\"N. T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God: A Review Article,\" PRJ 8.2 (2016): 212-40

$Page 1: \"N. T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God: A Review Article,\" PRJ 8.2 (2016): 212-40$
Puritan Reformed Journal

JULY 2016

q

Volume 8 • Number 2

Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary2965 Leonard St. N.E.

Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525

PURITAN REFORMED JOURNALEdited for Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary

Joel R. Beeke, EditorMichael Barrett, Associate Editor of Old TestamentJerry Bilkes, Associate Editor of New TestamentDavid Murray, Associate Editor of Pastoral Theology, Contemporary and Cultural IssuesWilliam VanDoodewaard, Associate Editor of Historical TheologyMichael Haykin, Associate EditorJonathon Beeke, Book Review EditorRyan McGraw, Assistant Book Review EditorKate DeVries, Copy EditorGary and Linda den Hollander, Typesetter/Proofreader

Puritan Reformed Journal is published semi-annually. The subscription price per year for individuals and institutions is $20.00 in the United States, $30.00 in Canada (payable in U.S. funds), $35.00 in foreign countries (surface mail). Back issues may be purchased at $10.00 per copy.

Please address all PRJ communication as follows:

Business, subscriptions: Mrs. Ann Dykema, PRJ Administrative Assistant, 2965 Leonard St. NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525; telephone 616-977-0599, x135; e-mail: [email protected]

Editorial, manuscripts (preferred length: 3,000–6,000 words): Dr. Joel R. Beeke, 2965 Leonard St. NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525; telephone 616-977-0599, x123; e-mail: [email protected]

Book reviews: Jonathon Beeke, 1438 Edith Ave. NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525; telephone 215-316-6766; e-mail: [email protected]

© Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. For a free seminary catalog and DVD, write: Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, Attn.: Mrs. Ann Dykema, 2965 Leonard St. NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525; [email protected]; web: www.puritanseminary.org

ISSN #: 1946-8652

Cover artwork by Caffy Whitney and design by Amy Zevenbergen: John Calvin (1509–1564)—the premier exegete and theologian of the Reformation, top right; William Perkins (1558–1602), “the father of English Puritanism,” bottom left.

POSTMASTER: SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO: Puritan Reformed Journal, Attn.: Mrs. Ann Dykema, 2965 Leonard St. NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525

Table of Contentsq

From the Editors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

BIBLICAL STUDIESWalking Through Grief by Faith: Lessons from Lamentations 3:1–39 Ryan M. McGRaw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5Habakkuk’s Connections to Biblical Theological Trajectories DaviD J. Bissett . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

SYSTEMATIC AND HISTORICAL THEOLOGYJohn Calvin and the Limits of Natural Theology thiaGo MachaDo silva . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33True Happiness: William Perkins’s Interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount — anDRew s. Ballitch . . . . . . . . . . . 49God, Owen, and Justification: The Role of God’s Nature in John Owen’s Doctrine of Justification stephen G. MyeRs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70John Owen on the Work of God the Father Ryan l. Rippee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

EXPERIENTIAL THEOLOGYWilhelmus à Brakel’s Biblical Ethics of Spirituality Joel R. Beeke anD paul M. sMalley . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107Images of Union and Communion with Christ Joel R. Beeke anD paul M. sMalley . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

PASTORAL THEOLOGY AND MISSIONSPositive Leadership: Leading like Jesus (Not Rehoboam) williaM Boekestein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139A Puritan Spiritual Household: William Perkins and the “Right Ordering” of a Family — J. stephen yuille . . . . . . . 158

iv taBle of contents

CONTEMPORARY AND CULTURAL ISSUESResting in the Sovereignty of God: The Spiritual Benefits of Peaceful Slumber — ZachaRy GRoff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

REVIEW ARTICLESToward a Biblical, Catholic, and Reformed Theology: An Assessment of John Frame’s Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Christian Belief — Ryan M. McGRaw . . . . . 197N. T. Wright. Paul and the Faithfulness of God Ben c. Dunson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212

BOOK REVIEWSMichael Allen and Scott R. Swain. Reformed Catholicity: The Promise of Retrieval for Theology and Biblical Interpretation Ryan M. McGRaw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243Ronald S. Baines, Richard C. Barcellos, et. al., eds. Confessing the Impassible God: The Biblical, Classical, & Confessional Doctrine of Divine Impassibility — Gavin BeeRs . . . . . . . . . . . . 245John D. Currid. Against the Gods: The Polemical Theology of the Old Testament — JeffRey t. RiDDle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249Karl Giberson. Saving the Original Sinner: How Christians Have Used the Bible’s First Man to Oppress, Inspire, and Make Sense of the World — williaM vanDooDewaaRD . . . . . . . . . . . 252Daniël Timmerman. Heinrich Bullinger on Prophecy and the Prophetic Office (1523–1538) — Ryan M. McGRaw . . . . . . . . . 255

Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259

From the Editorsq

Although wrongly neglected at times, the Old Testament is filled with riches for the Christian. In the first two articles of this issue, Ryan McGraw and David Bissett help us to see some of these riches in the Book of Lamentations and the prophet Habbakuk respectively. From Lamentations 3 McGraw outlines five biblical ways to express grief and then notes the way in which this text enables the believer “to exercise faith under grief through prayer, meditation, and humil-ity.” David Bissett’s essay takes a larger canvas: he shows the way in which various theological motifs and themes within Habbakuk reso-nate with other parts of Scripture. This biblical-theological exercise is helpful for a variety of reasons, not the least being the reminder that ultimately Scripture is the work of a single divine author.

John Calvin is not normally remembered as a theologian who was interested in natural theology. Nonetheless, as Thiago Silva demon-strates, Calvin’s commentaries and sermons, as well as his Institutes, are not chary of asserting that genuine knowledge of God is discoverable via nature and the human heart. Due to the impact of the fall, though, this knowledge cannot enable the knower to enter into a saving re-lationship with God. Human beings know, from the created realm and the witness of their own hearts, that there is a God, but, unless God gives trusting faith, this knowledge cannot save. Next, Andrew Ballitch explores Perkins’s exegesis of the Sermon on the Mount to help answer a vital question: what is “true happiness” according to this English theologian often called “the father of Puritanism”? Along the way he shows the similarities and differences between Calvin’s exegesis of the same text and that of Perkins and concludes that while “Perkins may not neatly conform to an idealized Calvin,… he does fit nicely in the Reformed tradition.”

On the 400th anniversary of the birth of John Owen, we offer two articles on “the prince of the Puritans.” Stephen Myers looks at Owen’s handling of justification. Myers concludes that we need to understand this crucial doctrine better than we have done so as to

2 puRitan RefoRMeD theoloGical JouRnal

proclaim it to others, and Owen’s own doctrine of justification “helps us to do both.” A second essay on Owen, by Ryan Rippee, explores a neglected area of theology, the doctrine of God the Father. The essay first looks at Owen’s delineation of the internal works of God the Fa-ther in election and the covenant of redemption, and then his thought on the Father’s external works of creation, providence, and redemp-tion. The essay helps the reader understand why Owen considered the Father “the ultimate object of all evangelical worship, [and] of all our prayers.”

The section dealing with experiential theology contains two es-says, both by Joel Beeke and Paul Smalley. The first fleshes out the important conviction of Wilhelmus à Brakel, a leading figure in the Dutch Further Reformation, that theology and praxis cannot be divorced from one another: his “Reformed theology is applied the-ology,” and as such a great resource for growing in godliness. The second essay in this section explores various images that relate to our union with the Lord Jesus, and how those images strengthen the spir-itual life of believers.

In recent years, the subject of leadership has been much written about in both the secular and sacred realms. William Boekestein dis-cusses the “positive leadership” model of Jesus (a term derived from Alexander Strauch and David Murray): its importance and nature, its source and style (the latter being summed up in one word, “love”), and ways in which it can be cultivated. Stephen Yuille returns the reader to William Perkins as he examines the Puritan’s thought about the family and its “right ordering.” Given the breakdown of the fam-ily in our day and the veritable attack upon this institution, this essay is essential reading. In the two final sections before the book reviews, Zachary Groff looks at the significance of sleep both theologically and practically, and Ryan McGraw and Ben Dunson give us substantial review-articles of books by John Frame (Systematic Theology: An Intro-duction to Christian Belief ) and N. T. Wright (Paul and the Faithfulness of God) respectively. Not every book merits a lengthy review, but these two definitely do, given the stature of their authors. It is noteworthy that McGraw and Dunson have serious concerns with the respective books they review, concerns that every reader needs to be aware of.

Biblical Studiesq


Before we were married, I suggested that my now wife Krista and I memorize Lamentations 3:1–39. Her friends were puzzled when they saw that the first line on her flash cards read, “I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.” Yet this passage furnished us with the necessary tools to grieve in faith through later trials. In the past ten years, we experienced betrayal from friends, threats against our family, slander and gossip, and other forms of persecution. We lost our first child to miscarriage and our fifth child at the beginning of the last trimester; her face is still burned vividly in my memory. We expe-rienced many of these trials during a move three thousand miles from friends, family, and all that we knew. We lost property in the move and several close family members died around the same time; we were unable to attend most of their funerals. When we moved to Greenville, we had personal health issues, one son in the hospital, and another son requiring multiple surgeries, while hospitals refused repeatedly to work with our insurance company. In these trials and others, the words of Christ rang true: “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).

This present life is often a vale of tears, yet Christians often strug-gle with how to grieve. Some feel guilty grieving at all because we should rejoice in the Lord always (Phil. 4:4). Others use grief as an occasion to say with Job that “God hath overthrown me” (Job 19:6). Yet there is a better and more biblical path to follow. As Christ was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief (Isa. 53:3), so the servant is not greater than his master. Lamentations 3:1–39 teaches us how to grieve in a godly manner and how to exercise joyful faith in Christ simultaneously. In this passage, Jeremiah teaches us how to express sanctified grief (vv. 1–18) and how to exercise faith in God under

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 5–14

Walking Through Grief by Faith: Lessons from Lamentations 3:1–39

RYAN M. MCGRAW

q

6 puRitan RefoRMeD JouRnal

hardship (vv. 19–39). Part one of this article will examine how to grieve in a sanctified way while part two will address how to exercise faith under hardship.

Five Biblical Ways to Express GriefSanctified Grief over God’s Displeasure (v. 1)The first thing to note is that Christians can express sanctified grief. We are not Stoics. This passage, and even more so the Psalms, pre-eminently direct our grief through holy channels of prayer. Jeremiah experienced the terrors of Babylonian exile; the atrocities of the Baby-lonians were exceeded only by the depraved atrocities of the Israelites. Perhaps the greatest of these was that women ate their children in the famine (Lam. 2:20, 4:10, in light of Deut. 28:53). The third chapter of Lamentations brings the themes of the entire book to their highest expression and resolution.1 The lament over the destruction of Jeru-salem in chapter 1 now shifts to the prophet’s personal lament.

The first verse of this chapter teaches us to acknowledge God’s wrath. God is angry with the sins of His people, though they are not under His wrath like the wicked are (Ps. 6:1; 38:1). Christians must remember that such wrath is the displeasure of a Father who loves us, not of a judge who condemns us (Heb. 12:3–11). While we, like Jeremiah, may not always suffer for our personal sins, all suffering is a result of Adam’s fall into sin and should lead to repentance from sin. Individuals often suffer for the church’s sins as well (Dan. 9:3–7, 6–15). Remember in your prayers that the Father may discipline us severely in love like a father does a child who repeatedly offends.

Sanctified Grief Under Hard Providences (vv. 2–7)Believers under trial are tempted to remove all restraints and to com-plain against God. Job said, “Though I were perfect, yet would I not know my soul: I would despise my life. This is one thing, therefore I said it, He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked. If the scourge slay suddenly, he will laugh at the trial of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked: he covereth the faces of the judges thereof; if not, where, and who is he?“ (Job 9:21–24). Job acknowledged God’s

1. John L. Mackay, Lamentations: Living in the Ruins (Fearn, Ross-shire: Mentor, 2008), 123.

walkinG thRouGh GRief By faith 7

sovereignty even while he slandered God’s character; Jeremiah gives us an alternative.

The expressions of sanctified grief in these verses are diverse. Do we feel as though we walk only in darkness (v. 2)? Are we troubled because we know our circumstance comes from God’s hand (v. 3)? Do we feel our troubles in our bones (v. 4)? Is life bitter to us (v. 5)? Is our burden heavier because we see no way to escape (vv. 6–7)? Such expressions drive us to pray and to sing the Psalms. The writer’s experiences are generalized in order to connect us to the text more effectively.2 We should use laments and imprecations in Scripture to keep our sorrow within biblical bounds as we voice our complaints to God rather than against Him. Biblical expression is better than free expression. Brutal honesty in prayer is then coupled with a loving submission to our Father’s hand.

Sanctified Grief under Unanswered Prayer (vv. 8–13)Interestingly, God commanded Jeremiah to stop praying for the peo-ple (Jer. 7:16; 11:14; 14:11). The problem was that he had prayed for their prosperity regardless of their repentance. So how do we pray for our own countries? Do we pray for the stability and prosperity of a land regardless of the character of its people? Sometimes we are frustrated because, in spite of our prayers, it seems as though nothing goes right and nothing gets better. We feel as though God has torn us apart like a lion or a bear. While the Lord always gives abundantly more than we can ask or think (Eph. 3:20–21), our prayers often do not turn out as we expect. We are constantly learning to sing by expe-rience, “Teach me the patience of unanswered prayer.”3

Sanctified Grief Under Persecution and Hardship (vv. 14–17)All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution (2 Tim. 3:12), though persecution may take varied forms. We may be subjected to ridicule (v. 14) or tempted to become “full of bitterness” (v. 15). We may be broken with grief, feel restless in spirit, and forget prosperity (vv. 16–17). “He has filled my teeth with gravel” points to

2. Mackay, Lamentations, 125.3 From the hymn, “Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart,” by George Croly

(London: 1854).


looking in vain for food.4 Sometimes we eat our bread with sorrow or forget our food entirely (Ps. 102:9). Like Jeremiah, our memories of past blessings may intensify our distress by exacerbating the bitterness of the present.5 Rather than stifling such thoughts immediately, we can release the pressure by venting them before God.

Sanctified Grief through Confessing Our Weakness (v. 18)The prophet concludes this section of his lament by saying, “My strength and my hope is perished from the LORD” (Lam. 3:18). While this is never true in an absolute sense (Deut. 31:6; Josh. 1:5; Heb. 13:5), it is often true in a relative sense. We cannot give people false assurance that everything will be okay. In Christ, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us (Rom. 8:37), yet cancer may take our lives. Persecution may increase. Our prayers for the spread of the gospel may come to fruition only after we pass from the scene. The Lord says, “[M]y strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9).

ConclusionAll of these griefs find their highest expression in Christ’s afflictions (Ps. 22:1–20; Isa. 63). Sanctified grief is only possible when we exer-cise Spirit-worked faith in Christ and fellowship with Him in His sufferings (Phil. 1:29; 3:10). Christ’s cry of “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” was an act of faith and an expression of sor-row at the same time. In faith, He called God His God; in sorrow, He cried, “Why hast thou forsaken me?”6 This paints a realistic picture

4. Mackay, Lamentations, 133.5. Mackay, Lamentations, 135.6. John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries (Grand Rapids: Baker, n.d.), 4:358:

“There is no one of the godly who does not daily experience in himself the same thing. According to the judgment of the flesh, he thinks he is cast off and forsaken by God, while yet he apprehends by faith the grace of God, which is hidden from the eye of sense and reason; and thus it comes to pass, that contrary affections are mingled and interwoven in the prayers of the faithful. Carnal sense and reason can-not but conceive of God as being either favorable or hostile, according to the present condition of things which is presented to their view…. When such a perplexing thought takes entire possession of the mind of man, it overwhelms him in profound unbelief, and he neither seeks, nor any longer expects to find a remedy. But if faith come to his aid against such a temptation, the same person who, judging from the outward appearance of things, regarded God as incensed against him, or as having abandoned him, beholds in the mirror of the promises the grace of God which is hidden and distant.”


for grieving Christians. Christ was forsaken and bore God’s wrath against sin so that we would no longer be children of wrath (Eph. 2:3). He trusted in the Father so that we might become the children of God (1 John 3:1–2). This means that Christ sanctified our deepest trials and distresses so that they no longer hold the wrath of a dread-ful Judge but come through the loving hand of a gracious Father. Use Jeremiah’s lament to channel your grief in a godly way. Do not com-plain against God, but bring your sorrows to God in prayer. Look to Christ, remembering that, as it was with Him, so it will be with us: humiliation precedes exaltation (Phil. 2:5–11).

Exercising Faith Under HardshipChristians must walk by faith through their grief (Lam. 3:19–38). We are thinking and believing Christians: how we think through trials determines how we bear them by faith in Christ. I once min-istered to a man who had recently lost his wife to brain cancer. He received counsel both inside and outside of the church to cut all ties that reminded him of his deceased wife, to include selling his home and leaving his church for one in another town. This devastated his local congregation that had invested itself heavily in ministering to this man, his wife, and his children in their trials. His actions left a wake of heartache and created a sense of abandonment and betrayal. Bad counsel taught him to turn inward by grieving at the expense of God’s glory and the church’s profit. This is not the biblical pat-tern for dealing with grief.7 Lamentations 3:1–39 teaches us how to grieve in a godly manner and how to exercise joyful faith in Christ simultaneously. This part of the article sketches the second half of this assertion: how to exercise faith under grief through prayer, medi-tation, and humility.

Turning Grief into Prayer (vv. 19–20)The prophet finally presents the first petition in his lament. The result was not immediately encouraging: “My soul hath them still in remem-brance, and is humbled in me” (Lam. 3:20). Prayer is the soul’s outlet to God (Ps. 62:8). Yet even our prayers can threaten to dishearten us. Praying over a child’s health concerns can remind you that you have

7. For excellent and opposite counsel, see Albert N. Martin, Grieving, Hope and Solace: When a Loved One Dies in Christ (Adelphi, Md.: Cruciform Press, 2011).


no immediate solution to the problem. While we must still make decisions and call doctors, we are tempted to throw up our hands in despair. While we must pray in distress, the very exercise of making our requests known to God can drive our sorrow to new depths. Most suffering Christians know this by experience. We sympathize with the psalmist who wrote, “I remembered God, and was troubled: I com-plained, and my spirit was overwhelmed” (Ps. 77:3). For this reason, Jeremiah introduces the fact that he prayed, but then spent most of his time teaching us how to think while we pray. Prayer is the first step to exercising joyful faith in Christ under grief, and prayer takes direction from meditation.

Confronting Grief with Meditation (vv. 21–38)Though the Puritans are best known for their devotional writings, many fail to recognize that much Puritan application is taken up with meditation. For example, in John Owen’s famous book, The Mortifica-tion of Sin, eight of nine rules for mortifying sin address how to think.8 Contrary to the cultural assumption that meditation involves empty-ing our minds, biblical meditation involves intense thought and labor. Exercising faith in distress is often like meeting resistance while lift-ing weights. Calling the great truths of Scripture to mind, especially truths about God’s character, gives us hope.

Jeremiah teaches us in verses 21–38 how to meditate on seven aspects of God’s character and on our relation to Him in order to put our prayers on a leash and direct them in a beneficial direction. The first and primary meditation here is that the Lord’s mercies preserve us (vv. 22–23). His mercies express His faithfulness to His covenant promises. The covenant refers to our relationship to God as our God in Christ, with the Spirit being the seal of God’s covenant promises to us, applying them to us for our salvation. We need new mercies day by day; and there is enough supply in divine mercies for the troubles of each day. Few people realize that the prophet penned these words of God’s daily new mercies in the face of a ruined city where women were eating their children with the people in exile. Exodus 34:6–7 is

8. John Owen, The Mortification of Sin, in The Works of John Owen (vol. 6), ed. W. H. Goold (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1965), chapters 9–13. Rule six urges us to prevent the occasions and advantages of sin; the other eight rules address our thoughts and affections in relation to sin.


the base of this profession of faith: “And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, keep-ing mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.” By this confession, the prophet implied that things could have been worse—and that they should have been worse. We confront grief with the truth that our merciful God preserves His people in the face of distress and in the midst of sin.

Jeremiah’s second meditation is that the Lord is our portion (v. 24; see also Pss. 16, 17, 29, and 146). The substance of God’s cov-enant with man is that He will be our God, we will be His people, and He will dwell in our midst (Ex. 6:7; Lev. 26:12, etc.). This is why Jesus is called Immanuel, or God with us (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23). Christ is with His people to the end of the age (Matt. 28:19–20). By uniting us to Christ through the Spirit, God has adopted us as heirs and made us joint heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:17). Whatever our circumstances in this world, we should remember we are rich beyond measure. We have received the greater part that will not be taken from us (Luke 10:42). Meditation on God as our portion should lead us to pray for deliverance: “From men which are thy hand, O LORD, from men of the world, which have their portion in this life, and whose belly thou fillest with thy hid treasure: they are full of children, and leave the rest of their substance to their babes. As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness” (Ps. 17:14–15).

The third point for meditation is that the Lord is good to His people (vv. 25–26). We should probably read the refrain in these verses as “He is good” instead of “it is good.”9 The Lord shows His goodness to those who wait patiently for Him in prayer. That is the basis on which we can hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord; it is an exercise in faith rather than a reaction of sense. Hope in prayer must begin with confessing the Lord’s goodness. Though He appears to tarry, we must wait for Him (Hab. 2:3).

Fourthly, the Lord disciplines those whom He loves (vv. 27–30). We should bear God’s yoke, even if He lays it upon us in our youth

9. Mackay, Lamentations, 145–46.


(Lam. 3:27). As Jerusalem in Lamentations 1:1 was the city sitting alone in silence, so believers should keep silence before God (Hab. 2:20). Being still and knowing that the Lord is God (Ps. 46:10) lit-erally means to stop striving10—neither despairing of our hope nor grumbling against God’s providences. We must put our mouths in the dust and give our cheeks to those who strike us (Lam. 3:29–30). The parallels to Christ’s submission to the Father under His suffer-ings are unmistakable. This is not the silence of inactivity, but the silence of meditative and prayerful submission.

The fifth meditation is that the Lord is compassionate to His people (vv. 31–33). The chastisements of the Lord are temporary, He shows compassion towards those whom He grieves, and, “He does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men” (Lam. 3:33). Though all things come to pass according to the counsel of God’s will (Eph. 1:11) and the Lord changes not (Mal. 3:6), the language of human emo-tions is used to describe the depths of His compassion towards His people. Isaiah says similarly, “In all their affliction he was afflicted…” (Isa. 63:9). The prophet is not saying that when the Lord chastens His people His heart is not in it, but rather that affliction does not reflect the end of His purpose in us. Look to God your heavenly Father, who does not delight in the chastening of His people as much as in “the peaceable fruit of righteousness” that comes through trial (Heb. 12:11).

The Lord’s just character is the sixth meditation (vv. 34–36). The world is full of injustice; scoffers cry, “Where is the God of judg-ment?” (Mal. 2:17). Yet we must grasp divine justice with the hands of faith. The Lord does not approve of those who crush the prisoners of the earth under their feet, who turn aside from justice and act as though God does not see, and who “subvert a man in his cause.” He will render to each according to their deeds (Rom. 2:6). Though the wicked taunt, saying, “Where is the promise of his coming?” (2 Pet. 3:4), we should remember that “the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (2 Pet. 3:7). Christ will vindicate those who wait patiently for Him (1 Thess. 1:10).

10. Joseph Alexander treats this text as God’s call to the enemies of His people, but treating it as a call to His people better fits the context. See Joseph A. Alexander, The Psalms Translated and Explained (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1975), 219.


The final meditation is the most difficult to embrace for many well-intended advisors. The Lord is in control over all things (vv. 37–38). Nothing comes to pass, good or evil, that the Lord has not ordered. We live by the command of God’s providential word (Deut. 8:3; Matt. 4:4). Some try to exclude God from catastrophe and moral evil to vindicate His character; others use God’s sovereignty over evil as an excuse for unbelief. Believers can take refuge in the fact that the Lord who controls all things is merciful. He is our portion, He is good and does good, He disciplines those whom He loves, He is compassionate, and He is just. This is the capstone of Christian com-fort without which we could have none. He brings meaning, purpose, and salvation out of the greatest hardship (Rom. 8:28) because He brings all things to pass according to the counsel of His will (Eph. 1:11). This is why we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us (Rom. 8:37).

Humility Under Grief (v. 39)Like every other aspect of godly living, grief has its proper bounds. Humility is the proper response in the face of grief. Sin is the cause of all grief and sorrow. Perhaps the Lord is disciplining us for personal sin, as he did when David lost his son for his murder and adultery (2 Sam. 12:18). In such cases, the longsuffering of the Lord leads us to repentance (Rom. 2:4). We also suffer in this life as the consequence of Adam’s first sin (Gen. 3:16–19). All who are in Adam die, and all who are in Christ shall be made alive (1 Cor. 15:22). Meditation on God’s character should remind us that the illness of a child, the loss of a spouse, hurricanes, earthquakes, wars, and other disasters are results of sin. Instead of leading us to complain against God, this fact should humble us under the mighty hand of God, who resists the proud but gives grace to the humble (James 4:6). Use affliction to confess the corporate sins of the church and of the nation, praying for repentance in both realms. Confess and repent of personal sins. While you may not suffer for personal sins, sufferings provide an occasion to repent. The same storm that floods the land waters the trees and makes them to grow.

ConclusionThe tune to which we sing Psalm 102 today is mournful and the words express the depths of sorrow; yet the psalmist ends with hope


and praise in light of our eternal, unchangeable, covenant-keeping Lord. If we do not resonate with this Psalm now, we will need it someday. Sometimes our greatest need as believers is not to subdue and to deny our grief, but to subject our grief through faith to the triune God. Submit to the Father’s hand in discipline. Partake with Christ in His suffering. Cultivate the comforts of the Holy Spirit. If we have seen affliction by the rod of His wrath, then we must become people who confess that the Lord’s faithfulness is great.

The trajectory of the various biblical motifs and themes woven within both the Old and the New Testaments reaches a climax in the book of Revelation. For instance, the garden-like temple-city of Revelation 21 is the climax of a major theme first evidenced in Genesis by the Garden of Eden, where “humans were created to build for God a temple-city on the earth.”1

Additional themes from the creation account (e.g., man’s status as the Lord’s vice-regent) are developed in the story of the Bible, even as the fall of mankind into sin created significant twists and turns. The book of Exodus further develops these, as well as unique sub-themes such as how God can continue to dwell among His people after their fall into sin. The tabernacle, the temple, and the city of Jerusalem in the Promised Land all play important roles in the grand theme of God’s design to dwell on earth with His people, and they set the stage for the specific developments of the New Testament—the coming of Jesus Christ, the church, and ultimately the “New Jerusalem” of Revelation 21.

This article identifies a few of the key theological trajectories from Genesis and Exodus as they appear in the minor prophet Habak-kuk, specifically focusing on chapter 3—the prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, and the final, climactic chapter of his book.

Overview of HabakkukThe book of Habakkuk is the eighth of twelve minor prophets found at the end of the Old Testament. These three short chapters were

1. T. Desmond Alexander, From Paradise to the Promised Land (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1993), 120.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 15–30

Habakkuk’s Connections to Biblical Theological Trajectories

DAVID J. BISSETT

q


composed in Judah during the last days of Josiah and the regime of Jehoiakim, sometime prior to invasion by the Chaldeans (Babylo-nians) and the exile of Judah, circa 605–587 B.C.2 Habakkuk himself is a main character of his book, yet little is known about him other than his title “prophet” (1:1). “Less is stated in the Bible concerning Habakkuk than almost any other prophet,” says David Baker.3 He was likely a contemporary of Jeremiah as well as other minor proph-ets such as Nahum and Zephaniah. The minor prophets are often called “The Twelve” to stress their shared emphases and their collec-tive unity. Stephen Dempster observes they all typically emphasize three things: the sin of Israel, the just judgment of God, and hope after that judgment. Habakkuk focuses primarily on the first two of those common elements, while the third element is implied in several spots, as we will see. “Not every prophet in this collection predicts all these events, but the entire combination (12 minor prophets) pre-sents a more panoramic view of the future than found in the previous prophets…. All announce coming judgment.”4

The times in which Habakkuk lived were filled with violence and gross disobedience towards God and His law. “The fabric of national life had begun to come apart at the seams.”5 God would chasten His people with the invasion of Judah, the destruction of Jerusalem, and exile from the land—all as “the result of covenantal defection, of a failure to trust in and obey the Lord.”6

The theme of the book of Habakkuk typically magnifies the pivotal verse: 2:4b: “the just shall live by his faith.” R. K. Harrison provides a summary-like statement of the theme, while F. F. Bruce highlights Habakkuk’s personal application.

2. R. K. Harrison, Introduction to the Old Testament: With a Comprehensive Review of Old Testament Studies and a Special Supplement on the Apocrypha (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1969), 935.

3. David W. Baker, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah: An Introduction & Commen-tary, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 43.

4. Stephen Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty, NSBT #15 (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 182, 184.

5. David Prior, The Message of Joel, Micah & Habakkuk: Listening to the Voice of God (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1998), 203.

6. Thomas Schreiner, The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2013), 401.

haBakkuk’s connections to BiBlical tRaJectoRies 17

Spiritual rectitude is an absolute necessity for both individuals and nations; that wealth is at best a treacherous foundation for a secure life; that evil is bound to fail ultimately even though it may experience temporary triumphs at the expense of good; and that trust in the power of God is the only sure basis of strength…whatever the external circumstances may be.7

[Habakkuk’s theme is the] preservation of loyal trust in God in face of the challenge to faith presented by the bitter experience of foreign invasion…. Habakkuk, in hardship and privation, comes to know God more fully and to rejoice in Him for His own sake and not for the benefits He bestows.8

Immediate Context for HabakkukThe book of Habakkuk is easily divided in two, with chapters 1 and 2 forming the first part and presenting a unique dialogue of sorts between the prophet and the Lord. The dialogue is initially about the sins of the people of Jerusalem and the seeming inattention of the Lord to the situation, but then quickly shifts, driven by the prophet’s concerns over the Lord’s harsh plan to deal with those sins (invasion and exile at the hand of a wicked nation). Chapter 3 forms the sec-ond part: a prayer in the form of a psalm-like poem9 presenting the prophet’s final response of faith in the Lord’s plans.

The third chapter, then, is the climax of the book, the result of the prophet’s dialogue with his Lord, and his understanding of that revelation. Chapter 3 is titled a prayer (3:1), yet packaged and appar-ently presented to the people for use as a psalm in public worship (see 3:19c).10 The intended audience was not limited to the doomed residents of Judah, but included any who would face similar, stark circumstances from the hand of the Lord. “In this prayer, Habak-kuk asserts that he will do what Yahweh calls the righteous to do in 2:4, namely, he will trust Yahweh and rejoice in Him even if it seems

7. Harrison, Introduction to the Old Testament, 937.8. F. F. Bruce, The Minor Prophets: An Exegetical & Expository Commentary, Volume

2: Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, and Habakkuk, ed. Thomas McComiskey (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1993), 835.

9. Harrison, Introduction to the Old Testament, 935.10. Daniel I. Block, For the Glory of God: Recovering a Biblical Theology of Worship

(Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2014), 20.


that Yahweh’s promises of a prosperous land—blossoming fig trees, fruit on the vines, flocks in the fold, herds in the stalls—are not seen (3:17–19).”11

Habakkuk 3 in the Bible’s Historical-Redemptive StoryThe book of Habakkuk has several points of contact with the Bible’s central historical-redemptive storyline; the text of chapter 3, in par-ticular, plays a crucial role. This section of the paper looks, first, at two broad connections with the Bible’s grand storyline in Habakkuk. It then narrows to examine the text of chapter three in light of key trajectories from Eden and Sinai.

Connections to the Dominion MandatePerhaps the strongest point of contact is found in the declaration of the prophet in Habakkuk 2:14, at the center of the “vision” (2:2) which he was instructed to write plainly and distribute widely: “For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.” This verse is anchored to the very pur-poses of creation, and displays God’s design behind the placement of mankind in the garden, as stated in the dominion mandate of Genesis 1:28: “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have domin-ion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” James Hamilton writes, “At creation, Yahweh designed a cosmic theater for His glory. On the cos-mic stage God constructed a garden-temple, and He put His image in the temple. The image of God, man, was to extend the borders of the garden-temple by ruling over the earth and subduing it.”12

The grand design of God for establishing His dwelling with men on the earth took a great turn at the fall of Adam and Eve and their exile from the garden (Genesis 3). When the wickedness of mankind grew great, the Lord permanently exiled all but eight souls from the face of the earth in the flood (Gen. 6–9). As the descendants of Noah increased and disobeyed the Creator’s commands, they attempted to build for themselves a man-made mountain-city named Babel (Gen.

11. James Hamilton, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment: A Biblical Theol-ogy (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2010), 252.

12. Hamilton, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment, 50.


11)—revealing that “by instinct, men are city builders” who would “attempt to access heaven and avoid filling the earth.”13

Nevertheless, God’s plan and purpose to fill the earth with His glorious presence remain. They are reiterated in Habakkuk 2:14, which speaks of “God’s purpose to establish and expand His presence in a new Edenic temple even after the exile.”14 Whether God’s people were living east of Eden, in Egypt as slaves, in the southern half of a divided kingdom, or exiled from Jerusalem to the land of Babylon, the goal of our Creator’s dominion mandate—to fill the earth with His presence and the knowledge of His glory—will be passionately pursued. As J. Ryan Lister writes:

The Lord’s commitment to be present with His people is over-whelming—strong enough to conquer sin and death. Nothing can thwart God’s plan to be with His people in a relationship that surpasses the intimacy of Eden. God’s goal to be with His people still directs the flow and outcome of salvation history as God providentially brings His redemptive mission to comple-tion, a mission accomplished through covenants.15

Connections to Babel–BabylonThe city of Babel not only “casts a long shadow over the whole of the biblical narrative”16 but is particularly significant to the content of the book of Habakkuk. Babel is more widely known in the Old and New Testaments by its other name, Babylon. It represents the determined, rebellious efforts of man’s opposition to dwelling with God on His terms. It will only be finally destroyed in the last day (Revelation 18) at the return of Christ and the coming of the New Jerusalem.

The book of Habakkuk connects with the Babylon theme in two ways: first in chapter 2, in the middle of an announcement of five woes; and then more generally in the rapidly-rising Babylonian empire (“Chaldeans” in 1:6), which God raises up to destroy the holy city and take its residents into captivity. The particular woe of 2:12–13

13. T. Desmond Alexander, class notes from DMin Module 803 (Ligonier Academy, January 2015).

14. G. K. Beale and Mitchell Kim, God Dwells Among Us (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2014), 66.

15. J. Ryan Lister, The Presence of God (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2015), 97.16. Alexander, class notes.


is clearly against those who live and labor as did the first Babylonians: “Woe to him that buildeth a town with blood, and stablisheth a city by iniquity! Behold, is it not of the LORD of hosts that the people shall labour in the very fire, and the people shall weary themselves for very vanity?” Alexander writes, “Tellingly, Habakkuk’s comments highlight the futility of building Babylon through the oppression of others, for ultimately when the New Jerusalem comes, the earth will be filled with God’s glory (2:14).”17

In the days of Habakkuk, although the northern kingdom had gone into exile, there were people of God dwelling in Jerusalem with the temple of God in their midst. As her prophets faithfully labored, “the importance of Jerusalem [began] to grow in prophetic eschatology.”18 But the people were living in sin and spiritual rebellion even after witnessing the exile of the northern kingdom a century earlier. W. Dumbrell writes: “She herself had not learned, however, that repeated violation of the covenant with God on her own part would not be left unpunished forever. She would not, according to the prophet, be faced with a similar fate herself.”19

The Lord would not let the residents of Jerusalem live as if they were residents of Babylon, so He ordained through Habakkuk that He would exile them to that very place (1:6ff). David Baker says, “Israel sinned like Adam and was exiled from God’s presence and out of the land, and God withdrew His presence from their temple.”20 Beale and Kim add that such a corrective move was vital to the larger mission of God, because “only by Israel being distinct from the nations was there any purpose in being Israel at all or any hope for the nations them-selves eventually.”21

It is a grand theme indeed, that Babel-Babylon—the “arche-typal god-less city,”22 which represented the first rebellious effort to compete with the proper establishment of God’s dwelling with men on earth—would arise centuries later as a swift, merciless, military

17. T. D. Alexander, From Eden to the New Jerusalem (Grand Rapids: Kregel Aca-demic, 2008), 182.

18. W. Dumbrell, The End of the Beginning (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985), 53.19. Baker, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, 44–45.20. Beale and Kim, God Dwells Among Us, 77.21. Christopher Wright, The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative

(Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2006), 47. Italics in the original text. 22. Alexander, class notes.


empire to overrun the holy city of Jerusalem during the lifetime of Habakkuk. Yet, as the book of Revelation makes clear, the Lord will destroy Babylon in the end, as the New Jerusalem arrives.

Connections to the Exodus and the “Song of Moses”Perhaps the most exciting discovery in this study of Habakkuk is how the psalm-like prayer of chapter 3 makes use of the “Song of Moses” in Exodus 15. We will unpack those connections after first recalling the context of the Song of Moses, and showing how Habakkuk 3 is to be understood as a song.

After four hundred years in slavery in Egypt, the Lord deliv-ered His people from Pharaoh by powerful signs and wonders. Arie Leder reduces the theme of Exodus to one sentence: “By mighty signs of power the Lord rescues Israel from Pharaoh and brings her to His presence at Sinai in order to dwell in her midst by means of the tabernacle.”23 To honor the Lord and to celebrate that great deliv-erance, “Moses and the children of Israel [sang] this song unto the LORD…” (Ex. 15:1). Leder writes, “This song reminds the reader of the wider perspective of the biblical narrative: The nations will trem-ble at the passing of God’s people (15:14–16), and the establishing of the Lord’s dwelling place (15:13, 17).”24 Blackburn concurs, pointing out that not only the Song of Moses but the entire book of Exodus sees “the Lord’s missionary commitment to make Himself known to the nations as the central theological concern.”25

But is the third chapter of Habakkuk also such a song? It could be understood as a psalm-like piece with designs for liturgical use in the temple26 or by worshippers in the coming exile. There are clues that point the reader in this direction. First, the presence of a formal title indicates “prayer” but is similar to many such titles in the Psalter used for poetic, liturgical prayer.27 Second, the liturgical term used

23. Arie Leder, “Reading Exodus to Learn and Learning to Read Exodus,” Cal-vin Theological Journal 34 (1999): 35.

24. Arie Leder, “The Coherence of Exodus: Narrative Unity and Meaning,” Calvin Theological Journal 36 (2001): 258.

25. W. Ross Blackburn, The God Who Makes Himself Known, NSBT 28 (Down-ers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2012), 15.

26. Block, For the Glory of God: Recovering a Biblical Theology of Worship, 20.27. See Pss. 17; 55:1; 61:1–2; 86; 90; 102; 141:2; 142; and 143:1. Cf. Ps. 72:20:

“The prayers of David, the son of Jesse, are ended.”


is Shigionoth, which may refer to an instrument or a type of psalm (the term appears only here and at Psalm 7:1). Third, we notice the repeated presence of the musical term Selah in 3:3, 9, and 13. Finally, unique in the prophetic writings, there is an explicitly musical post-script, “To the chief singer on my stringed instruments” (3:19c).

Just as the Song of Moses celebrates the defeat of the Egyptian slave masters, this psalm-like prayer also forms a broad recollection of the Lord’s past powerful deeds of judgment for the salvation of His people. O. Palmer Robertson describes it as “a collage, a collection of many images to convey an impression both of past experience and of future expectation is the medium of the prophet. Moses’s song, Debo-rah’s song, David’s song blend to provide a framework for anticipating the future.”28 It is composed with an eye to the impending conquest of the captors of God’s people (the Babylonians). James Hamilton, Jr., in his aptly titled work of biblical theology, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment, concurs on this point: “Habakkuk’s psalm of praise rehearses Yahweh’s past acts of salvation through judgment in order to assure his audience that they can trust Yahweh, in spite of the faith-threatening nature of their circumstances.”29

What are the actual points of connection in the text of these two songs? There are many terms and significant images in Habakkuk 3 that recall the Exodus, the Red Sea event, and specifically the Song of Moses.30 Certainly to the ancient Israelite’s ear, finding these in the climax of the book of Habakkuk would trigger a connection with the great, prototypical salvation event of the Old Testament—in some cases, creating vivid contrasts.

The listing that follows is a brief overview of these connec-tions, with comments, drawn from more detailed observations in the Hebrew text:

• God, the Holy One, comes from a far mountain to pow-erfully interact with men (v. 3). The Lord is the primary actor in both the psalm of Habakkuk and the Song of Moses, and He is the one celebrated for His character, His

28. O. Palmer Robertson, The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk and Zephaniah (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990), 219.

29. Hamilton, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment, 252–53.30. Schreiner, The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New

Testaments, 413.


power, and the great salvation (through judgment) which He affects. Both use His covenant name, Yahweh, and both mention His holiness/distinctness from other beings.

• The glory of the Lord covers creation, to His praise (v. 3). The verb for cover, used earlier (2:17) to state how God will “overwhelm” His enemies, is also part of the fulfill-ment of the great goal of 2:14. The widespread cover of the knowledge of the glory of the Lord certainly includes the execution of just judgments on His enemies, as well as the display of His redeemed grace to His people. The flood-victory over Egypt was but a foretaste of the coming defeat of the Chaldeans and the ultimate victory over Babylon in Revelation.

• His coming is attended by “pestilence” and “burning coals” (v. 5). These particular terms which occur early in the Habakkuk psalm narrow the hearers recollection to the period of the great signs and wonders of the Exodus.

• He employs imagery of rivers, waters, and seas as sites of powerful conflict (vv. 8, 10, 15). Certainly the references of Habakkuk’s psalm could be pointing to several events in the Old Testament besides the Exodus deliverance at the Red Sea. Yet the reader’s mind is drawn to the scenes at the Nile River (where wonders were performed) and the Red Sea (at the supernatural climax of the deliverance), especially when taken in concert with the other terms and images presented by Habakkuk.

• The imagery of horses and chariots in conquest is also shared (vv. 8, 15). While these are common elements of Old Testament battle scenarios, when mentioned by Habakkuk they add further impetus to recall the Exodus conflagration. The unforgettable refrain from the Song of Moses (Ex. 15:1, 21) rushes to mind: “Sing to the LoRD, for he has triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.” Notice, however, the con-trasting connection between the two passages. In the Song of Moses, the man-made chariots of superpower Egypt are destroyed by the Lord; in Habakkuk’s psalm, the Lord


Himself rides a figurative chariot of salvation—referring to forces of physical forces of creation harnessed against His enemies at the day of judgment. This contrast does not undo the link but strengthens the designs of Habak-kuk, exalting the superior ways of God.

• Specific and graphic actions involve “the deep,” trampling, and arrows (vv. 9–11). Among the key action verbs found in both passages, Habakkuk’s reference to “the deep” connects not only with the death-by-flood event of the Exodus, as described in the Song of Moses, but also with the great flood of Genesis. This world, its heights, and its depths are the Lord’s possession—and all are designed to function within the great blueprint of God for creation. In the hands of the Creator, the forces of nature are the great-est of all tools or weapons.

• Personal words of trust, hope, and praise form the clos-ing (vv. 17–19). The opening and closing elements of both the psalm of Habakkuk and the Song of Moses convey the related purpose for the passages: to exalt and praise the Lord for past deliverances, as well as to express faith and trust in Him for full salvation in the future. The closing confession of Habakkuk (3:18–19) arrives with similar, profound power, as does the refrain of Miriam at the close of the Song of Moses. What do the people of God need to fear, when He is such a powerful and faithful conqueror over the greatest armies and warriors of men?

These connections from Habakkuk 3 to the Song of Moses in Exo-dus 15 are easily identified when reading an English translation of the text. Imagine how much more a native Hebrew speaker would react to Habakkuk’s chosen terms and images to recall the Song of Moses and events of the exodus!

Themes of Habakkuk 3 throughout the Rest of ScriptureThe Latter Books of the Old TestamentThe physical city of Jerusalem, home of the throne of David and the temple (the throne of God), was fundamental to the plans of God in the Old Testament. But with the holy city destroyed and the people


of Judah taken away from the land, concerns arose about the future of God’s plans as the Old Testament era drew to a close. Habakkuk’s writing set forth a foundation for faith and trust in the Lord in the face of grim circumstances. As Schreiner writes:

A careful reading of the book demonstrates, however, that an eschatological promise for Israel remains. Babylon will ulti-mately be judged for its evil, and “the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.”… The book concludes with Habakkuk waiting for ‘the day of trouble to come upon those who invade us” (3:16), which almost certainly also involves salvation for Israel.31

Writing later in the sixth century B.C. to encourage the returned exiles and their leaders in the work of rebuilding and restoring the temple, Haggai echoes the triumphant language of Habakkuk:

Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, saying, I will shake the heavens and the earth; and I will overthrow the throne of king-doms, and I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the heathen; and I will overthrow the chariots, and those that ride in them; and the horses and their riders shall come down, every one by the sword of his brother. (Hag. 2:21–22)

The other minor prophets “were aware of one another, with earlier prophets influencing the language and the imagery of those who came later.”32 In various ways, they “recast the fulfillment of God’s objec-tives in an apocalyptic and eschatological light.”33 Dempster writes:

It seems as if Babylon has the last word at the end of the canon. But, just as God descended at the beginning of the canon to judge Babylon [Babel] and so to bring to nothing human pre-tensions to unite heaven and earth, so, through a foreign king [Cyrus], He commands an exiled Judah to go up from Babylon and build the temple, from which blessing will proceed. God is not finished with Abraham. There has been a setback, but the blessing will come through the Davidic house. Hope remains.34

31. Schreiner, The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments, 413.

32. Hamilton, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment, 231.33. Lister, The Presence of God, 221.34. Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty, 226–27.


As unexpectedly as the Lord raised up a people to punish His own (1:5), He would summon a king named Cyrus into His service to return them (2 Chron. 36:22)—even calling him His “anointed” (Isa. 45:1). Habakkuk 3:13 refers to an anointed one, but this was not a reference to an individual or the future Messiah. Habakkuk correlates this term with “thy people” (3:13) and it refers to Israel as a whole, as Daniel Block confirms.35

Ultimately, the whole narrative shape of Israel’s completed Scrip-tures (the Old Testament) shows the Lord’s “overriding concern to reveal Himself, that is His character and His intentions, to His people and through them to the world.”36

The GospelsAre there connections in the New Testament with the Habakkuk themes? Yes, primarily in the Epistles and the Book of Revelation; yet some subtle connections can be seen in the Gospels and the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. For instance, the descriptions of Jesus’ power and authority over the waves of the sea (e.g., Matt. 8:23–27) recall Habakkuk 3:15. When the disciples ask “Who is this?” the scene portrays Jesus as the divine LORD, for “in the Old Testament only Yahweh triumphs over a stormy sea.”37

In the narratives of His passion, Christ crushes and conquers the seed of the serpent as foreshadowed of the language of Habakkuk: “…thou woundedest the head out of the house of the wicked” (3:13c), and “Thou didst strike through with his staves the head of his vil-lages” (3:14a). “Through the judgment of the enemy, the crushing of the head of the seed of the serpent, Yahweh saves His people…. [As] in Habakkuk, Yahweh is glorified in salvation through judgment.”38

35. “Although the Latter Prophets (according to the Jewish canon) tell us a lot about the prophets’ understanding of the messiah, it is remarkable that the noun māšîaḥ occurs only in Habakkuk 3:13 and Isaiah 45:1. But neither text may be con-strued as a technical reference to the anointed one.” Daniel Block, Israel’s Messiah in the Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls, eds. Hess & Carroll (Eugene, Ore.: Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2003), 24.

36. Rikk E. Watts, From Creation to New Creation, ed. Daniel Gurtner & Benja-min Gladd (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2013), 207.

37. Thomas Schreiner, New Testament Theology: Magnifying God in Christ (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2008), 181.

38. Hamilton, God’s Glory in Salvation Through Judgment, 253.


In a fascinating line of thought, Schreiner sees the emphasis on divine sovereignty found in John’s gospel in connection with the con-clusion of Habakkuk 3, and the prophet’s resulting calm trust and submission to the unfolding ways of God (“Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, i will joy in the God of my salvation. The LORD GoD is my strength…” [vv. 18–19]).

Since Jesus’ death fulfills God’s plan, John especially empha-sizes divine sovereignty during the Passion Narrative. What happened to Jesus cannot be ascribed to the cruelty of fate or to events spinning out of control. Instead God supervised and superintended every detail. Hence, when Jesus knew death was about to befall Him [cf., Habakkuk’s situation] He did not flee in fear and even offered Himself to His captors, knowing that God was ruling even in such a dark hour.39

The EpistlesReferences to Habakkuk 3 are few in the New Testament Epistles, but of course the great truth of Habakkuk 2:4 plays a significant role in several letters (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11; Heb. 10:38). Reflecting on these New Testament references to 2:4 opens a conduit to recall the wider context of Habakkuk, including the psalm-prayer of chapter 3, which itself is a precious illustration of living by faith.

Aspects of Habakkuk 3 are seen in Hebrews. For example, the destruction of the city of Jerusalem and the attendant desolation (3:17) seem to stand behind Hebrews 13:14 (“For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come”) and Hebrews 11:10 (“For he [Abra-ham] looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God”). The status of exile is mentioned in Hebrews 11:13 (“These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but hav-ing seen them afar off,… and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth”) and resonates richly with Habakkuk’s resolve to wait for his removal and rejoice that his feet are made strong for the pilgrimage ahead (3:18–19).

Finally, 2 Peter 2:9 alludes to two themes from Habakkuk 3: rescue for His people and delayed-but-certain judgment for the unrighteous. Peter declares that “the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of

39. Thomas Schreiner, The King in His Beauty (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2013), 524; emphasis and comment added.


temptations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished.” Habakkuk, who mentions both (3:2, “in wrath remember mercy”), would say, Amen.

The Book of RevelationCertainly Habakkuk 3, broadly considered, is one of the many con-tributing threads in the tapestry of the “city” theme, traceable from Eden to the tabernacle, to Jerusalem, to the temple, into exile (loss of city and temple), to their return, to the church,40 and finally to the New Jerusalem. There are specific portions of Habakkuk 3 that come to mind when reading Revelation. The role of horse and char-iot in God’s work of salvation (Hab. 3:8) seems to be fulfilled with the appearance of the rider on the white horse (Rev. 19:11–16). The majestic glory/light imagery of the presence of God from Habakkuk 3:3–4 (“His glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of his praise. And his brightness was as the light…”) is fulfilled in Reve-lation 21:23 (“And the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof ”).

The climactic announcement of Revelation 21:3 (“Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God”) is the glorious fulfillment to the great storyline of the whole Bible, including the desired resolution of Habakkuk in his psalm-like prayer. Lister concurs and summarizes:

In this simple yet profound phrase, God’s mission is complete. It is what we as Christians all long to hear. It tells us that God’s presence to redeem is successful; it has removed the barriers of Eden and reconciled us to His glorious, eschatological presence. At the center of this functional work is the presence of God in Christ. He comes to change us and prepare a way for us to draw near to God…. Finally, we see that Christ has come to serve and

40. R. J. McKelvey explains the role of the church in this theme “as much more than a type of the divine indwelling in the old sanctuary or the fulfillment of the prophecy that God would again dwell with his people after the exile…. God no longer dwells with his people in a sanctuary which they make for him; he dwells in them, and they are his temple.” Cited in Alexander, From Eden to the New Jerusalem (Grand Rapids: Kregel Academic, 2008), 64.


save; He comes again to judge and destroy God’s enemies and to make a way to the fulfillment of God’s redemptive promises for His people. As the warrior-king, God will wage His final battle to culminate the goals of redemption (Ex. 15:2; Deut. 20; Isa. 59:16–18; Ezek. 38–39; Hab. 3:8–15; Zech 12:1–9; 14:3–5).41

41. Lister, The Presence of God, 323–24.


Systematic and Historical Theology

q


Natural theology is the attempt to know God and His attributes by human reason through the natural world, and there are those who affirm and those who reject natural theology as a source of knowl-edge of God. In modern theology, scholars as William Paley, on the one hand, believed that it was possible to argue for the existence of God from natural reason and nature alone.1 On the other hand, Karl Barth is a strong opponent who denied natural theology on the argu-ment that God does not reveal Himself in nature, but only in the person of Jesus Christ.2

Interestingly, John Calvin’s view on the natural knowledge of God does not align with either of these positions. Reformed scholars have tried to deal with Calvin and the question of natural theology.3

1. William Paley, Natural Theology or Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of the Deity (Philadelphia: John Morgan, 1802).

2. See Church Dogmatics: A Selection, trans. G. W. Bromiley (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1961); Paul Jersild, “Natural theology and the doctrine of God in Albrecht Ritschl and Karl Barth,” Lutheran Quarterly 14, no. 3 (1962): 239–57; Bouillard, Henri, Gerard Farley, Nicholas Fiorenza, and James E. A. Woodbury, “A dialogue with Barth: the problem of natural theology,” Cross Currents 18, no. 2 (1968): 203–28; Rodney D. Holder, The heavens declare: natural theology and the legacy of Karl Barth (West Conshohocken, Pa.: Templeton Pr, 2012); Paul D. Molnar, “Natural theology revisited: a comparison of T. F. Torrance and Karl Barth,” Zeitschrift Für Dialektische Theologie 21, no. 1 (2005): 53–83.

3. See Edward Adams, “Calvin’s View of Natural Knowledge of God,” Interna-tional Journal of Systematic Theology 3, no. 3 (2001): 280–92; John Bolt, “Getting the ‘Two Books’ Straight: With a Little Help from Herman Bavinck and John Calvin,” Calvin Theological Journal 46, no. 2 (2011): 315–32; Paul Helm, “John Calvin, the Sensus Divinitatis, and the Noetic Effects of Sin,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 43, no. 2 (1998): 87–107; I. John Hesselink, “The Revelation of God in Creation and Scripture: Calvin’s Theology and Its Early Reception,” Calvin’s Theology

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 33–48

John Calvin and the Limits of Natural Theology

THIAGO MACHADO SILVA

q


John Newton Thomas affirms that “in the debate of the last four decades, Calvin’s authority has probably been appealed to more than that of anyone else, and that by both the friends and the foes of natural theology.”4 The purpose of this essay is to explore whether Calvin’s theology, as found in his Institutes, commentaries, and sermons, offers a sufficient basis for a Reformed approach to natural theology rather than an objection to it. My purpose is to demonstrate that Calvin’s view of natural knowledge of God is defined by His view of divine revelation, thus forming a Reformed approach to natural theology within its own limits.

Although Calvin never used the term, he does not deny the pos-sibility of obtaining knowledge of God through nature; he uses the term “natural knowledge of God” instead of “natural theology.” But we have to keep in mind that Calvin’s theology of natural knowl-edge of God is not the same natural theology that has been pursued today by philosophers and scientists, that kind of knowledge that is produced by natural reason only, without referring to any divine reve-lation. As John Bolt argues, Calvin believes that true natural theology is based on general revelation, and only believers can have the right view of natural theology because only they are enabled by the Holy Spirit to recognize God’s revelation in nature.5 That is why, according to Timothy Jones, Calvin claimed that “after the Fall, God provided the written Word because humanity could no longer recognize God’s revelation through the cosmos.”6 For this reason, natural theology, based on Calvin’s perspective, should be based on God’s revelation; it is possible only through the lens of Scripture.

and Its Reception: Disputes, Developments, and New Possibilities, ed. J. Todd Billings and I. John Hesselink (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2012), 3–24; Belden C. Lane, “The World as the Theatre of God’s Glory,” Perspectives 16, no. 9 (2001): 7–12; T. A. Noble, “Our Knowledge of God according to John Calvin,” The Evangelical Quarterly 54 (1982): 2–13; Davis A. Young, John Calvin and the Natural World (Lanham: Univer-sity Press of America, 2007); Susan E. Schreiner, The Theater of His Glory: Nature and the Natural Order in the Thought of John Calvin (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991).

4. John Newton Thomas, “The Place of Natural Theology in the Thought of John Calvin,” The Journal of Religious Thought 15 (1958): 107.

5. John Bolt, “Getting the ‘Two Books’ Straight,” 331.6. Timothy Paul Jones, “John Calvin and the Problem of Philosophical Apolo-

getics,” Perspectives in Religious Studies 23 (1996): 397.

John calvin anD the liMits of natuRal theoloGy 35

Calvin and the Natural Knowledge of GodCalvin begins his Institutes by writing about the knowledge of God, establishing the foundation for his work. In his Catechism of 1538, he starts with the affirmation that “all of us have been created in order to acknowledge our Creator’s majesty and to receive it and esteem it, once acknowledged, with all fear, love and reverence.”7

According to Calvin, our knowledge of God comes from three sources. The first source is man’s innate sense of God originating from having been made in God’s image; the second source is God’s works in creation; and the third source is Scripture. However, these three sources of knowledge come to us by means of special revelation. All knowledge that one has of God is given through special revela-tion, and, as Calvin says, to know God is the final goal of our lives.8

Of course, knowing God through special revelation is differ-ent from general revelation. Through special revelation, God reveals Himself as Redeemer and Savior in the person of Jesus Christ. Through general revelation, God reveals Himself in nature as the all-powerful creator and sustainer. The former is revealed and known through God’s Word; the latter through God’s works. Calvin writes:

[I]t is one thing to feel that God as our Maker supports us by his power, governs us by his providence, nourishes us by his good-ness, and attends us with all sorts of blessings—and another thing to embrace the grace of reconciliation offered to us in Christ. First, as much in the fashioning of the universe as in the general teaching of Scripture the Lord shows himself to be simply the Creator. Then in the face of Christ [cf. 2 Cor. 4:6] he shows himself to be the Redeemer.9

Although humans are not able to recognize Jesus the Son of God as Redeemer and Savior through general revelation, Calvin affirms that we are able to recognize in it the beauty, wisdom, goodness, and greatness of God: “he not only sowed in men’s minds that seed of religion of which we have spoken but revealed himself and daily dis-closes himself in the whole workmanship of the universe.”10 Calvin’s

7. John Calvin, Catechism, trans. Ford Lewis Battles (Basel, 1538), 6.8. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Ford Lewis Battles (Lou-

isville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), 1.5.1. 9. Calvin, Institutes, 1:40.10. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.1.


affirmation suggests two sources of man’s natural knowledge of God. First, God reveals Himself in nature and in the works of His hands; and second, He implanted in human beings what Calvin calls an awareness of divinity. One is an external witness in the work of cre-ation; the other is an internal witness, implanted in people’s hearts and minds. One is objective; the other is subjective.

