Stylos is the blog of Jeff Riddle, a Reformed Baptist Pastor in North Garden, Virginia. The title "Stylos" is the Greek word for pillar. In 1 Timothy 3:15 Paul urges his readers to consider "how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar (stylos) and ground of the truth."
Image (left side): Decorative urn with title for the book of Acts in Codex Alexandrinus.
Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of
the Lord draweth nigh (James 5:8).
In v. 8 James exhorts: “Be ye also patient.” In v. 7 he offered
the mini-parable of the patient farmer: “Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the
precious fruit of the earth….” James is saying look to the farmer as an example
of one who is longsuffering even though he does not see any immediate growth on
the surface, but also, most importantly, learn from the patience of the Lord
himself.
He adds a second exhortation: “stablish your hearts” (v. 8b).
The verb here is sterizo, meaning to strengthen. Make strong and
vigorous your hearts, the center of your affections. The Christian faith is for
those who know that when they are weak, then he is strong, but the Christian
life is not for the spiritually faint-hearted, for spiritual weaklings. In
Christ’s parable of the sower, the seed that fell on the shallow soil did not
last (Mark 4:5-6).
There are just too many difficult things one will have to encounter
in this life to think that he can breeze through it all without ever exercising
the spiritual disciplines that will result in the strengthening of his heart. Why
are we baptized? Why do we come to the Lord’s table in the context of God’s
people? Why do we read and memorize God’s word? Why do we attend to the preaching and teaching
of the Scriptures? Why do we learn the practice of prayer? It is so that we
might have our hearts strengthened, so that, by God’s grace, when we face
resistance, obstacles, setbacks, opposition, and suffering our hearts are
strong. It is so that we might face such things and not be undone and destroyed
by them, but that we might be patient even in afflictions.
Finally, James adds at the end of v. 8: “for the coming of
the Lord drawth nigh.” I’ve mentioned before driving once on some back roads
towards the beach in NC and passing a sign that read, “Jesus is coming soon!”
The problem was that the sign was faded, the paint was peeling, and the sign
board was warped. It was a mixed message at best.
But we must remember what Peter said: “one day is with the
Lord like a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Peter 3:8;
Psalm 90:4).
Our job is not to know when he coming. Christ himself said
that no man knows that day or that hour (Mark 13:32-33). Our job is to know
that God is at work in the world and that he is coming and that in the meantime
(the in-between time) we are to be found faithful, so that we are not ashamed
when he does come.
I was happy to contribute an article to the new e-booklet O Come, O Come, Emmanuel: Devotions for December Lord's Days 2020, published by the IRBS Theological Seminary.
My article is titled "Though You Are Little," a reflection on Micah 5:2-5a; Matthew 2:1-6 (pp. 18-31).
The e-booklet is available to be downloaded for free from the IRBS website (find it here).
Note: This episode concludes this series. It is Episode 126 of 126. The series began on 2/19/19.
This is an occasional series of readings from and brief notes
and commentary upon Eusebius of Caesarea’s The
Ecclesiastical History: Book 10, chapter 8-9.
Notes and Commentary:
These final two chapters in the EH
describe the Emperor Constantine’s final victory over his rival Licinius to
unite the Roman empire and to ensure peace and security for the Christians.
Chapter 8 describes
the intrigues of Licinius against Constantine and the Christian community. Eusebius
notes that although Constantine acted graciously toward Licinius, who stood
second in rank to him, even giving his sister in marriage to Licinius, he
rejected this good will and rebelled against Constantine. In the end, however, God
proved to be Constantine’s “Friend and Protector and Guardian.”
In his rebellion, the ire of Licinius
was not just aimed at Constantine but also against the Christians. Eusebius notes
that Licinius first drove Christians from his palace and then deprived Christian
soldiers in his army of their rank.
He also passed various unjust
ordinances, including a law that forbade the humane distribution of food to
those who were imprisoned. He banished or arrested various men of nobility and
high-esteem. Eusebius also accuses Licinius of immorality in his abuse of many
married women and unwedded girls to satisfy his “unbridled lust,” calling him a
“drunken old dotard.”
In the final stages of his “madness”
Licinius struck against the bishops, putting some to death, and against the
churches, throwing them down “from top to bottom” or shutting them up. Some of
those put to death had their bodies cut to pieces with the sword and the pieces
of their body were cast in the sea as “food for fishes.” Many of the men of God
fled again to the fields, deserts, glens, and mountains to escape this
persecution.
Chapter 9 notes how
Constantine defeated Licinius. The “humane” Emperor and his son, Crispus,
stretched out “the right hand of salvation” by going into battle against “the
haters of God” and quickly won the victory.
