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When Jesus Gave Birth

March 14, 2013 — 6 Comments

The early church saw in John 19:34, the piercing of Christ’s side and subsequent flow of blood and water, an allusion to Eve’s creation (Genesis 2:21-22). By the end of the second century we find the Apologist Tertullian saying,

If Adam was a figure of Christ, the sleep of Adam was the death of Christ who was to fall asleep in death; that in the injury of His side might be figured the Church, the true mother of the living.

According to Alban Maguire,

This teaching had been foreshadowed before the time of Tertullian, and after his time we can find no doctrine more honored among the Fathers and Doctors of the Church.

Few scholars today, however, actively engage this interpretation and those that do dismiss it as foreign to John’s intent. Raymond Brown sees “little evidence that the Genesis story was in John’s mind here.” Mark Stibbe thinks, “(it) requires ideas which are properly speaking extrinsic to the gospel.” It’s no wonder Andreas Koestenberg in his comprehensive A Theology of John’s Gospel doesen’t even include it as a “Possible Instance of the New Creation Motif in the Passion Narrative.”

But far from being an unfounded interpretation such a meaning appears to have been intended by John himself. It demands renewed consideration. As allusion, John 19:34 is the Fourth Gospel’s keystone, holding this narratives most important themes together.

In the series of posts to follow we will examine the evidence for this implicit reference.

First we will consider the importance of John 19:34 in the fourth gospel and the interpretations which are most prominent today.
We will then examine the volume of correspondence between John 19:34 and Genesis 2:21-22.
And finally we will conclude with a look at how this allusion forms a fitting conclusion to four of John’s major themes: (1) New Creation, (2) New Birth, (3) Marriage, (4) Oneness.

In Easter, Gospels

How Can Evangelicals Be Right and Yet Get it So Wrong?

March 12, 2013 — Leave a comment

I’ve been talking with my dad about the state of Christianity in America. My dad is a well-known youth evangelist who in his thirty plus years of ministry has lead thousands of people to the Lord. But in recent years he’s become increasingly concerned about the church’s growing superficiality.

For example, he’s been asking Christians, both young and old, “why did Jesus have to die?”

The typical answer he hears is of course, “To save us from our sins.”

“So why couldn’t God just forgive?” He responds.

“uhhh.”

At this point most are at a loss. He’s seen it over and over again – even among life-long believers and leaders in the church.

But of course our shallowness is more than just anecdotal. In 2005, sociologists Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton in a comprehensive study identified a new belief system among otherwise fervent “Christian” teenagers which they termed Moralistic Therapeutic Deism.

“Moralistic” because their Christian faith was primarly about living a moral life.
“Therapeutic” because it’s aim was for them to feel good about themselves and therefore didn’t include things like “repentance from sin, of keeping the Sabbath, of living a servant of a sovereign divine, of steadfastly saying one’s prayers, of faithfully observing high holy days, of building character through suffering…”
“Deistic” because God is viewed as “one who exists, created the world, and defines our general moral order, but not one who is particularly personally involved in one’s affairs—especially affairs in which one would prefer not to have God involved.”

Some of you might be thinking, “Hey wait a minute! I’m a Christian. And that’s what I believe!”

I know. It does sound a lot like what people call Christianity today. You’ve heard it said, “It’s not a religion its a relationship.”

Of course I’m not blaming you or your church. It might just be the “Gospel” most churches appear to teach.

Think about it. What happens if an American who knows absolutely nothing about Jesus or the Bible is suddenly provided a banquet of nothing but the “Gospel” – What Trevin Wax calls the story for an individual?

All have sinned.
Sin deserves death.
But Jesus died for our sins.
Believe in Jesus and your sins will be forgiven.
Now be a good person.

That is the Gospel! And yet it’s NOT the Gospel. It’s the Gospel without an essential context. It’s a summary for a people who already know the bigger story.

But without a clear presentation of that larger story, the new believer is left to fill in the gaps in that summary with what our culture values the most – Self!

Now shake self and that summary together and Voila!

Moralistic Therapeutic Deism. Jesus died so we don’t have to feel guilty.

My point is that it just may be our over emphasis on the Gospel as told for the individual which is to blame for the anemic state of the church. Jesus + nothing does equal everything but in another sense it leads a real state of confusion. We need to emphasize the Gospel without ignorning this bigger picture.

