At the beginning of the Great Sacrifice performed by the Chinese emperor for centuries, singers sang the song of creation, addressed to the “Sovereign Lord” known as “Shang Di”: “Of old in the beginning, there was the great chaos, without form and dark. The five planets had not begun to revolve, nor the two lights to shine. In the midst of it there existed neither form nor sound. You, O spiritual Sovereign, came forth in Your sovereignty, and first did... Read more
One of the differences between those associated with “Federal Vision” theology and those opposed to it is a difference of theological imagination. The opponents operate with a theological imagination that distinguishes and clarifies; ontology is distinguished from relationality, nature from supernature, ecclesiology from soteriology. On the other side are theologians and pastors who operate with what might be called a perichoretic imagination. Relationality is embedded in ontology, and vice versa; supernature infuses nature, and supernature always comes through nature; scratch... Read more
According to Adolf Loos, a turn of the 20th-century Viennese architect and critic, modern style combines beauty and practicality. Both are necessary: “By beautiful, what we mean is that something has achieved fullness, completion. But no useless, impractical object can really be described as ‘full’ or ‘complete.’” One can imagine Loos salivating over sleek grills with names like Broilmaster P3, The Thermidor, and the Weber Genesis. Perhaps the original bohemians were already bobos? Read more
Some initial observations on Nobuyoshi Kiuchi’s recent commentary on Leviticus in the Apollos series from IVP. 1) Kiuchi intriguingly translates hata and hatta’t , traditionally rendered in terms of “sin” or “purification” in terms of “hiding”: ” hata and hatta’t mean ‘to hide oneself’ and the condition of ‘hiding oneself,’ respectively,” and therefore “we can assume that the function of the sin offering is to uncover the offerer’s heart.” He connects this back to Genesis 3, and finds “hiding” as... Read more
A student points out that Hebrews 1-2:4 contains seven quotations from the Old Testament. Through these seven words, God speaks His Son as the new creation. Read more
Thomas defines sacraments in terms of their power to effect sanctification. Not all sacred signs are sacraments, but only those which are efficacious; they are signs of holy things that make men holy (ST 60, 2). Thomas also denies that sacraments were necessary in Eden, since there was no need to remedy sin (ST 61, 2). With much of the Reformed tradition, I think Thomas is wrong about prelapsarian sacraments. But the reasons for affirming or denying prefall sacraments may... Read more
Much of this comes from a lecture by Jeff Meyers at a Biblical Horizons conference several summers ago. INTRODUCTION Forty days after Jesus rose from the dead, He ascended into heaven (Acts 1:3). As He had warned His disciples, He went away from them (John 14:28; 16:7). He promised that His disciples would not be orphans (John 14:18), and that He would come again for them (John 14:28). In the meantime, though, the disciples were to follow an absent Master.... Read more
Matthew 1:23: They shall call His name Immanuel, which translated means, God with us. As we saw in the sermon this morning, the prophecy that Matthew cites is a prophecy assuring Judah of her victory over Israel and Aram. Immanuel is also a sign of the Lord’s judgment. When God comes near, He comes to bless and to curse, to save and to condemn, for deliverance and for judgment. This table is the table of Immanuel, and God-with-us is with... Read more
For many of you, this will be your last Sunday in Moscow for a while. You have spent the past year studying the Bible, or learning music, or reading great books, or honing your rhetorical skills, or writing a thesis. And as you did that, you may have spent the last year gradually, almost imperceptibly, puffing yourself up with your own knowledge. You may have also been gradually, almost imperceptibly, developing a contempt for everything that did not originate in... Read more
Warren Carter (JBL 119/3) examines the intertextual relations between Matthew 1:22-23 and Isaiah 7:14, which Matthew cites (he also discusses Matthew’s citation of Isaiah 8:23-9:1 in 4:15-16). He argues first that Matthew intends to evoke the entire situation of Isaiah 7-9. Matthew does not name the prophet, since his audience was “very familiar with this part of the common tradition,” but he does mention “the prophet,” which brings Isaiah’s situation into view. Matthew has already evoked larger narratives with a... Read more
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