Justin Taylor's Blog, page 329

Audio for the 2011 Gospel Coalition Workshops

Now online:

Training the Next Generation of Pastors and Other Christian Leaders
R. Albert Mohler, Jr. Mark Driscoll, David Helm, Don Carson, and Ligon Duncan




The Pastor's Counseling Ministry
David Powlison




The Gospel for Muslims
Thabiti Anyabwile




Is Your Church a Safe Place for Sad People? Learning to Walk with Each Other Through Loss
Nancy Guthrie




Old Testament Narrative: Letting the Literature Speak
Kathleen B. Nielson




Women Teaching Women the Bible: A Suggested Model
Jenny Salt




Justification Versus Self-Justification
Ray Ortlund Jr.




Preaching a Christ to Whom We Can Come
Colin Smith




Orphans and Adoption
Russell Moore and Voddie Baucham




Power Through Weakness
Tim Savage




Signs of Grace in Inner-City Church Planting
Eric Mason




Gospel Faithfulness and Business Leadership in Tumultuous Times
Bob Doll




Christianity Explored – A Biblical Strategy for Effective Evangelism in the Local Church
Craig Dyer and Alistair Begg







What Should a Local Church Look Like?
Tim Keller, Crawford Loritts, and Mark Dever




Pastoring with Discernment: Applying the Gospel to the Hearts of Those You Serve
C. J. Mahaney




Asian American Christian Thought and Theological History: Pastoral Implications for Diversity and Innovation in a Multiracial Church
Stephen Um and Julius Kim




An Invitation to Hispanic Pastors and Would-Be Pastors
Juan Sanchez




Humble Orthodoxy
Josh Harris




Gospel-Centered Pastoral Leadership
Sandy Willson




The Feminist Mistake
Mary Kassian




Literary Beauty and Gospel Truth: Celebrating the Biblical Union
Kathleen B. Nielson




Pure Desire: Gospel-Centered Morality in a Sex-Saturated Society
Gary Inrig




Mixing Whites and Colors Without Making Them Run: Building Gospel-Centered, Intentionally Multicultural Churches
John Mahaffey




'They All Look Alike To Me': The Implications of a Christ-Centered Identity on the Issue of Racial Reconciliation in the Church
K. Edward Copeland




Writing Corporate Worship Music
Keith and Kristyn Getty







The Spirit-Filled Missional Ministry of Jesus
Mark Driscoll




Trellis and Vine
Tony Payne and Colin Marshall




Fostering a Praying Church
Scotty Smith




The Genesis of Gender
Mary Kassian




When Despair Invades Gospel Work: Learning from Elijah
Paige Benton Brown




One-on-One Discipleship: Grass-Roots Church Growth
Jenny Salt




Biblical Theology: What It Is and Why It Matters
Stephen Um and Richard Lints




Substitutes for the Gospel: A Modest Critique of Modern Evangelicalism
Erwin Lutzer




The Mission of the Church
Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert




Leading Corporate Worship Music
Keith and Kristyn Getty




Seizing Global Gospel Opportunities: Why and How You and Your Church Can Get Involved
Michael Oh




Questioning Evangelism
Randy Newman




The Heart of the Expositor
Kent Hughes

New Seeds CD: Scripture Memory for Families (Now in ESV)

We are big fans of Seeds Family Worship—we have and enjoy all five of their CDs (and each package has 2 CDs in it, so you can keep one and give one away).

They also recently made the decision to switch all their songs over to the ESV translation, which I was delighted to hear.

I'm also glad to see that they have a new CD out: Seeds of Character. Here are the songs:

More Than Conquerors (Romans 8:37)
The Wages and The Gift (Romans 3:23 & 6:23)
The Life (John 14:6, 1 John 5:11-12)
The Fruit (Galatians 5:16 & 22)
Delight (Psalm 1)
Teach Them (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)
The Perfect Example (John 13:12-17)
Children and Fathers (Ephesians 6:1-4)
Put On Love (Colossians 3:12 & 14a)
The Character Song (Romans 5:1-5)
Give Thanks (Psalm 105:1-5)
The Only Way (The New Testament Song) [all the books of the NT]

You can stream the whole album here for free.

If you get a CD and enter BTW20 in the checkout you'll get 20% off the regular price (and remember you end up getting two duplicate disks per album). [You can also order it digitally but the physical CD price is actually a better deal.]