Here’s how Fred Sanders in His book The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything puts it.

When evangelicalism wanes into an anemic condition, as it sadly has in recent decades, it happens in this way: the point of emphasis are isolated from the main body of Christian truth and handled as if they are the whole story rather than the key points. Instead of teaching the full counsel of God (incarnation, ministry of healing and teaching, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and second coming), anemic evangelicalism simply shouts its one point of emphasis louder and louder (the cross! the cross! the cross!). But in isolation from the total matrix of Christian truth, the cross doesn’t make the right kind of sense. A message about nothing but the cross is not emphatic. It is reductionist. The rest of the matrix matters: the death of Jesus is salvation partly because of the new life he lived after it, and above all because of the eternal background in which he is the eternal Son of the eternal Father. You do not need to say all of those things at all times, but you need to have a felt sense of their force behind the things you do say. When that felt sense is not present, or is not somehow communicated to the next generation, emphatic evangelicalism becomes reductionist evangelicalism.

Emphatic evangelicalism can be transformed into reductionist evangelicalism in less than a generation and then become self-perpetuating. People who grow up under the influence of reductionist evangelicalism suffer, understandably, from some pretty perplexing disorientation. They are raised on “Bible, cross, conversion, and heaven” as the whole Christian message, and they sense that there must be more than that. They catch a glimpse of this “more” in Scripture but aren’t sure where it belongs. They hear it in the hymns, but it is drowned out by the repetition of the familiar. They find extended discussions of it in older authors, but those very authors also reinforce what they’ve been surrounded by all along: that the most important things in the Christian message are Bible, cross, conversion, and heaven. Inside of reductionist evangelicalism, everything you hear is right, but somehow it comes out all wrong.

What do you think? Is it an over emphasis on the Gospel told for the individual partly to blame for Evangelicalism’s superficiality? And if so what other things might be essential to a fuller picture of the Gospel?

In Church, Gospels

3 Points that Reveal Luke’s Theology of Atonement

January 17, 2013 — 3 Comments

Many scholars today believe the Gospel of Luke offers no theology of substitutionary atonement. In other words they hold that Luke does not present Jesus’ death as doing for us what we could not do for ourselves. Greg Herrick states,

The reason for the scholarly movement away from a vicarious interpretation of the death of Christ in Luke-Acts is due to the fact that apart from two passages Luke never appears to make that equation. That is, apart from these two passages, he never explicitly links the death of Christ with forgiveness of sins. The problem is further compounded by the fact that the two passages in question, namely, Luke 22:19-20 and Acts 20:28 are fraught with both textual and interpretive problems.

It’s not my intention to rehash all the issues here. You can find excellent overviews here and here. Instead I want to offer an entirely overlooked way through the haze. It’s my contention that Luke does present Jesus and his death as overturning the curse placed upon us due to Adam’s sin. Luke does this by depicting Jesus as a new victorious Adam.

1. Luke presents Jesus as a new Adam.

This is beyond a doubt Luke’s purpose in the placement and arrangement of Jesus’ genealogy. Unlike Matthew who places his genealogy at the outset of his gospel, Luke places it immedietly after Jesus’ adult baptism and just prior to the temptations. It’s thus bookend by the issue of Jesus’ sonship. In the baptism God declares Jesus to be His “beloved Son” and in the temptations Satan challenges Jesus on precisely this point. “if you are the Son of God…”

Also instead of beginning with Abraham and working forward to Jesus, as Matthew does (Matthew 1:1-16), Luke genealogy begins with Jesus and works backwards to Adam (Luke 3:23-38). The net effect makes his genealogy a list of sons rather than a list of fathers and points to Adam rather than Jesus. Of course Luke’s intention is not to diminish Jesus but rather, in light of the context, to make a comparison between Jesus and Adam. Both are said to be God’s son.

2. Luke presents Jesus as tempted like Adam.

Jesus’ three temptation follow immediately after the genealogy. If Luke intends to present Jesus like Adam than the temptations could not have been better placed. But Jesus’ success here is merely the beginning of a battle that will continue in the later part of Luke. Luke tells us that after the temptations the devil, “left him until an “opportune time” (4:13). In Luke, Satan finds this opportunity at the beginning of the crucifixion plot, entering into Judas Iscariot (Luke 22:3).