General RevelationFirst of all, God reveals Himself externally and objectively in nature and in the works of His hands.11 In his sermon on Genesis 1:1–2, Cal-vin argues that although we frequently erase or obscure the glory of God in creation, it is impossible to not see evidences of the Creator God. “God shows himself everywhere and provides indications of his majesty, of his power, of his righteousness, of his goodness, and every-thing which can lead us to him.”12 He reveals Himself as the origin and the sustainer of all things. Consequently, according to Calvin, “the world, from its heights to its depths, is like a mirror to compel us to contemplate God.”13

The Bible declares in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Everything in creation bears the finger-prints of God; the entire cosmos is marked with His creative hands. “[T]here are innumerable evidences both in heaven and on earth that declare his wonderful wisdom.”14 Calvin makes a similar claim in his Institutes. He writes, “In the order of nature, there is a certain and evident manifestation of God, in that the earth is watered with rain; in that the heat of the sun doth comfort it; in that there cometh such abundance of fruit out of the same yearly; it is thereby gathered for a surety, that there is some God who governeth all things.”15 General

11. Writing about the place of natural theology in the thought of Calvin, John N. Thomas claims for Calvin that “the creation of the world was God’s first appear-ance in visible apparel, the expanded heavens are His royal pavilion, the symmetry of the universe a mirror in which we may contemplate the otherwise invisible God, the world a theater erected for displaying the glory of God, and the universe at large a book displaying God’s attributes.” See Thomas, “The Place of Natural Theology in the Thought of John Calvin,” 113.

12. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis: Chapters 1–11, trans. Rob Roy McGregor (Car-lisle, Pa.: Banner of Truth, 2009), 1.

13. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 1.14. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.2.15. Calvin, Commentary upon the Acts of the Apostles, trans. Henry Beveridge, vol.

2 (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1844), 20.


revelation of God teaches us that there is a God who created every-thing and sustains everything with His power and providence, and He is worthy of all praise and thanks.

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge.There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard.Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. (Ps. 19:1–4)

Writing on this passage, Calvin points out how these verses reveal that even in the silence of nature, creation does not fail to speak and to reveal God’s glory; it is as if the glory of God, His goodness, wis-dom, and power are richly engraved in large letters, which everyone can see and read.16 There is nothing in heaven or on earth in which the glory and the majesty of God cannot be contemplated, and “the testimony of the divine glory has not come into being by chance, but has been wonderfully created by the supreme Architect.”17 Calvin is saying that the world did not just appear without a purpose, but it was thought, planned, and created by the hands of the almighty God, and all creation reflects and reveals its Creator.

“How can our minds not be ravished with wonder at his infinite goodness, wisdom and power?”18 God took six days to create heaven and earth, and according to Calvin, “he did not do so, out of any necessity laid upon him, but to hold us back and cause us to consider more attentively his power, his goodness, his righteousness, and his infinite wisdom in the whole creation.”19 Moreover, God continues to reveal Himself through creation by sustaining and governing it with His power and goodness.

As Susan Schreiner writes, “Calvin emphasized the ceaseless activity of God: the Lord does not merely watch over the order of nature which he has set in motion but also exercises special care over

16. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 5.17. John Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2009),

100.18. Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms, 100.19. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 14.


each of his works.”20 Schreiner concludes that “without the constant activity of divine providence, nature would cease to exist or, what is more uniquely Calvin’s view, would disintegrate in complete disorder and chaos.”21

Psalm 104 is a psalm that reveals God sustaining, governing and taking care of each detail of everything that happens in nature. With respect to these verses Calvin comments:

By these words we are taught that the winds do not blow by chance, nor the lightning’s flash by a fortuitous impulse, but that God, in the exercise of his sovereign power, rules and controls all the agitations and disturbances of the atmosphere. From this doctrine a twofold advantage may be reaped. In the first place, if at any time noxious winds arise, if the south wind corrupt the air, or if the north wind scorch the corn, and not only tear up trees by the root, but overthrow houses, and if other winds destroy the fruits of the earth, we ought to tremble under these scourges of Providence. In the second place, if, on the other hand, God moderates the excessive heat by a gentle cooling breeze, if he purifies the polluted atmosphere by the north wind, or if he moistens the parched ground by south winds; in this we ought to contemplate his goodness.22

Because of God’s general revelation, Calvin concludes, “men cannot open their eyes without being compelled to see him.”23 This knowledge of God “is naturally presented to all people as in a mirror.”24 We cannot say that we are unaware that God exists because general revelation says that He does exist.

Awareness of DivinitySecond, God has implanted in human hearts the “awareness of divin-ity.” Calvin writes that “[t]o prevent anyone from taking refuge in the pretense of ignorance, God himself has implanted in all men a certain understanding of his divine majesty.”25 This elevation of the

20. Schreiner, The Theater of His Glory, 20.21. Schreiner, The Theater of His Glory, 22.22. John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms, trans. James Anderson, vol.

4 (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1847), 146–47.23. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.1.24. Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms, 101.25. Calvin, Institutes, 1.3.1.


senses that makes humans see and comprehend the divine majesty is called “awareness of divinity.” In his Catechism, Calvin affirms that “no human being can be found, however barbarous or completely savage, untouched by some awareness of religion.”26 This awareness of divinity is inscribed on the hearts and minds of all people, and “whether they want to or not, they are repeatedly brought up short by this thought, that there is a divinity by whose decision they stand or fall.”27

In his sermon on Genesis 1, Calvin declares that “our Lord has given us both eyes and senses to perceive more than we see, namely, that the things which are apparent did not create themselves, but that they proceed from another source, that there is a sovereign workman to whom all praise must be attributed.”28 Originally, before the fall, the goal of this natural knowledge of God was to lead us to Him in worship and honor. We would look at the works of His hands and rec-ognize and glorify the only true God, Creator and Sustainer of heaven and earth. However, Adam and Eve fell from that original purpose. Their nature was corrupted by sin and their vision obscured; they no longer would recognize and glorify God as the Creator. “With how-ever much care they afterwards weary themselves over worshiping God, they get nowhere, since it is not the eternal God but the dreams and ravings of their own heart they are adoring as God.”29

The original purpose of natural knowledge of God was corrupted and restricted by the fall.30 Note that the problem is not with God’s revelation in creation; the problem is with human hearts and minds that have been darkened by sin. Calvin says that God has “elevated our senses” because, after the fall, it is impossible for people to truly know Him using only their natural senses, and it makes us inexcus-able before God.31

26. Calvin, Catechism, 6.27. Calvin, Catechism, 7.28. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 6.29. Calvin, Catechism, 7.30. Michael L. Czapkay Sudduth says that the awareness of divinity that was

naturally implanted in people’s hearts and minds became “corrupted by the fall of man and the presence of sin in the human personality.... [T]he fall introduces a restriction on how far man can go in terms of knowledge of God based upon natural reason.” See Sudduth, “The Prospects for ‘Mediate’ Natural Theology in John Calvin,” 55.

31. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 6.


Calvin’s argument is the same as Paul’s when he writes to the Romans: “Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse” (Rom. 1:19–20). God implanted this awareness of divinity in human hearts and minds so that we could look for Him and get to know Him through the works of His hands. However, because of a sinful nature, humanity does not glorify God and does not give thanks to Him. Instead, in the words of Paul in Romans 1:21, they “became vain in their imaginations, and their fool-ish heart was darkened.”

Because of their futile thinking and darkened hearts, Calvin con-cludes, it is “in vain that so many burning lamps shine for us in the workmanship of the universe to show forth the glory of its Author. Although they bathe us wholly in their radiance, yet they can of them-selves in no way lead us into the right path. Surely they strike some sparks, but before their fuller light shines forth these are smothered.”32 God shines His glory in creation, but Calvin argues that because of sin, our “carnal sense thinks there is an energy divinely bestowed from the beginning, sufficient to sustain all things.”33

In his first sermon on Genesis, Calvin cites Acts 17:27 more than once. In this passage, Paul declares that God created everything “so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.” According to Calvin, Paul condemns all human beings “for closing their eyes and shutting down all their senses so as not to look upon the things that are designed to show God’s majesty and give a definite witness to his being the Creator.”34 He also writes that “because they measure God not by His infinite majesty but by the foolish and stupid vanity of their own nature, they fall away from the true God.”35

Thus the awareness of divinity has an original purpose: not to make people curious about it, but to lead people in worship and grat-itude to God. “God’s majesty in itself far outstrips the capacity of

32. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.14.33. Calvin, Institutes, 1.16.1.34. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 4.35. Calvin, Catechism, 7.


human understanding and cannot even be comprehended by it at all, it is fitting for us to adore rather than to investigate its loftiness, lest we be utterly overwhelmed by such great splendor.”36 Originally, this awareness of divinity was to lead humanity to worship the Creator with praise and thanksgiving, but now, after the entry of sin in the world, its goal is to make them inexcusable before God. After the fall, “the invisible divinity is made manifest in such spectacles, but that we have not the eyes to see this unless they be illumined by the inner revelation of God through faith.”37 That is the reason Calvin believes that general revelation must be seen through the eyeglasses of special revelation. After Genesis 3, mankind could not have a true natural knowledge of God apart from special revelation.

Calvin and Natural TheologyAs we have seen thus far, Calvin believes that, although natural rea-son remains, it cannot lead human beings to a right relationship to God or, indeed, to Christ. In fact, Calvin says, “in all their reasoning faculties they miserably fail.”38 For him, there is no natural theology apart from revealed theology, and there is no natural knowledge of God without God’s special revelation. The knowledge of God gained from nature should be understood as a form of revealed theology. Therefore, we can affirm that Calvin’s view of the natural knowledge of God offers a basis for a Reformed approach to natural theology. Instead of solely holding an objection, his approach takes into account the fall of Genesis 3 and the consequences of sin in human life today. As Charlotte Methuen observes, “Calvin’s approach to nature is in many ways characterized by the tension between his understanding of rational order and his perception of the effects of the Fall.”39

Originally, Adam was equipped with reason and understanding to pursue the true knowledge of God,40 which means that, before the fall, the awareness of divinity was simply enough for man to ascend to God. However, sin corrupted this awareness of divinity; after the

36. Calvin, Catechism, 7.37. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.14.38. Calvin, Commentary on the Gospel According to John, trans. William Pringle

(Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1846), 1:32.39. Charlotte Methuen, Science and Theology in the Reformation (New York: T&T

Clark, 2008), 17.40. Calvin, Institutes, 1.5.1.


fall, “the chief function actually performed by the knowledge of God derived from natural theology is quite distinct from its original one: it is to render men inexcusable before God.”41

For Calvin, those who pose the question of natural theology “are merely toying with idle speculations.”42 There is no benefit in pur-suing the knowledge of God out of speculation and curiosity. Our knowledge of God must serve two purposes: “first to teach us fear and reverence; secondly, with it as our guide and teacher, we should learn to seek every good from him, and, having received it, to credit it to his account.”43 Calvin leads believers to a natural theology with a deeper purpose than a vague notion of the existence of a deity: to truly know God and His revelation.

Because of this deeper purpose and because human hearts and minds have been darkened by sin, Calvin believes that one’s natu-ral reason alone is insufficient to lead to the true knowledge. The entrance of sin into the world blinded humanity, and the mirror that reflected the glory of God was broken, obscuring and distorting the reflection. The fall damaged people’s ability to know God through natural reason. Calvin comments that

the manifestation of God, by which he makes his glory known in his creation, is, with regard to the light itself, sufficiently clear; but that on account of our blindness, it is not found to be sufficient. We are not however so blind, that we can plead our ignorance as an excuse for our perverseness…. But this knowl-edge of God, which avails only to take away excuse, differs greatly from that which brings salvation, which Christ mentions in John 17:3, and in which we are to glory, as Jeremiah teaches us, Jeremiah 9:24.44

“When it is said that what is invisible with respect to God has been made manifest by the things he has created (Rom. 1:20), it does not mean that it can be sufficient for us, unless we have a better assis-tance. It is not enough for us to know God as our Creator, for we have

41. John N. Thomas, “The Place of Natural Theology in the Thought of John Calvin,” 129.

42. Calvin, Institutes, 1.2.2.43. Calvin, Institutes, 1.2.2.44. Calvin. Commentaries on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans, trans.

John Owen (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1948), 71.


fallen from the state in which he placed us.”45 Calvin also affirms that “it is needful that another and better help be added to direct us aright to the very Creator of the universe.”46

This better help comes from a special revelation, and the goal of this special revelation is to gather up the confused and obscured knowledge of God in human minds and hearts, and to show them clearly the true God.47 Calvin writes: “because we fail in our role, the second remedy must come to the fore, which is that by faith we recog-nize what would otherwise be hidden from us. That is why our Lord gives us his word.”48 Through His Word, God teaches “the elect to look upon a god, but also shows himself as the God upon whom they are to look.”49 The purpose of Scripture is to enlighten what sin has darkened and to lead believers in worship and thanksgiving to the Creator.

According to Calvin, general revelation and special revelation can-not be separated, because first came that knowledge of the God who is the founder and sustainer of the world. Then God added an inner knowledge, “whereby God is known not only as the Founder of the universe, but also in the person of the Mediator as the Redeemer.”50 God revealed Himself in the Word because natural reason would cer-tainly “seek some uncertain deity by devious paths.”51

Calvin also deals with the question of whether mankind can naturally gain the true knowledge of God. He observes that “their ignorance and blockishness is mixed with such forwardness, that, being void of right judgment, they pass over without understanding all such signs of God’s glory as appear manifestly both in heaven and earth.”52 His conclusion is that since “the true knowledge of God is a singular gift of his, and faith (by which alone he is rightly known) cometh only from illumination of the Spirit, it followeth that our minds cannot pierce so far, having nature only for our guide.”53 This

45. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 3.46. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.47. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.48. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 7.49. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.50. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.51. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.52. Calvin, Commentary upon the Acts of the Apostles, 167.53. Calvin, Commentary upon the Acts of the Apostles, 167.


means that we cannot truly know the real God through natural theol-ogy unless Scripture illumines them.

For Calvin, Scripture is superior to all human wisdom, and “unless this certainty, higher and stronger than any human judg-ment, be present, it will be vain to fortify the authority of Scripture by arguments, to establish it by common agreement of the church, or to confirm it with other helps. For unless this foundation is laid, its authority will always remain in doubt.”54 As Calvin writes, the same psalmist that affirms: “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork” (Ps. 19:1) also mentions the Word of God: “The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The stat-utes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes” (Ps. 19:7–8).55

According to Calvin, the Word is “the very school of God’s children” since it is in vain that God “calls all peoples to himself by contemplation of heaven and earth.”56 He writes in his Catechism:

Not only do we sin out of blindness alone, but such is our per-versity that in reckoning God’s works, there is nothing it does not interpret badly and wrongheadedly, and it turns completely upside down the whole heavenly wisdom which clearly shines in them. Therefore we must come to God’s Word, where God is duly described to us from His works, while the works them-selves are reckoned not from the depravity of our judgment, but the eternal rule of truth. From this therefore, we learn that God is for us the sole and eternal source of all life, righteousness, wisdom, power, goodness and mercy. As all good flows, with-out any exception, from Him, so ought all praise deservedly to return to Him.57

Therefore, “since the human mind because of its feebleness can in no way attain to God unless it be aided and assisted by his Sacred Word, all mortals at that time…because they were seeking God with-out the Word, had of necessity to stagger about in vanity and error.”58

54. Calvin, Institutes, 1.8.1.55. Calvin, Institutes. 1.6.4.56. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.4.57. Calvin, Catechism, 8.58. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.4.


He writes just pages later that “those who, having forsaken Scripture, imagine some way or other of reaching God, ought to be thought of as not so much gripped by error as carried away with frenzy.”59

Calvin believes that those who seek God apart from His Word will certainly fall in error and idolatry. Human beings need Scripture in order to understand God’s revelation in nature and in order to do a proper natural theology. According to Calvin, as Thomas writes, “natural theology is no preparation for the revelation in Scripture. The movement is from special revelation to natural theology, not the reverse.”60

It is not the contemplation of creation that leads people to God’s Word and true knowledge; rather, Scripture leads people to contem-plate His revelation in nature. Calvin writes that “the knowledge of God, otherwise quite clearly set forth in the system of the universe and in all creatures, is nonetheless more intimately and also more viv-idly revealed in his Word.”61 In fact, he affirms that “the knowledge of God set forth for us in Scripture is destined for the very same goal as the knowledge whose imprint shines in his creatures, in that it invites us first to fear God, then to trust in him.”62 For Calvin, the problem is not with God’s revelation in nature, but it is with our limited and sinful capacity to do a proper natural theology. Thus, Calvin gives natural theology its rightful place within its own limits.

The Limits of Natural TheologyCalvin knew that natural theology alone could not reveal meaningful truths about God because of the effects of sin. Therefore, he encour-ages us to look at the natural knowledge of God through the frame of general and special revelation. Calvin does not deny natural theology, but sets some limitations that must be respected in order to have the true knowledge of God.

First, as I have already observed above, Calvin held that natural theology offers only a vague knowledge of God as the Creator of the universe because of the limitations of natural reason. He claims that, because of the human situation and limitation, “God extends to us a

59. Calvin, Institutes, 1.9.1.60. Thomas, “The Place of Natural Theology in the Thought of John Calvin,”

134.61. Calvin, Institutes, 1.10.1.62. Calvin, Institutes, 1.10.2.


wondrous kindness, greatly pleased to help us in our ignorance, in our reluctance, and perceive in our wickedness, by adding his word to what we can see and perceive by experience. Consequently, we can call God’s word our eyeglasses.”63

Natural science is therefore a gift from God but is sufficiently limited and cannot communicate the true wisdom and knowledge of God.64 Calvin believes that those who pursue natural theology should be able to explore, describe, and understand the works of God, and this understanding should cause them to give the Lord glory and honor. However, this knowledge comes only with the help of special revelation. Consequently, natural theology, Calvin teaches, should never be dissociated from general and special revelation. In fact, natu-ral theology is based on God’s revelation in nature.

Second, only the believer can achieve a proper natural theology. Calvin affirms that, through the Word, God teaches “the elect to look upon a god, but also shows himself as the God upon whom they are to look.”65 Since the person needs to be regenerated by the Holy Spirit in order to understand and to correctly interpret the Word of God and to recognize His revelation, true natural theology is only possible for those who have been saved and regenerated by God and are able to recognize Him both in creation and in Scripture.

Calvin believes that natural theology brings more benefits for the believer than the unbeliever. Young claims that “Calvin regarded it as diabolical science that would focus our attention on the works of nature and then turn them away from God.”66 In fact, Calvin himself affirms that “empty is the man in whom there is not the knowledge of God, whatever other learning he may possess; yea, the sciences and the arts, which in themselves are good, are empty things, when they are without this ground work.”67 This means that the writings of non-Christian scholars concerning natural theology and natural knowledge of God may contain some truth; however, the truth in their work is obscured and confused because of the limitations of their natural reason.

63. Calvin, Sermons on Genesis, 4.64. Calvin, Commentary on the Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians, trans.

John Pringle (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1848), 1:45.65. Calvin, Institutes, 1.6.1.66. Young, John Calvin and the Natural World, 16.67. Calvin, Commentaries on the Epistles to the Romans, 126.


According to Schreiner, “Calvin recognized not only that the remaining gifts of man function quite well within the earthly realm but argued also that this lower sphere is the proper realm of activity for the believer. Christians are not to crucify all natural knowledge but are to submit their minds to Christ, after which they are to use their knowledge within the world.”68 Believers are to be active in nat-ural theology, and all creation should be used not only for necessity but also for delight. “This created realm can be enjoyed properly and is the legitimate sphere in which Christians are to act, study, and exer-cise their considerable talents and abilities; the church does not call the Christians away from the world created by God.”69

In fact, Calvin believes that the liberal arts and all the natural sciences are confined within their own limits.70 It means that natural theology is worthless until it has become subject to the Word of God, and if those who are engaged in natural theology “set themselves in opposition to Christ, they must be looked upon as dangerous pests.”71 The correct knowledge of God should draw the believer closer to Christ. Thus, Christians should approach natural theology based on divine revelation, not out of speculation only.

Calvin summarizes his view of natural theology in the Commen-taries on the Book of Genesis:

For men are commonly subject to these two extremes; namely, that some, forgetful of God, apply the whole force of their mind to the consideration of nature; and others, overlooking the works of God, aspire with a foolish and insane curiosity to inquire into his Essence. Both labor in vain. To be so occupied in the inves-tigation of the secrets of nature, as never to turn the eyes to its Author, is a most perverted study; and to enjoy everything in nature without acknowledging the Author of the benefit, is the basest ingratitude.72

Later, Calvin affirms that God added a new remedy to assist the ignorance of human minds. “For by the Scripture as our guide and

68. Schreiner, The Theater of His Glory, 120–21.69. Schreiner, The Theater of His Glory, 121.70. Calvin, Commentary on the Epistles to the Corinthians, 1:145.71. Calvin, Commentary on the Epistles to the Corinthians, 1:145.72. Calvin, Commentaries on the Book of Genesis, trans. John King (Grand Rapids:

Eerdmans, 1948), 1:60.


teacher, he not only makes those things plain which would otherwise escape our notice, but almost compels us to behold them; as if he had assisted our dull sight with spectacles.”73

ConclusionWe have demonstrated that, unlike Karl Barth, Calvin does not deny the validity of natural theology. He found it possible to develop a Reformed approach to natural theology, but within its own limits. Calvin offers three important points to consider in order to practice natural theology.

First, God reveals Himself in the works of His hands, and all cre-ation reflects His wisdom, power, and goodness. God also implanted in human hearts and minds the awareness of divinity, elevating their senses in order for us to recognize God and to lead us to the true knowledge of God in worship and gratitude.

Second, the fall of Genesis 3 and the entrance of sin into the world have darkened human minds, obscuring our senses. We have failed to pursue the true knowledge of God with natural reason alone. Although we can grasp some notion of God through creation, this notion is mixed with confusion and error because of our sinful nature. Consequently, natural theology has suffered the effects of sin. The results of natural theology are limited because human reason is limited by sin.

Calvin believes that it is impossible for us to know God truly without better assistance; this assistance is provided by God’s revela-tion in Scripture. For Calvin, natural theology needs to consider not only general revelation, but also special revelation. Divine revelation is necessary to take natural knowledge back to its original purpose, which is to lead people to true knowledge of God.

Scripture corrects the effects of sin and makes natural theology possible for believers. Without it, natural reason fails to truly know God and natural theology fails to accomplish its goal. However, the written Word of God helps believers perceive God’s revelation clearly in nature, erases the effects of sin in their lives and gives them a true knowledge of God. This means that, for Calvin, there is no true nat-ural knowledge of God without revealed theology, and there is no natural theology without special revelation.

73. Calvin, Commentaries on the Book of Genesis, 62.

William Perkins (1558–1602) was known for powerful preaching and remembered for it long after his death.1 He served as lecturer at Great St. Andrew’s Church in Cambridge for almost twenty years, from 1584 until his death in 1602.2 Not all of his sermons survive, but a large number of them do;3 one of the most substantial collections is his exposition of the Sermon on the Mount, which consists of a mas-sive 260 double column, folio pages. In that exposition, as in all of his preaching, Perkins called the people of England to live up to the ideals of the Protestant Reformation that they claimed to espouse.

Scholars tend to see either continuity or discontinuity between John Calvin and Perkins based on theological evaluations.4 The dog-matic considerations and assessments that are the focus of much of the discussion of Calvin’s relationship to the Reformed tradition distort both Calvin and later Reformed thinkers. Richard Muller has devoted

1. Benjamin Brook, The Lives of the Puritans: Containing a Biographical Account of Those Divines Who Distinguished Themselves in the Cause of Religious Liberty, from the Reformation under Queen Elizabeth, to the Act of Uniformity in 1662 (Pittsburgh: Soli Deo Gloria, 1994), 130; John Brown, Puritan Preaching in England: A Study of Past and Present, Lyman Beecher lectures 1899 (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1900), 72.

2. Joel R. Beeke and Randall J. Pederson, Meet the Puritans: With a Guide to Mod-ern Reprints (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2006), 471.

3. The surviving sermons include expositions of Zeph. 2:1–2, Matt. 4, Matt. 5–7, Gal. 1–5, Heb. 11, Jude, and Rev. 1–3. These sermons consist of vols. 1–4 in the reprinting of Perkins’s Works being undertaken by Reformation Heritage Books under the editorship of Joel R. Beeke and Derek Thomas.

4. Carl R. Trueman, “The Reception of Calvin: Historical Considerations,” Church History and Religious Culture 91, no. 1–2 (2011), 20–21. For discontinuity, see R. T. Kendall, Calvin and English Calvinism to 1649, New ed., Studies in Christian history and thought (Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 1997). For continuity, see Paul Helm, Calvin and the Calvinists (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982).

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 49–69

True Happiness: William Perkins’s Interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount

ANDREW S. BALLITCH

q


much of his corpus to changing this discussion entirely, arguing that “the Reformed tradition is a diverse and variegated movement not suitably described as founded solely on the thought of John Calvin or as either a derivation or a deviation from Calvin.”5 Perkins is often discussed when dealing with the relationship between Calvin and the later Reformed tradition. This conversation generally focuses on the theology of these individuals; yet, biblical interpretation is basic to both. While Perkins follows Calvin in his treatment of the Sermon, he is also a creative interpreter. Perkins’s handling of the Sermon is dissimilar to Calvin’s in his understanding of its composition, method of exposition, and polemics; yet he is driven by a comparable hermeneutic.

Perkins defies classification in many respects. He is credited with being the father of Puritanism, yet he never claimed the label Puri-tan for himself—in fact, he used it to deride others. He affirmed a supralapsarian ordering of the divine decrees, yet he preached evan-gelistically. He sustained a view of the atonement in which Christ’s satisfaction was only for the elect, yet he pointed people struggling with assurance to the cross and the promises of the gospel for comfort.

Perkins is also difficult to neatly categorize in his interpretation of Matthew 5–7. After a brief survey of the taxonomy of the Ser-mon, I will demonstrate this by first looking at the context of the Sermon and how Perkins puts it together as a whole. Second, I will highlight Perkins’s trends through analysis of particular passages. Observing Perkins’s method reveals unique tendencies and a heavy emphasis on application. His accent on polemics shows a resonance with Martin Luther. Finally, his moderate interpretation through a Scripture-interpreting-Scripture hermeneutic suggests affinity with Calvin. This evaluation focuses on the Beatitudes, Matthew 5:17–20, and the Lord’s Prayer, displaying Perkins as a Reformed interpreter of the Sermon on the Mount, but one not easily pigeonholed.6

5. Richard A. Muller, Calvin and the Reformed Tradition: On the Work of Christ and the Order of Salvation (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2012), 9.

6. Evidence for this will be derived from the two resources in which Perkins gave extended time and focus to the Sermon: his sermons on Matthew 5–7 and his treatise on the Lord’s Prayer. I will not deal with references to the Sermon or sec-ondary dealings with its themes throughout Perkins’s corpus.

williaM peRkins on the seRMon on the Mount 51

TaxonomyThe taxonomy of interpretive traditions for the Sermon on the Mount available to Perkins consisted of the Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist, and Anabaptist views. The Roman Catholic and Anabap-tist understandings would not have been viable options. Catholics took the burden of Jesus off of regular Christians and delegated it to monks.7 This division had nothing grounding it in the text and contradicted the cardinal Protestant doctrine of sola fide.8 Many of the radical Reformers took an absolutist view of Jesus’s Sermon, a view that understood it literally and as universally applicable.9 Perkins viewed this, along with Luther, Calvin, and other mainline Protestant thinkers, as a recipe for anarchy, contrary to common sense, and an assault on a holistic understanding of Scripture. Luther and Calvin’s articulations were realistic possibilities.

Luther’s understanding of the Sermon on the Mount must be seen in light of his view of the two kingdoms and the function of law. He attacked the Catholics for making the demands of Jesus optional and the Anabaptists for conflating the secular and the spiri-tual realm.10 Because every believer was supposed to live and work according to the demands of faith and love, the person and the office must be distinguished. Thus Luther qualified the words of Jesus with the hermeneutic of the two kingdoms.11 There was nothing in the Sermon about merit for Luther. What Jesus called His followers to was the fruit of justification, which is by faith alone. The Sermon is not all law or all gospel.12 There was law present, however, under-stood in its second use according to the classical trichotomy. In this

7. Clarence Bauman, The Sermon on the Mount: The Modern Quest for Its Meaning (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1985), 418; Harvey King Macarthur, Under-standing the Sermon on the Mount (New York: Harper, 1960), 114.

8. Dale C. Allison, The Sermon on the Mount: Inspiring the Moral Imagination (New York: Crossroad, 1999), 2–3. Allison asserts that this double-standard view was never as prominent as Protestant polemics would suggest.

9. Alisson, Sermon on the Mount, 2; Macarthur, Understanding the Sermon on the Mount, 106.

10. Loyd Allen, “The Sermon on the Mount in the History of the Church,” Review & Expositor 89, no. 2 (March 1, 1992): 251; Macarthur, Understanding the Ser-mon on the Mount, 117.

11. R. A. Guelich, “Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount,” Interpretation 41, no. 2 (1987): 119.

12. Jeffrey P. Greenman, Timothy Larsen, and Stephen R. Spencer, eds., Sermon


sense, the Sermon was supposed to bring about knowledge of one’s sinfulness.13 Given the impossibility of the ideal, because of sin, it taught the necessity of grace.14

Calvin also saw the demands of Jesus as applying universally, but he qualified them with the hermeneutic that Scripture interprets itself. The demands are practicable when understood in light of the whole canon.15 This analogy of Scripture allowed Calvin to moder-ately modify the requirements, making the precepts applicable to both individuals and states, to both the spiritual and the secular spheres. No one at any time is free from the law of God, and Jesus’s Sermon is just that: a clarification of the law.16 For Calvin, the New Covenant is a renewal, clarification, and restoration of the Old, not a substitute or replacement.17 He distinguishes between law and gospel but does not see them as antithetical. Because the law is fundamentally the Decalogue, which does not change, Jesus’s Sermon was an exposi-tion, not an addition. Inward righteousness was His theme, according to Calvin. Perfection or sinlessness cannot be achieved in this world, but happiness in this life depends on submitting to Jesus’s teaching. This happiness cannot be measured by one’s present state.18 Perkins did not parrot Calvin, but his interpretation of the Sermon overlaps most with that of the second-generation Reformer.

Purpose and Immediate ContextPerkins was adamant about the fact that the Sermon on the Mount was a real sermon, preached as one extended discourse. This form is indicated by the opening and closing statements. The Sermon was also the same address found in Luke.19 These assertions were very

on the Mount Through the Centuries: From the Early Church to John Paul II (Grand Rap-ids: Brazos, 2007), 111.

13. Macarthur, Understanding the Sermon on the Mount, 125.14. Allison, The Sermon on the Mount, 4.15. Guelich, “Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount,” 120. 16. Allen, “The Sermon on the Mount in the History of the Church,” 253;

Macarthur, Understanding the Sermon on the Mount, 120.17. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries,

142.18. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries,

145–50.19. J. Stephen Yuille, Living Blessedly Forever (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heri-

tage Books, 2012), 16–17.


different from Calvin’s. Calvin saw the design of both Matthew and Luke as collecting into one place the leading points of Jesus’s doc-trine relating to a devout and holy life. Because of this assumption, he sees some portions as detached, with no connection to the immediate context.20 Perkins’s assertions inform his understanding of the pur-pose and immediate context of Jesus’s Sermon.

Jesus’s purpose, according to Perkins, was “to teach his disciples, with all that believe in him, to lead a godly, holy, and blessed life.”21 This is the scope and point of the Sermon. The Jewish leaders had corrupted the true meaning of Moses and the prophets, so Jesus’s intent was to make that true meaning clear: the unchanging message of Scripture is the imperative to love God. This is the heart of the Mosaic law. Jesus was not instituting a new law, social gospel, or stan-dard to live by in some future kingdom; He was revealing the nature of true godliness.22 For Perkins, Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount is the “key of the whole Bible: for here Christ opens the sum of the Old and New Testament.”23 This sum is how to live a blessed life according to the law of God.

Luke’s account provides the immediate context, the time and setting of Jesus’s Sermon. Perkins understands the discourse in Luke 6 to be the same literal sermon found in Matthew 5–7. The time was the second year of Christ’s ministry. After curing the man with a withered hand on the Sabbath, He went up into the moun-tain because the Scribes and Pharisees were trying to kill Him. He spent the night there in prayer and then elected the twelve disciples. Matthew includes the account of the calling of the twelve in chapter 10 because that was the occasion of their commission to preach. But according to the context found in Luke, the actual timeline is such that Jesus calls His disciples on the mountain before the Sermon. He went down and performed miracles, but had to retreat again because of the crowds. He then preached the Sermon on the Mount to His

20. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries, 133–34.

21. William Perkins, The Workes of That Famous and Worthy Minister of Christ in the Vniuersitie of Cambridge, Mr. William Perkins, 3 vols. (London: John Legatt, 1616), 3:1. When quoting Perkins I have modernized the letters and the spelling. Gram-mar, punctuation, and capitalization are consistent with the original.

22. Yuille, Living Blessedly Forever, 19.23. Perkins, Workes, 3:1.


disciples with the multitude in the audience.24 This understanding of the purpose and context is crucial for understanding how Perkins handles the Sermon.

CompositionPerkins sees the Sermon composed of a preface, the matter, and the conclusion. The preface comprises the brief introduction of the first two verses. The body includes twelve heads of doctrine by which Per-kins organizes the major movements of his sermons. He sees five marks of godliness: blessedness, repentance, righteousness, sincer-ity, and contentment.25 These marks are followed by seven heads that describe the state of the faithful. The matter begins with the Beati-tudes. For Perkins, blessedness or “true happiness before God, is ever joined, yea covered many times, with the cross in this world.” The disciples were promised happiness, but seemed to get more misery. Jesus asserts that happiness is not carnal joy, which arises from one’s circumstances, but spiritual joy, which arises out of one’s relationship with God. The beatitudes then, are “rules for happiness.”26

Perkins systematically walks through each beatitude and asks two questions: who is blessed? And why? The promises are fulfilled partly in this life, but primarily in the next. The first rule for happiness is poverty of spirit, which for Perkins is proper self-perception in light of sin. Those who follow this rule possess at present the kingdom of grace, which will culminate in the kingdom of glory. The second rule for happiness is mourning or great distress over “an inward feeling of their spiritual want.”27 It is not just grief in Perkins’s understand-ing, but grief over sin. Those who experience such mourning are comforted by seeking God’s forgiveness in Jesus Christ. Meekness, another characteristic of the happy, is “a gift of God’s Spirit, whereby a man doth moderate his affection of anger, and bridle in himself impa-tience, hatred, and desire of revenge.”28 This attribute flows from the first two, for it is manifested in the bearing of the judgment of God

24. Perkins, Workes, 3:1–2.25. This language for Perkins’s five categories is from Yuille’s Living Blessedly

Forever, but is not foreign to Perkins’s work and both briefly and helpfully character-izes Perkins’s understanding of each of his divisions.

26. Perkins, Workes, 3:3.27. Perkins, Workes, 3:5–6.28. Perkins, Workes, 3:6–7.


and the reproach of men. The meek share in Christ’s inheritance, which is the whole earth. That inheritance is theirs by right and one day they will possess it in full. Those who hunger and thirst for righ-teousness long for both outward and inward righteousness. Perkins understands outward righteousness as justification and inward righ-teousness as sanctification. Those with such longing are filled because of partial satisfaction in this life and completion in the next. The mer-ciful are happy because they will receive mercy. Perkins stresses that this does not teach a doctrine of merit, but that “holy compassion of heart, whereby a man is moved to help another in his misery” is evi-dence of the mercy he has obtained.29

The sixth rule of happiness is purity in heart. This is obtained, again, through justification and sanctification, for “the holy in heart, having their hearts purged from defilement of their sin, can be in part renewed and sanctified by the Holy Ghost.”30 The heart for Per-kins is equivalent to the soul, consisting of the mind, conscience, will, and affections. The beatific vision is by faith through a “sight of the mind when the creature sees God, so far forth as it is capable of his knowledge.” It is perception of God “by his effects,” but the pure in heart will one day see Him “perfectly.”31 Peacemakers are those who are happy because they bring concord and agreement among men, which begins with peace with God. They are happy because their adoption is declared in this world and will be enjoyed fully in eternity. The final rule of happiness is being persecuted for righteousness’s sake. Everyone who lives contrary to the world by the previous seven rules will be persecuted, but eternal life is the reward. The paradox and apparent absurdity of the statements found in the Beatitudes only make sense in light of Christ and the cross.32

29. Perkins, Workes, 3:7–12.30. Perkins, Workes, 3:14.31. Perkins, Workes, 3:16.32. Perkins, Workes, 3:17–20. Calvin was also alert to the tension between the

believer’s present experience and the future promise, though his is even more of an eschatological emphasis. The Beatitudes have ethical demands implicit in them, but they are not entrance requirements into the kingdom, according to Calvin; rather, they are evidences manifested by those who are already part of the kingdom (John Calvin, Sermons on the Beatitudes: Five Sermons from the Gospel Harmony, Delivered in Geneva in 1560, trans. Robert White [Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2006], ix–x). Calvin’s sermons on the Beatitudes exegetically follow the interpretation found in his commentary, which preceded them (John Calvin, A Harmony of the Gospels,


Perkins holds that Matthew 5:13–16 explains how one becomes like those described in the Beatitudes, namely, through repentance. Jesus transitions to the illustrations of salt and light, which are the ministry of the apostles. Preaching is compared to salt, the properties of which when “applied to raw flesh, or fresh wounds are principally three: First, it will bite and fret, being of nature hot and dry; secondly, it makes meats savory unto our taste; thirdly, it preserveth meats from putrification, by drawing out of them superfluous moistness.” Preach-ing the Word of God, which includes both law and gospel, must have the same effect. The law must be applied to “rip up men’s hearts,” to recognize their sin, and cause them to renounce themselves. The gospel must season corrupt men with grace, so that they may be “rec-onciled to God, and made savory in his sight.” “Law and gospel must be continually dispensed” for the cause of preservation.33

Good works, or holiness of life, are compared to light. Perkins understands them to have a threefold use. They express reverence, obedience, and thankfulness to God; serve as evidence of salvation; and are a testimony to others. With regard to preaching, the similitude of light is important for two reasons. It shows the use of preaching in expelling the darkness or ignorance and how God’s Word is to be handled, namely, to make people aware of sin and the remedy of Christ. These illustrations of salt and light indirectly refer to other ministers and all Christians, but the ministry of the apostles is what Jesus had in view. Their preaching and good works are the salt and light, which bring people to repentance.34

According to Perkins, Jesus goes on the offensive in the rest of chapter 5 in restoring the moral law to its true sense, describing what it means to be righteous. The Jewish leaders’ accusation against Jesus about diminishing the law’s importance is the background of this part

Matthew, Mark and Luke., ed. David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance, trans. A. W. Morrison, 3 vols., Calvin’s Commentaries [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972]). Both portray an eschatological hope in the midst of contrary evidence in this life. While both Perkins and Calvin put the emphasis on the inward fulfillment of human happiness in the present life, Calvin seems to think that this inner realiza-tion will be less substantial than Perkins allows.

33. Perkins, Workes, 3:23. 34. Perkins, Workes, 3:26–32. The idea that being salt and light refers to the

apostles and ministers, while only referring to all Christians secondarily is a minor-ity interpretation. However, Calvin also affirmed it. See Calvin, Harmony of the Gospels, 175–78.


of the Sermon. Perkins understands Jesus to make three arguments. First, from verse 17, His purpose in coming was to fulfill the whole Old Testament. This is primarily a statement about the moral law, which is made clear by Jesus’s emphasis on the Decalogue in the rest of the chapter. Jesus fulfills it by restoring it, obeying it, suffering its penalty, and creating faith in His people. Second, in verses 18 and 19, Jesus promises that the law is permanent. The moral law is the eternal and unchanging rule for all people. Lastly, in verse 20, Jesus imposes His standard—a standard that is higher than that of the Jewish lead-ers.35 This is unfolded in six antitheses in the rest of chapter 5. Here Perkins sees Jesus restoring the moral law from the corruptions of the Jewish authorities and their focus on externals.36 Why command what no one can perform? No one can be perfect, but Perkins sees two reasons for the requirement. While it points to human beings’ need for justification or outward righteousness, it also aids the pursuit of sanctification or inward righteousness.37

Perkins sees another shift in Jesus’s Sermon in Matthew 6, from a description of righteousness to its pursuit through sincerity and con-tentment. One must be careful to avoid hypocrisy, which is a desire to please human beings rather than God, in the areas of giving, prayer, and fasting. Perkins expounds extensively on the Lord’s Prayer, which he sees as made up of a preface, six petitions, and a conclusion.38 The first three petitions focus on God’s glory, and the second three on the needs of humanity. God’s glory is the end of all things, even human needs.39 The conclusion, the fact that the kingdom, power, and glory eternally belong to God is the very reason for prayer.40 The first half of chapter 6 teaches sincerity, while the second teaches contentment. The imperative is to avoid attachment to worldly things.

35. Perkins, Workes, 3:33–40.36. Perkins, Workes., 3:57.37. Perkins, Workes, 3:101.38. See Kenneth Stevenson, The Lord’s Prayer: A Text in Tradition (Minneapolis:

Fortress Press, 2004), 222–23, for a discussion of the understanding of the shape of the Lord’s Prayer throughout church history. He shows that Perkins’s understand-ing of the prayer was more overtly Calvinistic than the Church of England Prayer Book, which included seven petitions and heavy liturgical use (180–81).

39. Perkins, Workes, 3:124.40. Perkins, Workes, 3:144.


Perkins’s understanding of the Lord’s Prayer deserves further attention, because he gave it an extended treatment in a treatise enti-tled An Exposition of the Lord’s Prayer. He systematically goes through the preface, petitions, and doxology, explaining the meaning of the words, the “wants to be bewailed,” and the “graces to be desired.”41 The interpretation between the two expositions varies little, but Per-kins’s treatise is even more polemically charged. The three petitions concerning God begin with the request that God’s name be hallowed, which rightfully takes first place as it concerns God’s glory in itself. This is followed by the request that God’s kingdom would come. Per-kins distinguishes between God’s absolute and particular, His general and special, kingdoms. His absolute kingdom consists of His abso-lute power and sovereignty, which has already been established. The petition is for His particular kingdom of grace and eventually glory to come. God’s absolute will is also distinguished from His revealed will, which consists of belief in Christ, sanctification, and endurance through suffering. The idea of this will being done on earth as in heaven means as it is done in the souls of faithful, departed believers and angels.42

The final three petitions are connected to the first according to Perkins. God’s name is hallowed when He reigns in the hearts of men and His will is done. And His will is done when people depend on His providence for earthly things, His mercy for pardon, and His power and might in resisting temptation. Perkins understands daily bread to mean food, raiment, or any other external need of human beings, family, and society; it is regular bread, symbolizing all things that preserve temporal life. The last two petitions reference the care of the soul, which Perkins takes as exhorting the double care of one’s soul. The request to be forgiven is an appeal for remission of sin. Such an entreaty must be repeated for renewal of fellowship. The final peti-tion is a plea for God to not lead into temptation, but to deliver from evil. Perkins sees the temptation spoken of here as that of Satan, not the testing of God; people must not only seek pardon but endeavor to prevent sins in the future. Again, the concluding doxology is the foundation for all six of the petitions.43

41. Perkins, Workes, 1:328.42. Perkins, Workes, 1:333–38; 3:126–31. 43. Perkins, Workes, 1:339–45; 3:135–44.


Perkins understands Matthew 7 to be Christ’s explanation of what it means to be faithful—“the state of those that profess his holy name.”44 This state is made up of the last seven heads of doctrine Perkins found in Jesus’s Sermon. First, being faithful means avoid-ing rash judgment.45 Second, it requires guarding the Word of God through church discipline.46 Third, the faithful ones are marked by earnest prayer.47 Fourth, the faithful practice equity and justice.48 Fifth, Christ exhorts “his hearers and us all effectually, to an earnest care in seeking eternal life.”49 Sixth, faithfulness involves discerning and avoiding false prophets.50 The final mark of faithfulness is doing the Father’s will.51 These seven marks identify those who are faithful, namely, those who profess His holy name.

Perkins sees Jesus’s conclusion as an exhortation to be doers of His teaching. It is not enough to hear, read, or learn Jesus’s doctrine, but one must put it into practice.52 The house that Jesus references in verses 24 through 27 is a profession of faith. Perkins understands the difference between the wise man and the foolish man, or the foun-dation of sand and the foundation of rock, as the difference between the effectual doer and the forgetful hearer. The doer is the one who experiences true happiness.

Perkins’s MethodPerkins’s method of exposition was relentlessly systematic and heavily emphasized application.53 Perkins lays out his hermeneutic and homi-letic principles in his The Arte of Prophesying. His method is threefold: interpretation, analysis, and application. Interpretation begins with

44. Perkins, Workes, 3:244.45. Perkins, Workes, 3:194. Matt. 7:1–5.46. Perkins, Workes, 3:207–8. Matt. 7:6.47. Perkins, Workes, 3:213. Matt. 7:7–11.48. Perkins, Workes, 3:219. Matt 7:12.49. Perkins, Workes, 3:226. Matt 7:13–14.50. Perkins, Workes, 3:234. Matt 7:15–20.51. Perkins, Workes, 3:244. Matt 7:21–23.52. Perkins, Workes, 3:258–59.53. Donald McKim understands Perkins’s method and resulting structure to

be primarily the influence of Peter Ramus (Ramism in William Perkins’ Theology, American University Studies. Series VII, Theology and Religion vol. 15 [New York: Peter Lang, 1987]). While Ramism was influential at Cambridge during Perkins’s career, I think McKim overstates his case.


grammar, rhetoric, and logical analysis. The goal is to bring out one, full, and natural sense. This goal is accomplished by considering the analogy of faith, the context of the passage, and other passages. The analysis or “resolution” is the drawing out of the passage’s various doc-trines, and these doctrines are then applied. The key for application is determining whether the passage is law or gospel; law points out sin and gospel teaches what is to be done or believed. Perkins articu-lates seven spiritual conditions or ways of applying. This sophisticated breakdown allows application to be specific and pointed.54

Perkins’s approach is seen throughout his sermons on the Sermon on the Mount. The demonstration of this will be limited to three examples. First, this method is clear in his exposition of the very first beatitude. He begins with interpretation, explaining how the state-ment that the poor are happy is an apparent contradiction. He defines the word “poor” as one who must beg. The teaching that he draws out of the statement is that the poor Jesus refers to are those who are aware of their sin, despair in themselves, and wholly fly to the mercy of God for grace and comfort. Perkins then goes about applying this truth. The first use is to test whether one is poor in this way. The second application is for the physically poor man, who is to allow his distress to show him his spiritual poverty. The application for the rich man is the same, but it is much harder because of his outward bless-ings. The fourth and final use is the uselessness of voluntary poverty.

Perkins then moves into interpretation of the second phrase. He reasons that receiving the kingdom of heaven is the cause of the hap-piness for the poor in spirit. The poor in spirit possess the kingdom of grace in their heart and will one day have full possession of the king-dom of glory. The first of four applications is that men should not seek happiness in this estate, whether in pleasure, wealth, or civil virtues. Second, men should also pray for the kingdom of heaven to come. Third, God’s Word should be listened to with fear and reverence, for through its preaching the kingdom of heaven is erected. Lastly, this truth should console those who experience physical poverty.55

54. See Ian Breward, “Introduction,” in The Work of William Perkins, ed. Ian Breward (Abingdon: Sutton Courtenay, 1970). For The Arte of Prophesying, see Per-kins, Workes, 2:646–73.

55. Perkins, Workes, 3:4–6.


Another representative example of Perkins’s method is his sermon on Jesus’s statement about the law not passing away (found in Matthew 5:18). Here Perkins begins with exposition, pointing out that the word “for” connects the verse to the one preceding. Jesus is setting down the stability and unchangeableness of the law, so much so that not even one letter will pass from it. The point, according to Perkins, is that the substance of the law will never be changed. It is eternal; it will never stop needing to be fulfilled. Thus this verse fits perfectly in Jesus’s defense against charges of destroying the law. The fact that the law is immutable and eternal is the doctrine from which Perkins draws nine applications. First, the moral law is perpetual and remains forever a rule of obedience for every child of God. Also, no creature may dis-pense with God’s law. Third, this brings confidence in the canon of Scripture, that no books are lost. Fourth, it should instill terror in the wicked, for the curse of the law against them is forever. Fifth, it should conversely be a comfort to the godly, for the promises found in Scrip-ture are forever. Sixth, it makes patience in affliction possible. Seventh, it ensures the integrity of the law. Eighth, it compels magistrates to enforce the law of God in their jurisdictions. Lastly, it affirms the fact that to keep the law is to keep it in its entirety.56

Perkins plainly adheres to his professed method again in his ser-mon on the preface of the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus’s words “our Father” refer to God, the first person of the Trinity who is the Father of all by creation and of Christ and His adopted children by special relation-ship. Jesus asserts that He is in heaven as an affirmation of His majesty and glory, manifested in His power, wisdom, justice, and mercy. The instructions then are that prayer is to be directed toward God alone. The Father is the first in order of the Trinity and is therefore usually addressed in prayer, but this does not exclude the Son and Spirit. The third and fourth applications are that men can go boldly before God in prayer because God is Father.

The fact that God is our Father also has four uses. This reality allows His children to apply His promises in Christ to themselves. They must also acknowledge the whole of the church in prayer; they must go to God with proper affection toward one another. Lastly, this truth teaches that all are equal before God. The doctrine that God is in heaven is the final teaching of this verse according to Perkins, and

56. Perkins, Workes, 3:35–37.


it has four further applications. First, in prayer, hearts, eyes, hands, and the whole being is to be directed toward heaven. Second, rever-ence is required in prayer. Third, heavenly things should primarily occupy petitions. Finally, one’s principle care should be how to get to heaven.57

Perkins remains true to his heavy emphasis on application even in his treatise on the Lord’s Prayer. For instance, in his elucidation of the first petition, Perkins argues that the rest of the requests are founded upon it. He understands it to be concerned with God’s glory itself. He defines “name” and explains what it means to “hallow.” He then devotes the same amount of space to application. The wants which are to be bewailed are pride of heart, hardness of heart, ingratitude, and an evil life. In contrast, the graces that are to be desired are knowledge of God, zeal for His glory, and a desire for sincerity of life.58 Perkins utilizes this threefold approach for all six petitions and the doxology, revealing a systematic method and an emphasis on application.

Perkins’s method is quite distinct from Calvin’s.59 Calvin’s ser-mons also go verse by verse and at times phrase by phrase, but there is

57. Perkins, Workes, 3:120–24.58. Perkins, Workes, 1:333–35.59. Calvin left no extended treatment of hermeneutics or method, but he did

leave clues to his primary interpretive principles. These principles include lucid brevity and authorial intent. Calvin’s discussion of his preference for clarity and concision is found in his preface to his commentary on Romans (John Calvin, The Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Romans and to the Thessalonians, ed. David W. Tor-rance and Thomas F. Torrance, trans. Ross Mackenzie, Calvin’s Commentaries [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1960]). He says that he felt “lucid brevity constituted the particular virtue of an interpreter” and while he acknowledges differences of opinion, he is “incapable of being moved by a love of abbreviation.” Beyond this commitment, Calvin reveals that he is inclined toward expounding the mind of the author in his preface to the homilies of Chrysostom (Ian Hazlett, “Calvin’s Latin Preface to His Proposed French Edition of Chrysostom’s Homilies: Transla-tion and Commentary,” in Humanism and Reform: The Church in Europe, England, and Scotland, 1400–1643: Essays in Honour of James K. Cameron, ed. James Kirk, Studies in Church History 8 [Oxford: Blackwell, 1991]). Here Calvin argues that tradition, including the Fathers of the church, should not be accepted uncritically. He favors Chrysostom because he strove to stay true to “the genuine plain meaning of Scrip-ture, and not to indulge in any license of twisting the straightforward sense of the words.” Calvin understands the expositor as concerned with the text. He assumes that we can understand what the author is communicating in the text. This explains his meticulous care for detail and great emphasis on Hebrew and Greek. These were necessary avenues leading to the literal meaning (T. H. L. Parker, Calvin’s New


a much more fluid and arbitrary feel. There is no structural indication of where exactly he is in the passage, as there is in his commentaries, where he systematically quotes the text and then explains it. There is no apparent structure, at least with any kind of consistency.60 This makes application sporadic and seemingly incidental, even if at times prevalent.

PolemicsPerkins takes an explicitly confrontational stance in his sermons on the Sermon on the Mount. He equates Roman Catholic teaching with what the Scribes and Pharisees were propounding in Jesus’s day, so Jesus’s teaching is used against the doctrine and practice of Rome. The exposition is a constant diatribe against Roman Catholicism; polem-ics are found in explanation, doctrine, and especially in application. Perkins mentions “Rome” or “Romish” forty-one times, with the vast majority being the “Church of Rome.” He denounces the “pope,” “popery,” or “popedom” thirty-two times. “Romish” things and “pop-ery” were often discounted for superstition. He attacks “papist(s)” sixty-five times throughout the sermons. These labels were in no way endearing or mere slights; in Perkins’s context, the Church of Rome and popery within the Church of England were bitter enemies. He does argue against Anabaptists, but only four times. He equates them with Familists and disagrees with their interpretation of Jesus’s prohi-bition of oath taking and their forbidding of the use of the exact words of the Lord’s Prayer—essentially taking issue with a hermeneutic that sacrifices the natural sense for an overly literal or spiritual sense.

Because Perkins’s polemics are almost as ubiquitous as his consistent method, the following examples will have to serve as representative of his practice. First, recall his exposition of the first

Testament Commentaries, 2nd ed. [Louisville: Westminster, 1993], 92). Calvin faith-fully and consistently sticks to the point of the text in his commentaries, refraining from indulging in theology (Parker, Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries, 192). Calvin’s preaching went beyond expounded truth to include application, exhorta-tion, and reproof (T. H. L. Parker, Calvin’s Preaching, 1st American ed. [Louisville: Westminster, 1992], 79). The nature of the task of preaching made diffuseness and repetition necessary.

60. Joseph A. Pipa, “William Perkins and the Development of Puritan Preach-ing” (PhD diss., Westminster Theological Seminary, 1985), 145–52. Pipa makes the case that Calvin did at times divide the text before expounding it and impose a structure upon his sermon, but this was very rare.


beatitude. One of his applications is against monastic vows of pov-erty. He says that based on this teaching of poverty in spirit, “Popish teachers” take voluntary vows of poverty, renouncing wealth and pos-sessions, and take up a monastic life of solitude. Perkins asserts that this poverty “will not agree with this text,” for “the Popish vow of voluntary poverty is no estate of misery or distress; for who do live in greater ease, or enjoy more freedom from the crosses and vexations of this life, then their begging Friars?”61 In the same way that the second beatitude is not about mourning for no reason, neither does poverty in spirit refer to self-inflicted outward poverty. Perkins is quick to use this teaching of Jesus as a sweeping denunciation of monasticism.

Another example of polemics from Perkins’s sermons on the Sermon on the Mount is his exposition of Matthew 5:18. Three of his nine applications directly combat the Church of Rome. The third application is that “no creature may dispense with the Law of God,” which “showed the blasphemous impiety of the Popes of Rome”; they dispense with the laws of God. Perkins provides the example of the Council of Trent, which overturned some of the laws of consanguin-ity found in Leviticus 18. The seventh application is that diligent study of Scripture should result from understanding the integrity of the law. Close study of every passage, sentence, verse, and letter is nec-essary for preserving and upholding the church. Perkins claims that “four or five hundred years ago, men left off to study the Bible, after this sort, and betook themselves to the writings of men, occupying their wits wholly in vain quiddities in Philosophy, and in hid myster-ies of Divinity,” with the result that “Popery and Apostasy from the truth, spread itself over the world, for many hundred years together.” According to Perkins, God, out of His mercy, caused some men to diligently study Scripture, which made the truth, appear “as light out of darkness.” He then tells the story of Luther’s conversion, founded upon study and meditation on Romans 3:21. He found that “by the perfect obedience of Christ, our justification was wrought; and there-upon, began to maintain and profess Justification before God to be free, through and by faith in Christ only, without help from works of the law, against the Doctrine of the Church of Rome.” The fateful story of Roman Catholicism and the glorious revival of the Refor-mation illustrate the importance of diligent biblical study. The final

61. Perkins, Workes, 3:5.


application is that the law must be kept in its entirety. On this “we may ground two conclusions against the Papists.” First, no one can be saved based on personal righteousness and obedience. Secondly, one’s fulfilling of the law must be in the obedience of Christ.62 For Perkins, the doctrine and practice of the Church of Rome are woe-fully inadequate.

Perkins’s separate exposition of the Lord’s Prayer also illustrates this point. From the very first line of Jesus’s prayer, Perkins finds applications that counter Roman Catholic practices. “Our Father” means that God alone is to be the receiver of prayer, not Mary or the saints. Further, the fact that God is “in heaven” has repercussions for life on earth. It makes “Romish” pilgrimages vain and foolish. It also necessitates the purging of crosses, roods, and other manifestations of “popish idolatry.”63 This type of opposition to the Church of Rome is found throughout Perkins’s sermons.

Perkins’s polemical intensity is closer to Luther’s handling of the Sermon on the Mount than Calvin’s. Luther took a combative pos-ture from the beginning, with his interpretation on the whole as a call for battle against all enemies, especially Satan.64 Satan, and the demonic, were primarily seen in the Church of Rome and the inter-nal movements that splintered Protestantism.65 With regard to the interpretation of Jesus’s Sermon, both Roman Catholics and Ana-baptists saw the visibly perfect life as earning rewards, according to Luther.66 Early in the preface to his sermons on the Sermon on the Mount, Luther asserts that Matthew 5 “has fallen into the hands of the vulgar pigs and asses, the jurists and sophists, the right hand of that jackass of a pope and of his mamelukes. Out of this beautiful rose they have sucked and broadcast poison, covering up Christ with it and elevating and maintaining Antichrist.”67 He maintains this tone,

62. Perkins, Workes, 36–37.63. Perkins, Workes, 1:330–32.64. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries,

109.65. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries,

119. 66. Greenman, Larsen, and Spencer, Sermon on the Mount Through the Centuries,

125.67. Martin Luther, The Sermon on the Mount and the Magnificat, ed. Jaroslav

Pelikan, trans. Jaroslav Pelikan, vol. 21, Luther’s Works (St. Louis: Concordia, 1955), 3.


for the most part, throughout his sermons. Calvin includes polemics, particularly against Rome, in his treatment of Jesus’s Sermon, but his style is vastly different and less dominating. On comparison, Perkins’s polemics are closer to Luther’s than Calvin’s, while less biting.

Perkins’s HermeneuticPerkins adopted a hermeneutic of Scripture interpreting Scripture, allowing him to practicably apply the demands of the Sermon on the Mount universally. Calvin used this analogy of Scripture as well. It allows the interpreter to avoid the extremes of Roman Catholic teach-ing and Anabaptist ideals. It also allows consistent application to both the spiritual and secular kingdoms. In his discussion of Matthew 5:21–22, Perkins is careful to qualify that not all killing is wrong; he makes this caveat based on the witness of the rest of the canon. God gives men the power to kill in three ways in the Bible. First, He gives permission to princes and governors. From these legitimate forms of authority, executioners and soldiers derive license to kill malefactors and enemies in lawful war. The second is found in an extraordinary commandment. Here Perkins recalls Abraham’s directive to sacri-fice his son, Isaac. The third is by “extraordinary instinct, which is answerable to a special commandment.” The reference for this is the slaying of Zimri and Cozbi by Phinehas.68 Based on the whole of Scripture, Perkins concludes that killing is murder when it is done without warrant from God.