Oulton explains in a footnote: “Licinius
was defeated first at Adrianople, 3 July and secondly, when he had fled to
Byzantium and had been forced to cross the Straits at Chrysopolis (Scutari),
September 18 or 20, 324. Shortly afterwards, Constantine had him put to death”
(476-477, n. 1).
The “pictures and honours” of
Licinius were disgraced, and he was “cast down prostrate.”
Constantine, the “most mighty
Victor,” “recovered the East” and “formed the Roman Empire, as in the days of
old, into a single, united whole.” The populace had all fear taken away and
celebrated the victory with “brilliant festivals,” as “all things were filled
with light.” Praise was given first to God and then to Constantine and his
sons.
Conclusion:
Eusebius ends the EH with
this narrative of the triumph of Constantine over Licinius and with the peace of
the Christians in the Roman Empire established. By AD 380, Christianity will be
made the official religion of the Empire by the Edict of Thessalonica issued by
the Emperor Theodosius. It continues to be debated today whether Constantine’s
embrace and protection of the church was a blessing or detriment to the Christian
movement.
Well done thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy Lord (Matthew 25:21).
A funeral service of worship in praise to God through Christ and with thanksgiving for the life and ministry of our sister will be held at Christ Reformed Baptist Church (2997 Courthouse Road, Louisa, Virginia 23093) on Monday, November 23, 2020 at 2:00 pm. The family will greet friends in the Fellowship Hall after the service. Interment will be private.
Last week I was asked to do a Zoom lecture to a group of staff, leaders, and deputation speakers from the Trinitarian Bible Society giving my
take on the current state of academic text criticism and the current popular resurgence of
interest in the TR. On the latter topic I noted the following:
Just as the Reformation was aided by the printing
press, this movement has been aided by the internet (blogs, websites, FB
groups, and podcasts), which has allowed advocates for the TR to put forward
their message and get around the normal “gatekeepers” (seminaries, mainstream
book publishers, etc.).
In other words, the TR is promoted by “amateurs” and resisted
by “professionals.”
I thought of this when I listened to the recent podcast on
the new biography of Samuel Prideaux Tregelles, who was also an “amateur”,
working outside the professional guild, laboring in the iron works by day and doing
text criticism by night (though, in his case, he worked against the TR).
One thinks as well of someone like James Snapp, Jr. who often
has a knack of seeing things that the “professionals” do not. Or, consider that
when we were exploring Ephesians 3:9 it was an “untrained” college student (“CC”)
who kept finding texts with the TR reading and not a “trained” man with a
respected doctorate.
Then, this morning I happened to be reading the little booklet
by media analyst Marshall McLuhan and graphic designer Quentin Fiore (co-ordinated by Jerome Agel), The Medium is the
Massage: An Inventory of Effects (Bantam, 1967) [Note in the title it is “Massage,”
a play on McLuhan’s better known The Medium is the Message]. The point
being that the electronic media “shapes, works over, alters—massages—every instant
of our lives” (148). And this was written in 1967 mainly in reference to the
advent of television, but eerily predictive of the internet.
More to the point, the book has an intriguing discussion of
the “amateur” in this brave new world.
It begins with a paragraph on Michael Faraday, a self-taught
amateur, “who had little mathematics and no formal schooling beyond the primary
grades” but who became a celebrated “experimenter who discovered the induction
of electricity” and thus became “one of the great founders of modern physics”
(92).
McLuhan and Fiore then add this interesting paragraph:
“Professionalism is environmental. Amateurism is
anti-environmental. Professionalism merges the individual into patterns of
total environment. Amateurism seeks the development of the total awareness of
the individual and the critical awareness of the groundrules of society. The
amateur can afford to lose. The professional tends to classify and specialize,
to accept uncritically the groundrules of the environment. The groundrules
provided by the mass response of his colleagues serve as a pervasive environment
of which he is contentedly and unaware. The ‘expert’ is the man who stays put”
(93).
Crawford Gribben of Queens University Belfast interviews Timothy C. F. Stunt on his new book The Life and Times of Samuel Prideaux Tregelles: A Forgotten Scholar on the New Books Network podcast.
Whereas
ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a
vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away (James 4:14).
I
am glad to be a Christian, because we get to ask the ultimate questions of life,
as James poses it here: “For what is your life?”
He
begins to answer that question by stressing the brevity and fragility of life. James
says that life is like a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes
away. Where we live close to the mountains it is not unusual to wake up in the
early morning to find a hazy vapor hanging low in the air, which soon
disappears as the sun rises. James says that life is like this. It is brief. It
is fleeting. It is fragile.
