Sundry Thoughts On Trinity

INTRODUCTION

Trinity Sunday — Church Calendar

Skeptics abound regarding the idea of Trinity desiring a perfect understanding before believing but they forget or never knew the Augustinian dictum that we believe in order to understand and not we understand in order to believe. We are not shy to say that we do not fully understand the depth of the idea of God as Trinity. Ask yourself if any God would be worth worshiping that you or any human could perfectly circumscribe with our human understanding? Would God be God if the human mind could comprehend Him perfectly?

But, while we admit that man cannot comprehensively understand God, we do not suggest that God can not be rightly apprehended or understood with the measure of grace we have been given consistent with God’s Revelation in Scripture. We can be knowing God and so go from knowing unto greater knowing but we will never exhaustively know God since the finite cannot contain the infinite. As such we can know that God is one in three and three in one due to the Revelation of Scripture, and as we grow in the faith we can have ever fuller understanding of what that means but, as mortals, we will never comprehend the essence or mind of God.

SCRIPTURAL TEXT TEACHING THE REALITY OF THE TRINITY

(a) Deut.6:4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: Eph.4:6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all. Isa.44:6 Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God. Isa.45:5 I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me: 1 Cor.8:4 As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one. 1 Cor.8:6 But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.

(b) Isa.61:1 The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; Luke 4:18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, Gen.1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. Gen.1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. Ps.33:6 By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. Isa.48:16 Come ye near unto me, hear ye this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was, there am I: and now the Lord GOD, and his Spirit, hath sent me. Ps.110:1 <> The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool. Matt.3:16 And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him: Matt.3:17 And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Matt.28:19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: 1 John 5:7 For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. Isa.6:1 In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Isa.6:3 And one cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the LORD of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. John 14:26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. John 15:26 But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me: 2 Cor.13:13 All the saints salute you. Gal.4:6 And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Eph.2:18 For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Tit.3:5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; Tit.3:6 Which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour;

The Scripture thus clearly teaches that there is unity and plurality in the being of God.

TRINITY IN CHURCH HISTORY

The doctrine of the Trinity reached a swelling point in the fourth century, when Arius claimed that Christ was created by God the Father, and was not co-eternal with him. Eventually, the Council of Nicea was convened to address Arius’ claims. Led in part by St. Athanasius, who suffered terrible persecution for his advocacy for the Deity of Christ, found Arius’ claims heretical and formulated the Nicene Creed to discredit and correct them. For the next 100 years, Church Fathers would defend the doctrine of the Trinity from Arian challenges that still existed. Yet, by about the end of the fourth century, the doctrine of the Trinity took on, more or less, the form that we have today.

Nicene Creed

I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made….

And I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]; who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified; who spoke by the prophets.

Athansian Creed

Athenasian Creed declares in part,

‘but this is the catholic faith, that we worship one God in trinity, and trinity in unity, neither confounding the persons nor diving the substance, for the person of the Father is one, of the Son, another, of the Holy Spirit, another. But the divinity of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost is one, and the glory equal, the majesty equal, such as is the Father, such also is the Son, and such the Holy Spirit. The Father is uncreated, the Son is uncreated, the Holy Spirit is uncreated. The Father is infinite, the Son is infinite, the Holy Ghost is infinite. The Father is eternal, the Son is eternal, the Holy Ghost is eternal. And yet there are not three eternal beings but one eternal being. As also there are not three uncreated beings nor three infinite beings, but one uncreated and one infinite being.’

IMPORTANCE OF TRINITY

In this point I am going to try and convince you how important the Church through the ages viewed the doctrine of the Trinity.

Rushdoony, gives us a quote that encapsulates the view of the Church throughout History on the importance of the Trinity.

QUOTE

“The doctrine of the Trinity is that basic foundation for all of faith, for the whole universe…

“The Trinity is the cornerstone of our faith. No faith can survive its denial. No church can live long apart from this doctrine. And no church, no matter how much it preaches other important and necessary doctrines, will long prosper. That Church may blossom for a while, but it will fade if it, under stresses,neglects the doctrine of the Trinity. And churches that lose this faith do not reproduce themselves. A second generation Unitarian, according to the Unitarians themselves, is a great rarity. They are rarely to be found.” ENDQUOTE

That this doctrine was considered essential can be seen in all the ink that has been spilled over the centuries in order to defend it.

Against Praxeas by Tertullian (160-220) In this letter, Tertullian demonstrates through the use of Scripture that the Son and the Father are “distinct” but not “separate.”

Nicene Creed (325) The result of the First Council of Nicene, the Nicene Creed states that the Son is of “one substance” with the Father, and not of a “similar” substance of the Father.

Defense of the Nicene Definition by St. Athanasius (297-373) In this work, St. Athanasius provides an account of the Arians at the Council of Nicene* and defends the Nicene Creed from criticism of it being ‘unbiblical.’

The Third Theological Oration. On the Son. by St. Gregory of Nazianzus (329-390) In this oration, St. Gregory of Nazianzus defends the traditional, Nicene understanding of the Trinity, claiming that the persons of the Trinity are “numerically distinct” without a “severance of essence.”

Dogmatic Treatises by St. Gregory of Nyssa (335-394) Although much controversy focused on the divinity of Christ, the doctrine of the Trinity also posits the Holy Spirit as divine. In this treatise, St. Gregory of Nyssa defends the divinity of the Holy Spirit through Scripture.

Homilies on the Gospel of St. John by St. John Chrysostom (347-407) In a homily on John 1, St. John Chrysostom argues that Scripture clearly teaches that God the Father and Christ are distinct, but not of a compound substance.

