I adapted the following Sinclair Ferguson quotation, which originally spoke of the pastor’s ministry of the Word, so that it speaks directly to the Christian’s approach to his personal study of the Word:

“The great gospel imperatives to holiness are ever rooted in indicatives of grace that are able to sustain the weight of [Scripture's] imperatives. The Apostles do not make the mistake that’s often made [by Christians]. [For the Apostles] the indicatives are more powerful than the imperatives in gospel preaching. So often in our [personal study of Scripture our grasp of Scripture's] indicatives are not strong enough, great enough, holy enough, or gracious enough to sustain the power of the imperatives. And so our [attempt to apply Scripture's imperatives] becomes a whip or a rod to beat our [own] backs because we’ve looked at the New Testament and that’s all we have seen. We’ve seen our own failure, and we’ve seen the imperatives to holiness, and we’ve lost sight of the great indicatives of the gospel that sustain those imperatives” (adapted from Sinclair’s sermon at 2007 Banner of Truth conference).

Here’s a suggestion for your personal reading of and meditation on Scripture for the remainder of the month of May: First, read the Epistles noting specifically those texts/verses that speak of who you are and what you possess in Christ. Second, pray for spiritual illumination to understand and faith to believe afresh all that you are and possess in Christ. Third, give sustained and prayerful thought on the glory of these great realities so that your heart is lifted up in joyful worship. Fourth, preach the truth of these texts to your own heart every morning, afternoon, and evening with abandon. Fifth, share the fruit of this spiritual exercise with others within the sphere of your Christian community for their spiritual encouragement.

If you decide to follow this suggested plan for the ramainder of this month, please let us know in the comment section and consider blogging about it on your personal blog.

Christopher Wright on Christ-centered interpretation:

“To speak of the Bible being ‘all about Christ’ does not (or should not) mean that we try to find Jesus of Nazareth in every verse by some feat of imagination. Rather we mean that the person and work of Jesus become the central hermeneutical key by which we, as Christians, articulate the overall significance of these texts in both Testaments. Christ provides the hermeneutical matrix for our reading of the whole Bible” (The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative, 31).

This is so very good and helpful!

“The great gospel imperatives to holiness are ever rooted in indicatives of grace that are able to sustain the weight of those imperatives. The Apostles do not make the mistake that’s often made in Christian ministry. [For the Apostles] the indicatives are more powerful than the imperatives in gospel preaching. So often in our preaching our indicatives are not strong enough, great enough, holy enough, or gracious enough to sustain the power of the imperatives. And so our teaching on holiness becomes a whip or a rod to beat our people’s backs because we’ve looked at the New Testament and that’s all we ourselves have seen. We’ve seen our own failure and we’ve seen the imperatives to holiness and we’ve lost sight of the great indicatives of the gospel that sustain those imperatives. … Woven into the warp and woof of the New Testament’s exposition of what it means for us to be holy is the great groundwork that the self-existent, thrice holy, triune God has — in Himself, by Himself and for Himself — committed Himself and all three Persons of His being to bringing about the holiness of His own people. This is the Father’s purpose, the Son’s purchase and the Spirit’s ministry” (Sinclair Ferguson).

(HT: John Fonville)

I’ve been thinking about the concept of “quiet time” lately and discussing it the past week with my Principles of Bible Study students. Here are a few resources that I think you’ll find helpful as you think about and engage in this practice.

Freedom from Quiet Time Guilt - This is a very thought-provoking article by Greg Johnson of the St. Louis Center for Christian Study.

A Basic Quiet Time Plan - This is a Bible study/Scripture meditation plan that I adapted from Tim Keller’s Preaching the Gospel in a Post-Modern World.

Psalm 62 Meditation - I wrote this example of the above quiet time plan. It’s even more basic.

Justin Buzzard has interviewed Graeme Goldsworthy over at his blog. If you are not familiar with Goldsworthy (or even if you are) or are new to gospel-centeredness discussion, particularly as it relates to interpretation, you’ll want to check this interview out. Thanks, Justin, for making this Goldsworthy interview available.

