To head off the possibility that the disciples will steal Jesus’ body, the priests and Pharisees ask Pilate for a guard at the tomb (Matthew 27:62-65). If the disciples are successful, “the last deception will be worse than the first” (v. 64). It’s a familiar phrase: Jesus Himself uses it to describe the state of the man who is delivered from demons and then reinfested (12:45). The two uses of the phrase stand in ironic contrast: In order to avoid... Read more
After Jesus’ Passover with His disciples, they leave singing for the Mount of Olives. Last time they were on the Mount, Jesus predicted the destruction of a temple. His return to the mountain marks the initial fulfillment of that prophecy: Jesus is the temple, torn down and raised again in three days; so too, the disciples are the temple, scattered and regathered in three days. In all likelihood, they go out singing the Hallel, Psalms 113-118, which climaxes with the... Read more
Matthew 26:31-75 is organized mainly as a series of small chiasms The first is in verses 31-35: A. Jesus predicts the fall of the disciples, based on Scripture, vv 31-32 B. Peter protests, v 33 C. Jesus predicts Peter’s triple denial, v 34 B’. Peter protests again, v 35a A’. All the disciples protest, v 35b (more…) Read more
Responding to Sinclair Ferguson’s defense of infant baptism in Baptism: Three Views , Anthony Lane attacks the use of “sign and seal” as the “controlling framework” for one’s theology of baptism. He points out that for Ferguson the “proper” function of baptism is to “display and portray God’s grace,” and lists the pages where Ferguson talks about how baptism “points” and “symbolizes” and “signifies” and “proclaims.” Lane charges: “This theme owes much to Reformed theology, little to the New Testament.”... Read more
The notion that salvation is illumination is often criticized for being too intellectualist. Jaroslav Pelikan sums up the criticisms of Athanasius’ use of this image by saying “the impression was almost unavoidable that the enlightenment given in salvation applied primarily to the mind and the intellect” and his language sometimes appears to support “the charge that he intellectualized faith into a species of knowledge.” But what if illumination is not about lighting up minds but about lighting the person himself... Read more
Why the incarnation? The eternal Son enters humanity to stretch it to its limits, and beyond. By becoming flesh and living and dying and rising in flesh, the Son makes it big enough for God to dwell in. More precisely, the Spirit: The Son stretches out the flesh He assumes, so that it becomes capacious enough to receive the fullness of the Spirit, ultimately to enable human bodies to become Spiritual bodies. Read more
Every word we speak, Derrida argues, wanders off on its own, and we can’t protect or control it. True enough with regard to human words. But God’s Word is a living Person, the eternal Son, a Word equal to the speaker with the resources to fend for Himself. This Word, though sent to a far country, never wanders from His Father. Read more
In the previous post, Jim Rogers asked what can morally be done about enemies who use innocents are human shields? That’s a difficult question, but I’ve found Daniel Bell’s discussion helpful ( Just War as Christian Discipleship: Recentering the Tradition in the Church rather than the State ). Bell takes issue with Paul Ramsey’s analysis. Ramsey argues that the blame for the deaths of innocents used as human shields lies with those using them, not with those who kill them... Read more
Jim Rogers of Texas A&M takes some issue with my discussion of the justice of NATO bombings in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I’ll briefly take up Jim’s questions about human shields in another post. Here’s Jim’s response: [1][a] Yes, in general, but your post doesn’t really deal with the problem of the innocent shield (let alone the innocent aggressor). In this context in particular, many of those fighting the U.S. intentionally seek to surround themselves with the innocent, and to blend... Read more
Athanasius points to the biblical teaching of creation from nothing to prove that creation is in its nature changeable. It’s not simply that something comes from nothing is fragile, unstable, dependent; it also seems that creatures have a changeable nature because their origin is change: Scripture “teaches that [the Son] changes everything else, and is Himself not changed, in saying, ‘You are the same, and Your years shall not fail.’ And with reason; for things originate, being from nothing , and not... Read more
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