The Seeds folks performed a video for BTW readers below, playing the song "The Life," combining 1 John 5:11-12 ("And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life") and John 14:6 (Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me").

New Testament Metaphors for the Church

The following is not meant to be exhaustive—one could also profitably include field, olive tree, flock, vine—but the following are verses that deal with the main New Testament metaphors for the church: body, marriage, family, and buildings.

The church is made up of many different members that comprise the one body of Christ.

"For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another." (Rom. 12:4-5)

"We who are many are one body" (1 Cor. 10:17).

"Just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ" (1 Cor. 12:12).

"You are the body of Christ and individually members of it" (1 Cor. 12:27).

"Equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ" (Eph. 4:12).

"Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior" (Eph. 5:23).

"We are members of [Christ's] body" (Eph. 5:30).

"In my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church" (Col. 1:24).

The church is the bride of Christ.

"Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb" (Rev. 21:9).

"The marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready; It was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure" (Rev. 19:7-8).

"For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ" (2 Cor. 11:12).

"'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church" (Eph. 5:31-32).

The church is the family of God.

"I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty" (2 Cor. 6:18).

"Stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother'" (Matt. 12:49-50).

"So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God" (Eph. 2:19).

"As we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith" (Gal. 6:10).

"Do not rebuke an older man but encourage him as you would a father, younger men as brothers, older women as mothers, younger women as sisters, in all purity" (1 Tim. 5:1).

The church is God's house.

"Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And we are his house if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope" (Heb. 3:6).

"I am writing these things to you so that . . . you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of the truth" (1 Tim. 3:14-15).

"It is time for judgment to begin at the household of God" (1 Pet. 4:17).

The church is the temple of God, built with living stones, with Christ as the foundation and cornerstone, and the Holy Spirit indwelling it.

"For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ" (1 Cor. 3:11).

"The household of God [is] built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Eph. 2:19-22).

"'Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.' . . . 'The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone'" (1 Pet. 2:6-7 [Isa. 28:16; Ps. 118:22).

"You yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ" (1 Pet. 2:5).

"Do you not know that you [plural] are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple" (1 Cor. 3:16-17).

"Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own" (1 Cor. 6:19).

A Prophetic Message to the PCUSA

As I'm sure most readers know, on May 10, 2011, the PCUSA presbytery of the Twin Cities in Minnesota voted to allow the their 173 presbyteries to ordain clergy without regard to sexual orientation. (Albert Mohler has a helpful summary, as usual.)

I missed this when it happened last year at the 2010 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), where gay marriage and gay-clergy ordination were being discussed. Terry Mattingly sets the stage:

Without a doubt, the most boring parts of these events — yes, even more boring than the business sessions — are the ultra-polite addresses delivered by special guests from the outside. These are often called "greetings" and they may be delivered by local civic leaders ("Thank you for eating lots of meals in our downtown restaurants") or by local, national or international religious dignitaries. . . . Normally, when journalists see the word "greetings" in a convention schedule, they know that it's safe to step out and get a cup of coffee or some other legal stimulant (the nature of which depends on the denomination one is covering).

But after delivering some pleasantries, the Reverend Siarhei Hardun, an Orthodox arch-priest from Belarus, used his short time as an ecumenical greeter to express his dismay at the way the PCUSA was seeking to reinvent morality. It is surely regrettable that they did not heed this prophetic analysis and warning:

Worth reading in this connection is S. Donald Fortson III's "The Road to Gay Ordination in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)," by Professor S. Donald Fortson III, a church historian at RTS—Charlotte. An excerpt on the unanimity of the church's tradition on sexual ethics:

Church history is crystal clear: Homosexual practice has been affirmed nowhere, never, by no one in the history of Christianity. . . .

Christianity is a tradition; it is a faith with a particular ethos, set of beliefs and practices handed on from generation to generation. The Christian tradition may be understood as the history of what God's people have believed and how they have lived based upon the Word of God. This tradition is not only a collection of accepted doctrines but also a set of lifestyle expectations for a follower of Christ. One of the primary things handed down in the Christian church over the centuries is a consistent set of lifestyle ethics including specific directives about sexual behavior. The church of every generation from the time of the apostles has condemned sexual sin as unbecoming a disciple of Christ. At no point have any orthodox Christian teachers ever suggested that one's sexual practices may deviate from biblical standards.

