Sen. Rafael Edward (Ted) Cruz is No Conservative

Recently, Mr. Joel Crospey, encouraged me to provide evidence for the lack of bonafide conservatism in Sen. Rafael Edward Cruz and why a vote for Sen. Rafael Cruz would be inconsistent with either conservatism or Biblical Christianity. Mr Crospey also asked me to sustain the fact that Sen. R. Cruz’s eligibility to be President is at the very least questionable.

This is my good faith attempt at doing just that. Keep in mind that I am not voting for any of the current Republican candidates for President. I have no dog in this fight. My only desire is to just expose these candidates for who they are. In previous posts on Iron Ink I have provided the same kind of  evidence for the lack in Donald Trump as I am now going to demonstrate in Sen. Rafael Cruz. I do not believe that Biblical Christians should be voting for either Trump or Cruz.

First we will seek to demonstrate, how it is uncertain that Sen. Rafael Cruz is qualified as a natural born citizen. To demonstrate this we have to realize that there are several different opinions on how the Constitution should be interpreted. We will examine Sen. Cruz’s eligibility to be President of these united States based on his own view of how the Constitution should be interpreted. Sen. Cruz holds to the view called “Originalism.” This theory of interpretation understands the Constitution as having a stable meaning according to the original meaning of the words and the understandings of those words as used by those who penned and ratified the Constitution. The Originalist then takes the text seriously as well as the intent of those who penned and ratified the Constitution as a document.

When we come to the issue of who qualifies and doesn’t qualify as a “natural born citizen,” the course of the Originalist is to look at the meaning of “natural born citizen” as that was used when the Constitution was penned and ratified. When we do just that we discover that when the Constitution was penned and ratified there were two methods by which it was determined whether or not someone was a natural born citizen. The first of these two was that a newborn belonged to the Sovereign or nation who ruled the territory upon which said child was birthed.  This was part of English common law, which the fledgling unites States adopted as their own. The second method shifted from looking to soil as being determinative of natural born status to looking to blood as being determinative of natural born status.  According to this methodology in determining natural born status one was natural born in keeping with the loyalty of the patriarch who sired the newborn, regardless of what or whose soil the child was birthed upon. By this “law of blood,” children born to those serving as diplomats in foreign lands would still be considered natural born of the country from which their diplomat Father haled.

By an Originalist understanding of the US Constitution, Sen. Ted Cruz is not natural born to these united States and so is not qualified to be the US President.  Sen. Cruz was neither born in these united States, nor was Cruz’s Father’s loyalty, being Cuban born and living in Canada, a loyalty vouchsafed to these united States.  Sen. Cruz, by his own Originalist understanding of the Constitution, thus is not a natural born citizen, and so is not qualified to be President of these united States.

Now, I am well aware that other arguments have been made to support Cruz’s natural born eligibility but my only task here is to support the idea that Cruz’s natural born eligibility is a open legal question not yet legally determined by the SCOTUS. For anyone to insist that it is undoubted that Sen. Cruz is qualified as natural born to be President is a insistence born of wishing and not the facts.

If any questions remains this lecture from a Constitutional Scholar reinforces my points.

https://vimeo.com/154765379

Having dealt with the questionable status of Sen. Cruz’s eligibility to be President I now turn to a more explicit treatment of why a vote for Sen. Cruz would be inconsistent with Biblical Christianity. This is a cumulative argument and I will move from the more serious reasons to reasons that might be deemed less serious.

1.) The greatest reason that a well informed Biblical Christianity would forswear voting for Sen. Cruz for President is his effusive praise for the Marxist murderer Nelson Mandela upon Mandela’s death.

“Nelson Mandela will live in history as an inspiration for defenders of liberty around the globe. He stood firm for decades on the principle that until all South Africans enjoyed equal liberties he would not leave prison himself, declaring in his autobiography, ‘Freedom is indivisible; the chains on any one of my people were the chains on all of them, the chains on all of my people were the chains on me.’ Because of his epic fight against injustice, an entire nation is now free.

We mourn his loss and offer our condolences to his family and the people of South Africa.”

By Sen. Cruz’s words here we see Proverbs 10:11 incarnated.

“The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence.”

This praise of Mandela by Sen. Cruz is instructive as to the Senator’s worldview. If Cruz counts the tyrant Mandela as a “inspiration for defenders of liberty” what must liberty mean to Cruz? The whole language of “equal liberties,” is seen as a lie when one considers the abuse of the Boers in South Africa. Could not Cruz see this by the time of Mandela’s death? The idea that South Africa is “free” would be news to the Boer population.

Does Cruz know of Mandela’s involvement, via his terrorist organization, of the bombing for which Mandela is responsible? This includes the bombing of public places, wherein a killing of piles of more judicially innocent civilian bystanders (women and children inclusive) than the killing of Mandela’s enemies.  Does Cruz know that Mandela stayed in prison, despite the offer of release that only stipulated that Mandela quit killing people? Mandela died with the blood of tens of thousands of people, both black and white, on his hands. Whether Sen. Cruz actually does believe what he said about Mandela, or whether it is the case that Sen. Cruz demonstrated a gross display of ignorance and lack of discernment, this praise of Mandela by Cruz means that Biblical Christians should not be voting for Sen. Cruz.

2.)  Sen. Cruz refused to support the bill Dr. Ron Paul tried for years to get passed to audit the Federal Reserve. The problem with fiat money as printed by the FED, may only have competition with the issue of illegal immigration as the number one threat to US nationhood, and yet Sen. Cruz refused to support a bill that would have moved forward setting boundaries for the Federal Reserve. Now, when you combine this lack of support with Heidi Cruz’s (Raphael’s wife) connection to Goldman Sachs, which works hand in glove with the FED, one wonders about Cruz’s lack of willingness to support Congressman Paul’s vote.