A
similar point had been made earlier in his warning to the rich in 1:10-11 where
the brevity of life was compared to the flower of the grass that soon passes
away (cf. Isaiah 40:6-8).
There are many other places in the Old Testament, in particular, where
this point is made. One of the most vivid is Psalm 90, a prayer of Moses the
man of God, in which we read this petition: “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply
our hearts unto wisdom” (Psalm 90:12).
Week
before last I was at the funeral of my 52-year-old cousin. He had been a gifted
athlete in his younger years, voted most likely to succeed his senior year in
high school, had a good job as an engineer, loved to build and fix things, had
a wife and three young adult children, was expecting his first grandchild, and
was a Christian man devoted to his local church. But cancer took his life away
in a year’s time.
We
also recently prayed for the family of Pastor Gary Hendrix who died last week
at age 73 after 50 years as a pastor at Grace RBC in Mebane, NC. Pastor Hendrix
was active on twitter and on October 23, 2020 he sent his last tweet which
read, “I have kept vigil by many death beds, now it is my time to lay on one of
my own. Sobbing.”
Friends,
we will all one day keep vigil at our own death bed, whether we be 20, 52, or
73, or whatever.
This is an occasional series of readings from and brief notes
and commentary upon Eusebius of Caesarea’s The
Ecclesiastical History: Book 10, chapter 6-7.
Notes and Commentary:
These chapters present two more
imperial letters (one each respectively) relating to privileges being granted
to Christians following the end of persecution against them.
Chapter 6 provides a
copy of a letter from Constantine to Caecilian bishop of Carthage, in which he
informs the bishop that he has ordered three thousand folles be given to
the churches. Oulton notes: “The follis was originally a small bag of
coins, but afterwards came to denote a coin itself, the double denarius” (461,
n. 2). He also tells Caecilian that if he has any trouble from any in his
government who oppose the Christians he should go to Anulinus, the proconsul,
and Patricius, the “Vicar of the Prefects,” to report this.
Chapter 7 is a
letter from the emperor to Anulinus, proconsul of Africa, in which he orders
Anulinus, that the “presidents of the church” (“clerics”) “be kept absolutely
free from public offices” so that they can devote their time to performing the
worship services of God, in which “they confer incalculable benefit on the
affairs of the State.”
Conclusion:
These chapters continue to show the
benefits and privileges that came to Christians during the rule of Constantine.
We might paraphrase a line from song in the musical Hamilton, “It must be nice
to have Constantine on your side.” In the long run, this will prove to be
something of a mixed blessing for Christians. They were freed from persecution,
but we see their affairs becoming entangled with the state.
I was pleased to be able to contribute an essay on pastoral theology, "The Administration and Administrators of Baptism", to the forthcoming festschrift for Pastor Albert N. Martin, edited by David Charles and Rob Ventura.
The book titled A Workman Not Ashamed: Essays in Honor of Albert N. Martin is being published by Free Grace Press and can be pre-ordered here.
Here is the forward to the work from Dr. Joel Beeke:
Al Martin’s ministry has had a profound impact on hundreds of faithful ministers and thousands of people for several decades, such that it is high time that a festschrift—that is, a book of essays reflecting his interests and passions written by friends, be written in his honor. I am grateful to David Charles and Rob Ventura who served as the organizers and editors for this festschrift, and wish to testify my gratitude to them and their fellow contributors that this book passes muster for what it is designed to do. I am confident that its honoree will be delighted with its contents.
To profit from this festschrift, one does not have to agree with every detail of each chapter of this book. A wonderful variety of subjects is presented to the reader, reaching the whole man: head, heart, and hands. Good scholarship, edifying soul-enriching food, and experiential and practical applications abound in these pages—all of which reflects Al Martin’s own ministry of the Word.
This book opens with a sketch of Al Martin’s life by John Reuther, who has known him for more than four decades, beginning when he first sat under Al’s preaching at Trinity Baptist Church in New Jersey.
Sam Waldron draws several encouraging points about preaching from Luke’s account of one of the most fruitful sermons in all history: Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). Here we are reminded that preaching is the authoritative proclamation of Christ from the Scriptures with a call to practical action.
Conrad Mbewe presents a plea that pastors mentor future pastors in the context of the local church, just as Trinity Baptist Church for many years sponsored its own academy for pastoral training. Pastors need to study books, but they also need to be with people to learn how godly pastors relate to their families and church members in a variety of settings.
Richard Barcellos provides a detailed exegetical study of the Greek text of Ephesians 4:12 to support the old translation that Paul uses all three phrases to describe the results of the ministry of the word (as in “for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ” KJV), not the newer translation that joins the first two to suggest that the ministry of the Word equips others to build up the body.