Perkins moderates the idea of relying on God for one’s daily means of living in several places. In his discussion of the Lord’s Prayer, he argues that “give us this day our daily bread” does not pro-hibit one from saving. This is evidenced by the story of Joseph and his storing up of grain in Egypt for the inevitable famine. The apostolic example of providing for the church of Judea is another indication that reliance on God for one’s daily bread is not comparable to Israel’s wilderness wandering and God’s daily provision of manna.69 Later in Matthew 6, Jesus commands that people not lay up treasures on earth, but in heaven. Here Perkins is quick to say that Jesus does not discourage saving. The point is to teach a “moderate care and desire of worldly things.” He sees three things that Christ does not forbid.

68. Perkins, Workes, 3:47.69. Perkins, Workes, 1:340.


First, “diligent labor in a man’s vocation” is not forbidden or else God “should be contrary to himself.” Perkins concludes this from Genesis 3:19, “enjoining man to eat his bread in the sweat of his face” and 2 Thessalonians 3:10, “he that will not labor, should not eat.” Second, “the fruition and possession of goods” is not forbidden, for they are good things from God as illustrated by Abraham, Job, and Solomon. Last, simple accumulation is not forbidden, for 2 Corinthians 12:14 says, “the father must lay up for the children,” and the Temple had a treasury. As a rule, Perkins proposes, “things necessary for man’s per-son and his calling, a man may seek for and lay up; but for abundance, and for superfluities, no man ought to labor or be careful.”70 The issue was to trust God for one’s daily needs.

Perkins restricts Jesus’s words “ judge not” in Matthew 7:1 to rash judgment. From the rest of Scripture, it is obvious that “this com-mandment forbids not all kind of judgment, but must be restrained to unlawful judgment.” The kinds of lawful judgment condoned by Scripture are four. One is civil judgment, belonging to the magis-trate. Another is ecclesiastical, belonging primarily to ministers; they may judge and condemn public sin as Hebrews 11:7 recounts Noah doing. There are also forms of private judgment allowed by Scripture. There is private admonition, which is commanded. This includes one Christian reprehending another for sin in a loving manner. Finally, there is just dispraise, “when the gross faults of notorious persons are reproved and condemned for this end alone, that others may take warning thereby.” The example provided of this type of righteous judgment is Jesus Himself. He judged the life and teaching of the Pharisees that His disciples might beware of them. He calls them hypocrites and their doctrine leaven. Further, Jesus called Herod a fox in order to discourage his subtlety.71 Because Scripture explicitly approves of some judgment, both public and private, Jesus’s words must not be taken too woodenly. In Perkins’s understanding, Jesus is condemning rash, unlawful judgment.

Perkins curbs the promise of answered prayer to those who ask, seek, and knock with two rules. Prayer must be offered by those who are in Christ and according to what Christ commands and allows for the promise to be effective. Prayer acceptable unto God has four

70. Perkins, Workes, 3:163–64.71. Perkins, Workes, 3:194–95.


conditions. First, it must be “while the time of grace and mercy remaineth.” This is made clear by the parable of the ten virgins. Sec-ond, it must not be according to the will of man, as in the case of the sons of Zebedee, who were denied their request. According to 1 John 5:14, prayer must be according to the will of God for God to hear it. Third, prayer must be in faith. Perkins employs James 1:5–6 and Mark 11:24 to demonstrate that one must believe that God will grant one’s request. Fourth, the time and manner of God’s accomplishing requests must be deferred to His good pleasure. It was the mistake of Israel to demand when they would have their request answered in Psalm 78:41. The model is rather David, who waited upon the Lord as he recounted in Psalm 40:1.72 While it would seem that Jesus’s words taken literally would mean that whatever one asks for will be given, Perkins under-stands that the rest of the Bible demands a different reading.

ConclusionPerkins follows Calvin in his treatment of the Sermon on the Mount, but not slavishly so. His innovation as a Reformed expositor is appar-ent in his understanding of the Sermon as a whole, his method, and his polemical tone. He was also a Reformed interpreter, utilizing the Scripture-interpreting-Scripture hermeneutic characteristic of Cal-vin’s reading of the Sermon. It should not be surprising that there are problems with continuity and discontinuity proposals, for both Cal-vin and Perkins were part of a variegated and developing international Reformed tradition. Further, they were ministering in peculiar times and places. Perkins was a third-generation Reformer in Elizabethan England, where the Reformation progressed quite differently than on the continent. He exhorted a nation, rather than a city-state. He was limited to his powers of persuasion, without the aid of civil power or ecclesiastical hierarchy and often against them.

Contextual considerations prove the identification of similarity/development more historically accurate. Perkins operated out of a similar theological framework and hermeneutic as Calvin, but this did not stop him from independent assertions (for example, that Jesus’s discourse was a literal sermon with an identifiable structure and argument). Further, Perkins developed the motif of application in sermons into the systematic goal or climax of exposition. He was

72. Perkins, Workes, 3:213.


preaching to the visible church, which included everyone in England based on birth. Observing that many of his hearers were not being sanctified, manifesting the fruit of their supposed justification, he tirelessly preached application. Perkins also intensified his polemic against Roman Catholicism in response to his context. Catholicism threatened the Church of England from within and without. Perkins may not neatly conform to an idealized Calvin, but he does fit nicely in the Reformed tradition.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 70–85

For the past five hundred years, the church has sought to refine her understanding of the doctrine of justification. To this ongoing labor, John Owen offers a significant and multi-faceted contribution.1 In his doctrine of justification, Owen both distils what was a coalescing Reformed consensus on the central issues involved in justification in the Post-Reformation era and formulates that doctrine in a way that offers distinctive insights into how the doctrine of justification is to be located within, and shaped by, a larger dogmatic system. Most specifi-cally, within Owen’s theological system, God’s nature demands that justification include the imputation of Christ’s active obedience. This suggestion, embedded within Owen’s thought, invests his articula-tion of justification with abiding potency for the church today.

To arrive at an understanding of John Owen’s doctrine of justi-fication, one must wrestle with his vast treatise entitled The Doctrine of Justification by Faith, Through the Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ; Explained, Confirmed, and Vindicated.2 While Owen dealt with issues pertaining to justification in his other writings—perhaps most

1. Presently, there are no full-length treatments of Owen’s doctrine of justifica-tion. One of the complications of producing such an account is Owen’s methodology in his primary treatise on justification. That work is structured polemically rather than systematically and thus Owen’s attention to any given doctrinal point often is spread over different sections and set within nuanced discussions of different issues and objections. Pulling his doctrine out of this polemical setting, however, is well worth the effort. The best extant accounts of Owen’s doctrine of justification are Carl R. Trueman, John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man (Aldershot: Ash-gate, 2007), 101–21; and Joel Beeke and Mark Jones, A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2012), 491–506.

2. John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold, vol. 5 (Edin-burgh: Banner of Truth, 1965), 2–400.

God, Owen, and Justification: The Role of God’s Nature in John Owen’s

Doctrine of Justification STEPHEN G. MYERS

q

GoD, owen, anD Justification 71

especially in several exchanges with Richard Baxter3—this larger work, published in 1677, represents the mature pinnacle of Owen’s doctrinal reflections in this area and it discloses his doctrine most clearly. A full analysis of this doctrine requires addressing two issues: to what extent Owen’s doctrine was representative of a larger dogmatic consciousness in the Reformed world, and what was dis-tinctive to Owen’s thought in his articulation of justification. These dual issues are addressed by placing Owen’s doctrine alongside the doctrinal systems of some of his contemporaries. Among the most prominent of these contemporaries were Francis Turretin (1623–1687), whose Institutes of Elenctic Theology (1679–1685) represented the final systemization of Geneva’s theology; and Herman Witsius (1636–1708), whose Economy of the Covenants Between God and Man (1677) represented an authoritative and influential statement of Dutch Reformed doctrine. An evaluation of these three works by Owen, Turretin, and Witsius—three of the most prominent theologians of the post-Reformation era—reveals both the representative and the distinctive components of Owen’s thought.

Owen and ImputationIn keeping with standard Protestant orthodoxy, Owen understood justification as a forensic, declarative act founded upon an imputed righteousness.4 For Owen, imputation had two constituent parts. First, imputation involved ascribing, or reckoning, something to someone; and secondly, it involved treating that person as if he possessed the thing in question.5 Owen saw this understanding of imputation underlying biblical passages such as 2 Corinthians 5:21: “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”6 Central to Owen’s

3. E.g., Owen, Works, 12:591–616.4. See, for example, Owen, Works, 5:123–37. See also Francis Turretin, Institutes

of Elenctic Theology, vol. 2, trans. George Musgrave Giger, ed. James T. Dennison, Jr. (Phillipsburg, Pa.: P&R, 1994), 634; Herman Witsius, The Economy of the Covenants Between God and Man: Comprehending A Complete Body of Divinity, vol. 1, trans. Wil-liam Crookshank (London: Baynes, Maitland, Lochhead, and Nelson, 1822; reprint, Kingsburg, Calif.: den Dulk Christian Foundation, 1990), 391 (page citations are to the reprint edition); Alister E. McGrath, Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification, 3rd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 270–71.

5. See Owen, Works, 5:162–75.6. For Owen’s fullest treatment of 2 Corinthians 5:21, see his Works, 5:347–54.


interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:21 are the two parallel sections of the verse. In the first section, Paul writes of Christ being “made” sin; in the second section, of Christians being “made” righteousness—the very heart of justification. That the Scriptures are describing an imputation in the first section of the verse is obvious, as Jesus had no wickedness nor defilement. Rather, like the Old Testament sacrifices that adumbrated Him, Christ had the sin of His people imputed to Him and He was treated as One who bore that sin.7

Given the parallel structure of the verse, this undeniably imputa-tional sense of the first clause demands an imputational sense in the second clause. Just as Christ had the sin mentioned imputed to Him, so the Christian had the righteous mentioned imputed to him. As Owen stated the correlation:

To be made the righteousness of God is to be justified; and to be made so in him, as he was made sin for us, is to be justified by the imputation of his righteousness unto us, as our sin was imputed unto him.8

The righteousness that is the formal cause of justification is an imputed righteousness. An elect sinner had a righteousness reckoned to him, and on account of that righteousness, he was treated as righ-teous by being declared righteous.

In considering his articulation of imputation, it is critical to recognize Owen’s “layered polemic.” Throughout his treatise on jus-tification, Owen frequently engages with a specific party with whom he disagrees, yet in doing so, he structures his argument so that he simultaneously is refuting the similar positions of other parties as well, even if those parties are not always explicitly named. In arguing for the imputation of righteousness, Owen openly engages with the Roman Catholic doctrine that justification is founded upon an inher-ent righteousness infused into believers.9 Just beneath this anti-Rome

Another critical text for Owen in this regard is Romans 5:18–19 (Works, 5:274–75, 321–38). For more on Romans 5, see Turretin, 2:651.

7. Owen drew particular attention to the sacrificial imputation of Leviticus 16:21–22, 30 and he saw a direct link between Isaiah 53:5, 6, 11 and 2 Corinthians 5:21. See Owen, Works, 5:34–35.

8. Owen, Works, 5:351. A similar exegesis is found in Turretin, 2:652; Witsius, 1:405. Turretin, like Owen, makes an explicit connection to Isaiah 53:6.

9. Most often, Owen critiques the doctrine of Robert Bellarmine. See, e.g.,


polemic, however, Owen also is engaging with both Arminian thought and Baxter’s Neonomian system.

Owen was able to use this layered polemic because, in his view, Rome, Arminianism, and Baxter all introduced human works into justification. Rome offered the obediences of an infused righteous-ness; both Arminianism and Baxter offered the human act of faith.10 In all three cases, human works assumed a role in justification. For Owen, the problem with thus including human works was twofold.

In the first instance, the covenantal structure of Owen’s thought absolutely precludes any role for man’s works in justification. Owen frequently cites Romans 11:6—“And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work”—as drawing an impermeable division between the economies of work and grace. The covenant of works bestowed blessings in accordance with man’s works, while the covenant of grace bestowed blessings in accordance with God’s grace and without reference to man’s works. In His deal-ings with mankind, God always operated by one of these covenantal economies. Given the stark difference between them, however, God operated by only one of the respective economies with any one indi-vidual. Given this mutual exclusivity of the economies of works and of grace, if any human work was introduced into justification, all grace was necessarily excluded and the man in question was cast back into the covenant of works economy for his salvation. Per the rationale of Romans 11:6, that man’s justification involved works and thus it would have no element of grace.11 Justification within the covenant of grace was entirely gracious, having nothing to do with man’s works, and thus the righteousness necessary for that justification had to be a righteousness wholly extrinsic to the sinner that was imputed to him. Because of the pervasiveness of Owen’s covenantal thought, he insisted that the covenantal obligation of righteousness was fulfilled entirely by Christ and had nothing at all to do with the actions of man. The righteousness of justification thus was an imputed righteousness.

Owen, Works, 5:63–64. Bellarmine’s writings were representative of Rome’s official position as expressed in Canons 9 and 11 of the Council of Trent.

10. See Beeke and Jones, 499–500. On Baxter, see McGrath, 287.11. See, e.g., Owen, Works, 5:167–68, 172, 275–77.


Importantly, Turretin and Witsius both pursued, in varied con-texts, this same rigorous exclusion of man’s works from justification. For Witsius, this exclusion comes through the robustly covenantal structure of his doctrine.12 In Turretin, a covenantal argument is pres-ent, yet one also senses the pervasiveness of the concern to excise human works from justification altogether.13 In the midst of ongoing continental debates between the followers of Voetius and Cocceius, respectively, Turretin rejects the notion of Christ as fidejussor and expands the notion of Christ as expromissor in order to argue precisely what Owen was arguing in England—that the righteousness neces-sary for justification had to be a righteousness that had everything to do with the work of Christ and nothing to do, even contingently, with the work of man.14 Whenever the possibility of man’s works being introduced into justification emerged, there was a decided and appropriately nuanced opposition to it. For Owen, this shared Reformed concern and conviction was being voiced through the cov-enantal structure of his doctrine. So, in the first instance, Owen’s covenantally-shaped doctrine led him to reject the introduction of any human work into justification.

But secondly, and perhaps more distinctively, Owen’s understand-ing of God’s nature led him to reject any human work in justification and to insist upon the imputation of righteousness.15 From the earli-est days of the Reformation, Protestant theologians had discussed the relationship between God and the law, sometimes reaching impor-tantly divergent positions on that relationship. For example, Ulrich Zwingli, in his essay on Providence, veers into suggesting that God is ex lex—beyond the law—and therefore is able to operate and judge outside of and above the law.16 In such an understanding, God is not

12. E.g. Witsius, 1:406.13. For an example of Turretin’s covenantal argument, see Turretin, 2:651, 671.14. See Turretin, 2:241–47. See also J. Mark Beach, Christ and the Covenant:

Francis Turretin’s Federal Theology as a Defense of the Doctrine of Grace (Gottingen: Van-denhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007), 275–76, 322–23.

15. The same notion is present in both Turretin and Witsius, but it is not as prominent as in Owen. See, e.g., Turretin, 2:647; Witsius, 1:402.

16. Ulrich Zwingli, On Providence and Other Essays, ed. William John Hinke (Durham, N.C.: The Labyrinth Press, 1922), 168–70. Prior to this instance, Zwingli offers a more standard understanding of God’s relationship to the Law. See Zwingli, 166–68. For more on these matters in Zwingli’s thought, see Gottfried W. Locher, Zwingli’s Thought: New Perspectives, Studies in the History of Christian Thought


finally constrained by the law in His speech and in His actings; He can act beyond the law. In the thought of John Calvin, such a view of God is firmly rejected. Calvin denies what he considers the fiction of poten-tia absoluta, writing that “[w]e fancy no lawless god who is a law unto himself.”17 For Calvin, God is not ex lex. Rather, the law is an expres-sion of God’s own righteousness and thus He never steps beyond it or out of it—not because the righteousness of the law is somehow higher than, or causative of, God’s will, but rather because the righteousness of the law is the expression of His will.18 The righteous God always acts in accordance with the righteousness of His law.

This expectation that God’s actions will accord with the righteous-ness revealed in the law was only heightened by the post-Reformation insistence on the necessary connection between God’s ad intra perfec-tions and His ad extra actions.19 In light of this connection, the ad extra actions of God were reflective of, and were disclosing, ad intra ontologi-cal realities. For Owen, this was as true of God’s righteousness as it was of any other attribute. In his Dissertation on Divine Justice, Owen draws a distinction between the iustitia Dei considered absolutely and the iusti-tia Dei considered “in respect of its egress and exercise”; an egress and exercise that Owen itemizes as God’s actions and God’s speech. While there is a distinction to be placed between the iustitia Dei considered absolutely and the iustitia Dei in its egress and exercise, the latter is always perfectly conformed to the former.20 The ad extra discloses the ad intra; God’s speech reveals the righteousness of God’s Being.

This relationship between the iustitia Dei and its egress had pro-found implications for Owen’s doctrine of justification. In order for God to declare something “righteous,” it had to be, in actual fact, righteous. When the iustitia Dei egresses in the divine declaration of justification, the righteousness receiving that declaration must com-port precisely with the inherent, ontological righteousness of God. If it does not, either the iustitia Dei in its egress is different from the abso-lute iustitia Dei (something is righteous by the former’s standard but

(Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1981), 168–72, 196–201. See also Richard A. Muller, Post–Refor-mation Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 3 (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 476.

17. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, vol. 1, trans. Ford Lewis Bat-tles, ed. John T. McNeill (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), 3.23.2.

18. Calvin, Institutes, 3.23.2. See also 3.17.5.19. See Muller, 3:481.20. Owen, Works, 10:498–500.


not by the latter’s), or God has stepped outside of His law in declaring something “righteous” that does not actually comply with the rigors of that law. In Owen’s understanding of God, neither is possible. The perfectly holy God, who is not ex lex, will not call “righteous” that which is not righteous, and that fact is a function of God’s nature.21

The “problem” that this introduces into the justification of a sinner is enormous. Because of God’s nature, He will not declare something “righteous” that is not perfectly righteous just as He is per-fectly righteous, yet no human work—neither the actings of inherent righteousness nor faith in its exercise—is perfectly righteous. In order for a righteousness to avail in justification, that righteousness can-not have its provenance in man. It must be an alien righteousness imputed to him. As Owen illustrates, God’s people always have real-ized that their own, imperfect righteousness could not justify them in God’s sight. For example, in Nehemiah 13:22, Nehemiah asserts his own integrity in temporal matters, yet casts himself on God’s mercy for justification.22 When one contemplates the judgment throne of God, only perfect righteousness will suffice.23 This perfect righteous-ness, demanded by the divine ontology, necessitates the imputation of righteousness.

In Owen’s theology, this extrinsic, perfect righteousness requi-site for justification was the righteousness of Christ imputed to the believer through that believer’s union with Christ. In Owen’s ordo salutis, an elect sinner was given faith; by that faith, he was united to Christ; and via that union, the man was possessed of the righteous-ness of Christ that elicited the declaration of “righteous” from the holy and righteous Judge of all. As Owen argued:

21. See Owen, Works, 5:162–75, 223–24.22. Owen, Works, 5:29. See also 5:224–28, 240 for further discussion of this

principle in Scripture.23. Owen often makes this point with great experiential poignancy. See, e.g.,

Owen, Works, 5:42, 230, 239–40. Owen judges that the disputes about man’s work having a role in justification are “but the speculations of men at ease” (5:230; empha-sis in original). Those who have been shown the holiness of God entertain no such notions. Indeed, Owen frequently asserts the necessary connection between a per-son’s saving knowledge of God and his apprehension of right doctrine. See, e.g., 5:69, 235, 364–65, 371. Similarly, see Turretin, 2:639–40; Witsius, 1:424–26.


To be righteous in him is to be righteous with his righteousness, as we are one mystical person with him.24

In seeing union with Christ as prior to, and foundational for, the forensic justification of the elect, Owen was expressing a common theme of Reformed doctrine.25 The same relationship between union and justification is voiced by Turretin and, even more prominently, by Witsius.26 Because of a righteousness imputed through this union with Christ, the just God declared His people “righteous”—a decla-ration in perfect accordance with truth. God’s nature demanded that the righteousness of justification thus be an imputed righteousness.

ApplicationOwen’s attention to imputation is important not only for dogmatic clarity, but also for the comfort and sanctification of God’s people. What Owen is saying is that since God is holy, the justification of His people is not contingent on anything in them. If God looked to any-thing in His people and justified them on account thereof, such action would impugn God’s own righteousness. What that means, among other things, is that the believer struggling with indwelling sin—the woman fighting an addiction that she cannot suffocate, the man war-ring against the predilection that he cannot defeat—need not despair of his salvation. Through his union with Christ and the indwelling of the Spirit, the believer certainly should be growing in holiness, but his right standing before the Judge of all creation is based not on the eradication of sin in his heart, but on the presence of an imputed

24. Works, 5:351. See also Beeke and Jones, 499.25. McGrath, 271. Recently, George Hunsinger has revived a thesis, first made

in the nineteenth century by Matthias Schneckenburger, that a distinction exists between Lutheran and Reformed in the seventeenth century on precisely this issue of the relative priority of union and justification. The Lutheran position argued that the divine justifying declaration created righteousness in an individual, while the Reformed position held that the divine justifying declaration recognized a logi-cally prior righteousness imputed via union with Christ. See George Hunsinger, “Justification and Mystical Union with Christ: Where Does Owen Stand?” in The Ashgate Research Companion to John Owen’s Theology, ed. Kelly Kapic and Mark Jones (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), 199–211. Owen generally bears out Hunsinger’s thesis, although he may reveal the need for some modifications thereof. See Owen, Works, 5:166–67, 171–72.

26. Turretin, 2:647, 653, 657; Witsius, 1:403.


righteousness.27 There is comfort and assurance there for the strug-gling saints of God. Similarly, there is firm rebuke for those who think themselves justified or exalted because of their lack of these same struggles. Men and women are justified by—and only by—the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. Were justification to come any other way, the holiness of God Himself would be vitiated.

Owen and Christ’s Active ObedienceWhile Owen strongly asserted the necessity of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness, he just as strongly asserted that that imputed righteousness necessarily included the active obedience of Christ.28 By the late sixteenth century, a distinction had been formalized between the active and the passive obedience of Christ, and, in the seventeenth century, that distinction was still under great discussion.29 Owen himself was not entirely happy with the distinction, arguing that it is nearly impossible to draw so precise a line within Christ’s mediatorial obedience.30 Nevertheless, the distinction suffuses Owen’s treatise because it simply was unavoidable in the polemical context of the mid-seventeenth century.

In that polemical context, on the specific issue of Christ’s active obedience imputed to believers for their justification, Owen engages explicitly with Socinian doctrine.31 But here, Owen’s layered polemic is on clear display. The Socinian rejection of the active obedience of Christ was founded upon the prior rejection of the deity of Christ.32 Within Socinian doctrine, as a non-divine human being, Jesus

27. Turretin makes great pastoral application of this very point. See Turretin, 2:660–61.

28. Underlying this position is Owen’s insistence that justification consists of more than just forgiveness; a positive righteousness also is involved. See Works, 5:262–75. Space constraints preclude a detailed consideration of this component of Owen’s doctrine in the present account. The position, however, is also clear in Tur-retin, 2:657; Witsius, 1:409.

29. For a brief discussion of this development, see R. Scott Clark, “Do This and Live: Christ’s Active Obedience as the Ground of Justification,” in Covenant, Justifi-cation, and Pastoral Ministry: Essays by the Faculty of Westminster Seminary California, ed. R. Scott Clark (Phillipsburg, Pa.: P&R, 2007), 230–237.

30. See Owen, Works, 5:63, 253–54.31. See, e.g., Owen, Works, 5:251–52.32. See J. V. Fesko, “Socinus and the Racovian Catechism on Justification,”

in Aspects of Reforming: Theology and Practice in Sixteenth Century Europe, ed. Michael Parsons (Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2013), 194–98.


personally owed God perfect obedience to the law. So, every obedience that Jesus undertook—active or passive—He undertook on His own behalf. Within the Socinian system, Christ’s positive righteousness, won through His active obedience, could not be imputed to anyone because, in a manner of speaking, Jesus, as a creature, needed it for Himself. The Socinian’s rejection of the active obedience of Christ was founded upon his rejection of the deity of Christ. As soon will be demonstrated, however, Owen’s entire argumentation in this area is founded upon the deity of Christ. Simply stated, everything Owen discusses to refute the Socinian position would have been patently unconvincing, on the very face of it, to every Socinian. Indeed, Owen freely recognizes this. He writes in his treatise that while he knows his arguments will be ineffectual with thoroughgoing Socinians, he hopes that they will merit consideration by those who have imbibed Socinian views on the work of Christ.33 Owen does not indicate who those secondary parties may be, but in seventeenth-century England, there were at least two theological positions that shared the Socinians’ view that Christ personally needed His own active obedience.

First, there were those who held to a position, earlier championed by Johannes Piscator, that the active obedience of Christ was required in order to qualify Him to serve as the mediator of the covenant of grace. In this view, Christ’s active obedience was antecedent to, not part of, His mediatorial work. Owen interacts with this position in his treatise, rooting Christ’s “qualification” to serve as mediator in the hypostatic union rather than in Christ’s subsequent obedience, but Owen affords the weight of his attention to those who are exercised by a slightly different, although not entirely unrelated, theo-logical concern.34

This second group were those who argued that Christ was obli-gated to render His “active obedience” because of His human nature. Among the proponents of this second view were some prominent men in seventeenth century England. Thomas Gataker, Richard Vines, and William Twisse all held to this particular view and argued for it at the Westminster Assembly.35 The starting point of this theological

33. Owen, Works, 5:256–57. See also 5:173–74, 253.34. E.g. Owen, Works, 5:257–58. See also Trueman, 104.35. See Trueman, 103–5. This understanding of Christ’s work has anteced-

ents even in the thought of Anselm of Canterbury. However, the English Civil War seems to have provided it a certain renaissance in the seventeenth century. Much as


position was the fact that all mankind, by virtue of their status as crea-ture, owed obedience to God’s law as the law of their creator. Although Christ was fully God, He also was fully man, so His human nature was under the law by obligation. Therefore, Christ’s obedience to the law throughout His life was on His own behalf. Christ did not obey the law for His people; He obeyed it for Himself out of the obligation that rested upon His human nature as created. From within the internal logic of this view, the justification of sinners was in no way impaired. In Gataker’s thought, for example, justification involved only acquittal from the guilt of sin; so while Christ might have rendered His active obedience on His own behalf, He rendered His passive obedience on behalf of His people and the cleansing that came via that sacrifice pro-vided full justification for the elect.36 While this view thus preserved a truncated version of justification, it held that justification alongside the insistence that Christ was obligated, because of His human nature, to render His active obedience on His own behalf. Only Christ’s passive obedience remained to be imputed to others.

In refuting this position, Owen draws on a rich Christology.37 The foundation of Owen’s position is the principle articulated in Galatians 4:4: that the Son of God came ὑπÕ νÒμον. Jesus Christ, throughout His earthly ministry, was “under the law” and, accord-ing to the rationale of Galatians 4:4, He was under the law just as all men are, meaning that He was under the demand for obedience to its precept. Jesus Christ was under obligation to obey the law; He was ὑπÕ νÒμον.38

From this starting point, Owen pursues two lines of argument. In his first, Owen bypasses the question of whether the human nature of Christ was necessarily ὑπÕ νÒμον, and thereby necessarily obliged to obedience, by virtue of its being created. As Owen argues, it was not

Richard Baxter was driven to Neonomian formulations by his revulsion at the hor-rors of war, so it appears that Gataker and others were reticent to embrace the idea of an imputed active obedience out of fear that such would be the seedbed of the antinomianism they also had witnessed.

36. An intriguing presentation of Gataker’s position is found in The Minutes and Papers of the Westminster Assembly 1643–1652, vol. 2, ed. Chad Van Dixhoorn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 53–107.

37. See Owen, Works, 5:252–62. Gataker, Vines, and Twisse all had died before Owen published his treatise. Owen was not refuting them personally but rather the doctrine they had advanced and represented.

38. Owen, Works, 5:255–57, 272–73.


the human nature of Christ in the abstract that lived ὑπÕ νÒμον; it was the person of the Mediator.39 Owen cites Acts 20:28, where Paul speaks to the Ephesian elders of “the church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood,” as biblical proof that even actions undertaken in the human nature (in this case, death) are fully actions of the whole person of Christ. That ὑπÕ νÒμον person, of course, was the hypostatic union of the anhypostatic humanity and the eter-nal Son of God. But Owen observed that the eternal Son of God, being God, could not be formally obligated to the law, because “the divine nature cannot be subjected unto an outward work of its own, such as the law is.”40 Regardless of what some might argue about the human nature of Christ, the person of Christ was not, by necessity, ὑπÕ νÒμον because the eternal Son did not owe such subjection to the law. When the person of Christ came ὑπÕ νÒμον, it was not by necessity, but by voluntary condescension. Thus, it was a submis-sion Christ undertook not for Himself by necessity, but for others by choice.41 This voluntary submission was the vicarious obedience of Romans 5:19—“by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.”42 Fully man but also fully God, the Mediator had ren-dered an active obedience and won a righteousness that He did not need that then could be imputed to His people.

Having established that a potential obligation of the human-ity of Christ to the law did not obviate an active obedience, Owen then doubles back to argue, in his second line of argument, that the humanity of Christ did not, in fact, owe a creaturely obedience to the law. The humanity of Christ was not, of necessity, ὑπÕ νÒμον. In Owen’s argumentation, the hypostatic union of the humanity of Christ with the divinity of Christ exalted that humanity far above any subjection to the law. Because of its union with the divine Son, and immediately upon that union, the humanity of Christ was due, and received, the worship of men and angels. The humanity of the God-Man thus already was more highly exalted than it ever could be

39. Owen, Works, 5:255–56.40. Owen, Works, 5:256.41. The voluntary nature of Christ’s work is critical in Owen’s assessment of

it. See Owen, Works, 5:169–71, 260. The same emphasis can be found in Witsius, 1:402–403.

42. For Owen’s refutation of seeing Romans 5:19 as speaking only of Christ’s atoning death, see Owen, Works, 5:274–75.


by nature.43 Even considered strictly in regard to His humanity, then, Jesus Christ was not, in any way, ὑπÕ νÒμον on His own behalf. Christ was not under the law for Himself; He was under the law for His people. In that condition, He rendered an active obedience that won a positive righteousness that then was imputed to His people.

In all of this, one sees that, from within Owen’s system, the “imputable” active obedience of Christ is a reality demanded by the divinity of Jesus Christ. Because of the divinity of God the Son, there cannot not be an active obedience; if the Son is divine, then in the person of Jesus Christ, He is coming ὑπÕ νÒμον and willingly ren-dering an obedience He is not obligated to render, thereby winning a righteousness that He can impute to others. In this, the entire category of the active obedience of Christ emerges not from a consideration of what a sinner needs to be justified, but rather from a consideration of the very person of Christ. The nature of God—specifically, the nature of God the Son—demands the reality of Christ’s active obedience.

The distinctiveness of Owen’s Christology-driven doctrine at this point is underscored by a comparison with the doctrines of Turretin and Witsius. All three theologians assert the same salvific realities – the active and passive obedience of Christ imputed to believers for their justification—yet Turretin and Witsius do so based upon differ-ent and much more conventional bases. For Turretin, Christological matters are important, yet primarily insofar as the deity of Christ affects the quality and extent of His active obedience. The dignity of Christ’s divinity invests His acquired righteousness with an infinite value.44 For Witsius, the deity of Christ serves as the necessary pre-condition of both His perfect obedience and His engagement as the covenant’s mediator whose righteousness is imputed to those under His headship.45 In the doctrinal system of both Turretin and Witsius, the deity of Christ obviously is present and important, yet neither system is as thoroughly and structurally Christological as Owen’s doctrine, based as it is not just on the simple fact of Christ’s divinity, but on the intricacies of the hypostatic union. For Owen, the deity of Christ does not just inform or make possible the active obedience

43. Owen, Works, 5:258–59.44. E.g., Turretin, 2:650–51.45. E.g., Witsius, 1:403–406.


of Christ; for Owen, the deity of Christ demands the reality of His active obedience.

Quite obviously, all of this argumentation would be meaningless to the Socinians to whom it ostensibly was addressed. To those who recognized the deity of Christ yet saw no basis for an active obedi-ence, Owen hoped that it would be persuasive.

Implications of Owen’s DoctrineWithin Owen’s doctrine of justification, God’s nature demanded that justification include the imputation of Christ’s active obedience. Imputation and Christ’s active obedience are necessities created not by the needs of the redeemed, but by the divine being of the redeem-ing, triune God. While Owen’s doctrine of justification is vast and complex, it is here that it offers perhaps its most distinctive and fruit-ful contributions to an overall understanding of the doctrine. The importance of this distinctiveness is seen in a cursory glance at some if its implications.

In the first instance, Owen’s doctrine of justification offers a richly textured view of the importance of the active obedience of Christ within late-seventeenth-century Reformed theology. Presently, some scholars contend that throughout the seventeenth century, widely divergent views on the active obedience of Christ were considered acceptable within Reformed thought.46 However, the present study has demonstrated that, by the 1670s, the active obedience of Christ was a central part of the doctrinal systems of the leading theologians in England, Switzerland, and Holland. Within each of these systems, the active obedience of Christ was not a peripheral doctrine; it was embedded within Theology Proper, Christology, and the doctrine of the covenants. It would appear, in other words, that a consensus had been reached in the Reformed world. The breadth of that con-sensus and the rootedness of Christ’s active obedience within larger

46. E.g., James R. Daniel Kirk, “The Sufficiency of the Cross,” Scottish Bul-letin of Evangelical Theology (2006): 36–64. Kirk argues that the debate regarding the theological validity of Christ’s active obedience occurred “within the arena of West-minster orthodoxy” (39). For an account of the Westminster Assembly’s handling of this debate, see Van Dixhoorn, 2:53–107; Trueman, 105; Jeffrey K. Jue, “The Active Obedience of Christ and the Theology of the Westminster Standards: A Histori-cal Investigation,” in Justified in Christ: God’s Plan for us in Justification, ed. K. Scott Oliphint (Fearn, Scotland: Christian Focus, 2007), 99–130.


dogmatic systems may be helpful in evaluating not only the decades of debate in the mid-seventeenth century on these topics, but also the debates surrounding justification, atonement, and related topics in subsequent years. For Owen studies specifically, a modification may be in order. Owen’s doctrine of justification frequently is understood as a doctrine strongly influenced by covenantal structure.47 While that undoubtedly is true, when one sees the Christological concerns and argumentations of Owen’s doctrine, then holds that doctrine along-side the even more explicitly covenantal argumentation of Witsius, it seems that Owen’s doctrine of justification perhaps ought to be seen as a doctrine shaped and influenced not just by the covenant, but by the person of the mediator of the covenant.

Second, Owen’s doctrine of justification, with its rootedness in Theology Proper and Christology, offers the possibility of more nuanced responses to present-day challenges to the doctrine of justi-fication. For example, proponents of the “New Perspective on Paul” roundly reject the active obedience of Christ. Within such critiques, the doctrine of Christ’s active obedience is seen to have emerged from a misunderstanding of the “courtroom setting” of “righteous-ness” language in first-century Judaism. N. T. Wright, for example, argues that in first-century Jewish parlance, “righteousness” referred to an enacted, covenant-keeping fidelity within God’s character and “justification” referred strictly to a court’s declaration about a party’s standing before that court. With terms thus defined, it is illogi-cal to conceive of God’s “righteousness” being imputed to a sinner to ground his “ justification.” To do such is to pile category confu-sion upon category confusion; a divine attribute cannot be imputed to a sinful man or woman and such imputation is not even needed to secure a justification whose only necessary ground is the juridi-cal declaration in question.48 To such a presentation, Owen’s doctrine of justification offers several ready responses. The necessity of the active obedience of Christ imputed to believers for their justification stems not from misunderstanding first-century legal language and settings but from rightly understanding the triune God as He has

47. E.g., Thomas Schreiner, Faith Alone: The Doctrine of Justification (Grand Rap-ids: Zondervan, 2015), 68–76, 79.

48. E.g., N. T. Wright, Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision (Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2009), 64–71.


revealed Himself in the Scriptures. The active obedience of Christ is necessitated by Christ’s divinity, and the imputed possession of that obedience by the believer is required for the egress of God’s justice in His speaking to comport with His ontological justice as it always does within the God who is not ex lex. In this regard, Owen’s doctrine even offers a unique challenge to the New Perspective. One of the effects of Wright’s presentation is to create space between the divine ontology and the divine declaration. Due to His faithfulness (“righteousness”), God declares someone “in the right” (“justifies” him) who actually is not “in the right.” In light of Owen’s attention to the congruity between the absolute iustitia Dei and the egress thereof in the divine declaration, what are the implications of the New Perspective’s view for the underlying doctrine of God? In these and other ways, Owen’s articulation of the doctrine of justification perhaps provides new and clear ways to understand, articulate, and defend the “old perspective” on justification.

Third, Owen offers practical “apologetic” help for Christians today, as many of the views he refutes in his treatise on justification are ones that modern Christians confront on a daily basis. For exam-ple, both the equation of faith with righteousness and the rejection, or at least neglect, of any notion of a positive righteousness imputed to Christians are views latent in much current popular evangelical thought. Owen’s understanding of justification helps disclose the errors of these views more precisely and hopefully equips God’s peo-ple to guard against them more effectively.

Finally, Owen’s doctrine of justification reminds us afresh of the splendorous glory of the gospel—that the Holy God of all creation, who looks on the heart of man and in whose presence no blemish can stand, gives the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ to His sin-ful people. In this, there is profound comfort for God’s people that when they come into judgment and stand in the presence of a holi-ness that could melt them, they need neither protest their obedience nor tremble for their sin. They need only look to the Mediator who died on Calvary and who rose again, knowing that when the Judge looks on them, He is looking on that same Man as well. Christians have no need to fear the judgment, because they are in Christ and His righteousness will cover them as the waters cover the seas. That is the gospel. The better we understand it, the better we proclaim it to others. John Owen, in his doctrine of justification, helps us do both.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 86–103

Born into the golden age of British Puritanism, John Owen (1616–1683) would grow to become arguably its greatest theologian.1 Owen was firmly established in the tradition of the Reformed Orthodox2 and possessed a talent for synthesizing the historic doctrines of the faith with what Carl Trueman calls “the new doctrinal and practi-cal frameworks of Protestantism.”3 Nowhere is this more clearly seen than in his doctrine of the Trinity.4 Robert Letham argues that Owen’s

1. For biographies of Owen, see Peter Toon, God’s Statesman: The Life and Work of John Owen (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1973), Andrew Thomson, Life of Dr. Owen, in John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William Goold. 24 vols. Edinburgh and London: Johnstone and Hunter, 1850–53; digital reprint ed., Bellingham, Wa.: Logos Bible Software, 2009), 1:xix–cxxii; hereafter Works. For his theological thought see Sebastian Rehnman, Divine Discourse: The Theological Methodology of John Owen, Texts and Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation Thought (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2002), Robert W. Oliver, John Owen: The Man and His Theology (Phillipsburg, N.J.: Presbyterian & Reformed, 2002), Sinclair B. Fergu-son, John Owen on the Christian Life (Edinburgh, Scotland: Banner of Truth, 1987), Kelly M. Kapic and Mark Jones, eds., The Ashgate Research Companion to John Owen’s Theology (Farnham, Surrey, England: Ashgate, 2012), and Carl R. Trueman, John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man, Great theologians series (Burlington, Vt.: Ashgate, 2007).

2. For a good summary of Owen’s Reformed Orthodox background, see Carl R. Trueman, The Claims of Truth: John Owen’s Trinitarian Theology (Carlisle, England: Paternoster Press, 1998), 13–19.

3. Trueman, John Owen, 47.4. Recent Owen scholarship has argued that Owen’s doctrine of the Trinity

is foundational for his entire theology. See Kelly M. Kapic, Communion with God: The Divine and the Human in the Theology of John Owen (Grand Rapids: Baker Aca-demic, 2007), Brian Kay, Trinitarian Spirituality: John Owen and the Doctrine of God in Western Devotion, Studies in Christian history and thought (Milton Keynes: Pater-noster, 2007), Trueman, The Claims of Truth, James I. Packer, “A Puritan Perspective:

John Owen on the Work of God the Father

RYAN L. RIPPEE

q

John owen on the woRk of GoD the fatheR 87

Trinitarianism “is classic and orthodox in the Western sense but he avoids some of its problems. One of the ways he achieves this is by his overwhelmingly Biblical approach; there is a remarkable absence of philosophical terminology, a profusion of Biblical exegesis.”5 Whereas John Calvin emphasized the unity of the Godhead in his ministry and writing,6 Owen distinguishes himself by continually meditating on the diversity of persons within the Godhead.7

Trinitarian Godliness According to John Owen,” in God the Holy Trinity (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006), 91–108, and Peter De Vries, “Union and Com-munion with Christ in the Theology of John Owen,” Reformed Theological Journal 15 (1999): 13–18. For the best survey of trinitarian doctrine in Reformed and post-Ref-ormation theologians, see volume 4 in Richard A. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725 (Grand Rapids: Baker Academics, 2003).

5. Robert Letham, “John Owen’s Doctrine of the Trinity in Its Catholic Context and Its Significance for Today” in Kapic and Jones, The Ashgate Research Companion to John Owen’s Theology, 190.

6. For Calvin, this was simply continuity with the pro-Nicene Fathers and their doctrine of inseparable operations. The doctrine of inseparable operations can be broadly defined by the Latin axiom, opera trinitatis ad extra sunt indivisa (The external works of the Trinity are undivided). Nevertheless, in Calvin’s mind, the united work of the Trinity also included particular actions in the economy of salvation that could be distinctly appropriated to a particular member of the Godhead.

7. Letham writes, “[Owen’s] focus on the three persons was and is missing from the West in general.” Robert Letham, “John Owen’s Doctrine of the Trinity in Its Catholic Context and Its Significance for Today,” 196. According to Dale A. Stover, Owen’s emphasis was a danger to the theology of a unified triune God. Dale A. Stover, “The Pneumatology of John Owen: A Study of the Role of the Holy Spirit in Relation to the Shape of Theology” (PhD diss., McGill University, Montreal, 1967), 304. Cited in Kapic, Communion with God, 31. Kapic argues against Stover’s conclusion and writes, “Against the charge of Stover; Owen’s Trinitarian emphasis on the distinct roles of the three divine persons does not weaken his Christology, but actually may be understood as strengthening it. This will quickly become appar-ent in the emphasis he gives to communion with the Son in his book Communion with God. Christ is the mediator between God and humanity, and only through him are relations between the divine and human secure.” Kapic, Communion with God, 32–33. With Owen’s emphasis on persons in mind, Alan Spence argues that although Owen verbally affirmed the doctrine of inseparable operations, in real-ity, his theology and writing greatly undermined the doctrine. Alan Spence, “John Owen and Trinitarian Agency,” Scottish Journal of Theology 43, no. 2 (January 1, 1990): 157–73. Recent responses are found in Kyle Claunch, “What God Hath Done Together: Defending the Historic Doctrine of the Inseparable Operations of the Trinity,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 56, no. 4 (December 2013): 781–800, and Tyler R Wittman, “The End of the Incarnation: John Owen, Trinitarian


An example of this pattern can be seen in Communion with God. Owen outlines the book using the Trinity, and in chapter 3 writes about each Person in the Godhead’s respective works:

There is a concurrence of the actings and operations of the whole Deity in that dispensation, wherein each person concurs to the work of our salvation, unto every act of our communion with each singular person…. [For example], suppose it to be the act of faith:—It is bestowed on us by the Father: “It is not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.” Eph. 2:8. It is the Father that revealeth the gospel, and Christ therein, Matt. 11:25. And it is purchased for us by the Son: “Unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, to believe on him,” Phil. 1:29…. And it is wrought in us by the Spirit; he administers that “exceeding greatness of his power” which he exerciseth towards them who believe, “accord-ing to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead.” Eph. 1:19, 20; Rom. 8:11.8

Because the works of the Son and the Spirit, respectively, have been addressed in recent Owen scholarship,9 the goal of this paper is to

Agency and Christology,” IJST International Journal of Systematic Theology 15, no. 3 (2013): 284–300.

8. Owen, Works, 2:18. Likewise, in his Discourse Concerning the Holy Spirit, he writes, “The beginning of divine operations is assigned unto the Father, as he is fons et origo Deitatis,—“the fountain of the Deity itself:” “Of him, and through him, and to him, are all things,” Rom. 11:36. The subsisting, establishing, and “uphold-ing of all things,” is ascribed unto the Son: “He is before all things, and by him all things consist,” Col. 1:17. As he made all things with the Father, so he gives them a consistency, a permanency, in a peculiar manner, as he is the power and wisdom of the Father. He “upholdeth all things by the word of his power,” Heb. 1:3. And the finishing and perfecting of all these works is ascribed to the Holy Spirit, as we shall see. I say not this as though one person succeeded unto another in their operation, or as though where one ceased and gave over a work, the other took it up and car-ried it on; for every divine work, and every part of every divine work, is the work of God, that is, of the whole Trinity, inseparably and undividedly: but on those divine works which outwardly are of God there is an especial impression of the order of the operation of each person, with respect unto their natural and necessary subsistence, as also with regard unto their internal characteristical properties, whereby we are distinctly taught to know them and adore them.” Works, 3:94–95.

9. For example, Kapic and Jones, The Ashgate Research Companion to John Owen’s Theology; J. I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness: The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 1990); Oliver D. Crisp, “John Owen on Spirit Christology,” Journal of Reformed Theology 5, no. 1 (January 1, 2011): 5–25; Peter


examine the work of God the Father10 in two parts.11 First, a consider-ation of the internal works of the Father in election and the covenant of redemption;12 and then, an inspection of Owen’s thought on the external works of the Father in creation, providence, and redemption.13

The Internal Works of the FatherOwen often speaks of the Father as the fountainhead of the Trinity; therefore, the Father’s distinct work ad intra (though never separate from the other members) is as the master designer of creation and

De Vries, “Union and Communion with Christ in the Theology of John Owen,” Reformed Theological Journal 15 (1999): 13–18; J. V. Fesko, “John Owen on Union with Christ and Justification,” Themelios, No. 1, April 2012; Suzanne McDonald, “The Pneumatology of the ‘Lost’ Image in John Owen,” Westminster Theological Jour-nal 71, no. 2 (September 1, 2009): 323–35.

10. I am not so much concerned with the metaphor of Father as I am with the work of the first person of the Godhead. Furthermore, this paper will be confined to the work of the Father. For John Owen’s teachings on the personhood of God the Father, including His attributes, see his A Dissertation on Divine Justice in Works, 10:541–48, and Vindiciae Evangelicae (1655) in Works, 12:1–590, which is a refuta-tion of the Socinian claims of John Biddle. See also Trueman, John Owen, 38–46. Owen says that the “distinguishing property of the person of the Father” is “to be of himself only the fountain of the Godhead—John 5:26, 27; Eph. 1:3,” in his Greater Catechism. See Owen, Works, 1:472.

11. The discipline of Paterology (the study of the person and work of the Father) has been largely assumed under the topic of Theology Proper, but rarely given spe-cific attention. For current studies, see Tom Smail, The Forgotten Father: Rediscovering the Heart of the Christian Gospel (London: Paternoster Press, 1996); Ben Witherington and Laura Michaels Ice, The Shadow of the Almighty: Father, Son and Spirit in Biblical Perspective (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), ch. 2; Bruce A. Ware, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: Relationships, Roles, and Relevance (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 2005), ch. 3; and John Koessler, God Our Father (Chicago: Moody Press, 1999).

12. Also called the pactum salutis or theologoumenon. A more detailed examination follows from the perspective of the Father, but in brief, the covenant of redemp-tion is the covenant made between the Father and Son in order to accomplish the redemption of the elect. Owen often cites the “eternal covenant” of Hebrews 13:20 as biblical evidence.

13. In his Greater Catechism, Owen answers the question, “What do the Scrip-tures teach concerning the works of God?” “That they are of two sorts; first, internal, in his counsel, decrees, and purposes, towards his creatures; secondly, external, in his works over and about them, to the praise of his own glory—Acts 15:18; Prov. 16:4.” Owen, Works, 1:473. Reformed Orthodox scholarship used the terminology ad intra for the internal works and ad extra for the external works. Richard Muller has an excellent discussion in Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics, 257–60.


salvation.14 As the originator, His purpose and plans are rooted in love and bring Him great glory. In the concluding chapter of his Christolo-gia, Owen writes, “God would have it so, for the manifestation of his own glory. This is the first great end of all the works of God. That it is so is a fundamental principle of our religion. And how his works do glorify him is our duty to inquire.”15

His Eternal Free Purposes in ElectionIn his Greater Catechism, Owen gives primacy to the Father’s work of election, which he defines as:

The eternal, free, immutable purpose of God [the Father], whereby in Jesus Christ he chooseth unto himself whom he pleaseth out of whole mankind, determining to bestow upon them, for his sake, grace here, and everlasting happiness hereaf-ter, for the praise of his glory, by the way of mercy.16

Owen meditates on the Father’s love in a sermon on Romans 4:20 and says, “Should I now proceed to show what God hath done, what he doth, and will do, to set up his glory, it would make it evident, indeed, that he aimed at it. His eternal electing love lies at the bottom of this design.”17 Owen unpacks the Father’s purposes further in his work The Doctrine of the Saints Perseverance Explained and Confirmed. First, the Father gives His elect to the Son (John 6:39), and then effects His will so that none will be lost and so that they will all have everlasting life (John 6:40).18

14. For example, he says, “The Father is the fountain of all, as in being and existence, so in operation. The Son is of the Father, begotten of him, and, therefore, as unto his work, is sent by him; but his own will is in and unto what he is sent about. The Holy Spirit proceedeth from the Father and the Son, and, therefore, is sent and given by them as to all the works which he immediately effecteth; but yet his own will is the direct principle of all that he doth,—he divideth unto every one according to his own will. And thus much may suffice to be spoken about the being of the Holy Spirit, and the order of his subsistence in the blessed Trinity.” Owen, Works, 3:92.

15. Owen, Works 1:262.16. Owen, Works, 1:473.17. Owen, Works, 9:36.18. Owen, Works, 11:189–90. Elsewhere Owen writes, “All the elect of God

were, in his eternal purpose and design, and in the everlasting covenant between the Father and the Son, committed unto him, to be delivered from sin, the law, and death, and to be brought into the enjoyment of God: ‘Thine they were, and thou


Brian Kay rightfully asserts, “The Father does not first love his people because of Christ’s mediation, rather, Christ’s mediation is the outworking of the Father’s prior love. For Owen, the love of the Father is the impetus for the whole plan of salvation, including his sending of the Son.”19

His Covenant of Redemption with the SonJohn Owen was one of the first advocates of the covenant of redemption,20 which is the “covenant made among the members of the Trinity to bring about the redemption of fallen man through the covenant of grace.”21 His thought also made it into the Savoy Decla-ration in section 8.1, making the covenant explicit: “It pleased God, in his eternal purpose, to chuse and ordain the Lord Jesus his onely begotten Son, according to a Covenant made between them both, to be the Mediator between God and Man.”22

Carl Trueman contends that Owen’s contribution to the doc-trine…is in his attention to the role of the Holy Spirit with reference to covenant, a point which represents a distinctly Trinitarian advance on the works of Fisher and Bulkeley…and in so doing, he is being consistent with his basic premise that every external act of God is in its deepest sense an act of the whole Trinity.23

With regard to the Father’s part of the covenant, Owen roots it in the truth that the Son is the eternal object of the Father’s love. “The

gavest them me,’ John 17:6. Hence was that love of his unto them wherewith he loved them, and gave himself for them, antecedently unto any good or love in them, Eph. 5:25, 26; Gal. 2:20; Rev. 1:5, 6.” Owen, Works, 5:180.

19. Kay, Trinitarian Spirituality, 127.20. The first extended articulation of the doctrine is often ascribed to Johannes

Cocceius in his work Summa Doctrina de Foedere et Testamento Dei, in his Opera Theo-logica, 8 vols (Amsterdam, 1673). For a history of the doctrine and an attempt at its origins, see Richard A. Muller, “Toward the Pactum Salutis: Locating the Origins of a Concept,” Mid-America Journal of Theology 18 (January 1, 2007): 11–65.

21. See J. V. Fesko, “John Owen on Union with Christ and Justification,” Themelios, No. 1, April 2012, 7–19. Owen has an extensive treatment on the pactum in Exercitation 28, “Federal Transactions between the Father and the Son” in his introduction to Hebrews in his Works, 19:77–97, as well as in chapter 4 in his Declara-tion of the Glorious Mystery of the Person of Christ in Works, 1:54–62.

22. The WCF 8.1 reads, “It pleased God, in His eternal purpose, to choose and ordain the Lord Jesus, His only begotten Son, to be Mediator between God and man;” Quoted in footnote 60 of Trueman, John Owen, 82.

23. Trueman, John Owen, 86.


Father knows the Son, and the Son knows the Father; the Father loves the Son, and the Son loves the Father; and so, consequently, of the Holy Ghost, the medium of all these actings.”24 Owen subsumes the teaching of Scripture on the love of the Father into two categories: 1) His sending His Son to die for the elect (John 3:16; Rom. 5:8; 1 John 4:9–10), and 2) His choosing sinners for the purpose of partici-pation in the fruits of His love (Eph. 1:3–6).25

Furthermore, the covenant flows from the Father’s grace and wisdom:

Its [the covenant’s] projection was in the wisdom and love of the Father. Whatsoever is spoken concerning the love, grace, and wisdom of the Father before the world was, was laid out in the projection of this covenant. Take it as it wraps Christ in it,—as it brings forth the forgiveness of sin,—as it is the centre of grace; and it compriseth the whole effect of divine wisdom, as far as the infinitely holy God ever manifested, or ever will manifest to eternity.26

Within the terms of the covenant,27 the Father appoints the Son to be a surety. “The will of the Father appointing and designing the Son to be the head, husband, deliverer, and redeemer of his elect, his church, his people, whom he did foreknow…is that compact (for in that form it is proposed in the Scripture) that we treat of.”28 Owen elsewhere writes, “The Father was the prescriber, the promiser, and lawgiver; and

24. Owen, Works, 8:614. He elaborates: “And had not the love of God been fixed in the first place in all things upon the person of Christ, there would have been no redundancy to us, nor communication of love unto us. From the first eternal love of God proceeds all love that was in the first creation; and from this second love of God, to the person of Christ as incarnate, proceeds all the love in the second creation.”

25. Owen, Works, 2:435–36.26. Owen, Works, 8:418.27. Owen elaborates on scriptural basis of these terms in Communion with God:

“The terms of this covenant are at large insisted on, Isa. 53, summed up, Ps. 40:7, 8, Heb. 10:8–10. Hence the Father became to be his God; which is a covenant expres-sion, Ps. 89:26; Heb. 1:5; Ps. 22:1, 40:8, 45:7; Rev. 3:12; Mic. 5:4. So was he by his Father on this account designed to this work, Isa. 42:1, 6, 49:9; Mal. 3:1; Zech. 8:7; John 3:16; 1 Tim. 1:15. Thus the ‘counsel of peace’ became to be ‘between them both’ Zech. 6:13; that is, the Father and Son. And the Son rejoices from eternity in the thought of this undertaking, Prov. 8:22–30.” Works 2:177.

28. Owen, Works, 12:496–97.


the Son was the undertaker upon his prescription, law, and promises [emphasis in original].”29

The Father then promises to reward the Son for His work of redeeming the elect:

We may therefore, in the first place, consider the promises that in this compact or covenant were made unto the Son upon his undertaking this work…. And these promises were of two sorts:—(1.) Such as concerned his person; (2.) Such as concerned the prosperity of the work which he undertook. Those also which con-cerned his person immediately were of two sorts:—[1.] Such as concerned his assistance in his work; [2.] Such as concerned his acceptance and glory after his work [emphasis in original].30

The External Works of the FatherIn his Greater Catechism, Owen delineates the external works of the Father as “First, of creation; secondly, of actual providence—Ps. 33:9; Heb. 1:2, 3.”31 To these, Owen elsewhere adds the work of redemp-tion. He believes that three “excellencies” are to be considered in all of the external works:

(1.) His Goodness, which is the communicative property thereof. This is the eternal fountain and spring of all divine communica-tions. Whatever is good in and unto any creature, is an emanation from divine goodness. “He is good, and he doeth good.” That which acts originally in the divine nature, unto the communica-tion of itself in any blessed or gracious effects unto the creatures, is goodness. (2.) Wisdom, which is the directive power or excel-lency of the divine nature. Hereby God guides, disposes, orders, and directs all things unto his own glory, in and by their own immediate proper ends, Prov. 16:4; Rev. 4:11. (3.) Power, which is the effective excellency of the divine nature, effecting and accomplishing what wisdom doth design and order.32

29. Owen, Works, 19:84–85.30. Owen, Works, 19:93.31. Owen, Works, 1:474.32. Owen, Works, 1:179–80. Owen later assigns the excellency of goodness to

the Father, wisdom to the Son, and power to the Spirit respectively. “In this great work [of creating man in his image], divine goodness exerted itself eminently and effectually in the person of the Father—the eternal fountain and spring, as of the divine nature, so of all divine operations. Divine wisdom acted itself peculiarly in the


Carl Trueman claims that, for Owen, “all of the external works of God are to be understood as works of the one God, and that all such are also to be ascribed in particular and distinct ways to each of the three persons of the Trinity.”33 In creation, the Father works as an architect through the power and wisdom of the Son and the care of the Spirit. In providence, the Father works as a governor, preserving and ruling the world that He has made. In redemption, the Father works as a loving savior, providing salvation by sending His Son and producing it through pouring out His Spirit.

His Design in CreationIn Communion with God, Owen uses Romans 1:19–21 as an expla-nation for the purpose of creation. He says, “God [the Father], by the work of the creation, by the creation itself did reveal himself in many of his properties unto his creatures capable of his knowledge;—his power, his goodness, his wisdom, his all-sufficiency, are thereby known.”34

Elsewhere he gives his clearest description of each member’s role in the outworking of creation:

For although the whole creation in its first framing, and in its perfection, was, and is, by an emanation of power and goodness from the divine nature, in the person of the Father, as he is the fountain of the Trinity, whence he is said peculiarly to be the Creator of all things; yet the immediate operation in the creation was from the Son, the power and wisdom of the Father, John 1:1–3; Col. 1:16; Heb. 1:2. And as upon the first production of the mass of the creation, it was under the especial care of the Spirit of God, to preserve and cherish it unto the production of all distinct sorts of creatures, Gen. 1:2,—so in the continuance of the whole, there is an especial operation of the same Spirit in all things.35

person of the Son; this being the principal notion thereof—the eternal Wisdom of the Father. Divine power wrought effectually in the person of the Holy Spirit; who is the immediate actor of all divine operations.” Owen, Works, 1:182.

