Love One Another
Gerald L. Sittser
Inter-Varsity Press, Nottingham 2008
Love One Another is an interesting book about the right attitudes and behaviour we ought to have for one another in the Christian church (and all too often are sadly lacking in it must be confessed).
The chapters are all good expositions of the subjects they deal with, though I felt that the book is far stronger in describing what our attitudes should be like than it is in advising or guiding how we might actually change our churches and ourselves to be like this.
Each chapter begins with a relevant Bible verse. Even to look at the chapter names and the verses is helpful in seeing the kind of aspirations we might have as Christians for the churches where we worship:
1. The New Commandment
"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." (John 13:34-35)
Jesus' most fundamental commandment to his followers is both simple and profound - that we should love one another. The church is therefore a community of people who love each other. The rest of the book explores eleven ways in which we might seek to foster and develop our local fellowship as such a loving community.
2. Welcome One Another
"Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God." (Romans 15:7, ESV)
The most basic thing the church needs to get right is that when we see each other, or when strangers join us, we are to welcome each other. We have to actually be glad to see each other, and we are to make everyone feel that we value their company. Yet it is amazing how many churches fail in this regard.
3. Be Subject to One Another
"Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ." (Ephesians 5:21)
Christ commands his people to be different to the way the world is. We are not to "lord it" over each other. Instead, we are to submit to each other. We are to put one another's needs and one another's views and opinions before our own.
4. Forbear One Another
"Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love." (Ephesians 4:2)
Bearing with one another or forbearing each other means giving each other room to be ourselves, to express our doubts and fears, to sometimes fail, and sometimes disappoint. It is one of the most attractive qualities of a good Christian fellowship.
5. Forgive One Another
"Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you." (Colossians 3:12-13)
It is inevitable in any group of people that at times people will do things they shouldn't and things we don't like. In such occasions, Christ and the apostles exhort us to forgive one another just as we have been forgiven for our sins by God.
6. Confess Sin to One Another & Pray for One Another
"Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." (James 5:13-16)
The Bible is at times admirably clear and it is often those clear statements that we find the most difficult to put into practice. But here James is clear we are supposed to confess our sins to each other - to admit when we've done wrong to those we have wronged. Confession is almost the mirror image of forgiveness in a healthy relationship. As well as confession, we are to regularly and always pray for one another.
7. Serve One Another
"You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: 'Love your neighbour as yourself.'" (Galatians 5:13-14)
One of the most practical expressions of Christian love is in serving one another. Far too often the simple things like offering a helping hand is overlooked, but it is at the heart of the new humanity that Christ is building in the Kingdom of God.
8. Encourage One Another
"Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing." (1 Thessalonians 5:11)
Offering encouragement, using our time with others to be positive and build them up, is another of those little things that is easily overlooked, but when present in a fellowship is like oil that lubricates and keeps the machinery working smoothly. It is something we Scots are very bad at in general. We could all do with giving more encouragement and accepting such encouragement when given in our lives.
9. Comfort One Another
"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God." (2 Corinthians 1:3-4)
Giving comfort to others operates in a similar way to encouragement, but whereas the latter focuses on when things are going well or when we've done something good, comfort focuses on when things aren't going so well. We all need to be comforted at times of sadness, grief or regret.
10. Bear One Another's Burdens
"Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." (Galatians 6:2)
This is a practical aspect of loving and serving each other. Sometimes we just need to get stuck in and help people in practical ways. Often such help is more deeply appreciated than all the words we could say or offers of prayer we could make.
11. Stir Up One Another
"And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near." (Hebrews 10:24-25, ESV)
The key words could be also be translated as "spur one another on" (NIV). It is a special form of encouragement and a real gift for a fellowship that has to be used with much wisdom and discernment. When others are in a period of stagnation or have become lukewarm, this stirring up or spurring on is a healthy prod to get them back on track and more active in Christian life and witness.