This suggests that the events surrounding the crucifixion are themselves a continuation of the temptation. Certainly there are echoes of the devil’s challenge at the trial when the leaders ask, “Are you the Son of God…” (22:70). And it’s Jesus’ bold “Yes!” which seals his fate and overcomes the desire to save his own skin.

As with the other gospels Jesus confession is juxtaposed with Peter’s denial. If Peter’s denial is due to, as Luke tells us, the sifting of Satan (22:31-32) then there is little doubt Satan is also present in this challenging question to Jesus. It echoes the devil’s challenge in the earlier temptations.

3. Luke presents Jesus undoing the curse of Adam.

At Jesus’ death, the centurion declares, “surely this man was innocent!” Here Luke differs remarkably from the centurion’s confession in the gospels of Matthew and Mark. In those accounts the centurion says, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” Owing to the fact that Luke has already declared Jesus to be the Son of God, it is doubtful that Luke wants to downplay this fact here. Instead it appears the verdict of innocence is in some sense connected to Jesus being like Adam, the Son of God.

For Luke, Jesus’ innocence is not simply in reference to the crime for which He has been charged but His victory over all temptation. What Christ has done in his persistent innocence is to reopen the way closed by Adam. Jesus final words to the thief on the cross are directly connected to this second Adam motif, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.” “Paradise” is the same Greek word used elsewhere in Septuagint and the book of Revelation for the “garden” of Eden.

Several of these points have been noted by others (here and here) but as of yet I have found no one who sees in Luke’s Adam the key to Luke’s theology of vicarious atonement. Does Luke teach that the crucifixion of Jesus satisfies God’s punishment for sin? Absolutely. Jesus is the victorious Son of God who’s final victory over temptation reverses the curse of Adam.

In Easter, Gospels, Theology

How that First Christmas Census Adds to Luke’s Message of Peace

December 11, 2012 — Leave a comment

There’s a well known problem with Luke’s nativity. Luke states that Mary and Joseph went to Bethlehem because of a census that took place while Quirinius was governor of Syria (2:1-5).

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town.

Now Josephus, the first century historian, says Quirinius conducted a census in A.D. 6. And here in lies the problem. Because Luke, like Matthew, also places Jesus birth before the death of King Herod in 4 B.C (Matt. 2:1, Luke 1:5). Which adds up to unmistakable difference of 9 years.

Whatever the solution to this problem, and there are good solutions, It appears to me that Luke did indeed want his readers to at least connect Jesus’ birth with the memory of the census of A.D. 6. Here’s why.

The census that year sparked a major Jewish revolt. Luke knows of this event because he refers to it in his second volume (Acts 5:37).

After this Judas the Galilean rose up in the days of the census and drew away some of the people after him. He too perished, and all who followed him were scattered.

It’s quite natural to connect this census with the one already mentioned at the beginning of Luke.

Concerning Judas, Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews provides a little more.

Yet was there one Judas, a Gaulonite, of a city whose name was Gamala, who, taking with him Sadduc, a Pharisee, became zealous to draw them to a revolt, who both said that this taxation was no better than an introduction to slavery, and exhorted the nation to assert their liberty; as if they could procure them happiness and security for what they possessed, and an assured enjoyment of a still greater good, which was that of the honor and glory they would thereby acquire for magnanimity.

The result, however, was vastly different than Judas intended. Rome quickly crushed the rebellion. But the repercussions, Josephus finds, extended long after.

the sedition at last increased so high, that the very temple of God was burnt down by their enemies’ fire. (A.D. 70)

It appears to me that Luke implicitly compare and contrast the well-known actions of the Rebel Judas with the actions of Mary and Joseph. Like Judas, Mary and Joseph are from Galilee. And yet unlike the revolutionary they don’t rebel when commanded to register. They humbly obey.

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.

If anyone had a reason to rebel, they did. Mary with child, a long distance to travel and no room for them when they arrive. But suffering the insults, they conducted themselves as Rome, the oppressor state, required.

Luke in both his Gospel and Acts is insistent on the peaceful behavior of Jesus and his followers. Despite Jesus being executed as an enemy of Rome, and His followers being the source of numerous riots, Luke stresses over and over again that the seditious overthrow of the government is not the way of those who follow Christ.

Instead Jesus comes, as Zachariah says,

to guide our feet in the way of peace (Luke 1:79).