33. Trueman, John Owen, 124.34. Owen, Works, 2:80.35. Owen, Works, 1:361.


Thus, the Father purposed to show forth His glory in creating the heavens and the earth, filling it with those made in His image. He did so through the agency of the Son and the Spirit.

His Rule through ProvidenceIn his Greater Catechism, Owen’s section on providence follows on the heels of creation. He defines providence as:

The effectual working of [the Father’s] power, and almighty act of his will, whereby he sustaineth, governeth, and disposeth of all things, men and their actions, to the ends which he hath ordained for them.—Exod. 4:11; Job 5:10–12, 9:5, 6; Ps. 147:4; Prov. 15:3; Isa. 45:6, 7; John 5:17; Acts 17:28; Heb. 1:3.36

The Father’s providence is exercised particularly toward His elect in three ways: 1) causing all things to work together for their good; 2) in ruling and disposing of kingdoms, nations, and persons for their benefit; and 3) in avenging them on their adversaries.37

However, Owen is quick to explain that the works of creation and providence were not designed to save His elect. They are insufficient for knowing the Father rightly and living for Him.38 He contemplates the necessity of revelation made in Christ:

The endeavours of some to contemplate and report the glory of God in nature—in the works of creation and providence—in the things of the greater and the lesser world—do deserve their just commendation; and it is that which the Scripture in sundry places calls us unto. But for any there to abide, there to bound their designs—when they have a much more noble and glorious object for their meditations, viz., the glory of God in Christ—is both to despise the wisdom of God in that revelation of him-self, and to come short of that transforming efficacy of faith in the contemplation hereof, whereby we are made like unto God. For hereunto alone doth it belong, and not unto any natural knowledge, nor to any knowledge of the most secret recesses of nature.39

36. Owen, Works, 1:475.37. Owen, Works, 1:475.38. Owen, Works, 1:69 and 1:300. 39. Owen, Works, 1:52. Later, he describes the revelation the Father makes in

Christ as “sublime and mysterious” (1:76).


His Love in RedemptionIn his commentary on Hebrews 10:5–10, John Owen asserts, “The foundation of the whole glorious work of the salvation of the church was laid in the sovereign will, pleasure, and grace of God, even the Father.”40 For Owen, the “economy of the blessed Trinity” is “respected” in this ordering of salvation.41 According to Kelly Kapic, “In Owen’s thought, three crucial elements are required for the redemption of humanity: authority, love, and power; and all of these must be governed by ‘infinite wisdom.’ These three characteristics ‘originally reside in the person of the Father; and the acting of them in [redemption] is constantly ascribed unto him.’”42

Thus, in Owen’s theology, the work of salvation begins with the Father, and is rooted in His love:

The emanation of divine love to us begins with the Father, is carried on by the Son, and then communicated by the Spirit; the Father designing, the Son purchasing, the Spirit effectually working: which is their order. Our participation is first by the work of the Spirit, to an actual interest in the blood of the Son; whence we have acceptation with the Father.43

Owen considers the works of the Father in redemption to be summed up into two categories: the giving of the Son and the giving of the Spirit:

For when God designed the great and glorious work of recov-ering fallen man and the saving of sinners, to the praise of the glory of his grace, he appointed, in his infinite wisdom, two great means thereof. The one was the giving of his Son for them, and the other was the giving of his Spirit unto them. And hereby was way made for the manifestation of the glory of the whole blessed Trinity; which is the utmost end of all the works of God. Hereby were the love, grace, and wisdom of the Father, in the design and projection of the whole; the love, grace, and condescension of the Son, in the execution, purchase, and procurement of grace and

40. Owen, Works, 19:507.41. Owen, Works, 3:107–8.42. Kapic, Communion with God, 74. Cf. Works 1:219.43. Owen, Works, 2:180. See also Works, 1:333, where he says, “The eternal dispos-

ing cause of the whole work wherein the Lord Christ was engaged by the susception of this office, for the redemption and salvation of the church, is the love of the Father.”


salvation for sinners; with the love, grace, and power of the Holy Spirit, in the effectual application of all unto the souls of men,—made gloriously conspicuous.44

The Father Provided Salvation through the Sending of His Son45 In Owen’s exposition of Hebrews, he enumerates a number of par-ticular works of the Father related to the sending of His Son. First, as the “peculiar author of both law and gospel,”46 the Father promises a Messiah. Owen believed that the promises started in Genesis 3:15 and were the foundation of the church.47 Even before His incarnation, the Son was the “prophet of the church,”48 appearing on the Father’s behalf to the patriarchs and prophets.49

Second, the Father sends the Son to become incarnate.50 For Owen, this work is parallel to the Father’s commissioning the Son to create the world. “As God the Father did nothing in the first creation

44. Owen, Works, 3:23; cf. 10:163 and 23:461.45. In The Death of Death in the Death of Christ, Owen gives a number of passages

where the Father is said to send the Son: “So also Tit. 2:10, 3:4; Deut. 32:15; 1 Sam. 10:19; Ps. 24:5, 25:5; Isa. 12:2, 40:10, 45:15; Jer. 14:8; Micah 7:7; Hab. 3:18; most of which places have reference to his sending of Christ….” Owen, Works, 10:164.

46. Commenting on Hebrews 1:1–2, in Owen, Works, 20:7.47. Owen, Works, 1:86. See also 1:124, where he says, “All the promises that God

gave afterward unto the church under the Old Testament, before and after giving the law—all the covenants that he entered into with particular persons, or the whole congregation of believers—were all of them declarations and confirmations of this first promise, or the way of salvation by the mediation of his Son, becoming the seed of the woman, to break the head of the serpent, and to work out the deliverance of mankind.”

48. Owen, Works, 1:88–89. Owen is convinced that it is most fitting for the Son to become incarnate and not the Spirit or the Father, and gives three reasons: 1) as the one who images the Father, it is fitting for Him to restore the lost image of God in man; 2) as the one who owns and inherits all things, it is fitting for Him to bring the elect into their sonship; and 3) as the Son is eternally generated from the Father’s love, it is fitting he be sent in the same love in the incarnation. Works 1:218–220. See also Ferguson’s summary in Oliver, John Owen, 87–88, and Kapic, Communion with God, 73–75.

49. Owen, Works, 1:88 and 20:21–22. For a study of Owen’s position on Old Testament theophanies as christophanies, see Andrew S. Malone, “John Owen and Old Testament Christophanies,” Reformed Theological Review 63, no. 3 (December 1, 2004): 138–54.

50. Commenting on Hebrews 1:1–2 in Owen, Works, 20:28–29.


but by him—as his eternal wisdom; (John 1:3; Heb. 1:2; Prov. 8) so he designed nothing in the new creation, or restoration of all things unto his glory, but in him—as he was to be incarnate.”51

Third, the Father empowers and sustains the Son in His earthly ministry as Mediator:

God the Father is perpetually present with the Lord Christ, in love, care, and power, in the administration of his office as he is mediator, head, and king of the church. He hath taken upon himself to stand by him, to own him, to effect every thing that is needful unto the establishment of his throne, the enlargement of his kingdom, and the ruin and destruction of his enemies. And this he will assuredly do to the end of the world.52

In his work, The Death of Death in the Death of Christ, Owen explains the Father’s appointment of the Son as Mediator in two parts: 1) the “purposed imposition of his counsel,” and 2) the “actual inauguration…of Christ into his office.”53 Then, Owen unpacks the Father’s furnishing of the Son with “a fullness of all gifts and graces.”54 Finally, Owen ties the incarnation into the completion of the covenant of redemption.55

Fourth, the Father pours out His wrath upon the Son in order to make propitiation for sins.56 In his A Brief Declaration and Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity, Owen defends the satisfaction made by Christ:

If the Lord Christ, according to the will of the Father, and by his own counsel and choice, was substituted, and did substitute him-self, as the mediator of the covenant, in the room and in the

51. Owen, Works, 1:64.52. Commenting on Hebrews 1:5 in Owen, Works, 20:148. See also 19:68.53. Owen, Works, 10:164.54. Owen, Works, 10:166–67. Owen further explains that Christ has in Himself

two “spiritual excellencies:” 1) “the natural all-sufficient perfection of his Deity, as one with his Father in respect of his divine nature,” and 2) “a communicated fulness, which was in him by dispensation from his Father, bestowed upon him to fit him for his work and office as he was and is the ‘Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.’”

55. Owen, Works, 10:168. Owen further writes that the Father protects and assists his Son in the “perfect fulfilling of the whole business.”

56. Commenting on Hebrews 2:10 in Owen, Works, 20:374; cf. 6:384 and 10:163.


stead of sinners, that they might be saved, and therein bare their sins, or the punishment due unto their sins, by undergoing the curse and penalty of the law, and therein also, according to the will of God, offered up himself for a propitiatory, expiatory sac-rifice, to make atonement for sin, and reconciliation for sinners, that the justice of God being appeased, and the law fulfilled, they might go free, or be delivered from the wrath to come; and if therein, also, he paid a real satisfactory price for their redemp-tion; then he made satisfaction to God for sin: for these are the things that we intend by that expression of satisfaction.57

As a result of the Son’s death, according to Owen, the Father gives Him the authority to forgive sins58 and considers Him worthy of all glory.59

Fifth, the Father raised the Son from the dead and exalted Him to His right hand.60 Commenting on Hebrews 1:13, Owen says:

God the Father, in the exaltation of Jesus Christ, hath given unto him all nations for his inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for his possession, Ps. 2:8. Upon this grant a twofold right ensued:—[1.] A right to call, gather, and erect his church, in any nation, in any part of the world, and to give unto it his laws and ordinances of worship, to be owned and observed by them in a visible and peaceable manner, Matt. 28:18–20. [2.] A right, power, and authority to dispose of and order all nations and per-sons for the good, benefit, and advantage of his kingdom.61

The Father Produces Salvation through the Sending of His Spirit62 Owen gives his clearest exposition of this in his Discourse Concern-ing the Holy Spirit. He presents five expressions of the Father’s work; giving Him, sending Him, ministering Him, pouring Him out, and

57. Owen, Works, 2:425.58. Owen, Works, 6:406.59. Owen finds several reasons why the Father glorifies the Son: 1) it manifests

His righteousness, 2) it glorifies His love, 3) it glorifies His grace and pardoning mercy, and 4) it glorifies His wisdom. See Owen, Works, 8:604–5.

60. Commenting on Hebrews 1:13 in Owen, Works, 20:229–30; cf. 3:181–82.61. Owen, Works, 20:229–30.62. Owen is committed to the filioque. See Ferguson’s discussion in Oliver, John

Owen, 84–85.


putting Him in the elect.63 This is, according to Owen,64 for the pur-pose of regeneration,65 sanctification,66 consolation,67 and edification.68 Elsewhere, Owen also includes the drawing69 and sealing ministry of the Spirit.70

Finally, Owen associates the doctrines of justification and adop-tion to the Father’s work in the ministry of the Spirit.71 With regard to justification, Owen writes:

To the glory of the Father, we are accepted with him, justified, freed from guilt, pardoned, and have “peace with God,” Rom. 5:1. Thus, “through Christ we have access by one Spirit unto the Father,” Eph. 2:17. And thus are both Father and Son and the Holy Spirit glorified in our justification and acceptation with God; the Father in his free love, the Son in his full purchase, and the Holy Spirit in his effectual working.72

With regard to adoption, he writes:

63. Owen, Works, 3:105–14.64. Owen, Works, 3:408.65. “[The Father] quickens them and sanctifies them by his Spirit….” Owen,

Works, 20:381. See also 3:209.66. “Sanctification, as here described, is the immediate work of God by his Spirit

upon our whole nature, proceeding from the peace made for us by Jesus Christ, whereby, being changed into his likeness, we are kept entirely in peace with God, and are preserved unblamable, or in a state of gracious acceptation with him, according to the terms of the covenant, unto the end.” Owen, Works, 3:369. See also 3:481.

67. “He gives them the Holy Ghost as their comforter, with all those blessed and unspeakable benefits which attend that gift of his.” Owen, Works, 20:381. See also 2:227, 2:262, and 23:295–96.

68. “[The Father] confirms them in faith, establisheth them in obedience, preser-veth them from dangers and oppositions of all sorts, and in manifold wisdom keeps them through his power unto the glory prepared for them.” Owen, Works, 20:381.

69. “The Father gives the elect into the hands of Christ to be redeemed; having redeemed them, in due time they are called by the Spirit, and marked for God, and so give up themselves to the hands of the Father.” Owen, Works, 2:243.

70. “So must we inquire into the nature of our being sealed by the Spirit in his sealing also; for as it is said that ‘he who hath sealed us is God,’ 2 Cor. 1:21, 22, so of him it is said emphatically, ‘For him hath God the Father sealed,’ John 6:27. And if we can learn aright how God the Father sealed Christ, we shall learn how we are sealed in a participation of the same privilege.” Owen, Works, 4:401.

71. For “acceptance with God” and “ justification: in the thought of Owen,” see Kapic, Communion with God, 187–89, and for “adoption,” see Kapic, Communion with God, 189–92.

72. Owen, Works, 2:180.


The distinct economy of the Father, Son, and Spirit, in the work of adoption, is here clearly discovered. He is sent, “sent of God,” that is, the Father…. He hath sent him as the “Spirit of his Son,” procured by him for us, promised by him to us, proceeding from him as to his personal subsistence, and sent by him as to his office of adoption and consolation…. And, lastly, what there he doth is also manifested. He sets them on work in whom he is, gives them privilege for it, ability to it, encouragement in it, causing them to cry, “Abba, Father.”73

Our Response to the FatherIn John Owen’s Paterology, he never loses sight of the fact that the doctrine regarding the Father is not so much an intellectual exercise as an exposition of the character of a Person.74 Furthermore, Owen meant for his theology to be put into practice. Trueman reflects, “None of his theology was intended for its own sake, as some kind of glass-bead game to be played by an elite few in isolation from the world around. On the contrary: it was theology done within the church for the benefit of the church.”75

Owen’s teaching on the Father was to correct the view of God the Father as distant, wrathful, and “implacable” toward His elect so that none would dare to draw near to Him.76 Owen assures the believer, “It is misapprehension of God that makes any run from him, who have the least breathing wrought in them after him.”77 On the contrary, Owen wants a believer’s communion with God to produce a loving “intercourse with him.”78 This is why, in Communion with God, he devotes four chapters to the Father.79 The sum of the matter is that the Christian must believe that all of the Father’s works flow from love:

73. Owen, Works, 11:332–33. See also 2:207, 2:241, 2:245, 20:381, and 24:255.74. Sinclair Ferguson gives the same idea regarding the Son in “John Owen

and the Doctrine of the Person of Christ” in Oliver, John Owen, 72. He further says, “There is constantly in Owen, even when we are in the thick of him (and some of his writing is dense indeed) a doxological motive and motif.”

75. Trueman, John Owen, 128.76. Owen, Works, 2:19, 34.77. Owen, Works, 2:32.78. Owen, Works, 2:24.79. For an excellent summary of Owen’s Communion with God, see Joel R.

Beeke and Mark Jones, A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life (Grand Rapids: Ref-ormation Heritage Books, 2012), 101–16: “Owen embraced this idea of enjoying


Of the peculiar and distinct communion which the saints have with the Father—Observations for the clearing of the whole premised—Our peculiar communion with the Father is in love—1 John 4:7, 8; 2 Cor. 8:14; John 16:26, 27; Rom. 5:5; John 3:16, 14:23; Titus 3:4, opened to this purpose—What is required of believers to hold communion with the Father in love—His love received by faith—Returns of love to him—God’s love to us and ours to him—Wherein they agree—Wherein they differ.80

When Christians understand this, they obey the Father, not merely because they are servants, but because they enjoy the reality that “sons are free.”81 Kapic says this is possible because “the Father always keeps the Son before the believer, knowing that his or her whole soul can endlessly delight in Christ.”82 Finally, this freedom leads to what Owen calls “gospel worship,”83 the ultimate object of which is God as the Father:84

Wherefore, as a Father is he the ultimate object of all evangeli-cal worship, of all our prayers. So is it expressed in that holy and divine description of it given by the apostle, Eph. 2:18. “Through Christ we have access by one Spirit unto the Father.” No tongue can express, no mind can reach, the heavenly plac-idness and soul-satisfying delight which are intimated in these

the Trinity and amplified it through the concept of distinct communion with each divine person. Owen found scriptural support for ‘distinct communion’ in such texts as John 14:23; 1 Corinthians 1:9; 12:4–6; 2 Corinthians 13:14; 1 John 1:3; 5:7; and Revelation 3:20…. Rather than trying to relate to an impersonal essence or, worse, an abstract collection of attributes, believers should relate to each person of the Godhead in a distinctly personal way.” See also Packer, A Quest for Godliness, 203–15.

80. Owen, Works, 2:17. In his exposition of Hebrews, Owen says, “To be love, full of love, to be the especial spring of all fruits of love, is peculiar to him as the Father” (20:37), and later, “Care is proper to a father as such; to God as a father. Care is inseparable from paternal love. And this also is to be considered in the revelation of the will of God” (20:38). Owen also makes an interesting argument in 1 John 4:8, where “God is love” refers, not to the Godhead in general, but to the Father in particular. Owen, Works, 2:19.

81. Owen, Works, 2:213.82. Kapic, Communion with God, 190. Cf. Owen, Works 2:215.83. Owen, Works, 18:45.84. Owen, Works, 9:556.


words. To come to God as a Father, through Christ, by the help and assistance of the Holy Spirit, revealing him as a Father unto us, and enabling us to go to him as a Father, how full of sweet-ness and satisfaction is it!85

85. John Owen, The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold, vol. 4 (Edin-burgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1967), 292–93.


Experiential Theologyq


In the United States and Canada, when people speak of mighty waterfalls, we naturally think of Niagara Falls. It truly is a beautiful place to visit. However, Niagara is dwarfed by Victoria Falls, known in Zambia as “the smoke that thunders” (Mosi-oa-Tunya). This mam-moth sheet of water spans 5,604 feet and falls an average of 328 feet before crashing onto the rocks below and casting up a tower of mist visible more than eighteen miles away. As the Zambezi River drops into deep rock gorges, its spray produces a life-giving environment for animals and birds, as well as a gorgeous and awe-inspiring place for people to visit.1

The Bible speaks of a waterfall far greater than Victoria Falls, a spiritual waterfall that reaches from the highest heaven down to earth. It is the waterfall of God’s Spirit poured out through God’s Son upon God’s people, and it spans all the nations of the world. The Lord said in Isaiah 44:3, “For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing upon thine offspring.” The result is life and beauty where before there was only death and barrenness. Men, women, and chil-dren spring up and say, “I am the LORD’s” (v. 5). Where God pours out His Spirit, the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, producing a harvest of justice, righteousness, and peace (Isa. 32:15–18).

Where do we find this waterfall of spiritual life and power so that we may bathe in its life-giving waters? Where can we go to find God’s

1. “Mosi-oa-Tunya/Victoria Falls,” UNESCO: World Heritage List, accessed July 15, 2015, http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/509. The basic substance of this article was first given as an address by Joel Beeke at a ministers’ conference in Lusaka, Zambia in August, 2015.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 107–124

Wilhelmus à Brakel’s Biblical Ethics of Spirituality

JOEL R. BEEKE AND PAUL M. SMALLEY

q


“smoke that thunders”? God has hidden it in a place where few look: the teachings of God’s Book. He says in Isaiah 59:21, “As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the LORD; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth.” In the same way, our Lord Jesus said, “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). We find the Spirit of God by listening to the Word of God.

One of the great teachings of the Reformers and Puritans is that we must never separate the power of God’s Spirit from the truth of God’s Word, and we must never isolate doctrine from life. For this reason, Wilhelmus à Brakel (1635–1711), a premier representative and popularizer of the Dutch Further Reformation, opened his great four-volume work of theology, The Christian’s Reasonable Service, by calling each person “to live unto God at all times and in all things with all that he is and is capable of performing.”2 In a word, the point of theol-ogy is that the Christian be so soaked in the thunderous downpour of God’s grace and Holy Spirit that he may testify, “I am the LORD’s” in every aspect of life. In this article, we show that one of the most important aspects of Brakel’s magnum opus is the way he joins theol-ogy and doctrine with practice and spirituality so that people may know the truth, and the truth may set them free.

A Practical Theology and Doctrinal SpiritualityThe Dutch Further Reformation preachers, like the Puritans, excelled in linking biblical truth with personal experience and practical appli-cation. They did not separate Christian theology from Christian living, as if the soul and body could live in different houses; instead, their spirituality was doctrinally derived and their theology was prac-tically applied.

The divines of the Dutch Further Reformation shaped their the-ology according to Paul’s exhortation in 2 Timothy 1:13–14, “Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was com-mitted unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.” The treasure of sound doctrine must be guarded, not merely intellectually

2. Wilhelmus à Brakel, The Christian’s Reasonable Service, trans. Bartel Elshout, ed. Joel R. Beeke, 4 vols. (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 1992–1995), 1:4. Brakel cites Isaiah 44:5 shortly after this statement.

BRakel’s BiBlical ethics of spiRituality 109

but with the faith and love that the Holy Spirit generates in Christian experience by union with Jesus Christ. As the Dutch Statenbijbel noted on this text, “faith and love” are the “two principle heads” of sound doctrine—things to be believed and things to be done. Both require the “work and gift of the Holy Spirit.”3 Thus these divines joined head, heart, and hands in a way that is rarely done in modern theology.

Classic Theology for the Whole Person: Head, Heart, and HandsWhen you buy a book on systematic theology today, you expect to see the major topics or loci of theology: the doctrines of the Word, God, man, Christ, salvation by the Spirit’s gracious work, and sanctifica-tion by the Holy Spirit, the church, and things that belong to the end of the age. However, you do not expect to see a section dealing with the meaning and application of God’s commandments and various aspects of Christian life and practice. Scan the pages of systematic theologies from the late nineteenth century through today, and you find that though they discuss the doctrine of sanctification, they give little consideration to biblical, practical, and ethical directions for the Christian life.4 With a few exceptions,5 theology has been separated from ethics and spirituality and placed in a different category.

3. The Dutch Annotations upon the Whole Bible, trans. Theodore Haak (1657; fac-simile repr., Leerdam, The Netherlands: Gereformeerde Bijbelstichting, 2002), on 2 Tim. 1:13–14. This is a translation of the Dutch Staten Bible (Statenbijbel), a transla-tion with marginal notes requested by the Synod of Dordt and commissioned by the States-General of the Netherlands.

4. This phenomenon is not limited to a single tradition, as is evident from the systematic theologies or dogmatics of Herman Bavinck, Louis Berkhof, Michael Bird, James M. Boice, James P. Boyce, Robert Culver, Millard Erickson, John Frame, James Garrett, Norman Geisler, Wayne Grudem, A. A. Hodge, Michael Horton, Thomas Oden, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Robert Reymond, and William G. T. Shedd—none of which give much attention to God’s commands or instructions for Christian spirituality. Charles Hodge addresses each of the Ten Command-ments and has an extensive discussion of the means of grace, but he does not include many of the practical, ethical subjects that Brakel discusses. This is not a criticism of these authors—many if not all of whom seek to wed theology and practice in the Christian life—but simply an observation about how the categories of modernity shape our methodology.

5. Examples of modern theologies attending to God’s law, all from the Presby-terian tradition, are John Dick, Lectures on Theology (Edinburgh: William Oliphant & Son, 1834), 4:404–79; Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology (1871–1873; repr., Pea-body, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1999), 3:259–465; Robert L. Dabney, Systematic Theology (1878; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1985), 110–19, 351–429; Morton H.


That has not always been the case; early Reformed theology went hand in hand with practical directions for the Christian life. For example, in the Institutes of the Christian Religion, the sixteenth-century Reformer John Calvin offered substantial treatments of the Ten Commandments (56 pages), Christian self-denial in the hope of heaven (37 pages), and prayer (70 pages).6 Calvin gave more space to discussing prayer than he did to election! This approach fit Calvin’s premise that people do not truly know God except when they love and fear Him. Reformed theology is applied theology.7

In the early seventeenth century, William Ames’s The Marrow of Theology (1623) defined “theology” as the doctrine of “living to God.”8 He said, “The two parts of theology are faith and observance,”9 and devoted over a hundred pages to “observance,” that is, instructions on godliness and keeping God’s commandments.10 Later in that same century, Francis Turretin in Institutes (1679–1685) spent 167 pages dis-cussing the Ten Commandments.11 In the eighteenth century, similar explanations of godliness and the commandments of God are evident in John Gill’s Body of Divinity (1769–1770)12 and John Brown of Had-dington’s Systematic Theology (1782).13 When we add to these teachings many Reformed expositions of the Westminster Shorter Catechism,14

Smith, Systematic Theology (Greenville, S.C.: Greenville Seminary Press, 1994), 617–53.

6. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, ed. John T. McNeill (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), 2.8 (pp. 367–423), 3.7–10 (pp. 689–725), 3.20 (pp. 850–920).

7. Calvin, Institutes, 1.2.1.8. William Ames, The Marrow of Theology, ed. and trans. John D. Eusden (Grand

Rapids: Baker, 1968), 1.1.1.9. Ames, Marrow of Theology, 1.2.1.10. Ames, Marrow of Theology, 2:219–331.11. Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, trans. George Musgrave

Giger, ed. James T. Dennison, Jr. (Phillipsburg, N.J.: P&R, 1992–1997), 2:1–167.12. John Gill, A Complete Body of Doctrinal and Practical Divinity (Paris, Ark.:

Baptist Standard Bearer, 1995), 697–851, 973–94.13. John Brown of Haddington, Systematic Theology (repr., Grand Rapids: Refor-

mation Heritage Books, 2016), 450–500. It was originally published as A Compendious View of Natural and Revealed Religion.

14. For example, see the catechism expositions of Thomas Vincent, Thomas Watson, James Fisher, John Flavel, Samuel Willard, Thomas Boston, and John Brown of Haddington.


we can see that Reformed writers devoted a significant amount of attention to the laws of God and the practice of biblical spirituality.

The combination of theology, faith, and obedience was one of the defining marks of the Dutch Further Reformation in the seven-teenth and eighteenth centuries. The father of the movement, Willem Teellinck, said, “The true Christian faith is knowledge that leads to godliness.”15 This requires that we “heartily wish and sincerely desire to understand as much as we can of the revealed will of God con-cerning us,” and so we should pray with Psalm 119:33, “Teach me, O loRD, the way of thy statutes; and I shall keep it unto the end.”16 Teellinck saw no dichotomy between theology and spirituality, for, as Arie de Reuver writes, “The Holy Bible is the point of contact with the Holy Spirit.”17

The divines of the Dutch Further Reformation labored to draw out the implications of doctrine for life. Gisbertus Voetius worked out a Reformed marriage of knowledge and piety, for he believed that ethics is living out biblical doctrine.18 Johannes Hoornbeeck wrote, “Theology never teaches one only to speculate but always directs the action of the will.”19

Petrus van Mastricht said that Christian theology “is neither the-oretical only…nor is it practical only,” but joins theory and practice as “a knowledge of the truth which is according to piety,” as Paul wrote in Titus 1:1.20 Adriaan Neele says that Mastricht was “one who brought theory and praxis together.” Neele writes, “Mastricht defines theology as a doctrine of living to God through Christ and, secondly,

15. Willem Teellinck, The Path of True Godliness, trans. Annemie Godbehere, ed. Joel R. Beeke, Classics of Reformed Spirituality (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2003), 31.

16. Teellinck, The Path of True Godliness, 36–37.17. Arie de Reuver, Sweet Communion: Trajectories of Spirituality from the Middle

Ages through the Further Reformation, trans. James A. De Jong, Texts and Studies in Reformation and Post-Reformation Thought (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 123.

18. Joel R. Beeke, Gisbertus Voetius: Toward a Reformed Marriage of Knowledge and Piety (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 1999), 25.

19. Johannes Hoornbeeck, Theologiae Practicae (Utrecht: Henricus Versteeg, 1663, 1666), 1:7, quoted in Todd M. Rester, introduction to Petrus van Mastricht, The Best Method of Preaching: The Use of Theoretical-Practical Theology, trans. Todd M. Rester (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2013), 10.

20. Petrus van Mastricht, Theoretico-practica Theologia (1698), part I, I.i.20, quoted in Rester, introduction to Mastricht, The Best Method of Preaching, 12–13.


as a doctrine that accords with piety (1 Tim. 6:3).”21 Each chapter of Mastricht’s major work of theology has a practical section, and large parts of the book discuss aspects of obedience, godliness, justice and love toward our neighbors, spiritual disciplines, and answers to prac-tical questions.22

Brakel’s Synthesis of Theology, Ethics, and Christian SpiritualityNowhere do we see this joining of theology and practice developed more fully than in The Christian’s Reasonable Service. Brakel covers all the topics of systematic theology in about forty chapters, with each chapter ending with practical instructions to apply that doctrine to the Christian life.23 As a result, his systematic theology is deeply devotional. However, Brakel went further and gave about sixty more chapters entirely to practical and spiritual topics considered under the doctrine of salvation.24 Let me outline them by topic to give you a taste of the scope of his practical theology and evangelical ethics.

First, Brakel gave extensive attention to the Ten Command-ments, including a chapter on the law in general and then one chapter on each commandment (chaps. 45–55). Brakel explained the mean-ing of each commandment, the sins it prohibits, and the virtues or duties it requires. Occasionally he also addressed objections, as in the thirty-four-page section defending the practice of the Sabbath today.25 The result of his studies in the Decalogue is a comprehensive work of ethics that is more than two hundred pages in length.26 This work breathes the spirit of Psalm 119:14–15, “I have rejoiced in the way of thy testimonies, as much as in all riches. I will meditate in thy pre-cepts, and have respect unto thy ways.”

21. Adriaan Neele, Petrus van Mastricht (1630–1706), Reformed Orthodoxy: Method and Piety, Brill’s Series in Church History 35 (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 5, 95.

22. Petrus van Mastricht, Theoretico-practica Theologia, trans. Todd M. Rester, ed. Joel R. Beeke (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, forthcoming).

23. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, chaps. 1–35, 38–40, 44, 99–103. Brakel’s book covers the loci of theology in the following order: the doctrine of God (chaps. 1–9), the doctrine of man (chaps. 10–15), the doctrine of Christ (chaps. 16–23), the doctrine of the church (chaps. 24–29), the doctrine of salvation (chaps. 30–99), and the doctrine of last things (chaps. 100–103).

24. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, chaps. 36–37, 41–43, 45–98. 25. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:149–83.26. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:35–242.


Second, Brakel devoted twenty chapters to exploring the vari-ous fruits of the spiritual life that spring from faith in Christ. He offered a chapter on each of the following: spiritual peace, spiritual joy (chaps. 36–37), glorifying God, love toward God, love toward the Lord Jesus, the fear of God, obedience toward God, hope in God, spiritual strength or courage (chaps. 56–62), contentment, self-denial, patience, sincerity or uprightness (chaps. 64–67), love toward our neighbor, humility, meekness, peace, diligence, compassion, and pru-dence (chaps. 82–88). By themselves these chapters form a treatise on Reformed spirituality that has few equals.

Third, Brakel wrote fifteen chapters on the practice of the spiritual disciplines, both corporate and private. In addition to the treatment he had already given to the doctrine of the church, he wrote a chapter on preparing for, celebrating, and reflecting on the Lord’s Supper (chap. 41). He offered a chapter on giving public testimony to Christ and His truth (chap. 63). He treated the subject of prayer at length, including a chapter for each petition of the Lord’s Prayer (chaps. 68–74). He wrote a chapter on each of the following spiritual disciplines: fasting, watchfulness, solitude, spiritual meditation, singing spiritual songs, vows, and reflecting on God’s providence (chaps. 75–81). This book is a gold mine for anyone desiring practical advice on how to implement the spiritual disciplines that are rooted in biblical doctrine.

Fourth, Brakel devoted several chapters to the battle of faith and unbelief in every believer. He wrote a chapter on living by faith in God’s promises (chap. 42), and another warning against mystical spirituality that does not root the believer in the Holy Scriptures or connect believers to the church of God (chap. 43). He commended spiritual growth to believers (chap. 89). He also dealt with the difficult topics of backsliding, spiritual desertion, doubting that God is real, doubting God’s Word is true, lack of assurance of salvation, Satan’s attacks, the power of indwelling corruption, spiritual darkness, and the experience of spiritual deadness that can come on those who are spiritually alive (chaps. 90–98). Brakel did not write from an ivory tower of triumphal theology, but, like the Good Shepherd, walked with poor Christians through the valley of the shadow of death to show them that even there the Lord is with them.

One can understand why godly Christians of previous genera-tions would read through The Christian’s Reasonable Service during the


long evenings of the winter season.27 In it they found sound doctrine, warm Christian experience, biblical ethics, Reformed spirituality, dis-ciplines for spiritual growth, and a mixture of idealism, realism, and optimism for the Christian life. The degree to which Brakel inte-grated these elements into one, unified treatise makes his book an astonishing gift to the church, and we are deeply grateful to God that after almost three centuries it was finally translated into English in the 1990s by Bartel Elshout.

A Practical Sampler of Brakel’s Theological Ethics and SpiritualityWhile it is impossible to sample each of Brakel’s sixty or so chap-ters on ethics and spirituality, we would like to give you a taste of two chapters from different sections of his book. First, we will survey his teaching on the seventh commandment, “Thou shalt not commit adultery” (chap. 52). Second, we will give a brief exposition of his chapter on spiritual growth (chap. 89). On the one hand, we will hear the voice of the law as Brakel unfolds God’s condemnation of sin and righteous demands. On the other hand, we will hear the voice of the gospel as he reminds believers that in Christ they are both enabled and obligated to increase in grace.

Brakel on the Seventh CommandmentBrakel’s treatment of the seventh commandment in The Christian’s Reasonable Service opens with a short theology of marriage as God’s institution between one man and one woman (Mark 10:8). Brakel wrote, “God instituted marriage and gave His blessing upon it, not only prior to the fall, but He also repeated this after the fall (Gen. 3:16; 9:1). God Himself decrees who one’s wife will be and gives her to [a] man (Gen. 24:44). ‘A prudent wife is from the Lord’ (Prov. 19:14).”28 Therefore, we must honor marriage (Heb. 13:4), not despise it (1 Tim. 4:1), but give all people, including God’s ministers, the free-dom to marry (Lev. 1:7; 1 Sam. 8:2; Matt. 8:14; 1 Cor. 9:5). The “ability and inclination to procreate” in marriage is good and from

27. Bartel Elshout, The Pastoral and Practical Theology of Wilhelmus à Brakel (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 1997), 6.

28. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:205.


God, though after the fall sinners often desire the pleasures of sex without the responsibilities of parenting that go with it.29

Brakel taught that the commandment “Thou shalt not commit adultery” forbids a number of sins. It prohibits sinful actions, such as:

• adultery, or intercourse of a married person with someone other than his spouse.

• desertion of one’s spouse when he has not committed adul-tery (Matt. 5:32; 19:6; 1 Cor. 7:12, 15).

• incest, sexual relations between persons too closely related by blood (Lev. 18; 20).

• sodomy, sex between two persons of the same gender (Gen. 19:5; Lev. 20:13; Rom. 1:26–27).

• bestiality, sex with an animal (Lev. 18:23).

• fornication, sex between two single persons (Deut. 23:17; Acts 15:20; 1 Cor. 6:9; Gal. 5:19)

• personal fornication, which apparently was Brakel’s euphe-mism for masturbation (Gen. 38:9; Col. 3:5; Gal. 5:19).

• polygamy, the marriage of three or more people (Matt. 19:5; 1 Cor. 7:2).

• concubinage, living together as husband and wife outside of a lawful marriage (John 4:17–18; 1 Cor. 7:9).

• premarital intercourse between persons engaged but not mar-ried (Matt. 1:18).30

Brakel said that the commandment also forbade sinful gestures, such as lustful looks with the eyes (Matt. 5:28), motions with the body that communicated sexual intent (Ezek. 16:25), kissing and caressing (Prov. 7:13; Ezek. 23:3, 8), and wearing immodest clothing, for cloth-ing reveals the heart. The prohibition extends to lewd stories, words, and books. It condemns lusts and fantasies of the mind (Matt. 15:19).31

29. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:206.30. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:206–7.31. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:208–9.


He spoke against common situations in society that may lead to sexual sin. Dancing, though in its essence consists merely of taking steps in time with music, provokes sexual sin in those observing or participating in it. As to stage plays, he observed that if you removed all the blasphemy, paganism, violence, sex, and sinful jokes, few peo-ple would watch them—a comment also relevant to modern forms of video entertainment. Idleness also corrupts the heart and opens the door for fornication (1 Tim. 5:11, 13), as David’s example shows (2 Sam. 11). Similarly one must avoid wild parties (Rom. 13:13), fre-quent socializing with immoral people (Prov. 13:20), and looking at sexually provocative pictures (Ezek. 23:13–16). Brakel also warned that a troubled marriage leads to immorality, whether caused by mar-rying someone far older than oneself, resulting in a lack of desire and intercourse between spouses, or from quarrels that alienate husband and wife so that they do not have sex with each other.32

Brakel’s concern for specific causes of sin did not arise from a legalistic, graceless attitude, but from a sincere concern to help people to walk in holiness in their daily lives. He wisely understood that we are sinful people in a sinful world, and life is full of situations where “one’s corrupt nature will get the opportunity to manifest itself.” Therefore, each person must examine himself “as to how innocent or guilty you are.”33 In any morally questionable gathering, we must not neglect Brakel’s call to self-examination. Are you walking in sexual purity? Are you cutting off the offending hand and plucking out the offending eye—that is, are you repenting or turning away from any-thing that tempts you to uncleanness?

Brakel exhorts us to respond to sexual sin by seriously pursuing holiness, according to the biblical pattern of putting off sin and put-ting on righteousness. He admonished us to cultivate “in one’s heart a hatred and aversion for, and hostility toward all uncleanness of heart and whatever issues forth therefrom” (Amos 5:15; Rom. 12:9; Jude 23).34 He offered several reasons why believers should hate sexual sin:

• “It is the captain of all sin and is listed first among the works of the flesh” (Gal. 5:19).

32. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:209–10.33. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:210.34. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:212.


• “It runs counter to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit who dwells in believers as in a temple” (1 Cor. 6:18–19).

• “It runs counter to the suffering of Christ, who thereby has redeemed believers and made them His property” (1 Cor. 6:15, 20).

• “It runs counter to the heavenly calling whereby believ-ers have been translated from the kingdom of Satan to the kingdom of Christ” (1 Thess. 4:7).

• “It is a dreadful act of contempt toward God and a provo-cation against Him.” Most people would be ashamed to commit such acts in the presence of another person. How much more should we be ashamed to do such things in the presence of the One who repeatedly threatens His wrath and damnation against those who give themselves to such sins (Heb. 13:4; 2 Pet. 2:9–10; 1 Cor. 6:9–10; Eph. 5:5; Rev. 21:8)?35

Positively speaking, a believer must “endeavor to have a heart marked by modesty [and] purity” (Matt. 5:8) and to be “chaste in all his actions” (2 Cor. 7:1). The Christian must always keep watch, knowing that “we carry the seed of uncleanness within.” He must especially guard his eyes and ears against “all occasions which would stimulate this sin.”36

Believers must also exercise self-control. Brakel said, “If an unclean motion arises in your heart, immediately shake it off as you would shake off fire. Divert your thoughts immediately to something else.” Avoid the company of immoral people. Busy yourself in good, honest work, not just going through the motions but doing your job with joy and mental focus. Exercise moderation in how much you eat, drink, and sleep, for a lack of self-control in one area will make you vulnerable in others. If necessary, “have days of fasting” to help you discipline your body and devote yourself to God. Above all, “arm yourself with fear for God’s presence and omniscience.” In the light of His holy eyes, which are always upon you, remember that this sin

35. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:211–12.36. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:212.


“yields but a brief delight for the flesh and a long and bitter aftertaste for the soul.”37

Brakel did not mince words when it came to sin. Though a minis-ter of the gospel and an earnest preacher of justification by faith alone, he did not hesitate to call sinners to repentance, to exhort believers to holiness, and to warn that a life of unrepentant sin is headed for hell. At the same time, he had an optimistic view of the Christian life based on the power of God’s grace to transform sinners increasingly into the likeness of Jesus Christ.

Brakel on Spiritual GrowthJust as a tree naturally seeks to grow to its proper height and fruitful-ness, so “it is natural for a believer to grow,” Brakel said, for we are like trees planted in the courts of God (Ps. 92:12–13). Spiritual life is like the dawning of daylight; by its “very nature” it tends to shine brighter as the day progresses (Prov. 4:18). The purpose of God’s appointing the means of grace is “the growth of His children” (Eph. 4:11–15; 1 Pet. 2:2). The Bible constantly exhorts them to growth as their duty: “But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 3:18). The church contains people at all different levels of maturity: spiritual children, youth, and fathers, but “those who do not manifest any growth are not believers.”38

Brakel offered the following definition of growth: “Spiritual growth is a gracious work of God in the regenerate whereby they increase in both habitual and actual grace.”39 The beginning, preser-vation, and increase of spiritual life is from the Lord, for apart from Him we can do nothing (John 15:5), but God works in His chil-dren both their willing and their doing (Phil. 2:13). Brakel said, “The Lord causes spiritual life to grow by granting an increased measure of His Spirit.” He does this by means of His Word, prayer, godly examples, trials and troubles, and experiences of material and spiri-tual prosperity.40

Only the regenerate grow, for “growth presupposes the presence of life.” However, among God’s children there is great variety in the

37. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 3:213.38. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:139–41.39. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:141.40. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:141–42.


rate of growth. Some die soon after their conversion and have little time to grow. Some grow quickly to the amazement of those who know them. Others make little progress for various reasons, such as a lack of good teaching, isolation from other believers, or laziness in reading the Bible and praying. Some make steady progress, gener-ally “in the way of strife…and by the exercise of faith” in spiritual conflict. Some grow for a time but then weaken when they get old. Others flourish spiritually to their death (Ps. 92:14).41

Spiritual growth does not consist of using one’s gifts and abili-ties to build up others, nor in external, moral improvement without a change of heart, nor in experiences of comfort from the Lord. Spiritual growth, Brakel said, involves a growth of “habitual grace” in the soul, that is, the growth of a settled inclination toward God and holiness created in the heart by His grace.42 Brakel outlines five dimensions of growth in habitual grace.

First, spiritual growth consists of greater spiritual light, not mere understanding but a light that “has inherent warmth and ignites the soul in love, renders one fruitful, and brings spiritual truths into the soul, so that whatever is true in the Word also becomes true within.” The growing Christian sees the beauty of God’s attributes more clearly as well as the ugliness of man’s sins.43

Second, spiritual growth consists of more depth in fellowship with God. Brakel wrote of the growing Christian, that “he will pray, yearn for, desire after, and speak with the Lord. His heart will be fixed on the Lord, and he will rest, rejoice in, and glorify Him…. His thoughts will then not gravitate toward earthly things, but to his God.”44 The growing Christian increasingly lives for God.

41. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:142–44.42. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:144. Richard Muller explains the

phrase “habit of grace” (habitus gratiae) to mean “a divine gift infused into the soul in such a way as to become a part of human nature” (Richard A. Muller, Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theol-ogy [Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985], 134). Muller notes that the Reformers rejected this terminology because of its association with semi-Pelagianism and justification by inherent righteousness. However, later Reformed divines used the language of habi-tus gratiae or habit of grace while maintaining justification by faith alone. For more on the Reformed use of habitus, see Richard A. Muller, Post-reformation Reformed Dogmat-ics, Volume 1, Prolegomena to Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1987), 226–30 (chap. 6.4).

43. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:145.44. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:145.


A third dimension of spiritual growth is increasing reliance upon Christ. Brakel said, “Growth which does not center in Christ is no spiritual growth.” It is a grand mistake to think that we only need Christ at the beginning of our spiritual lives. Christ is our life (Col. 3:4), and we grow by walking in Him and being increasingly rooted in Him (Col. 2:6–7). He is the Head, and believers are the body (Eph. 4:15–16). He is the vine; believers are the branches (John 15:5). He is the High Priest, and Christians do not dare approach God except by faith in Christ. Therefore, “spiritual growth consists of making use of Christ.”45

Fourth, spiritual growth consists of greater holiness of motivation. As a Christian grows, he becomes more concerned about not just what he does, but also why and how he does it. Brakel wrote,

We shall then find no delight in our conduct if it is not governed by a holy objective; that is, not having ourselves in view, but doing all to the honor of God (1 Cor. 10:31), in the presence of God (Gen. 17:1), in obedient submission to God and His will (Eph. 6:6), in love (1 Cor. 13:1), in the fear of God (Job 31:23), and in believing union with Christ and through Christ with God (Heb. 1:6). We shall thus do everything out of God, for God, and unto God.46

The fifth and final dimension of spiritual growth according to Brakel is an increased display of gracious activity. Growth in habitual grace in the heart must lead to visible changes in every aspect of our lifestyle. It brings holistic change. The growing Christian fights against both external sins and internal sins, and against both sins of commission and sins of omission. Spiritual growth produces fruit that includes virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, kind-ness, and love (John 15:5; 2 Pet. 1:5–7). Growth is also apparent when we practice Christian virtue with greater perseverance, wisdom, faith, and zeal. We are not so easily shaken by the contempt of other people or the loss of temporal blessings, for we are learning to be “well satis-fied to live with God alone.”47

Brakel challenged every Christian by asking, “Are you growing?” On the one hand, we should not flatter ourselves if we are not. On the

45. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:146.46. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:146–47.47. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:147–49.


other hand, we should not deny a lack of growth. We need to examine ourselves, not just with respect to “a brief time span,” but over the course of our lives after our conversion. If there has been no growth, or worse yet, a general increase in sin since one’s professed conver-sion, this is a sign that there is no saving grace in the soul.

However, Brakel also exercised great pastoral caution at this point, for some Christians cannot perceive their own spiritual growth, and others may go through seasons of apparent spiritual barrenness though they are still alive in Christ.48 Like a tree with many branches, a believer may grow more in one area of life than in another. Like a tree deprived of rain in a dry season, a person may possess true spiritual life yet bear little fruit for a time. Furthermore, as a Chris-tian grows in spiritual illumination and spiritual desire, his increasing frustration with his sins may cause him to think he is regressing rather than progressing.49 On the basis of Brakel’s discussion, we must use wisdom and care in evaluating our own spiritual growth, and engage the help of godly friends and pastors to help us discern our true spiri-tual condition.

Why do true Christians fail to grow as they should? Brakel identi-fied several problems in a believer’s soul that hinder growth, such as secret complacency—“I’m saved and going to heaven, and don’t need to grow”—or a lack of assurance of salvation, or discouragement over one’s sins, or desires after the things of the world.50 Brakel also put his finger on a major cause of spiritual stagnation when he wrote, “Many are hindered in their walk solely by laziness.” He said, “Effort is required here—consisting in prayer, fasting, watchfulness, medita-tion, and the engagement in spiritual warfare.”51

Brakel exhorted the children of God to strive after spiritual growth. They have only just begun to walk with God, he said. The only alternative to growth is to remain in their sin. If they grow, they will display more of the image of God and enjoy more communion with God. They will please God more, just as the growth of children pleases a father. Brakel wrote, “God is glorified by our growth,” for the growth of Christians shows “that He is good, benevolent, faithful,

48. Brakel called these “spiritual winters” (Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:151).49. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:149–52.50. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:153.51. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:154.


holy, and omnipotent.” Furthermore, if they grow, God will cause their joy to grow, for He will draw near to them.52

For this reason, Brakel urged believers to press on with “valiant courage” and “joyful willingness,” trusting in Christ as their strength and joy. He urged them to engage in the battle against every sin and to practice every virtue. He warned not to let their spiritual wounds and falls into sin discourage them.53 Instead, Brakel said,

Continually feed upon the Word of God for by this one grows. Be continually in prayer in order that you might continually be strengthened and supported by the Spirit of the Lord—for you are weak and will not prevail in your own strength. Continually exercise faith so that you may continually be united with Christ and apply the promises to yourself. You will thus purify the heart by faith, overcome the world, and resist the devil. While thus engaged, you will soon experience that you are progressing and increasing in strength.54

Brakel’s doctrine of spiritual growth exemplifies the practi-cal theology of the Dutch Further Reformation. His book grounds the believer in the assurance of God’s sovereign grace. At the same time, it spurs the believer to get up on his feet, shake off his lazi-ness, and run the race that is set before him with his eyes fixed upon Jesus. Brakel’s teaching is idealistic in its high demands, realistic in its down-to-earth counsel, and optimistic in its Christ-centered hope. Brakel is thus a model for pastors in every generation.

ConclusionBrakel’s theology is a great resource for pastoral ministry because it is eminently practical theology. The Christian’s Reasonable Service lives up to its title: it is theology for the worship and service of God. Its exten-sive exposition of the commandments of God, the fruits of godliness, and the disciplines of the Christian life show how Reformed doctrine must be worked out in our relationships and activities. The book is a sparkling diamond in the crown of the Dutch Further Reformation, a written testimony of a vision for a theology that is theory and practice, doctrine and piety.

52. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:154–55.53. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:156.54. Brakel, Christian’s Reasonable Service, 4:156–57.


Brakel’s writings also call us to self-examination. We have surveyed a book that marries truth and obedience, so you must ask yourself, “Am I a man of truth and obedience?” You confess the truth of Scrip-ture with your mouth. Many of you preach it and teach it. However, is it just a theory to you? Do you live in daily obedience to the teachings of the Bible? Do those who know you say, “There goes a person who has the Bible in his mouth, in his heart, and written across his whole life”? If your personal history were turned into a book, would there be not only chapters on sound doctrine but also chapters on obedience to God’s laws, chapters on love and godliness, chapters on the spiritual disciplines, and chapters on spiritual growth by faith—written with the paper and ink of your daily actions and habits?

If your life is missing such a testimony, remember a fundamental truth of Reformed theology: “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief” (1 Tim. 1:15). Whether God’s holy eyes expose you as a hypocrite, or as a true believer who has backslidden in some area of life, there is a sense in which the answer to your problem is the same: look to Jesus Christ. Trust in Christ both for justification from the guilt of sin, and sanctification from the power of sin. Turn from your sins and draw near to God through Jesus Christ.

If, however, your life is a testimony of how biblical doctrine pro-duces godliness for all of your life, then we say, “Press on, friend, with all humility and faith, in hope of the kingdom of our Lord.” You are standing in the aura of the waterfall of grace; stay ever near to it and bring as many others to its life-giving waters as you possibly can.

Brakel’s legacy to us is a doctrine for life. He taught the truth and lived it with integrity. After he died in 1711, these words were written on his tombstone:

Here rests a man who could not restUntil he won souls to Jesus;An intercessor for his native land,He now is on the other side, In the fatherland of Abraham,Where he ever follows the blessed Lamb.


Follow in the way of his doctrine and life,And you too shall one day sing Hallelujah!55

May God grant the grace to be faithful in doctrine and life, so that after we pass from this earth, we may receive the same testimony.

55. We provide a somewhat better translation here of Brakel’s tombstone than is found in the introduction to Christian’s Reasonable Service, 1:lxxix.

Christ is the great reservoir of blessing, and without Him we have nothing. The great means of salvation’s application is union with Christ. In the mind of the apostle Paul, to be “without Christ” is to have “no hope” and be “without God in the world” (Eph. 2:12). John wrote, “And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life” (1 John 5:11–12).

John Calvin wrote, “As long as Christ remains outside of us, and we are separated from him, all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value for us. Therefore, to share with us what he has received from the Father, he had to become ours and to dwell within us.”1 Ames said, “Not all are saved by Christ, but only those who are united or engrafted into Christ.”2 Similarly, the Westminster Larger Catechism says:

Q. 65. What special benefits do the members of the invisible church enjoy by Christ?

A. The members of the invisible church by Christ enjoy union and communion with him in grace and glory (John 17:21; Eph. 2:5–6; John 17:24).

1. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, The Library of Christian Classics XX and XXI (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), 3.1.1. The substance of this paper was given by Joel Beeke at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary for the Midwest Regional Conference of the Evangelical Theological Society on March 11, 2016.

2. William Ames, A Sketch of the Christian’s Catechism, trans. Todd M. Rester, Classic Reformed Theology 1 (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2008), 37. See the Heidelberg Catechism, LD 7, Q. 20.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 125–136

Images of Union and Communion with Christ

JOEL R. BEEKE AND PAUL M. SMALLEY

q


Q. 66. What is that union which the elect have with Christ?

A. The union which the elect have with Christ is the work of God’s grace (Eph. 1:22; 2:6–8), whereby they are spiritually and mystically, yet really and inseparably, joined to Christ as their head and husband (1 Cor. 6:17; John 10:28; Eph. 5:23, 30); which is done in their effectual calling (1 Peter 5:10; 1 Cor. 1:9).3

Puritan pastor Rowland Stedman (d. 1673) wrote a treatise on mysti-cal union with Christ. He defined it as such: “Union with Christ is that special relation, which believers have to the Lord Jesus, as Media-tor of the Covenant of Grace; arising from their close and intimate conjunction with him: whereupon they are accounted as one with Christ, their spiritual state is fundamentally changed, and the benefits of redemption are effectually applied unto their souls.”4

To open up this rich theme of the Holy Scriptures, in this paper we will explore the doctrine of union with Christ with respect to various images of union which the Scriptures derive from Adam’s first home, the Garden of Eden.

We often think of the epistles of Paul as our primary sources for the doctrine of Christ’s union with His people, and rightly so, but the building blocks of this doctrine appear as early as the book of Genesis. Before the fall of man into sin, God had prepared types of Christ that would help sinners after the fall to look forward with hope in Christ. As Paul explained in Romans 5, the first and most basic type of the union between Christ and His people appears in the corporate solidarity of mankind in Adam.

Christ stands like Adam as the one head of His people. God cre-ated the entire human race in a single man so that from him came every other individual in the world, including his wife by a super-natural act of God (Gen. 2:7, 22; 3:20; 1 Chron. 1). Adam’s very name means “Man.” This method of creating mankind reveals God’s pur-pose to deal with us as people summed up in one person.

3. James T. Dennison Jr., comp., Reformed Confessions of the 16th and 17th Centu-ries in English Translation: 1523–1693 (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2008–2014), 4:312. Henceforth cited as Reformed Confessions.

4. Rowland Stedman, The Mystical Union of Believers with Christ (London: by W. R. for Thomas Parkhurst, 1668), 55. Stedman was a Puritan minister of Oaking-ham (Wokingham) in Berkshire, who was ejected for nonconformity.

iMaGes of union anD coMMunion with chRist 127

In Luke 3–4, we read that Christ is the Son of God who overcame Satan’s temptations in the wilderness, and that Christ is descended from Adam, also called a son of God. Luke thus contrasted Adam, the son of God who succumbed to the tempter in a perfect world, to Christ, the Son of God who overcame the tempter in the sorrows of a fallen world (Luke 3:22, 38; 4:1–13). Richard Sibbes wrote, “So then we see we have in Christ, ‘the second Adam,’ whatsoever we lost in the first root…and more than all we lost, he being God-man.”5

Although we cannot fully understand the union between Christ and His people, God calls His people to embrace this truth with faith, hope, and love. To help us to receive it, God has given us in the Bible a number of delightful pictures of our union with Christ. Though these are fully developed only in the New Testament, all of them are rooted in the account of the garden of Eden, which was the prototype of man’s communion with God (Gen. 2). Let’s consider six of these images that are traceable back to the Garden of Eden.

Worshipping as God’s TempleThe Garden of Eden was the first temple, for in it Adam and Eve experienced God’s special presence giving them life, speaking to them, and caring for them. Adam was like a priest in the garden, charged by God to serve and keep (Gen. 2:15), the same two Hebrew words used of the duties of the Levites at the tabernacle (Num. 3:7–8; 8:26). After the fall of man, God gave Israel the tabernacle and temple as a sign that He would dwell with His people again in grace despite the uncleanness of their sins (Ex. 29:42–46; 1 Kings 8:12–13). God designed the tabernacle and temple with images derived from the garden, such as trees and cherubim.6 Even after the sins of Israel provoked God to remove His presence from them and destroy His temple, He promised to set up His sanctuary among them forever (Ezek. 37:23–28).

In the new covenant, God has gone far beyond putting a tem-ple among His people; He has made them into His temple by their union with Christ in the Holy Spirit. Paul wrote, “Know ye not that

5. Richard Sibbes, The Hidden Life, in The Works of Richard Sibbes, ed. Alexander B. Grosart (1862–1864; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1973), 5:210.

6. Compare Gen. 2:8–9; 3:22, 24 with Ex. 25:18–20, 22, 31–33; 26:1, 31; 1 Kings 6:23–35.


ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Cor. 3:16). The “ye” translates a plural pronoun, indicating that the church together is God’s temple where He dwells.

Paul explained that believers in Christ, regardless of whether they are Jews or Gentiles, are joined to Christ like parts of a temple are joined to its cornerstone, founded upon the truths revealed by the Spirit to the apostles and prophets (Eph. 2:19–22; 3:5). Likewise, Peter, citing the Old Testament, described Christ as the cornerstone upon whom believers are built like living stones into “a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices” for the glory of Him who called them “out of darkness into his marvellous light” (1 Peter 2:4–9). The hope of believers is that God will dwell with His people, and they will be like a magnificent temple-city which needs no holy buildings because God is there through Jesus Christ (Rev. 21:3, 9–23).7

How can people be God’s temple? Believers are joined to the Lord Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit, and therefore the Holy Spirit dwells in their bodies as God’s temple for His glory (1 Cor. 6:17–20). Christ is the temple of God (John 1:14; 2:19–22), for in Him the “fullness” of deity dwells in a bodily form (Col. 2:9). The church in union with Him is indwelt and increasingly filled by His fullness until His glory fills all things in the new creation.8

Grant Macaskill writes, “The logic of this image…is that this mediatorial function of Christ involves nothing less than a giving of himself…. The glorification spoken of, then, can only be understood in relational or even personal terms: it is the giving of one person to others, who are thereby glorified by his presence, while remaining dis-tinct from him.”9

The biblical imagery of a temple teaches us that union with Christ joins believers permanently to Him so that they become the home of God’s special presence, to behold His glory and offer up their praises forever. Since He is the cornerstone, believers rest upon Him by faith,

7. Note that the description of the New Jerusalem in Rev. 21 is patterned on the temple with its lavish use of gold, cubic most holy place, angels at the gates, and gemstones like those on the high priest’s garments.

8. Eph. 1:23; 3:17–19; 4:10–13; cf. Isa. 6:1, 3. 9. Grant Macaskill, Union with Christ in the New Testament (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 2013), 151. For his exegesis of the “fullness” texts of Ephesians listed in the previous footnote, see pp. 149–52.


and He bears the full weight of God’s temple by His wisdom, righ-teousness, and power.