Alan Dunn writes an essay exploring how the church overcomes the world in its witness through suffering and martyrdom. Dunn strikingly calls this “the strategy of slaughtered lambs.”
Jim Savastio exhorts pastors to “feed the flock of God which is among you” (1 Pet. 5:2), that is, to preach to address the needs of the people whom God has entrusted to them. Toward that end, preachers must know their Bibles and know their flocks.
The core of the message that we preach is the gospel of justification by faith, and D. Scott Meadows opens Galatians 2:15–19 to proclaim that we can never be justified by works of obedience to God’s law. Our righteousness is Christ alone received by faith alone.
Rob Ventura touches upon a key theme in Al Martin’s life: the Holy Spirit and the preacher. Without the prevailing power of the Spirit to convict, convert, and comfort hearers, the preacher would be wise never to enter the pulpit.
Michael Haykin offers a chapter on the life of one of the earliest Reformed (or Particular) Baptist ministers, William Kiffen or Kiffin (1616–1701). Kiffen was a signatory and probably an author of the First London Baptist Confession of Faith (1644), and in 1689 he also signed the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith.
At the heart of Christ’s purpose to build His kingdom is the church, with its ordinances of worship. Jeffrey Riddle makes an argument that the ordinance of baptism should be done in the assembly of the church by its designated officers—not just by an informal gathering of believers.
Nothing is more important for the church to do than the worship of God. Scott Aniol explains the Reformed regulative principle of worship and its particular applications by Baptist churches in their practice of baptism, the Lord’s Supper, singing, and church polity.
The goal of preaching the gospel is to restore fallen men and women to fellowship with God—deep and rich communion, as is explored in the chapter by Jeffrey Waddington. He draws particularly from Geerhardus Vos’s insights into the purpose for which God created us.
Few Calvinistic Baptists have attained to the stature of the Bible commentator and systematic theologian John Gill (1697–1771). Gill’s sermon, “The Duty of a Pastor to His People,” originally given at the ordination of George Braithwaite in 1734, rounds out the book with a call to faithful pastoral ministry.
Here, then, you will find a book that honors a veteran minister and teacher of the Word by exhorting other ministers to preach the Word, shepherd the flock, do the work of an evangelist, and fulfill the commission placed upon them by the Lord. May God use the contributions of these authors to raise up preachers who fit the words of Francis Wayland (1796–1865): “From the manner in which our ministers have entered upon the work, it is evident that it must have been the prominent object of their lives to convert men to God.”
D. Scott Meadows, pastor of Calvary (Reformed) Baptist Church, Exeter, New Hampshire, has written an article worth reading titled "After the Election" on the Herald of Grace website.
Cleanse
your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded (James 4:8b).
James’s
instructions here may have been taken from Psalm 24, which asks, “Who shall
ascend into the hill of the LORD? Or who shall stand in his holy place?” (3)
and then answers, “He that hath clean hands and a pure heart” (v. 4a).
In
his commentary on James, the Puritan Matthew Poole notes that this is a call to
reform one’s actions and to amend his life. He notes that the call to cleanse
the hands, as the principle instrument of bodily actions, is a call to
“innocency of outward conversation [conduct].” Correspondingly, the call to
purify your hearts is a call amend one’s “thoughts and inward affections, from
whence the evils of your outward actions proceed.”
In
the beatitudes of Matthew 5, Christ taught: “Blessed are the pure in heart: for
they shall see God” (v. 8).
And
in Luke 6:45 Christ said: “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart
bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of
his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart
his mouth speaketh.”
Our
words are indeed a window into the condition of our heart.
We
are to heed James’s exhortation to reform both our outward actions (hands) and
our inward thoughts (heart), knowing that in this life we will not fully attain
to clean hands and pure hearts. Yet we also know one who had clean hands and a
pure heart, one who was tempted in all points even we are, and yet remained
without sin. He is the Lord Jesus Christ, and if our lives are hid in his, we
too may be found blameless in God’s sight.
This is an occasional series of readings from and brief notes
and commentary upon Eusebius of Caesarea’s The
Ecclesiastical History: Book 10, chapter 5.
Notes and Commentary:
This chapter contains four
important ordinances and letters, translated from the original Latin into
Greek, from the emperors Constantine and Licinius relating to the Christians.
The first is known as “The
Edict of Milan” (313). It grants freedom of worship not only to
Christians but to all Romans. It explicitly states, “we have granted to these
same Christians free and unrestricted authority to observe their own form of
worship.”
It also stipulates that any
property (like churches) taken from the Christians without compensation should
be freely restored to them.