How important is it that the preaching of the church be informed and shaped by biblical theology, that is, by the story of God’s redemptive activity within human history? Graeme Goldsworthy writes:

If a pastor does not understand or teach biblical theology, the members of the congregation are likely to suffer thus:

1. Congregations will not understand the unity of the Bible or the progressive nature of revelation. They will fall prey to those proclaiming the disunity of the biblical message; and a fragmented Bible cannot be recognized as the inspired word of God.

2. Congregations will not understand the centrality of Christ for interpreting Scripture and the meaning of life in our world. Recourse to people and events—particularly those of the Old Testament—will be valued mainly for their exemplary lessons, and not for their typological contribution to understanding the person and work of Christ. They will not see that Christ in his gospel is the interpreting principle for Scripture and, indeed, for all reality.

3. Grace will be eroded by legalism. Preaching that principally points to the examples of Bible characters leads almost inevitably to legalism since the connection with the gospel of grace will be clouded or even completely lost.

4. The application of Bible texts will often be short-circuited. The Bible is reduced to a lucky-dip of texts all of which are perceived as standing in the same essential relationship to the Christian believer, and the progressive nature of biblical revelation in salvation-history is ignored.

5. The presuppositions of the New Testament in portraying Christ as the fulfiller of the Old Testament will be overlooked so that the fullness of Christ’s person and work is undermined. Teaching from the Old Testament is particularly at risk.

6. The doctrinal formulations of the church will be seen as less important in that their relationship to the progressive revelation of the Bible will not be evident. Biblical theology and doctrine work together for a robust understanding of God and his purposes for his people and the world.

Graeme Goldsworthy is the visiting lecturer in hermeneutics at Moore Theological College in Sydney, Australia.

(HT: Justin Buzzard)

Note to Readers: Those of you who regularly visit Eucatastrophe are well aware of the fact that my blogging has been almost non-existent the past three months. I’ve only posted 15 times since July 28^th!  My intention is to begin posting regularly once this particular semester is over.

If someone said to you, “Your main problem in life is that you want your will over God’s will,” how would you respond? If that were said to me, I would probably say something like this, “Tell me something I don’t already know. I’m very aware of what my main problem is. I know that God’s will is not done in my life like it is done in heaven. So rather than just telling me what my main problem is, why don’t you also tell me what the solution is.”

“Well,” he says, “the solution is to ask the Father that His will be done on earth as it is in heaven, that His will be done in your life as it is done in the lives of those in heaven.”

I respond, “So you are telling me that the solution to my main problem in life is simply to habitually ask God to do this?”

“Yes, ask, wait, and strive to obey. Well, you’ll need to read your Bible, identify biblical principles, and daily apply them to your life too.”

“Oh, okay, I now understand. What you are essentially telling me is that in order for God’s will to be done in my life as it’s done in heaven, I need to tell God daily that I want His will to be done in my life as it is in heaven and then just do it? That does make sense. After all, Jesus did instruct us to petition the Father that His will would be done on earth as it is in heaven. But I do have one last question. Where’s the gospel in all of this? Where is the good news in all you’ve told me? If the bad news is that I don’t do God’s will as I ought, what’s the good news?”

That’s the question that I wish to address in this post. Where is the gospel in this petition of Matthew 6:10? How did Matthew envision this petition being answered? How should we envision this petition being answered when we consider it in the light of the entirety of Matthew’s Gospel?
Read the rest of this entry »

One of the main objectives of this blog is to encourage preaching that is gospel-centered. Because of this emphasis I am occassionally asked, “What does a gospel-centered sermon look like?” Those who have asked me this question are often already convinced of the necessity of preaching from a gospel-centered perspective, but how this kind of sermon should actually look in practice is still not clear to them. So, below you’ll find a link to a sermon I recently preached that is an attempt to preach a gospel-centered sermon on the baptism and temptation of Christ (Matthew 3:13-4:11). My emphasis is not on the illustrative value of this section of narrative. Rather, it’s on how this baptism and temptation narrative fits within the unfolding of salvific history.