Biblical Christians support responsibility in fiscal matters. Cruz’s lack of support for Congressman Paul’s legislation, when combined with all these other concerns, should cause Biblical Christians to understand that a vote for Cruz is not consistent Christianity.

3.) Sen. Cruz has indicated support for a Constitutional Convention. This support underscores, again, a lack of discernment on the part of Sen. Cruz. A Constitutional Convention would be sure to open a Pandora’s box for revising the Constitution in a Marxist – Progressive direction. Support for a Constitutional Convention would be to take us from the frying pan to the fire.

Biblical Christians understand that any action that is going to open a door for the advance of Marxism is contrary to Biblical Christianity and so would not vote for those who are in support for such an open door.

4.) Heidi Cruz, has worked for the Council of Foreign Relations which is a globalist organization. Are we to believe that Sen. Cruz is not compromised by his wife’s association with one of the premier organization’s dedication to a New World Order that envisions the end of Nation State sovereignty?

Biblical Christianity is opposed to all attempts to build a Babel New World order.

5.) Sen. Cruz seems to have a inordinate passion for Israel’s interests. Will that passion for Israel’s interests be prioritized over his work to advance the interests of the nation state that he is not a natural born citizen of?

Of course any conservative worth his salt wants a chief executive that is not beholden to foreign interest.

6.) Sen. Cruz’s record on immigration is cloudy.  Was he trying to add a poison bill to the “gang of 8” immigration legislation? Was he trying to massively expand the Hb1-B visa program to ridiculous levels? Is he serious about the one issue that is the number one threat to the continuance of America as a definable nation state? My estimation is that Sen. Cruz is a typical grifter politician who is not to be trusted in the least in terms of being able to believe what he says about anything.

Immigration is the issue in 2016. Sen. Cruz’s cloudy doublespeak is a positioning that no conservative can support.

7.)   Cruz’s complete inexperience as a young Senator weighs in here. The country just elected, in 2008, a young inexperienced Senator like Cruz. I shouldn’t think we’d not want to make this mistake again.

8.) Sen. Cruz support for Legislation  S.306. If Cruz were truly conservative, he would know that in the history of homeschooling, once a state has called homeschools “private schools” just so that homeschoolers could have access to sports, band, tax rebates, etc…. That’s when they expanded it to be a requirement, and after that came mandatory standardized annual testing, and after that came cover schools who must meet with you to check your progress several times throughout the year. Aka, what homeschoolers in California have to do every single year.

9.) If Cruz were truly a conservative, he would know that the government has no business in education. A truly conservative presidential candidate would abolish the dept of education, so that instead of being “allowed” to call ourselves a private school (and thus be kept in a database) so that we are “allowed” to keep some of our own money tax free, we would simply eliminate the tax entirely because we’d do away with the $77 billion dollar education budget!  Cruz’s support for the abolishing of the Department of Education is inconsistent with his support for S.306.

In conclusion, it is clearly seen that Sen. Cruz’s is not a natural born citizen, per his own Constitutional theory and that Sen. Rafael Cruz is not a bonafide conservative, nor is he championing Christian positions.

________________________
Hat Tip to Mrs. Mickey Henry on points 9 & 10 above

 

 

Women In Combat … A Natural Law Negative Answer

Someone asked me how I would answer the question that was asked at the Republican debate tonight about whether or not I would support women being registered for the draft. My answer would be quite different from Sen. Rubio, Gov. Bush, and Gov. Christie who all answered that they thought women should be required to register for the draft. The person who asked me to answer this insisted that I not appeal to Scripture for my answer and so I have given an answer that might be considered a “Natural Law” argument.

Candidate McAtee turns to the debate moderator,

Gladys, I’m glad you asked that question.

I esteem the place of women so highly in this culture that I would be opposed to women registering for the draft. Regardless of what our Politically Correct thought masters want to tell us, women, on average, just are not as capable as men are for the rigors of war. This is proven by the simple observation that in the Olympics, for example, women do not compete with men. Everyone knows why. They don’t compete with men in sprints, or pole vault or shot put, or high jump, or distance races because they can not, on average, successfully preform these physical activities to the same level as men. Similarly, you find no women as Linebackers or defensive ends in the NFL. Now, transfer this to our military. When we are in a position where we have to kill the enemy and destroy the infrastructure of a enemy Nation we want those people fighting who are best conditioned and best able to do just that. Statistics, as well as the Olympics as analogy, tell us that those people are men.

Gladys, read about the battle of Stalingrad. Read about the hardships in the Trenches of WW I … or the Battle of Somme. Read about the brutalities of war on the Pacific Islands. Read about all that our POW went through in Vietnam. Talk to a the few remaining veterans who were at Chosin in Korea. Read about all that and then ask yourself again….”Do we really want our daughters, Mothers, wives, and sisters trying to survive those kinds of perils?”

Next, consider what women in combat will do to morale on the battlefield. What will the sight of women soldiers bloodied, raped, and disfigured do to the psyche of our men in combat?  And what of a man’s natural instinct to protect women? Will it not be the case that our male soldiers will begin prioritizing protecting their female comrades above the accomplishing whatever mission they are assigned to accomplish? Do we want our male soldiers to suppress that instinct?

Next, we must consider combat readiness. The Marine Corps, just last September reported on a test comparing the performance of an all-male combat unit with that of a combat unit which included women. The results of the test are unsurprising to sane people whose brains have not been rotted by political correctness. The results demonstrated that all male combat units outperformed the integrated units in more than two-thirds of the areas evaluated, including speed, lethality, and strength, and with 26 percent fewer injuries. Of course, what this means, concretely speaking, is that when we put women in combat units the result is that we make every man and woman in that unit more likely to get their heads blown off their shoulders.