On the Holy Trinity by St. Augustine (354-430) St. Augustine devoted an entire book to the topic of the Trinity. Among other things, he argues that the Trinity can be seen in Scripture, responds to objections to the Trinity, and demonstrates the equality of the Godhead.

The Trinity is One God Not Three Gods by St. Boethius (480-525) Using general philosophical principles, St. Boethius demonstrates that God is unified in substance, but differs in number of persons.*

Monologium by St. Anselm (1033-1109) St. Anselm seems to suggest that we lack any fitting language for describing the Trinity as “three,” because terms like “person” or “substance” seem to only apply to things of plurality, of which God is not.

Treatise on the Most Holy Trinity by St. Aquinas (1225-1274) In a long treatise on the Trinity, St. Aquinas addresses many features of the Trinity including: the Divine relations, the procession of the Trinity, and the relationship of the members of the Trinity to God’s essence.

Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin (1509-1564) Using both Scripture and philosophy, Calvin argues for the traditional understanding of the Trinity as “three persons in one God.”

Brief Declaration and Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity by John Owen (1616-1683) Using both Scripture and reason, John Owen defends the doctrine of the Trinity against “Socinianism”—the view that Christ did not pre-exist before being a man.

Systematic Theology, vol. 1 by Charles Hodge (1797-1878) In a rigorous fashion, Hodge examines the Scriptural evidence for the Trinity, the Nicene Creed, and philosophical formulations of the doctrine.

During the Reformation The Council of Geneva — the city where Calvin was the First among equals in terms of the Pastorate there, thought the doctrine of the Trinity so important that the Council handed down and implemented a death sentence upon a notorious heretic named Servetus who was actively seeking to overthrow the doctrine of the Trinity. This death sentence had already been pronounced in absentia by many of the countries of Europe, both Roman Catholic and Protestant.

These communities understood that if the doctrine of the Trinity was given up the whole basis of their civil social order would be overthrown. The death penalty for Servetus was done as a protection for the whole community.

The Church understood that reality was integrated. They understood that if one went from a Trinitarian to a Unitarian understanding of God the consequence would be that everything would change. This idea of a integrated reality is captured by a quote from Edmund Opus in a book entitled “Problems of Church and Society.”

“Communism is all of a piece. Adopt its metaphysics and in a technological age we get the ‘planned from the top down’ society. Start on the social level by putting any collectivist principle into operation, and it breeds more of the same until eventually the society becomes fully collectivized. The many part of society are delicately interrelated. Start by fixing the price of a quart of milk, and the glass industry will be told what it must charge for bottles. The wages of delivery men must be regulated, the diary industry controlled and so until the logical end result in time is the totally regimented economy or socialism.”

Now apply that realization to Trinitarian Christianity. Paralleling Opus we might say, “Trinitarian Christianity is all of a piece. Adopt its metaphysics and we get the unity in diversity society. Start on the social level by putting jurisdictionalism as a reflection of Trinitarian understandings of God into operation, and it breeds more and more of the idea of unity in diversity.”

All this to say that if a social order is Trinitarian it is going to resist the attempt by Unitarianism to overthrow understandings of the Trinity in order to protect itself. All this to say that historically the idea of Trinitarian Christianity was seen as foundational and worth dying for AND killing for (Consider Servetus) in order to protect.

As an aside … one thing that R2K does with its dualism is that it cuts off the influence of Trinitarianism on a social order. R2K insists that Trinitarianism’s organizing power is restricted to the Church while suggesting that Christians can be satisfied with Unitarianism in the public square.

The Current Church seems not to see the Trinity as Important

But this is not the opinion of much of the Evangelical Church today in the West. We have so insisted on the pragmatic “cash value” side of Christianity that we are increasingly putting the foundational doctrines aside.

Rob Bell seems to contend in one of his books that the doctrines of Christianity themselves are more useful than true. He specifically names the Trinity, likening the Trinity to the idea of one of the springs that serve to keep a Trampoline taut and by which a Trampoline gets its launching quality and saying something to the effect of, “People have been using this particular (Trinity) ‘spring’ to jump for years. But does that mean that it is essential? Couldn’t we change it for something else? I am not saying that we should – but certainly we could. If we did so, couldn’t we still love God, live moral lives, etc.?”

SUCCINCT EXPLANATION OF TRINITY

See handout

IMPLICATIONS OF THE TRINITY

Community

The reality of the Trinity gives us a basis for Christian community. Clearly, if God has community in Himself, then that community of the Godhead becomes the template for the community of the saints as they have communion with Him. The Church as covenant community is, or at least ought to be, the “live in technicolor” demonstration of God as community.

Miroslav Volf put it this way

“Because the Christian God is not a lonely God, but rather a communion of three persons, faith leads human beings into the divine communion. One cannot, however, have a self-enclosed communion with the Triune God- a “foursome,” as it were– for the Christian God is not a private deity. Communion with this God is at once also communion with those others who have entrusted themselves in faith to the same God. Hence one and the same act of faith places a person into a new relationship both with God and with all others who stand in communion with God.”

― Miroslav Volf, After Our Likeness: The Church as the Image of the Trinity

Our Fellowship with the Trinity brings us into Fellowship with one another. This seems to be part of what St. John is getting at when he writes,

20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;
21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: 23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

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UNITY IN DIVERSITY

The Eternal One and Many gives meaning to the temporal One and Many.

One & The Many

The reality of the Trinity suggests to us that as God’s unity and His diversity (plurality) are equally ultimate so that neither unity nor plurality is more equally ultimate then the other. What this means is that followers of this Triune God build family structures, church structures, and civil social structures where one finds unity in diversity. Both Unity and Diversity are both valued properly. As such the Christian faith values both the individual as individual while at the same time valuing the individual as part of one community. Both the individual and the community, like the persons of the Godhead and the unity of the Godhead, are equally ultimate.