To download: right click on link below and select “save as”

Vicarious Humanity

P.S. the first couple minutes of the sermon were not recorded. A written version of the missing introduction is below.

P.P.S. If you want to expose yourself to sermons that are consistently and beautifully gospel-centered, listen to Tim Keller. I agree with Mark Lauterbach when he says, “No one, and I mean no one, preaches Gospel saturated messages better than Tim Keller. Buy his sermons and see how the Gospel is everywhere in the Bible.”

Sermon Introduction:

I have the privilege of teaching 18-19 year old young people an introductory course on Bible study. Teaching freshman in this particular area is one of the most exciting things that I do. One of the areas where I have to work extremely hard to correct their thinking is in how they approach biblical narrative. Every freshman who has entered my classroom the past year and half has treated all biblical narrative texts as if there primary purpose is to be illustrative. There seems to be this underlying conviction that biblical narrative is primarily for exemplary value. In other words, they all seem to assume that the primary intention of the biblical writers is to give us examples to follow or not to follow to aide us in navigating life. So what I spend a considerable amount of class time doing is demonstrating that biblical narrative is primarily historical rather than illustrative.

What do I mean by historical narrative? By that I mean that biblical narrative is primarily about what God has done within space and time to accomplish redemption. It is not primarily about illustrating how we should live within space and time. Biblical narrative is primarily about God’s entrance into history to accomplish His redemptive purposes. The reason is spend so much time arguing that biblical narrative is historical rather than illustrative is because when our dominant focus is on the illustrative value of the text, the gospel of Jesus Christ begins to lose its central place in our thinking and living. And when preachers primarily preach narrative as illustrative material, the gospel subtly loses its centrality functionally in the life and practice of the church.

As long as we live on this side of glorification, we will always be tempted to interpret biblical narrative as illustrative rather than historical. So what I would like to do this morning is look at a text, half of which is too often thought of as illustrative rather than an historical account of God’s activity within history to accomplish redemption.

Matthew 3:13-4:1 Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. [14] John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” [15] But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. [16] And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; [17] and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” [4:1] Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

“No matter where you are reading in the Bible, faith is the first mystery you should recognize. Faith is not believing that the story you are reading is true as written. That does nothing for anyone. Even unbelievers can believe the Bible story of Jesus’ birth is true. Faith is not a natural work apart from God’s grace…Rather the right kind of faith, the kind that flows from Grace and that God’s Word demands, is firmly believing that Christ was born for you. His birth is yours and occurred for your benefit. For the Gospel teaches that Christ was born for our benefit and that everything He did and suffered was for us.”

Martin Luther, By Faith Alone

(HT: Tom Wood of Graced Again)

I Kings 18 tells one of my favorite stories in the Bible. It’s the story of Elijah vs. the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel. Or more correctly, it’s God vs. Baal on Mt. Carmel. It’s a great story of God drawing attention to Himself once again. Basically, He takes Baal out behind the woodshed (if you don’t know what that means, ask your parents).

This past summer, I heard a message on this passage. It was pretty much a de-secularized pep talk about how we need to be bold like Elijah. Don’t get me wrong. We certainly need to be bold as Christians in the face of idolatry and worldly philosophy. But that’s not the center of the meaning circle in the passage.

The hero of the story isn’t Elijah, it’s God. I really can’t tell someone to be like Elijah, b/c in the story, we aren’t Elijah. Unfortunately, we are the people of Israel. We are the ones who have gone and are going to great lengths to worship something that is an idol of our own imagination. We are even hurting ourselves to worship this false god.