To be honest, Gladys, I don’t want to be the Chief Executive of a Nation that sends it’s Mothers, Wives, Daughters, and Sisters to combat. The immorality of such social policy screams for judgment from the God we politicians are forever invoking to “Bless America.” Let the non-Civilized nations make an offering of their women to the Volcano God of war.

The Feminists who are pushing this agenda just need to be told, “no, we are not going to allow your insane fantasies about equality get sane men and women killed in combat.”

I might lose this election on this issue. I know that the Politically Correct thought control does not allow this to be thought or said. However, in the end, I’d rather lose this election protecting the noble women of this great nation than win by sending them to war to protect men who should be the ones doing the fighting.

The Blood of Christ and Its Work of Erasing Creaturely Distinctions

“You are to be defined as a spiritual family from the world and not by the world — by the World’s distinction. The distinctions the world would put upon us. It is not our definitions. We are not to be known as Male Christians or female Christians… single Christians, Asian Christians, black, white, wealthy or poor. These are worldly distinctions. They don’t belong in the Church. When we consider one another and how we value and how we care for and how we treat one another we are not to see these worldly or these societal distinctions among us. We are to see the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ that has been shed for you, just as shed for you and for you and for you. All without any difference — all of us together. We are to see the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and therefore equally bound together and equally called the brethren of the Lord Jesus Christ…. So great care must be taken to prevent that virus of favoritism from finding its way into the body and coursing itself through us.”

As From a Reformed Pulpit during a AM Sermon
Somewhere in these united States

I believe in the Kingdom Come
Then all the colours will bleed into one
Bleed into one.
But yes, I’m still running.

Bono — U2

I often will listen to random sermons from Reformed Churches that style themselves Conservative (PCA, OPC, RPCNA, RPCUS, ARP, RPCGA, UCR, CanRef, OCRC etc.). The purpose is just to keep a finger on the pulse of what is going on in the larger Reformed world.

There are several prisms one can view this quote through. One could view it through the prism of  Dr. Peter Jones’ work at “Truth Exchange.”  Jones has written several books on what he calls “Oneism.” Oneism is the attempt to level all reality to a place where all differences are seen as “maya” (illusion).  One of Jones’ staff saw this quote on social media and commented, “Oneism.”

Another prism to see this through is to see this as an example of Anabaptist leveling. Leveling is just the egalitarian idea that social distinctions should be erased. Historically, Anabaptist theology has been one where social distinctions are far less recognized. It was the Anabaptists who gave us the Levelers, Diggers, Fifth Monarchy Men, etc. — all Levelers. It was the Anabaptists who leveled the distinction between minister and laymen in their circles. It was the Anabaptist who called one another “Brother,” so as to flatten any hierarchical distinctions. Anabaptists were strong on erasing the prohibition on Women preachers and this because of their leveling instinct. It is interesting that Satan was the first Leveler, informing Eve, “you shall be as God, knowing good and evil.”

Yet another prism to see this through is the “secular” equivalent of Anabaptism and that is Communism. Communism, like the Anabaptists before them has always had the leveling impulse. In the French Revolution everyone was “Citoyen.” In the Communist Revolution in Russia everyone was “Comrade.”

Still, yet another prism could be the influence of Gnosticism. Gnosticism, historically held that the corporeal aspect of man (his materiality) was not really important or was even evil. It was the spiritual realities which were the be all end all of reality. So, in the quote above, it is not who God who has made us as creatures (Husbands, Married, Single, Asian, Black, etc.) which is important. What is important is the spiritual “blood of Christ,” which erases all other creaturely distinctions with which God us been pleased to embody us.

Finally, it just may be the case of a young minister saying things in-artfully.

Very very in-artfully.

The problem here of course is the following,

1.) The young minister might be confusing the fact,  that when it comes to belonging to Christ there are no hierarchical barriers, with the heretical idea that therefore there are no longer proper creaturely distinctions that exist in our embodied existence. It is true that Jesus accepts all those who are weary and heavy laden who come to Him, regardless of lack of status, rank, or position. Spiritually speaking, we are all one in Christ. As it is said, the ground at the Cross is level. Christ does not accept the Black men above the Asian, simply because of race. Christ does not accept the Female over the Male simply because of gender. However, that spiritual truth does not erase our respective ethnicity or our maleness, or femaleness. Being Justified in and united with Christ does not make us interchangeable cogs in a leveled social hierarchy … not even in the context of the Church. The fact that St. Paul repeatedly gave instructions to “slaves,” “masters,” “husbands,” “wives,” “children,” “men,” “women,” “widows,” “families,” proves beyond a scintilla of doubt that social leveling is not a Biblical or Christian idea. Because of that we would have to say that there is more of Robespierre than of Jesus Christ in this quote.

2.) The minister seems to think that hierarchies are something from which we are saved. Hierarchies are “worldly,” and “societal,” and in the Church we are not “worldly,” and “societal” therefore in the Church we don’t do hierarchy. The thought seems present that once one comes into the Church at that point the blood of Christ washes us from our embodied creatureliness so that we are now egalitarian spiritual beings. Hello, “Liberté, Equalité, Fraternité.”

3.) The minister is exegeting from James 2 where favoritism to the wealthy is forsworn. However, teaching that there should not be a unbiblical favoritism does not mean that there is not a biblical favoritism. St. Paul himself advocates for this proper Biblical favoritism when he writes,

“But if any man does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (1 Timothy 5:8).

Notice that Paul is teaching here a proper Biblical favoritism.  God writes this need for a proper Biblical favoritism again in Galatians 6:10,

As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith.

Note that we are to favor those who of are the household of faith.

4.) Honestly, if we are to abide by this kind of logic then we would should just take down our terribly non-Christian signs that hang over our Church Restrooms. If we are not to be known as Male Christians or Female Christians let’s get serious about implementing this idea and cease with the hateful signage over our bathroom facilities. Also, if we are to take up this idea we Conservative Christians should cease with insisting that boys marry girls. After all, we are not to be known as Male Christians or Female Christians. Our marriage services should end with,

“‘I now pronounce you Christian and Christian. You may kiss the Christian.”