The second is an
ordinance addressed to Anulinus, proconsul of Africa. It
stipulates that property taken from the churches be restored to them, “whether
gardens or building or whatsoever belonged to these churches by right.”
The third is an
imperial letter from Constantine to Miltiades, bishop of Rome, and to one named
Mark. It calls for a synod or meeting of bishops in Rome to address controversy
relating to Caecilian, bishop of Carthage, and to assure that there is no
schism in the church. Oulton explains that this referred to the so-called Donatist
controversy that was arising in Africa: “The Donatists (so called from a bishop
of theirs, Donatus) alleged that Caecilian had been consecrated by a bishop
(Felix) who in the Diocletian persecution had proved himself a traditor,
i.e., had surrendered up Scriptures to the pagan authorities. Hence they held
that Caecilian’s consecration was invalid; and by appointing a bishop of their own
in his stead began what is known as the Donatist schism” (454-455, n. 1).
The fourth is an imperial
letter from Constantine to Chrestus, bishop of Syracuse, relating to the
Council of Arles (314). It calls for a synod of bishops to meet in
Arles by the Kalends of August (the first day of August). The purpose of the
meeting was to continue to address problems relating to the Donatus schism.
Conclusion:
This chapter provides an important
historical record of the religious freedom that came to the Christians (and
pagans also) under Constantine with the Edict of Milan. It also gives insight
into the rise of the Donatist controversy and of imperial intervention into the
life of the church to address schism. The Council of Arles (314) will be a
forerunner to the Council of Nicea (325).
WM 181: Review: K. P. Yohannan, Never Give Up is posted. Listen above. Here are my notes:
There was an old Monty Python gag line, “And now for
something completely different” that I might employ today. In recent days we’ve
been covering a lot of things related to text criticism, but one of the bread
and butter content elements of this blog has been book reviews. So, in WM 181 I
am going to be offering a review of K. P. Johannan’s book Never Give Up: The
Story of a Broken Man Impacting a Generation (Gospel for Asia, 2020).
I picked up and read K. P. Yohannan’s Revolution in World
Missions decades ago. The book was first published in 1985 by Gospel for
Asia, Yohannan’s parachurch mission organization. There are millions of copies
in print. I have used anecdotes and illustrations from the book over the years.
Two things stood out about this book:
First, and most importantly, Yohannan critiqued the whole
Western missionary enterprise and its sending of Western missionaries into the
third world and suggested instead support for indigenous Christian workers.
Second, he critiqued the whole idea that doing “good works”
(or social work) is equal to preaching. A typical statement: “Substituting a
bowl of rice for the Holy Spirit and the Word of God will never save a soul and
will rarely change the attitude of a man’s heart” (112, thirtieth printing,
2004). I knew Yohannan did not share my Calvinism but saw him, nevertheless, as
an earnest evangelical and resonated (especially as a former missionary) with
many of his critiques of Western missions and the substitution of the social
gospel for the preaching of Christ crucified.
I had lost track of Yohannan until recent days when I saw this video of his conversation
with Hank Hanegraaff and Francis Chan. It was obvious that some major changes
had taken place in Yohannan’s life and ministry both by his personal appearance
(long hair and beard, large cross around his neck) and his new title
“Metropolitan” and even new name (Moran Mor Athanasius Yohan). Had he become
Eastern Orthodox, as has Hanegraaff? I followed up by listening to Hanegraaff’s
interview with Yohannan on his Unplugged podcast.
Mention was made in the podcast interview of Yohannan’s
memoir Never Give Up: The Story of a Broken Man Impacting a Generation
(GFA, 2020). I ordered a used copy and read it.
This is quite a different book than Revolution in World
Missions. Yohannan begins by describing and responding to charges of
financial corruption and mismanagement that had been lodged against Gospel for
Asia.
Yohannan begins by describing his despair in dealing with
this scandal and even confesses that he suffered suicidal thoughts during this
time. He is, on one hand, seemingly open, but on the other, rather vague, not
only about the whole financial scandal but also about the momentous spiritual
changes that have taken place in his life.
The man who wrote Revolution in World Missions was a
Protestant evangelical. It is clear that the man who wrote Never Give Up
has gone through some profound changes in his convictions. Let’s consider two:
(1) his transition from evangelical Protestantism to what might be called
Evangelical “Orthodoxy” [“Orthodoxy” is in quotes because Yohannan’s church
does not appear to be part of mainstream Eastern Orthodoxy—see below] ; and (2)
his embrace of social ministry apart from gospel preaching.