But something happens. The fire will fall, but where does it fall? It’s supposed to fall on the people. We, the people deserve the fire of God’s judgment. We deserved to be incinerated, burnt to a crisp for having other gods before the One True and Living God. But the fire fell on the sacrifice instead. And what happens in the story? The people confess that the LORD is God. Their hearts are turned back by the sacrifice being consumed by the fire of God.

You see, it’s ultimately the Gospel of Jesus Christ that keeps us from facing God’s wrath. The Perfect Sacrifice, Jesus Christ, has already faced God’s wrath for us. We may now confess that Jehovah is God, not because of what we’ve done, but because the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Are you struggling with an idol? I know I am. Look to the Perfect Sacrifice!

I’ve been tagged for this book meme by Mick Porter of Unveiled Face! So here it goes:

Total number of books I’ve ever owned: I would guess a few thousand. I’m really not sure though. I’ve been heard saying that I would rather buy a book and read it then purchase food or clothing. I don’t read as much as I would like too though (time and brain constraints).

Last book I bought: The Drama of Scripture: Finding Our Place in the Biblical Story by Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen. It has been a good read thus far.

Last book I read: River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze by Peter Hessler. It is a book about the author’s experience in the city where we are going to serve in an orphanage, namely, Fuling, China.

Five books that mean a lot to me:

1. The Bible: There are many books that I would like to master. There is something ennobling about thinking the thoughts of great men. But the Bible is the one book that I want to master me.

2. Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture by Graeme Goldsworthy: This book was recommended to me when I was seeking to understand how to interpret/preach the Bible from a gospel-centered perspective. This is a must multiple-read for all Christians (not just for all pastors).

3. The Pleasures of God by John Piper. I consider this book to be Piper’s best. It has been a few years since I’ve read it. So I think it’s about time to pick it up again to drink deep.

4. The Christian Doctrine of God: One Being, Three Persons by Thomas F. Torrance. As far as I’m concerned, this book is without peer in its presentation of the beauty of our God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

5. The Mediation of Christ by Thomas F. Torrance. If I had to pick the one book that I think is helping me understand and apply the gospel more than any other book I’ve ever read, it would be this one.

Occasionally I will alert you to what I think are some very helpful (i.e. edifying) gospel-centered posts by other bloggers. Today I would like to recommend three excellent posts by David Bish (thebluefish blogger of the UK). They provided rich gospel food for me this past week (seeing that I struggle with the very same things). So let me encourage you to take a trip across the pond to read David’s gospel-centered posts.

Aircon for My Soul

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

I’ve added a new link category to my sidebar. It lists eucatastrophe articles that specifically unpack some of the various facets of gospel-centeredness. For those of you who are relatively new to eucatastrophe, here is the primary object of this blog: to explore the beauty and implications of the gospel of Christ for all of life. So with that objective in mind, I added “B 2: eucatastrophe articles” to our link categories.

If you’ve never read anything by T.F. Torrance, you need to pick up one of his books. I would recommend starting with The Mediation of Christ. He is not easy to read but who cares about easy when you can find hundreds of paragraphs like the following:

“This does not mean that all our knowledge of God can be reduced to Christology, but that, as there is only one Mediator between God and man, who is himself both God and Man, and only one revelation of God in which he himself is its actual content, all authentic knowledge of God is derived and understood in accordance with the incarnate reality of God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ, and is formulated in doctrinal coherence with Christology. That is to say, doctrinal statements about God are possible and true only when Christologically grounded” (T.F. Torrance, The Christian Doctrine of God, p. 17).

Both Adrian Warnock and David Wayne are linking an interesting discussion started at Stronger Church. It asks the following question: “If you could only have five books out of your library to keep to help you prepare sermons, what would they be?” I want to modify the question slightly. “If you could only have five books to aide you in your study of Scripture for personal holiness, what would they be?” So feel free to answer from either perspective.

Here is David Wayne’s answer:

Actually, for about the last seven or eight years I’ve been using Logos Software and accumulating all kinds of stuff from them so I would just ask for my laptop and my Logos disks and could be very happy. But, since that’s not the question I’ll play along.

