I’m hoping that this might become an occasional series on my thoughts about a biblical hermeneutic that is essentially Reformed in perspective and essentially baptistic. I know that sounds like I’m saying that I want to develop a method of reading the Bible that will result in believer’s-only baptism, but that isn’t what I’m intending. There are plenty of Baptists who are Reformed ¹By “Reformed” I mean more than just Calvinists. I’m thinking at least Calvinist but also adhering to a form of Covenant Theology in opposition to Dispensational or New Covenant Theology. and generally we read the Bible in similar ways. These Christians would most likely agree with the theology expressed in the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith. I’ll be using that confession as a guideline as I consider this subject.

So why develop a hermeneutic at all? Well, you have one even if you don’t know it and even if it isn’t consistently applied. A hermeneutic shouldn’t be a pair of shackles that bind you as you read the Scriptures, but neither should it be a pamphlet that introduces you to the city zoo but doesn’t really give you much detail. I think it should be somewhere in between those two and it should be an aid in making sense of the Biblical record.

“Why not just read the Bible and leave it at that?” Well, as I said, you have a hermeneutic whether you acknowledge it or not. When we read our Bibles we come to them with a set of presuppositions that affect how we understand the text. We need to be honest about that. If we think otherwise, we’re fooling ourselves. The question is not whether we have presuppositions or not, it is whether they are Biblical presuppositions. If we can acknowledge our presuppositions exist then we can try to allow the Bible to correct them where they need correction. I think this is possible to a certain resolution and then there will be honest differences after that. What I mean is that there will be some things that we’re just going to disagree on even if we use the same hermeneutic.

Let me give you an example of how some of this works. For a while after I became a Protestant, I adopted the dispensational teaching I’d heard on Christian radio. My presupposition was that there was a distinction between Israel and the Church in this age. The promises made to Israel were for ethnic Israel and were not transmitted to the Church. So as I was teaching through the book of Galatians, I got to chapter 3. I was doing okay till I got to verse 29, “And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.” Now I wanted the Abrahamic Covenant to be just for the Jews, Abraham’s offspring. When I read this verse I remember pushing back from the kitchen table and thinking, “How do I explain this?” I wanted to find a way to look Galatians 3:29 in the face and maintain the distinction. It took a second before my conscience kicked in and I decided that if the Bible says that we are heirs to Abraham’s covenant, then that was the way it was. ²This is not “replacement theology” where the Church replaces Israel. That would mean that the Jews were cut off and that clearly isn’t true. This is more “fulfillment theology” where the community of Israel is expanded and the promises that include the ingrafting of the Gentiles are part of the picture. I don’t know anyone who holds to replacement theology. I had to let my presupposition go or be at odds with what the Bible teaches. Once I released it, I saw in other passages that the same thing was true. It wasn’t taught only here. I hadn’t seen it in other places before because my presupposition caused me to read those verses a certain way.

An example of how a similar hermeneutic will only get us so much “resolution of agreement” is in the area of eschatology. Reformed Baptists are largely amillennial in their eschatology. Largely but not exclusively. I am premillennial of the historic kind. I’m not aware of any who are postmillennial but there are probably a few. Some of the issues that we face require more resolution than a hermeneutic that is generally agreed on can yield. This is really important to keep in mind because our eschatology can drive some of our presuppositions.

So back to the hermeneutic issue. I recognize that we’re going to have presuppositions and I want to include that reality in the development of the hermeneutic. To ignore them will insure failure. But I also want to make room for those presuppositions to be challenged and corrected by the testimony of the Bible.

Well, that’s the introduction to the topic. We’ll have to see if I go any farther with this, but I probably will. This is something that I’ve been thinking on for a while and it finally found its way to my finger tips.

There is a $27 million museum being build outside Cincinnati that promotes a creationist view of, well, creation. In this age of tolerance and peaceful coexistence, you’d figure the whole thing would be ignored except by those who already hold a literalist view of the first chapters of Genesis, right? Bah! One of the most intolerant groups of people in the world is scientists! Don’t you dare shake the status quo! And so a protest is planned because some “fear that their children may be influenced by what the museum teaches.” Egad! You mean they might think for themselves when presented with contradictory evidence! This cannot stand.

But the protesters include Christians as well. Go figure. I found this quote rather ironic:

“My brothers and sisters in the faith who embrace [the creationist] understanding call into question the whole Christian concept,” expressed the Rev. Mendle Adams, pastor of St. Peter’s United Church of Christ in Cincinnati, according to the Enquirer. “They make us a laughingstock.”

Is “the whole Christian concept” that we not be made a laughingstock Rev. Adams? Wasn’t this the kind of reaction the philosophers of Paul’s day had when he preached on Mars Hill? He confronted the worldview of the day and was not well received. It didn’t “call into question the whole Christian concept.” Look, Rev. if the creationists are wrong, they’re wrong based on faulty exegesis not based on what the world thinks of them.

The museum is being built by Answers in Genesis, a group who have on occasion jacked up my blood pressure with some of their exegesis. No, I’m not a fan. However, these people have as much right to build a museum that showcases their view of how we got here as does any other. If there was a group who build a museum to demonstrate that mankind arrived on this planet by means of an superior race who put us here as part of an eighth grader’s science experiment would there be protests? Perhaps there is some evidence for creation that cannot be put in a museum without “proper scientific interpretation?” Let them build the museum and let them compete in the marketplace of ideas.

Here it is. The perfect, and I mean absolutely perfect gift for the man who has everything.

Nothing.