This doctrine of the Trinity therefore wars against all arrangements where people become uniformed clones who lose all their distinctions in the great miasma of social order oneness. Similarly this doctrine of the Trinity wars against all arrangements of social anarchy where each man does what is right in his own eyes thus losing all basis for community. The doctrine of the Trinity suggests that what will we find are a plurality of Christian communities, one in their beliefs regarding our undoubted Catholic Christian Faith, but yet distinct according to families of man that God has sovereignly placed us in. By such an arrangement one finds the reason why Heaven is populated with men from every tribe, tongue, and Nation.

Chesterton was getting at this when he wrote,

“For the highest thing does not tend to union only; the highest thing, tends also to differentiation. You can often get men to fight for the union; but you can never prevent them from fighting also for the differentiation. This variety in the highest thing is the meaning of the fierce patriotism, the fierce nationalism of the great European civilization. It is also, incidentally, the meaning of the doctrine of the Trinity.”

― G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

Conclusion

Re-cap

USA Today Slams The Reformed Faith … A Slight Rebuttal

It is often difficult to determine when the Main Stream Media is malevolent, when it is incompetent, and when it is just clueless. More often then not it is all three at the same time. Recently the USA Today ran a column on the Bowe Bergdahl case, suggesting that Biblical Christianity (as opposed to Marxist Christianity) was the cause for the apparent strange behavior of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.

Below I interact with some of the brilliance of the author of the column who apparently is,

1.) A Teacher of Religion
2.) The Director of the Religion program at Skidmore college.

Surely these are expert qualifications for getting everything wrong in an analysis on Orthodox Presbyterianism.

Begin Article,

“Can Bergdahl’s faith explain his actions?”

Mary Stange

Bret responds,

Already with the headline we are on shaky ground. After all, what else can explain Bergdahl’s actions except his faith? In other words, “Of course Bergdahl’s faith explains his actions.” All of our actions can only be understood in light of our faith. Even Mary Stange’s woeful analytical abilities are explained by her faith. There is nothing else that can explain our actions except our faith. You’d think a teacher of religion at the University level would realize that a person’s behavior is always driven by their faith commitments.

Mary plunges on,

Were it not for the political wrangling over whether he is a hero or a traitor, Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who arrived in San Antonio early Friday, might well be held up as a classic example of the religious seeker: the deeply spiritual quester after truth, light and justice.

Bret,

This would be true except Scripture teaches that there are none who seek after God. If Sgt. Bergdahl were seeking it is only because He was a Christian.

Mary continues,

Yet the news media have been curiously silent on the question of his religious background. Aside from vague references to his belonging to a Calvinist church, no one has taken a serious look at how that church might have played a role in his decision to join the Army, and subsequently to leave his unit behind.

Philip Proctor, the Bergdahls’ pastor at Sovereign Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Boise, told The Huffington Post that Bowe had “grown up in a conservative Christian home, and he was trying to figure out if this was his faith or his parents’ faith.”

Maybe. But in young Bergdahl’s case — unlike that of the more typical Catholic or Jewish or mainline Protestant adolescent — the devil had to have been in the details. His family’s faith, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, makes extraordinary demands on a sensitive young person’s conscience and conduct.

Bret responds,

We are left asking if Ms. Stange is telling us that her preferred religious beliefs are more simplistic than Biblical Presbyterianism so that there does not exist those devilish details that the typical Catholic or Jewish or mainline Protestant adolescent deals with.

And Ms. Stange asserts that the Calvinist faith makes extraordinary demands on a sensitive young person’s conscience and conduct but she offer absolutely no proof. Are we to conclude from this that the typical Catholic, or Jewish, or mainline Protestant only makes “ordinary demands” on their adolescents? And if that is what Ms. Stange is implying I’d like to know, “by what standard” Ms. Stange is determining what constitutes extraordinary vs. ordinary demands on the conscience and conduct of a sensitive young person. (And how does Ms. Stange know that Sgt. Bergdahl was sensitive?)

Mary Stange keeps it up,

A hyperconservative offshoot of the mainstream Presbyterian Church USA, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church sees the world in stark either/or terms. This is Calvinism on steroids. You are saved and bound for heaven. Or you are a sinner, treading a one-way path to the fiery pit of hell.

1.) Hyper-conservative by whose standards? I suspect, to hyper-liberals like Ms. Stange, anything more conservative than Ms. Stange’s religion classes is “hyper-conservative.”

2.) So, what Ms. Stange is saying is that we EITHER can see the world in “either/or terms OR we can see it not in either/or terms? That’s kind of a stark way of seeing things don’t you think?

3.) Ms. Stange laments the Orthodox Presbyterian Church being “Calvinism on steroids” since it teaches that one is either saved and bound for heaven, or is a sinner, treading a one-way path to the fiery pit of hell.

One is left wondering what other options exist? What exactly is behind Ms. Stange’s door number 3? Purgatory? Limbo? The Stay Puff Marshmallow heaven?

Ms. Stange continues with her blinding brilliance,

The church, founded in the 1930s, has obviously been a genuine source of support for families such as the Bergdahls, who might have little in the way of material or spiritual comforts in this life but can feel confident of reward in the life to come. It is all about the counterpoise of heaven and hell, and it appears that for Bergdahl, this cosmic tension laid the groundwork for his subsequent actions and attitudes.

The Orthodox Presbyterian Church compels followers to feel the inner spark of absolute certainty of one’s own God-given righteousness. It is a more than plausible explanation that, failing such certainty, Bergdahl embarked on a series of life transformations — Buddhism, Tarot, French Foreign Legion and all the rest, culminating in the transformation from gung-ho warrior to pacifistic deserter — that looks like chaotic mood swings without the religious explanation.

