INTRODUCTION Yahweh summons the nations from a distance to gather for a court session (Isaiah 41:1; cf. vv. 21-24). Yahweh is Judge. Just as importantly, Yahweh subjects Himself to scrutiny and judgment. THE TEXT “Keep silence before Me, O coastlands, and let the people renew their strength! Let them come near, then let them speak; let us come near together for judgment. Who raised up one from the east? Who in righteousness called him to His feet? . . .... Read more
Every theologian is a negative theologian in the sense that there are certain traditions and theologies that he defines himself against . Protestants have always defined themselves against Catholics, Lutherans against Reformed and vice versa, and within each tradition there are subtraditions that co-define each other. One of the main negative sources of my own theological work is B.B. Warfield’s classic defense of Calvinism (really, a certain version of Calvinism), The Plan Of Salvation . I first read the book... Read more
John 17:20-23: Jesus said, I do not ask in behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they be one, even as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You, that they may be in us . . . . that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be perfected in unity. Our God comes as a Mighty Man... Read more
By following the church calendar, we commemorate the events of our salvation each year. Trinity Sunday doesn’t celebrate an event. Instead, it shows that throughout the church year we commemorate the events of our salvation in order to encounter the God of our salvation. During Advent and at Pentecost, we come to know the Father who gives His Son and Spirit to sons of Adam. Between Advent and Ascension, we become acquainted with God the Son who was born, suffered,... Read more
In a 1981 article in the Journal of Religious Ethics , Paul Camenisch points to the paradox of gifts. On the one hand, a gift is only a gift if the recipient “has no right or claim upon” the thing given. It the thing or payment is compensation, it is wages and not gift. Gifts are free. Freely given, it would seem, would mean freely disposable. The opposite, however, is the case, as anyone knows who has received an heirloom... Read more
I re-enter the “too catholic to be Catholic” arena again this morning at http://www.firstthings.com/ . Read more
Sarah J. Dille concludes her study of Mixing Metaphors: God as Mother and Father in Deutero-Isaiah (Library Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies) with this summary of Isaiah’s use of maternal metaphors for Yahweh (p. 176): “An appreciation of the commonplaces of the ‘mother’ have shed light on Deutero-Isaiah’s rhetoric about YHWH, particularly ideas about labor (42.14 and 45.10), nursing (49.14-15), and child abandonment (49.14-21). In 45.9-13 the laboring woman image appears in parallel with the begetting father to highlight God as... Read more
In his Concentricity and Continuity: The Literary Structure of Isaiah (Library Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies) , Robert H. O’Connell argues that “the formal structure of the book of Isaiah comprises seven asymmetrically concentric sections, each of which presents a complex frameworking pattern of repetitions among its subunits, and that the rhetoric of the book is closest to that of the prophetic covenant disputation” (pp. 19-20). Because Isaiah isn’t arranged chronologically, O’Connell’s “primary task . . . was to discover whether... Read more
The opening verses of Isaiah 40 record a conversation. God instructs some unidentified group to “comfort” and “speak” and “call” the people, and gives them the message they are to speak (vv. 1-2). In verse 3, a voice from an unidentified source instructs the people to make a way and a smooth path for Yahweh’s glory, which is coming back to Zion (vv. 3-5). Verse 6 reintroduces the voice, this time conversing with an “I,” presumably Isaiah. “What shall I... Read more
Paul famously declared that Christ Jesus came to save sinners, adding “Of whom I am chief” (1 Timothy 1:15). Paul qualifies as chief of sinners because he was a “blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor” (v. 13). That Jesus would save this sinner is a demonstration of His “perfect patience,” so that Paul becomes a type or pattern ( hupotuposis ) of the grace of Christ. Other sinners take heart from the fact that Jesus saves even Paul.... Read more
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