Loving Like Jesus

Paul said in Philippians 2:5, “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.” Paul Rees, commenting on that verse, writes:

Don’t forget, cries Paul, that in all this wide universe and in all the dim reaches of history there has never been such a demonstration of self-effacing humility as when the Son of God in sheer grace descended to this errant planet! Remember that never – never in a million aeons – would He have done it if He were the kind of Deity who looks “only to his own interests” and closes His eyes to the “interests of others!” You must remember, my brethren, that through your union with Him, in living, redemptive experience, this principle and passion by which He was moved must become the principle and passion by which you are moved” (The Adequate Man: Paul in Philippians, p. 43).

Faith Now, Sight Later

Bill Combs addresses 2 Cor 5:7 - A Much Misused Text, and notes that this verse ("we live by faith, not by sight") is often wrongly taken to be an exhortation that we should live by faith - and consequently an exhortation not to live by sight. But this is not what the verse means:

The “for” that begins v. 7 is what the standard Greek dictionary (BDAG) calls a “marker of clarification.” One could easily take Paul’s statement in v. 6 to mean that since believers are presently “away from the Lord,” they enjoy no fellowship with him at all. But, of course, that is absolutely false, for, you see, Paul says (v. 7), “we presently live in the realm of faith ["by faith"], not in the realm of sight.” Paul is contrasting actually seeing the Lord (“at home with the Lord”) with our present experience of believing in the Lord without seeing him (“away from the Lord”). For now believers “live in the realm of faith,” trusting in the Lord whom they have not seen, but one day they will “live in the realm of sight.”

Interpreting David and Goliath

Mike Riccardi addresses a common approach to the story of David and Goliath, and makes an important distinction in Preaching Christ from the Old Testament: Interpretation vs. Application:

We don’t have to choose between (a) a Christocentric hermeneutic, on the one hand, and (b) a failure to read the OT as Christians, on the other. We must allow the text to speak for itself, considering both what the original author was intending and what the original audience would have understood. And we should also faithfully make application to Christ and the Gospel. What we need is contextual, grammatical-historical interpretation with Christocentric application.

We can get to Jesus—the climax of the story of redemption—from any point in the story of redemption. We don’t need to insert Him into every phrase of that story, where the biblical authors didn’t. That is truly the way to “preach the whole Bible as Christian Scripture.” We allow it to speak for itself in all its parts. We make interpretive connections to Christ where the text does, and we don’t where it doesn’t. We don’t “reinterpret” the Old Testament, but we apply each scene of the redemptive story in light of its climax: the Gospel of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God. In this way, we will demonstrate that we believe that the Old Testament already is Christian Scripture, and doesn’t need our creativity to make it Christian Scripture.

See also David Doran's post: Moralism or Allegory? Are These the Only Options?

"Early and Later Rains"

"Every reference to 'early and later rains' in the OT occurs in a context affirming the faithfulness of the Lord (Deut. 11:14; Jer. 5:24; Hos. 6:3; Joel 2:23; Zech. 10:1)." - Douglas Moo, in The Letter of James, p. 223.

To Obey Is Better than Sacrifice

Fred Zapel on the Priority of Obedience:

Two major points of application arise from this. First, God expects us to obey him, and he holds us accountable accordingly. God does not offer suggestions. He gives commands. And we, his creatures, are bound to obey. We must not pick and choose — we must obey.

Second, we must not pretend to worship God if we will not obey his commands. We may go through the motions — go to church, give our money, sing the songs, pray — but if we are otherwise disobedient, our worship will not be acceptable.