Now, I don’t think this conservative Reformed minister really believes any of the implications of what he said, however, all of this is indeed the implications of what he has said and it is all damn confusing when coming from a pulpit unto a people who are just saturated in this kind of egalitarian nonsense.

Personally, I’m willing to give the minister the benefit of the doubt. Goodness knows, having been in the Pulpit now for over 25 years myself, I have said things that came out different than how I intended. However, for the sake of the laity these in-artful expressions need to be pointed out.

 

 

Did God Learn New Information per Genesis 22:12? McAtee contra Vander Zee

Genesis 22:12 And he said, Lay not thy hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.

“If you read the text (Genesis 22, especially vs. 12) on its own terms — I mean without all the layers of interpretations and explanations — it is really quite astounding. I used to think, and I’ve preached the text this way, that this test was for Abraham’s sake. You know like a teacher might say to you or a prof might say to you, ‘This test isn’t for me, it is for you. It is for you to learn.’ So here, Abraham learns to trust God.

Great Sermon.

Or perhaps little Isaac learns the importance of faith from his Dad’s own obedience. But the text doesn’t say anything about Abraham learning something. What it does say is that God learned something. At the end of the story the Angel of the Lord calls out to Abraham, just as he is about to slice into the thin neck of his son and says, ‘Now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld thy son, thy only son from me.’

It’s those words from God, ‘Now I know,’ that are so astounding and intriguing. God isn’t teaching Abraham anything here, God is learning something about Abraham.

Wait a minute. God learning something?

What kind of God learns something? Evidently the God of this story. The God of the Bible. Of course it goes against everything we think we know about God. God is infinite. God is eternal. God is unchangeable. God knows everything before it happens. We tend to think about God in terms of abstract terms like, omniscience, and immutability and omnipotence. But the Bible is not a set of concepts about God. It’s mostly stories about God and about how God interacts with us and how we interact with God and these stories bring God from the rarefied atmosphere of omniscience and immutability into our world — into the way we live and the way we experience God in our lives.

It’s not that these theological concepts (i.e. — Omniscience, Omnipotence, Immutability) aren’t worth thinking about or that they are not true. It is that they cannot contain the deeply textured, multi-layered mystery, that is God. And that is what these stories try to do and that is why they are so mysterious to us.”

Rev. Len Vander Zee
River Terrace Christian Reformed Church
Lansing, Michigan
Sermon — January 31, 2016

Recent Sermons

Starting at 13:21 and moving through to the 15:57 mark.

Normally, I wouldn’t take the time to correct a sermon by another minister in another Church. Were I to make that my routine I would be spending my life in futility as a modern day Sisyphus. I only take time to dissect this mishandling of the Genesis 22:12 text due to the fact that a couple of the lambs in the flock I serve were in attendance when this sermon was preached and came to me confused about some of what was said.  After I listened to this sermon, I understood why they were confused. Confusing sermons tend to cause confusion.

As such, I intend to unravel the confusion and point out the alarming errors in the quote above. Then I intend to bring it to the direct attention to my young charges while I tell them to stay away from any Church where this kind of confusion is articulated from the pulpit.

1.) Note the implied complaint about reading the Genesis 22:12 text “with layers of interpretation and explanation.”  The Minister seems to be suggesting that unlike all others who heap layers of interpretation and explanation upon the text he is just going to let the text speak by itself.

The problem with this, is that by not reading the text in its context of the whole of Scripture the result is that God is made to be not God. More about that in a minute. For now, let us consider what happens when we do not read texts with layers of proper interpretation and explanation.

Well, when we do not read texts with layers of proper interpretation and explanation what we get is the Roman Catholic Mass. After all, the “layer-less” text finds Jesus saying, “this is my body.” What more proof do we need that the Roman Catholic Mass is true? When we read the text without “layers” then we must conclude that Infant Baptism shouldn’t be done because the “layer-less” text says nothing about Baptizing babies. When we read the text without layers of interpretation and explanation we must conclude that the idea of the Trinity is not true since no text uses the word “Trinity.”  Layer-less texts finds us required to greet the Brethren with a Holy Kiss. Layer-less text would require Christians to embrace some form of Communism since the “layer-less” text teaches that the believers in Acts “had all things in common.”

Clearly we see that the last thing we want in our preaching is “layer-less” texts. One reason we send men to be trained in Seminaries is so that they will learn how to handle texts aright and will understand that all texts must be read in light of all other texts and that the lest clear texts must be layered by the explanation and interpretations of the more clear texts.

To read a text naked, as if no broader context exists is to enter into the realm of subjectivity and eisegesis.

2.) The text does not say “God learned something.”  The text has the Angel of the Lord saying to Abraham, “Now I know …” The fact that the good Reverend here says that the text says that “God learned something,” is instead a layer of explanation and interpretation that is neither faithful to the text nor to the context.

3.) Note the humongous, begging to be noticed, contradiction in the Reverend’s words. First the Preacher insists that God learned something and then within a few sentence the Preacher says that “it’s not that these theological concepts (i.e. -Omniscience) aren’t true.” One finds one’s self screaming at the audio, “Well either God learned something and so never was omniscient or God was omniscient and so can’t learn anything.” Rev. Vander Zee can’t have it both ways.

4.) Rev. Vander Zee emphasizes here the fact that God isn’t omniscient. God learned something he tells us. The idea that God is not omniscient is of course the error of what is called “Free Will Theism.” Free Will Theism is the denial that God is a God who knows all, ordains all, predestines all, and conditions all. Free Will Theism is the anti-Calvinism theology. In Open Theism God is dependent upon man’s choices and God learns along with man. In Open Theism God shares His sovereignty with man so that man and God work things out together.