Concerning homosexuality there has been absolute unanimity in church history; sexual intimacy between persons of the same gender has never been recognized as legitimate behavior for a Christian. One finds no examples of orthodox teachers who suggested that homosexual activity could be acceptable in God's sight under any circumstances. Revisionist biblical interpretations that purport to support homosexual practice are typically rooted in novel hermeneutical principles applied to Scripture, which produce bizarre interpretations of the Bible held nowhere, never, by no one.

HT: Jordan Ballor

Judgment Day: May 21, 2011?

Albert Mohler has some good background on Harold Camping's latest claims (part of a larger pattern of false teaching), and closes his article with some helpful reminders:

First, Christ specifically admonished his disciples not to claim such knowledge. In Acts 1:7, Jesus said, "It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority." In Matthew 24:36, Christ taught similarly: "But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only."

To state the case plainly, these two verses explicitly forbid Christians to claim the knowledge of such dates and times. Jesus clearly taught that the Father has not revealed such dates and timing, but has reserved that knowledge for himself. It is an act of incredible presumptuousness to claim that a human knows such a date, or has determined God's timing by any means.

Second, the Bible does not contain hidden codes that we are to find and decipher. The Bible has been given to us in order that we might know the truth, and the truth is clearly revealed in its pages. We are not to look for hidden patterns of words, numbers, dates, or anything else. The Bible's message is plain and requires no mathematical computation for its understanding. The claim that one has found a hidden code or system in the Bible is an insult to the Bible as the Word of God.

Third, Christians are indeed to be looking for Christ to return and seeking to be found faithful when Christ comes. We are not to draw a line in history and set a date, but we are to be about the Father's business, sharing the Gospel and living faithful Christian lives. We are not to sit on rooftops like the Millerites, waiting for Christ's return. We are to be busy doing what Christ has commanded us to do.

In Hebrews 9:28, we are taught that Christ will come a second time "to save those who are eagerly waiting for him." That is the faithful Christian response to the New Testament teachings about Christ's coming. The church is not to be arrogantly setting dates, but instead to be eagerly waiting for him. Of that we can be truly certain.

For those who know people affected by this false teaching, another helpful resource is Robert Godfrey's five-part blog series. He "discusses his early memories of Camping as an orthodox Christian Reformed Bible teacher, outlines Camping's scriptural misunderstandings and misinterpretations about the end times and the church, and shows how they led to his heretical teaching."

The End of the World According to Harold Camping: Part 1
The End of the World According to Harold Camping: Part 2
The End of the World According to Harold Camping: Part 3
The End of the World According to Harold Camping: Part 4
The End of the World According to Harold Camping: Part 5

Good Reading and Good Thinking as a Prerequisite to Good Writing

Peter Kreeft, in Socratic Logic, pp. 2-3:

On the basis of over 40 years of full time college teaching of almost 20,000 students at 20 different schools, I am convinced that one of the reasons for the steep decline in students' reading abilities is the decline in the teaching of traditional logic.

Mortimer Adler's classic How to Read a Book is based on the traditional common-sense logic of the "three acts of the mind" [simple apprehension, judging, reasoning]. . . . If I were a college president, I would require every incoming freshman to read Adler's book and pass a test on it before taking other courses.

. . . . [C]lear writing and thinking are a "package deal": the presence or absence of either one brings the presence or absence of the other. Muddled writings fosters muddled thinking, and muddled thinking fosters muddled writing. Clear writing fosters clear thinking, and clear thinking fosters clear writing. . . .

There is nothing more effective than traditional logic in training you to be a clear, effective, and careful writer.

C.S. Lewis's last interview was on May 7, 1963—six months before he died. One of Sherwood Wirt's questions was on writing: "How would you suggest a young Christian writer go about developing a style?"

Lewis responded:

The way for a person to develop a style is (a) to know exactly what he wants to say, and (b) to be sure he is saying exactly that.

The reader, we must remember, does not start by knowing what we mean. If our words are ambiguous, our meaning will escape him.

I sometimes think that writing is like driving sheep down a road. If there is any gate open to the left or the right the reader will most certainly go into it.

