Love Bade Me Welcome

Here is George Herbert's wonderful poetic portrayal of justification by faith:


LOVE

LOVE bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,
       Guilty of dust and sin.
But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack
       From my first entrance in,
Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning
       If I lack'd anything.

'A guest,' I answer'd, 'worthy to be here:'
       Love said, 'You shall be he.'
'I, the unkind, ungrateful? Ah, my dear,
       I cannot look on Thee.'
Love took my hand and smiling did reply,
       'Who made the eyes but I?'

'Truth, Lord; but I have marr'd them: let my shame
       Go where it doth deserve.'
'And know you not,' says Love, 'Who bore the blame?' 15
       'My dear, then I will serve.'
'You must sit down,' says Love, 'and taste my meat.'
       So I did sit and eat.



- George Herbert. 1593–1632

Galatians and Growing in Grace

I think God is really teaching and growing me in the realm of grace and much of it is tied to the book of Galatians. Eric Smith who is preaching through Galatians has commented on this (here and here) and has helped me in conversation. At our church, we have been walking through Galatians as well (sermons online). We pastors felt our people needed this emphasis of being reminded of our standing in Christ due to grace, and we are seeing that we needed it just as much!
Here is a comment from a church member that I thought was well put and edifying so I share it with you:

Lee,

I just wanted to let you know that the Lord has spoken to me through your messages on Galatians. I know you feel like you are saying the same things over and over, but you also rightly recognize that we can never really mature beyond justification by faith.

If I could express something of the impact that your messages have had on me, I would say that the sting of my sin has been blunted. This is true not only in the sense that guilt and creeping despair have lost power over me because of the gospel, but also in the sense that sin seems less alluring because of the doctrine of justification by faith. I recognize much more readily now how easily I slip into tying my subjective sense of standing with God to my performance. Thank you for exposing that to me and killing it through your faithful proclamation of the Word of God. Christ is addressing his people through you week by week.

Don't let the pressure toward novelty cause you to lose sleep during sermon preparation. We don't need something new. We need the old truths that have been proclaimed for centuries….

Let us be faithful to keep preaching the old truths.

Funeral Message Online

Following some request I have posted the print version of the funeral message for my brother. It is basically complete except for the gospel proclamation at the end.
I have been delayed in getting this up due some technical issues, and that has caused me to reflect on the fact that it has finally, in full form, gone up just as we get to Reformation Day. It seems to me appropriate in a few ways.

1. Doug had a great appreciation for the Reformation and the truths recovered there.
2. In fact some of these Reformation truths were what he most liked to talk about.
3. One of the last things he did was to order study bibles drawing from the Reformation for his daughters.
4. The truth of justification by faith, far from merely an academic, abstract doctrine, is a central ground of comfort in the light of death.
“to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Rom 4:5)

Bray on Wright and Justification

As I mentioned previously Dr. Gerald Bray is with us at Union for a couple of weeks as our Scholar-in-Residence. On Tuesday he spoke at our Christian Studies colloquium addressing the current debate on justification particularly the recent interaction between John Piper and N. T. Wright. Bray’s editorial on this topic in the Churchman stirred a lot of conversation previously.

The audio of this lecture is now available here. Bray was informative and entertaining as always! Perhaps the most intriguing portion of the lecture is the beginning where he discusses his personal interaction with and knowledge of Piper and Wright. Bray described the trajectory of Wright’s thought as beginning in a thoroughly Calvinistic framework (Bray referenced Wrights first book, a co-authored piece, published by Banner of Truth) to which was then mixed a more critical approach to biblical studies. Bray then described Wright’s position (apparently his work on Paul) as essentially hyper-Calvinistic.

This is an informative lecture worth listening to.

Book, By Faith Alone

By Faith Alone: Answering the Challenges to the Doctrine of Justification
Ed. Gary Johnson & Guy Waters
(Crossway, 2006), pb, 219 pp.

I obtained this book because I wanted to read more particularly about Federal Vision (or Auburn) Theology. The book is presented as a response to both Federal Vision and the New Perspective on Paul. As the introduction states:

In what follows, we want to trace the background and development of two seemingly disparate movements that have surfaced within the evangelical and Reformed church- the New Perspective(s) on Paul and the Federal Vision. (21)

I am fairly familiar with the New Perspective but was not as clear on the claims and concerns of Federal Vision, though I continued to see it arise in both academic and pastoral situations. There is a chapter devoted specifically to Federal Vision and one interacting with N. T. Wright and the New Perspective. The other chapters take up doctrinal issues at stake such as imputation, the active obedience of Christ, and the covenant of works.

Although Al Mohler wrote the afterword this is clearly a book arising out of a Presbyterian setting. This is not a slur, by the way! Justification is the key unifying doctrine of the church (as argued here before), but some of the issues raised here are simply not the issues faced in my churches at the moment and I am not in full agreement with all the nuances. Therefore, this is not a book I am going to read straight through. It served me well in introducing some topics and will be a useful reference for the future.