1.) So, according to Stange, Bergdahl completely abandons his Calvinist faith, but his Calvinist faith is the reason for his alleged improprieties.

2.) Is Ms. Stange implying that Calvinism is only for the down and outers and the lower class fauna in life? If so she might want to read about the life of Millionaire William Borden of Yale. Maybe she should pick up a biography on the life of Henry Martyn. Stange should also consider conservative Presbyterian Cyrus McCormick. Even the founder of the denomination that Stange takes exception too, J. Gresham Machen, was a man of means.

3.) Stange asserts that “it appears that for Bergdahl, this cosmic tension laid the groundwork for his subsequent actions and attitudes” and then gives no proof whatsoever for this “left dangling in the air” claim. Wouldn’t it have been easier for Stange just to write an article for the USA Today entitled, “Why I Don’t Like Calvinism?”

4.) Stanger next reveals her utter torpidity by combining a comment about feeling the inner spark that yields certainty of God given righteousness. In doing so she combines a Quaker concept (inner light) with a gnostic concept (divine spark) with Presbyterianism. This is so jumbled and confusing that anybody who knows anything but comparative religions is left with having a fine belly laugh at such confusion.

5.) Presbyterianism of the sort that Stange inveighs against finds the chasing of feelings of any sort to be an anathema. Has Stange ever met a Calvinist? We’re not called “Frozen Chosen” for no reason. We don’t do feelings.

6.) Presbyterians do think it is important to understand that we are imputed God given righteousness but the reality of that is not based on our feelings or our certainty but on God’s promises.

7.) Stange insists that her explanation is more than plausible that Bergdahl slipped his nut because he couldn’t find the certainty for which Stange asserts he was looking. This is the worst psychologizing with no facts that one could possibly imagine. This analysis of Stange ranks right up there with the proto Psychologists probing for personality traits by feeling the bumps on a person’s head. Stange is telling us, quite without knowing Bergdhal, or any other pertinent facts, that it is the fault of Calvinism that Bergdahl was unstable.

Is this a case of the transference of one unstable person upon another unstable person?

Stanger wraps up,

Religious motives might or might not justify whatever Bergdahl might or might not have done. But those same motives can go a long way toward helping to comprehend his actions. We as a society have too frequently failed to take religion seriously as a source of evil as well as good. And, as Bergdahl might himself observe, all too frequently there has, as a result, been hell to pay.

1.) Religious motives might or might not justify what Bergdahl might or might not have done?

Translated –“We don’t have any idea of any of the facts but all this we don’t know anything about is certainly the fault of that dastardly hyper-conservative Calvinism.”

2.) We just admitted that we don’t know for sure what he might have or have not done but whatever he did or did not do hyper conservative Calvinism is surely to blame.

3.) Given this analysis I’m going to pray tonight that Stange does us all the favor of never trying to take religion seriously again.

After reading this I’m convinced that given all the hard evidence that exists right now that if I had to choose either Stange or Bergdahl to babysit by 4 children under 10, I’d choose Bergdahl.

A Small Case For Infant Baptism

As we consider Baptism we are reminded that the Church does not extend Baptism on the basis of our ability to see with certainty that all who receive the sign of Baptism receive the thing signified. With adults whom we baptize we have no certainty that their confession is legitimate … still we baptize adults on the basis of God’s command and promise. Those who want absolute certainty can never dispense any sacrament to anybody. We likewise baptize our children on the basis of God’s command and promise and not on the basis of our ability to do what only God can do and that is to know with certainty the elect vs. unelect status of the one coming for Baptism.

Still, having said that we are likewise confident that those who receive the sign of Baptism and never repudiate, by word or action in a sustained direction, God’s covenantal seal, are saved because of God’s faithfulness to His covenant.

Having said that by way of introductory comments let us examine some of what the Scripture teaches on Baptism.

1.) First of all, we need to overcome our astonishment over the fact that the New Testament nowhere explicitly mentions infant baptism. In point of fact it would be unusual if infant baptism would have been explicitly mentioned in the NT since the ancient frame of mind was covenantal. People seldom make a point of droning on and on about that which is obvious and which everyone knows and in the ancient world everyone knew that God dealt with families covenantally — God’s household had always included children. The astonishment does not lie in the fact that the NT nowhere explicitly mentions infant baptism. The astonishment should lie in the fact that the NT nowhere explicitly mentions that the children are no longer partakers of the covenant and recipients of God’s promises until reaching some magic but undetermined age of discretion.

Another reality we must take into consideration here is that with the NT we have the age of the collection and expansion of the Church come of age. Jesus told his disciples to disciple the Nations and we would expect to find that in that first generation those who would be first discipled and Baptized would be adults, and so of course it is adults that we find first mentioned as Baptized, yet still with hints about the inclusion of children.

There is another astonishment factor here and that is if the current popular view is correct we should be astonished that there is no record in the NT of adult children of previously baptized adults being Baptized.

2.) In the OT the sign of the covenant was circumcision. According to Colossians 2:11-13 this circumcision, having fulfilled its function as a bloody rite that was indicative of Christ’s bloody sacrifice, gives way to Baptism as the non bloody sign of the covenant. In Colossians 2 St. Paul is not mixing his metaphors when he seamlessly glides between circumcision and Baptism.

11 In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ:12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;

St. Paul seamlessly glides between these two because he understands that there is a relation between the two of them as there is a relation between shadow and fulfillment. Circumcision was the shadow covenant sign that, with its bloody rite, pointed towards Christ but Christ having come, the bloody rite gives way to a water rite that points back to the cleansing Christ accomplished via the spilling of His blood. It was the Lord Christ Himself who ordained Baptism as the covenantal rite of membership.