Now, it is altogether possible that Rev. Vander Zee does not realize he has wandered into this territory.

5.) Notice that the Preacher presents the idea that God learning something “goes against everything we think we know about God.” The clear implication here is that we think we know that God is eternal, infinite, immutable, omniscient, omnipotent, but it may well be the case that those things are not really true of God. We only think we know that. Again, this undermines our confidence in Scripture which repeatedly teaches the non-communicable attributes of God.

6.) Rev. Vander Zee suggests that concepts about God are bad while stories about God are good. Of course it is those very stories that undergird the concepts and teach us that God is eternal (Genesis 1), immutable (I Samuel 15), omnipotent (Job 38-40), omniscient (Genesis 45, 50).

7.) Rev. Vander Zee misses the point that it is the stories that give us the concepts. Every story has within it a conceptual point to make. One simply can divorce story from concept, or concept from story. We see Rev. Vander Zee extrapolating here concept from story by his errant explanation and interpretation of this story in Genesis 22. We have a story, and Rev. Vander Zee is trying to give a concept (God’s non omniscience) that communicates the meaning of the story. Now, Rev. Vander Zee is not doing the story justice because he has not read it as comparing the less clear scripture with the more clear didactic scripture that teaches that,

“Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please” (Isaiah 46:9-10).

“Who can fathom the Spirit of the LORD, or instruct the LORD as his counselor? Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him, and who taught him the right way? Who was it that taught him knowledge, or showed him the path of understanding?” (Isaiah 40:13-14).

“Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD” (Psalm 139:4).

“O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways” (Psalm 139:1-3).

“My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand—when I awake, I am still with you” (Psalm 139:15-16).

“Can anyone teach knowledge to God, since he judges even the highest?” (Job 21:22).

“He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name. Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit” (Psalm 147:4-5).

“And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the LORD searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever” (1 Chronicles 28:9).

“Do you know how the clouds hang poised, those wonders of him who has perfect knowledge?” (Job 37:16).

“From heaven the LORD looks down and sees all mankind; from his dwelling place he watches all who live on earth—he who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do” (Psalm 33:13-15).

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!” (Romans 11:33).

“Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (Hebrews 4:13).

“Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows” (Luke 12:7).

“… for whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything” (1 John 3:20).

Rev. Vander Zee ignores all this context … ignores the explicit statements of Scripture in order to insist that God learned and he does this all the while still affirming that what he denies in this sermon as true, is true.

8.) Rev. Vander Zee claims that terms like “omniscience, omnipotence, immutability, eternality,” are abstract terms that are naughty. The listener is left to infer that terms like “non-omniscience, non-omnipotence, mutability, and non eternality” are good abstract terms that can be proven by bad interpretations and explanations as drawn from Genesis 22.

9.) Rev. Vander Zee says that the Bible is about how God interacts with us and how we interact with God. Unfortunately this is just not true. The Bible is about how God alone does all the saving of a sin besotted people via the God-man keeping covenant as on a bloody Cross. Only then is it about how a sin besotted people respond in gratitude to God’s grace.

10.) Rev. Vander Zee insists that our theological language of omnipotence, omniscience, immutability, and eternality, cannot contain God. However, that the God of the Bible is more than all those does mean He is other than all those. God cannot both be and not be omniscient. God cannot both be and not be omnipotent. God cannot both be and not be immutable. God cannot both be and not be eternal. To insist that He is, is to turn God into a  surd. If Rev. Vander Zee desires to define God as contradiction then he would have to insist, in order to be consistent with His own hermeneutic here, that God cannot be defined as contradiction. If God is contradiction then God is not contradiction.

11.) Rev. Vander Zee appeals to a deeply textured and multi-layered mystery that is God. This is poetic smoke to hide Rev. Vander Zee’s appeal to contradiction to explain God. Again, if we  appeal to the hoist in Rev. Vander Zee’s petard we would have to say that if God is a deeply textured and multi-layered mystery then God isn’t a deeply textured and multi-layered mystery.

12.) Though Rev. Vander Zee may not realize this, when Rev. Vander Zee calls into question God’s omniscience in Genesis 22:12, he, at the same time, calls into question God’s omnipotence. God’s omniscience is based on the foundation of His omnipotence. Because God determines, ordains, and predestines all things therefore He knows all things. It is not possible to be non-omniscient and sovereign and omnipotent at the same time. How does a God, that orders and predestines every detail of all reality and all of what will happen, learn? He can’t. To insist that God learns, the way that Rev. Vander Zee is insisting that God learns, is to put him in direct denial of God’s omnipotence.

13.)  Though Rev. Vander Zee may not realize this, when Rev. Vander Zee calls into question God’s omniscience in Genesis 22:12, he, at the same time, calls into question God’s immutability. If God does not change then God cannot learn for to learn something is to change by going from a state of non-knowing to a state of knowing.

14.) There is not a lick of rationality or intelligence in any of this. This kind of preaching is insulting to the integrity of Scripture, the character of God, and the intelligence of the congregation listening. That likely isn’t the intent of Rev. Vander Zee, but it is surely the result.

Now having exposed the in-congruence in the sermon with the goals of restoring God’s honor and protecting God’s lambs we turn to briefly explain what is going on in Genesis 22:12. In John Calvin’s commentary (a commentary that used to be consulted by CRC ministers) on this passage Calvin offers up that,

“by condescending to the manner of men, God here says that what he has proved by experiment, is now made known to himself. And he speaks thus with us, not according to his own infinite wisdom, but according to our infirmity.”

Calvin thus appeals to the idea that God speaks to Abraham here anthropopathically, which is to say that God is speaking to Abraham in such a way as to attribute a human passion (“now I know”) to God.  More on this anthropopathism in just a bit.