("Cross-Examination," in C.S. Lewis: Essay Collection and Other Short Pieces, ed. Lesley Walmsley, p. 555)

Seven years earlier (June 26, 1956), Lewis responded to letter from an American girl named Joan with advice on writing. Each of the five points is well worth considering, but none more so than the first one:

Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn't mean anything else.

(C.S. Lewis, Letters to Children, p. 64)

But in order to say what you mean you have to know what you are saying. What follows are a few notes from Peter Kreeft's Socratic Logic (pp. 28-33) that can help to clear some of the cobwebs from the attic of your mind:

There are three kinds of thoughts, or three acts of the mind:

Simple apprehension [understanding a simple term—e.g., "man"]
Judging [relating two concepts by predicating one term of the other—e.g., "man is mortal"]
Reasoning [relating two or more judgments with a conclusion—e.g., "man is mortal; I'm a man; therefore I'm mortal"]

These three acts of the mind result in three mental products:

Concepts (the products of conceiving)
Judgments (the products of judging)
Arguments (the products of reasoning, or arguing)

Expressed logically these are:

Terms
Propositions
Arguments (most commonly, syllogisms)

These logical entities answer the three most fundamental questions:

A term answers what something is.
A proposition answers whether something is.
An argument answers why it is.

These logical entities also reveal three aspects of reality:

Terms reveal essences (what something is).
Propositions reveal existence (whether something is).
Arguments reveal causes (why something is).

These logical entities can be judged logically good or logically bad:

Terms are either clear or unclear (=ambiguous).
Propositions are either true or false.
Arguments are either valid or invalid.

To make a convincing argument you have to fulfill all three of the following conditions:

Your terms are clear.
Your premises are true.
Your logic is valid.

If you want to critique someone's argument, you have to show an error in just one of the following:

They are using a term ambiguously.
They are using a false premise.
They are committing a logical fallacy (i.e., the argument is invalid; the conclusion does not follow from the premises).

Good Reading and Good Thinking as a Prequisite to Good Writing

Peter Kreeft, in Socratic Logic, pp. 2-3:

On the basis of over 40 years of full time college teaching of almost 20,000 students at 20 different schools, I am convinced that one of the reasons for the steep decline in students' reading abilities is the decline in the teaching of traditional logic.

Mortimer Adler's classic How to Read a Book is based on the traditional common-sense logic of the "three acts of the mind" [simple apprehension, judging, reasoning]. . . . If I were a college president, I would require every incoming freshman to read Adler's book and pass a test on it before taking other courses.

. . . . [C]lear writing and thinking are a "package deal": the presence or absence of either one brings the presence or absence of the other. Muddled writings fosters muddled thinking, and muddled thinking fosters muddled writing. Clear writing fosters clear thinking, and clear thinking fosters clear writing. . . .

There is nothing more effective than traditional logic in training you to be a clear, effective, and careful writer.

C.S. Lewis's last interview was on May 7, 1963—six months before he died. One of Sherwood Wirt's questions was on writing: "How would you suggest a young Christian writer go about developing a style?"

Lewis responded:

The way for a person to develop a style is (a) to know exactly what he wants to say, and (b) to be sure he is saying exactly that.

The reader, we must remember, does not start by knowing what we mean. If our words are ambiguous, our meaning will escape him.

I sometimes think that writing is like driving sheep down a road. If there is any gate open to the left or the right the reader will most certainly go into it.

("Cross-Examination," in C.S. Lewis: Essay Collection and Other Short Pieces, ed. Lesley Walmsley, p. 555)

Seven years earlier (June 26, 1956), Lewis responded to letter from an American girl named Joan with advice on writing. Each of the five points is well worth considering, but none more so than the first one:

Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn't mean anything else.

(C.S. Lewis, Letters to Children, p. 64)

But in order to say what you mean you have to know what you are saying. What follows are a few notes from Peter Kreeft's Socratic Logic (pp. 28-33) that can help to clear some of the cobwebs from the attic of your mind:

There are three kinds of thoughts, or three acts of the mind:

Simple apprehension [understanding a simple term—e.g., "man"]
Judging [relating two concepts by predicating one term of the other—e.g., "man is mortal"]
Reasoning [relating two or more judgments with a conclusion—e.g., "man is mortal; I'm a man; therefore I'm mortal"]

These three acts of the mind result in three mental products:

Concepts (the products of conceiving)
Judgments (the products of judging)
Arguments (the products of reasoning, or arguing)

Expressed logically these are:

Terms
Propositions
Arguments (most commonly, syllogisms)

These logical entities answer the three most fundamental questions:

A term answers what something is.
A proposition answers whether something is.
An argument answers why it is.