Because of St. Pauls language here, as well as the way the rest of the NT speaks, we see it as legitimate to speak of Baptism as God’s means by which He cures us of sin. Men are born sinners, bent on insisting that he is the creator of meaning and that all reality must orbit with him as the center. Men, apart from Christ, are bent. They are rebellious and selfish. God offers Baptism as the cure to this wound in man that will bring man back to his senses. Such a statement is not meant to diminish the importance of regeneration, faith, and conversion, it is merely to note the Baptism is the objective marker which proclaims these elements of the ordo salutis. When we Baptize our children we are proclaiming that we agree with God that they are sinners. When we baptize our children we are agreeing with God that our children can only find the cure for sin in God’s provision.

3.) Note in the Colossians passage that there is an objective subjective nexus which we often speak of here. Objectively the cure for our sins is the cutting off (Circumcision) of Christ. When Christ was cut off God’s elect were saved. However, that salvation was made existential to them when they were baptized and so that salvation provided for them, in the death of Christ, is applied to them in Baptism and so they are saved. It is fascinating that here the “forgiveness of sins” is connected both to Christ’s Objective work on the Cross AND to a Baptism conveyed in space and time to each one of the saints. Because this is true, for the rest of our lives, we look back through our Baptism in order to see our death and resurrection with Christ. When we are beset with temptation we remember our Baptism. When we desire to grow in Christlikeness we talk about “improving our Baptism.” When we attend a Baptism service we are reminded again that we have been marked as the people of God eager for good works. When we see the consecrated water we are reminded that we were regenerated by the washing of the Word.

Baptism communicates Christ. It is not merely so much water and a mental recalling of what Christ has done. It is, in God’s ineffable ordination, the work of Christ come to us for the washing away of sin.

4.) Because in the Colossians passage there is such a seamless gliding between OT circumcision and NT Baptism we become convinced that those who received the sign of the covenant in the OT ought to be the same who receive the sign of the covenant in the NT. In the OT children were recipients of the sign of the covenant — circumcision. In the NT likewise it should be the case that children are included in the household of God.

Paul uses this phrase, “The Household of God” in Ephesians and we would only note that God’s household in the OT was always busy with children and there is nothing that would indicate that God’s household in the NT is now bereft of children.

5.) We would note there that the seamlessness between circumcision and Baptism is not the only indicator that children as members of the covenant should be given the sign of the covenant. We need to remember that the covenant is the means by which God in space and time connects the invisible elect to the visible Church. The covenant has always been the means by which God collects His elect into the Church and God does so in a very concrete and organic way. This covenant that God has ordained to be the means by which the elect are gathered into the visible Church has never been established by means of collecting a set of abstracted individuals. Throughout time God has collected His Church through the channels of family. As the family belonged to God, so the children of that family belonged to God. The covenant embraced children not just for the sake of their person as isolated, but instead as connected to their families as considered historically as “the people of God.” When we delimit Baptism as belonging only to atomistic individuals we delimit the organic interconnectedness of the one people of God in their generations throughout time and space. When we delimit Baptism as belonging only to atomistic individuals we testify against the faithfulness of God to a thousand generations.

On this score Dutch theologian Bavinck could offer,

“Specifically the children are regarded in their connection with their larger family. There is a kind of communion of parents and children in sin and misery. But over against this, God has also established a communion of parents and children in grace and blessing. Children are a blessing and heritage from the Lord (Ps. 127:3). They are always counted along with their parents and included with them. Together they prosper (Exod. 20:6; Deut. 1:36, 39; 4:40; 5:29; 12:25, 28). Together they serve the Lord (Deut. 6:2; 30:2; 31:12–13; Josh. 24:15; Jer. 32:39; Ezek. 37:25; Zech. 10:9). The parents must pass on to the children the acts and ordinances of God (Exod. 10:2; 12:24, 26; Deut. 4:9–10, 40; 6:7; 11:19; 29:29; Josh. 4:6, 21; 22:24–27). The covenant of God with its benefits and blessings perpetuates itself from child to child and from generation to generation (Gen. 9:12; 17:7, 9; Exod. 3:15; 12:17; 16:32; Deut. 7:9; Ps. 105:8; and so forth). While grace is not automatically inherited, as a rule it is bestowed along the line of generations. “For the infants of believers their first and foremost access of salvation is the very fact of their being born of believing parents.”

6.) The idea of Baptism for children is given credence by the way that Jesus speaks of and interacts with children. Despite the fact that Israel is rejecting Christ, the Lord Christ continues to speak of the children of the children of Israel as belonging to the covenant (Matt. 18:2ff.; 19:13ff.; 21:15–16.; Mark 10:13ff.; Luke 9:48; 18:15ff.). The Lord Christ calls the children to himself, embraces them, blesses them, lays hands on them, tells them that theirs is the Kingdom of heaven, insists that adults must become like children to enter into the Kingdom, warns adults of the consequences of offending his little children, tells us that their angels watch over them, and receives the Hosannas of the Herald children as fulfillment of prophecy. The Lord Christ connects children to the covenant in all of this and yet we are to believe that children should be abused by not giving them the sign of the covenant?

Now couple that observation with the observation that in the book of Acts the Jews complain bitterly about Gentiles coming into the Kingdom without Circumcision and yet we hear not a peep in the book of Acts from anybody complaining about the idea that their children, who for generations received the sign of the covenant and so were members of the covenant, are no longer to be regarded as members of the community of God. Never has a argument from silence screamed so loudly.

7.) Reading the NT corpus we understand that the covenant of Grace established with Israel remains in essence the same though its outworking is altered slightly with the reality come in Christ. The Church has superseded Israel as the people of God with God as their Father. Here we find the theme of organism again. The Church is Temple, it is a body, it is a household. And here we pause briefly at the idea of household.