12. Admonish One Another
"Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts." (Colossians 3:16)
Finally another gift for a church that needs to be used carefully and wisely. In essence it means that there are times when we need to gently point out to others where they have strayed and in a Christlike way seek to bring them back to faith and obedience to God's Word once more.
Sunday, 26 August 2012
Holidays
We're just back from a lovely week's holiday at Ambrisbeg Cottage on the Isle of Bute. It was a really relaxing and restful break. As ever for the west coast of Scotland the weather was mixed but warm and sunny a lot of the time and we enjoyed exploring the island. The extra fun this year was going away with our seven-month old son. He had his first experience of the sea, a sandy beach, had a wee paddle in a tidal pool and a wee swim in the indoor pool in Rothesay.
Thoroughly recommended if a holiday in a cottage on a Scottish island is your idea of a good holiday.
Thoroughly recommended if a holiday in a cottage on a Scottish island is your idea of a good holiday.
Saturday, 11 August 2012
The King Jesus Gospel
The King Jesus Gospel
Scot McKnight
Zondervan 2011
In this challenging, radical, yet somehow comforting book, Scot McKnight tackles the centrepiece of evangelical theology - the gospel itself - and makes the stark claim that evangelicals have often failed to understand or preach the full biblical gospel. In fact McKnight takes us back to basics by asking the question: What is the gospel?
Now this is a question that evangelicals think we know the answer to. It's our question. Par excellence. We feel we own it.
McKnight argues that evangelicals have traditionally answered this question wrongly because we confuse the gospel with the plan of salvation. We have often been content with a partial gospel about our own personal salvation instead of the gospel preached by the apostles and by Jesus himself which was much bigger than just answering the question "How do I get saved?"
To borrow a telling phrase from theologian Dallas Willard, we have reduced the gospel to being about mere "sin management"rather than being about Christ's lordship over the whole world and all of life. And we have too often concentrated on making converts rather than - as Christ and the apostles focused on - making disciples. In this respect, McKnight says what we call evangelical Christianity would really be more accurately dubbed soterian Christianity or salvationist Christianity.
The trouble is that a soterian approach leads to a soterian culture instead of a genuine gospel culture. Church life becomes all about getting people into the "saved club" rather than Christ's lordship of all of life and church life being about all of life. A gospel culture's focus - just like the New Testament's focus - is about making disciples, not just converts. Rather than focusing on getting people in, the focus is on what to do with people once they are in.
I found McKnight's analysis convincing. I think he is right that there is a tendency to separate the plan of salvation from its biblical moorings in the Story of Jesus which is in itself rooted in the Story of Israel. McKnight makes the point that the plan of salvation is not the gospel. It exists. It is biblical. It emerges from the Bible's Story. The plan of salvation is dependent on the gospel, but it not the gospel.
It is well into the book before McKnight finally answers the question. The gospel is the Story of Jesus as culmination and resolution of the Story of Israel. The gospel is the announcement that God's King (Jesus) has now come to rule God's world.
He shows that this is the gospel Paul preached, regarding 1 Corinthians 15:1-5; 20-28 as the essence of the gospel:
This means that the four books we call "the Gospels" actually are the Gospel. They are therefore not mere story books before we get to the theology of the Pauline letters. They are preeminent. They are the gospel. That's why they are each called "The Gospel [singular] according to..."
This also means the ancient creeds are the gospel. I have heard evangelicals say they believe the Apostles' Creed but are disappointed it doesn't deal the gospel - by which they mean the plan of salvation - but if the gospel in summary is about who Jesus is and what he's done, then the creeds are very close to the 1 Corinthians 15 passage.
And therefore we can also agree that Jesus himself preached the gospel. (It is surprising how many evangelicals would deny this, thinking that we don't get to the gospel before the book of Acts and the letters of the New Testament.) Yes, Jesus preached the gospel because as the Messiah he is the very embodiment of the gospel in his actions as well as his teachings.
