jonah, to save the lives of all from complete destruction. And while Jonah was legitimately guilty, Jesus took on himself our guilt. Jesus took our destruction that we might be spared. The words of Psalm 69:1-2 (which  psalm is applied by Jesus to himself and his ministry in the New Testament)  were true of Jesus as he hung on the cross:

Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me.

This picture does much to convey the wonder of the gospel. And I do not think that the parallel to Jonah’s situation from the events in Mark 4 is a stretch. I believe it was intended to point us back to that picture from Jonah’s life. In so doing we see the great terror that Jesus saved us from. We comprehend with great clarity the substitutionary death of Christ on our behalf. And we can see that God’s wrath for our sin was placed on Him. Indeed, Jesus drew the parallel between the duration of time Jonah spent under the water and inside the whale with the time Jesus would spend in the belly of the earth in death’s fast hold.

To make clear to all that this is not a recent innovation by myself leaning on Tim Keller, let me provide a couple quotes from older  commentaries which bring attention to this point.

“Herein Jonah is a type of Messiah, the one man who offered Himself to die, in order to allay the stormy flood of God’s wrath (compare Ps 69:1,2, as to Messiah), which otherwise must have engulfed all other men.”

[Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary on verse 12, online here.]

“The reason he gives is, For I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you. See how ready Jonah is to take all the guilt upon himself, and to look upon all the trouble as theirs: “It is purely for my sake, who have sinned, that this tempest is upon you; therefore cast me forth into the sea; for,” 1. “I deserve it. I have wickedly departed from my God, and it is upon my account that he is angry with you. Surely I am unworthy to breathe in that air which for my sake has been hurried with winds, to live in that ship which for my sake has been thus tossed. Cast me into the sea after the wares which for my sake you have thrown into it. Drowning is too good for me; a single death is punishment too little for such a complicated offence.” 2. “Therefore there is no way of having the sea calm. If it is I that have raised the storm, it is not casting the wares into the sea that will lay it again; no, you must cast me thither.” When conscience is awakened, and a storm raised there, nothing will turn it into a calm but parting with the sin that occasioned the disturbance, and abandoning that. It is not parting with our money that will pacify conscience; no, it is the Jonah that be thrown overboard. Jonah is herein a type of Christ, that he gives his life a ransom for many; but with this material difference, that the storm Jonah gave himself up to still was of his own raising, but that storm which Christ gave himself up to still was of our raising. Yet, as Jonah delivered himself up to be cast into a raging sea that it might be calm, so did our Lord Jesus, when he died that we might live.”

[Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 1:12, online here.]

A Few More Points: I forgot to mention a few other parallels.    First, Jonah did not just jump in, instead he told the sailors a saving “gospel” message: throw me in and you’ll live. Then, the sailors refused to heed the message at first, and tried to save themselves from the storm. This parallels the fact that the lost often try to atone for their own sin or to work their way to heaven. Thirdly, just before the sailors finally sacrifice Jonah, they declare they are innocent of his blood. This parallels Pilate’s declaration that he was innocent of the blood of Jesus, and the Jews’ declaration that they wanted to be guilty of his blood. Pilate and the Jews, however, were guilty of the blood, while the sailors were actually innocent of Jonah’s blood. Fourthly, a parallel could be given in that Jonah did not excuse his sin or offer any defense, and likewise Jesus willingly took our sin, not offering a defense of his own innocence. There are probably more, and for some of these I drew from JFB and Henry and possibly other commentaries.

The Glorious God behind the Story of Esther

~ fundyreformed ~ 1 Comment

The only book of the Bible to not mention God at all is Esther. This feature has led to some canonical questions concerning the book. Yet, perhaps no book so clearly shows the hand of God in the background of the story.

Nathan Pitchford in a recent post on Esther, points out the many things God did to prevent the destruction of His people so that He might still bring the Messiah, Jesus Christ into the world. Nathan makes many helpful observations and even presents a picture of Christ as seen from the book. One important point he makes is this: since God is at work behind the scenes (and only “behind the scenes”)  in accomplishing His purposes in the story of Esther, we can draw encouragement and trust that God is at work behind the scenes in our own lives to bring to completion that great work He has begun in us.

Beyond an excellent example of a redemptive, historical, hermeneutical approach to the book of Esther, Nathan gives us a feast for our souls. He takes the many intricacies of the story of Esther and paints a glorious and stunning picture of our great sovereign God and His Son, Jesus Christ.

I encourage you all to read Nathan’s post, but I want to quote two paragraphs of it below, to whet your appetite.