Bearing Fruit for God’s PleasureThe Garden of Eden was an orchard, for “out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food,” including “the tree of life” (Gen. 2:9). No doubt these trees were for the delight and nourishment of man, as we will dis-cuss shortly. However, Genesis tells us that God also delighted in the goodness of His creation, including fruitful trees (Gen. 1:12). Fur-thermore, the language of fruitfulness is applied not only to plants but to mankind as well in God’s original commission to His image-bear-ers (Gen. 1:28; cf. 9:1, 7), and is an important part of God’s covenant with respect to the multiplication of offspring.10

The Holy Scriptures apply this picture of fruitfulness not only to bearing children, but also to living in righteousness. In the tabernacle, the golden lampstand had the form of an almond tree (Ex. 25:33), a sign of the fruitful life found through the priestly ministry of Christ (Num. 17:8). The Psalms say that the righteous flourish like trees planted in the house of God to declare His perfection (Ps. 92:12–15). The person who trusts in the faithful love of God is “like a green olive tree in the house of God” (Ps. 52:7). However, idolatrous Israel, though once planted by God as “a green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit,” was shut out of God’s house (Jer. 11:15–17). As we noted ear-lier, these images of trees in the temple allude back to the Garden of Eden. Surprisingly, we find that in some sayings of Proverbs, the “tree of life” functions as an image of how the righteous produce fruit that blesses other people (Prov. 11:30; 15:4).

God compared Israel to a vine that He had planted and had grown to impressive size, but which He gave over to destruction.11 Like the trees of Eden,12 the vineyard of Israel was planted by God to bear fruit: the fruit of justice and righteousness (Isa. 5:1–7). The vine of Israel proved corrupt (Jer. 2:21), but God promised that He would bless His vineyard again so that Israel would fill the world with fruit (Isa.

10. Gen. 17:6; 28:3; 35:11; 48:4; Lev. 26:9.11. Ps. 80:8–19; Ezek. 15:6; 17:6; 19:10. 12. In the Bible, a vine is not sharply distinguished from a tree, but is con-

sidered as a woody plant “among the trees of the forest” (Ezek. 15:6), and may be depicted as growing to a great height with a mass of branches (Ezek. 19:11).


27:2–6). Indeed, the wilderness of Israel would become like the garden of Eden (Isa. 51:3), for the Lord would pour out His Spirit to produce righteousness and peace among a people who acknowledge the Lord (Isa. 32:15–18; 44:1–5). God would heal their backsliding and “be as the dew unto Israel” so that the nation would grow as a beautiful olive tree, for from the Lord comes Israel’s fruit (Hos. 14:4–8).

Therefore, when Christ said, “I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing” (John 15:5), He identified Himself as the true Israel, the fulfillment of what God’s people were meant to be. God’s judgment was going to fall on the rebellious vineyard again (Matt. 21:33–44; cf. John 15:6). The only way for people to bear fruit pleasing to God is to have a living, organic, abiding union with Christ as branches to a vine. As the branch has no root from which to draw sap unless it is in the vine, so human beings have no spiritual life to produce fruit apart from union with Christ. In Him alone can we be the true Israel of God, the delightful garden of the Lord.

The image of branches on the vine has immense practical sig-nificance for the Christian life. Stedman said, “If they have strength and ability to work the works of God, it is imparted through him. For they are branches in him, and he is the vine, so that we have no cause to boast of ourselves, nor is there any ground for self-confidence, or trusting in ourselves. But the whole life that we live, should be by faith on the Son of God.”13

Eating and Drinking in God’s PresenceThough the trees of Eden served as pictures of God’s fruitful people in union with Christ, in the historic garden they functioned primarily to nourish the life of Adam and his wife. God had given them a place of lush and ample provision (Gen. 2:16), especially in the tree of life (Gen. 2:9), which would have sustained life forever (Gen. 3:22). Gen-esis emphasizes the verdant setting by directing attention to the river that watered the garden before issuing into four great rivers (Gen. 2:10). To the Israelites who had left the Nile to wander in the dry wilderness, this must have been a picture of overwhelming blessing. The first man and woman ate and drank a daily feast in the presence of the Lord God.

13. Stedman, Mystical Union, 247.


Food and drink depict the life-giving communion of God’s saints with Him. Israel ate manna in the wilderness (Exodus 16), the bread of heaven (Ps. 78:24; John 6:31). The elders of Israel had a taste of table fellowship with God on Mt. Sinai (Ex. 24:9–11). Christ appears in Proverbs as the personal Wisdom who is “a tree of life” to all who take hold of Him (Prov. 3:18). Wisdom prepares a rich banquet and calls foolish humanity to come and eat (Prov. 9:1–12). The Lord calls sin-ners to return to Him so that they may eat and drink without money and without price (Isa. 55:1–2). He is the best of hosts (Ps. 23:5–6) and the fountain of living water who alone can satisfy the thirsty soul (Jer. 2:13; 17:5–8, 13). Feasting on God as one’s satisfying food and drink is especially associated with God’s temple as the place of God’s special presence, a picture of union which we already discussed.14 The temple was the location of Israel’s feasts, and it was there that Israel ate the meat of the sacrifices (Deut. 12:5–7, 17–18).

Christ drew upon this rich Old Testament background when He compared union and communion with Him to eating and drinking. Christ alone gives the living water that eternally satisfies (John 4:14), the heavenly streams of the Holy Spirit (John 7:37–39). Jesus Himself is the Bread of Life whom we eat by faith (John 6:35). With respect to eating this bread, Jesus shockingly said that we must eat His flesh and blood to have eternal life (John 6:48–58), a reference to the sacri-fice of His humanity upon the cross. Eating Christ is a metaphor for entering into a deep union with Christ by faith so that the incarnate Mediator becomes your life. Michael Barrett writes, “As we believe Christ and His gospel we receive life and enter into a mutual bond with Christ: ‘He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwell-eth in me, and I in him’ [John 5:56]. We must have a regular, daily diet of eating the Bread of Life and drinking the Living Water if we are going to grow in grace and in the knowledge of God.”15

Being Loved as Christ’s BrideOne of the most amazing pictures of union with Christ is that of a bride and bridegroom. This too is rooted in Eden, where God made the first woman from Adam’s side and presented her to him as his

14. Pss. 36:8; 42:1–4; 46:4–5; 63:1–5; cf. 27:4; 43:3–4; 65:4; 84:1–2.15. Michael P. V. Barrett, Complete in Him: A Guide to Understanding and Enjoying

the Gospel (Greenville, S.C.: Ambassador-Emerald International, 2000), 107.


wife (Gen. 2:18–25). Just as Christ is the last Adam, so our union with Christ was foreshadowed by the union of the first man and woman in marriage (Eph. 5:31–32). The Bible teaches that marriage is a cov-enant or solemn promise (Mal. 2:14; cf. Gen. 2:23), so the image of marriage communicates covenantal love and faithfulness.

Through the old covenant prophets, the Lord God repeatedly used the image of marriage to describe His love for Israel and to call her to faithfulness toward Him. God’s relationship with His people is a love story, where His undeserved kindness is answered by their infidelity, until His grace breaks their hearts and brings them home to live in covenant with Him (Ezek. 16). Backsliders in Israel must repent, said the Lord, “for I am married unto you” (Jer. 3:14). Though Israel had committed spiritual adultery, God would renew their mar-riage covenant based upon His own righteousness, faithfulness, love, and compassion (Hos. 2:19–20). The Lord spoke to Israel as to a bar-ren woman, promising her a vast number of children, “For thy Maker is thine husband; the loRD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; the God of the whole earth shall he be called” (Isa. 54:5). This is a surprising twist to the story of Abraham and Sarah, for here the Lord is the husband. The Lord promised to rejoice over His people as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride (Isa. 62:5). Greater love has never been seen than the love between the divine Bridegroom and His beloved bride.

Against this background, we can only consider Christ’s refer-ence to Himself as the Bridegroom of His people to be a claim to deity (Matt. 9:15; 25:6). Ministers of the gospel are mere friends of the Bridegroom, whose hearts long for the church to be fully devoted to Christ (John 3:29; 2 Cor. 11:2). Paul used the marriage of Christ to His church as the basis for his instructions for earthly marriages. Christ gave Himself on the cross because of His husbandly love for the church (Eph. 5:25). A defining mark of the true church is her wifely submission to Christ her Head (Eph. 5:23–24). The spiritual union of the Bridegroom and His bride is compared to the one-flesh union of man and woman (1 Cor. 6:16–17; Eph. 5:31–32; both citing Gen. 2:24). Macaskill writes, “The two do not meld or melt, their beings are not confused. They are, instead, united and any trans-fer of properties of one to the other must be spoken of in terms of


inter-personal communication, not hybridization.”16 The hope of the church is that her covenant betrothal will one day come to fruition at the “marriage supper of the Lamb,” and for this she prepares herself by grace by making a wedding dress of righteous deeds (Rev. 19:7–9). Indeed, she can produce good deeds only by her marital union with the risen Lord (Rom. 7:1–6). Joined together as spiritual lovers, Christ and His church live in a union and communion of which the inti-macy of sexual union is a faint shadow at best.

Receiving Nurture as Christ’s BodyWhen Adam received his wife from God in the Garden of Eden, the Lord added these words to explain the relevance of this for man-kind: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). Paul interpreted this according to his inspired Adam-Christ typology, writing, “For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church: for we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church” (Eph. 5:29–32).

Therefore, just as a husband and wife are one flesh, so the church is Christ’s body, joined to Him as closely as His hands and feet. He is the head of the body.17 Barrett writes, “The head is the command cen-ter for all the operations of life. From the head flow all the impulses and instructions for the body to function. A headless body is lifeless. It is only in union with its head that a body can live.”18

Christ has great tenderness for His body. Whatever affects them also involves Him, and therefore they must conduct themselves in holiness (1 Cor. 6:13–17). Christ tells His suffering people that who-ever touches them touches the apple of His eye (Deut. 32:10; Zech. 2:8). The risen Lord rebukes the persecutors of the church, “Why persecutest thou me?” (Acts 9:4).

Christ’s union with His body transcends the union between any earthly husband and wife because He lives in His body by the Holy

16. Macaskill, Union with Christ in the New Testament, 156.17. 1 Cor. 11:3; Eph. 4:15; 5:23; Col. 1:18; 2:19.18. Barrett, Complete in Him, 108.


Spirit (1 Cor. 6:15, 17; 12:12–13). Christ promised to send the Spirit to dwell in His people, and promised, “I will come to you…. Because I live, ye shall live also” (John 14:17–19). Thus it is “the Spirit of Christ” who dwells in those who belong to Christ (Rom. 8:9). Through this spiritual and organic connection, Christ shares His life with His body so that it grows and builds itself up (Eph. 4:15–16; Col. 2:19). Though we may perish physically in our afflictions, yet we shall live forever, for already we are joined to Christ in His resurrection, and are “his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all” (Eph. 1:23).

The church is not a collection of isolated individuals, but “one new man” in Christ, reconciled to God “in one body” (Eph. 2:15–16). Paul wrote, “so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individu-ally members of one another” (Rom. 12:5). Though we are diverse, every member of the church belongs to the body, and every member is needed (1 Cor. 12:12–30). We are one body with one Lord, and therefore must labor to maintain the unity Christ has given us (Eph. 4:1–6). Union with Christ has massive implications for how we relate to other Christians.

The union of Christ with the church as His body far exceeds anything found in the first Adam. In this regard, we must recognize that the last Adam is more than a man, but the Lord. As God and one person in the Trinity, Christ is one in essence with the Spirit, and therefore is also one with His Spirit-indwelt people in a manner that transcends the types and shadows of the Old Testament and brings us into the most intimate union with God possible for created beings.

Being Clothed by God’s GraceClothing originated in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve made puny attempts to cover their shame after the fall (Gen. 3:7). How-ever, God in His mercy clothed them with the skins of animals (Gen. 3:21), which was mankind’s first exposure to physical death and a sign of the sacrifices by which their guilt and shame would be covered. In the temple, the priests wore holy garments for beauty and glory so that they would not die in God’s holy presence (Ex. 28). Cloth-ing became a symbol of salvation itself: “I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and


as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels” (Isa. 61:10).19 Frequently, the Lord puts on clothing when He goes forth to fight for His people: the armor of righteousness, salvation, and judgment (Isa. 59:16–18).

Clothing too becomes an image of union and communion with Christ in the New Testament. Paul wrote, “But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. 13:14). Being clothed with Christ is not only an imperative, but also an indicative true of all believers, “For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal. 3:27). Just as in conversion they have “put off” the “old man” of Adam, so they have “put on the new man” of Christ (Eph. 4:22–24; Col. 3:9–10). Remarkably, their union with Christ is so close that believers may clothe themselves in the very armor of God, for they fight in the strength of the Lord (Eph. 6:10–11).20 God clothes them with power by the Holy Spirit (Luke 24:49). One day, when the trumpet sounds, they will be clothed with immortality by their union with the risen Lord Jesus (1 Cor. 15:53–54). In all His graces, the Lord Jesus will be as close to them as their own garments.

Conclusion and ApplicationThe union of God’s chosen people with Christ arises from His unique office as the last Adam of the new creation. In corporate solidarity with Christ as their Prophet, Priest, and King in the covenant, believ-ers are living stones built upon the cornerstone of Christ in the temple where God dwells; branches abiding in the vine of Christ to bear the fruit of the true Israel; guests eating at God’s table where Christ is the bread, meat, and drink received for their life; the beloved bride of the Son of God, who loved them and gave himself up for them; and the body of Christ, joined to Him as their living Head in the Holy Spirit and clothed with His righteousness and glory. Macaskill summarizes:

The union between God and humans is covenantal, presented in terms of the formal union between God and Israel. The concept of the covenant underlies a theology of representation, by which the story of the one man (Jesus) is understood to be the story of his people. Their identification with him, their participation in his narrative, is realised by the indwelling Spirit, who constitutes

19. See also Ps. 132:6, 9; Zech. 3:4.20. See also Rom. 13:12; 1 Thess. 5:8.


the divine presence in their midst and is understood to be the eschatological gift of the new covenant. Reflecting this cove-nantal concept of presence, the union is commonly represented using temple imagery. The use of temple imagery maintains an essential distinction between God and his people, so that her glo-rification is understood as the interpersonal communication of a divine property [glory or fullness], not a mingling of essence.21

Since union with Christ is the heart of salvation, we must examine ourselves to see if we are truly united to Him. Paul wrote, “Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?” (2 Cor. 13:5). True religion is not merely a matter of true beliefs, moral behavior, and participation in the ordinances of wor-ship, although it includes such. It is a supernatural relationship with Jesus Christ, such as you are in Him and He is in you.

If you are in Christ, then you have much for which to be grate-ful. The thought that Christ has united Himself so very closely to us should overwhelm Christians with His love for them. God overcame all our enmity and resistance against Him and gave us the Spirit of faith so that we take hold of Him who has taken hold of us. As Owen said, the Christian should exclaim, “What am I, poor, sinful dust and ashes, one that deserves to be lightly esteemed by the whole creation of God, that I should be thus united unto the Son of God, and thereby become his son by adoption?”22 Our mouths should be full of songs of praise that the almighty Lord would join Himself to such as we are. Our hearts should swell with desire to enjoy intimate fellowship with the God who has so desired to be near to us.

In 1890 at a funeral service for a deacon in his church, C. H. Spur-geon cited the favorite expression of that brother, which was, “Lord Jesus, we are one with thee. We feel that we have a living, loving, lasting union with thee.” Said Spurgeon, “Those three words have stuck by me; and ever since he has gone, I have found myself repeat-ing them to myself involuntarily—‘a living, loving, lasting union.’ He owed everything to that.”23 So also do we.

21. Macaskill, Union with Christ in the New Testament, 1.22. Owen, Hebrews, 4:149.23. Charles H. Spurgeon, Sermon 2245, “Living, Loving, Lasting Union,” in

Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit (1892; Pasadena, Tex.: Pilgrim Publications, 1969), 38:98.

Pastoral Theology and Missions

q


King Rehoboam had a choice. As king of Israel, he could exercise positive leadership by easing the burden which his father Solomon had heaped on the people. He could “be a servant to the people…and speak good words to them.” If so, his subjects promised to serve him happily. Or he could lead with a severity reminiscent of Egypt’s task-masters. When he chose the latter, the people lost their enthusiasm to follow. Rehoboam eventually lost half the kingdom and the nation began its downward slide toward dissipation. Alexander Maclaren refers to this narrative as a “wretched story of folly and selfishness” on the part of the leader. “If Rehoboam had wanted to split the kingdom, he could have found no better wedge than this blustering promise of tyranny.”1 Rehoboam learned the hard way that negative leadership is a recipe for failure (cf. 1 Kings 12:1–19).

This article will propose a better way, the way of positive lead-ership.2 Positive leadership uses biblical means winsomely to guide

1. Alexander Maclaren, Second Samuel and the Books of Kings to Second Kings VII, Expositions of Holy Scripture (Cincinnati: Jennings and Graham, n.d.), 216, 220.

2. Of the plethora of leadership books available, the following will be among the most useful for elders and deacons. General Christian leadership books include: J. Oswald Sanders, Spiritual Leadership: Principles of Excellence for Every Believer, 2nd revision (Chicago: Moody Press, 1994); John Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998); Albert Mohler, The Conviction to Lead: 25 Principles for Leadership that Matters (Minneapolis: Bethany House Publishers, 2012); John Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership (Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Books, 2014). Leadership books written more specifically for church officers include: Jay Adams, Pastoral Leadership, vol. 3, Shep-herding God’s Flock (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1976); Kent Hughes, Disciplines of a Godly Man (Wheaton: Crossway, 1991), 169–79; John Stott, Basic Christian Leadership: Biblical Models of Church Gospel and Ministry (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press,

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 139–157

Positive Leadership: Leading like Jesus (Not Rehoboam)

WILLIAM BOEKESTEIN

q


people into greater success. It is “the capacity and will to rally men and women to a common purpose, and the character which inspires confidence.”3 Consider this contrast: Rehoboam and Jesus were both leaders. Rehoboam’s followers were coerced by fear; Jesus’s follow-ers are compelled by love. All leaders motivate and move people, but positive leaders motivate people affirmatively, constructively, and productively. Commendable leadership promotes a palpable aura of desirability. William Hendriksen’s comment on Colossians 3:21 applies to all leaders: “Fathers should create an atmosphere which will make obedience an easy and natural matter, namely, the atmosphere of love and confidence…. Though the negative admonition cannot…be avoided…, the emphasis must be on the positive.”4 Negative leaders can teach, decide, and protect, but they can’t capture our affections and loyalties the way positive leaders can. Negative leaders can achieve objectives. Only positive leaders can enlarge hearts. Even negative leaders can make good decisions, but the positive leader makes good decisions well. People want to follow the positive leader—and they are blessed for following. “Leadership and lordship are two quite dif-ferent concepts. The Christian leads by example, not force, and is to be a model who invites a following, not a boss who compels one.”5

Why Is Positive Leadership Important?Positive leadership should be a non-negotiable goal for current and future church pastors, elders, and deacons. At the same time, the prin-ciples of positive leadership are applicable for all leaders. And almost all of us are leaders. If you are a husband, you are helping to chart the course of your marriage. If you are a friend, you have the potential to make an edifying impact on those who welcome you into their circle

2002); Steve Miller, C. H. Spurgeon on Spiritual Leadership (Chicago: Moody, 2003); Timothy Whitmer, The Shepherd Leader: Achieving Effective Shepherding in Your Church (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2010). Resources addressing the specific issue of positive leader-ship include Alexander Strauch, Leading with Love (Littleton, Colo.: Lewis and Roth Publishers, 2006); David Murray, “Positive Leadership” (http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=927141328448). From a non-Christian perspective, see Kathryn D. Cramer, Lead Positive: What Highly Effective Leaders See, Say, and Do (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2014).

3. Quoted in Sanders, Spiritual Leadership, 27.4. William Hendriksen, Exposition of Colossians and Philemon, New Testament

Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1964), 172.5. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 90.

positive leaDeRship 141

of influence. If you are a parent, your children are learning to under-stand their world through your leadership. If you are an employee, your actions affect those around you, for better or for worse.

Leaders Are Always Influencing Because you can’t “turn off” leadership, the way you lead always mat-ters. For example, the President of the United States is always leading, whether he’s delivering a State of the Union address or vacationing with his family. In the church, officers set the tone for a church, both formally and informally. Formally, they lead by making decisions. They sustain or defeat motions to introduce changes in the life of the congregation, they decide which education curricula will be used, and they conduct official family visits. Informally, elders and deacons interact with the congregation over meals and in other social settings, and as they do, they are leading, shaping, directing.

Officers are pace setters in church life, for better or worse. When leaders consistently fail to engage visitors with hospitality, they pow-erfully subvert God’s opinion that hospitality matters. When leaders persistently grumble about church decisions, they undermine the biblical principle of corporate decision-making. When leaders com-municate harshly in the church or in their home, they disrupt God’s vision for a safe and loving Christian community.

Likewise, church officers can lead positively. Leaders who vol-untarily clean up after a church event set an encouraging example. Leaders who sing with all their heart and take an active role in prayer meetings model for the congregation a biblical pattern of worship. Leaders who praise others for their service or patience in suffering guide the congregation in the use of “wholesome words” (1 Tim. 6:3). Leaders are always leading, but depending on your leadership meth-ods and manners, you could be doing more harm than good.

Negative Leadership Can Cripple a ChurchWhen leaders are pessimistic, fearful, harsh, unprincipled, indecisive, or otherwise negative, an unhealthy culture almost always develops. With all that is wrong with the world, where church leaders do not lead with biblical hope, a culture of negativity and pessimism is imminent. John Stott suggests that “discouragement is the greatest occupational


hazard of a believer, as it can lead to loss of vision and enthusiasm.”6 Where positive leadership is lacking, the spirit of negativity is often palpable; sometimes, it is oppressive. Negativity is contagious; so are a critical spirit, fear, and apathy. These traits are especially infectious from leaders.

Additionally, without positive leadership, a church can lose inter-est in its mission and decline into a “hold-the-fort” existence. Few organizations will succeed if its leaders fail to inspire. Behind many uninspiring groups stand uninspiring leaders; contemporary exam-ples of this are legion.7 By the very definition, uninspiring leadership is not positive leadership. If leaders do not lead positively, “their lack of enthusiasm, if not their open antagonism, will weaken the work and threaten the mission.”8

The differences between churches with positive leaders and those without will only become further exaggerated in the future. In pre-vious eras when Christianity’s influence was more pervasive and pop culture’s impact was weaker, dynamic, positive leadership in the church might have seemed less important. To be blunt, in previous generations, many people were simply looking for a faithful church, with or without thoughtful leaders. Today, more people seem to be looking for churches that have a clear sense of their mission—and rightly so! Such churches can hardly exist without positive leaders who develop and nurture a positive vision. Let Rehoboam’s example impress upon you the tragedy of failed leadership.

Positive Leadership is TransformationalThe right leaders can move an organization to become far greater than the sum of its parts. A positive leader doesn’t simply make decisions; he inspires others. The old saying is, “Some things are sooner caught than taught.” This is certainly true of optimism and enthusiasm in the church. A congregation needs to see what godly confidence looks like. Most organizations succeed when they are led by individuals

6. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 14.7. A poll conducted by the Harvard Kennedy School Center for Public Lead-

ership concluded that 69% of Americans are convinced they are being negatively affected by leadership. Accessed on July 7, 2014, http://www.centerforpublic leadership.org/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=886%3Aamericans %E2%80%99-confidence-in-leaders-rises-remains-low&Itemid=53.

8. Mohler, Conviction to Lead, 210.


who affirm, encourage, and engender hope and confidence. Winston Churchill rallied a hopeless Britain to rise up and defend itself against the Nazis.

I hope to demonstrate that Jesus and the disciples were positive leaders. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, the organization they led turned the world upside down as no other ever has. This is still a possibility today. When asked about the vibrancy and success of his congregation, John MacArthur points to the positive leadership of the church’s elders. “By affirming and emulating the godly example of our elders, the church has opened the door to extraordinary blessings from the hand of God.”9

God’s Officers Are Instructed to Lead PositivelyNotice how the images of leadership in Scripture are largely posi-tive. Teachers educate (2 Tim. 2:2), farmers cultivate (2:6), watchmen warn (Ezek. 3:21), soldiers protect (2 Tim. 6:3), managers steward (Titus 1:7). The most dominant portrait of biblical leadership, that of a shepherd, is overwhelmingly positive (Ps. 23:2).

Likewise, the qualifications of an overseer describe a positive leader (1 Tim. 3, Titus 1). He exercises and cultivates moral integrity, relational fidelity, and emotional stability. He is not a knowledge-monger but is able and willing to share with others what the Lord has shown to him. He doesn’t “lord it over” others but serves them (Matt. 20:25). His positive, even-handed, non-violent leadership bears fruit in the home, the church, and the world. His positive leadership culti-vates an endearing reputation with those both in his inner and outer circles of relationship.

Jesus Modeled Positive LeadershipD. A. Carson writes that “the life and death of Jesus are to constitute the measure of Christian leadership.”10 Jesus grounded His leadership in love, not fear. He warned against overbearing leadership (Matt. 20:25–28) and never led by spiritual bullying. Men followed Him because they were drawn, not shoved (John 6:44). His message and

9. John MacArthur, “A Few Good Shepherds,” accessed on July 7, 2014, http://www.gty.org/resources/articles/A104/a-few-good-shepherds.

10. D. A. Carson, For the Love of God: A Daily Companion for Discovering the Riches of God’s Word (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Books, 1998), entry for January 20.


manners pulsed with benevolence. As Joel Beeke said, “It is His love, not His wrath that compels us.”11

While He never shied away from necessary battles and delivered scathing rebukes when warranted (cf. Matt. 23, Mark 8:17–21) Jesus was not belligerent. He exercised humility, and gentleness, and His earthly ministry was characterized by tears (Heb. 5:7), generosity, sympathy, courage, and clarity. He personified kindness, compassion, sacrifice, prudence, and timeliness. As He wept at Lazarus’s tomb, His enemies were struck by His love toward those He led (John 11:35–36). Even those who disagreed with His message were attracted by His methods.

Jesus is the quintessential positive leader. Christ doesn’t just rule; He leads. He doesn’t just lead; He leads positively. Can we not say that positive leadership is a bare-bones summary of what makes Christ so lovely to us? Our Good Shepherd never condemns us (Rom. 8:1), never forsakes us, and never belittles us. Instead, He sacrifices His glory, His blood, His life, to make us whole and bring us to heaven. The King of kings treats us as brothers and as friends. His leadership is inseparable from our salvation. That fact alone makes positive lead-ership an eminently worthy pursuit.

The Source of Positive LeadershipWe all know the difference between positive and negative leadership because we have experienced both kinds. We have known leaders whom we would have followed into impossible challenges because they inspired our confidence in a greater good. We have also followed leaders simply because it was the right (or only) thing to do. Follow-ing negative leaders is a chore, while following positive leaders is a joy. So what distinguishes positive leaders from negative leaders? More importantly, what does it take to be a positive leader?

Being a positive leader is not about learning a few techniques to help manage people more effectively. Instead, positive leaders possess certain indispensible characteristics which qualify them for leadership and enable them to make good decisions and to do so consistently. In Mark 10:35–45, Jesus paints a portrait of positive leadership in con-trast to negative leadership. According to Jesus, positive leaders are

11. Joel Beeke, “Leadership and Administration” (lecture, Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary).


driven by faith, humility, and forethought. The foil of the positive leader is the ruler of the Gentiles who leads out of self-confidence for the purpose of selfish gain.

Positive Leaders Possess Gospel ConfidenceAll effective leaders exude confidence in something. Positive Chris-tian leaders aren’t confident because they believe in themselves or in the power of positive thinking; rather, they are confident in God. They share the perspective of the psalmist: God “only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defence; I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory” (Ps. 62:6–7). Positive Christian leaders know that, in Christ, the Father upholds them, the Spirit indwells them, and Jesus’s blood and intercession cover them. They are convinced that heaven is before them, the devil is beneath them, and God stands behind them. Victory is certain! For positive leaders, the Heidelberg Catechism’s definition of true faith (Q. 21) is a shaping reality:

True faith is not only a sure knowledge, whereby I hold for truth all that God has revealed to us in His Word, but also a firm confidence which the Holy Spirit works in my heart by the gos-pel, that not only to others, but to me also, remission of sins, everlasting righteousness and salvation are freely given by God, merely of grace, only for the sake of Christ’s merits.

The positive leader’s heart “has been humbled by failure, broken and conquered by Calvary’s love.”12 In Mark 10, Jesus grounds the disciples’ leadership in their solidarity with Him and His suffering. Therefore, only those who have been converted to Christ can lead others in a Christ-like manner. Calvin puts it bluntly: “The whole life of man, until he is converted to Christ, is a ruinous labyrinth of wan-derings…. The blood of Christ is not only the pledge of our salvation, but also the cause of our calling,” even our calling to leadership.13

Armed with gospel confidence, positive leaders confront chal-lenges with courage. That is, their theology translates into action! All moral leadership reflects the theological convictions of the decision-makers. Only those fortified by the theology of the gospel can lead the church with a Christ-like indomitability. Because positive leaders

12. Sanders, Spiritual Leadership, 48.13. John Calvin, Commentaries on the Catholic Epistles (Grand Rapids, Baker,

1989), 50 (on 1 Peter 1:18).


have cast all their cares on God, they don’t fall apart at the first sign of conflict (1 Peter 5:7); they have learned, as Oswald Sanders writes, to “transfer the weight of spiritual burdens onto shoulders bigger, stron-ger, broader, and more durable.”14

Gospel confidence equips positive leaders to make difficult deci-sions for themselves and others, even in the face of stiff opposition. Such leaders care about the opinions of others but are not terrorized by them. Paul made the difficult decision to withstand Peter to his face because Peter was “not straightforward about the truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:11, 14). Paul cared more for the honor of the gospel than for his rapport with this church pillar. Young David would never have agreed to Goliath’s challenge unless he firmly believed that “the battle is the Lord’s” (1 Sam. 17:47).

Gospel confidence also emboldens positive leaders to accept blame for mistakes. They agree with the dictum of President Tru-man: “The buck stops here!”

Positive Leaders Excel in Self-ForgetfulnessOne minister reflected on two types of church leaders in this way: “Some lead, others merely rule.” The positive leader’s interest is not in ruling or lording his authority over others, but in serving (Mark 10:42). The leader with the mind of Christ puts the interests of others over his own (Phil. 2). D. A. Carson is right: “To lead…you must have the gift of leadership (Rom. 12:6–8). But you must also be profoundly committed to principled self-denial for the sake of brothers and sisters in Christ, or you are disqualified.”15 Likewise, says John MacArthur,

Leadership in the church…is not a mantle of status to be con-ferred on the church’s aristocracy. It isn’t earned by seniority, purchased with money, or inherited through family ties. It doesn’t necessarily fall to those who are successful in business or finance. It isn’t doled out on the basis of intelligence or talent. Its requirements are blameless character, spiritual maturity, and above all, a willingness to serve humbly.16

Commenting on 1 Peter 5:3 (where Peter insists that a Christian leader will not bully those in his charge), Sanders adds, “A domineering

14. Sanders, Spiritual Leadership, 50.15. Carson, For the Love of God (entry for January 20).16. MacArthur, “A Few Good Shepherds.”


manner, an unbridled ambition, an offensive strut, a tyrant’s talk—no attitude could be less fit for one who claims to be a servant of the Son of God.”17 Instead, positive leaders are convinced that their calling is worthy of their own sacrifice as well as the sacrifices of others.

Because of their humility, positive leaders can be team players as they prioritize the well-being of the church and the glory of God over their own initiatives. One mark of positive leaders is their deter-mination to celebrate decisions that differ from their desires. This applies to how elders and deacons respond to decisions made by a consistory or council. They recognize that a decision has been made by a duly authorized body. If they feel that the decision violates the church’s charter, they may appeal that decision; if not, they will accept the decision with contentment. A church officer leads well when he chooses to speak positively to a church member about a council deci-sion that he voted against.

Positive Leaders Demonstrate Future ThoughtfulnessThere is a difference between a positive person and a positive leader. Positive people (and Christians should be positive) provide encour-agement in the present. But they do not necessarily help chart a course for the future.

Luke uses a phrase in Acts 19:21 to describe one example of Paul’s visionary leadership. He resolved or “purposed in the Spirit.” Paul strategized. One phase of Paul’s work had been completed in Ephe-sus. He now planned—in concrete terms—to build upon previous accomplishments. Paul didn’t just say, “I would like to see the minis-try grow. I would like to see the church expand.” He laid out a plan to minister in Macedonia and Achaia to Jerusalem to Rome. A spiritual purpose also requires action. “So he sent into Macedonia two of those who ministered to him” (Acts 19:22).

For a group to succeed, someone has to be spending concentrated time thinking about its future.18 “Leaders must know the way the organization should be directed and the course that must be taken, but also need the skill to motivate others to follow that lead.”19 Posi-tive leaders willingly “weigh-in on big decisions and think through

17. Sanders, Spiritual Leadership, 49.18. Cf. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 37–39.19. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 63.


methodological and practical issues in the church.”20 Timothy Keller has suggested that we need to use our doctrine to answer specific questions about our mission in order to formulate an overarching “theological vision.”21 Positive leaders give serious and regular con-sideration to questions such as: Why do we exist as a church? What is our mission? How can we better fulfill our mission? What changes should we make to be more faithful? Positive leaders identify goals and develop a plan to reach those goals, trusting in God to establish the work of their hands (Ps. 90:17).

Future thoughtfulness requires being proactive. Positive leaders refuse to merely respond as circumstances are thrust upon them. This doesn’t mean they simply embrace change for the sake of change, but they are persuaded that change is often a good and necessary part of life. They are not disposed to preserving existing conditions at all costs. Change is inevitable. The question is not, “Will this church change?” but “Will this church change for better or worse and will it have leaders that help navigate the new waters?”

If positive leadership was simply about learning a few techniques, the world would be populated with leaders. The fact is, positive lead-ership is about trading confidence in self for confidence in Christ and leaning into the positive future the gospel guarantees to God’s children.

How Do Positive Leaders Lead?The difference between the way positive and negative leaders lead can be summed up in a single word: love. The negative leader leads out of self-love. Carl Trueman explains:

It is often noted how many narcissists make it to the top in their respective fields…. Driven by the need to feed their own self-image, to satiate…the insatiable: they love themselves, and that love, because it does not terminate on the infinite God, can never satisfy; and so it serves only to drive them on to greater heights of self-love, evidenced in everyday life by massive

20. Jason Helopoulos, What Makes for a Good Elder?, accessed on August 26, 2014, http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevindeyoung/2014/07/10/what-makes-for-a -good-elder/.

21. Timothy Keller, Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012), 13–26.


over-achievement. Hence…they tend to rise to the top…rou-tinely break[ing] the rules themselves while imposing these rules with a ruthless efficiency on those under them.22

In marked contrast, positive leadership radiates from and expresses a heart that loves God and others. The greatest church leader (after Christ) led in love. Just as a nursing mother cherishes her children, so Paul “affectionately [longed]” for those whom he led (1 Thess. 2:7–8). Until we lead lovingly, we will be leading negatively.

Positive Leaders Understand the Power of Love People operate at the level of love or desire. As James Smith (bor-rowing from Augustine) has articulated, “[T]he center of gravity of human identity” lies in “our kardia–our gut or heart.”23 We feel our way around life by our desires. When people have a choice, they tend to do what they love.

For this reason, love is the best motivator.24 Jesus asserted that people followed Him because they loved Him (John 14:15), not because they were forced to. Paul explains his motivation to follow Christ even beyond the apparent bounds of sanity: “The love of Christ compels us” (2 Cor. 5:14). William Hendriksen summarizes a bibli-cal theory of motivation in three words: “Love precedes obedience.”25 You will never lead anyone into any real, God-honoring, long-lasting, community-building, self-fulfilling obedience unless they are ani-mated by love for God and for His glory.26 Peter Y. De Jong writes: “True growth in grace is always the result of an internal compul-sion worked in the heart by the Spirit of God. However, by means of

22. From Carl Trueman’s “Leadership, Holy Men, and Lessons from Augus-tine,” accessed on August 20, 2014, http://www.reformation21.org/counterpoints/carl -truemanleadership-holy-men-and.php. Cf. Mida Zetlin’s “What Leaders Can Learn from Narcissists, Manipulators, and Psychopaths,” accessed on August 26, 2014, http://www.inc.com/minda-zetlin/what-leaders-can-learn-from-narcissists -manipulators-and-psychopaths.html.

23. James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom: Worship, Worldview, and Cultural Formation (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), 47.

24. See “The Motivating Power of Love” in Strauch, Leading with Love, 27–35.25. William Hendriksen, New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Gospel

According to John (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1953), John 14:15.26. Cf. Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 91.


words of wisdom and kindness such spiritual desires…may be fanned into a flame.”27

We cannot truly lead until we captivate hearts. To this point, Al Mohler cites a critical study on leadership. “Leadership…may once have been something that was characterized by a command-and-con-trol, top-down, do-as-I-say style. But no more. Those days are long gone. Today, leadership is an aspiration. It is something you have to earn every day, because on a daily basis, people choose whether or not they’re going to follow you.”28 And they choose based on whether you stimulate their desires, right or wrong. You can command followers by strength, but you can only draw followers by love. When you have control, you can make people do what you want; but when they are no longer under your thumb, they will do what they love.

Positive leaders know that duty is never stronger than love. Mohler echoes Augustine in insisting that “love undergirds the entire process of learning,” which is an important part of leading. The first step for the loving teacher is to love those whom he will teach and to help them love what they are learning.29 As Al Mohler says, “The great aim of leadership is to lead followers continually into a deeper and more comprehensive love for what is most real, most true, most right, and most important.”30

Positive Leaders Project LoveBoth positive and negative leadership can be felt before the leader says a word. Positive leaders project an overall spirit of warmth. Con-sider an analogy with Scripture. God’s Word deals frankly and firmly with sin, and yet, the strongest melody of Scripture’s song is that of redemption and salvation. Redemptive history is more like a smile than a frown! Likewise, positive Christian leaders face the difficulties of life with a tangible optimism you would expect from someone who has become God’s friend.

This means that positive leaders are cheerful. David Murray says, “A sunny character and joy-filled words attract people and empower them. Much easier to follow such a person than someone who looks

27. Peter Y. De Jong, Taking Heed to the Flock: A Study of the Principles and Practice of Family Visitation (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1965), 66–67.

28. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 84.29. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 71.30. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 48.


like a tornado and who speaks like an undertaker.”31 This is important because, like it or not, people tend to follow those they like. Do we not feel enriched by positive people and drained by negative people?

Positive church leaders project likeability because their personali-ties are flavored by the fruit of the Spirit. Positive Christian leaders smile because they’ve experienced God’s smile. The word “smile” and its opposite “frown” are not found in most English Bibles, but the concepts are. God conveys His displeasure toward His enemies by frowning. He threatens His enemies by saying: “I will set my face against that man” (Ezek. 14:7–8). By contrast, David rejoices in the “light of thy [God’s] countenance” (Ps. 44:3). He asks God to “Make thy face to shine upon thy servant” (Ps. 31:16). Positive leaders smile because God smiles on them. In fact, for Reformed Christians, cheer-ful service is a confessional matter! Every church member is bound “to use his gifts readily and cheerfully for the service and enrichment of other members” (Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 55). How much more should this be true for leaders?

Positive Leaders Speak LoveThis means, first, that they understand the power of words. They recognize that words can kill and they can bring life (Prov. 18:21). Leaders choose their words carefully and retract them when necessary.

Second, positive leaders handle negative matters with care. They don’t dwell on the negative but speak five positive statements for every negative one.32 Leaders articulate concerns winsomely. While there is a place in Christian leadership for loving rebuke (2 Tim 4.2; Titus 1:9), positive leaders never raise problems without reflecting on potential solutions (cf. 1 Cor. 10:13). Leaders are careful in sharing personal burdens. Positive leaders don’t amplify their sacrifices. They believe and talk about their privilege to lead.

Third, positive leaders make others feel valued. Mohler writes: “Loyalty grows where it is cultivated and admired. Do you value long service and commitment? If so, admire it openly and express grati-tude. Have certain team members demonstrated a particular tenacity

31. David Murray, “Positive Leadership,” Unpublished lecture notes from 2013 “Semper Reformanda” conference hosted by the Eastern Classis of the URCNA.

32. Cf. Cramer, Lead Positive, 26.


and sacrifice for the cause? Celebrate them.”33 Address people by name, congratulate, and affirm.

Fourth, positive leaders speak hopefully about the future. Speak-ing in the context of opposition and hardship, Paul wrote: “For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:19). Paul’s harshness to the Galatians stands out because it was so uncharacteristic! His mode of operation was to encourage. Positive leaders remind other believers that “with a view to the future [we] may have good confidence in our faithful God and Father that no creature shall separate us from His love” (Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 28.)

Fifth, positive leaders speak enthusiastically about their projects. Positive leaders pursue a godly vision with energy. They heed Paul’s imperative that the one who leads must do so with zeal (Rom. 12:8), and they communicate their zeal verbally. Positive leaders have a pas-sion for God, for the gospel, and for the church. Sin is no match for Christ, and leaders project success in dependence on God’s promises and character. They speak the language of Joshua and Caleb, who said about the land of Canaan, “Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it” (Num. 13:30).

Positive Leaders Practice LovePositive leaders love by compromising, building consensus, and pro-moting cooperation. Godly leaders know the difference between preferences and convictions; they compromise the former but not the latter. A willingness to compromise preferences allows the positive leader to be a unifier who emphasizes common ground where pos-sible. Notwithstanding abiding differences (1 Corinthians 12), the positive leader “helps and encourages all God’s people to discover, develop and exercise their gifts” and work together.34

Positive leaders love by relating well with difficult people. They love the difficult people in their circle enough to treat them with kindness and dignity, recognizing that difficult people are hurting, malfunctioning people who need grace more than anyone. Posi-tive leaders graciously handle opposition from naysayers. Often this means listening and bringing the matter to God for help.

33. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 153.34. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 93.


Such leaders also love by active example. Theological prognosti-cators are not positive leaders. If the leader is viewed as an armchair manager, he will never lead well. Case in point, deacons must “[super-vise] the works of Christian mercy among the congregation.” This means that they must “[acquaint] themselves with congregational needs; [exhort] members of the congregation to show mercy.”35 The deacons are mercy managers, but as leaders, they must be ministers of mercy among the congregation. When congregants are asked to name a merciful church member, current deacons should pop quickly to the top of their list. If a consistory approves a new evangelistic outreach program, elders should be the first to sign up.

Positive leaders love by attempting difficult tasks and making hard decisions. True leaders show love by doing what is best, not what is popular or easy. John Stott reminds us that “to be accountable to [God] is to be delivered from the tyranny of human criticism.”36 “Con-gregations…need effective leaders who are authentically Christian —whose leadership flows out of their Christian commitment.”37 This commitment is stronger than the fear which makes others falter. “The leadership that matters most is convictional—deeply convictional.”38 The conviction needed to make difficult choices is rooted in a love for God and His glory and fueled by the love of God toward His children.

How Do We Develop Positive Leadership?More pointedly, what can we do as the Spirit graciously reveals our leadership shortcomings? Thankfully, positive leadership is a grace to be cultivated. Despite nearly undermining the need for God’s help in developing leadership, John Maxwell articulates what almost every-one acknowledges: “Although it’s true that some people are born with greater natural gifts than others, the ability to lead is really a collection of skills, nearly all of which can be learned and improved.” Citing an important study on leadership, Maxwell adds, “It is the capacity to develop and improve their skills that distinguishes leaders from their followers. Successful leaders are learners.”39

35. URCNA, Church Order, Art. 15.36. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 94.37. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 18.38. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 21.39. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 24.


Address Leadership WeaknessesFuture positive leaders understand Lamentations 3:40. “Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the LORD.” Examining our lead-ership shortfalls means a number of things.

First, positive leaders evaluate their leadership. Toward this end, they learn to listen to others. To properly evaluate your leadership, you will need the help of a trusted spiritual friend. King David saw his leadership through rose-colored glasses until Nathan shattered his false confidence (2 Sam. 12:7). You need a Nathan! True leaders invite this kind of evaluation.

Of course, the problem with requesting evaluation of our leader-ship is that we might receive criticism. But growing leaders respond to criticism positively. John Stott writes, “When our authority is ques-tioned, threatened or resisted, the great temptation is to insist more strongly, but we have to resist that temptation.”40 Instead, we should use such occasions to evaluate our leadership. Are these concerns legitimate? “Leaders who fear acknowledging alternatives to the deci-sion undermine their own credibility,”41 Mohler says.

Some years ago, our church council members “exhorted one another in an edifying manner regarding the discharge of their offices.”42 During our “mutual censure,” someone pointed out a flaw which he noticed in my pastoring. My first impulse was to push back, but I did my best to resist that urge. A week later, someone else gently confronted me with the same exhortation. I still felt like deflecting the criticism but I started to perceive a trend. That same day I asked my family, Is this true about me? They respectfully agreed that it was. These events were a great gift from God to help me become a better leader.

Second, growing positive leaders ponder their weaknesses. A wise man, when he encounters failure, reflects upon it in order to receive instruction (Prov. 24:32). Do you have a reputation for being overly aggressive or highly critical? How might your spirit be affecting others and blocking openness and creativity? Do you lack approach-ability and inadvertently keep people at arm’s length? How might this weakness be keeping you from helping those around you? Are you

40. Stott, Problems of Christian Leadership, 66.41. Mohler, The Conviction to Lead, 64.42. URCNA Church Order Art. 63.


unnecessarily timid? Might your followers lack confidence that you have the courage to lead? Are you spread too thin, making “a mil-limeter of progress in a million directions”?43 Have you created, by negative leadership, the ideal breeding ground for rebellion?44 Reflect-ing on our weaknesses is the first step in developing a recovery plan.

Third, growing positive leaders repent of negativity. There are good reasons that there should “be not many masters” as James says (James 3:1). Poor leadership is a sin that corrupts others and invites God’s judgment. The journey from negative to positive leadership always passes through the gate of repentance. In repentance, “a sin-ner, being truly aware of his sinfulness, understands the mercy of God in Christ, grieves for and hates his sins, and turns from them to God, fully intending and striving for a new obedience” (Westmin-ster Shorter Catechism, Q. 87). We repent of negative leadership by expressing a changed mind that yearns for a changed life. We own our sin and the damage it has produced. We seek God’s pardon—and the pardon of others where appropriate—and begin making changes that will move us from failure to faithfulness.

Build Your Positive Leadership QuotientCharles Spurgeon observes that grief over leadership failures needs to be followed by positive change.

What is the use of regret unless we can rise by it to a better future? Sighs, which do not raise us higher, are an ill use of vital breath. Chasten yourselves, but be not discouraged. Gather up the arrows which aforetime fell wide of the mark…to send them to the target with direct aim, and a more concentrated force. Weave victories out of defeats. Learn success from failure, wis-dom from blundering.45

43. Greg McKeown, Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less (New York: Crown Business, 2014), 7.

44. See Greg McKeown’s “Can We Reverse the Stanford Prison Experiment,” in which he describes how those treated like prisoners can quickly begin acting the part. Just days into the experiment, the Stanford “prisoners” “demonstrated symp-toms of depression and extreme stress.” Accessed on August 27, 2014, http://blogs .hbr.org/2012/06/can-we-reverse-the-stanford-pr/.

45. C. H. Spurgeon, An All Round Ministry: Address to Ministers and Students (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1978), 228–29.


We “weave victories out of defeats” by first focusing on the believer’s positive future. A greater understanding of God’s providential dealings with us can change our entire approach to leadership. Kevin DeYoung points out, “For many Christians, coming to grips with God’s all-encompassing providence requires a massive shift in how they look at the world,” to see it as a place “where God creates and constantly controls with sovereign love and providential power.” Positive leaders have a hearty belief in “God the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth, [which is] brought to bear on our present blessings and troubles and [which buoys] our hope in the future.”46 As we lay greater trust upon the Father’s providence, the Son’s sacrifice and prayers, and the Spirit’s comfort, we can lead with increasingly greater positivity.

Second, emerging positive leaders learn from other positive lead-ers. One leadership guru suggests that eighty-five percent of leaders owe their success to the influence of another leader.47 When you reflect on positive leadership, personal portraits pop into your mind. Seek out these people and regularly sit at their feet.

Additionally, leaders can be mentored by reading invigorating literature. Begin to notice how the Scriptures call you to positive leadership (cf. Is. 40:10–11; Ezek. 34:11–16; Matt. 11:29–30, 12:15–21; John 10:7–16). Read biographies of positive Christian leaders. For example, learning how St. Augustine overcame intense narcissism and ambition to sacrifice his entire converted life for the good of the church can leave an indelible mark on contemporary leaders.48 Read carefully selected books on leadership.

Third, as in any task, positive leaders need to get started. Running a marathon starts by taking a step. This is true even of those who are not currently in a leadership position. Before leadership is a position, it is a pattern of life. Develop positive leadership characteristics so that you will be prepared to lead when the time comes. Where is the first place you need to show positive leadership? Identify your closest followers and let them begin to see positive leadership. As you begin

46. Kevin DeYoung, The Good News We Almost Forgot: Rediscovering the Gospel in a 16th Century Catechism (Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2010), 59–60.

47. Maxwell, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, 133. 48. Consider K. C. Murdarasi’s excellent book on Augustine, The Truth Seeker

(Ross-shire, Scotland: Christian Focus Publications, 2014). While written for school-aged readers, most church leaders will find it stimulating.


to cultivate a community of optimism, that community will, in turn, help your leadership.

Finally, God’s best leaders grow in grace (2 Pet. 3:18). Becoming a more positive leader is a lifelong goal that only God can deliver. Still, “God will give his grace and Holy Spirit to those only who with hearty sighing unceasingly beg them of Him and thank Him for them” (Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 116). If you are a leader, pray for greater humility, better listening, longer suffering, deeper tenderness, bolder creativity, more contagious cheerfulness, more Christ-like communication, and more consistent courage. And don’t be surprised when God begins to act!

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 158–179

The historian, Christopher Hill, first wrote of the “spiritualization” of the Puritan household in 1964.1 As a Marxist, he was primar-ily interested in demonstrating how such a household served as the breeding ground for economic individualism and, therefore, the advent of capitalist values and practices. Whether employing Hill’s exact phraseology or not, others have posited different theories as to the historical and sociological significance of the spiritual household. The German scholar of English literature, Levin Schucking, viewed it as the catalyst for the development of the close conjugal family, owing to its repudiation of celibacy and its celebration of intimacy.2 Predictably, the feminist historian, Lyndal Roper, decried the spiri-tual household as responsible for reinforcing repressive patriarchal structures and subjecting children to harmful indoctrination.3 More recently, the church historian, Alexandra Walsham, revisited the spir-itual household, theorizing that it functioned at times as a support for the political and ecclesiastical establishment, and at other times as an impetus for clandestine resistance to authority.4

1. Christopher Hill, Society and Puritanism in Pre-Revolutionary England (1964; rpt., London: Panther Books, 1969), 429–66.

2. Levin Schucking, The Puritan Family: A Social Study from Literary Sources (Lon-don: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1969). For a similar thesis, see Edmund Morgan, The Puritan Family: Religion and Domestic Relations in Seventeenth-Century New England (New York: Harper & Row, 1956).

3. Lyndal Roper, The Holy Household: Women and Morals in Reformation Augsburg (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991).

4. Alexandra Walsham, “Holy Families: The Spiritualization of the Early Mod-ern Household Revisited,” in Religion and the Household (Rochester: Boydell Press, 2014), 122–60.

A Puritan, Spiritual Household: William Perkins and the “Right Ordering” of a Family

J. STEPHEN YUILLE

q

a puRitan spiRitual householD 159

Without disparaging the profitableness of these and other studies, I am going to sidestep them in order to consider the contemporary significance of the Puritan spiritual household. To accomplish this, I am going to focus on William Perkins’s understanding of “Chris-tian oeconomy”—“the doctrine of the right ordering of a family.”5 He expounds his insights in a treatise penned in the early 1590s; it is entitled Oeconomy, or Household Government: A Short Survey of the Right Manner of Erecting and Ordering a Family, According to the Scriptures.6 By the end of the sixteenth century, there was a considerable body of literature about managing a household.7 So why does Perkins’s treat-ment merit our attention?8 For starters, his membership in “the trinity of the orthodox” (along with John Calvin and Theodore Beza) is a good reason for considering his insights on any subject.9 Moreover, his stature as “the father of Puritanism”10 points to his formative role in a movement that profoundly shaped Christianity in the West. As

5. William Perkins, Oeconomy, or Household Government, A Short Survey of the Right Manner of Erecting and Ordering a Family, According to the Scriptures, in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1631), 3.669. Perkins’s definition of “oeconomy” is derived from Proverbs 24:3, “By wisdom a house is built, and by understanding it is established.”

6. Perkins likely produced this treatise in the early 1590s—an interesting detail, given that he married Timothye Cradock in 1595. Did his impending union provide him the necessary impetus to produce a marriage manual?

7. By way of examples, see Richard Greenham, A Godly Exhortation and Faithful Admonition to Virtuous Parents and Modern Matrons (London, 1584); Henry Smith, A Preparative to Marriage, (London, 1591); and John Dod and Robert Cleaver, A Godly Form of Household Government (London, 1598).

8. In the words of Ian Breward, what makes Perkins “so important is that by the end of the sixteenth century his writings had begun to displace those of Calvin, Beza, and Bullinger.” Breward gives two reasons for this interest in Perkins: (1) “an ability to clarify and expound complex theological issues which aroused the respect of fellow scholars;” and (2) “a gift for relating seemingly abstruse theological teach-ing to the spiritual aspirations of ordinary Christians.” “The Significance of William Perkins,” Journal of Religious History 4 (1966): 113, 116.

9. John Eusden, Puritans, Lawyers, and Politics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958), 11; Paul Seaver, The Puritan Lectureships: The Politics of Religious Dis-sent, 1560–1662 (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 1970), 114; Christopher Hill, God’s Englishman: Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution (New York: Harper & Row, 1970), 38; J. I. Packer, An Anglican to Remember—William Perkins: Puritan Popu-larizer, St. Antholin’s Lectureship Charity Lecture (1996), 1.

10. Richard Muller, “William Perkins and the Protestant Exegetical Tradition: Interpretation, Style, and Method,” in William Perkins, Commentary on Hebrews 11, ed. John H. Augustine (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1991), 72.


the historian William Haller observes, “No books were more often to be found upon the shelves of succeeding generations of preachers, and the name of no preacher recurs more often in later Puritan literature” than that of William Perkins.11 All that to say: Perkins’s widespread popularity makes his views on the “right ordering” of a family wor-thy of our consideration.12 I want to make seven observations that are central to Perkins’s vision for the family and of specific interest to us.

1. Perkins appeals to Scripture as the only rule for the right ordering of a family.Throughout his writings, Perkins champions what he describes as Scripture’s “infallible certainty”—meaning “the testimony of Scrip-ture is the testimony of God Himself.”13 Because Scripture is the very Word of God, Perkins views it as the means by which God reveals Himself and imparts grace to His people; and this necessarily implies that Scripture stands alone at the center of the Christian’s life. Unsur-prisingly, Perkins adopts Scripture as the axiom for all his thinking and the focus of all his teaching. This leads him to conclude that “the only rule of ordering the family is the written Word of God.”14 Per-kins pours over the written Word for any text that might shed light on God’s will for the family.15 He lives in the world of the patriarchs, the kings of Israel, and the New Testament saints, gleaning examples

11. William Haller, The Rise of Puritanism (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1957), 65. For more on the life and ministry of Perkins, see W. B. Patterson, Wil-liam Perkins and the Making of a Protestant England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014); and Joel R. Beeke and J. Stephen Yuille, William Perkins (Welwyn Garden City, UK: EP Books, 2015).

12. Incidentally, I believe Perkins would sanction my approach. He would have been distinctly uncomfortable with the notion of “pure theology”—the idea that someone might study theology as an academic discipline without any concern for its situational application. This holds true for the Puritans in general. As Martyn Lloyd-Jones notes, “There is nothing that they more deplored than a mere academic, intellectual, theoretical view of the truth.” The Puritans: Their Origins and Successors (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2002), 55.

13. William Perkins, A Godly and Learned Exposition Upon Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1631), 3.219–26.

14. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.669. 15. Perkins’s treatise is saturated with Scripture references and inferences. As

expected, he turns repeatedly to Genesis 1–2, Proverbs 31, 1 Corinthians 7, Ephe-sians 5–6, Colossians 3–4, 1 Timothy 3–4, and 1 Peter 3.


both to be shunned and emulated. In short, Perkins’s right ordering of the family is the outworking of his biblical theology.

The historian Margo Todd has challenged any notion of a Puri-tan spiritual household arising from Protestant theology,16 arguing that the exaltation of marriage, the creation of the family church, the rise of religious education, the practice of disciplinary duties, and the recognition of spiritual equality emerged from “classical ideas trans-mitted to the Puritans by humanism.”17 She concludes, “Social theory is not as dependent on theological stance as historians of Puritanism have thought. Christian humanism, not English Calvinism, laid the foundation of the spiritualized household.”18

But Todd fails to consider how the Puritans themselves view the classical writers. Perkins, for example, comments, “The ancient writ-ers will have their sayings and testimonies well examined, and so far forth only to be received as they do agree with the rule of our faith, and the writings of the prophets and apostles.”19 Moreover, Todd fails to account for the fundamental differences between the Puritans and these writers. At the foundation of Perkins’s spiritual household is not the promotion of “civic-mindedness” as articulated by any of the clas-sical authors, but the promotion of godliness. The New Testament

16. Margo Todd, “Humanists, Puritans, and the Spiritualized Household,” Church History 49 (1980): 18. Kathleen Davies also disputes the suggestion that Puri-tanism represents “a very different and more elevated view of family life from that presented in pre-Reformation or early Protestant views of marriage.” “The sacred condition of equality—how original were Puritan doctrines of marriage?” Social History 2 (1977): 563. For the opposite view, see Roland Frye, “The Teachings of Classical Puritanism on Conjugal Love,” Studies in the Renaissance 2 (1955): 149–55.

17. Todd, “Humanists, Puritans, and the Spiritualized Household,” 22. These views, Todd insists, were common to Puritans, Catholics, and Anglicans alike until the last two groups rejected the humanist tradition. Roman Catholicism desired “parochial conformity” and, therefore, “saw the practice of religious education and discipline in the household as liable to threaten the spiritual authority of the hierarchy by replacing it with the priestly position of parents.” For this reason, the Council of Trent condemned parental teaching as unauthorized teaching (31–32). As for Angli-canism, it desired “doctrinal and liturgical uniformity,” thus William Laud attempted “to replace the spiritual autonomy of families with a clerically dominated conformist religion” (33). This departure from the humanist tradition left Puritanism by itself, thereby accounting for the erroneous concept of “Puritan household theory.”

18. Todd, “Humanists, Puritans, and the Spiritualized Household,” 34.19. William Perkins, The Forged Catholicism, or Universality of the Romish Religion,

in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1631), 2.487.