On this view, the Jesus of the Gospels with his Kingdom of God emphasis is in total harmony with the Christ of the Epistles. As McKnight shows, Paul's gospel was also Peter's gospel and all the other apostles, and it was also Jesus' gospel. One of the great things about McKnight's understanding is how it really brings the whole New Testament together.
It will come as no shock that I really liked The King Jesus Gospel. I have a feeling that because Scot McKnight challenges the heart of what we evangelicals think we are about he will be attacked for this book and these insights. It is now predictable that this will be so. The same people attacked proponents of the New Perspective on Paul (with which McKnight's views have much in common) for the same reasons. The truth is that McKnight's gospel does not take anything away from us. It gives us a whole lot more. Whether we like the more - the need to build communities of disciples rather than clubs of the saved - is another question again.
Scot McKnight
Zondervan 2011
In this challenging, radical, yet somehow comforting book, Scot McKnight tackles the centrepiece of evangelical theology - the gospel itself - and makes the stark claim that evangelicals have often failed to understand or preach the full biblical gospel. In fact McKnight takes us back to basics by asking the question: What is the gospel?
Now this is a question that evangelicals think we know the answer to. It's our question. Par excellence. We feel we own it.
McKnight argues that evangelicals have traditionally answered this question wrongly because we confuse the gospel with the plan of salvation. We have often been content with a partial gospel about our own personal salvation instead of the gospel preached by the apostles and by Jesus himself which was much bigger than just answering the question "How do I get saved?"
To borrow a telling phrase from theologian Dallas Willard, we have reduced the gospel to being about mere "sin management"rather than being about Christ's lordship over the whole world and all of life. And we have too often concentrated on making converts rather than - as Christ and the apostles focused on - making disciples. In this respect, McKnight says what we call evangelical Christianity would really be more accurately dubbed soterian Christianity or salvationist Christianity.
The trouble is that a soterian approach leads to a soterian culture instead of a genuine gospel culture. Church life becomes all about getting people into the "saved club" rather than Christ's lordship of all of life and church life being about all of life. A gospel culture's focus - just like the New Testament's focus - is about making disciples, not just converts. Rather than focusing on getting people in, the focus is on what to do with people once they are in.
I found McKnight's analysis convincing. I think he is right that there is a tendency to separate the plan of salvation from its biblical moorings in the Story of Jesus which is in itself rooted in the Story of Israel. McKnight makes the point that the plan of salvation is not the gospel. It exists. It is biblical. It emerges from the Bible's Story. The plan of salvation is dependent on the gospel, but it not the gospel.
It is well into the book before McKnight finally answers the question. The gospel is the Story of Jesus as culmination and resolution of the Story of Israel. The gospel is the announcement that God's King (Jesus) has now come to rule God's world.
He shows that this is the gospel Paul preached, regarding 1 Corinthians 15:1-5; 20-28 as the essence of the gospel:
- Christ died for our sins
- Christ was buried
- Christ is risen from the dead
- Christ has appeared to people
- Christ is victorious over his enemies
This means that the four books we call "the Gospels" actually are the Gospel. They are therefore not mere story books before we get to the theology of the Pauline letters. They are preeminent. They are the gospel. That's why they are each called "The Gospel [singular] according to..."
This also means the ancient creeds are the gospel. I have heard evangelicals say they believe the Apostles' Creed but are disappointed it doesn't deal the gospel - by which they mean the plan of salvation - but if the gospel in summary is about who Jesus is and what he's done, then the creeds are very close to the 1 Corinthians 15 passage.
And therefore we can also agree that Jesus himself preached the gospel. (It is surprising how many evangelicals would deny this, thinking that we don't get to the gospel before the book of Acts and the letters of the New Testament.) Yes, Jesus preached the gospel because as the Messiah he is the very embodiment of the gospel in his actions as well as his teachings.