We see the immutability of God’s purpose to accomplish the coming of Christ from the seed of the Jews in two circumstances: the first is how he sovereignly effects the minutest details of history to preserve the line from which he should come. Consider how many incidents he brings about for the preservation of the Messianic line: first, he causes King Ahasuerus, in whose pleasure resides the fate of the Jews (in an earthly sense), to become angry against his queen. Then he causes Esther, who is of Jewish seed (although unbeknownst to him) to find favor in his eyes. Then he provides for Esther the godly counsel she needs in the person of Mordecai, her cousin. Next, he reveals a plot against the king to this same Mordecai, and gives him the opportunity and desire to report the plot and deliver the king from the potential assassins. He causes Haman, the next in power to the king, to be angry with Mordecai, and with the Jews in general; he causes Haman, through the use of lots, to mark a certain day for the destruction of the Jews; he gives Esther the counsel and the courage to seek an audience with the king; he gives the king a favorable reception to this brazen request for an audience; he allows Esther such trepidation that she is unable to ask for her true request, and causes her instead to prepare a feast for Ahasuerus and Haman; he gives Haman the false sense of flattery, that he alone was invited to Queen Esther’s feast; and he does the same thing a second time, so that Haman is emboldened to construct a gallows for Mordecai; he causes the king, on the night before the second feast, to be smitten with insomnia, so that the chronicles of the kingdom should be read to him, so as to put him to sleep; he causes that very portion of the chronicles to be read which speak of Mordecai’s heroic saving of the king from the assassins; he leads the king to desire to honor him who saved his life; he causes him to seek counsel how to honor him from Haman; he stirs up Haman to think that the king wishes to honor himself; he instructs Haman of a method by which true honor might be shown to him who is worthy; he causes the king to command Haman himself to carry out this true honor for Mordecai, whom he hates; he gives Esther boldness, at the proper time, to declare to the king Haman’s wickedness; he causes Haman to fear, and to fall upon the bed of Esther in seeking her mercy; he causes the king to find him in this position; he stirs up anger in the king, at the false supposition that Haman is attempting to force Esther in the king’s own house; he gives Ahasuerus the heart to grant Esther’s request to overturn the intention of wicked Haman; he brings to the king’s attention the gallows of Haman, and gives him the desire to have Haman hanged on the gallows he built for Mordecai; he gives the Jews a mighty victory out of what should have been their annihilation, from the counter decree of Ahasuerus. He brings to his people a feast of celebration out of the sorrow of defeat; and finally, he causes Haman’s own sons to be hanged upon the gallows of their father, while the Jews celebrate their victory. It is simply staggering to consider how many tiny details God worked together for the salvation of his people.

The second notable circumstance is how God accomplished this great orchestration, as it were, behind the scenes. In no place at all is the name of God mentioned in the book of Esther. And yet, even when he is not seen, God is sovereignly and mightily at work to effect his great plan. How comforting is this reality to all who are his! God truly does cause “all things to work together for good to them that love him” (Romans 8:28)! And more comforting yet is the reality that the purpose for which he is exercising this minute and staggering sovereignty is nothing other than to bring Christ into the world. Christ alone is the good that God has purposed to bring about for his children, through every circumstance. The effect of God’s great control over history is that “nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:39). Oh Christian, do you despair at the manifold trials which attend the insignificant details of your life? Rejoice, for God is at work, even when you cannot see him; and he is at work to bring to you Christ, your only hope of glory and eternal satisfaction! [Read the whole article here.]

5 Months in 1 Sermon: Piper on the Gospels & Justification

~ fundyreformed ~ 10 Comments

This past Sunday was a special day. For the second year in a row, we had a combined service in the parking lot of the new building for our north campus. There easily could have been around 4,000 people there in attendance and it was exciting to be together worshipping God with one voice. And John Piper was back! He again thanked us for his sabbatical, and then delivered a great message.

As is typical upon his return from a writing leave, Piper preached a message birthed from his thoughts and labor over the writing of his books during the past few months. As soon as the sermon is posted onine at Desiring God, I plan to link to it. [update, it is posted now, read it by clicking here. Also, Justin Taylor recently provided the link to the audio, in a recent post providing an excerpt from this same sermon.] But I couldn’t wait until then to comment on it. The sermon’s text was Luke 18:9-14, the parable of the Pharisee and tax collector. While his main point had to do with his book on Justification’s importance (an answer to N.T. Wright), he also touched on a topic relative to his other book on the demands of Jesus in the Gospels. I want to discuss both of these points below.

The Gospels

Piper stressed that in going through all of Jesus’ commands in the Gospels, he discovered one very important consideration. You must read the Gospels backward. By this he meant that you must always keep in mind that Christ was coming to die and shed His blood to provide for our justification and redemption. This thought really riveted me, as I will explain in a second, but first we must look to his proof.

Piper showed that each of the Biblical writers of the Gospels had clues in their book that this was the case. Matthew, Luke, and John all have such clues at the beginning of their works: Matt. 1:21, Luke 2:10-11, & John 1:29. And for Mark, the very structure of his book trumpets this fact. His book spends half of its chapters dealing with the very last week of Jesus’ life. I would marshall a few other considerations to defend Piper’s point. One, Mark 1:1 would be in the vein of the opening declarations in Matthew, Luke, and John mentioned above. But, secondly, consider that all of these Gospels were written several years (30 to 50 or more) after Jesus’ life. Certainly as the writers themselves had been experiencing the new covenant blessings bought by Christ’s death, they were writing in light of them. They were not out to give a historical biography primarily, rather they were trying to give a thematic biography centering on Jesus’ gospel/the gospel of Christianity–which centered on Christ’s atoning work on the Cross and His resurrection. That is why each of those books begins with the title, “The Gospel according to…”.