This has already made its rounds in the blogs but I thought I’d point it out here too. There was recently a large church planting gathering in Florida. Mark Driscoll decided not to fly from one side the continent the other in order to deliver a 20 minute talk, so he sent a video. It was a good message and the Acts 29 folks brought a few cases worth of DVDs to hand out for free. After the video was played at the conference, the hosts decided not to hand it out. Bill Hybels had a problem with the complementarianism of it. Acts 29 got to haul back the cases of DVDs.

Russell Moore of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary recently had an article (PDF) published in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society on the complementarian/egalitarian debate. I kept that volume of JETS off the shelf so I could reread that piece. He says some interesting things but there is something in it that has me a bit worried. I can’t tell what, I need to revisit the article. It is, nonetheless, an interesting read.

Speaking of Moore, he was recently part of a panel discussion at 9 Marks on the subject of complentarianism. It is Mark Dever, CJ Mahaney, Moore and Randy Stinson. It is available as a free MP3 download and I recommend getting it and listening. Moore has some provocative statements such as “many people are involved in same sex marriages and they don’t even know it” and “complementarianism, I prefer patriarchy.” They also mention that IVP refuses to publish complementarian materials. However, Crossway Books has committed to publish compementarian stuff.

Finally, Wayne Grudem has published a new book on complementarianism. The title sounds a bit alarmist; “Evangelical Feminism: A New Path To Liberalism?” But having read and listened to Grudem a lot, I’m pretty sure it isn’t just paranoid.

Introducing Reformation Hardware! Reformation Hardware is a store that offers a (growing) handful of Reformation related items, tastefully done. We’re nailing the Reformation to the 21st century. T-shirts, mouse pads, stickers with Reformation mottos and images. I just ordered the mouse pad.

At this point, Reformation Hardware is a CafePress storefront, but we hope to move to an independent operation. As Reformation Hardware grows, we be able to add more products. Take a look and check back regularly, there are more logos to come.

Update: Just added a John Calvin design in its own storefront.

Well, well. It looks like “sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide with fluorine” or as we like to call it “kryptonite” may be real! Now, can we please locate Superman? We need some help in Iraq. Tell him that we promise not to use jadarite, er, kryptonite on him. Promise. For reals. And we won’t let Lex Luthor out of prison this time either.

I got the feedback from my assessment today. Here is the summary:

• The assessment team recognizes Tim as an elder caliber man who is more of a waterer than a planter.
• The assessment team recommends that Tim pursue placement in an established ministry as either a solo pastor or associate.
• The assessment team recommends that Tim develop his commitment to church planting by leading an established church to become a multiplying ministry.

So in the end I am not a church planter. Our district superintendent made the comparison between Apollos and Paul. Paul is most often found amongst unbelievers starting new things. Apollos is found amongst Christians feeding and watering. That illustration was helpful for me since I tended to feel guilty about not being more like Paul. It is okay to be Apollos. I am still very interested in church planting and a big advocate. They said that the role I seem to fit the best is not church planter but leading an established church to go become a church planting church. I couldn’t agree more!

This really rewrites my internship plans for this summer and totally retools my vision for what happens after I graduate. Can’t wait to see where the Lord leads next!

Added: I have been asked and yes, I am fine with this. I’d rather know this now than find out later. It is actually a bit of a relief because what I heard is that it is ok for me to be who I am and I can still have an effective ministry.

A recent article at First Things points out that:

This Lent we have seen the Discovery Channel airing a documentary about the “Lost Tomb of Jesus,” a New York confectioner making a life-sized Jesus out of chocolate, Newsweek boldly asking “Is God Real?,” and the New York Times discussing both theism as the outgrowth of brain architecture and the myth of the Exodus. The History Channel graced Easter Sunday night with “Banned from the Bible,” two hours about all that nifty stuff that was “deemed unfit to grace the pages of the sacred scriptures for Jews and Christians . . . heresy or hidden truth?”

The author then reflects on the “many-branched assault on the fabric of Christendom” but it got me thinking in a different vein. With every attack on Christianity this “olde tyme religion” answers her critics often soundly defeating them. The Da Vinci Code got whomped and so did Jesus’ tomb. Along the way the reality of the person of Jesus and the reality of his resurrection gains more credibility. The historicity of the “Christ event” ¹An academic term for the events recorded in the gospels. I really don’t like it because Jesus is a person not an event but it is useful shorthand for the entire story. is shown over and over to be a trustworthy thing.

And yet the media feeds on these pseudo-scholarly attacks on Christianity. They believe it will sell and so they go for it. I’m not convinced that they have an axe to grind with Christianity, I don’t really think the folks who run our media: a) care, b) understand, or c) have a conviction stronger than their bottom line. But their greed really does a service to the cause of Christ. By airing this trollop, they also provide an opportunity for Christian scholars to refute the errors and offer support for our truth claims. ²Another scholarly word that I’m not keen on. If it is truth it isn’t a claim. But that isn’t what it means and I need to chill out. :)

This is what happened in the early centuries of the church. Critics would write horribly misguided critiques of Christian beliefs and men like Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Jerome got to write lengthy and detailed refutations and statements of what the true faith is. But their letters were not made as public as our responses are. We get to use a media that beams the answer around the globe. We have electronic media that can duplicate those responses instantly instead of having to wait for monks to transcribe the work.

In the end I am glad to see the attacks on the faith. May God grant the church more powerful apologists like those in the past to stand up and defend her.

[HT: Herr Luther]

My Google news aggrate picked up an interesting article in the Burbank Leader which was printed on Saturday before Easter. Various religious traditions were asked about the reality of Jesus’ resurrection. Take a look for yourself, it is a fairly short read but a revealing one.

Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.

But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 1Co 15:12-20