(NT, hereafter) household codes and the maxims of moral philoso-phers are not two sides of the same coin. The NT supplies a new power to carry out God’s commands: God’s grace. The NT presents a new purpose to carry out God’s commands: God’s glory. And the NT supplies a new pattern to carry out God’s command: God’s Son. Moreover, there is a clear antithesis between the Aristotelian and the Christian concept of virtue. The former is external, whereas the lat-ter is internal. In other words, Christian virtue issues from a love that arises from a transformed heart. For Perkins, the intention of the heart is the essence of virtue. This means that the deeds of the unregenerate might be good in their material form yet still sinful because they issue from a corrupt heart. Of necessity, therefore, the individual’s affections must be changed. This is the goal of the spiri-tual household and a far cry from Aristotle’s virtuous man.20

Clearly, Perkins believes Scripture alone establishes the param-eters for all discussions concerning the family. We need to hear that today. Just as the arts and sciences have fundamental axioms, so too does theology, of which the following is paramount for Perkins: the canonical Scripture is God’s Word.21 If this axiom for the study of theology is lost, all others fall. Related to this, it is important to note that Perkins is no relativist—one who assumes that the original intent of the biblical authors is unknowable. Nor is he a rational-ist—one who reduces the Christian faith to truths that he can derive from nature. And Perkins is no incarnationalist—one who believes Scripture comes wrapped in human language and culture, resulting in a mixture of God’s truth and cultural myth. Perkins is a bibli-cist, functioning on the premise that the theologian’s task is simply to expound what the Holy Spirit has revealed in Scripture. This

20. John Calvin’s assessment is helpful: “This is the main difference between the gospel and philosophy. Although the philosophers speak on the subject of mor-als splendidly and with praiseworthy ability, yet all the embellishment which shines forth in their precepts is nothing more than a beautiful superstructure without a foundation, for by omitting principles, they propound a mutilated doctrine, like a body without a head.” The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Romans and to the Thessalo-nians, trans. Ross MacKenzie (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973), 262.

21. William Perkins, A Reformed Catholic; or, A declaration showing how near we may come to the present Church of Rome in sundry points of religion, and wherein we must forever depart from them, in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1608), 1.573–76.


conviction governs his approach to the right “erecting and ordering” of the family.

2. Perkins addresses familial challenges with pastoral sensitivity and theological clarity.When people turned to Perkins for counsel, they discovered a shep-herd’s heart. By all accounts, he was a skilled spiritual advisor who excelled at adapting the wisdom of Scripture to every conceivable issue. This made him extremely popular, especially given the fact that English Protestants had very little literature that offered any insight on dealing with the problems of daily living. Perkins’s writing and teaching filled this gaping void. His pastoral counsel addressed the innumerable struggles that Christians experience while living in a fallen world.

In the context of the family specifically, Perkins addresses a host of practical issues. He explains, for example, the difference between the “betrothal” and “consummation” stages in a marriage contract.22 He highlights the “essential signs” that indicate a person is “fit” for marriage.23 In relation to this, he spends several pages mapping out “the just and lawful distance of blood” that is necessary for people to marry. He also deals with issues of compatibility. Is there “parity or equality” in terms of age, condition, and reputation?24 Perkins also elaborates on the distinctive roles of parents and children in realizing a marriage contract.25

In addition to these practical issues, Perkins speaks to a num-ber of specific “cases”—perplexing situations, many of which he undoubtedly faced as a pastor. What happens if a young woman is unwilling to marry a man to whom she was engaged as a child? What happens if a young man enters an engagement in a “furious and frantic” condition and subsequently changes his mind?26 What happens if a young woman’s parents arrange for her to marry an unbeliever? What happens if someone’s prospective spouse becomes incapacitated?27 How should a spouse handle a prolonged absence

22. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.672.23. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.673–78.24. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.680.25. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.681–82.26. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.682.27. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.683.


that is “prejudicial” to the marriage?28 When is it permissible to dis-solve a marriage?29 What should you do if your spouse deserts you?30 What should you do if your spouse threatens you?31 What should you do if your spouse requires something “intolerable” of you?32 What should you do if your spouse is unfaithful?33

In all this, Perkins demonstrates great biblical wisdom, especially as he applies Scripture to broken people in broken relationships. This realism is a missing element from many of the funeral sermons and biographical accounts of the time period, which tend to embellish domestic bliss while ignoring the messier aspects of family life. This is likely the result of apologetic intention. But Perkins provides a much needed reality check, one we would do well to heed. We tend to idolize the past, plunging ourselves into romantic idealism, but there was never an idyllic time in the past when families were free from the ravages of sinful human behavior. And there are never any easy fixes for marital and parental challenges. There is the cross. The only hope for broken homes and marriages and relationships is a broken and exalted Christ. “As mutual love joins one man unto another,” writes Perkins, “so true faith makes us one with Christ.”34 This is par-adigmatic for Perkins. By means of this union, “Christ, with all His benefits, is made ours.”35 That means we enjoy a new legal status and identity in Him; moreover, we enjoy communion with Him in His names, titles, righteousness, holiness, death, and resurrection. This is the necessary starting point for addressing the many challenges that beset the family.

28. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.683.29. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.683–84.30. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.687.31. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.688.32. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.688.33. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.690.34. Perkins, Christ’s Sermon in the Mount, 3:256. R. Tudur Jones demonstrates

that, from Perkins to John Bunyan, the Puritans stress “union with Christ.” He finds it present in earlier Protestantism; e.g., John Calvin, who insisted that there is no benefit unless the Holy Spirit engrafts us into Christ. “Union with Christ: The Existential Nerve of Puritan Piety,” Tyndale Bulletin 41 (1990): 186–208.

35. William Perkins, A Golden Chain: or, the Description of Theology, containing the order of the causes of salvation and damnation, in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1608), 1.83.


3. Perkins articulates a biblical view of the family, founded upon the creation narrative.As Perkins surveys Genesis 1 and 2, he makes five observations con-cerning the marital relationship.36 (1) “It was ordained by God in paradise, above and before all other states of life, in Adam’s inno-cency before the fall.”37 (2) “It was instituted upon a most serious and solemn consultation among the three persons in the holy Trinity.” (3) “The manner of this conjunction was excellent, for God joined our first parents, Adam and Eve, together immediately.” (4) “God gave a large blessing unto the estate of marriage.” (5) “Marriage was made and appointed by God himself, to be the fountain and semi-nary of all other sorts and kinds of life in the commonwealth and in the church.”

For Perkins, therefore, the creation account is foundational to a biblical view of marriage (and the family). For the present discus-sion, his second observation is particularly pertinent: again, marriage “was instituted upon a most serious and solemn consultation among the three persons in the holy Trinity.” That is to say, the creation narrative stresses the fact that the triune God made Adam and Eve in His image, and then commanded them to be fruitful. The infer-ence is that the triune God intended for this family to mirror the relationship within the Trinity, and to be the context in which we enjoy the kind of relationship enjoyed within the Trinity. That is why the expression “they became one flesh” is so crucial. It highlights an experience of “diversity in unity” which is exclusive to the domain of marriage. Building on this, Perkins’s fifth observation becomes instructive: “Marriage was made and appointed by God himself, to

36. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.671. Perkins acknowledges that the “gift of conti-nency” is in many respects better than marriage, “yet not simply, but by accident, in regard of sundry calamities which came into the world by sin.” See 1 Cor. 7:25–35.

37. “Marriage of itself,” writes Perkins, “is a thing indifferent, and the king-dom of God stands no more in it than in meats and drinks; and yet it is a state in itself far more excellent than the conditions of single life.” Oeconomy, 3.671. He adds, “Now if mankind had continued in that uprightness and integrity which it had by creation, the state of single life had been of no price and estimation among men, neither should it have had any place in the world, without great contempt of God’s ordinance and blessing.”


be the fountain and seminary of all other sorts and kinds of life in the commonwealth and in the church.”

Many discussions about marriage fail to direct our attention back to this reality, and thereby end up presenting a restricted view of the family. We must have the right starting point. The recovery of our identity as image-bearers entails the restoration of the family to its intended character; this is the heart of the Christian view of the fam-ily. It keeps us from several dangers. For example, it keeps us from turning roles and responsibilities into the “key” for a happy marriage (and family). It also keeps us from making techniques and methodol-ogies the “key” to a happy marriage (and family). Perkins stresses the importance of these, but never detached from the creation narrative. When detailed prescriptions for obedience become central, grace is always threatened. This is true of the home. When rules become central, the result is intolerance and inflexibility, whereby the right ordering of a family becomes mechanical rather than relational.

4. Perkins affirms the “one flesh” principle as the defining feature of the relationship between husband and wife.“Marriage,” says Perkins, “is the lawful conjunction of the two mar-ried persons; that is of one man and one woman into one flesh.”38 He explains the duties of those who are thus conjoined. The first is “cohabitation”: the “quiet and comfortable dwelling together in one place, for the better performance of mutual duties.”39 The sec-ond is “communion”: the mutual communication of “their persons and goods” to each other, “for their mutual help, necessity, and comfort.”40 Perkins adds, “This duty consisteth principally in the performance of special benevolence one to another, and that not of courtesy, but of due debt…. Due benevolence must be showed with a singular and entire affection one towards another; and that three

38. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.670. Perkins cites Genesis 2:21, Matthew 19:6, and Ephesians 5:31.

39. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.686.40. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.689.


ways principally”—enjoying one another,41 cherishing one another,42 and rejoicing in one another.43

The significance of the “one flesh” principle is evident throughout Perkins’s treatise. A husband is to love his wife as himself,44 regard-ing his wife’s estate as his own.45 He is also to esteem his wife by “making account of her as his companion.”46 Perkins asserts that such “communion of married persons” is “a lively type of Christ and his

41. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.689. For Perkins, the “marriage bed” is that “solitary and secret society” that exists alone between husband and wife. The “right and law-ful use” of the marriage bed “is indeed an essential duty of marriage.”

42. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.691. “This cherishing,” writes Perkins, “is the per-forming of any duties that tend to the preserving of the lives one of another. Wherefore they are freely to communicate their goods, their counsel, their labors, each to other, for the good of themselves and theirs.”

43. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.691. According to Perkins, husband and wife rejoice in each other by a “mutual declaration of the signs and tokens of love and kindness.”

44. See Ephesians 5:33. George Swinnock places a tremendous emphasis upon the husband’s responsibility to love his wife, stating, “They are one body, one flesh, and so should have but one soul, one spirit; they have one bed, one board, one house, and therefore should be one in heart. The love betwixt Christ and his spouse, which is so fervent that she is sick of love to him, and he died for love to her (Cant. 2:4; Jn. 15:13) is set out by the love betwixt husband and wife, to shew how great this love is, or at least ought to be.” The Works of George Swinnock, ed. J. Nichol (London, 1868; rpt., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1992), 1.472. He adds, “So the word proskollhqe\nai in the Greek also signifieth, shall cleave to his wife (Matt. 19:51), be glued to his wife, importing a conjunction so near as nothing can come between, and so firm that nothing can dissolve it” (1.473). With this in mind, he exhorts husbands, “Be thou ravished with her love (Prov. 5:19).” Again, “Do thou err in thy love…and so affectionately to desire her, and to delight in her, that others may think thee to doat on her” (1.492). There is nothing wrong with strong “desire” and “delight.” As Edmund Leites remarks, “an outward fulfillment of the duties of marriage was not enough; the proper intentions and feelings toward your spouse must also exist.” “The Duty to Desire: Love, Friendship, and Sexuality in Some Puritan Theories of Marriage,” Journal of Social History 15 (1982): 383.

45. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.691.46. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.691. In this context, Perkins gives a practical example

of the “one flesh” principle in action. He asks “whether the husband may correct his wife?” Having dismissed such a notion as contrary to Scripture, he affirms, “he may not chastise her either with stripes or strokes. The reason is plain: wives are their husbands’ mates, and they two be one flesh. And no man will hate, much less beat his own flesh, but ‘nourisheth and cherisheth it’ (Eph. 5:29)” (Oeconomy, 3.692). Similarly, Swinnock writes, “Surely if Scripture will not allow thee to be bitter to thy wife, it will not allow thee to beat her…. Socrates could say, For a man to beat his wife was as great a sacrilege as to profane the most holy things in the world.” Works, 1.491. For William Gouge, the husband who beats his wife is “worse than the


church,” and “a figure of the conjunction that is between him and the faithful.”47

An appreciation of this truth is crucial. One of the principal strains upon marriage in our day is the Epicurean worldview, which ultimately posits no reality outside of the natural order. Faithfulness in marriage, therefore, is simply the result of personal and economic factors. Furthermore, marriage is merely a provisional convenience to be dissolved whenever one of the parties decides it is no longer in their interest. In sharp contrast, a concept of marriage informed by the “one-flesh” principle frees it from its modern-day caricature as a trap, chore, or burden. It liberates marriage from the self-serving con-venience or inconvenience that it has become, and elevates marriage into the realm of the divine. And it sets marriage apart as one of the most sacred callings the world has ever known.

5. Perkins emphasizes the importance of cultivating an intimate marital relationship.In his third observation concerning the institution of marriage, Per-kins affirms, “The manner of this conjunction was excellent, for God joined our first parents, Adam and Eve, together immediately.” For Perkins, this joining was emotional, spiritual, and physical. For this reason, he denounces those who forbid marriage and view “due benevolence” as a sin.48 He criticizes those “schoolmen” who teach

venomous viper”—a “beast” rather than a “man.” Of Domesticall Duties: Eight Treatises (London, 1622), 389–90.

47. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.690. See Ephesians 5:23. For more on this, see J. Ste-phen Yuille, The Inner Sanctum of Puritan Piety: John Flavel’s Doctrine of Mystical Union with Christ (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2007), 25–32.

48. The view of celibacy as a means to spirituality entered the church at an early date. Beginning in the second century, many allowed dualistic philosophies to influence their beliefs regarding sex (e.g., Gnosticism and Manichaeism). They held that lust taints all sexual activity. For many, this implied that virginity was superior to marriage (e.g., Cyprian, Treatises Attributed to Cyprian, in The Ante-Nicene Fathers [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1951], 5.589). For some, it implied that second marriages were unacceptable (e.g., Tertullian, On Monogamy, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, 3.59–72). These convictions even contributed in part to the emulation of the Virgin Mary (e.g., Irenaeus, Irenaeus Against Heresies, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, 1.547; and Gregory, Four Homilies, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, 6.62–63). Without question, the most influ-ential thinker of the time period was Augustine, who argues that sex practically paralyzes all power of deliberate thought. See City of God, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, ed. P. Schaff (New York: Random


that “the secret coming together of man and wife cannot be without sin.”49 He also criticizes the Church of Rome for prohibiting “cer-tain parties” from marrying because “they think this secret coming together of man and wife to be filthiness.”50 Perkins makes specific mention of Syricius (334–399), “that filthy pope of Rome, who deter-mined that marriage was the uncleanness of the flesh, and to that purpose abused the words of the apostle (Rom. 8:8), affirming that they which are in the flesh, that is, in the state of matrimony, ‘cannot please God.’”51

In contrast to the medieval tradition, Perkins affirms four “ends” of marriage.52 (1) “The procreation of children, for the propagation and continuance of the seed and posterity of man upon the earth.” (2) “The protection of a holy seed, whereby the church of God may be kept holy and chaste, and there may always be a holy company of men that may worship and serve God in the church from age to age.” (3) “That after the fall of mankind, it might be a sovereign means to avoid fornication, and consequently to subdue and slake [quench] the burning lusts of the flesh.”53 (4) “That the parties married may

House, 1948), 2.14.16–21. As Henry Chadwick remarks, for Augustine, “in human nature as it now is the sexual impulse is the supreme symptom or expression of the irrational, the uncontrollable, the obsessive condition of the human psyche in its fallen condition.” “The Ascetic Ideal in the History of the Church,” in Monks, Her-mits and the Ascetic Tradition: Vol. 22, ed. W. J. Sheils (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1985), 19. From this premise, the church of the Middle Ages acknowledged two reasons for marriage: the procreation of children and the avoidance of fornication. These notions remained prominent within the church until the Reformers departed from the accepted tradition by adding a third reason for marriage, namely, mutual society. Heinrich Bullinger, for example, insisted that “holy wedlock was instituted…in the paradise and garden of pleasure…before the fall of man…of God himself, doubtless to man’s great comfort and help.” The Christen State of Matrimonye, trans. M. Cover-dale (1541; rpt., Amsterdam: Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, 1974), i.

49. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.671.50. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.689. Also see 3.671.51. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.689. Swinnock makes the same observation, stating,

“Jerome, whom Pope Syricius followed, in his passionate love of virginity, did make a blot in his exposition of Romans 8:8. They that are in the flesh, i.e., qui inserviunt officio conjugali, that is, saith he, those that are married, cannot please God, when man pleased God by taking a wife, before ever he displeased God by hearkening to his wife. God would never have said, ‘It is not good for man to be alone,’ if it had been evil for him to have had such a companion” (Works, 1.467).

52. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.671.53. Perkins makes it clear that the third “end” has only existed since “the fall


thereby perform the duties of their calling in better and more com-fortable manner.”

In his treatment of this subject, Perkins demonstrates no antipathy toward the body.54 God’s good gifts (including the conjugal relation-ship) are expressions of His kindness and are, therefore, intended for our enjoyment.55 The fact that God created Adam and Eve, declared that they should not be alone, and brought them together (all prior

of mankind.” In other words, the need to avoid fornication only exists, because sin exists. For an overview of Puritan views of sexuality, see Daniel Doriani, “The Puritans, Sex, and Pleasure,” Westminster Theological Journal 53 (1991): 125–43; and Frye, “The Teachings of Classical Puritanism,” 149–55. For the common charge of Puritan prudery, see Lyle Koehler, A Search for Power (Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 1980), 10; and Lawrence Stone, The Family, Sex and Marriage in Eng-land, 1500–1800 (New York: Harper & Row, 1977), 499, 523. For the opposite view, see Leland Ryken, Worldly Saints: The Puritans as They Really Were (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986), 43–45.

54. Daniel Doriani argues that the Puritans never really freed themselves from their forefathers’ dualistic tendencies. He writes, “The Puritans…formulated so many warnings and restrictions that their protestations of the goodness and purity of sexuality lost their force.” They maintain that marriage and sex are pure, that God requires couples to communicate their bodies to each other, and that sexual rela-tions have beneficial products. However, he believes they fail to rid themselves of “the Greek and Roman Catholic idea that lust taints the procreative act so that it is shameful” (“The Puritans, Sex, and Pleasure,” 133). Therefore, their “vague dis-comfort with passion and pleasure descends from the Greek and Catholic dualism with its denigration of and antipathy toward the body. The godly brethren found it very difficult to make a complete break with that tradition, even over several genera-tions” (142). There is undoubtedly some truth to Doriani’s conclusion; however, it is difficult to speak categorically for all Puritans. Swinnock, for example, affirms that “matrimony and sanctity are not inconsistent,” pointing out that marriage is a “divine institution,” established in “man’s estate of innocency” (Works, 1.465). Thus, “how abominable is it to call that impure which God hath cleansed; or to make the holy God the author of a sinful ordinance…. Surely those popish doctors who term it filthiness and pollution do not consider that it was ordained before man’s fall and corruption” (1.466–67). Gouge shares these sentiments, openly encouraging “due benevolence” (Domesticall Duties, 365–66). He states, “As the man must be satisfied at all times in his wife, and even ravished with her love; so must the woman be satis-fied at all times in her husband, and even ravished with his love.” Again, “This due benevolence…is one of the most proper and essential acts of marriage…it must be performed with good will and delight, willingly, readily and cheerfully” (217, 222).

55. God’s good gifts must be received with thanksgiving (1 Tim. 4:3–4). Because of sin, we can easily abuse food, drink, recreation, sleep, sex, etc. Thanks-giving prevents such abuse. We use God’s gifts sacredly: we acknowledge that they come from God. We use them soberly: we do not make an idol of earthly delights. We use them sensibly: we do not make them more important than the soul.


to the fall), is sufficient evidence that marriage is good.56 Perkins was no ascetic. He had no problem with “natural” delights. “We may use these gifts of God,” says he, “not sparingly alone, and for mere neces-sity…but also freely and liberally, for Christian delight and pleasure. For this is that liberty, which God hath granted to all believers.”57 The way to holiness, therefore, is not found in abstaining from God’s good gifts, but in enjoying them, echoing Paul’s words: “Whether there-fore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31).58

In all this, Perkins strongly opposes a disembodied spirituality. The fundamental ontological split of reality, in the Gnostic/Platonic/Neo-Platonic worldview, is between spirit and matter. Reality con-sists of a material realm (imperfect, unreal, and changeable) and a

56. God’s Word is the “warrant that they may lawfully do this action,” whereas prayer is the means of seeking God’s blessing upon the union between husband and wife. Perkins highlights three prayer requests: that it might (1) produce “a blessed seed,” (2) preserve “the body in cleanness that it may be a fit temple for the Holy Ghost to dwell in,” and (3) serve as “a lively type of Christ and his church” (Oecon-omy, 3.689).

57. William Perkins, The Whole Treatise of the Cases of Conscience, Distinguished into Three Books, In The Works of William Perkins (London, 1632), 3.321. Also see 3.342.

58. The issue is not natural delights. They are good because God has ordained them. The issue is abuse, whereby we seek satisfaction in these things apart from God. When the fear of God “tempers” and “allays” our affections, the result is moderation in our use of natural delights. Speaking of the Puritans in general, Frye observes that “their fear was of an immoderate love, whose very violence precluded it from maintaining the stability necessary for the marriage relationship, and whose intensity of attachment was likely to burn itself out and die.” He adds, “Man’s humanity…consisted in his living according to the divine plan, in his existential expression of God’s will rather than self-will. To assign prior importance, before God, to anything under God was idolatry” (“The Teachings of Classical Puritanism,” 156, 158). On this basis, the Puritans consider lust to be idolatry. “Thus,” says Frye, “the Puritan warnings were not concerned with any sin involved in physical love itself…. Two things were feared: lust as unstable sexual foundation for marriage in this world, and lust as idolatrous preventative of happiness in the world to come” (158). From his analysis of the primary literature, Leites concludes, “This sensuous love is not simply permitted, given the existence of a higher, holier, ‘spiritual’ relation between man and wife, nor is it allowed only to forward the other purposes of marriage. It is required as a constituent and intrinsic element of a good marriage. This sensual affection and delight must continue unabated, with the full intensity of youthful desire throughout the whole of married life” (“The Duty to Desire,” 388).


spiritual realm (perfect, real, and unchangeable).59 Man lives in both realms. His body resides in the material realm: he relates to it through his senses; he evaluates his sense perception by using his reason. His spirit resides in the spiritual realm: he relates to the spiritual world through his spirit—not his senses or reason. Death marks the spirit’s release (literally, escape) from the material realm. Until then, man’s goal is to dwell in the spiritual realm by de-emphasizing the mate-rial realm. And so, in the Gnostic/Platonic/Neo-Platonic worldview, there is a definite hierarchy from the lesser (the material) to the greater (the spiritual). The Council of Nicaea (325) confirmed the doctrine of creation ex nihilo (out of nothing). This position posited a great ontological gulf between God and humanity. Perkins stands in this tradition, rejecting the spirit-matter dualism of reality and affirming the absolute distinction between infinite Creator and finite creature. This means that there is no ontological kinship between

59. In Phaedrus, Plato explains how we can make contact with the spiritual realm. The Dialogues of Plato, trans. by B. Jowett (New York: Random House, 1937), 1.248–55. In a word, the mind (human reason) has no place in the spiritual realm. All experience is between the human spirit and the spiritual realm. The material realm (the world of particulars) is irrational, because knowledge is based on sense and reason. We cannot trust either. Building on this, Plotinus (207–270), a third-century Roman philosopher and the father of Neo-Platonism, emphasizes the role of contemplation in bringing the human spirit into union with the divine. For him, the way to divine knowledge is “to separate yourself from your body and very ear-nestly to put aside the system of sense with its desires and impulses and every such futility.” The Essence of Plotinus, trans. by S. Mackenna (New York: Oxford Uni-versity Press, 1948), 5.3.161. Again, “The All-Transcending has no name. We can state what it is not, while we are silent as to what it is. Those who are divinely possessed and inspired have at least knowledge that they hold some greater thing within them, though they cannot tell what it is” (162). Plotinus teaches that there is an ultimate principle—the One. It is the principle behind absolutely everything. It does not possess any properties. It is impossible to know anything about the One through reason. Therefore, we must become one with it through mystical experi-ence. “Contemplation was a unifying principle in Origen’s cosmos:… Behind this was the Platonic idea of the soul’s kinship with the divine: it was this kinship that made contemplation possible and which was realized in contemplation…. Neither for Plato nor for Origen were souls created: they were pre-existent and immortal. The most fundamental ontological distinction in such a world was between the spiritual and the material. The soul belonged to the former realm in contrast to its body which was material: the soul belonged to the divine, spiritual realm and was only trapped in the material realm by its association with the body.” Andrew Louth, The Origins of the Christian Mystical Tradition from Plato to Denys (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), 76–77.


God and humanity. This was a much needed corrective to the Ori-genic spirituality so prevalent within the Roman Catholic Church. The monastic ideal was that sinful nature must be subdued within the secluded environment of a monastery with a well-ordered regime for soul and body. In marked contrast, Perkins believes that godliness encompasses all of life; that is, everything is spiritual. Moreover, he believes there is a far better school for godliness than monastic isola-tionism—namely, the family, where we see our sinfulness and learn how to grow in Christ-likeness.60

6. Perkins constructs a spiritual household, marked by mutual responsibilities, distinctive roles, and common purposes.Perkins defines a household as “a natural and simple society of cer-tain persons, having mutual relation one to another, under the private government of one.”61 There are two crucial components to this definition.

First, the household consists of a “society of certain persons.” Per-kins distinguishes this “society” into three “couples.”62 The first is husband and wife. As the head of his wife, the husband is to love and honor her.63 His chief responsibilities include leading family worship, ensuring attendance at public worship, providing for his family, and

60. Martin Luther described family life as “the school for character.” As quoted in Roland Bainton, Here I Stand (Nashville: Abingdon, 1951), 234ff.

61. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.669. Swinnock’s definition of the family mirrors Per-kins’s almost word for word: “a natural and simple society of certain persons, having mutual relation one to another, under the private government of one head or chief” (Works, 1.329–330). He also believes this “society” consists of three main relation-ships: parents and children, husbands and wives, masters and servants.

62. Perkins adds, “A couple is that whereby two persons standing in mutual relations to each other are combined together as it were in one. And of these two the one is always higher, and beareth rule, the other is lower, and yieldeth subjec-tion.” Oeconomy, 3.670. As Edmund Morgan observes, “The order of society,” for the Puritans, “consisted in certain dual relationships, most of them originating in agreements between the persons related and all arranged in a pattern of authority and subjection” (The Puritan Family, 28). For a treatment of family relations in the Puritan era, see Helen Berry and Elizabeth Foyster, eds., The Family in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 1–17.

63. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.691. For Swinnock on a husband’s duties, see Works, 1.489–500. For Gouge, see Domesticall Duties, 349–426. In these later writers, there is an increased emphasis on rules.


keeping order within his home. For her part, the wife is “to submit herself to her husband.”64 Her responsibilities include advising her husband and maintaining her home.

The second couple is parent and child. Parents have two princi-pal duties. First, they are responsible for “bringing up” their children, ensuring “that they may live, and also that they may live well.”65 This applies to their physical well-being and, more importantly, their spiri-tual well-being.66 Parents are “to sow the seeds of godliness and religion in the heart of the child, so soon as it comes to the use of reason and understanding; and as it grows in years, so care must be had that it grow in knowledge and grace.” Together, husband and wife exercise authority over their children in raising them according to the tenets of God’s Word. As for children, they must “yield” obedience, and “rec-ompense” their parents by supporting them when they are old.67

64. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.692. For Swinnock on a wife’s duties, see Works, 1.504–11. Many argue that subjection necessarily implies a low view of women. There is no doubt that some Puritans view women as intrinsically inferior; however, this attitude is difficult to detect in Perkins, for whom subjection is no gauge of worth. He believes there are God-ordained roles in the marriage relationship. For the husband, this means he must love his wife as Christ loves the church. For the wife, this means she must submit to her husband as the church submits to Christ. Swinnock’s insights on this subject are helpful: “Though the philosopher tells us that woman is only sfa/lma fu/sewv, the aberration of nature, and many vilify them as persons of no worth, yet Scripture, the word of truth, dignifieth them as consisting of the same essential parts, and capable of the same celestial perfections, with men. How highly doth God commend them when they are holy! And for aught any man can tell, a woman, next the human nature of Christ, hath the great-est place of any creature in heaven” (Works, 1.504). Similarly, Gouge writes, “But if man and woman be compared together, we shall find a near equality…. They are both made after the same image, redeemed by the same price, partakers of the same grace, and heirs together of the same inheritance. Question. What is then the preferment of the male kind? What is the excellency of the husband? Answer. Only outward and momentary. Outward, in the things of this world only, for in Christ Jesus are both one. Momentary, for the time of this life only: for in the resurrec-tion they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven: then all subjection of wives to husbands ceaseth” (Domesticall Duties, 423).

65. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.693. For Swinnock on parents, see Works, 1.395–416. For Gouge, see Domesticall Duties, 497–588.

66. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.693.67. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.695. For Swinnock on children, see Works, 1.438–59.

For Baxter, see Christian Directory, 454–457. For Gouge, see Domesticall Duties, 427–96.


The third couple in the household is master and servant. By servants, Perkins means employees such as domestic workers, appren-tices, laborers, and shop assistants.68 Under normal circumstances, these lived as members of their employer’s family. The master is to assign labor according to the servant’s strength. In addition, he is to recompense his servant by (1) giving him due sustenance while employed; (2) paying him fair wages at the end of his service; and (3) caring for him if he becomes sick during his time of employment.69

68. Perkins makes it clear that there are “two sorts” of servants: (1) a “free servant” is hired for wages to complete a certain service; and (2) a “bond servant” (“commonly called a slave”) is purchased for money. Oeconomy, 3.697. Perkins wres-tles at some length over the legitimacy of slavery, concluding, “The power and right of having bondmen, in those countries where it is established by positive laws, may stand with good conscience, if it be used with moderation, wherein these caveats be observed.” (1) “That the master has not over his servant the power of life and death.” (2) “That there be not liberty granted him, to use his servant at his own will and pleasure in all things.” (3) “That the power be not enlarged to the commanding of things against piety and justice.” (4) “That masters do not take liberty to make sepa-ration of those their servants that be married, the one from the other, or of those that be parents from their children: considering that God himself hath made these soci-eties, and joined such persons together, and therefore man may not separate them.” (5) “That masters do not take liberty to put over their servants to ungodly and unbe-lieving masters: for that is an unkind and cruel liberty.” (6) “That they do not bind them to perpetual slavery, and never make them free.” (7) “That the servitude be not procured and retained by force, for it is a more grievous crime to spoil a man of his liberty than of his riches.” This last point is particularly significant. For Perkins, slavery is a voluntary practice, which is “against the law of nature” before the fall, but not “against the law of nature” after the fall (698). He adds, “Servitude proceedeth not of nature, but hath its original from the laws of nations, and is a consequent of the fall. For all men by nature are equally and indifferently free, none more or less than others.” For this reason, “Where this kind of servitude is abolished, it is not to be again received or entertained among Christians, especially considering it is a far more mild and moderate course to have hired servants” (3.698). Baxter is very strong in his condemnation of the practice: “To go as pirates and catch up poor negroes or people of another land, that never forfeited life or liberty, and to make them slaves, and sell them, is one of the worst kinds of thievery in the world; and such persons are to be taken for the common enemies of mankind; and they that buy them and use them as beasts, for their mere commodity, and betray, or destroy, or neglect their souls, are fitter to be called incarnate devils than Christians.” A Christian Directory, in The Practical Works of Richard Baxter (London: George Virtue, 1846; rpt., Morgan: Soli Deo Gloria, 2000), 1.462.

69. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.696–97. For Swinnock on masters, see Works, 2.5–24. For Baxter, see Christian Directory, 460–63. For Gouge, see Domesticall Duties, 646–93.


On the other hand, a servant “is faithfully and diligently to demean himself in the affairs of his master, and to do service unto him, as unto Christ.”70

Perkins’s “three-couple” paradigm is developed from Ephesians 5:22–6:9 and Colossians 3:18–4:1. In the first text, Paul prefaces his remarks with a general exhortation: “Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.”71 He then applies this to the three household relation-ships. He addresses wives before their husbands and tells them to be subject to them. He addresses children before their parents and tells them to obey them. He addresses servants before their masters and tells them to obey them. The success of these relationships is made contingent upon adherence to the first command: “Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.”

The second component to Perkins’s definition of a household is that the above three couples relate to one another “under the private government of one.”72 The head of the household exercises leader-ship under which his wife performs her duties, as do his children and servants.73 Such a view of the family is not without its detractors,

70. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.697. For Swinnock on servants, see Works, 2.34–37. For Baxter, see Christian Directory 458–60. For Gouge, see Domesticall Duties, 589–645.

71. See Ephesians 5:21.72. From the above three couples, says Perkins, “arise two persons of a mixed or

compounded nature and condition, commonly called the Goodman and the Good-wife of the house.” Oeconomy, 3.698. The Goodman (or Master of the family) has “the place of a husband, a father, a master in his house.” The whole household rests in his hands by God’s ordinance. His responsibilities are as follows. (1) “To bear the chief stroke, and to be the principal agent, and furtherer of the worship of God within his family.” (2) “To bring his family to the church or congregation on the Sabbath day, to look that they do religiously there behave themselves, and after the public exercises ended, and the congregation is dismissed, to take account of that which they have heard, that they may profit in knowledge and obedience.” (3) “To provide for his fam-ily meat, drink, and clothing, and that they may live a quiet and peaceable life.” (4) “To keep order, and to exercise discipline in his house.” (5) “To give entertainment to those that are strangers, and not of the family, if they be Christians and believers.” (3.698–700). As for the Goodwife (or Mistress of the family), she yields assistance to the Goodman in the governance of the family. “She is the associate, not only in office and authority, but also in advice and counsel” (3.700).

73. It is not difficult to see how quickly the principle of governance and obedi-ence can become determinative in a marital relationship, especially if divorced from the “one flesh” principle. Likewise, it is relatively easy to infer (intended or not) intrinsic male superiority from some of Perkins’s remarks.


but it is important to appreciate Perkins’s full vision. Authority is never an end in itself, but a means to an end. It exists so that life can flourish. Such authority functions within the “one-flesh” principle, meaning it is based on self-giving, not self-serving. Such author-ity functions within the parameters of God’s Word; thus, it is never arbitrary. Moreover, such authority functions within the context of mutuality—acting together, deciding together, working together, liv-ing together, etc. Its ultimate goal is to promote family relationships in which love is expressed in selflessness. In Perkins’s estimation, when family members fulfill their roles and responsibilities within such a framework, the household becomes “a kind of paradise upon earth.”74

7. Perkins aims at the promotion of godliness through the family—the basic unity of society.The English Reformation was a drawn-out process, in which the country moved back and forth on multiple occasions between Catholicism and Protestantism as monarchs came and went. In a span of twenty years, the religion of the land shifted four times. But the reign of Elizabeth brought stability and provided the much needed climate for English Reformers to solidify the church’s position. Per-kins played a pivotal role in this, and his works became the standard polemic against Rome.

Despite the marked progress in reforming medieval teaching in the light of Scripture, Perkins was concerned with the spiritual con-dition within the Church of England and the country as a whole. He was convinced that the people still suffered the ill-effects of the Roman Catholic dogma of implicit faith. That is to say, most people still assumed that as long as they accepted “some necessary points of religion” they were good Christians. In a day (not unlike our own) in which mere assent was accepted as faith, empty profes-sion was accepted as conversion and dead formality was accepted as godliness, Perkins was particularly burdened by the prevalence of “civility” within the professing church. “If we look into the general state of our people,” says he, “we shall see that religion is professed, but not obeyed: nay, obedience is counted as preciseness, and so reproached.”75 Prayer Book services, homilies, and catechisms intro-

74. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.670.75. Perkins, Christ’s Sermon in the Mount, 3.261. As R. C. Lovelace explains,


duced Protestant teaching to the people; however, these things did not lead them to deeper devotion. The average person was content with the minimum required of religious observance.

In his struggle for reform, Perkins viewed the household as piv-otal. Naturally, therefore, he looked to the head of the household as God’s appointed instrument for effecting religious change. This gov-ernor must ensure that the members of his household are devoted to the worship of God, and employed “in some honest and profit-able business, to maintain the temporal estate and life of the whole.”76 Perkins writes, “Governors of families must teach their children, and servants, and their whole household the doctrine of true reli-gion, that they may know the true God, and walk in all his ways in doing righteousness and judgment…. But whereas they neglect their duty, falsely persuading themselves that it doth not belong to them at all to instruct others, it is the cause of ignorance both in towns and families.”77 In Perkins’s worldview, the family is the basic unity of society, providing the pattern for larger communities: town, church, and commonwealth. The way to reform the church, transform the town, and alter the course of the commonwealth, therefore, is to spir-itualize the household.78

This is a timely observation. As the Enlightenment experiment (and all its moral, legal, and political ramifications) finally gains the ascendency in the West, and the Christian worldview is increasingly

“The problem that confronts the Puritans as they look out on their decaying society and their lukewarm church is not simply to dislodge the faithful from the slough of mortal or venial sin, but radically to awaken those who are professing but not actual Christians, who are caught in a trap of carnal security.” “The Anatomy of Puritan Piety: English Puritan Devotional Literature, 1600–1640,” in Christian Spirituality III, eds. L. Dupré and D. E. Saliers (New York: Crossroad Publishing, 1989), 303.

76. Perkins, Oeconomy, 3.669–70. Perkins provides a brief description of family worship, focusing on biblical instruction and prayer in both the morning and eve-ning. For examples of family devotional works, see Edward Dering, Godly Private Prayers, for householders to meditate upon, and to say in their families, 1578; John Parker, A True Pattern of Piety, meet for all Christian householders to look upon, for the better education of their families, 1592; Richard Jones, A Brief and Necessary Catechism, for the benefit of all householders, their children and families, 1583.

77. William Perkins, An Exposition of the Symbol or Creed of the Apostles, Accord-ing to the Tenor of the Scripture and the Consent of Orthodox Fathers of the Church, in The Works of William Perkins (London, 1608), 1.173.

78. Swinnock agrees: “The way to make godly parishes, and godly countries, and godly kingdoms, is to make godly families.” Works, 1.330.


marginalized (if not outright vilified), how will believers engage with society at large? In Perkins’s estimation, the spiritual household is the most effective means of altering the course of society, because it is (in his words) “appointed by God himself to be the fountain and seminary of all other sorts and kinds of life in the commonwealth.”


Contemporary and Cultural Issues

q


The increasing use of electronic devices in modern societies presents an old, spiritual problem in a new, more technologically advanced form. Laptops and smartphones have emerged as co-belligerents alongside electric lighting, late-night television programming, sugar, and caffeine in the long war against the singular benefits of restful sleep. For tech-savvy Americans, personal experience confirms what academic studies have observed repeatedly: “night-time use of screen-based gadgets has a bad effect on peoples’ sleep.”1 As influential as new technology may be, voluntary sleep deprivation and neglect is primar-ily related to the spiritual sickness of pride rather than exclusively to the unique challenges presented by modernity. As one correspondent for NPR put it, “I live and report in New York City, and there is defi-nitely a kind of pride or resignation here about lack of sleep.”2

Understanding the activity of sleep as something other than an inconvenience is of the utmost practical importance to Christians in all walks of life. In a society that values maximum productivity, and in a culture that exalts so-called “short sleepers,”3 the biblical injunction to “do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31) in relation to sleep may seem difficult to apply. But sleep is a God-ordained means of both

1. “To Sleep, Perchance,” The Economist, May 16, 2015. http://www.economist .com/news/science-and-technology/21651112-screens-bedtime-harm-sleep-effect -biggest-teenagers-sleep (October 15, 2015).

2. Margot Adler, “In Today’s World, the Well-Rested Lose Respect,” National Public Radio. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18155047 (Octo-ber 15, 2015).

3. Melinda Beck, “The Sleepless Elite,” Wall Street Journal, April 5, 2011. http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703712504576242701752957910 (Octo-ber 15, 2015).

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 183–194

Resting in the Sovereignty of God: The Spiritual Benefits of Peaceful Slumber

ZACHARY GROFF

q


sustaining people physically and humbling them spiritually, enabling them better to glorify Him. In sleep, we not only prepare for the day ahead, but we admit tacitly our inescapable dependence on God as our creator and sustainer. My purpose in this article is to explore how sleep, perhaps surprisingly, helps men and women glorify and enjoy God as creatures bearing His image.

Sleep as a Gift from GodSleep is an instrument of general revelation in that God makes known to every man and woman their common need for God’s protec-tion every night. Our bodies are part of the creation that testifies to God’s existence and present activity; the universal physical need for sleep testifies to our great need for God as both our protector and our sustainer. Paul wrote forcefully in Romans 1:20, “For the invis-ible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.” The frailty of the human physical condition reveals His invisible attributes by contrast rather than by direct analogy. As Albert Martin observes, “It is an established fact of general revelation and nature that optimum physi-cal health is most likely maintained with concern” for physical needs such as exercise, a nutritional diet, and “adequate rest.”4

God gives us a picture of spiritual rest through the analogy of physical sleep. Just as people who are asleep have entered into their slumber, believers, through faith in Jesus Christ, are entering into the spiritual rest prepared for them beforehand by the Father.5 Following this analogy, consider the voluntary insomniac who actively resists sleep and does not find adequate rest. In biblical terms, resistance to the things of God is disobedience against His righteous laws. It is on account of their disobedience that unbelievers fail to enter into God’s rest: “they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief ” (Heb. 4:6b).

What does obedience to the gospel look like? Furthermore, can we apply the principle of that restful obedience to physical sleep? Hebrews 4 builds on a rich redemptive-historical background which

4. Albert N. Martin, You Lift Me Up: Overcoming Ministry Challenges, Reprint edition (Scotland: Mentor, 2013), 109.

5. Hebrews 4:1, 3, 5, 6, 10, 11.

RestinG in the soveReiGnty of GoD 185

can help us understand the kind of disobedience that is in view and the obedience which accompanies the rest promised in Christ. The author of Hebrews (4:7b) appeals to King David’s admonition in Psalm 95, “To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your heart.” The hardening that David warned against is that which the sons of Israel were guilty of at Massah and Meribah in Exodus 17:1–7. They tested the Lord by grumbling against Moses and demanding that he provide water for them. The Israelites’ grumbling exemplifies obsti-nacy and ungrateful insubordination towards God. The converse of such insubordination is joyous praise and humble worship of God as “a great God, and a great King above all gods” (Ps. 95:3), who exer-cises control over all that He has created. David thus exhorted the people, “O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the loRD our maker. For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand” (Ps. 95:6–7). David called believ-ers to submit to God in faith, resting worshipfully in His sovereign care for them.

God Watches Over our SlumberBelievers surrender to God because He is uniquely qualified to receive their absolute trust. Infinite in His holiness, God is set apart from all things, “a great King above all gods” (Ps. 95:3b). One expression of His infinite power, holiness, and goodness is that “Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep” (Ps. 121:4). The people of God literally lay their heads down at night, trusting their infinitely good God to keep them in His care. The believer submits daily to God’s design when he closes his eyes in restful slumber and trusts his Savior to preserve his soul. The act of sleeping illustrates the sur-render of the creature to the Creator. Adrian Reynolds articulates this dynamic well when he writes, “the willingness to lie down and sleep is itself an expression of trust in the sovereign hand of God. Nothing is going to happen to me that He does not determine.”6 The believer places his trust in God unconditionally, regardless of whether God has decreed for him to wake in the morning or to enter into glory that very night.

6. Adrian Reynolds, And so to Bed...: A Biblical View of Sleep (Fearn, Scotland: Christian Focus, 2014), 42.


As a believer prepares to go to sleep, he should reflect on the spiri-tual significance of actively entrusting himself into the Lord’s care. Puritan Henry Scudder (1585–1662) referenced Proverbs 3:21–25 and 6:21–22 to encourage his readers to trust in the Lord at each day’s end. He directed his audience to “fall asleep with some heavenly medita-tion, then will your sleep be more sweet, and more secure…and your heart will be in a better frame when you awake.”7 Those who resist such wise counsel refuse to trust God, who created them as physical beings in need of sleep. Scudder offered a disconcerting alternative: “though you have God to watch when you sleep, you cannot be safe, if he that watches be your enemy.”8

Surrender to God through SleepScripture uses descriptions of physical rest to illustrate the wisdom of surrendering to God’s providence. Though Job’s friend Zophar falsely diagnosed the cause of Job’s affliction, he provided generally good advice when he directed Job to repent of iniquity.9 By doing so, Job would experience security in God’s favor. This finds its physi-cal expression in sleep. Zophar claims, “ And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy rest in safety. Also thou shalt lie down, and none shall make thee afraid; yea, many shall make suit unto thee” (Job 11:18–19). He that truly trusts in the saving grace of God will not only be assured in his mind and become secure in the Father’s care, but he will reflect that assurance in his life in experiencing daily physical rest.

Sleep also provides a daily occasion of thanksgiving. Even if a man has nothing else, to awake in the morning full of life and breath provides him with great cause for gratitude to God. Rising in the morning to a symphony of life in a home full of children, or to the delicious smells of breakfast, or to a house kept safe overnight should drive a man to his knees in thanksgiving to God for His unmerited favor. Scudder insisted, “In the instant of awaking let your heart be lifted up to God with a thankful acknowledgment of his mercy to you…. For, while you sleep, you are as it were out of actual possession

7. Henry Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk (Harrisonburg, Va.: Sprinkle Pub-lications, 1984), 96.

8. Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk, 94.9. Cf. Job 11:13–15.


of yourself, and all things else. Now, it was God that kept you, and all that you had, and restored them again, with many new mercies, when you awaked.”10

Sleeping in Humiliation, Waking in ExaltationAs Scudder suggested above, sleep necessarily proves human weak-ness. When practiced rightly, sleep also expresses humility, paralleling the spiritual humiliation with which every believer must come to terms at the foot of the cross. Paul called the church to “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus…. And being found in fash-ion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him” (Phil. 2:5, 8–9a).

The Westminster Larger Catechism states that the Mediator between God and man must be human in order to “have a fellow feeling for our infirmities” (Q. 39). It defines Christ’s humiliation as including “subjecting himself to…infirmities in his flesh, whether common to the nature of man, or particularly accompanying that his low condition” (Q. 48). In one notable incident, Christ is recounted in the Gospels as having slept in the midst of a storm!11 Even while bearing the most basic physical weakness “common to the nature of man,” He rested securely in perfect confidence that the Father would preserve Him in sleep. After quelling the tempest, Christ famously reprimanded His disciples by inquiring where their faith was that they should be so fearful in the midst of the storm.12

Just as spiritual humiliation in this life blossoms into perfect spiritual exaltation in the next, so a night of healthy sleep produces a morning of physical and mental vigor. Prefiguring Christ’s exam-ple of sleeping in the storm, King David characterized sleep as an expression of trust in God. In the midst of Absalom’s rebellion, David wrote, “ I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the Lord sustained me” (Ps. 3:5). David continued this theme in song: “I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, LORD, only makest me dwell in safety” (Ps. 4:8). As Reynolds summarizes rightly, “This peace about

10. Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk, 29.11. Matthew 8:24; Mark 4:38; Luke 8:23.12. Matthew 8:26; Mark 4:40; Luke 8:25.


going to sleep expresses a trust and confidence that God is in control and watching over us.”13

Reynolds further describes sleep as a “part of our created human-ity, a good gift from God to be treasured and enjoyed; an earthly picture of a spiritual reality.”14 Sleep is especially a gift to Christians. It anticipates, by way of analogy, the promised rest described in Hebrews 4. Sleep gives us a daily opportunity to entrust ourselves to the care and provision of the Lord, surrendering to God through the course of our lives.

With a clear picture of what sleep is—a gift of God rather than an inconvenience—we can now move forward to explore the need for and uses of sleep in greater detail.

Sleep is NecessaryThe deleterious effects of sleep deprivation on our bodies are peren-nial objects of study to researchers in medical fields ranging from neuroscience and psychology to immunology and cardiology.15 Beyond a doubt, healthy sleep is a basic physical necessity for human well-being. Calvin’s clear injunction applies to us today: “For if we must live, we must also use the necessary instruments for life.”16 Understanding that sleep is a gift from God, Calvin’s follow-up state-ment applies to us with equal force: “the use of gifts of God cannot be wrong, if they are directed to the same purpose for which the Creator himself has created and destined them.”17 Yet a man’s need for healthy sleep habits extends beyond physical requirements. Just as with other divine gifts that are common to all people, there is great spiritual ben-efit in sleeping properly. Scudder described sleep as that “which being taken in its due measure, is a restorer of vigour and strength to your

13. Reynolds, And so to Bed…, 42.14. Reynolds, And so to Bed…, 10.15. Cf. Janet M. Mullington et al., “Cardiovascular, Inflammatory and Meta-

bolic Consequences of Sleep Deprivation,” Progress in Cardiovascular Diseases 51, no. 4 (2009): 294–302; David F. Dinges et al., “Sleep Deprivation and Human Immune Function,” Advances in Neuroimmunology 5, no. 2 (1995): 97–110; Michael W. L. Chee and Wei Chieh Choo, “Functional Imaging of Working Memory after 24 Hrs of Total Sleep Deprivation,” The Journal of Neuroscience 24, no. 19 (May 12, 2004): 456–67.

16. John Calvin, Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life, trans. Henry Van Andel (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2004), 83.

17. Calvin, Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life, 86.


body, and a quickener of the spirits.”18 It is a divine gift to be used wisely and well, to both physical and spiritual ends.

A Physical NeedMaintaining healthy sleep patterns nightly is the foundational means by which we sustain stable and productive energy levels in our work and ministry. Martin observes that the first step for Christian min-isters who seek to achieve healthy physical practices is to “beware of seeking to serve God in the office and functions of the ministry as through you were a disembodied spirit, rather than a creature of flesh and blood.”19 This warning applies equally to all Christians in every vocation. Though Martin’s immediate aim is to encourage ministers to establish healthy physical disciplines for godly living, his ultimate goal is to prevent spiritual burnout, partly due to neglecting physical needs. He writes, “Ministerial burnout ordinarily occurs as a result of neglecting the fundamental mental and physical disciplines ordained by God for our general well-being.”20 Men must recognize that they are physical, not merely spiritual, beings. Only God is a “Spirit, infi-nite, eternal, and unchangeable, in his being, wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth.”21 By way of contrast, men are embodied souls. We are finite, temporal, and mutable. Sleep serves as a reminder of the frailty of the human condition, and of our need for God. Sadly, for many, it is a relatively ineffectual reminder quickly squelched by our unreasonable aspirations of improving productivity.

Presenting the Full-Orbed Gospel in Our SleepThe act of sleep should remind believers of the gospel—namely, of God’s gracious deliverance of His people through Christ out of spiri-tual deadness. Awaking from sleep provides a picture of the Spirit’s work of regeneration, our experience of sanctification, and a reminder of the promise of future resurrection. In his directions for meditation immediately after waking in the morning, Scudder wrote, “[I]t will be useful to think upon some of these: I must awake from the sleep of sin, to righteousness…. Think also of your awaking out of the sleep

18. Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk, 96.19. Martin, You Lift Me Up, 104, 119.20. Martin, You Lift Me Up, 103.21. WSC Q. 4.


of death, and out of the grave, at the sound of the last trumpet, even of your blessed resurrection unto glory, at the last day.”22 Reynolds adds, “[W]hen we wake up and thank God for a good night’s rest we should be thanking Him that one glorious day we will wake in His presence for all eternity.”23

In addition to being a physical necessity and a spiritual reminder, sleep also plays an important role as an instrument of progressive sanctification. Just as healthy sleep patterns implicitly declare the sovereign care of God, they assist in the important work of morti-fying sins like anxiety, paranoia, doubt, stress, and unwarranted crankiness. As D. A. Carson affirms, “[I]f you are among those who become nasty, cynical, or even full of doubt when you are missing sleep, you are morally obligated to try to get the sleep you need.”24 This strong rebuke is not only for the rebellious unbeliever seeking to fight against God’s clear designs for human physical well-being. The danger of compromising the value of one’s Christian witness by the consequences of curtailing sleep should cause believers to consider Carson’s words. Martyn Lloyd-Jones provided a cautionary descrip-tion of the over-wearied well-doer when he wrote, “They are moving in the right direction but the trouble is that they are shuffling along with drooping heads and hands and the whole spectacle and picture they present is the very antithesis of what the Christian is meant to be in this life and world.”25 As Carson suggests, one remedy to such burdensome weariness is restoring healthy, balanced sleep regimens.

Lastly, healthy sleep patterns not only help believers “die unto sin,” but they also empower them to “live unto righteousness” by the effectual work of God’s free grace.26 Establishing a healthy routine of rest promotes diligence, productivity, faithfulness, temperance, purity, and self-control in every aspect and area of life. As Kevin

22. Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk, 29–30.23. Reynolds, And so to Bed…, 58.24. D. A. Carson, Scandalous: The Cross and the Resurrection of Jesus (Wheaton, Ill.:

Crossway, 2010), 147, as quoted in Kevin DeYoung, Crazy Busy: A (Mercifully) Short Book about a (Really) Big Problem (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2013), 97.

25. David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Its Cure, reprinted edition (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965), 191–92.

26. WSC Q. 35 reads, “What is sanctification? Sanctification is the work of God’s free grace, whereby we are renewed in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die unto sin, and live unto righteousness.


DeYoung notes, “If my goal is God-glorifying productivity over a lifetime of hard work, there are few things I need more than a regular rhythm of rest.”27 Recognizing that “God, in his ordinary providence, maketh use of means, yet is free to work without, above, and against them, at his pleasure,”28 it is not unreasonable to expect to cultivate the fruits of the Spirit in the lives of believers by means of caring for the body faithfully. We cultivate “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance” (Gal. 5:22–23) in our lives partly by proper care for the whole person, both in body and in spirit. To quote Carson again: “We are whole, complicated beings: our physical existence is tied up to our spiritual well-being, to our mental outlook, to our relationships with others, including our rela-tionship with God.”29

Sleep Under AttackIn order to examine how sleep can be abused and how such abuses violate God’s law, we will explore slothfulness, gluttony, and neglect in relation to sleep, and how they manifest the effects of pride on people’s sleep habits.

Slothfulness involves overindulging in sleep. It is a parody of what sleep should be. As Scudder counselled, “You should sleep only so much as the present state of your body requires; you must not be like the sluggard, to love sleep.”30 DeYoung clarifies the biblical mean-ing of the term “sluggard”: “When Proverbs talks about the sluggard lying on his bed, it has in mind the kind of person who would rather starve than strive, the person who would rather receive a handout than put his hands to work.”31 The slothful man uses sleep irrespon-sibly with no plan to work productively and to worship God. He fails to regard sleep as something to be planned for and respected in its appropriate time and place. Slothfulness is ultimately an expression of sinful self-gratification and irresponsibility; these impulses flow from a prideful disregard of God and His mandate that we work as

27. DeYoung, Crazy Busy, 92.28. WCF 5:3.29. Carson, Scandalous, 147, as quoted in DeYoung, Crazy Busy, 97.30. Scudder, The Christian’s Daily Walk, 96.31. DeYoung, Crazy Busy, 94.


unto His glory. Commenting on Proverbs 20:13,32 Reynolds writes, “Don’t spend all day in bed—get up and do some work! Sleep here is an idol because it supplants the command to work.”33 Lethargy is the result of persistent slothfulness. This leads to restlessness, tempta-tion, and further occasions for sin.

Gluttony is the sinful overindulgence of lawful things, especially with respect to food, alcohol, entertainment, and other things we con-sume. When allowed to grow in our lives unhindered, these influences consume time, vitality, and reputation. Martin writes, “Scripture does demand that we deny bodily appetites that are inordinate and irreg-ular…lest through the corruption of remaining sin they lead into a course of sin.”34 Like the slothful man, the glutton does not esteem sleep as something to be structured purposefully as he goes about his daily activities. He might, for instance, give no consideration to allow-ing his body to slow down as he lifts a shot of espresso to his lips late in the day. He might choose to watch another hour of television pro-gramming when he should be preparing for bed. Overindulgence in otherwise good things can hinder restful, productive sleep.

Slothfulness and gluttony both exemplify the “scattered, frantic, boundary-less busyness”35 that has defined much of the American experience in the early twenty-first century. Like slothfulness, glut-tony will put us on a hedonic treadmill of restlessness, temptation, and more self-indulgence. This pattern of escalating sinfulness is rooted in a prideful rejection of God’s warnings to seek moderation and balance while enjoying His good gifts in this world. As noted by Calvin, taking pleasure in moderate use of the things that are neces-sary for life should cultivate happiness. 36

The neglect of sleep is another danger. Essentially, neglect mani-fests sinful self-reliance. Though present in slothfulness and gluttony, neglect is seen most clearly in the workaholic who neglects healthy sleep patterns in order to accomplish tasks that seem to require immediate attention. This “workaholism,” when accompanied by the neglect of sleep, leads to over-exhaustion, burn-out, and the inability

32. Prov. 20:13 cautions, “Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty; open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with bread.”

33. Reynolds, And so to Bed…, 54.34. Martin, You Lift Me Up, 110–11.35. DeYoung, Crazy Busy, 98.36. Calvin, Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life, 84.


to strike a healthy balance in life. Self-imposed sleep deprivation is a grave infraction of God’s moral law, summarized in the Ten Com-mandments.37 As the Puritan Thomas Vincent observed, the sixth commandment requires “[t]he nourishing and refreshing our bodies in a sober and moderate use of meat, drink, and sleep.”38 When we reject God’s clear direction to pursue bodily health, we implicitly place ourselves above God as the authority on what is right and wrong in our lives. More directly, neglecting sleep in vain self-reliance may express destructive self-aggrandizement and self-glorification. As DeYoung writes, “God made us to need sleep, and when we think we can sur-vive without it, we not only spurn his gift (Ps. 127:2); we show our mistaken self-reliance…. Going to sleep is our way of saying, ‘I trust you, God. You’ll be okay without me.’”39 Reynolds puts it similarly by writing, “the willingness to lie down and sleep is itself an expression of trust and faith in a sovereign God.”40 In summary, slothfulness, gluttony, and neglect of healthful sleep patterns are born of the age-old desire to dethrone the Father in order to enthrone ourselves.

ConclusionIn order to honor God through sleep, we must recognize that we should devote the entire day to serving and glorifying God. Diligence in work leads to ease in resting at the right time. Healthful eating throughout the day also has the effect of enabling the body to shut down in due time, and to rest without hindrance. By depending on God as described above, we can establish self-control, which helps us to maintain proper sleep regimens. By recognizing the spiritual significance of sleep, we take a fresh approach to slumber by regard-ing it as a cause for thanksgiving rather than as an inconvenience or “necessary evil.”

Sleep provides us with a daily reminder of several universal spir-itual realities. The primary reminder is that we are created beings dependent upon an infinite, ever-wakeful and watchful God. As such,

37. WSC Q. 41 reads, “Wherein is the moral law summarily comprehended? The moral law is summarily comprehended in the ten commandments.”

38. Thomas Vincent, “The Shorter Catechism of the Westminster Assembly Explained and Proved from Scripture,” Westminster Shorter Catechism Project, http://www.shortercatechism.com/resources/vincent/wsc_vi_068.html (October 16, 2015).