Spirit of the Reformation Study Bible
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - ok, this has four volumes so I’m done, but if you’ll allow me to count it as one volume I’d go with the following three others.
Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem (betcha thought I was going to say Berkhof, didn’t ya?)
According to Plan - Graeme Goldsworthy
Your Best Life Now - Joel Osteen - kidding - just checking to see if anybody’s really reading this. How about Young’s Analytical Concordance so I can have a language reference.

My answer is the result of about 5 minutes of thinking. It would probably change if I thought about it a few more minutes, but right now I’m satisfied. Also, I’m assuming that I will have my BibleWorks computer program which allows me to reference the biblical languages :-).

1. ESV Bible
2. Preaching the Gospel in a Post-Modern World (Tim Keller)
3. Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture (Graeme Goldsworthy)
4. Gustav Oehler’s Old Testament Theology
5. New Testament Theology: Many Witnesses, One Gospel (I. Howard Marshall)

What 5 books would you choose?

How often do Christians consider the lines of implication that the doctrines of the Trinity and Hypostatic Union send out into all of life? Could we say that most Christians consider understanding these two doctrines and their implications as vitally important for living life? Or might we say that though most Christians think of these two doctrines as essential to the Christian faith, they do not see them as having any real significant relevance for Christian living? In other words, would we be right in thinking that most Christians think of these doctrines as dry and abstract without any real import for the daily grind of living life?

I would guess that most of you who are reading this article would agree that Christians in general fail to see the relevance of these two doctrines for understanding life in general and living the Christian life in particular. I’ve spent most of my life failing to see their profound relevance for “life under the sun.” So I began to wonder, “What might account for this widespread failure to recognize the deeply practical significance of the Trinity and Hypostatic Union?” Consider Ralph Smith’s thoughts about the lack of Trinitarian thought in the church.

“As Carl F.H. Henry rightly protested, ‘The doctrine of the Trinity is seldom preached in evangelical churches; even its practical values are neglected…’ It is not that the essential points are unknown—though perhaps in some churches even that may be a problem—it is more that pastors and their congregations have not really considered the implications of the doctrine. Once the doctrine is proved from Scripture, little more is taught about it. This is a tragedy since the doctrine of the Trinity is the crux of the Christian understanding of the world” (Trinity and Reality: An Introduction to the Christian Faith, xii).

I think this widespread failure really comes down to the fact that pastors themselves have failed to think out the practical importance of these two great doctrines particularly as it relates to interpretation and preaching. When pastors begin to think out the practical significance of the Trinity and Hypostatic Union particularly with reference to preaching, I believe their preaching will become much more gospel-centered regardless of the text. So let’s briefly explore a few of the lines of implication that these two great doctrines send out into the realm of interpretation and preaching.

The One God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

The Christian doctrine of God is that there is one God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God has never been nor ever will be just Father. Neither has God ever been or ever will be just Father and Son or Father and Spirit. No, the Christian God has forever been and will forever be Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He is eternally the Triune God. T. F. Torrance writes:

“God’s distinctive self-revelation as Holy Trinity, One Being, Three Persons, creates the overall framework within which all Christian theology is to be formulated. Understandably, therefore, the doctrine of the Holy Trinity has been called the innermost heart of the Christian faith and worship, the central dogma of classical theology, the fundamental grammar of our knowledge of God” (The Christian Doctrine of God: One Being, Three Persons, 2).

So what happens to redemption if God is not Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? What happens to the gospel if God is just one person? In other words, what relevance does the doctrine of the Triune God have with reference to the gospel? In its personification of love, 1 Corinthians 13 teaches that love is always self-giving ever moving outward in relationship with others. It always seeks the benefit of other persons.

(article is currently being revised…)

This post is the manuscript of a seminar that was originally written for a men’s retreat. But even though I wrote it specifically for men, it has application for all who desire to be gospel-driven. If you want to save the document in WORD format, click on the link below. Blessings!