On this view, the Jesus of the Gospels with his Kingdom of God emphasis is in total harmony with the Christ of the Epistles. As McKnight shows, Paul's gospel was also Peter's gospel and all the other apostles, and it was also Jesus' gospel. One of the great things about McKnight's understanding is how it really brings the whole New Testament together.
It will come as no shock that I really liked The King Jesus Gospel. I have a feeling that because Scot McKnight challenges the heart of what we evangelicals think we are about he will be attacked for this book and these insights. It is now predictable that this will be so. The same people attacked proponents of the New Perspective on Paul (with which McKnight's views have much in common) for the same reasons. The truth is that McKnight's gospel does not take anything away from us. It gives us a whole lot more. Whether we like the more - the need to build communities of disciples rather than clubs of the saved - is another question again.
Monday, 6 August 2012
The Dawkins Letters
The Dawkins Letters: Challenging Atheist Myths
David Robertson
Christian Focus Publications 2007
I borrowed a copy of this short book from the local library. It is actually a series of open letters from David Robertson (a minister of the Free Church of Scotland in Dundee) to Richard Dawkins about Dawkins' book The God Delusion.
It is amazing how reviews of this book and others like it - and Dawkins' own book to be fair - on places like Amazon are almost all sharply divided down Christian/Atheist lines. Perhaps that should not surprise me, but it does. Basically, atheists seem to love Dawkins' book and hate Robertson's book. And vice versa for Christians.
Well as a Christian, I liked Robertson's book. I thought in the ten letters he succeeded in the most important point, which is pointing out that atheism is primarily a philosophical and not a scientific position. Dawkins' position is in the end consistent with science but not derived from science. Yet I would say the same can be said for many theistic views.
In fact, Dawkins' worldview at times relies on "the science of the gaps" (a phrase I loved that Robertson uses a few times) in theories that sound as much science fiction as science and therefore are as much faith based as Christian doctrines - parallel universes and alien implantation of life on earth and so forth.
In the final analysis, I think theists and atheists tend to bring presuppositions to the table before looking at the evidence. The same evidence leads one man to say "there is no god" and another to say "the heavens are telling the glory of God."
No one book, whether Dawkins' or Robertson's, is going to lay the knock-out blow to the opposing view. But Robertson's book certainly shows that atheist presuppositions and arguments are open to serious criticism, all too often of precisely the same criticisms that are used by atheists against Christianity.
David Robertson
Christian Focus Publications 2007
I borrowed a copy of this short book from the local library. It is actually a series of open letters from David Robertson (a minister of the Free Church of Scotland in Dundee) to Richard Dawkins about Dawkins' book The God Delusion.
It is amazing how reviews of this book and others like it - and Dawkins' own book to be fair - on places like Amazon are almost all sharply divided down Christian/Atheist lines. Perhaps that should not surprise me, but it does. Basically, atheists seem to love Dawkins' book and hate Robertson's book. And vice versa for Christians.
Well as a Christian, I liked Robertson's book. I thought in the ten letters he succeeded in the most important point, which is pointing out that atheism is primarily a philosophical and not a scientific position. Dawkins' position is in the end consistent with science but not derived from science. Yet I would say the same can be said for many theistic views.
In fact, Dawkins' worldview at times relies on "the science of the gaps" (a phrase I loved that Robertson uses a few times) in theories that sound as much science fiction as science and therefore are as much faith based as Christian doctrines - parallel universes and alien implantation of life on earth and so forth.
In the final analysis, I think theists and atheists tend to bring presuppositions to the table before looking at the evidence. The same evidence leads one man to say "there is no god" and another to say "the heavens are telling the glory of God."
No one book, whether Dawkins' or Robertson's, is going to lay the knock-out blow to the opposing view. But Robertson's book certainly shows that atheist presuppositions and arguments are open to serious criticism, all too often of precisely the same criticisms that are used by atheists against Christianity.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)