The move to Evangelical “Orthodoxy”:
For more biographical information, I turned to Yohannan’s Wikipedia page. It notes that Yohannan (b. 1950 in
Kerala, India) had worked with the parachurch ministry Operation Mobilization
in India for eight years (from age 16) and came to the US in 1974 to study at
(what was then) the Criswell Bible Institute in Dallas, TX, upon the personal
invitation of W. A. Criswell. After a short stint as pastor of an ethnically Native American SBC church, he and his
German-born wife started Gospel for Asia.
I also noted that according to the Wikipedia article states
that Yohannan had grown up in the Mar Thoma Syrian church in Kerala India, an offshoot of the St. Thomas Christians. The Mar Thoma church is an apparent
example of an Eastern (Oriental) Protestant church, which emerged in the nineteenth
century. This church, under the influence of Anglicanism, attempts to meld
Protestant theology with Orthodox liturgy.
This helped me understand his pilgrimage and how his
itinerant church planting ministry, under Gospel for Asia, has now issued in
the establishment of the Believers Eastern Church, over which Yohannan is now
Metropolitan (leading bishop).
There are references to this transition in Never Give Up,
but the details are sometimes vague. There is no “linear” narrative of how exactly
he made this transition from American-style evangelical para-church Protestantism
to this new episcopal, Eastern-influenced liturgical denomination came about.
Here are a few of the interesting statements made about Yoahannan’s
new theological conviction in Never Give Up:
The headwaters analogy (136-137): KPY uses the analogy of
needing to return to the “headwaters” of a stream to find water that is “still
clear and clean and pure.” He adds, “We can’t simply go back 500 years to the
Reformation and think we’re at the beginning. We need to return to the real
beginning, the early centuries” (137).
On theosis: KPY affirms the Eastern Orthodox concept
of theosis (deification) over against the Protestant concept of
sanctification/glorification (142-143).
On the acceptance of the Nicene Creed and its recital in
Sunday liturgy in the Believers Eastern Church (160-167): He writes, “It is our
plumb line of faith” (160).
On ecclesiology: He writes, “The true church is not
just individuals worshipping God on their own” (161).
On problems of “individual interpretation” of the Bible:
After affirming that the Bible “is God’s primary way of speaking to us” he
adds, “At the same time, we must keep in mind that the Scripture is not meant
for individual interpretation, for each of us to just read it and do what is
right in our own eyes” (163). He continues with an argument common with Roman
Catholic and Orthodox apologists, arguing that when Christians began to
interpret the Scriptures individually the result was “42,000 denominations”
each claiming “to be the one true church” (164). He closes, “Almost all cults
started as Bible study gatherings…” (164).
On Western Protestant intellectualizing of the faith: “Years
ago, in my journey, I found my heart and my head were in two completely
different worlds” (165).
On the centrality of the Eucharist: “If you are seeking for
the truth, I think you will eventually arrive at the reality that Holy
Communion (the Eucharist) is an important, unexplainable mystery” (169).
The embracing of social ministry apart from gospel preaching:
KPY confesses, “There was a time when I was a radical,
calling only for preaching the Gospel and forgetting about any kind of social
work. I’ve since had to repent and change my ways from saying social work
cannot be mission work” (173).
He does nuance this by saying that the Great Commission
cannot be fulfilled through social ministry alone but now lauds this
type of ministry (174).
He later shares that he even added a new chapter to the
latest editions of Revolution in World Missions to reflect his
repentance in this area (202).
How it Ends:
Never Give Up ends with a Biblical quote from the NLT of 1 Corinthians
4:4-5 that seems more than a little ambiguous: “My conscience is clear, but
that doesn’t prove I’m right. It is the Lord himself who will examine me and
decide” (224). Does he have a clear conscience even if not proven right
(guiltless) with respect to charges of financial mismanagement?
Final Thoughts:
Let me return to the two big transitions in Yohannan’s life
and thought:
First, what do we make of his transition to Evangelical
“Orthodoxy”? On one hand, we might say at KPY has simply come full circle in
returning to his childhood roots after a long detour through American
Protestant evangelicalism. So, his story could be seen as a personal journey.
It can also be examined for its wider implications. Yes,
there are many glaring weaknesses in evangelicalism: ecclesiologically,
theologically, and liturgically. Yes, the Western, Enlightenment influenced
approach to the faith too often addresses the head and not the heart. These
things finally caught up with KPY. Along these kinds of lines, one might
compare my previous review of Thomas Howard’s Evangelical Is Not Enough.
Yes, broad and vacuous evangelicalism too often results in spiritual
anemia in those hungry for substance, which sends them to Rome or
Constantinople or Canterbury looking for substantial nourishment. Former Christianity
Today editor Mark Galli’s conversion to Roman Catholicism in September 2020
is but the latest high profile example of this (see this article).