To break Genesis 22:12 down more specifically we see that on the surface, as taken as naked without the context of all of Scripture, the text suggests that God went from a state of not knowing something to having learned something new. However, as the Scripture above cites we know that God’s “understanding is infinite” (Ps. 147:5), and that God knows “the end from the beginning” (Isa. 46:10), and that God has foreknown and predestinated us from the foundation of the world (Rom. 8:29–30).  As such, unless we  embrace a hermeneutic of contradiction (which would, at the same time mean that we would not embrace a hermeneutic of contradiction) we cannot allow a conclusion on Genesis 22:12 to mean that God was a good student who had a large capacity to learn.

The solution then is to concede, per Scripture, that because God is omniscient that God knew exactly what Abraham would do with Isaac precisely because God predestined exactly what Abraham would do with Isaac. What happens in Genesis 22 is that which God knew by omnipotence and omniscience He now knows by the demonstration of Abraham’s faith.

Remember, we must think in terms of the literary technique that Scripture repeatedly employs called anthropopathism.  The Bible, written for a human audience, often ascribes to deity those passions, feelings, and emotions of humans so that we might better be able to comprehend.

We speak like this sometimes in our own professions. As a minister, I might say, “Let’s see if we can learn from Scripture what omniscience means,” and then after demonstrating it, as I have in this essay, I might declare to the congregation I serve, “Now, I along with you, have learned what omniscience means by looking at Scripture,” and this even though I knew what omniscient meant before the lesson began.

Therefore Joshua and Sarah, Genesis 22:12 does not mean what Rev. Vander Zee wrongly made it mean.

Luke 9:28f — Transfiguration

First Sunday of Epiphany — Baptism of Christ
Second Sunday of Epiphany — Cana of Galilee Wedding
Third and Fourth Sunday of Epiphany — Reading of scroll in Nazareth
Last Sunday of Epiphany — Transfiguration

All of this is communicating that the long anticipated Messiah that the covenant Fathers spoke of has arrived. The epiphany in Christ’s Baptism is that He is identified as the covenant head for His people. His actions will be their actions. His baptism their baptism. The epiphany of the Miracle at the wedding of Cana is found in the fact that the water of the Old Covenant has now blushed into Wine of the New Covenant as the Lord Christ is identified as the Messiah long promised so that it is announced that, in Christ, the best has been saved to end. In the Reading of the Scroll of Nazareth the epiphany being communicated is that the age to come promised in the old covenant is Present in the person of the Lord Christ. He is the one who will bring good news to the poor, set the captive free, give recovery to the blind because He Himself is the promised age to come.  Also, the epiphany aspect hinted at in the Scroll reading is that the ministry of the Messiah is going to extend to Gentiles as Christ is rejected by His own people.

In the words of both John the Baptist and the Lord Christ the Kingdom of God is at hand.

All of this is what is called Redemptive History. It is real History but it is the History of God’s redemptive work.

Epiphany is intended to give us basic Christianity 101. Ideally, mature Christians would have these basics down so that they could communicate how it is that Christ is the nadir point and fulfillment of God’s promises.

Why is a Epiphany sermon series like this important for your faith?

Prologue,

Let us first note the movement of the Church calendar. During the time of Advent we reach the zenith with the Incarnation of Christ. During the time of Epiphany we reach the zenith with the Transfiguration of Christ. During the time of Lent we reach the zenith with the Crucifixion. From there we move to the Exaltation of Christ as found in the Resurrection season of Christ. The Church Calendar gives us the life of Christ and teaches us Redemptive History as we consider the Lord Christ.

1.) It requires you to see that the Kingdom of God is present.

— Remember the “Now — Not Yet” Hermeneutic that we emphasize here. What we’ve been looking at the past few weeks, during the Epiphany season, is the Now-ness of the Kingdom. This is important to realize because the majority of the Christians you meet have imbibed (often quite without know it) that the Kingdom of God is only Future. They look forward to some future day when Jesus returns and sets up His rule and Kingdom in Jerusalem. The Kingdom of God is totally future to them.  In this series we’ve been trying to teach, consistent with the Scripture accounts, that the Kingdom of God has arrived in Christ.

This already present Kingdom, to be sure, has a “yet to come” dynamic but if we don’t understand the already presence of the Kingdom we miss out on the confidence and optimism that is the birthright of every Christian. We live, in what some would style as ‘dark times,’ but as Christians we know objectively that God’s Kingdom has come and we live in terms of that present Kingdom.

With the completed work of the Lord Christ, God’s eschatological future Kingdom begins and is already present. In Christ, the Father has subjected the inhabited World to the rule of Christ. In Christ there is a new Creation and as God’s people walk in terms of that freely given new Creation this present evil age begins to be increasingly diminished and rolled back.

Ill — Sickness vs. Penicillin — Christ is the Penicillin

2.) It allows you to focus on Christ who is the Kingdom as opposed to focus on Israel today as somehow being wrapped up with Kingdom events as if Israel is more important than the King.

3.) It aids you in reading the Scripture in terms of the Scripture and not in terms of the Newspaper. I hope we have demonstrated here that when we read the Scripture we ask ourselves how does a knowledge of the unfolding and organic growth of the rest of the Scripture impact upon the blooming of the Kingdom in the Gospel Accounts. The Gospels are much like the point in the novel that is the crescendo to all that has been developed to date.

4.) Along the way we’ve tried to include the idea that as a people who have been swept up into this Kingdom of God we have the privilege and responsibility to live in terms of the present-ness of the Kingdom. For example, having been made citizens in the Kingdom of a King who is merciful and gentle we seek to demonstrate those virtues in our own lives. As another example, having been made citizens in the Kingdom of a King who is just we champion His Law word as the universal standard for Justice for all men. Being citizens in the Kingdom of God we resist evil because evil is inconsistent with this already present Kingdom.