Real Men are Gospel-Driven lecture notes

Real Men (and women) are Gospel-Driven
Dan Cruver

Introduction: The title of my session is “Real Men are Gospel-Driven.” I could have entitled it “Real Men are Gospel-Centered” just as easily. But in either case, the topic as it stands has broad application. I could talk about men being gospel-driven as husbands, as fathers, as congregants, as servants, as leaders, as employees or employers, etc., but my emphasis here is not so broad. What I’m primarily concerned with here is men being gospel-driven as students of Scripture. Why? Because it seems to me that if men are gospel-driven in this way, if men are gospel-driven in their study and application of Scripture, then they will increasingly become more gospel-driven in all these other areas of life. A husband and father who is a gospel-driven student of Scripture will find that he is becoming more gospel-driven as a husband and father. A single man who interprets and applies Scripture from a gospel-driven or gospel-centered perspective will find that he is becoming more gospel-driven in all of his relationships. So even though my primary concern here is with the study of Scripture, I’m not losing sight of the big picture.

At this point someone might say, “What does it even mean to be gospel-driven? I’m not sure I know what it means in general let alone what it means to be gospel-driven as a student of Scripture.” For now let me merely introduce an answer to that question by quoting Jerry Bridges from his article entitled “Gospel-Driven Sanctification.” Hopefully, by the time we conclude this session today you will have a fuller understanding of what it means to be gospel-driven particularly as it relates to Bible study. Regarding progressive-sanctification Bridges writes:

“We must always keep focused on the gospel because it is in the nature of sanctification that as we grow, we see more and more of our sinfulness. Instead of driving us to discouragement, though, this should drive us to the gospel. It is the gospel believed every day that is the only enduring motivation to pursue progressive sanctification even in those times when we don’t seem to see progress. That is why I use the expression ‘gospel-driven sanctification’ and that is why we need to ‘preach the gospel to ourselves every day’” (from “Gospel-Driven Sanctification” by Jerry Bridges).

What is gospel-driven sanctification? According to Jerry Bridges, it is sanctification that is motivated and empowered by the gospel. At the heart of gospel-driven sanctification is the conviction that the gospel is the very power of God for growing in Christ-likeness (cf. Romans 1:16-17). So, what is a gospel-driven man as it relates to life in general? To state it succinctly, a gospel-driven man is a man who lives and breathes the gospel. He is a man (1) who believes that the gospel is not just the power of God to give him entrance into the Christian life, but also the power of God to live the entirety of his Christian life; and (2) who lives accordingly.

What is a gospel-driven man as it relates to the study of Scripture in particular? He is a man (1) who believes that the center and ultimate reference point of Holy Scripture is the life, death, and resurrection of Christ; and (2) who interprets and applies Scripture accordingly. That being said, let’s consider the following two points as it relates to being gospel-driven men in our study of Scripture: (1) The Essential Centrality of the Gospel: A Biblical Perspective; and (2) The Functional Centrality of the Gospel: A Biblical Paradigm. Read the rest of this entry »

A friend of mine made me aware of this online audio discussion on The White Horse Inn. This particular program is entitled “Christ, the Center of Scripture.” It is part one of their new series on How to Read the Bible. I recommend it highly.

a http://www.whitehorseinn.org/listenonline.htm

2 Timothy 3:16-17 is often used, and rightly so, when discussing the value of personal Bible study. “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable…that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” The value of Bible study for the believer is that it is the means by which God equips him/her for Christian living. Given that Paul is primarily referring to the OT Scriptures in this context (verse 15, “sacred writings”), we can say that God in part equips believers to live the Christian life through the study of Genesis, Exodus, 1 & 2 Samuel, Esther, Ruth, Haggai, and every other OT book (side note: 2 Timothy 3:16-17 will not permit us to neglect the study of OT books like Haggai!).