Repeatedly in the NT we find the fact that Households were baptized (There are specific references to household baptisms in the New Testament. See Acts 10; 16:15, 33; 1 Cor. 1:16). We readily concede that children are NOT specifically mentioned in those Baptisms, but even in the light of that concession we still glow about how the household Baptisms scream for inclusion of God’s children. As long as household baptisms were pursued it really is irrelevant whether or not children were present in those Baptisms since what Household Baptisms communicates is that on the principle of household Baptism if children had been present they would certainly have been concluded. Even with the Lord Christ we find Zacchaeus believing and our Lord saying, “that salvation has come to his house (Luke 19:9).” Note … not just to Zacchaeus but to his house.

When we consider all this we now can hear Acts 2:39 with different ears. “The promise is to you and to your children and to all who are afar off whom the Lord our God shall call.”

Pentecost Sunday

These verses have to do with the festival of Pentecost. Pentecost means simply, “fiftieth”. It gains this name because it falls on the fiftieth day after Passover. It was a one-day celebration and it was a thanksgiving for God’s gracious provision. It came at the end of the harvest season. It gave thanks to God for His providence. And there was an offering to God of animal sacrifices, cereal gifts and drink offerings. Our modern Thanksgiving is modeled after Pentecost.

When Jesus ascended into heaven He instructed his disciples to remain in Jerusalem until they should receive power from on high. As a group of 120 were praying in an upper room in Jerusalem fifty days after his death, the Holy Spirit descended upon them with the sound of a great wind and with tongues of fire which settled upon each one of them. They began to speak with other languages and to preach boldly in the name of Christ, with the result that three thousand were converted. In rebuttal to criticism by devout Jews, Peter stood up and, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, gave a wonderful sermon. After the sermon Luke wrote in verses 41 and 42. Then read Acts 2:41-42

This incredible manifestation of divine power marked the beginning of the church which has ever since regarded Pentecost as its birthday.

Pentecost, then, is the anniversary of the coming of the Holy Spirit in order to give birth to the Church come of age.

This day was not the beginning of a denomination. It was the beginning of the one church: The One True Church.
The Church that is bought with the blood of Christ.

The Church that is united by the indwelling Spirit.
The Church that is taught with the inspired Word.
The world did not know what happened at Pentecost.
The world did not know that God had come to live with His people forever.

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I.) Pentecost as God’s Harvest

It was the culmination of the “feast of weeks” (Ex. 24:22; Deut. 16:10), which began on the third day after the Passover with the presentation of the first harvest sheaves to God, and which concluded with the offering of two loaves of unleavened bread, representing the first products of the harvest (Lev. 23:17, 20; Deut. 16:9-10).

Of course the Parallel on the Day of Pentecost is that God is Harvesting His elect into the Church. They are rightly seen as the first produce of the Harvest. The book of Acts then records this continued Harvesting of the Church.

Note here that this Pentecost is a single event in God’s Redemptive work. In Pentecost God was putting His imprimatur upon the work of Christ. We should no more look for more Pentecosts today in terms of all the Phenomena then we would look for more Crucifixions, more Resurrections, or more Ascensions. These are all one time Redemptive Historical events. We certainly look forward to the continued Harvest of God as He gathers in His elect from every tribe, tongue, and nation, but we do not demand that every convert has to have this same Pentecost experience of speaking in tongues.

In as much as God is Harvesting a New Church this is testimony that He is done with the nation-State Israel as an entity tied to His Redemptive-Historical outworking in History. Naturally, Hebrews are included into the Church as they look to Christ but the idea that Israel, as a collective Nation State, is still important to God’s macro Redemptive time-table is seen as void by the fact that He creates this New Israel of God.

II.) Pentecost as God’s doing something New

Rabbinic scholars believe that it was on this day that God visited His people after their exodus from Egypt and through Moses, brought the Law down from Mount Sinai. This earthshaking day of visitation, trembling, and betrothal is the birthday of the nation of Israel. Moses brings down the Torah or Law for the nation.

God has made it clear that He is done with disobedient Israel. He is finished with that Nation that He had created at Mt. Sinai.

40 When therefore the Lord of the vineyard shall come, what will he do to those husbandmen?
41 They said unto him, He will [aa]cruelly destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall deliver him the fruits in their seasons.
42 Jesus said unto them, Read ye never in the Scriptures, The stone which the [ab]builders refused, the same is [ac]made the [ad]head of the corner? [ae]This was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.
43 Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and shall be given to a nation, which shall bring forth the [af]fruits thereof.

On this greater Pentecost He creates a New Royal People and Holy Nation. Now there are many many continuities between the Old and the New but the Scripture can even call what is happening a “New and Better” covenant. We would say that it is New in the Sense that it is the fulfillment of all that was promissory before. The Old Israel was promissory of the New Israel. And on the Pentecost following Christ’s death, God creates a New and Improved Israel comprised of Jew and Gentile as one Spiritual Nation.

Of course what we need to see here is the continuity in Scripture. It is true that God is fulfilling all His promises so that a New and Better covenant is coming to the fore, but note the continuities with the Old Covenant. God does this New and Better covenant in the context of the previous covenant. The creation of His Old Covenant people was on Pentecost. The creation of His New Covenant people is on Pentecost. The Creation of His Old Covenant people was for the purpose that they might be a light to the Nations. The creation of the His New Covenant people is that they might be His witnesses to all the Nations. The creation of the Old Covenant people was attended by Fire. The Creation of the Church is attended by cloven tongues of fire. On the First Pentecost 3000 people die because of their sin of rejecting God. On The Pentecost 3000 are saved because of their God given acceptance of their sin covering who is Christ. On the Sinai Pentecost children are part of the Covenant. In the fulfillment Pentecost it is communicated that children are part of the covenant (Acts 2:38)

In the Old Testament (Lev. 23:15-23), Pentecost was considered the primary harvest celebration. In the OT economy Firstfruits celebrated the barley harvest (3 days after Passover), but Pentecost celebrated the wheat harvest—the main staple. In the New and Better Covenant Christ is crucified on the Passover, resurrected on the festival of first fruits (Barley) and then on Pentecost the Church is resurrected from dead Israel.