In KPY’s case, however, it seems he has not gone over to
Orthodoxy but to something like an “Orthodoxy” by way of Canterbury. By
founding a new church could he not be charged with just adding to the supposed
42,000 plus denominations?
It is also interesting that despite his critique of the
failures of evangelicalism, Never Give Up has a forward written by George
Verwer, founder of Operation Mobilization and the back cover has an endorsement
blurb from Calvary Chapel pastor Skip Heitzig (as well as Hannegraaff, now
Orthodox).
As a confessional Reformed Protestant, I also take exception
to his statement, “We can’t simply go back 500 years to the Reformation and
think we’re at the beginning. We need to return to the real beginning, the
early centuries.” By going back to the classical Reformed confessions, however,
are we not attempting to go back to the apostles and also back to the classic
creedal statements of the early church related to the doctrine of God and
Christ (as affirmed in the WCF and her daughter confessions)?
Rather than move to Rome, or Constantinople, or Canterbury,
can one find perhaps a more serious and meaningful expression of the faith by
going to Geneva (or London)?
Second, what are we to make of his embrace of “social
ministry”? Though Christ certainly taught that we are to love our neighbor as
ourselves and Paul taught in Galatians 6:10 that we are to do good to all men,
but especially to those who are of the household of faith, I still think that
the “old” Yohannan was right strongly to challenge the idea of social ministry apart
from the preaching of the gospel.
James 4:6: But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he
saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.
In James 4:1-5, the apostle describes man’s
dilemma in sin, including the lusts that war in his members (v. 1).
In v. 6, however, there is relief: “But he giveth
more grace.” This refers to God’s saving grace (cf. Eph 2:8-9). He gives to
those who are his own grace that is greater than all our sin. John 1:16 says:
“And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.” Some modern
versions render that last phrase in John 1:16 as “grace upon grace.” The idea
here is grace piled on grace, grace heaped on grace.
What if you had a huge debt. It was like a cloud
hanging over your head every day. It made you to lose sleep. The harder you
worked the further behind you got. But then someone comes along and says, I
have paid off all your debt and, what is more, there is a huge surplus left
over, and I have transferred this to our account also.
Our sin is great, but God giveth more grace.
James cinches his point by citing Proverbs 3:34,
“God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.” This fits with
Christ’s teaching in Matthew 23:12: “And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be
abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.”
Likewise,
in Matthew 18, we are told how Christ once set a child into the midst of his
disciples and said, “Verily I say unto you,
Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into
the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever
therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in
the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 18:3-4).
A child is generally not too proud to ask for help. An infant
will, in fact, wail and cry till his needs are met. Even though a toddler
cannot articulate the words, he can extend his arms and ask to be picked up and
comforted. It seems the older we get, the more prone we are to pride. The man
who stiffens his back in pride against God will be broken in his obstinance,
but the man who humbles himself will be saved.
Yes, our sin is great, but God giveth more grace. Let us then
humble ourselves, child-like, and extend our arms to him.
This is an occasional series of readings from and brief notes
and commentary upon Eusebius of Caesarea’s The
Ecclesiastical History: Book 10, chapter 4 (part three).
Notes and Commentary:
This section continues and completes
the lengthy chapter 4 which records the Panegyric of Eusebius dedicated to
Paulinus of Tyre at the end of persecution under the tyrants and the rise of
Emperors sympathetic to the Christians.
The occasion of the Panegyric is
the dedication of a magnificently restored and expanded church building.
This final part begins by
continuing a comparison between the physical restoration of the building and
the spiritual restoration of the people.
Eusebius notes, with thanksgiving,
how God first raised up the Emperors (Constantine and Licinius), “dearly beloved
of God” in order to cleanse “the whole world of all the wicked and baneful
persons and of the cruel God-hating tyrants themselves.” Next, he raised up his
disciples, including the church leaders, whom he had secretly concealed from
the storm of persecution.
Eusebius takes up a spiritual allegory
using the idea of locations of various persons in the church building to
describe how God had “duly divided the whole people according to their several
abilities.” Some were at the entrances. Others were at the pillars becoming acquainted
with “the letter of the four Gospels.” Still others were on the inside taking in
“the innermost mystic teachings of the Scriptures.” The whole temple was
adorned with “a single, mighty gateway”, the praise of God.
He also describes Christ as being
the “unique altar” and as standing by it as “the great High Priest of the universe.”
The Word has created not only this temple but the whole universe.
He closes the panegyric with a call
to worship “the Author of the present assembly … even the Ruler of the Assembly
Himself.”