And it is because of His birth the angels sing,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased! (Luke 2:14)

By implicitly comparing and contrasting Mary and Joseph’s behavior with the infamous actions of Judas the Galilean, Luke offers them as examples of peace for all Christians to follow.

In Christmas, Devotions, Gospels

Why the Foot Washing Belongs with Christmas

December 10, 2012 — Leave a comment

It’s Christmas again! And like the tensile and lights, it’s time to pull out those well worn advent passages we’re all familiar with.

Prophecies about Jesus coming (Isaiah 9 and Micah 5)
Narratives about Jesus birth (Matthew 1-2, Luke 1-2 and Revelation 12).
Reflections on the incarnation, the fact that God became man (John 1 and Philippians 2)

How about a new passage to read and preach this year? John 13 is not typically associated with Christmas and yet it has the birth of Jesus written all over it. Here’s how.

Water in John is an important symbol of purification and the Spirit.

John 13 isn’t the only time water plays a significant role in this gospel. Beginning in chapter one, John the Baptist states three times that he baptizes in “water” (1:26, 31, 33) only then to proclaim that Jesus will “baptize in the Holy Spirit” (1:35). Jesus changes water into wine (2:9), proclaims a new birth of “water and Spirit” (3:5) and offers the Samaritan woman “living water” (4:10). He heals a paralytic longing to be cured in a troubled pool (5:7), invites the thirsty to come to him and drink (7:37-38) and opens the eyes of the blind in the pool of Siloam (9:6-7). Ultimately, Jesus in death releases a flow of water from His pierced side (19:34).

What do all these references to water mean?

Sometimes water is simply a clear physical liquid used for rituals of purification. However when associated with Jesus, water in John represents the Spirit (7;37-38). By comparing and contrasting these two meanings, John makes clear the supremacy of Christ’s Spirit over earthly cleaning. (See my post, Jesus is Greater: What does Water Mean? for more details.)

Jesus is a container of water which represents the Spirit.

It’s not enough though to say water refers to purification and the Spirit. In John 7:37-38, Jesus prophecies “living water” will flow from within Him and in 19:34 we find it doing just that. Jesus is literally a container of water!

This water also comes from Jesus in John 11, at the tomb of Lazarus. John says Jesus was “troubled” and “wept” or more literally “shed tears.” The word “trouble” points back to the first time this word is used in John. In chapter five it refers to the waters of Bethesda (5:7). The water heals when the water is “troubled” and so too does Jesus here, raising Lazarus from the dead.

The water also comes from Jesus in John 9. Remember it’s Jesus’ spit mixed with clay which opens the eyes of the man born blind (9:3).

The Water within Jesus’ is His Divine nature.

In 1 John 5:6, John says Jesus Christ “came by water and blood; not with water only with water and blood.” The blood here clearly stands for Jesus’ fleshly nature which some erroneously denied (see 1 John 4:2 and 2 John 7).

If the water associated with Jesus in John represents the Spirit (7:37-39) than the only conclusion we can draw here is that water stands for Christ’s Divine nature as opposed to this fleshly nature. John 1:14 says, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” The water signifies the intangible Word. (See my post, Finally Someone Gets the “Water and Blood” Right! for more details).

In John 13 the washing with water is explicitly connected with Jesus. When Peter refuses the humble service of His Lord, Jesus tells him, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.” By refusing the washing, Peter has inadvertently rejected Jesus himself.

Jesus pours water into a bowl to symbolicly reenact His birth.

John 13 is about the self humbling of Jesus. Knowing his intimate union with God (13:3), Jesus

got up from supper, and laid aside His garments; and taking a towel, He girded Himself. Then He poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.

This humbling is significantly reminiscent of an early Christian hymn found in Philippians 2:5-8,

Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature god, did not consider equality with god something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.

In both accounts, Jesus equal with God progresses to the role of a servant. In John, Jesus “makes himself nothing” by “laying aside His garments” to dress the part of a slave.

The water poured into basin likewise expresses the self humbling of Jesus. The Word became flesh (1:14). In Jesus, the water becomes contained. It’s no coincidence that John, the only gospel to recount the foot washing, is also the only gospel to explicitly proclaim the incarnation (John 1:14).

John replaces the communion recorded in Matthew, Mark and Luke with foot-washing because it symbolizes not just Christ’s sacrifice of his flesh in death but the humbling in his birth and life as well.

This Christmas Jesus has left an example we should follow. Will you humble yourself and do the same?

What do you think?