Inherent in the story of the Transfiguration is the promise of a kind of life beyond what is apparent to earthly eyes most of the time. Hebrews 12 speaks of this other realm when it talks about being surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses.  The Transfiguration reminds us again that there is a realm … a life beyond this life. Unlike the Academic Atheist who I once encountered in conversation, the Transfiguration reminds the Modern that it is not the case that when one dies there is just unconsciousness.

If nothing else, (and there is much more) the Transfiguration reminds that “Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die” is not a true synopsis of life.

Let’s examine some of the symbolism and motifs (themes) that are attached to this passage and see what we can draw out from these as we read the rest of Scripture.

Exodus 24:15f

Exodus 24:15 Then Moses went up to the mount, and the cloud covered the mountain,16 And the glory of the Lord abode upon mount Sinai, and the cloud covered [o]it six days: and the seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud.

 There is likely a connection here then between the Mosaic witnessing of the glory of God and the disciples witnessing the brightness of God’s glory here in Christ. If that is the case then this is one of those testimonies of Scripture where another Divine character quality of the Father is seen in the Son so that what is being subtly communicated is the Divine Nature of the Lord Christ.

This is underscored when Luke writes,

“they saw His glory, and the two men that stood with him.”

This is not merely the refracted character of God’s glory, this is a case where the Son is full of the same glory as the Father.

That the disciples are witnessing the Glorified and Divine Christ, in a kind of “time before the time manifestation”, is confirmed by John’s record in his Apocalypse (Revelation) where John describes the ascended Christ.

Revelation 1:14 His head and hairs were white as white wool, and as snow, and his eyes were as a flame of fire,

Compare that with what is recorded here

Luke — the fashion of his countenance was altered, and his raiment became white and dazzling.

Mark 9:3 And his raiment did [c]shine, and was very white as snow, so white as no fuller can make upon the earth.

The Whiteness here communicates the intense glory radiating from the Son. Snow was as close as they could come to this intense spectacle of God’s person. That the divinity of Christ is being pressed here is underscored by Daniel’s description of the “Ancient of Days in Daniel 7

Daniel 7:9 I beheld till the [r]thrones were set up, and the [s]Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels, as burning fire.

So, on the Mount of Transfiguration the post-Ascension divinity of Christ is put on display and what is communicated for those playing close attention when we read what leads up to this event, where Christ speaks of His death (vs. 22), is that He who is God  glorified is going to lay down His life for His people.

The paradox of the Kingdom is that it comes in with both glory and humility at the same time. During Epiphany we find the Lord Christ everywhere assaulting the Kingdom of Satan. We even see the proclamation here of His divinity and yet all this is wrapped in the enigma of His coming Humiliation — His death and burial.

Luke says they: “Spoke of His Exodus which He should accomplish at Jerusalem”.

Of course the Exodus phraseology takes us back to the the departure of Israel from Egypt. When you combine the idea of Exodus mentioned here to the Lord Christ’s speaking of His coming death (22) one can’t help but see that Christ, in His Exodus will the be the Passover Lamb of God whereby God’s people are not visited with God’s wrath against His enemies. All of this bespeaks the great themes of God’s justice and mercy and God’s means of salvation. It speaks of a substitute in our place and instead of us. It speaks of delivery from what we deserve. It speaks of reconciling God to man and man to God by man presenting a sacrifice, as provided by God, in order to satisfy God’s just demands by propitiating (appeasing) God with something more than animal blood.

Likewise in this Exodus of Christ we are reminded that we are delivered as in Christ. His blood is spilled so that we might Exodus into the promised New Creation that is provided in and by Christ. Christ’s Exodus thus is our Exodus. By His stripes we are healed.

This also speaks of the necessity of Christ and His Exodus being our Exodus. Christ is both the necessary and sufficient condition in order to be right with God. If we will not have His ransom price paid as our ransom price we will remain in this present evil age and under the authority of “the God of this world.” If we will not have His deliverance and protection proved by His shed blood we are on a trajectory that will find us joined with the foulest and cruelest imps and demons for all eternity.

Moving on, this Transfiguration also serves then as analogy for the “Now … Not Yet” of the Kingdom of which we have been speaking. It has arrived in glory and yet it, more often than not, comes to us wrapped in humility. Paul was the great champion of the Kingdom … a champion beaten with rods and whips as well as stoned and shipwrecked while bearing a thorn in the flesh. Peter does many great miracles in the context of Kingdom work and yet Stephen and James are recorded as martyred in the Scripture. We share in the glory of Christ and yet we do so around the Word broken and the humble elements of Bread and wine and Water. The Kingdom is present … the Mt. of Transfiguration tells us that. The Kingdom is yet to come … the fact that we are not yet transfigured tells us that.

Do not miss the significance that this is all taking place on a Mountain,

As we have seen before Mountains are often associated with the place where concourse with God is held.

The entry for “Mountain” in Dictionary of Biblical Imagery reads:

“Almost from the beginning of the Bible, mountains are sites of transcendent spiritual experiences, encounters with God or appearances by God. Ezekiel 28:13-15 places the *Garden of Eden on a mountain. *Abraham shows his willingness to sacrifice Isaac and then encounters God on a mountain (Gen 22:1-14). God appears to Moses and speaks from the *burning bush on “Horeb the mountain of God” (Ex 3:1-2 NRSV), and he encounters Elijah on the same site (1 Kings 19:8-18). Most impressive of all is the experience of the Israelites at Mt. *Sinai (Ex 19), which *Moses ascends in a *cloud to meet God.