III.) Pentecost as Revelatory of God’s Intent

God’s intent was to build His Church. Pentecost was revelatory of that purpose.

1.) God would build His Church as a Nation of Nations.

The dividing wall that kept the Gentile from all the spiritual promises would be torn down (Eph. 2:14) All men from every tribe tongue and Nation are now commanded to Repent. And when they are given repentance they are placed into the one body of Christ the Church.

As we see at Pentecost though that Church is comprised of Nations. At Pentecost God baptizes Babel, which is to say that God still insists upon distinct Nations just as He did at Babel but now He calls all those Nations to bow to Christ. We know this because, as the text teaches, all those present heard the Gospel in their own ethnic tongues,

8 [f]How then hear we every man our own language, wherein we were born? 9 Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the inhabitants of Mesopotamia, and of Judea, and of Cappadocia, of Pontus, and Asia, 10 And of Phrygia, and Pamphylia, of Egypt, and of the parts of Libya, which is beside Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, and [g]Jews, and Proselytes,11 Cretes, and Arabians: we heard them speak in our own tongues the wonderful works of God.

If God intended to build a Church that was not diverse all would have heard the Gospel in one language. This is why we can say that at Pentecost God Baptized Babel. His intent is to provide a Spiritual unity in the context of diversity thus reinforcing the idea of the One and the Many as found in the Trinity.

So God intends to build a Universal Church that is a Nation of Nations. All the ends of the earth would see the salvation of God” was seen on the day of Pentecost and in the book of Acts as the Gospel comes upon people of diverse tongues and then covers the known world via the Missionary effort.

Unity in diversity. The Unity seen in that all in the Church can call one another “Brothers.” Diversity seen in the promise that it is people from every “Tribe, tongue, and Nation” in their Tribes, Tongues, and Nations, that make up the Church (Rev. 21:24f).

This is what Calvin Seminary Scholar of yesteryear Wyngaarden was getting at when he wrote in another context,

“Thus the highest description of Jehovah’s covenant people is applied to Egypt, — “my people,” — showing that the Gentiles will share the covenant blessings, not less than Israel. Yet the several nationalities are here kept distinct, even when Gentiles share, in the covenant blessing, on a level of equality with Israel. Egypt, Assyria and Israel are not nationally merged. And the same principles, that nationalities are not obliterated, by membership in the covenant, applies, of course, also in the New Testament dispensation.”

Wyngaarden, pp. 101-102.

2.) God would build His Church by the Power of the Holy Spirit working in the lives of His Witnesses

Ten days after the Ascension of the Lord Christ, He, with the Father, sent forth the Holy Spirit as the Agent to empower the Church to accomplish what in His Authority had deigned and ordained to be accomplished. That which He has ordained is the triumph of the Gospel over all the Earth. Over the lands of the Usurper Allah. Over the lands of the Usurper Jew god, over the lands of the Usurper Hindu gods. Over all lands. The Holy Spirit empowers us to the end of working towards triumph in light of the Triumph of the Lord Christ over all the Kings who would put off His chains.

Immediately upon Pentecost the Spirit filled Church fans out, eventually across the known world, to take the Gospel outwards. It is one of the most fascinating aspects of History that a tiny tiny oppressed minority ended up conquering the World. And yet that is exactly what happened.

We need to be reminded of this today when we are increasingly becoming an oppressed minority. Numbers are irrelevant if the Church is operates in terms of being filled by the Spirit of Christ. We shall continue to be His witnesses and He will express the Dominion He currently has through His Spirit filled, Gospel wielding Church.

IV.) Pentecost as God’s Methodology (Word & Sacrament)

Notice that the really big news of Pentecost is not so much the attendant display of Phenomena as it is the fact that a Sermon is preached and a Sacrament distributed. The sermon was focused on Christ. It recited the Historical facts. It was hardly a “wowzer” in terms of pulpiteering ability but it was Spirit filled and it found its target.

Luther said,

“Take me, for example. I opposed indulgences and all papists, but never by force. I simply taught, preached, wrote God’s Word: otherwise I did nothing. And then, while I slept or drank Wittenberg beer with my Philip of Amsdorf the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that never a prince or emperor did such damage to it. I did nothing: the Word did it all. Had I wanted to start trouble…. I could have started such a little game at Worms that even the emperor wouldn’t have been safe. But what would it have been? A mug’s game. I did nothing: I left it to the Word.”

One of the major problems with the current Church is that it has lost its ability to

1.) Know the Word
2.) Trust the Word to accomplish what needs to be accomplished.

Instead we try to jazz things up. But like Luther we need to “leave it to the Word.”

The Word creates what it calls for. The Spirit filled Word is God’s agency to overcome the hardest hearts. We spend time planning, marketing, polling, but if we would just trust the Word God would do it all.

The Sovereign God

While sitting in a Dentist’s office I picked up one of the magazines and read,

“More problematic … are the disturbing images of God we find in parts of the Old Testament. At times, the Old Testament portrays a God who seems judgmental, vengeful, and capricious, sanctioning or even instigating excessive violence. One has only to think of the conquest recorded in Joshua and God’s command to “utterly destroy” the Canaanite nations (Deut. 7:2; 20:17). Or descriptions of God unleashing disease and death among his own people (Num. 21:6; 2 Sam. 6:7; Jer. 21:3-7). Or the psalmists’ prayers to God as the great Avenger who curses our enemies and heaps evil upon those who seek our downfall (Ps. 69:22-28; 109:8-15).”