Conclusion:
This final part concludes this lengthy
speech that comprises EH 10.4. Eusebius continues to celebrate and give thanks
to God for the removal of the tyrants and their replacement by the sympathetic
emperors. We also see his use of spiritual allegory in taking the dedication of
the restored building to describe the restoration of the Christian community with
Christ, as their altar, in the center.
This is an occasional series of readings from and brief notes
and commentary upon Eusebius of Caesarea’s The
Ecclesiastical History:Book 10, chapter 4 (part two).
Notes and Commentary:
This section continues the lengthy
chapter 4 which records the Panegyric of Eusebius dedicated to Paulinus of Tyre
at the end of persecution under the tyrants and the rise of Emperors
sympathetic to the Christians.
In this section Eusebius recalls
the pagan attacks on the Christians, and especially how the “books [no doubt,
including Bibles] they destroyed and set on fire the sanctuary of God” adding
“they profaned the dwelling place of His name to the ground.”
He also notes that this trial
served as divine chastisement for the church, as discipline from “a careful
father.” The end result was that the church emerged even stronger.
Paulinus is also highly praised as
“our new and goodly Zerubbabel.” Taking Christ as his “Ally and Fellow-worker”,
who alone can quicken the dead, Eusebius says that Paulinus “raised up her who
had fallen.”
Eusebius next gives a detailed
description of the church building that had been restored by Paulinus. It was built
on the foundations of the previous building and expanded. Oulton calls this
“the earliest account that we possess of the structure and furniture of a
Christian church” (421, n. 2).
He begins by describing an outer
porch, “great and raised aloft,” so that “even strangers to the faith” could
gaze inside. The building thus served as an “evangelistic” tool to encourage
pagans to enter. Between the entrance and the temple were “four traverse
colonnades, fending the place into a kind of quadrangular figure.” An open
space let in the sun and fresh air and fountains supplied “copious streams of
flowing water.”
Within the temple were the
“innermost porches,” adorned with “rich materials” including “costly cedars.” One
entered through three gates, the central one of which was larger and ornately decorated.
The building was ordered with
“perfect wisdom and art” leaving those who saw it in awe of “the surpassing
beauty of every part.”
The temple was also fitted with
thrones, “very lofty, to do honour unto the presidents”, and with benches.
In the midst was the “holy of
holies,” an altar, protected “with a fence of wooden lattice-work.”
The pavement was of “fair marble.”
Various chambers and buildings were also erected outside the temple.
After the description of the church
building, Eusebius says its beauty is fitting since Christ had taken the church
(both people and building) and changed its “foul body” into “His splendid and
glorious body.” This also anticipated what will happen at the resurrection, when
believers receive their glorious resurrection bodies.
Conclusion:
This panegyric is essentially a
building dedication speech or sermon. As Oulton points out it serves as the
earliest written description of an early Christian church building. Whereas,
according to the book of Acts and the letters of Paul, the church of the first
century met in the homes of believers or in rented school buildings (cf., e.g.,
Acts 18:7-8; 19:9; Rom 16:5) the Christian movement of the early fourth century
meets in spacious and prominent public buildings. The church building is described
in terms taken from the OT temple. There is a strong emphasis on the pleasing
aesthetics of the architecture of the building. The early Christians are concerned
that their churches be places of beauty and order. They are taking a new place
in the Roman public square.
Ye
ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your
lusts (James 4:3).
James
here suggests that one reason for unrest in the heart is faulty prayer,
immature prayer, self-serving prayer, described here as “asking amiss.”
He
reminds us that mature prayer, born of mature faith, does not center on the
satisfaction of our good pleasure but in doing God’s will, giving him glory and
in giving blessing to our neighbor.
So,
Christ taught: “And whatsoever ye
shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified
in the Son” (John 14:13; cf. John 16:23; 1 John 3:22).
The
reason to pray for an education is to love God with your mind.
The
reason to pray for a job is to serve God with your vocation.
The
reason to pray for a good salary is so that you can be a faithful steward for
the kingdom of the resources with which you have been entrusted.
The
reason, if single, to pray for a spouse is so that you might serve him or her
and establish a household where Christ is at the center.
The
reason to pray for a home is so that you can extend hospitality in the name of
Christ and wash the feet of the saints.
The
reason to pray for children is so that you might be able to raise disciples for
the Lord.
The
reason to pray for good health is so that you might serve him with your body.
The
reason to pray for a church is that you might join with like-minded brothers
and sisters to worship the Lord and serve the brethren.
The
reason to pray for the peace and security of the world is that the Great
Commission might be fulfilled.