A similar picture emerges from the NT, where Jesus is associated with mountains. Jesus resorted to mountains to be alone (Jn 6:15), to *pray (Mt 14:23; Lk 6:12) and to teach his listeners (Mt 5:1; Mk 3:13). It was on a mountain that Jesus refuted Satan’s temptation (Mt 4:8; Lk 4:5). He was also transfigured on a mountain (Mt 17:1-8; Mk 9:2-8; Lk 9:28-36), and he ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives (Acts 1:10-12).[4]

Jesus also designated a mountain in Galilee from which he gave the Great Commission to the eleven (Matthew 28:16). Jesus is both the tabernacle of God among men (John 1:14) and a temple (John 2:19-22) who builds the new temple (Ephesians 2:19-22 [his body, the church]). Hebrews 12:18-24 contrasts Mount Sinai and Mount Zion in the context of the transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant. God’s people have gone from one mountain to another. Surely these mountains are symbols of the Old Covenant and the New Covenant and have their foundation in the first mountain-temple, the Garden of Eden.”

We could do much the same with the Biblical Motif of Clouds

Exodus 40:34-38 — Then the cloud covered the Tabernacle of the Congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle. 35 So Moses could not enter into the Tabernacle of the Congregation, because the cloud abode thereon, and the glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle. 36 Now when the cloud ascended up from the Tabernacle, the children of Israel went forward in all their journeys. 37 But if the cloud ascended not, then they journeyed not till the day that it ascended. 38 For [a]the cloud of the Lord was upon the Tabernacle by day, and fire was in it by night in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.

Staying with the Cloud motif

After the exodus from Egypt, when the Israelites wander in the wilderness for forty years, their journey is marked by a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night (Ex 13:21, 22; 14:19, 20, 24, see later reflections in Neh 9:12, 19; Ps 78:14; 99:7; 105:39; and 1 Cor 10:1–2). Exodus 16:10 associates the cloud in the wilderness with the “ glory of the Lord.” The cloud and the fire represents God’ s presence with them

See, the Lord rides on a swift cloud and is coming to Egypt. The idols of Egypt tremble before him, and the hearts of the Egyptians melt within them. (Isaiah 19:1-2)

Jesus, like God in the OT , rides on a cloud (Acts 1:9). One of the most pervasive images of Christ’ s return is as one who rides his cloud chariot into battle (Mt 24:30; Mk 13:26; 14:62; Lk 21:27; Rev 1:7; cf. [cf. cf.. compare] Dan 7:13).

That takes care of some of the Imagery here. Now let’s turn our attention to the persons present.

Both Moses and Elijah, two figures whose passing’s were mysterious, were believed by many Jews to be God’s precursors of the end times. That this is at least some of the point in the text is seen in vs. 11-12

The reason for this end time expectation of these two was the mysterious end of each

Elijah — Chariot into Heaven (II Kings. 2:9-12)
Moses — Buried by God Himself (Ex. 34:4-7)

As such these two men were thought to be available for God to send back to prepare for the end. Their presence here reminds us that the Messianic end times was nigh. They also represent the idea of “the law and the prophets.” In Moses and Elijah God’s covenant people are present.  Luke’s account tells us that they speak of Christ’s Exodus … meaning his Death. This would have been a matter close to the interests of the OT Saints. The Messiah is their Champion as well as ours. His Exodus is there Exodus as well.

God Speaks — Tracks with Isaanic Servant passages

Messianic Sonship OT

1 Behold, [a]my servant: [b]I will stay upon him: mine elect, in whom my soul[c]delighteth: I have put my Spirit upon him: he shall bring forth [d]judgment to the Gentiles. 2 He shall not [e]cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. 3 A [f]bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking [g]flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment in [h]truth. 4 He shall not fail nor be discouraged till he have [i]set judgment in the earth: and the [j]isles shall wait for his Law.

Christ is the Isaanic Servant in whom God delight and in delighting in Him He God’s beloved Son.

_____________________

Peter — James — John

That Peter at least notes that the end is at hand he blurts out this bit about building Tabernacles or booths. We think Peter odd for saying that but Peter, though fearful (wouldn’t you be afraid if you were on the cusp of the end of the world?) connects some OT dots.

Zechariah 4:16 But it shall come to pass that everyone that is left of all the nations, which came against Jerusalem, shall go up from year to year to worship the King the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of Tabernacles.

So, this God-commanded festival kept by Jews for centuries, was considered a possible time for God’s taking control of God’s creation and beginning the age of shalom. Peter’s comments then were not “off the wall” but consistent with Jewish understanding.

Conclusion

Perhaps we would be well reminded that the Mt. of Transfiguration becomes an objective marker of the Truth of God’s Salvation narrative. Our belief in the presence of the Kingdom is not pinned upon our own personal experience, nor upon how we are feeling at any given moment, nor upon our sense of  utter dependence. Those are all subjective markers. Our belief in the presence of God’s Kingdom is based upon these Objective realities. It was for Peter.

16 [t]For we followed not deceivable fables, when we opened unto you the power, and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but with our eyes we saw his majesty: 17 For he received of God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from that excellent Glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. 18 And this voice we heard when it came from heaven being with him in the holy mount.

Second we can be reminded that God’s glory comes in God’s time and according to God’s movement. There is nothing so foolish as to think that we can seize God’s glory somehow. God’s glory comes to us in God’s time and if Scripture is any indication the glory of God is never far removed, in this life, with a theology of the Cross. Everyone wants the glory … nobody wants the humiliation. Everyone wants to go to heaven. Nobody wants to die.

Third, we are reminded of how the presence of the Kingdom is wrapped up in the death of Christ. Our hope for the Kingdom is anchored in the fact that we are united to Christ in His death, resurrection and ascension. The victory of Christ is our victory. But this victory is not only a spiritual victory (though it is that) without any corporeal repercussions. The Kingdom has come. Christ has conquered and so we move in that victory understanding that the Gates of Hell can not resist the assault of the Church upon the defense mechanisms of Satan.