39. DeYoung, Crazy Busy, 95.40. Reynolds, And so to Bed…, 26.


we should receive sleep with gratitude as a divine gift and neither neglect nor abuse it. For Christians, this is especially important since God calls us to worship and glorify Him as He renews us in every aspect of our being after His image. This doxological motivation for taking care of our bodies must accompany us as we travel through this world to our heavenly home—rest stops included.

Review Articlesq


Toward a Biblical, Catholic, and Reformed Theology: An Assessment of John Frame’s Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Christian Belief 1

To what does “Reformed” Theology refer?2 “Reformed” is primarily a historical term that describes the system of doctrine that led to a decisive break with confessional Roman Catholicism in the sixteenth century and then continued into subsequent centuries.3 Reformed theology came to be defined by its confessions of faith and catechisms as summaries of its doctrine.4 These documents united churches internationally by providing a means to promote the catholicity of the church’s confession. However, all of the major Reformed confessions included statements on the necessity, authority, and sufficiency of

1. John M. Frame, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Christian Belief (Phil-lipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 2013).

2. Elsewhere Frame wrote, “On the view I advocate, it is not possible to state in precise detail what constitutes Reformed theology and church life…. The concept, frankly, has ‘fuzzy boundaries,’ as some linguists and philosophers say” (http://www.frame-poythress.org/review-of-r-scott-clark-recovering-the-reformed-confession -our-theology-piety-and-practice/). It is important to recognize that Frame’s rejec-tion of creeds as markers of Reformed theology is itself out of accord with Reformed theology.

3. See the introduction to Herman J. Selderhuis, ed., A Companion to Reformed Orthodoxy, Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition (Leiden: Brill, 2013).

4. Richard A. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Devel-opment of Reformed Orthodoxy, Ca. 1520 to Ca. 1725, 4 vols., 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academics, 2003), 1. For a concise yet detailed treatment of Reformed theol-ogy in relation to the church and her confesisons, see J. Mark Beach, “Theology and the Church,” in Companion to Reformed Orthodoxy, 65–89.

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 197–240

Review Articles

q


Scripture alone as the rule of faith and practice.5 The goal of Reformed theology is to represent accurately the system of doctrine taught in Scripture and to proclaim this system of theology to the church and to the world. “Reformed,” therefore, represents what a certain group of churches taught or continue to teach about what the Bible says. Ordi-narily, those who call themselves Reformed do so because they believe that the Reformed confession is biblical. This approach reflects love for Scripture and for the church, which Christ purchased with His precious blood.

John Frame’s Systematic Theology is hard to categorize. His the-ology is simultaneously brilliant, innovative, and eccentric. Its primary strengths are the clarity of his arguments, his extensive use of Scripture, and his ability to interact critically with unbelief. The primary weakness of his theology lies in its lack of connection to historic Reformed theology. This is a problem because the absence of historical theology will almost always result in detachment from the confession of the church and an interpretation of the Bible that detracts from rather than promotes church unity.

Frame’s Systematic Theology, though helpful and profound in many respects, bears a problematic relationship to Reformed theology. After describing the general structure and unifying features of Frame’s work, the material below largely raises questions about Frame’s theol-ogy in relation to Reformed teaching. Being biblical is more important than being Reformed; however, the primary aim of this review is to bring Frame into conversation both with biblical principles and with some historic witnesses to Reformed theology. Doing so is important in pursuing a theology that stands in continuity with our Reformed forefathers in the faith. As we do so, we pursue unity in the teachings of Scripture and are better able to pursue unity with all who rest on the supreme authority of God’s Word by appealing to and promoting a common understanding of the Bible.

General StructureFrame’s roughly 1,100 page work is very uneven; J. I. Packer notes in the preface the author’s fear that this might be the case. A glance at the Table of Contents reveals that almost eight hundred pages of the work

5. J. V. Fesko, “The Doctrine of Scripture in Reformed Orthodoxy,” in Com-panion to Reformed Orthodoxy, 429–63.

Review aRticles 199

are devoted to the doctrine of God, the doctrine of the knowledge of God, and the doctrine of Scripture. In the traditional structure of Reformed theology, this would encompass merely two out of seven theological loci.

To be fair, Frame incorporates much of the rest of the system of theology into these subjects (for example, including providence and covenant theology early in the book). Even though this is the case, some topics receive little direct development. Most notably, Christology, Soteriology, and Ecclesiology, which ordinarily occupy three distinct areas of study in a Reformed system, receive roughly 120 pages combined attention. While the first two of these topics are woven admirably into virtually every section of his work, this does not meet adequately the inherent demand for depth in them. Weaving the loci of theology together in this way is useful to show the inter-connectedness of biblical doctrine, but it leaves too many unanswered questions and ambiguities.

MultiperspectivalismFrame is most famous for his tri or multiperspectivalism.6 He divides every area of investigation into three perspectives: normative, situ-ational, and existential. These correspond to the three “Lordship attributes” of control, authority, and presence. While praising Calvin for not having a central theological theme that governed his writ-ings, Frame chooses Lordship to be his own central theme both in this book and in his four-volume Theology of Lordship series.7 Control points to God’s sovereign rule over all things, and authority speaks of His right to rule. Presence ensures His ability to exercise His control and authority over all things. These Lordship attributes result in three perspectives in human knowledge. The normative perspective serves, as the name suggests, as a norm regulating the other two perspectives, while the situational perspective describes the situation in which we find ourselves in the world. The existential perspective largely coin-cides with personal experience or appropriation of the other two perspectives. In his chapter on the Trinity, Frame notes that his

6. Packer suggests that this will likely be Frame’s primary legacy to systematic theology. Frame, Systematic Theology, xxix.

7. Frame, Systematic Theology, 16.


multiperspectivalism does not arise from his trinitarianism, but that he would not be surprised if there ended up being some correlation.

Frame’s triperspectivalism is problematic both in terms of the rela-tive importance that he places on the three Lordship attributes and the three perspectives of human knowledge. Lordship is certainly a bibli-cal attribute of God; the problem lies with making it the centerpiece of the system of theology. For example, control and presence largely coincide with what are traditionally known as divine omnipotence and omnipresence. Singling these attributes out as two of three Lord-ship attributes raises questions concerning the traditional doctrine of divine simplicity (though Frame still affirms this doctrine).8 Divine simplicity affirms that God is His attributes and that divine attributes inform one another. Frame’s treatment of omnipotence illustrates this well.9 Traditionally, Reformed theology treated omnipotence as meaning that God can do whatever He wills to do in agreement with His attributes.10 For example, He cannot lie (Heb. 6:18; Titus 1:1–2) or die because this would contradict His nature and therefore limit His omnipotence. As one children’s catechism puts it, “God can do all his holy will.”11 Every divine attribute informs every other, including God’s power.

Frame, however, has lifted Lordship out of this typical con-struction and placed it in a privileged status. He acknowledges that his Lordship paradigm does not allow him to follow the traditional description of omnipotence in relation to other divine attributes. Instead of God’s power consistently expressing His other attributes, Frame resolves omnipotence into the tautological statement that God’s power accomplishes His power. This Lordship paradigm, while

8. Even though he defends a proper relationship between his view and divine simplicity, he later criticized the traditional concept of divine simplicity as making all of God’s attributes “identical.” Frame, Systematic Theology, 835. This exemplifies his characteristic tendency to affirm traditional theological language while simulta-neously redefining and adapting it to his own ends.

9. Frame, Systematic Theology, 342–46.10. For example, Johannes Wollebius, Compendium Theologiæ Christianæ (Com-

pendium of Christian Theology)., 9th ed. (Cantabrigiæ: ex celeberrimæ Academiæ Typographeo, 1654), 15: “Objectum omnipotentiae Dei est, quidquid eius natura non est adversum, et contraditionem non implicat.”

11. Hoornbeeck observes that divine omnipotence always follows the divine will, which in turn, reflects perfectly all divine attributes. Johannes Hoornbeeck, Theologiae Practicae (Practical Theology) (Francofurti & Lipsiae: Bailliar, 1698), 1:109.

Review aRticles 201

initially sounding plausible, represents a seismic shift away from the Reformed (and Medieval) concept of divine simplicity.12 When we view God’s attributes as informing and explaining one another, we have a coherent theological system (even though we know but the edges of God’s ways [Job 26:14]). If we follow Frame in prioritiz-ing Lordship over divine simplicity, then we must rework the entire system of theology accordingly. He is radically changing theological paradigms in the name of being biblical. Whether he is so is a separate question, but readers should be aware of the novelty of his views as they weigh them carefully in light of God’s Word.

Frame later distinguishes between God’s necessary and relative attributes. Relative attributes are those that describe the relationship between God and His creation. Lordship is, in Frame’s view, a relative attribute.13 While it is true that we know God primarily in terms of our relationship with Him, making a relative attribute the govern-ing principle of theology creates two potential problems. The first is that it gives one divine attribute precedence over all others, thus again compromising divine simplicity. The second is that it subtly shifts the center of gravity in theology from God to man. Frame denies this charge vigorously, and it is not a new charge against him. It is hard to find precedent for the centrality that he gives to divine Lordship in any prior Reformed theological system—for good reason. Through-out Scripture, the divine name (Yahweh) encompasses everything that it means to be God. Frame, however, defines this name in terms of control, authority, and presence. Frame only agrees with the tradi-tional construction by relativizing traditional definitions of the divine attributes either to make them interchangeable with the three Lord-ship attributes or to envelop them into these attributes.

Frame’s description of the interrelationship between the nor-mative, situational, and existential perspectives creates theological tensions as well. He notes that these perspectives are three ways of viewing the same thing and that each perspective implies the oth-ers. However, he adds repeatedly that, “ultimately, these three are the same.”14 His treatment of the sufficiency and authority of Scripture

12. Which is why Wollebius treats divine simplicity after the being of God but prior to other divine attributes, including power. Wollebius, Compendium, 12.

13. Frame, Systematic Theology, 232.14. Frame, Systematic Theology, 33.


highlights the problems arising from such assertions. After treating Scripture as the norm that regulates the rest of life, he argues that since Scripture appears in history and is interpreted by people, it is part of the situational and existential perspectives as well as the nor-mative.15 Since all three perspectives “are ultimately the same,” this raises the question as to whether Scripture has absolute normative authority over situations and experiences. My situation in life and my personal experience turn out to be aspects of the normative perspec-tive rather than absolutely subject to it.

In some sense, Scripture does stand as judge over the other two perspectives, since Frame promotes the formula that whenever Scrip-ture contradicts our view of something, Scripture is right and we are wrong. However, he appears to construct the doctrine of the suffi-ciency of Scripture in a way that is more akin to a Lutheran than a Reformed principle. If Scripture does not contradict (or forbid) what I think or do, then it is permissible.16 The traditional Reformed under-standing of the sufficiency of Scripture is that we must worship and serve God only as He commands us to do.17 Frame departs from this construction by flattening the distinction between how Scripture regulates public worship and the rest of life.18 Scripture takes priority over one’s situation in life and experience, but it is hard to conclude under Frame’s construction that Scripture has absolute authority over the other two perspectives. He argues later that the existential per-spective is itself a form of divine revelation, rather than a response to divine revelation.19 It is important to remember in this connection that all three perspectives are, in his view, ultimately one; yet Scrip-ture directs us to “the law and to the testimony” (Isa. 8:20), often in contrast to the perceptions shaped by our situation and experience (Deuteronomy 13).

Moreover, Frame’s triperspectivalism sometimes comes across as arbitrary. In the triad of covenant, kingdom, and family, for example,

15. Conversely, the situational and existential perspectives are “part of the nor-mative.” Frame, Systematic Theology, 737.

16. Frame, Systematic Theology, 1041.17. WCF 21.1.18. For example, see his Worship in Spirit and Truth: A Refreshing Study of the Prin-

ciples and Practice of Biblical Worship (Phillipsburg, N.J.: P & R Publishing, 1996). This is a large part of his case for dance and drama in public worship.


Review aRticles 203

treating the covenant as a normative perspective and the kingdom of God as a situational perspective appears to be forced.20 Frame stressed earlier that God’s Lordship attribute of presence is covenantal in nature. Covenant highlights communion with God, which, in his terms, is an existential perspective. Yet here covenant is normative. Frame argues that since each perspective includes the others, his para-digm holds. However, if every doctrine can shift its relation to the normative, situational, and existential perspectives when convenient, then how can these perspectives be useful as criteria for theological distinction and organization? If they are ultimately one, then how are they useful for making distinctions? Frame’s triperspectivalism ends up distinguishing everything and nothing at the same time.

In his last chapter, Frame vigorously denies charges of relativ-ism against his triperspectivalism,21 but it is easy to understand where the charge comes from. While he desires to maintain a traditional Reformed position on the authority and sufficiency of Scripture, his non-traditional methodology raises questions whether he does so consistently. It is easy to understand mankind’s relationship to God in light of Scripture under classic Reformed formulations, but this relationship is not so easy to describe or define using Frame’s mul-tiperspectivalism. This is both Frame’s most distinctive contribution to theology and the root of many difficulties arising from his work.

Frame’s Definition of TheologyFrame’s definition of theology runs the risk of facing a subjective dilemma parallel to his triperspectivalism. His definition focuses on edification as the purpose of theology.22 He defines theology as “the application of Scripture, by persons, to every area of life.”23

Though Frame does not take note of the fact, it was a common question in the Medieval, Reformation, and Post-Reformation peri-ods as to whether theology was primarily theoretical, practical, or both.24 William Ames, following Peter Ramus, famously defined the-

20. Frame, Systematic Theology, 87.21. Frame, Systematic Theology, 1112.22. Frame, Systematic Theology, 6.23. Frame, Systematic Theology, 8.24. See chapter 2 of Ryan M. McGraw, ‘A Heavenly Directory:’ Trinitarian Piety,

Public Worship, and a Reassessment of John Owen’s Theology, Reformed Historical The-ology 29 (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014).


ology as the doctrine of living to God.25 Almost all later Reformed theologians desired to stress the practical side of theology in some way.26 Johannes Hoornbeeck’s influential work was entitled Theolo-giae Practicae27 and, without downplaying the dogmatic foundation of theology, stressed communion with God as the purpose of theology. Peter van Mastricht represented a growing tendency in Reformed theology to balance both sides of the equation in his Theoretico-Practica Theologia.28 While Frame makes passing reference to Ames, Calvin, and the twentieth-century theologian, John Murray,29 he does not reflect the nature of the question in its historical context.

There is a subtle difference between Frame’s definition of theol-ogy and historical Reformed reflections on the nature of theology. He defines theology as the application of Scripture. Prior Reformed authors believed that theology was both theoretical and practical; they debated the relative weight that one should place on either side of this scale. Application was an integral part of theology without being equated with theology. By equating theology with the application of Scripture (to use Frame’s terms), the normative aspect of theology no longer remains distinct absolutely from its subjective components. The doctrinal norm derived from Scripture is enveloped in the situ-ational and existential perspectives in a way that threatens the unique place of the normative perspective. Instead of arguing in which direction the scale should tip, Frame has melted down the metal out of which the scale is made and formed in into a solid disk. He has reframed a vital historical debate by cutting it loose from its historical expressions and invented his own unique paradigm.

25. William Ames, Medulla S.s. Theologiæ…in Fine Adjuncta Est Disputatio De Fidei Divinæ Veritate. Editio Tertia Priori Longe Correctior (The Marrow of Sacred Theol-ogy…) (Apud Robertum Allottum: Londini, 1629),1. On Ramus see Tobias Sarx, ‘Reformed Protestantism in France,’ in Companion to Reformed Orthodoxy, 228–33.

26. Adriaan Neele, in his work on Mastricht, notes that this is a neglected area in the study of Reformed orthodoxy. Adriaan C. Neele, Petrus Van Mastricht (1630-1706) Reformed Orthodoxy: Method and Piety (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2009).

27. Hoornbeeck, Theologiae Practicae.28. Peter van Mastricht, Theoretico-Practica Theologia. Qua, Per Singula Capita

Theologica, Pars Exegetica, Dogmatica, Elenchtica & Practica, Perpetua Successione Conju-gantur (Theoretical-Practical Theology, in which Theology is Divided in each Chapter into Exegetical, Dogmatic, Elenctic, and Practical Parts) (Trajecti ad Rhenum, & Amstelo-dami: Sumptibus Societatis, 1715).


Review aRticles 205

Covenant TheologyFrame’s treatment of covenant theology is more traditional in some respects than some modern approaches. In contrast to many contem-porary authors, Frame defends an intra-trinitarian covenant (pactum salutis or covenant of redemption) standing behind all historical cov-enants.30 However, he argues for the presence of a creation covenant that is distinct from the covenant of works.31 This relates to the third Lordship attribute, which is God’s covenant presence. In other words, God is not Lord if He is not present, and His presence is inherently covenantal. In Frame’s view, the fact of creation results in a creation covenant.

Early Reformed orthodoxy identified two covenants: a covenant of works and a covenant of grace. High orthodoxy added the eternal covenant of redemption to this scheme. Some Reformed theologians treated the Mosaic covenant as a covenant distinct from the covenant of grace.32 The results were that most Reformed thinkers held either to one eternal covenant with two primary historical covenants (works and grace), or to one eternal covenant with three primary historical covenants (works, grace, and Mosaic).33 Reformed authors generally equated the creation covenant with the covenant of works. Some, such as Herman Witsius, argued that the covenant of works was coeval with man’s creation.34 Others, such as Thomas Goodwin, argued that

30. For an extensive classic treatment of this doctrine, see Patrick Gillespie, The Ark of the Covenant Opened, Or, a Treatise of the Covenant of Redemption Between God and Christ, as the Foundation of the Covenant of Grace the Second Part, Wherein Is Proved, That There Is Such a Covenant, the Necessity of It, the Nature, Properties, Parties Thereof, the Tenor, Articles, Subject-Matter of Redemption, the Commands, Conditions, and Promises Annexed, the Harmony of the Covenant of Reconciliation Made with Sinners, Wherein They Agree, Wherein They Differ, Grounds of Comfort from the Covenant of Suretiship (London: Printed for Tho. Parkhurst…, 1677). See also Carl R. Trueman, “The Harvest of Reformation Mythology? Pattrick Gillespie and the Covenant of Redemption,” in Maarten Wisse, Marcel Sarrot, and Willem Otten, Scholasticism Reformed: Essays in Honour of Willem J. van Asselt (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 196–214.

31. Frame, Systematic Theology, 29.32. Mark Jones, ‘The “Old” Covenant,’ Drawn into Controversie, 183–202.33. Cocceius offered an alternative view, but his covenant theology was so

unusual and complicated that almost no one followed the precise details of his schema. See Brian J. Lee, Johannes Cocceius and the Exegetical Roots of Federal Theology, Reformed Historical Theology 7 (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2008).

34. Herman Witsius, De Oeconomia Foederum Dei Cum Hominibus Libri Quatuor, 2 vols. (Rhenum, 1694), 1.2.1.


God instituted the covenant of works when He prohibited Adam to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.35 Reformed writers agreed about the nature of this covenant and they did not recognize another creation covenant distinct from it.36 They tended to regard passages such as Jeremiah 33, in which the prophet referred to God’s covenant with day and night, as metaphorical expressions.37

While Frame is not alone in identifying a creation covenant as dis-tinct from the covenant of works, this is an appropriate place to notice the silent shift that has taken place in Reformed covenant theology. This does not make the shift right or wrong, but it begs the questions of when it occurred and how it affects the system of Reformed doc-trine. The Westminster Confession of Faith (7.1) acknowledges that man could not enjoy God as his fruition or reward apart from a “vol-untary condescension” by way of covenant. Yet even apart from this “voluntary condescension,” mankind owed obedience to God and related to Him as creature to Creator. It seems problematic biblically to equate the Creator/creature relationship with a covenant; in Scrip-ture, all covenants involve relationships, but not all relationships are covenantal. Covenants affect the quality of the relationship between God and people, but the Creator/creature relationship would still exist without covenants. In Frame’s case, an additional creation covenant appears to be a theological result of his Lordship paradigm.38

For an author that claims to be strictly biblical, his position appears to be a significant, systematic leap that does not easily fit his-torical categories or precedents. He claims to be biblical as well in rejecting the common Reformed idea that Adam and Eve were in a period of probation under the covenant of works that would have led to confirmation in eternal life on the grounds that “the text does not

35. Thomas Goodwin, Of the Creatures, and the Condition of their State by Creation, The Works of Thomas Goodwin (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2006), 7:48–53.

36. See Richard A. Muller, “The Covenant of Works and the Stability of Divine Law in Seventeenth-Century Reformed Orthodoxy: A Study in the Theology of Herman Witsius and Wilhelmus à Brakel,” Calvin Theological Journal 29, no. 1 (1994).

37. For example, John Downame, The Second Volume of Annotations Upon All the Books of the Old and Nevv Testament This Third, Above the First and Second, Edition so Enlarged, as They Make an Entire Commentary on the Sacred Scripture, the Like Never Before Published in English: Wherein the Text Is Explained, Doubts Resolved, Scriptures Parallel’d and Various Readings Observed (London: Printed by Evan Tyler, 1657), in loc.

38. Frame, Systematic Theology, 61, 146, 190.

Review aRticles 207

say this.”39 Yet he has no hesitation in importing a creation covenant into the Genesis narrative that is prior to the covenant of works, even though the text does not say this either. Drawing theological conclu-sions in continuity with the historical witness of the church fosters unity; ignoring this witness in the name of being biblical leads to new paradigms that make such unity virtually unreachable.

Something Close to Biblicism?40

Frame unashamedly notes that he includes less historical theology than other comparable works because he wants to be biblical.41 While this sounds appealing to many Christians, it is impossible to do the-ology in a historical vacuum. Frame’s situational perspective reflects this fact. The question is not whether we are influenced by the his-torical teachings of the church, but which ones will influence us and whether they are correct.

For example, while relying on the supposed structure and charac-ter of ancient Near Eastern suzerainty treatises (which is a debatable topic), he goes so far as saying that these ancient treatises are “the root of the Bible’s doctrine of Scripture.”42 The origins of his triper-spectivalism are not entirely clear (though he makes passing reference to an idea planted by Cornelius van Til).43 What is clear is that this construction does not arise from simple and straightforward biblical exegesis. Ignoring historical theology as a conversation partner in the name of producing a theology that is more biblical gives readers a false impression and threatens to confuse Frame’s innovations with a bare reading of Scripture. Without historical theology, systematic theology becomes detached from the church. Historical theology does not tell us what to believe, but it helps us be self-critical. Without drawing from the past, we will have the unfortunate circumstance of holding communion with the church at the present day.44 This unavoidably detracts from a biblical catholicity of doctrine, which by definition

39. Frame, Systematic Theology, 64.40. Frame wrote an online article bearing this title.41. Frame, Systematic Theology, xxxiii.42. Frame, Systematic Theology, 19.43. Frame, Systematic Theology, 1104, fn. 3.44. Velema and van Genderen have an excellent treatment of this point in the

first chapter of their Concise Reformed Dogmatics (Phillipsburg, N.J.: P&R Publishing, 2008).


cannot reinvent itself in every generation. A Reformed theology dis-tinguishes itself from everything that is not Reformed; yet a common confession that is steeped in Scripture provides inroads to a greater biblical catholicity. In the name of being biblical, Frame distances himself from the Reformed tradition to some extent and modifies this tradition in a way that appears to be sui generis. It is hard to see how this promotes catholicity in relation either to the Reformed com-munity or to the broader Christian world.

Frame’s attitude to Reformed confessions further emphasizes this point. Confessional subscription has been a debated topic in American Presbyterianism.45 The question is whether or not ministers subscribe to their confessions and catechisms in toto, or whether they subscribe to an unspecified system of doctrine contained within them. Frame asserts, “Strict subscriptionism violates sola scriptura.”46 This accusa-tion raises at least two problems. The question of the nature of creedal subscription is itself problematic. If two believers confessed the words of the Nicene Creed, for example, and one said, “I believe,” but the other said, “I generally adhere to,” then the creed would lose its purpose immediately. Creeds enable believers to join in a united confession of their faith. Strict or full subscription to a creed does not violate auto-matically the Reformed sola scriptura principle. Such questions usually result from the content of the creed rather than difficulties over what it means to say, “I believe this.” While this is not the place to resolve this debate, Frame’s words against those who subscribe to creeds are insubstantial and make uncharitable assumptions concerning the con-victions and consciences of those who subscribe fully to creeds.47

Frame’s view of the nature and use of creeds is more deeply trou-bling. He argues that creeds are optional, if not unnecessary, because the NT protected orthodoxy reactively rather than proactively.48 In other words, he argues that the NT responded to error rather than pro-viding positive summaries of doctrine. This ignores the fact that early summaries of doctrine in the pages of the NT, such as 1 Corinthians 15:1–11 and 1 Timothy 3:16, were almost always reactive in response to some error. This is the biblical pattern for creed making. Creeds are

45. See David W. Hall, ed., The Practice of Confessional Subscription (Oak Ridge, Tenn.: Covenant Foundation, 1997).

46. Frame, Systematic Theology, 628, 656.47. Thanks to Ryan Speck for this observation.48. Frame, Systematic Theology, 654.

Review aRticles 209

stable and well-defined statements of common belief that churches or officers adopt to express their convictions; Frame does not appear to grasp this historical purpose for creeds or their biblical necessity. He argues that if ministers subscribe to creeds, then they will stifle theo-logical growth and development and they will not be able to amend their creeds.49 However, the Reformed creeds themselves acknowl-edge the right of synods and councils to determine matters of doctrine alongside of the possibility that they may err and need correction.50 Moreover, Samuel Miller observed that ministers need theological stability and maturity before they can prevent the church from being “tossed about by every wind of doctrine” (Eph. 4:14). If their views change, then men who are godly and honest will have the integrity to acknowledge this fact and to minister elsewhere if necessary.51

Scripture has ultimate authority beyond which there is no appeal, but unity and trust is not possible without some agreement over what the Bible says. As a young Christian, the present author belonged to a group of “non-denominational” churches that professed “no creed but the Bible.” However, each congregation had a statement of “what we believe” on their websites in order to inform visitors. Because of their refusal to acknowledge creeds, each congregation had a different statement of faith. This made unity between sister congregations dif-ficult and ambiguous at times. There was also a tacit assumption that the leadership subscribed to their statements of belief without excep-tion, otherwise visitors would be misled.

Frame’s appeal to being biblical is not what it appears to be at first glance. Frame gives the impression that he is interested in what the Bible says rather than what the church has said about the Bible. Yet he appeals to sources such as ancient Near Eastern suzerainty treatises to build his covenant theology. The question is not whether we will draw from elements of extra-biblical sources as an aid in understanding Scripture, but whether we will draw from the Spirit’s work through the church in ages past. The church is not infallible, but Christ has promised to work through her. We ought to begin with her testimony if we would be biblical.

49. Frame, Systematic Theology, 656.50. WCF 31.2–3.51. Samuel Miller, The Utility and Importance of Creeds and Confessions (Green-

ville, S.C.: A Press, 1991), 29–32.


Miscellaneous IssuesMuch more could be said about Frame’s Systematic Theology that illus-trates where he suffers from a paucity of historical theology, such as shifting from discussing God’s intent in the free offer of the gospel to something approximating English hypothetical universalism;52 mis-understanding the historical context of the lapsarian controversy;53 importing the two natures of Christ into pre-incarnate theophanies;54 careless language on the Trinity, such as referring to “three divine beings”;55 inadequate understanding of the relationship between eter-nal generation and aseity in Reformed theology;56 imputing to the Son “eternal obedience” and even “eternal subordination of role” in relation to the Father;57 importing Christ’s threefold office into the definition of the image of God, rather than describing man’s function in the world in terms of these offices;58 opening the door for those who say that Adam was the head of a pre-existing group of early hom-inids, rather than existing by the special creation of God;59 redefining the Reformed doctrine of total depravity and accusing the traditional doctrine as teaching that man is as bad as he can be;60 questioning the legitimacy of a logical order in the traditional ordo salutis;61 and urging the church to adopt elements of Presbyterianism, Congregationalism, and Episcopalianism simultaneously and at its own discretion.62

The aim in listing these examples is not to say whether Frame is right or wrong. The aim is to illustrate how, as a modern Reformed theologian, he departs from historic Reformed theology in significant ways. Sometimes he is self-conscious in doing so and tells his reader that this is the case. At other times, he makes theological shifts in silence, leaving some readers unaware that a change has taken place.

52. Frame, Systematic Theology, 239; See Drawn into Controversie for the nature of this question.

53. Frame, Systematic Theology, 225.54. Frame, Systematic Theology, 319.55. Frame, Systematic Theology, 441, 447, 488.56. Frame, Systematic Theology, 492–93.57. Frame, Systematic Theology, 494, 501.58. Frame, Systematic Theology, 785–91, 889.59. Frame, Systematic Theology, 806.60. Frame, Systematic Theology, 865.61. Frame, Systematic Theology, 936.62. Frame, Systematic Theology, 1027–28.

Review aRticles 211

ConclusionFrame’s Systematic Theology is profound and thought provoking. Yet the very features that make his theology innovative make it less clear what relationship he has to the historic Reformed faith. His lack of histori-cal theology makes his work less catholic in character. If the church does not self-consciously stand on the shoulders of its Reformed fore-fathers, then the term “Reformed” will quickly lose all meaning in contemporary discussions. A theology that is genuinely Reformed must be biblical and must not rest on human tradition; otherwise that theology would call itself Reformed while simultaneously demolish-ing one of the primary foundation stones of Reformed theology. Yet a theology that does not build on the past threatens rather than pro-motes the unity of the church.

Christ appointed means to promote unification in sound doctrine. In Ephesians 4:11–16, the apostle Paul lists gifts that the ascended Christ gave to the church: apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers were foremost among these gifts (v. 11). Through varied means, Christ sent them to accomplish the common task of equip-ping the saints for the work of ministry and of building up the body of Christ (v. 12). These officers should promote unity in faith and maturity among believers and prevent them from being tossed about by every wind of doctrine (vv. 13–14). This comes through teaching sound doctrine and speaking the truth in love in order to build up the saints in love (vv. 15–16).

Christ promised to furnish His church with teachers who pro-mote doctrinal unity through sound teaching and loving discipleship, and He has kept this promise. He has preserved the truth in His church throughout her history. Reformed Christians have believed that the theology embodied in their creeds and confessions repre-sents Christ’s faithfulness in giving scriptural light to the church to promote unity in sound doctrine. If the church would pursue a theol-ogy that is biblical and Reformed, she must do so in light of Christ’s promises. She must pursue Christian unity not only in light of the present teaching of the church, but in continuity with the unity with which Christ has already blessed the church. Only a theology that is both biblical and catholic can be unambiguously Reformed—and the character of Reformed theology is unmistakably both.

—Ryan M. McGraw


N. T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God

N. T. Wright’s book Paul and the Faithfulness of God (hereafter PFG) is the culmination of nearly thirty-five years of Wright’s research and writing on the Apostle Paul.1 It is sweeping in scope: Wright explains Paul’s thought in the context of the overall storyline of the Bible. This is unusual for a modern biblical scholar because most believe such an approach to be out of bounds; either they do not think there is a coherent storyline running through the Bible, or the demands of modern academic specialization have led them to become so focused on narrow areas of study that they are simply unable (or unwilling) to look for unity or coherence at the level of the entire biblical narrative.2

Wright’s book is massive (1,660 pages, including bibliography and indices), and it is ambitious. No single review can hope to address everything he says, and this review article will also be selective, as will others, no doubt. I will not even attempt to summarize every detail of the work, nor will I comment on points that seem uncontroversial or on points that are not at the heart of Wright’s proposal. Since Wright uses a narrative approach to the study of Paul, I will follow suit and engage with his book primarily at the level of how he explains Paul’s narrative of redemption. Of course, for Wright’s version of Paul’s story to be true, the particulars of that story have to be true as well, so I will also focus on several key details. In what follows I will attempt to accurately summarize Wright’s main concerns, as well as interact with and critique elements of his book that do not accurately capture Paul’s story of salvation or the theology contained in his letters.

Paul the Theologian?Unlike many New Testament scholars, Wright does not dismiss the notion that we can find a coherent theology of Paul.3 While of

1. N.T. Wright, Paul and the Faithfulness of God, Christian Origins and the Ques-tion of God, vol. 4 (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress, 2013).

2. For a helpful introduction to modern debates about the validity of doing biblical theology that attends to the witness of the entire scriptural narrative see Edward W. Klink III and Darian R. Lockett, Understanding Biblical Theology: A Com-parison of Theory and Practice (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012). Chapter 6 of Klink and Lockett’s book discusses Wright’s understanding of biblical theology.

3. For more on this see the evaluation of modern scholarship on the question of whether Paul’s theology is coherent in T. E. Van Spanje, Inconsistency in Paul? A

Review aRticles 213

course Paul never wrote a systematic theological treatise, it does not follow that his thinking is incoherent or unsystematic (568).4 Paul was a pastoral and missionary theologian, addressing urgent issues in his churches, but addressing them from the coherent perspective of Christ’s redemptive work in fulfillment of the Old Testament scriptures (see 1 Cor. 15:1–4, which is of “first importance” for Paul).

Wright recognizes an overarching unity to Paul’s thought, which he finds at the level of what he terms Paul’s worldview, a world-view sustained by three core theological convictions (monotheism, election, and eschatology, all to be discussed below). At the heart of Paul’s worldview is his attempt to clarify “the question of who the one true God actually is, what this God has done and is doing, and what this all means for the lives of the community and the particular Messiah-follower” (36). For Wright, to engage in an analysis of Paul’s worldview is to engage in theology, which strictly speaking means “words about God.”

That being said, Wright is dismissive of topical systematic theol-ogy of the sort practiced since at least the medieval period, which he sees as being problematically ahistorical because it is not rooted in the biblical story of salvation. Without interacting with Wright on this in detail, it suffices to say that while systematic theology can become ahistorical and lose its mooring in the redemptive story of the Bible, it need not be so, and in its best expressions is not so. Systematic theology (as compared to Wright’s preferred “narrative theology”) is simply a different way of organizing the truths of Scripture, one that becomes particularly important when Christians begin asking the question, “How does the biblical story affect the concrete details of my life?” Systematic theology aids in this attempt to put the biblical story of redemption into practice by giving concise answers to the very practical issues that all believers face: “What sort of God do I worship?” “How should I worship Him?” “What kind of relationship do I have with God?” “How should I live before God?” “What will He do in the future?” The overarching narrative of Scripture must be

Critique of the Work of Heikki Räisänen (WUNT 2.110; Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 1999).

4. All numbers (besides biblical references) in brackets refer to page numbers from PFG.


applied to the particulars of life. This is at least one reason systematic theology exists.

The Jewish WorldviewWorldview is a much discussed concept today, but Wright’s defini-tion revolves around a series of questions: “Who are we, where are we, what’s wrong, what’s the solution, and what time is it?” (33). For those not familiar with Wright, these questions need some explana-tion. Wright’s aim is to situate Paul in his Jewish context. To do this, he asks these five worldview questions of the Judaism of Paul’s time. How would a Jew contemporary with Paul answer each question?5

First: Who are we? Israel is the elect people of the creator God, chosen to be a light to the nations, that is, to undo the sin of Adam and bring salvation to all nations of the earth.

Second: Where are we? Israelites live in the land God prom-ised and gave to them long ago, although they are not free like they should be.

Third: What’s wrong? According to Wright, after the exile to Babylon, Israelites saw themselves—despite having returned to Palestine—as continuing to live in exile. The evidence? They were living under the rule of pagan overlords, and often their own priests and people were wicked and apostate. Radical change was necessary.

Fourth: What’s the solution? Israel knew that God had promised in the prophets that He would one day visit them again with salvation and deliver the nation in a new exodus. Clearly, this had not happened, since they were living under Roman occupation in their own land. Thus Israel was in a state of longing, waiting for the coming day of the Lord when all would be made right for them, and the nations of the world would stream into the land to place themselves in submission to Israel and to worship her God. An important dimension of the solu-tion to Israel’s predicament for Wright is the notion that however God chooses to act, it must include the entire world. Since sin has infected the whole world with all of its concrete structures of life, salvation

5. Throughout PFG, Wright refers back to discussions in his previous scholarly works. A succinct summary of the worldview questions of first century Judaism can be found on p. 243 of Wright’s book The New Testament and the People of God, Chris-tian Origins and the Question of God, vol. 1 (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress, 1992). Wright focuses on the worldview of the Pharisees, since Paul is a former member of this group (177–79).

Review aRticles 215

must also be “cosmic” in scope. That is to say: God does not simply save souls; in the coming age, He will restore all of creation (111, 113, 163–75, 477). Wright often polemicizes against what he views as the Western Christian tradition’s obsession with postmortem, heavenly, personal salvation at the expense of a holistic conception of salvation that includes the entire created realm within its orbit.6

Fifth: What time is it? It is a time of waiting for God’s covenant faithfulness to deliver Israel from her bondage, but it is also a time of intense anticipation as the dawning new age of salvation draws near (178–79).

The Jewish StoryThe answers to these five questions give us a snapshot of Israel’s worldview. This worldview, however, arises out of a narrative of God’s dealings with Israel and the world. Here is how Wright describes the basic story of God’s work of salvation as understood in first-century Judaism:

Israel’s God has thus determined to make Israel his people, to rescue them from pagan overlordship as at the exodus, and to fulfill his purpose, as in the promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He will enable the present Israel to stay loyal, will pro-tect his people from the wicked pagan world, and will rescue them and give them what he had promised, the sovereignty over the world which had been theirs a thousand years before in the golden age of David and Solomon. What they need is what had been provided from early on: the Temple as the place of YHWH’s presence; the Torah as the guiding way of life; the

6. Wright tends not to cite sources when dismissing the nebulous “Western Christian tradition” (usually encompassing both Catholicism and Protestantism) that has so badly misunderstood Judaism and Paul. He usually seems to have in mind either critical biblical scholars (like Rudolf Bultmann) or hypothetical lay-people whose conception of salvation and heaven owes more to depictions of life after death in Looney Tunes cartoons (halos, harps, clouds, grinning devils, etc.) than the depictions in Paul. Wright’s criticisms would be fairer if he would make his targets explicit, rather than insinuating (without substantiating the insinuation) that the majority of the Western Christian tradition is flawed on such important doc-trinal points as salvation and heaven. An example of Wright’s rhetoric: “The basic Pharisaic story [of redemption] was not, then, about the sort of question that has exercised western theology over the last half-millenium” (111). See my conclusion for more discussion of this aspect of Wright’s rhetoric.


king as the leader and deliverer, the people’s focal point and mili-tary leader. And all because YHWH is faithful. (110)

Paul’s WorldviewPaul, of course, is not simply a Jew; he is a Jewish believer in Jesus Christ. Therefore, his answers to these worldview questions are not the same as those of the various Jewish groups of his day, even if his answers flow out of Jewish answers or are related to them in many ways. According to Wright, Paul’s answers to these questions get at the heart of his theology, revealing the story of salvation that shapes Paul’s entire ministry. So, in broad outline, how does Paul answer Wright’s set of questions? Answering these questions gets us to the heart of Wright’s understanding of Paul’s theology.

First: Who are we?7 We the church, whether Jews or Gentiles, are Israel, the true people of God. We are the people who are experi-encing the fulfillment of all of God’s covenant promises to Israel in the Old Testament as these have been fulfilled through the faithful-ness of Jesus Christ. We are also a people indwelt by God’s Spirit, who enables us to participate in the initial renewal God has accom-plished in the world in Christ ahead of the total renewal of the world at Christ’s return.

Second: Where are we?8 We are communities of the Messiah liv-ing throughout the Roman Empire, but even more importantly, we are people living in God’s good creation under the lordship of Jesus Christ, who “has brought together heaven and earth” (546).

Third: What’s wrong?9 Adam’s sin has put creation “out of joint,” and malevolent powers have entered the world in an attempt to thwart God’s good plan for creation (476). Furthermore, Israel—who was meant to be the means God used to make right what sin has made wrong—has herself not been faithful. “Abraham and his family are stuck within their own failure to keep the covenant” (503) and thus usher in the renewal of creation. Israel is “in Adam.” First-century Jews recognized this problem but came up with radically different solutions than did Paul and the rest of early Christianity for fixing it.

7. Wright, PFG, 538–46.8. Wright, PFG, 546–47.9. Wright, PFG, 547–50. Wright answers this and the next question (“What’s

the solution?”) in the same section.

Review aRticles 217

Fourth: What’s the solution? God will defeat the forces that have created disorder in the world and will bring the whole created order to the completion, harmony, and peace that He originally intended for it (476). Paul believes that this restoration of “the ‘coming age’ has already been inaugurated (though not yet completed) through Jesus” (477, 521). In other words, salvation is primarily about the redemption of the whole cosmos as God reestablishes His rule over the world (481). Furthermore, the role of humanity in this divine rescue opera-tion is central to Wright’s reconstruction:

The creator’s plan for the cosmos was that humans should be given stewardship of it, to tend it and enable it to flourish. The failure of humans to accomplish this, to be obedient to the cre-ator’s intention, is thus a problem not just for them but for the creation itself…. Only when human beings, restored to their full dignity, are placed in authority over creation will creation be what it was intended to be. (485)

In other words: humanity was meant to order the world so as “to reflect creation’s praise back to the creator” (486).

But Adam and Eve failed in this creational task. How then could God’s purposes for the world be realized? The “creator’s rescue plan was to call Abraham and his family. Here is the vital narrative ele-ment, the crucial turn in the road which (so far as I can see) almost all exegetes miss” (494). What was the purpose of calling Abraham and his family? They (eventually “Israel”) are “the people through whom the creator was intending to rescue his creation” (495, emphasis original). How would Israel rescue God’s creation? Wright’s primary answer is that Israel will be the means of world redemption (restoring order to the cosmos), but he is not entirely clear on the precise mechanics of how Israel will accomplish this (cf. 495–505).

Israel, too, failed in its task, thus necessitating a different means for God to rescue His creation. “But how will he do all this? As we shall see, Romans 3.21–26 gives the answer: through the faithful Isra-elite, the Messiah” (498). It is through Jesus Christ that “the human story gets back on track, which was what Israel’s story was designed to do in the first place. And that is how the creator’s purpose for the whole cosmos is to be accomplished” (502). That task, again, is stew-ardship over the earth so as “to tend it and enable it to flourish” (485). This task has been accomplished in Jesus Christ, even if its fulfillment


awaits the future. As Wright puts it, the “overarching cosmic plot” of the Bible is that “God is bringing to birth ‘the age to come’ out of the womb of the ‘present evil age’” (525). Believers, as they exercise their own faithfulness, already live in the age to come (544).

Wright does not believe this means “God has changed his mind, first trying to rescue the world through Israel and then, when that didn’t work, going a different route by sending his son” (498, emphasis removed), because, for Paul, God’s sending His Son is the fulfillment of His plan to rescue the world through Israel. While Wright is cor-rect to see Jesus’s life and work as a fulfillment of God’s plan for the world, I confess that I do not understand how this does not lead to the conclusion that Israel’s vocation “didn’t work,” thus necessitating God “going a different route by sending his son.”

Fifth: What time is it?10 It is the time between the “‘now’ and the ‘not yet’ of the messianic narrative” (550). That is to say: those who model Christ’s faithfulness (for Wright’s definition of faith as “faithfulness” see 1027) in the present are those who participate in the new creation that has arrived in His first coming. They do this even as they wait for the resurrection of the body and the fullness of God’s new creation in the renewed earth that will arrive with Christ’s second coming (1072). Since the Christ-community already belongs “to God’s future,” they must “learn the habits of heart and life appro-priate for it even in the strange present time” (553). The church must be about the work of renewal that has already begun on this earth in anticipation of its full unveiling in the future. In the meantime, this age, “celebratory though it is, continues to be contested and fraught with trouble” (562), since sin and corruption will not be fully cast aside until Christ’s return.

Paul’s StoryAs with Israel’s worldview, Paul’s worldview (which is a modified form of the Pharisaical worldview) arises out of a narrative of God’s work of redemption. Wright summarizes his understanding of the overarching redemptive narrative of the Bible this way:

Creation was supposed to be looked after by Adam, but he sinned and so lost “the glory of God” ([Rom.] 3.23). He is replaced not

10. Wright, PFG, 550–62.

Review aRticles 219

just by the Messiah but by “those who receive the abundance of grace, and of the gift of covenant membership, of ‘being in the right’”: they will “reign in life through the one man Jesus the Messiah” ([Rom.] 5.17). By this means, creation itself will be set free from its slavery to corruption ([Rom.] 8.18–26).

That is the big story, the overarching plot. This is how cre-ation itself is to be renewed. This is the “cosmic” story. Humans in their sin, which prevents them from attaining their true voca-tion, are rescued through “the obedience of the one man”…. The specific problem of Israel, highlighted and exacerbated by the arrival of Torah ([Rom.] 5.20), has been met, and more than met, by the grace which has abounded in the Messiah…. His Israel-work rescues Adam’s people; his Adam-work rescues creation itself…. It is because the Messiah has fulfilled Israel’s calling that humans are rescued from idolatry, sin and death. (531)

Put another way: Adam was meant to bring order and harmony to the whole world. He failed. Thus, Israel was called by God to this same task. Israel, too, failed. Jesus Christ, however, has faithfully car-ried out the Adamic task of bringing order and harmony to the whole world. The church participates in Christ’s work of faithfulness as it—through its own faithfulness directed toward the Messiah—takes part in the task of fully putting into practice what has begun in a dramatic fashion with Christ’s first coming.

While we will examine some significant problems with his understanding of the biblical narrative, it should be said at the outset that Wright’s focus on narrative is to be applauded. Many, if not most, biblical scholars are so occupied with the minutiae of their specialized fields of study that they are unable (and often unwilling) to relate small portions of the biblical text to the overall story of redemption that runs from Genesis to Revelation. Wright correctly highlights the necessity of understanding this narrative if we are to make sense of how Paul thinks, even if Wright’s description of the details of the biblical narrative has problems. Wright also rightly highlights the problems with some “apocalyptic” readings of Paul in modern New Testament scholarship. This is a somewhat complex area of Pauline scholarship, but as Wright correctly argues (at many places in his book), the notion of “‘[a]pocalyptic’ as the breaker of ‘narrative,’ the saving power ‘invading’ the world vertically from the outside with-out connection to anything that has gone before” (460) cannot be


squared with the thought of someone who can say, as Paul does in 1 Corinthians 15:3–4, “that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” (emphasis mine). To put this differently: some scholars believe that Paul’s theology is shaped almost exclusively by a focus on a radical in-breaking of otherworldly salvation that was not even foreseen in the Old Testament.11 Wright does not fall into this false dichotomy, rightly pointing to the fact that radical, divine deliverance from sin and its effects is the fulfillment of all of God’s saving purposes in the Old Testament, not an abandonment of that original, divine plan of redemption.

Paul’s TheologyWhile Wright is careful to distinguish Paul’s theology from the phil-osophical-theological speculations of Roman authors like Cicero and Seneca, he insists that theology is indispensible for Paul because it is “the stabilizing, reinforcing, undergirding element” (565) of Paul’s worldview. What this means is that questions of Christian identity and action in the world (see the five worldview questions above) must be grounded in who God is (monotheism), what He has done and is doing in Christ for His people (election), and what He has already done in Christ and will do in the future for all of creation (eschatol-ogy). These are the three central categories in Wright’s explication of Paul’s theology. Contemporary Jews also shaped their worship and lives around these three categories; Paul’s chief distinctive is that he reshapes each category with reference to Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit (612). Here, we will briefly examine each category.

First, Jesus in His saving activity reveals the true nature of Israel’s one God. In conjunction with this, the Holy Spirit is revealed to be the “presence of the living God inhabiting the new temple” (612). At the heart of Wright’s proposal is the idea (held by Christians through the ages, but also by a growing number of New Testament scholars) that Paul placed Jesus Christ at the heart of Jewish monotheism, that,

11. See, for example, J. Louis Martyn, Galatians (Anchor Bible Commentary 33A; New York: Doubleday, 1997); idem, Theological Issues in the Letters of Paul (Lon-don: T & T Clark, 1997). On the issue of Paul and apocalyptic in modern Pauline scholarship see R. Barry Matlock, Unveiling the Apocalyptic Paul: Paul’s Interpreters and the Rhetoric of Criticism (Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series 127; Sheffield, United Kingdom: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996).

Review aRticles 221

in essence, when Paul thinks of Jesus, he thinks of God, because Jesus is God. This is Paul’s redefined Jewish monotheism.12

Second, Jesus is a new Israel, faithful where national Israel failed (879, 907, etc.). His saving work redefines the boundaries of Israel; everyone who replicates Jesus’ faithfulness, through the enlivening power of the Spirit, belongs in the family of God regardless of their ethnic status. Because there is only one God, there can be only one people of God, entered into on equal terms for all people. This is Paul’s redefined Jewish understanding of election.13 Wright’s main discussion of salvation in Paul (soteriology) is found in his chapter on election (ch. 10). I will interact with Wright’s view of Pauline soteriol-ogy below.

Third, the “endtimes” (eschatology) have been redefined around Jesus. While Jews were looking for a single “Day of the Lord” where God would come in power to save His people, we see in Paul a two-stage coming of the Lord in Jesus Christ. God has already accomplished redemption in Jesus Christ, and yet He will complete this work in the future at the return of Christ. The new creation foretold by Isaiah (Isa. 65:17, 66:22, etc.) is already here, and yet it is still coming in its fullness in the future. In the time between Christ’s first and second comings, believers must be engaged in the Spirit-empowered work of advancing God’s present new creation in anticipation of its future fullness in the new heavens and new earth. This—in a nutshell—is Paul’s redefined, or “inaugurated,” eschatology.14

Interaction with Paul and the Faithfulness of GodHow does Wright’s understanding of Paul’s telling of the story of redemption square with the actual text of Paul’s letters? This review won’t interact in detail with every point he makes. Instead, it will engage with his overall telling of the story, zooming in on several of what I think are the most significant points where Wright’s account of Paul is faulty.15

12. See Wright, PFG, 619–773.13. See Wright, PFG, 774–1042.14. See Wright, PFG, 1,043–1,265.15. The biggest omission in my interactions with Wright is with his attempt

to place Paul in conversation with the cultural, philosophical, and religious trends of his day (197–347 and 1,269–1,472). As important as these parts of Wright’s book


The overall contours of Wright’s description of Paul’s story of redemption are essentially correct: Adam has introduced sin and dis-order into the world; Israel is called to be a light to the nations; God will make things right through a dramatic act of redemption; cre-ation itself—and not just individuals—is affected by sin and thus in need of redemption; one day God will be all in all, and His people will experience the fullness of salvation on the renewed earth as all nations give homage to God.

Serious problems emerge when we focus on specific components of Wright’s telling of this story. There are two particular (and foun-dational) problems on which I will focus, namely the effects of sin on humanity and how God will make right what sin has made wrong in the world.

What effect does sin have on the world?Wright’s view of sin appears clearly in his discussion of judgment. Wright believes that Paul retains a theology of judgment, but it is important to note what Paul means by this term: “‘[J]udgment’ is what happens when the creator says ‘No’ to all that stands out against his good, positive purposes for his world, in order to say ‘Yes’ to that world itself, in all its fullness” (483). Judgment is “bad news, to be sure, for any who want to go on distorting, corrupting and destroying God’s good creation, but good news for all who long to see cre-ation restored” (482). Sin—in this way of thinking—has to do with attempts to thwart God’s plan for the restoration of the world rather than with personal rebellion against God’s law. It is only “those who have wrought evil, damage, hurt or destruction” that will face God’s “condemnation” (549). Even condemnation appears to be simply a metaphorical way of describing how God will restore the world “to some kind of balance” (549).

God’s judgment, Wright argues, should not be understood “in the context of a dualistic mindset where the aim of ‘ judgment’ would be to destroy the present world and rescue only a chosen few” (482). As we will see below, if Wright simply wants to affirm that the whole world will be renewed in the coming age, there is no problem. How-ever, he sets up a false dichotomy: either redemption includes the

may be, I have chosen to focus on the heart of Paul’s own positive theology, rather than the ways in which that theology might interact with his cultural environment.

Review aRticles 223

whole world within its scope or redemption is only about rescuing individual, disembodied souls while putting a complete end to the space-time universe. Does personal judgment for personal violations of God’s law fall into the category for Wright of “a dualistic mindset where the aim of ‘ judgment’ would be to destroy the present world and rescue only a chosen few”? At the very least, Wright believes that anything that can be said about individuals and their salvation is subordinate to the redemption God will provide for the world itself (cf. 487). While he affirms that “[c]reation cannot be put right until humans are put right” (488), as we will see below, this “putting right” of humans does not refer in any significant sense to things like for-giveness for the sins of individuals.

The overarching problem with Wright’s understanding of sin is that, despite arguing that sin is both “a human propensity and action” (492), he does not describe sin with reference to rebellion/transgres-sion of God’s law, a rebellion that incurs guilt and condemnation. Rather: sin is a defacing of God’s world, a refusal to order it properly.

Human actions can be sins, no doubt, but the sinfulness of these actions is described merely with reference to their negative effects in the world, not with reference to the fact that—most importantly—they are sins against God.

For Wright, sin

has to do with a corruption, a distortion, a fatal twisting of gen-uine humanness into a ghastly perversion, an abuse of power which is destructive both to those affected by the human actions and to the humans themselves. Thus the rescue operation needs to deal with this corruption as well as to restore humans to their proper place. (493)

Salvation, therefore, is “revealed as God’s rescue from the ultimate enemies themselves. The death and resurrection of Jesus transformed Paul’s…belief…into…[a] hope for a totally renewed cosmos and for the people of this One God to be given an immortal physicality to live in it” (762, see also 934–35). This explanation of sin and salvation is not wrong in what it affirms, but wrong because it does not also affirm what is just as important for Paul: sin is primarily a violation of God’s law (Rom. 4:5; cf. 1 John 3:4) that incurs guilt and condemnation (Rom 3:9–19).


Paul’s view of sin is much more radical than Wright’s reconstruc-tion: sin festers in the heart of every human being, and leads to overt acts of rebellion against God (Rom. 3:23). The only response of a holy God to such rebellion is condemnation—in the sense of active pun-ishment (wrath) against sinners (see Rom. 1:18; 2:3, 5, 8, 9, 16; 5:16, 18; 14:10–12; etc.). Wright’s view of sin and condemnation revolves almost entirely around how humans have marred the order and har-mony of the world. Thus, for Wright, salvation (and justification) is about what God is going to do to bring the world back to its proper state rather than what He has done to enable guilty sinners to be rec-onciled to Himself.

What will God do to make right what has been made wrong through sin?We’ve seen Wright’s answer to the question, “How has sin affected humanity and the world?” How, then, does Wright conceive of the solution? What does Paul have to say about salvation and redemption? In a concise summary, Wright lays out Paul’s view of salvation like this: after Adam plunged the world into sin, God’s plan was “to save the world through Abraham’s family,” which is what the Old Testament means by Israel being “a light for the nations” (814, emphasis origi-nal). The original vocation given to Adam was not rescinded after Adam’s failure; it was simply passed on to others. Adam’s vocation was “to uproot evil and establish God’s world as it should be” (488). This vocation remains in place for Israel, which is “the people through whom the creator was intending to rescue his creation” (495, emphasis original). According to Wright, Paul likewise picks up on this theme, redefining it around Jesus Christ as the true Israel who brings redemption to the entire created order where Adam and national Israel failed.

There are significant problems with this line of reasoning. To begin with, the supposed Old Testament background itself is mis-understood. When Wright refers to Israel’s vocation, he is referring to Isaiah 49:6 and 60:3 where God says to Israel, “I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Wright reads into this verse (and others) the notion that Israel is meant to be the means through which God rescues the world, when in fact the text refers to Israel as a light that draws the world to God, and to His act of rescue and redemption. This is how Isaiah 60:1–3 actually speaks of Israel as a “light to the nations”: Israel reflects God’s glory, making them a bright light in the midst of the sinful darkness of

Review aRticles 225

the world. As Israel reflects God’s glory, it will be a beacon that guides the nations (lost as they are in the darkness of sin) to God Himself. In other words, God is the One who saves, and while He uses Israel as a means to point the nations to His redemptive work, He does not use Israel as the actual means of salvation. Israel shines as a light of testimony to God’s saving work. Israel does not carry out the rescu-ing and redeeming of the world itself. Adam could have extended the reign of God over the face of the earth because there was no sin in the world, but the conditions that existed with Adam in his pre-fall state no longer exist once sin has been introduced into the world.

Furthermore, what should we make of Wright’s claim that Paul believed that Israel was meant to be the means through which God redeemed and rescued the entire world? Wright leans heavily on Romans 2:1–16 to make his argument. Instead of seeing in these verses a discussion of God’s total impartiality in judging Jews and Gentiles on the same terms, Wright argues that this passage is “about the vocation of Israel to be the means by which the creator God will solve the problem of the world” (496, emphasis original). There is simply noth-ing in this passage that indicates this is Paul’s focus.

Romans 2:19 surely alludes to the latter half of Isaiah 49:6, but the failure for which Paul condemns some Jews in Romans 2 is hypocrisy, not failing to be the means through which God rescues the world. Paul argues that God will not show favor to Jews simply because they are Jews. Paul levels the playing field between Jews and Gentiles by placing every individual on the same footing before the bar of divine justice on the final day (Rom. 2:6–16).

A second passage to which Wright appeals is Romans 9–11. In these chapters, Paul reveals that Israel’s unbelief is a mysterious means through which the gospel goes out to the whole world (see especially Rom. 11:11–32). Wright believes that in Israel’s unbelief (and sub-sequent exile) we see the nation “acting out…the Messiah-shaped vocation…of being ‘cast away’ for the sake of the world,” and that in so doing Israel is “indeed the means of bringing God’s rescue to the world” (500). In other words, Israel would suffer for the sake of the world. However, unbelief is quite a different thing from righteous suf-fering for the sake of the world. Israel became enemies of God for the sake of the world (Rom. 11:28), not in order to suffer vicariously for the world, but because of obstinate unbelief (Rom. 10:21). If Israel could fulfill the Messianic vocation both positively (being the rescuer of the


world) and negatively (through suffering for the sake of the world via exile), why was another Messiah (namely, Jesus) necessary? What aspects of Israel’s vocation did Israel not already accomplish itself?

This brings us, then, to the most serious problem with seeing Israel as the intended rescuer of the world, namely, what this says about the mission of Jesus Christ Himself. Wright’s view leads to the conclusion that the incarnation of Jesus Christ only became neces-sary after Israel failed in its vocation to rescue the world. If Israel could carry out the mission originally given to Adam, then it is not necessary that the God-man Jesus Christ be the One who rescues the world. In other words, humanity is perfectly capable itself of ushering in God’s new creation (with divine assistance, no doubt); what “Paul means by ‘redemption’ was that Israel’s God had acted decisively within history to deal with evil in general and the sin of his people in particular, meaning that with this blockage out of the way the new creation could be set in motion” (1071). When redemption is defined simply as a renewal of the created order (recognizing that individuals will find their proper place in that order), Israel being the means of this redemption might not seem so far-fetched. However, when we recognize the full problem of human sin—that of rebellion against, and transgression of the law of God—a much more radical solution becomes necessary. This solution is nothing less than God the Son taking on human flesh in order to save a people for Himself. Since humanity has sinned, a human must make things right; but only God can save, so God—in human flesh—must make things right. This is the dilemma that faced humanity the instant Adam sinned in the garden of Eden. Jesus Christ as fully God and fully man becomes necessary once sin enters the world because redemption goes much further than simply restoring harmony to the created order. Atone-ment must be made (Rom. 3:21–26). Sinners must be reconciled to a God who otherwise is their enemy (Rom. 5:10). Israel could never solve this problem, which is the true “problem of the world” (to bor-row a phrase from Wright [496]), nor were they ever intended by God to do so.