Paul’s words to Timothy in these verses must be discussed when considering the necessity and benefit of studying Scripture. But there is a question that is not oftened asked when considering 2 Timothy 3:16-17, namely, how is it God equips believers for Christian living through an OT book like 1 Samuel? There are two common answers to this question.

(1) The stories of the OT were written down for our instruction. “Now these things [i.e. the things in Israel’s history spoken of in verses 1-5] took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did…Now these things happened to [Israel] as an example, but they were written down for our instruction” (1 Corinthians 10:6, 11). So God equips us for every good work through a book like 1 Samuel by giving us examples to follow or not to follow. Samuel Driver puts it like this: “The importance and real significance of the narrative lies in the types of character which they exhibit, and in the moral and spiritual lessons which…may be deduced from them. The patriarchs are tupoi hemoon; and in their biographies examples of faith and goodness–and also, sometimes, of unworthiness and moral failure–are set vividly and expressively before us” (The Book of Genesis 247). Therefore, for example, God equips His people in biblical friendship through accounts like that of David and Jonathan’s friendship in 1 Samuel 20.

(2) The OT Scriptures reveal the character of God to us. We learn that He is holy, righteous, compassionate, faithful, etc. It is as we see by faith the character of God as it is revealed in the OT that we are equipped to live the Christian life. The OT does set forth examples to be followed or not followed, but, to play off the Samuel Driver quotation, “the importance and real significance of the narrative lies in the character of God as it is shown in the text.” So we are equipped to be faithful as we by faith see the faithfulness of God in His dealings with Israel in the OT. We are equipped to be loving as we…etc.

As far as I am concerned, there is really nothing inherently wrong with these two answers (though I do have serious problems with Samuel Driver’s statement). The only real problem that I have with them is that they do not go far enough. Does God equip us through the instruction of OT stories? Yes. Does God equip us through the OT Scriptures as they reveal the character of God? Yes. But we still have not really answered our question, namely, how does God equip believers for Christian living through an OT book like 1 Samuel?

Consider the context of 2 Timothy 3:16-17. While exhorting Timothy to continue in what he had taught him, Paul makes a significant statement concerning the OT Scriptures which must influence our understanding of verses 16-17. Paul tells Timothy that “the sacred writings” (i.e. the OT Scriptures) “…are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus” (verse 15). So according to Paul, 1 Samuel is able to make us wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. As Donald Guthrie comments, “The mere reading of [the OT] Scriptures is ineffective in securing salvation unless faith is in operation, faith centered entirely in Christ” (The Pastoral Epistles 163). Concerning 2 Timothy 3:15-17, Graeme Goldsworthy states:

Paul here expresses the important hermeneutical principle that the Old Testament instructs us for salvation, but only in relation to Jesus Christ. The function of the gospel as the means of interpreting aright the Old Testament is inescapable…To understand the Bible correctly requires faith in Christ along with the Spirit’s enlightenment. Christ is revealed as the meaning of the Scriptures so that no part can be rightly understood without reference to him (Preaching the Whole Bible as Christian Scripture 85).

It seems to me that we need to carry this thought over into verses 16-17. If the Scriptures are only able to make us wise unto salvation through faith in Christ, must we also say that they are only able to equip us through faith in Christ? I believe the context indicates that God equips us by means of the Scriptures in the same He saves us by means of them, namely, through faith in His Son. To borrow from the language of Galatians 3:5-6, we are sanctified by faith in Christ just as we are justified by faith in Christ. It seems to me that 2 Timothy 3:15-17 ultimately requires us to understand and interpret every text in its necessary relationship to the Person and Work of Christ. “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable…that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work through faith in Christ Jesus.”

I taught my last Principles of Bible Study class of the semester on Friday, May 6th. It is hard to believe that my first full year of teaching this class is over. If my students learned half as much in taking the class as I have in teaching the class, I will be very pleased. What would please me most is if they are now convinced of the necessity of discerning the connection that every text they study has with the Gospel. If there is one thing my students might get weary of hearing me say, it is this: “You have not rightly handled or interpreted a text unless ultimately you can clearly identify its relationship to the Gospel.”