This truth, that the everything in the Gospels has the cross ultimately in view, has some astounding implications. Piper stressed one of them. Namely, that Jesus’ commands are not suggestions for living a blessed life. They are not a creed for having a successful Business. (Piper was pretty emphatic on this, saying it made him sick that people use Christ’s teaching as a basis for business success, when they really need to hear Christ’s message and be saved.) Neither are they requirements for living the kind of life that will let you in to heaven. Rather, the commands first highlight your guilt in the fact that you cannot keep them, and then they point you to dependence on the only one who can keep them–Jesus Christ. Further, they are given with the seeking and saving ministry of Christ fulfilled on the Cross in view.

Another implication that I immediately considered has to do with a proper hermeneutical approach. Dispensationalists often emphasize that Christ came to offer his kingdom first and then being rebuffed, went to the Cross. Now some make it seem like His purposes were thwarted, while others emphasize that He knew all along that he would be rejected, but in either case this view leads to such extremes as a hyper dispensationalism which disallows virtually any application of the Gospels to our Christian life today, and free grace theology which declares that Christ’s hard sayings in the gospels are not for us today–they have no bearing on what is necessary for salvation in this dispensation. Not all who hold those extreme views would say it exactly as I do above, but many think that way, I am sure. This is where reading the Gospels backward seems to demolish these views. Every chapter of the Gospels has the end of Christ’s life in view–in the author’s mind, and even in Christ’s mind for he is speaking and working to that end. This should at the least inform our hermeneutic. And it might help us avoid some of the extremes birthed from an incorrect view of the Gospels.

Justification

The core of the message centered on the doctrine of justification. From the first and last verses in the story, Piper concludes it is clear the passage is about justification. But he made an important assessment of the passage which has great bearing on N.T. Wright and his doctrinal teachings concerning justification.

Piper sees no reason to doubt the Pharisee’s self assessment. He had a righteousness which was moral, ceremonial, and God-given. Piper highlighted the words “God, I thank you that…”. While we cannot say for sure if the Pharisee was a synergist or monergist, Arminian or Calvinist, clearly he attributed his righteousness to God and not his own self merit. So Piper argues the Pharisee is NOT a legalist. He was not working for his salvation, he saw his works as being given graciously from God.

But he WAS trusting in his righteousness to secure his standing before God–this much Christ makes clear. N.T. Wright and a rapidly increasing number of theologians are saying that our Christ-wrought righteousness is the very basis of our acceptance with God/our justification. Yet this passage teaches that it is not a God-given righteousness in which we should trust, but rather we should be looking away from ourselves and trusting/pleading for God’s mercy as the publican does. This is not to say God-given righteousness is not important, but it is to say that looking at the righteousness as our surety is not only wrong but perilously so.

With sadness, Piper concluded the message emphasizing four words Christ spoke: “rather than the other”. Piper said he can see no reason for those four words in v. 14 other than Christ making it absolutely clear what we should expect of the Pharisee and others who “(trust) in themselves that they (are) righteous”, namely that they are not justified and have no place in heaven. Piper made it clear that he would rather not think such of those who disagree with the historic doctrine of justification–for he knows many people who do; but this passage forces him too. He also made it clear that he believes some who follow this new teaching do not really believe it, but sadly others like the Pharisee do. It was a sobering message, for sure, and a foretaste of his book which hopefully will be published soon.

Redemptive Historical Interpretation Compared to the Dispensational Hermeneutic

~ fundyreformed ~ 2 Comments

I came across an excellent article on Triablogue by Evan May entitled “The Redemptive-Historical Hermeneutic vs. The Foreign-Eschatological Hermeneutic” (HT: Doxoblogy). The article does a good job explaining redemptive historical hermeneutics to a dispensational commentor. I will quote a few points he makes here, and then refer you to read the article–it will help you understand reformed hermeneutics and will be well worth your time (it is not that long of a read, actually).

1. The Pendulum swings both ways. The Covenantal hermeneutic interprets the Old Testament in light of the New testament. The Dispensational hermeneutic interprets the New in light of the Old. Both camps must defend their hermeneutical methods. We don’t simply assume a Dispensational hermeneutic until we find something better….

3. Much of the Covenantal hermeneutic isn’t so much “the way NT authors used the OT,” but simply being fair to a text in its own context. Dispensationalists habitually rip OT prophecies from their redemptive-historical context and force them into a foreign eschatological context. It’s almost as if Dispensationalists believe that the prophets couldn’t find a topic to speak about: one moment they’re talking about restoration from the exile; the next moment they’re talking about folks disappearing out of their clothes on an airplane….

5. But, it must be noted that the Covenantal hermeneutic is not some knee-jerk, arbitrary dogma of “spiritualize any Old Testament prophecy whatsoever.” Rather, we deal with texts on their own merit. We want to be fair to what the text itself states, and we exegete them on a case-by-case basis (and for this reason, I am glad that Bobby posed a text rather than simply speaking generically)…. [Read the whole article.]