What is Righteousness?The most problematic feature of Wright’s book is centered on his understanding of justification. The English noun justification is clearly related to the verb to justify.

Review aRticles 227

What is not obvious in English is that two other biblical words are also derived from the same root word as justify/justification, namely, righteous and righteousness. In simple terms, these four words fit together in the Bible like this: a person is righteous when he has done what is righteous. A person has righteousness when he has done what is righteous. To justify a person is to declare that person to be righ-teous. Justification is the state in which a person exists after he has been declared to be righteous (that is, after that person has been justi-fied). If you change the meaning of any one of these terms, all of the other meanings must change accordingly. Thus, if you get one of the terms wrong, you will get them all wrong.

The source for most of Wright’s problems lies in his definition of the word righteousness, a problem that then radiates out to his defi-nition of justification. Wright begins his discussion of righteousness on the right track by noting that the “word tsedaqah/dikaiosyne [righ-teousness] and its cognates in the Israelite scriptures seem to have the primary meaning of ‘right behavior’” (796). However, Wright quickly qualifies this statement in this way: “But the emphasis is not merely on implicit conformity to a law or abstract standard, though that may be involved as well, but to the question of being in right relation with others” (796, emphasis original). In other words, righteousness may include the notion of “right behavior” (although Wright never really explains how), but its core meaning is “being in right relation with others.” By this, Wright sees righteousness as being a relational term rather than a moral term.

To substantiate this understanding of righteousness, Wright appeals to Genesis 38 and the story of Judah and Tamar. In this story, when Judah refuses to provide his son Shelah to Tamar for marriage (as he had promised, and in obedience to Old Testament law [see Deut. 25:5–10]), she dresses as a prostitute, seduces Judah, and gets pregnant by him. When Judah discovers that Tamar is pregnant, he responds by demanding that she be burned to death for her immo-rality, but when she reveals herself to Judah, he exclaims that “[s]he is more righteous than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah” (Gen. 38:26). Wright contends that righteousness in this instance is not about “abstract moral character,” but about having “behaved appropriately…in relation to the present lawsuit in particular” (797). In other words, righteousness is relational. To be righteous is not about whether you have been good enough to earn God’s favor, but about


whether you are in a right relation with other people. Wright calls such biblical uses of the word righteousness “quasi-legal judgment[s]” (798) because they include a declaration of righteousness without a determination by a judge who decides between a plaintiff and defen-dant. As Wright argues later in his book, a relational understanding of righteousness is a covenantal understanding of righteousness. That is to say: to “have” righteousness means that one has been declared a member of the covenant community.

Wright’s procedure here is strange. The word righteousness is used often in the Old Testament. Instead of focusing on the wide-spread—and fairly straightforward—uses of the word, he chooses an exegetically difficult passage (the story of Judah and Tamar) and extracts a great deal out of the purported meaning of the word in this passage. Since no one would suggest that Tamar’s prostitution is righteous according to an “abstract moral standard,” Wright takes it to mean that righteousness is simply about Tamar being rightly related to Judah in this one instance. Righteousness, according to this under-standing, is not something one must accrue in order to be accepted by God; it is about being rightly related to other people.

The Old Testament simply does not sustain this understanding of righteousness. A few representative categories of examples make this clear.16 First, there is the category of legal righteousness, where the term can be applied to humans (Lev. 19:15) or to God (Ps. 96:13). In Leviticus 19:15, a judge is said to judge righteously when he treats the rich and the poor equally, using only God’s law as the standard of jus-tice. Righteousness, in cases like this, means doing the right thing (in this case: judging impartially). In Psalm 96:13, God is said to judge “in righteousness” when He comes to judge the earth. God’s righteous-ness is displayed precisely in His activity as judge of all people. The

16. I owe many of these examples and classifications to Stephen Westerholm, Perspectives Old and New on Paul: The “Lutheran” Paul and His Critics (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 261–96, and Charles Lee Irons, The Righteousness of God: A Lexi-cal Examination of the Covenant-Faithfulness Interpretation (WUNT 2.386; Tübingen, Germany: Mohr Siebeck, 2015). The numerous examples of the meaning of righ-teousness language in the Old Testament and in Paul discussed by both authors should be consulted. Irons surveys nearly every single instance of righteousness terminology in the Old Testament and Paul, and his conclusions are devastating for scholars who define righteousness the way Wright does: out of the roughly 276 occurrences of the words righteous and righteousness in the Old Testament, not a sin-gle one denotes faithfulness to a relationship.

Review aRticles 229

standard of righteousness in this latter case is certainly not abstract, nor is it something external to God, something to which He Himself is subordinate. The standard for righteousness is God Himself, and God will always remain consistent with His own righteous character (Ps. 7:11; 50:6; Isa. 5:16; Rom. 3:5; James 1:20).

Second, there is the category of simple ethical righteousness, without reference to an explicitly legal setting. Deuteronomy 9:4–6 is one example in this category, which clearly refers to the moral uprightness of individuals. In this passage righteousness is equated with “uprightness of heart” and is contrasted with wickedness, which is not a relational term, but simply an ethical descriptor indicating someone who has transgressed God’s law. In sum, “doing righteous-ness” is the way that a person “keeps the way of the Lord” (Gen. 18:19). Righteousness is attained when a person has done what is right according to God’s law, which is simply an external reflection of His righteous character.

Some examples of the word righteous also show the undeniably ethical/moral focus of righteousness terminology in the Old Testa-ment. In Genesis 18:23, Abraham asks the Lord (with reference to God’s promise to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah), “Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?” Just as righteousness is contrasted with wickedness in Deuteronomy 9:4–6, the contrast in Genesis 18:23 is between individuals who are morally upright (the righteous) versus those who are morally corrupt (the wicked). Those who are righteous in this sense are not so according to an “abstract standard” (Wright’s phrase on 796). There is nothing abstract about it: righteousness is defined according to the concrete stipulations of God’s law. In Exodus 9:27, after experiencing the plague of hail, Pha-raoh says to Moses and Aaron: “ I have sinned this time: the LORD is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.” The contrast could not be any clearer: the opposite of being righteous is being a wicked sinner. Righteousness is inescapably about whether a person has done what is right, not about whether that person is rightly related to someone else. Righteousness terminology throughout the Old Testament confirms this picture.

Paul also displays this Old Testament understanding of righ-teousness language in his letters. A few examples suffice to show this. In Romans 3:10, Paul states that “no one is righteous.” What does he mean by righteous? Paul’s statement “no one is righteous” is a biblical


proof (taken from Psalm 14:1–3 and possibly Ecclesiastes 7:20) in sup-port of Paul’s claim that “both Jews and Greeks are under sin” (Rom. 3:9). In other words, a person’s being unrighteous entails that person’s being “under sin”—being a sinner. Sin and righteousness are oppo-sites. This is not a matter of a relationship with others in a particular legal or quasi-legal case. Because all people in the world are unrigh-teous, they are therefore guilty before God (3:19). Unrighteousness leads to God’s wrath being poured out upon sinners (1:18; 2:3; 1 Cor. 6:9a). Righteousness is the opposite of wickedness (Rom. 6:18–19; 2 Cor. 6:14), and is defined, not according to the terms of a relation-ship, but according to God’s law (Rom. 4:15; 7:12). Righteousness is what one should do, but also what one possesses when one has done what is right according to God’s law (Phil. 3:9; Rom. 10:3).

In short, righteousness is not a relational term; righteousness is what a person “possesses” when he or she has done what is right. More precisely: to be righteous is to have done righteousness.

Even in the case of Judah and Tamar, we should not be led to redefine righteousness in relational terms, since we see the same prin-ciple here that is found throughout the Old Testament: righteousness is defined according to God’s law. You are righteous when you have acted in accordance with God’s law, which Tamar—not Judah—has done in this particular instance. Genesis 38:26 does not state that Tamar is righteous in all of her actions (such as her prostitution), but it does make a pointedly legal/moral claim with reference to Judah. He has not done what is righteous in this instance because he has vio-lated God’s law by refusing to provide his son to Tamar according to the prescriptions of Deuteronomy 25:5–10. Thus, Tamar, in seeking to force Judah to keep his promise, has acted righteously only with reference to this one issue.

Righteousness is still defined according to God’s law and is ines-capably moral/legal here. It is not possible to call this instance of righteousness terminology “relational,” as if that somehow shifts the meaning of the word away from its moral meaning—doing the right thing.

It is also curious that Wright appeals to the story of Judah and Tamar, which he calls a “quasi-legal judgment,” when the Old Testa-ment is full of actually legal judgments that use righteousness and justification terminology. Consider Deuteronomy 25:1–2: “If there be a controversy between men, and they come unto judgment, that

Review aRticles 231

the judges may judge them; then they shall justify the righteous, and condemn the wicked. And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault, by a certain number.” The duty of Israelite judges was to judge according to the truth of the particular situation, using God’s law as their standard. In such a case, justifying the righteous person means declaring that person to have done what is right. Alternatively, the judge must condemn the person who has done what is wrong.

For example, if two men came before a judge, one claiming that the other had stolen his cow, it is necessary for the judge to determine the truth of the matter. If the first of these men had stolen the cow, the judge must condemn that man, and “justify” the second man, that is, declare the second man to be in the right. The standard the judge must use in determining whom to justify and whom to condemn is, of course, God’s law. While human judges are not infallible, they are still required by God to determine who is in the right in a particular case and to justify only that person. Contrary to Wright’s contention (799, 945–47), it is not simply the declaration of righteousness that matters in a legal or “quasi-legal” setting; the declaration must corre-spond with the presence or absence of guilt and is thus an inescapably moral designation. Proverbs 17:15 concisely expresses the necessity of judges judging according to actual uprightness or innocence: “He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous are both alike an abomination to the Lord.” Wright is fundamentally mistaken when he says that “it makes no difference how upright and innocent the person in question may be” (945), and that justification is thus merely “a declaration” that “confers a status” irrespective of a person’s moral standing or character (946). Texts such as Proverbs 17:15 cre-ate the very problem that Paul addresses in Romans 3:9–20: if judges are required to justify (i.e., to declare righteous) only those who are truly in the right, and if God is the ultimate judge of all of humanity, how can God justify anyone, since “none is righteous” (Rom. 3:10)? In other words, how can God justify “the ungodly” (Rom. 4:5) without abandoning His own righteousness? We’ll see how Paul answers this question below.


What Is Justification?As was noted above, the meaning of justification is closely related to the meaning of righteousness throughout the Bible. If the meaning of righteousness changes, the meaning of justification changes, since the verb to justify simply means to declare a person to be righteous. It should be noted that Wright correctly highlights the fact that at the lexical level to justify means to declare righteous (935, 945–46, 957). His relational definition of righteousness language, however, causes him to define justification like this: “‘Justification’ is the declaration of the one God, on the basis of the death of Jesus: this really is my adopted child, a member of Abraham’s covenant family, whose sins are for-given” (958–59, emphasis original). Or this: “The verdict [righteous] issued in justification declares that the Messiah’s people form the single worldwide family” (960, emphasis original). For Wright, righteousness means being in the covenant.

Righteousness is relational; it is about whether you are rightly related to others within the bounds of the covenant. Therefore, to be justified, to be declared righteous, means to be declared really to be in the covenant community of God. In light of the biblical meaning of righteousness surveyed above (doing what is right according to God’s law), Wright’s understanding of justification simply is not possible. Since righteousness is about whether a person has done what is right, justification cannot be about something else altogether; it cannot be a declaration that one is in the covenant community. This is a complete confusion of categories. A brief survey of Paul’s discussion of righ-teousness and justification in Romans 1–3 should make the problems with Wright’s view clear.

In Romans 1:16, Paul exclaims that the gospel is the “power of God for salvation.” How is this so? In 1:17, Paul gives the answer: the gospel is seen to be the power of God for salvation because the gospel reveals the “righteousness of God.” Wright (and others) understands the phrase “righteousness of God” to be a reference to God’s com-mitment to save Israel, and thus he does not find a reference in 1:17 to individuals being declared righteous in a moral or legal sense. It is true that 1:17 is a tightly compressed statement that could potentially be taken in several ways. However, at the very least, the connection between righteousness and individual believers is established in the second half of the verse, where quoting Habakkuk 2:4, Paul says, “the righteous shall live by faith.” However it is that a person becomes, or

Review aRticles 233

is declared to be, righteous, the word righteous is clearly connected to individuals (“the righteous” = “the righteous person” in Greek), and is clearly connected to faith (“shall live by faith”).

Any ambiguity about whether Paul is referring to individu-als’ being declared righteous in the sense of being declared morally/legally in the right (according to the standard of God’s law), however, disappears as Paul’s argument progresses. In Romans 3 Paul states unequivocally that “none is righteous” (3:10). Because of this univer-sal unrighteousness inherent in the human race, the whole world is “held accountable to God” (3:19), with God’s law as the standard that holds everyone accountable (3:19; see also 7:12). This is why guilty sinners cannot “be justified in [God’s] sight” (3:20). The law sim-ply points out sin; it cannot grant anyone the righteousness that it requires. Had things ended there, we would be left merely with the dark news of universal condemnation. God’s holiness demands that He condemn sinners for their rebellion against His law.

But the story doesn’t end there: despite universal human sinfulness and unrighteousness, “the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law” (3:21), that is, in Jesus Christ Himself. No human being can be justified (declared righteous) through “works of the law” (3:20) because no one has kept the law; again, all are unrighteous (3:10). Everyone has fallen short of what God requires (3:23). Therefore, jus-tification (being declared righteous) must be received as a gift (3:24). Christ’s work on the cross (His “propitiation”) forms the basis of His redeeming work on our behalf (3:24– 25), and all of this is “received by faith” (3:25). God’s righteousness is clearly manifested in this reception of a righteous status (3:25) because Christ’s bearing our guilt (being our propitiatory sacrifice) is the precise way in which God is seen to be both “just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus” (3:26). In terms of the connection between the words justify and righteousness, this means that God’s being “just” equals His being “righteous,” and His being “justifier” equals His being the “one who declares a person righ-teous.” Because God is righteous, He must condemn the guilty and justify the righteous (Deut 25:1–2). Yet, God is not simply righteous; He is also the one who justifies the person who believes in Jesus (3:26), since Jesus has borne that person’s guilt in his or her place (3:24). When that happens, one is justified, one has been declared to be righteous, or morally and legally in the right in God’s sight.


If there was any doubt that a righteous status before God is something received and that faith is the means to receive it, Romans 9:30–10:13 should put that doubt to rest. In this section of Romans, Paul contrasts the Israelites, who because they were ignorant of “the righteousness of God,” sought “to establish their own” righteousness (10:3) with Gentiles who have in fact “attained” righteousness by faith (9:30). Using Wright’s definition of righteousness as “covenant membership,” we are left with an absurdity: Paul faults Israel (God’s covenant people) for seeking to be declared to be members of God’s covenant people (9:30; 10:3). Wright’s definition of “works of the law” merely as badges that show that a person is within Israel’s covenant is similarly wrongheaded: Israel’s failure to find salvation consists in Israel’s seeking to be found righteous through actively keeping the stipulations of the law (9:31), not in a restriction of the boundaries of the covenant community to Jews alone. Works of the law are actions commanded in the law (10:5). When one has done them, one is righ-teous; when one breaks them, one is unrighteous.

Using the biblical definition of righteousness (moral/legal upright-ness) we can see what is actually going on in Romans 9:30–10:13. Israelites, on the whole, believed that they could attain righteousness through law-keeping (9:30). They believed they could “establish their own righteousness” (10:3) in the sense of being declared to be morally and legally in the right with God via their own obedience. In attempt-ing this, they refused to “submit to God’s righteousness” (10:3). In other words, the “righteousness of God” is a righteousness that is valid in God’s sight and is received as a gift. “God’s righteousness” is received by faith (10:10) on the basis of Christ’s finished work on the cross: “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes” (10:4).

What exactly does Paul mean by calling Christ “the end of the law for righteousness”? This is a widely debated phrase, but thank-fully, Paul doesn’t leave us in the dark; he tells us what he means in 10:5–13. For Paul, there are two options when it comes to attaining to righteousness (to being justified). The first one is through faith-fully keeping the requirements of God’s law: “Moses writes about the righteousness that comes from the law that ‘the person who does them [that is, the requirements of the law] will live’” (my translation of 10:5). The phrase “the person who does them will live” is a quota-tion from Leviticus 18:5. Strictly speaking, Paul understands the Old

Review aRticles 235

Testament law as holding out the reward of a righteous status only to those who carry out its requirements perfectly. In light of human unrighteousness, of course, this is very bad news. But Paul doesn’t stop there. Romans 10:6–8 puts forward the second option for attain-ing to righteousness: “The righteousness by faith speaks this way: ‘Do not say in your heart “Who will go up into heaven?” That is to say: “Who will bring Christ down?” Or: “Who will go down into the abyss?” That is to say: “Who will bring Christ up from the dead?”’ Rather, what does it [the righteousness by faith] say? ‘The word is near you, in your mouth, and in your heart.’ That is: ‘the word of faith that we preach’” (my translation). What is the content of this “word of faith?” Paul tells us in 10:9–10: “If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved. For one believes in the heart, which leads to righteousness, and one confesses with the mouth, which leads to salvation” (my translation). In other words: faith is the only path that leads to a righteousness that is acceptable before God.

To conclude this section, it is worth mentioning two issues on which Wright has been heavily criticized in the past by traditional Protestants. First, for Wright, justification has both a present and future dimension, although the language Wright uses to describe the relation between present and future justification varies. Quoting Romans 8:4, Wright can say that “the future verdict” of justification “will be in accordance with the…‘just requirement of the Law’” (939). Wright has been perceived by many in the past to be speak-ing of two justifications, with final justification at the final judgment being unsure until that day, since it is based at least partially on one’s own Spirit-wrought faithfulness (cf. p. 121 of Wright’s book Paul in Fresh Perspective, where he says that “the final justification of God’s people” will be “on the basis of their whole life”). It may be possible that Wright has clarified his view slightly in PFG as seen in this quote: “all those over whom [the declaration of justification] is made are per-manently ‘in the right.’ The status of dikaiosyne [righteousness] is not temporary. It truly anticipates the verdict which will be issued on the final day” (948, emphasis original). There is a big difference in saying that the verdict at the final judgment will be “in accordance with works” and saying it will be “on the basis of works.” The former statement simply indicates that all true believers will have good works to show as evidence that they were truly justified to begin with, whereas the


latter statement indicates that the works themselves are at least part of the reason God pronounces sentence in favor of believers.

While this may signal a slight shift on Wright’s part, it must be remembered that he defines justification as a declaration that one is truly in the covenant community, rather than a declaration that one is morally and legally in the right in God’s sight. Thus, even Wright’s apparent concession about the certainty of a believer’s “future justifi-cation” does not alter Wright’s erroneous conclusion that justification is a declaration that one is in the covenant community (a “relational” understanding). As we saw above, this definition of justification completely bypasses the meaning of biblical righteousness and justifi-cation language, which is centered instead on doing what is right and on forgiveness for not doing what is right. It should also be noted that Wright does still speak of future justification as being “on the basis of the totality of the life led” (1,028). He also is comfortable stating that “the criterion for [the] future judgment is ‘doing the law’” (1,088), citing Romans 2:13–14 in support.

The second point on which traditional Protestants will demur from Wright’s understanding of justification has to do with the doc-trine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness. In Wright’s scheme “[t]o say that…‘righteousness’ is somehow accounted to, or accredited to, the vindicated defendant makes no sense” (947). Since he defines righteousness as being rightly related to another person, this righteous-ness is not something that can be passed on to another person. You are either the judge who has ruled rightly or you are the vindicated defen-dant who has the status of righteousness because the declaration “you are righteous” has been pronounced in your favor (947).

Wright does not believe this kind of righteousness is something that can be passed on to another person. Although he is correct, this is not what the traditional Protestant doctrine of imputation claims. The doctrine of imputation simply states that the basis for the declara-tion that a sinner is righteous in God’s sight must be found outside of the personal righteousness of that person. Since all are sinners (Rom. 3:23) and no one is righteous (3:10), condemnation is what awaits all people. But because Jesus Christ has been perfectly faithful to His Father, and has died for the sins of His people, He has opened the way for guilty sinners to receive grace and forgiveness from God. Imputation is the means through which that grace comes: Christ is righteous, we are not; His righteousness is counted in place of our

Review aRticles 237

own unrighteousness. The doctrine of imputation is a whole-Bible synthesis that unpacks these glorious truths.17

Nullifications and MischaracterizationsSome final criticisms are necessary. A recurring flaw in Wright’s book is the way in which he seemingly affirms certain truths, but in reality nullifies the force of those truths with his main arguments. For exam-ple, Wright would disagree with the charge that he is unconcerned with matters of individual salvation in Paul’s letters. Nonetheless, his account of Paul’s theology relegates questions of personal sin and transgression, personal forgiveness, etc., to the side, essentially nullifying their significance. As merely one example, consider the fol-lowing. For Wright, Paul’s view of salvation

is not simply a matter of humans being made for ‘fellowship with God,’ this being spoilt by ‘sin,’ and the ‘rescue operation’ being seen in terms of ‘restoring the broken fellowship’ (a scheme of thought which then grabs Paul’s language about ‘reconciliation’ and ‘righteousness’ and assumes that both are talking about this ‘relationship,’ confusing both categories with one another and with this larger one)…. Rather…[God’s] plan of rescue backed up by his promise, restore[s] humans to their dignity, their ‘glory,’ their place in glad, free obedience to himself and in wise, stewardly authority over the world (493).

Wright says that Paul’s view of salvation is “not simply” about individuals finding a restored relationship with God, leading us to expect that it is at least partly about that. How it is partly about this, however, is never explained, and in fact when Wright begins to talk about what is actually accomplished by reconciliation, justification, etc., he does not explain how the restoration of individuals to a right moral and legal status before God, or a restored relationship with God, is included within Paul’s understanding of salvation. Wright’s “not simply” comes across as a rhetorical ploy to deflect potential criticisms of his position since he can always claim that he has not completely denied the idea he is disparaging.

17. I have attempted to show the problems with Wright’s critique (and that of other scholars) of the Protestant doctrine of imputation in Ben C. Dunson, “Do Bible Words Have Bible Meaning: Distinguishing Between Imputation as Word and Doctrine,” Westminster Theological Journal 75, no. 2 (2013): 239–60.


A second point of criticism along these lines is that there are mischaracterizations of “traditional” views in Wright’s book. Again, one example should be sufficient (though many more can be found): “The distinction between ‘faith’ in the Reformers’ sense and ‘theol-ogy’ or ‘doctrine’ has by no means always been clear, producing as we saw the problem whereby ‘ justification by faith’ has come to mean ‘ justification by believing in the proper doctrine of justification,’ a position which, in attempting to swallow its own tail, produces a cer-tain type of theological and perhaps cultural indigestion” (42). When Wright makes assertions like this, he never offers sources. No Protes-tant theologian or biblical scholar says that justification by faith means “justification by believing in the proper doctrine of justification.” It makes for a nice foil to Wright’s argument though, and this appears to be the sole reason he inserts so many of these mischaracterizations into his text. If Wright is simply coming across misguided ideas like this from his own personal experience talking to misguided laypeo-ple, he should say so. As it stands, he clearly portrays this as a problem endemic to the theology of the Reformation.

One false characterization that plays a fairly large role in PFG is the notion that “it is massively misleading to bring to the texts the question ‘What must I do to inherit eternal life?’ in the sense that almost all modern western persons would understand” (163). In place of this question (and its equally problematic answer) Wright proposes, as we saw above, that redemption is cosmic in scope, that the entirety of the created order will one day be redeemed (which is the focus of ch. 11 in PFG).

There is not much controversial in Wright’s claim that in the majority of Second Temple Jewish texts “the aim and goal [of redemption] does not have to do with the abolition of the universe of space, time and matter, or the escape of humans from such a wreck-age, but with its consummation” (163). While Paul could conceivably have differed from his non-Christian Jewish contemporaries on this point and argued for a purely disembodied, “heavenly” eternity, texts such as Romans 8:18–25 show us that this is not the case. Redemp-tion will indeed one day include the entire created order, which will be transformed along with the resurrected bodies of believers at Christ’s return.18

18. Wright’s discussion of the present creation, the new creation, and how they

Review aRticles 239

Consider another quote: “If…we insist on projecting on to the text the questions of individual salvation, in a classic western heaven-or-hell scheme, trying to discern where they fit in terms of the ‘qualifications’ people might have for the one or the other, and how (either through God’s grace or human merit or some combination of the two) some might attain such a salvation, we will simply miss the entire story within which” Paul and his fellow Jews were living (164). By speaking in this way, Wright sets up a false dichotomy: either sal-vation is about individuals seeking salvation, or salvation is about the redemption of all of creation.

Wright’s polemics notwithstanding, when speaking of the pres-ent age, the consistent focus in the New Testament is quite clearly on individuals and the spiritual transformation that takes place within believing individuals. If this is “pietistic” or “Platonic” or “Western individualist,” so be it. The creational side of redemption awaits the age to come. Paul makes this point in numerous places, but perhaps nowhere more clearly than in 2 Corinthians 4–5. Focusing in par-ticular on the body, Paul says that “our outer self is wasting away” in this age, even as “the inward man is renewed day by day” (2 Cor. 4:16). It is for this reason that we must “look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. 4:18). Living in this way, with this set of priorities, is what it means to “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7). Living in this way is what it means—in the present age at least—to participate in the “new creation” of God (2 Cor. 5:17). Yes; as per Romans 8:18–25, Paul does believe that the entire created realm will be renewed, but timing is everything: only in the age to come will creation be released from its sin-induced slavery to corruption and decay (8:21).

Furthermore, two representative texts in Romans can be adduced to prove just how important “questions of individual salvation” are for Paul. In both Romans 2:6–13 and Romans 14:10–12, Paul makes it clear that the final judgment will be a matter of individuals’ stand-ing alone before God to give an account of their lives. In Romans 2:6, Paul says that God “will render to each [individual] according to his works.” In Romans 14:12, he says that “each of us will give an

are related is found on pp. 1,043–1,265, where he expounds on Paul’s view of “rede-fined eschatology.”


account of himself to God.” In both instances, the focus is clearly on the salvation of the individual. Perversions of the “classic western heaven-or-hell scheme” are certainly not faithful to classical Judaism or to Paul, but such perversions are hardly the most robust dialogue partners for Wright. Pitting “cosmic salvation” against “individual sal-vation” (even if only to gain polemical traction for his proposals) pulls apart what the New Testament sees as integrally connected.

ConclusionN. T. Wright has ambitiously set out to answer numerous modern scholarly puzzles related to Paul’s theology. Despite his obvious eru-dition, and despite his many beneficial insights into Paul’s thought, Wright has fallen into intractable problems that can be traced back largely to a single source, his incorrect definition of the biblical word righteousness. Because Wright’s distinctive understanding of this word wrongly places it outside the realm of moral uprightness, his entire understanding of salvation becomes problematic as well. The fun-damental “salvation question” shifts from “How can guilty sinners find forgiveness before a holy God?” to “How can Jews and Gen-tiles be members of God’s covenant community on the same terms?” The second question, while not unimportant, flows out of the answer given to the first question. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians shows us how these two questions are related in Paul’s presentation of the gospel, and thus serves as a fitting conclusion to this article. All of mankind is born in sin and therefore subject to God’s wrath (Eph. 2:1–3), but because of God’s great mercy, sinners are extended grace and forgive-ness in Jesus Christ (Eph. 2:4–10). The reconciliation of guilty sinners with a holy God through Christ alone also means that Gentiles enter into God’s people on the same terms as Jews (Eph. 2:11–22). While this is an important ramification of the gospel, it is not its core.

—Ben C. Dunson

Book Reviewsq


Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain. Reformed Catholicity: The Promise of Retrieval for Theology and Biblical Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2015. 168pp. Paperback.

Catholicity is as important as it is often misunderstood. In search of a deeper connection to historic Christianity, some study Roman Catholicism only to become Roman Catholic. Others study Eastern Orthodoxy and adopt that system of thought, in whole or in part. The great strength of post-Reformation Reformed theology is that it provides an example of how to glean from the entire catholic tra-dition of the church without adopting alternate theological systems. In Reformed Catholicity, Allen and Swain make a persuasive case why we need to learn to do the same thing today. They argue for build-ing a distinctively Reformed theology, in conversation with the entire Catholic tradition of the church, under the authority of Scripture, in the church and for the church. This is precisely the kind of theologi-cal maturity that Reformed churches so desperately need today.

Reformed Catholicity points the church in the right direction with regard to doing systematic theology. It stresses the meaning and appli-cation of the Reformed principle of sola scriptura in conjunction with confessional theology when formulating Reformed theology. The authors rightly note the importance of scriptural texts such as Ephe-sians 4:11 for establishing the necessity of teaching as an instrument by which Christ, through the Spirit, teaches the church and builds believers up to maturity. They make a biblical case for the special role of historic creeds and confessions in this process, followed by an outstanding concluding chapter “In Defense of Proof-Texting.” This section shows the nuanced exegesis that ought to stand behind proper

PRJ 8, 2 (2016): 243–258

Book Reviews

q


proof-texting in theology. The only weakness to this treatment is the absence of discussing theological inferences and their proper use in light of scriptural examples.

One thing that should be added is that recovering Reformed catholicity highlights the necessity of Latin for Reformed theologians. English-speaking theologians draw predominantly from British and American texts, effectively cutting themselves off from the conti-nental Reformed tradition. This is unfortunate since most Reformed systematic theology in continental Reformed orthodoxy was written in Latin.

In spite of the many virtues of this work, the book highlights as well that Reformed catholicity is easier to formulate than to practice. For example, appealing explicitly to the churchly context of theology would strengthen their treatment of “proof-texting.” They suggest that in order to keep theology biblically grounded, systematic theologians should engage in writing theological commentaries or articles on parts of Scripture. While this counsel is valid, if theology is truly a churchly activity, then what better place for systematicians to ground their the-ology in Scripture than ministering what they learn in the context of the church from the pulpit? Preaching naturally gravitates towards exegetical and biblical theology. However, systematic theology, if used properly, has the potential to make preaching more precise, edify-ing, personal, and practical. It is possible for professors to stress the churchly context of theology without giving a churchly solution to contemporary problems. In the past, the best ministers were the best professors. Laboring prayerfully in the study in the context of min-istering to God’s people in the local church has greater potential to produce sound and useful systematic theology than writing theologi-cal commentaries, though both are important. It is telling that older forms of church order, such as the Scottish Second Book of Discipline, charged the doctors of the church with teaching in theological schools and with catechizing the youth. This is how it should be.

The generally excellent appendix by Todd Billings takes a tragic turn when he appeals to City Church in San Francisco as an example of what it means to be catholic-Reformed. He calls this congregation, “a distinctively Reformed church that seeks to draw upon the larger catholic tradition of theology and practice, for the sake of its mission and witness in the world. The felt needs of the culture do not drive its agenda” (157). Having recently moved from the San Francisco Bay

Book Reviews 245

area, this reviewer finds this assessment puzzling, if not shocking, since City Church declared itself independent from an established Reformed denomination in order to ordain women elders, rejected ministerial vows to uphold historic Reformed creeds, and now accepts practicing homosexuals into their membership. It is hard to conceive how City Church embodies either catholic or Reformed theology and practice.

Reformed churches today desperately need to recover the theo-logical maturity exemplified by their forefathers. This entails critical and appreciative engagement with the entire catholic tradition of the church, with the conviction that Christ has spoken and continues to speak to and through His bride. However, there is a fine line across the spectrum trying to repristinate the seventeenth-century, appropriat-ing and adapting historic Reformed theology to a new generation, and transforming the content of that theology into something entirely new. The authors of Reformed Catholicity aim at the second option, but the appendix by Billings appears to drift into the third one. Yet in an age in which there are almost as many methods as there are systematic theologians, Allen and Swain provide much sage wisdom for students, professors, and scholars. In particular, this reviewer hopes and prays that Reformed pastors would develop a healthy Reformed catholicity that will prevent believers from being tossed about by every wind of doctrine, but instead be built up into unity and maturity in the Lord and with His church in all ages. —Ryan M. McGraw

q

Ronald S. Baines, Richard C. Barcellos, et. al., eds. Confessing the Impassible God: The Biblical, Classical, & Confessional Doctrine of Divine Impassibility. Palmdale, Calif.: Reformed Baptist Academic Press, 2015.

Confessing the Impassible God has its genesis in a contemporary theo-logical discussion among Reformed Baptists in America. However, the issue at hand is much bigger than an intramural Baptist debate. The authors write in the immediate context of subscription to the 1689 Baptist Confession to explain and defend the statement in Chapter 2:1 that God is “a most pure spirit, invisible, without body, parts or passions…,” but this doctrine is not the sole preserve of con-fessional Baptists. The same statement is found in the Westminster


Confession, the Savoy Declaration, the Irish Articles of 1615, and the 39 Articles of the Church of England. Nor is it a peculiarly Protestant or Reformed dogma; it has been the catholic confession of the church in her theological tradition since Patristic times, and had near univer-sal acceptance until the middle of the nineteenth century. Since then, modifications of the doctrine have become increasingly popular to the point where total or partial rejection of divine impassibility is now the new norm.

Process theologians, influenced by Hegelian philosophy and bio-logical evolution, proposed a God who is not only changed by the world but, in a sense, constituted by it as the whole history of the world becomes part of the changing experience of God. Open Theists later struggled to see how the transcendent God of classical theism could properly relate to the world. Their solution was to stress God’s imma-nence while surrendering, among other things, His sovereignty and immutability. Evangelicals (e.g., Bruce Ware and Rob Lister) mounted a response, yet, in the process, the classical doctrine has not remained intact. Whereas classical theism saw impassibility as God’s inability to suffer or experience emotional experiences of state whether enacted freely from within or effected by His relation to creation, the new doctrine sees impassibility as God’s inability to undergo emotional change from without but reserves for God a sovereignty over His own emotional life so as to effect change on Himself from within. Confessing the Impassible God predominantly engages those within the evangelical and Reformed tradition who have recast the doctrine of classical theism in this and other ways. The writings of a number of respected evangelical and Reformed authors are critiqued (e.g., Rob Lister,1 K. Scott Oliphint,2 Don Carson,3 and Donald Macleod4).

The book is a collaboration of nine authors, collectively edited by five of them, and helpfully introduced by a foreword from Paul Helm. The contributions vary in length, style, and quality ranging

1. Rob Lister, God is Impassible and Impassioned: Toward a Theology of Divine Emo-tion (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2013).

2. K. Scott Oliphint, God With Us: Divine Condescension and the Attributes of God (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2012).

3. D. A. Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God (Wheaton, Ill.: Cross-way, 2000).

4. Donald Macleod, Christ Crucified: Understanding the Atonement (Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Aademic, 2014).

Book Reviews 247

from good to excellent; none are poor. There is also a degree of help-ful repetition between the various chapters which helps to reinforce the book’s main points. The aim of the work is well stated. The authors propose “nothing new, neither methodologically nor theo-logically,” and they remain true to their claim throughout, or, as one endorsement puts it, they “present the old view of divine impassibil-ity, using old arguments, against new critics.” The strength of the argument they present is, to a large extent, to be found in the theo-logical method they espouse, which is itself reflected in the structure of the book. The authors are convinced that precise theology requires proper scriptural exegesis which in turn demands a sound hermeneu-tical model faithful to Scripture.

After an introduction to the importance of the doctrine, Part 1 presents a theological and hermeneutical prolegomena, with vital principles for scriptural interpretation and theological definition—the analogy of Scripture and the analogy of faith. Each deviation from the classical doctrine is guilty to a greater or lesser degree of treating scriptural statements concerning God univocally without a proper sensitivity to its analogical predication. In this section, Charles Ren-nie excels with precision and simplicity in introducing the issue of analogy and its relation to the ways Scripture speaks about God and how we are to understand Him.

Part 2 begins to lay biblical foundations. Working from the Old Testament into the New, texts that reveal the nature of God, His immutability and thus impassibility are surveyed. Other texts that speak of God in the language of human emotion and change are examined in the light of texts that declare who God is. The exegesis of some of the passages is stronger than others, and in a few instances the authors may leave themselves open to the charge of an overly theological or philosophical interpretation of a text. However, the cumulative weight of the argument presented from the biblical data in this section is compelling in support of impassibility.

Part 3 is a historical theological survey of divine impassibility from the Patristic to the modern era. Any attempt at this needs to be selective and any reader must bear in mind what the author is aiming to do. That said, there is very little interaction with Patristic authors in this section while medieval and scholastic theologians—for instance, Thomas Aquinas—are not mentioned at all. The sample of Reforma-tion and Post-Reformation authors is also admittedly small, though


representative, but readers are directed to Samuel Renihan’s work God Without Passions, a Reader5 as a helpful companion to this brief histori-cal survey. Moving into the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and beyond, we see where the modifications started to occur. At Princeton, Charles Hodge and later B. B Warfield introduced new perspectives on the doctrine of God. The modifications of more recent authors such as Robert Reymond, Bruce Ware, Rob Lister, John Frame, and K. Scott Oliphint are also introduced.

Parts 4 and 5 deal with systematic and confessional theology, respectively. Here the importance of divine impassibility is asserted and demonstrated in its connection to the family of attributes related to God’s transcendence—attributes which stand or fall with it: immutability, eternity, infinity, aseity, and simplicity. The views of Lister and Oliphint in particular are responded to in this section, and misunderstandings of impassibility are corrected as the nature of divine “affections” are considered. Just as immutability is not immo-bility, so impassibility is not impassivity or inertia. Rennie focuses in particular on God’s love, which is properly an immutable perfection in God not a changeable affection as in us. The exposition of the doc-trine of God’s love here provides a basis for the pastoral reflection and application later in the book. An essential section on impassibility and Christology sets the doctrine in the context of Chalcedonian defini-tion of the Person of Christ and the Communicatio Idiomatum: The impassible God suffers in Christ, according to His human nature, for the sins of the world.

Parts 6 and 7 bring out some pastoral implications of the divine impassibility and draw conclusions on the doctrine in a series of affir-mations and denials which are not only a wonderful summary of theology but could serve as a manual to devotion and doxology. Two book reviews are included as appendices: Charles Rennie’s review of K. Scott Oliphint’s God with Us and James Dolezal’s review of Rob Lister’s God is Impassible and Impassioned.

Confessing the Impassible God is an excellent and necessary con-tribution to contemporary theological literature and discussion on the doctrine of God. It does what it sets out to do by ably explain-ing and defending the doctrine of divine impassibility in its biblical,

5. Samuel Renihan, God Without Passions: A Reader (Palmdale, Calif: Reformed Baptist Academic Press, 2015).

Book Reviews 249

historical and confessional context. The church at large is in debt to the contributors and editors for undertaking this work, but one fears many will fail to appreciate its significance. In the modern climate, there is a sad tendency to see discussion of this issue as an elaborate exercise in splitting theological hairs. It is not that. Theologians from the Patristic to the Post-Reformation era knew this. Furthermore, contemporary opponents of impassibility such as Nicholas Wolters-torff know this: “Once you pull on the thread of impassibility, a lot of other threads come along with it. Aseity, for example…. one also has to give up immutability and eternity. If God really responds, God is not metaphysically immutable and, if not metaphysically immu-table, not eternal.”6 The authors of Confessing the Impassible God agree on this point, and readers should come away convinced that while one may reject the doctrine of divine impassibility, one cannot do so while claiming to hold to the classical doctrine of Christian theism, or strictly to those confessions that assert God is “without body, parts, or passions.” This book deserves to become a standard text in seminary libraries and pastors’ bookshelves in years to come. —Gavin Beers

q

John D. Currid. Against the Gods: The Polemical Theology of the Old Tes-tament. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2013. 160 pp. Paperback.

John D. Currid is the Carl McMurray Professor of Old Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary in Charlotte, as well as a Pres-byterian minister. Currid’s Against the Gods provides a popular-level introduction for comparing religious texts from the ancient Near East (ANE) and the Hebrew Old Testament (OT). Currid’s central thesis is that the Old Testament does not demonstrate a naïve liter-ary dependence upon parallel ANE literature. Rather, it exercises a vibrant polemical theology meant to exalt the superiority of Yahweh, the God of the Bible, and the religion of the people of Israel over the false gods and false religions of the surrounding nations.

6. N. P. Wolterstorff, “Does God Suffer?” Modern Reformation 8, no. 5 (1999): 47. Cited in Clark H. Pinnock, Most Moved Mover: A Theology of God’s Openness (Exeter: Paternoster, 2001), 75–78.


Against the Gods begins with two introductory chapters that pro-vide a brief history of ancient Near Eastern Studies (chapter 1) and an introduction to what Currid calls “polemical theology” (chapter 2). The remaining chapters present an analysis of various parallels between Old Testament and ANE literature; each chapter argues for an inter-pretation along the lines of polemical theology. The parallels in these chapters are as follows: Genesis 1 and ANE Creation Accounts like the Enuma Elish (Chapter 3); Genesis 6–9 and ANE Flood Accounts like the Sumerian Flood Story and the Epic of Gilgamesh (Chapter 4); Genesis 39 and the Egyptian “Tale of Two Brothers” (Chapter 5); the birth of Moses and the Sumero-Akkadian Legend of Sargon (Chapter 6); the flight of Moses and the Egyptian “Story of Sinuhe” (Chapter 7); the revelation of the divine name in Exodus 3 and the Egyptian “Book of the Heavenly Cow”7 (Chapter 8); the rod of Moses in the Exodus narrative and its background in Egyptian culture (Chapter 9); the part-ing of the Red Sea and the Egyptian Westcar Papyrus (“King Cheops and the Magician”) (Chapter 10); and finally the Old Testament and various Canaanite motifs (Chapter 11).

The opening chapter provides a helpful historical overview of the study of ANE literature and its relationship to the study of the Old Testament. Research in the field began with the first archeological discoveries of ANE materials (1788–1872). This led to a “period of suspicion” (1873–1905), which resulted in many modern historical-critical scholars assuming that the Hebrew texts were dependent on the earlier pagan texts. The “New Horizons” period (1906–1940) was spawned by the ongoing discoveries at places like Nuzi and Mari and the expansion of the field of ANE studies apart from its relationship to biblical texts. Currid describes the present age as one of “synthesis” (1945–present) in which “modern scholarship commonly views bibli-cal history as invention and propaganda” (22). He ends this chapter by suggesting that some evangelical OT scholars (e.g., Peter Enns and John Walton) have gone too far when they “emphasize the similari-ties and parallels between ancient Near Eastern literature and biblical writings,” but “they do not recognize, to any degree, the foundational differences between the two” (23). Thus, Currid is attempting to

7. Currid argues for this parallel as a kind of polemics in reverse, with the Egyptians mimicking the Hebrew “deification formula ‘I am that I am.’ By doing so the Egyptians were attempting to vanquish and mock the Hebrew God” (109).

Book Reviews 251

offer a corrective to those who emphasize synthesis between the Old Testament and ANE literature, rather than distinction and contrast.

Currid’s alternative to the synthesis thesis is the aforementioned “polemical theology” as outlined in chapter 2 (25–32). He offers this initial definition:

Polemical theology is the use by biblical writers of the thought forms and stories that were common in ancient Near Eastern culture, while filling them with radically new meaning. The Biblical authors take well-known expressions and motifs from the ancient Near Eastern milieu and apply them to the person and work of Yahweh and not to other gods of the ancient world. Polemical theology rejects any encroachment of false gods into orthodox belief; there is an absolute intolerance of polytheism. Polemical theology is monotheistic to the very core (25).

According to Currid, the OT writers did not merely borrow from the pagan myths and sanitize them by removing mention of the gods and substituting Yahweh, but they often intentionally drew upon these myths in order to repudiate them and to declare the superior-ity of Yahweh. In his opening discussion of the creation account in Genesis 1, for example, Currid concludes by noting that it stands in stark contrast to “dark mythological polytheism” (46). This refrain is essentially repeated throughout the succeeding examples of the fol-lowing chapters. In fact, one criticism of Currid’s analysis is that it is fairly repetitive. The argument becomes redundant. One reviewer suggested that the book reads like a good article that has been some-what forcibly expanded into a book.

Despite this repetition, in the end I believe that Currid’s book fills an important void. It provides students and pastors with a non-technical, popular-level introduction to the study of various ANE parallels with biblical literature, which some modern historical- critical scholars have used to downgrade the unique nature and authority of the Old Testament Scriptures. In the book’s conclusion, the author concedes that polemical theology “does not answer every question about the relationship of the Old Testament to ancient Near Eastern literature and life” (141). Yet he also adds:

At times, however, polemical theology can serve as a solid and reliable interpretive lens by which one can properly see the sig-nificance of a parallel. In addition, and of utmost importance,


is the truth that the biblical writers often employed polemical theology as an instrument to underscore the uniqueness of the Hebrew worldview in contrast to other ancient Near Eastern conceptions of the universe and how it operates. In this day and age, when a considerable number of scholars seek to diminish the originality and uniqueness of the Old Testament, this is no small thing (141).

Indeed, Currid’s thesis is a needed corrective to those—including some evangelical scholars—who have too readily adapted a “synthe-sis” framework. Perhaps the most important lingering question which remains is whether or not conservative evangelicals can make any use of mainstream historical-critical methodology (whether ANE stud-ies, source criticism, form criticism, literary criticism, etc.) and not be tainted by it in the end. —Jeffrey T. Riddle

q

Karl Giberson. Saving the Original Sinner: How Christians Have Used the Bible’s First Man to Oppress, Inspire, and Make Sense of the World. Boston: Beacon Press, 2015. 240pp. Paperback.

There is a long history of the rise and demise of scholars. Gifted, bright, and erudite, but gradually chafing at the constraints of divine revelation and ecclesial confession—some intellectual stars begin to wander. From Pelagius to Charles Augustus Briggs and beyond, they rise from within orthodoxy, only to exit its margins.

Karl Giberson’s Saving the Original Sinner is a classic example of controversial writing by a departing academic. Described as a “for-mer evangelical,” Giberson taught for twenty-seven years at Eastern Nazarene College before moving (under pressure) to teach science and religion at Stonehill College.

Giberson’s prologue casts academics who challenge the existence of a historical Adam as victims. Citing Galileo and Isaac La Peyrere’s sufferings at the hands of “heresy hunters,” he reminisces:

In midwinter 2011 as I started on this book, another scholar, this time an American Calvinist named John Schneider, was sum-moned by heresy hunters and interrogated for the same beliefs

Book Reviews 253

that had threatened La Peyrere. The heresy was the status of the biblical Adam (ix).

The introduction is at times poignant. Reflecting on a visit to the Cre-ation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, Giberson recounts seeing “wholesome, loving Christian families like mine had been,” wonder-ing whether “these young people would have faith crises in college, as I did?” (2). He muses that faith in a heaven, “is a flickering mes-sage of hope to me, holding out the possibility that I may once again see my mother, who remains daily in my thoughts despite having passed away years ago” (4). These reflections are a healthy reminder that those who disagree with us also suffer. Controversy ought not dim our compassion.

Caricaturing TruthWhile Giberson includes a personal narrative of his academic suffer-ing, he also provides a scathing, sustained criticism of creationism, biblical inerrancy, belief in a historic Adam and Eve, the doctrine of the fall, and original sin. Particularly anathema to Giberson is the idea that presuppositions drive the reading of evidence in origins, so that “if you start by rejecting God’s infallible wisdom in the Bible and instead put your faith in fallible human reason, you end up with evolution, the big bang, despair, moral relativism, and eternity in hell” (5). Giberson’s gloves are off: “the oft-repeated claim about starting assumptions is both wrong and offensive. It’s a cheap debating trick. Like most Christians who no longer believe in Adam and Eve, I did not come to that belief by rejecting the Bible and then forcing what-ever changes followed from that as though being anti-Bible was a reliable way to generate falsehoods. I came to it by trying to reconcile science with that Bible” (6).

Giberson’s claims here are caricatures: few evangelicals believe that individuals commonly experience a sudden, wholesale exchange of foundational intellectual commitments, and then crisply set about reassessing reality. Even in sanctification and its implications for understanding, changes often take place over a lifetime. The same is true in declension. Nonetheless, even slow shifts in basic commit-ments have profound implications for our understanding of reality. Giberson’s own narrative arguably presents such a story of change in both foundational beliefs and understanding of “the evidence.” His


“faith crisis” as a college student was integral to his pursuit of recon-ciling science and Scripture, from which he moved to a rejection of divine inspiration, infallibility, and inerrancy.

Departing from the FaithGiberson’s irritation with the concept of basic beliefs and their implications connects with a crucial aspect missing from his book. While complaining of evangelical “heresy hunts,” he fails to provide any understanding of the place of confessional statements in institu-tional life.

The fact is that some—perhaps all—of the individuals whom Giberson casts as victims, challenged and contradicted commitments to which they had subscribed at their hiring. This does not mean in every case they were entirely to blame—some schools quietly allowed wider latitudes than their stated creeds, which in the end is fair to no one. But Giberson’s complaint is wider: he contends that it is oppressive to college professors, women, and gay marriage, to pursue commitment to Scripture as God’s Word.

A Narrative of SkepticismMuch of the remainder of the book’s substance is Giberson’s story of a range of criticisms of the Scriptures and historic Christian orthodoxy on human origins, the fall, and sin. God is described as giving arbi-trary commands: the “mysterious talking serpent made sure Eve had a chance to think about the odd prohibition” (17). Giberson exhibits a Marcion-like distaste for the God of the Old Testament, obscur-ing the redemption narrative: “[God] is enraged…[and] grants no immortality option to the first humans…children become the only hope that one will not have lived in vain” (19). The gospel promise of Genesis 3:15 is ignored. In the flood account, Noah “is apparently satisfied that he and his family will survive…makes no effort to miti-gate God’s wrath…or sneak any of his friends and neighbors aboard the ark.” He ignores God’s patience with mankind and Noah’s role as a preacher of Christ (1 Peter 3:19), later echoing as “plausible” Rich-ard Dawkins’s claim that God is a “vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser” (24).

Turning to the New Testament, Giberson describes Jesus’ mes-sage as “exclusively for the lost sheep of Israel and not for the despised Gentiles,” revealing an ignorance of the gospels (eg. John 4; Matt. 8)

Book Reviews 255

(39). Jesus appears as a mere man, with “ambiguous” teaching charac-terized by “vagueness” (38–39). Paul becomes a theological innovator who develops the idea that God loves and redeems all of human-ity, partly because he “felt free to use the Adam story in any way he wanted” (39). Not only is there no Adam for Giberson: there is also no Emmanuel.

Beyond the canon, Giberson continues his history of thought on origins. Some is debatable, too much is caricatured, and plagued by poor historiography, relying heavily on secondary sources. Even fol-lowing Giberson’s premises, there is significantly better scholarship in the field.8

Wandering StarsSaving the Original Sinner mingles characteristics of works ranging from Abelard’s Historia Calamitatum to those of Bart Ehrman and Richard Dawkins. While the scriptural terms “heresy” and “blas-phemy” are rarely used in present-day evangelicalism, Giberson has moved into the realm where these sober descriptors find warrant: these people blaspheme all that they do not understand… “[they are] wandering stars” (Jude 10–13). I pray he comes back.

This article is reprinted with permission from The Gospel Coalition Book Reviews, first published on February 12, 2016 https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article /book-reviews-saving-the-original-sinner —William VanDoodewaard

q

Daniël Timmerman. Heinrich Bullinger on Prophecy and the Prophetic Office (1523–1538). Vol. 33. Reformed Historical Theology. Gottin-gen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2015. 329pp.

In Reformed theology, the prophetic office in Scripture became asso-ciated with the ministry of the Word from the pulpit. While most Reformed thinkers did not believe that the prophetic office was still in force, many believed that ministers of the gospel fulfilled a prophetic function. Daniël Timmerman traces the theme of the prophetic office and function throughout the early writings of Heinrich Bullinger.

8. Cf. David Livingstone, Adam’s Ancestors: race, religion, and the politics of human origins (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2008).


This study highlights an important aspect of Reformed thought in one of its most prominent second-generation proponents.

Timmerman’s study is well researched and clear. He traces the concept of prophecy in Bullinger by examining his exposition of Scripture from the original languages in the context of Bullinger’s early defense of Zwingli (chapter 2), Bullinger’s participation in the Zurich practice of daily Prophezei meetings (chapters 3 and 7), and his three major treatises on prophecy and the ministerial office from this time period (chapters 4–6). Timmerman demonstrates that Bullinger shifted slightly in this period from appealing to the prophetic office as the pattern for ministers to the teaching and intercessory func-tion of the Levites as their primary model. This helps unfold some of the developments within Reformed ecclesiology. The primary value of this book is that it highlights the significance of the ministry of the Word in Reformed churches, especially in sixteenth-century Zurich. Both Zwingli and Bullinger held daily meetings in which one minister read an Old Testament text in Hebrew, another read it in the Septuagint, another read it in Latin, and another preached a sermon on the passage. Regardless of whether the prophets or Levites provided the primary foundation for the New Testament ministe-rial office, Reformed thinkers such as Bullinger clearly developed an ecclesiology that supported the primacy of Scripture in the life and ministry of the church.

The primary deficiency of this work is that the author does not adequately establish the historical importance of his subject. It is one thing to argue one’s case thoroughly and effectively, but it is another thing to show why one should do so. Timmerman’s study broadens the reader’s understanding of the Swiss reformation to some extent, as well as shows Bullinger’s interest in English religious develop-ments under Henry VIII. However, it would be more helpful to trace the consequences of this material for Reformed ecclesiology resulting from Bullinger’s shift in emphasis from the prophetic to the Levitical office. Historical theologians need to aim at more than simply filling in gaps in scholarship. Part of their burden is to show why these gaps should be filled. Timmerman’s findings are potentially significant, but readers are largely left to discover why for themselves.

Reformed theology has always been a Word-centered theology. This feature permeates every part of theology, including the doctrine of the church and her officers. For these reasons it is important to

Book Reviews 257

understand how pivotal Reformed thinkers, such as Bullinger, devel-oped their understanding of these offices. Small shifts in emphasis can have far-reaching consequences. Some readers will gain seed thoughts in this volume that will help them ask and answer further questions. In this regard, Timmerman’s research has great potential to help us understand the ministry of the Word and church officers in Reformed theology. —Ryan M. McGraw


Andrew S. Ballitch is associate pastor at Hunsinger Lane Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky.

Joel R. Beeke is president and professor of Systematic Theology and Homiletics at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, and a pastor of the Heritage Reformed Congregation of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

David J. Bissett is the pastor of Clifton Park Community Church, a Reformed Baptist congregation in upstate New York.

William Boekestein is a pastor of Immanuel Fellowship Church in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Zachary Groff is a candidate for the ministry under the care of the Philadelphia Metro West Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church in America, and an MDiv student at Greenville Presbyterian Theologi-cal Seminary.

Ryan M. McGraw is professor of theology at Greeenville Presbyte-rian Theological Seminary, Greenville, South Carolina.

Stephen G. Myers is a newly appointed associate professor for Puri-tan Reformed Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, and is presently completing his ministry as pastor of Pressly Memorial Associate Re-formed Presbyterian Church in Statesville, North Carolina.

Ryan L. Rippee is a pastor at Calvary Community Church in Brentwood, California, a professor at The Cornerstone Seminary

Contributorsq


in Vallejo, California, and a PhD student in Biblical Spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Thiago Machado Silva just completed his ThM at Calvin Semi-nary in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is presently an ordained pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Brazil.

Paul M. Smalley serves as a teaching assistant for Dr. Joel Beeke at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. He received his ThM from PRTS in 2013.

J. Stephen Yuille is pastor of Grace Community Church, Glen Rose, Texas.

2965 Leonard Street NE, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49525 Phone: 616-977-0889; Fax: 616-285-3246 • E-mail: [email protected]

THE MISSION OF PURITAN REFORMED THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary is an educational institution whose mission is to prepare students to serve Christ and His church through biblical, experiential, and practical ministry. The seminary’s training objectives are to glorify God, to promote and defend the gospel of Jesus Christ, to promote the supremacy of the Holy Scriptures, and to be true to the historic Reformed creeds. In dependence on the Holy Spirit, we believe that our objectives are well served by providing theological instruction and training to facilitate the development of knowledge and skills in our students as well as personal piety and Christian character that is essential for faithful Christian ministry.

The seminary is committed to the perspective that a balanced training for Christian ministry includes a sound theological education and the nurturing of healthy, personal piety. The theological development of a student at PRTS in-cludes instruction in the full range of biblical, theological, historical, and mission studies. Please ask for our catalog and DVD.

The seminary also strives to provide its students with a social environment that nurtures godliness. Instruction is complemented by formal and informal occasions for personal interaction with academically qualified and spiritually minded theological professors or instructors as well as with godly fellow stu-dents. This creates a seminary atmosphere that facilitates personal piety in the context of responsible scholarship.

Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary

Please consider partnering with us in carrying out our mission of offer-ing the following degrees: MAR (Master of Arts, 2 years), MDiv (Master of Divinity, 4 years), and ThM (Master of Theology, 2 years). Above all, please continue to pray for us that our institution may remain faithful to biblical, Reformed truth.

YES, I WOULD LIKE TO DONATE!q I would like to financially support PRTS by giving $________ , designated for:

q Operation Fund q Scholarship Fund

q PRTS Foundation q Puritan Resource Center

q I am enclosing $20 for a 2015 subscription to Puritan Reformed Journal.

q I would like to enroll in the monthly donation program.

q I will send a check for ________ each month.

q Please charge my Debit/Charge card $________ per month.

PAYMENT METHOD q Check/cash enclosed q Charge my Debit/Charge card: Card #______________________________

Exp. Date ____ / ____ Security Code ____________

q Please send me the PRTS catalog and DVD.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Name ______________________________________________________________

Address _____________________________________________________________

City/State/Zip ________________________________________________________

Phone _____________________ E-mail _________________________________

American donors and donors from countries other than Canada, please send your gifts and this form to: Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary 2965 Leonard Street NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49525

Canadian Donors please send your gifts and this form to: Burgessville Heritage Reformed Church, Attention: PRTS 685 Main Street, P.O. Box 105, Burgessville, Ontario N0J 1C0

Donors may also give on-line through www.CanadaHelps.org. Make donations to the Heritage Netherlands Reformed Congregation, PRTS operating fund.

Thank you for supporting Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary. Were it not for the prayers and financial gifts of friends like you, much of what takes place on a daily basis at the seminary would need to be reduced or eliminated.

For more information regarding the seminary, visits, or ministries affiliated with the seminary, please contact our Executive Director of Operations, Mr. Henk Kleyn, at 616-977-0599 ext. 120, or send an email to [email protected].

Date post:	10-Dec-2023
Category:	Documents
Upload:	independent
View:	0 times
Download:	0 times

\"N. T. Wright’s Paul and the Faithfulness of God: A Review Article,\" PRJ 8.2 (2016): 212-40

Documents