Every text has two contexts in which it must be interpreted, namely, its micro (i.e. the immediate context) and macro contexts (i.e. the larger context of the particular book and of Scripture as a whole). It is not enough merely to interpret a text in its relationship to its micro-context. As important as it is to understand a text in its immediate context, to do so does not mean that you have identified its relationship to the Gospel, that is, its relationship to what God has done in Christ to accomplish salvation. The failure to understand a text in its macro or redemptive-context is tantamount to the failure of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus to understand that the entire OT testifies to Christ in his suffering and subsequent glory (Luke 24:21).

How many sermons have you heard on Matthew 18:15-20 (process of church discipline) that have actually shown the text’s essential relationship with the work of Christ on the cross? I have heard plenty that have done an adequate job interpreting the text within its micro-context but very few in its macro-context. So how might we preach a sermon on Matthew 18 that takes in to account the macro-context of the entire Gospel of Matthew?

There are many questions that I think Matthew 18:15-20 presses upon us that may help us discern its connection to the work of Christ. Here are a few (all three questions are related and the answers I give are only suggestive):

Question One: What connection does Matthew 18:15-20 have with the climax of Matthew’s Gospel, namely, the passion of Christ?

Answer: In Matthew 18, an individual who refuses to repent is cut off from the community of faith. But it is at the cross where we see (1) what ultimately happens to a man who remains in an unrepentant state. He is cut off from God. At the cross Jesus was cut off from God because he bore the guilt of our sin. (2) We also see that Jesus was cut off that sinners might not be cut off from God’s presence. His work on the cross opened the way for sinners like you and me to enter into the holy presence of God (Matthew 27:51). If we fail to make that connection explicit, those who are working through the process of confronting another brother with his sin might very well fail to do so humbly. After all, both the ones exercising church discipline and the ones receiving it are equally in need of what Christ accomplished at the cross. Only when we see Matthew 18’s connection with Christ’s work on the cross will we be both confident and humble in walking through the discipline process. On the one hand, we will be confident because we know that the cross is the power of God unto restoring our wayward brother. On the other hand, we will be humble because we know that we too stand in desperate need of what Christ accomplished at Calvary.

Question Two: How is it possible to expel an unrepentant brother from the community of faith with a view to restoration? In other words, how can we hold out restoration as a possibility for one who has remained blatantly unrepentant through the entire discipline process? What hope is there for one who has been excommunicated from the Christian assembly?

Answer: It is possible to expel an unrepentant individual from the community of faith with a view to restoration because there is one who though he never sinned against God or his brothers but rather loved God with all his heart and his brothers as himself at all times, was expelled (i.e. forsaken, abandoned) from the Father’s presence in the unrepentant individual’s place. At the cross Jesus, the only truly righteous man, was treated as if he were the unrepentant one. He who knew no sin became sin for those who are in desperate need of restoration that they might become the righteousness of God in him. The only reason we can practice church discipline with a view toward restoration is because Jesus has already taken the sinner’s place thereby opening for him the path of life (Psalm 16:11).

Question Three: What must we do with the individual who has been expelled in order that we might see him restored?

Answer: Keep lovingly facing him (1) with what it means to be cut off from the community of faith, namely, you are cut off from the presence of God; and (2) with what Christ has done in his place that he might be restored. The cross is the one place where both of these truths are seen most clearly. Why must we bring this two-fold message of the cross to bear upon the expelled individual? (1) That he might be awakened to the sinfulness of his sin and its terrible consequences. (2) Because it is this very message of what Christ has done in his place that is the very power of God unto his restoration.

May we all seek to be Gospel-centered in our handling of texts like Matthew 18:15-20.

If you would like to comment on my blog’s new look, please feel free. My brother David did all the work! Thanks, David!