I would suggest here that there is nothing disturbing in the slightest about the images of God we find in parts of the Old Testament when we begin with the premise that because of man’s sin, no man deserved anything but the wrath of God against sin. The shock really isn’t that God was demonstrably wrathful in the Old Testament to the point of excessive violence upon some people. The shock is that God wasn’t demonstrably wrathful in the Old Testament to the point of excessive violence upon all people. From Genesis to Revelation the wages of sin has always been death and God does no one wrong in the slightest when He gives what is deserved. It strikes me that often the character of God in the Old Testament is complained about most when people wrongly believe that somehow they deserve something better from God then violence, destruction, and death.

We must consider that all that blood flowing in the sacrificial system of the Old Testament flowed, in part, to demonstrate what the one bringing the sacrifice deserved. The question is not then, “why did God kill people in the Old Testament.” The question rather is, “Why didn’t God kill everybody in the Old Testament.” We should not be surprised by justice. We should be surprised by mercy and grace.

Keep also in mind that God was long-suffering towards the Canaanites that He eventually visited with just judgment. In Genesis 15, God speaks to Abraham and tells him that His people will go into captivity for 400 years. In Gen. 15:16 we read,

16 But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

What is suggested here is that those God would eventually visit just judgment upon were a people God was yet being long-suffering towards. They had not reached the point yet where they were ripe in their sin and rebellion against God and God was being patient in the face of their iniquity. The curiosity then of this aspect of the Old Testament character of God is not that He eventually visited just penalty against Canaan but rather the curiosity lies in the incredible patience, long-suffering, and forbearance of God.

Before our outrage swells to high at the thought of God’s just judgment against Canaan let us keep in mind what a wicked place Canaan was. They were a people who burned their children in honor of their gods (Lev. 18:21), and practiced sodomy, bestiality, and all sorts of loathsome vice (Lev. 18:23, 24, 20:3). As a result the land itself began to “vomit” them out as the body heaves under the load of internal poisons (Lev. 18:25, 27-30). Talking about how mean God is in light of this is really an objection to the highest manifestation of the grace of God in keeping the infection of sin from spreading to His people. After all, Canaan is justly judged so as to prevent Israel and the rest of the world from being corrupted (Deut. 20:16-18). Allow me to suggest that only if God had not visited the just wage of sin upon the Canaanites could we talk about the scandalous character of the Old Testament God.

We should also note here that the just visitation of God’s judgment against His enemies is also intended to be read as a warning to the greater judgment of God against His enemies in God’s visiting the unrepentant with eternal punishment. So Canaan serves as a type that is answered in the anti-type of Hell, the subject of which is on Jesus lips more than any other New Testament figure.

In terms of God visiting His own people with wrath, again this is consistent with the New Testament where we learn that judgment begins in the household of God (I Peter 4:17). It could be said of Ananias and Sapphira that they were part of the Covenant people who in the NT God visited with justice. In terms of the God of the Old Testament being a “great avenger who curses our enemies and heaps evil upon those who seek our downfall, we read in the New Testament in Romans 12:9 in the context of speaking to Christians that “vengeance is mine; I will repay, said the Lord.”

Also we find the theme of vengeance struck in 2 Thessalonians 1:6-9

6 For it is a righteous thing with God, to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you,
7 And to you which are troubled, rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall show himself from heaven with his mighty Angels, 8 In flaming fire, rendering vengeance unto them, that do not know God, and which obey not unto the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, 9 Which shall be punished with everlasting perdition from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power

And finally the desire for vengeance is articulated righteously in Revelation 6:10 where we find the martyred saints crying with a loud voice, saying, How long, Lord, which art holy and true! dost not thou judge and avenge our blood on them, that dwell on the earth?

What we see here then is that the Character of God is consistent from the Old to the New Testament. When people find problems with the Old Testament God the problem generally is, is that they believe that somehow God is unjust for giving people what they have earned.

Another aspect we need to consider here is that while it is our moral duty to follow God’s revealed law, God Himself is not under the same moral duty we are. God does not issue commands to Himself and so He has no moral duties to us to fulfill. The point here is that while we are responsible to God and so must follow His Law God is not responsible to us. He does not answer to us.

As an example, God tells me that “Thou Shalt Not Murder” and so I may not take a judicially innocent life and to do so would be murder. But God has no such prohibition upon Himself. He can give and take life as He chooses. We recognize this at every funeral when we say, “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away … blessed be the name of the Lord.” We all recognize this when we accuse some authority who presumes to take life as “playing God.” Human authorities arrogate to themselves rights which belong only to God. God is under no obligation whatsoever to extend my life for another second. If He wanted to strike me dead right now, that’s His prerogative.

What that implies is that God has the right to take the lives of the Canaanites when He sees fit. How long they live and when they die is up to Him. This is the right of ownership. God as Creator owns everything and everything is at His disposal to do with as He pleases. When He does so, it is not for us to question God (Romans 9:20).

So the problem isn’t that God ended the Canaanites’ lives. Some might contend that the problem is that God commanded the Hebrew soldiers to end them. Isn’t that like commanding someone to commit murder? No, it’s not. Rather, since our moral duties are determined by God’s commands, it is commanding someone to do something which, in the absence of a divine command, would have been murder. The act was morally obligatory for the Hebrew soldiers in virtue of God’s command, even though, had they undertaken it on their on initiative, it would have been wrong.

On divine command theory, then, God has the right to command an act, which, in the absence of a divine command, would have been sin, but which is now morally obligatory in virtue of that command.