These logical entities also reveal three aspects of reality:

Terms reveal essences (what something is).
Propositions reveal existence (whether something is).
Arguments reveal causes (why something is).

These logical entities can be judged logically good or logically bad:

Terms are either clear or unclear (=ambiguous).
Propositions are either true or false.
Arguments are either valid or invalid.

To make a convincing argument you have to fulfill all three of the following conditions:

Your terms are clear.
Your premises are true.
Your logic is valid.

If you want to critique someone's argument, you have to show an error in just one of the following:

They are using a term ambiguously.
They are using a false premise.
They are committing a logical fallacy (i.e., the argument is invalid; the conclusion does not follow from the premises).

Advice for Aspiring Christ-Centered Preachers

Wise advice here from Stephen Um:

Read the Scriptures . In order to see how inter-canonical themes and the narrative of redemptive history run through the entire Bible, and how Christ is the fulfillment of it all, you must regularly read it, both devotionally and in devoted study. Familiarity with the ins and outs of the Bible's stories, letters, songs, etc., is absolutely necessary to begin making meaningful gospel connections. The preacher who is not immersed in the scriptures, and meeting Christ there regularly, will not preach him well from them.
Recognize that it takes time . Going hand in hand with regular immersion in the Bible is the need for extended time therein. The Bible is a book that repays years of careful reading. While one need not necessarily have those years of study under his belt to preach well, the benefits of a life long commitment to the scriptures are countless, and a sustainable preaching ministry demands that we be in it for the long haul.
Rehearse it in conversation . Part of making gospel connections and seeing Christ properly throughout the scriptures is learning to articulate what you learn to others. Find like-minded individuals who are interested in Christ-centered preaching and learn to talk through, challenge, and mutually enjoy the connections that you are making in your devotional life.
Really listen to other preachers . We listen to many sermons, but often we don't hear the sermons that we listen to. In other words, we are often captivated by rhetorical and stylistic matters, important in their own right, yet fail to hear the actual content, logical flow, and biblical fabric that is at the heart of the best sermons. To really hear is to break down (not cynically but searchingly) what we hear in a sermon, to plug it into the one story plot line of the bible, and to press it into our own hearts.

Tortured for Christ

Richard Wurmbrand (1909–2001), whose many years of imprisonment for the gospel included three years in solitary confinement, went on to write Tortured for Christ and to found Voice of the Martyrs.

Below is a video where he talks about his suffering and God's grace and presence:

Trevin Wax recently posted a new clip about the persecution of Christians under Ceausescu's Romania.

Hebrews 10:32-36:

But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised.

I Want to Be "Left Behind"

Benjamin L. Merkle, "Who Will Be Left Behind? Rethinking the Meaning of Matthew 24:40-41 and Luke 17:34-35," WTJ 72 (2010): 169-79.

Here's his thesis, in essence: "Although many assume that those taken in Matt 24:40-41 and Luke 17:34-35 are taken to be with Jesus and those left behind are left for judgment, this inter­pretation should be rejected."

His conclusion summarizes his arguments:

Throughout the context of these passages Jesus uses judgment language reminiscent of the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and the subsequent exile of its inhabitants. Those who were taken away were the ones judged by God whereas those left behind were the remnant who received grace.

Furthermore, the teaching of Jesus confirms this thesis. In the Parable of the Weeds the Son of Man sends his angels to gather out the children of the devil and throw them in the fiery furnace whereas the wheat is left behind (Matt 13:36-43).

The context of Matt 24 and Luke 17 also suggests Jesus is intentionally using judgment and remnant language. Such language naturally brings up images of the former destruction of Jerusalem where the enemy came and "took away" (i.e., killed) those in the city.

Finally, the parallel with Noah and the flood in the preceding verses strongly confirms our thesis. Just as in the days of Noah the people were taken away by the great flood, so those who are not prepared will be taken away when the Son of Man returns.

You can read his arguments in more detail here.

HT: Dane Ortlund