Shameful Even to Mention

Carl Trueman shares this quote from Peter O'Brien's commentary on Ephesians, regarding Ephesians 5:11-12:

"The earlier expression, 'the fruitless deeds of darkness' (v. 11), is a general one and could include sins done openly as well as those committed secretly. Such a description focuses on their evil character - they belong to the realm of darkness - and the fact they are utterly futile. These 'works' are the sexual vices (perhaps even perversions) mentioned in v. 3, not immoral pagan religious rites, as some have suggested. They are now described as 'the things done in secret': those who commit them (i.e., the 'disobedient' of vv. 6, 7) do not want their sins to be brought out into the open (cf. John 3:20). But their dark deeds are so abhorrent, Paul asserts, that it is 'shameful' even to mention them, much less to do them. He utterly repudiates these sexual sins, but desires to convey their seriousness without mentioning the details of the depravity. Paul and his readers knew what they were, and he will not dignify them by naming them. Instead, he wants the light of the gospel to shine through the readers' lives and expose these deeds for what they are" (The Letter to the Ephesians, pp. 371-72).

Trueman applies this text to our Christian culture: "Here's a question: would it make any difference to you, any difference at all to the way you talk, to what you watch, to the way you 'engage culture', if Eph. 5:12 had never been written?"

Understanding the Synoptics

Justin Taylor collects together four videos featuring Darrell Bock (research professor of New Testament studies at Dallas Theological Seminary), who gives a 40-minute talk on How the Synoptic Gospels Help Us See Jesus’ Authority from the Ground Up. In other words, he shows some of the ways that the Synoptics (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) establish Jesus’ authority one step at a time.

Christmas in November?

In Paul's Maier's article, The Date of the Nativity and the Chronology of Jesus' Life, he examines the biblical and historical clues to suggest the "first Christmas" took place sometime in November (or early December) of 5 B.C.

(HT: Justin Taylor)

God Is Jealous

It’s hard for us to think of God as a jealous God, because most of the time human jealousy is so destructive and ugly. It is full of resentment and spite. It diminishes and controls the other person. But divine jealousy is different. Joyce Baldwin describes it like this:

It is significant that God is first spoken of as ‘jealous’ at the giving of the covenant code (Ex. 20:5; 34:14; Dt 5:9), when the special relationship was established between the Lord and His people, Israel. Because they are His, they can belong to no-one else, hence the prohibition of idolatry and the sanctions against it in the third commandment; but these are followed by assurances of ‘steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments’ (Ex 20:6). God's jealousy is a measure of the intensity of His love towards those with whom He has entered in covenant. So great is His love that He cannot be indifferent if they spurn Him by disobedience or sheet carelessness….

God’s love is never passive but is always expressing itself in positive encouragement of what is right, or, when it is spurned, in unmistakable judgments, intended to bring the sufferer to his senses, and back to God. His love is so intense that it can do no less (Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, TOTC, pp.102-103).

A Leader Who Has Forgotten Grace

In Numbers 20, as in Exodus 17, the children of Israel complain to Moses that they have no water and are going to die of thirst. God tells Moses to gather the people at "that rock" and then he says to Moses, "Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water. You will bring water out of the rock for the community so they and their livestock can drink" (Numbers 20:8). So Moses gathers the people together, but instead of speaking to the rock, he says to the people: "Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?" (v. 10). And then he strikes the rock twice and water gushes out. But God says to Moses, "Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them" (v. 12).

In an article about Speaking with Contempt, Tim Keller explains what's going on:

What did Moses do wrong? Of course he failed to follow instructions. He struck the rock instead of speaking to it, and that is disobedience. Nevertheless, God’s rebuke goes deeper. In calling them “rebels” Moses set himself up as their judge. In saying, “Must we bring you water?” he set himself up as their deliverer. Everything Moses did pointed away from God toward himself.

It is not hard to understand why. Leadership brings a steady drumbeat of criticism and misunderstanding, even when things are going well. When things go poorly, people vent their frustration and anger on those in charge....

This makes sense of Moses’ reaction. “His response is not only the striking of the rock, it is the answer of a man who under pressure has become bitter and pretentious.” (D. Carson, For the Love of God, vol 1, May 11th reading.) God was ready to be gracious, but Moses was in no mood for that. The relentless criticism had made him self-righteous. He held them in contempt. He had wrath but no compassion, and that is the mark of a man who is becoming less like God, not more. (See Isaiah 15-16 where God grieves even as he speaks in judgment.) Moses is a man who has forgotten grace, and the sign of it is a sanctimonious spirit along with words of denunciation without humility and compassion.