The Upper Register Blog

For my daily Greek reading I was in 1 Corinthians 15 this morning. The opening paragraph is very helpful in orienting us to the primacy of the gospel:

“[1] Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, [2] by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. [3] For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, [4] and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, [5] and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. [6] After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; [7] then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles; [8] and last of all, as to one untimely born, He appeared to me also. [9] For I am the least of the apostles, and not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. [10] But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me did not prove vain; but I labored even more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me. [11] Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed. [12] Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? [13] But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; [14] and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. [15] Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. [16] For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; [17] and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. [18] Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. [19] If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.” (NASB)

Several things stand out:

First, Paul makes it clear that the gospel is “of first importance,” literally, “among the first (i.e., most important) things” (ἐν πρώτοις, cp. BDAG). This implies that there are many other important issues in the Christian faith and life — perhaps some of the topics Paul has addressed in the foregoing parts of his first letter to the Corinthians, e.g., church unity, church discipline, the dangers of immorality, lawsuits, marriage and divorce, food sacrificed to idols, and spiritual gifts — but none of these stands on the same level as the gospel itself.

Second, this begs the question, “What is the gospel?” Paul answers the question by pointing to the central reality of substitutionary atonement (”that Christ died for our sins”), as well as his burial and resurrection on the third day, confirming that his sacrifice of atonement had been accepted. The prepositional phrase in the death-formula, ”for our sins” (ὑπὲρ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν), is critical, because it identifies the death of Christ as a penal substitution. That is, he died the death that we deserved for our sins. [See Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics, pp. 383-89, on the substitutionary meaning of the preposition ὑπέρ in Koine Greek.]

Third, the death of Christ for our sins and his resurrection on the third day is also the content of a message that is proclaimed. Paul uses several different verbs to refer to the proclamation of the gospel message concerning the death and resurrection of Christ:  twice, the verb εὐαγγελίζομαι (”to preach the gospel,” vv 1-2); twice, the language of “handing on” and “receiving” a tradition (vv 1, 3); twice, the verb κηρύσσω (”to herald, proclaim,” vv 11, 12); once, its cognate noun τὸ κήρυγμα (v 14); and once, the verb μαρτυρέω (”to bear witness,” v 15). The gospel, then, is the apostolic preaching of the saving message of the cross of Christ. Now that the apostles have died, we merely preach what the apostles preached, but we do so in their name and authority.

Fourth, the message is not only proclaimed, it is also believed, and when it is believed, received, and held fast, it leads to salvation. This is stated at the beginning of the passage:  “Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain” (vv 1-2). What it means to be “saved” is fleshed out a bit later: “For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.” The point of believing that Jesus died for our sins and rose again is that we will not perish or die in our sins, but will have the hope of attaining to the resurrection from the dead, of which Christ’s resurrection is the pledge.

Note the tie between the message and faith:  “So we preached and so you believed” (v 11). Thus the message is preached, then it is received in faith, and the result is that when we die, we do not perish, but are destined to attain resurrection life with Jesus at his coming. This is why Paul mentions the fact that some of the witnesses of the resurrection of Jesus have fallen asleep (v 6) — they did not merely hope in Christ in this life only (v 19). Their hope is that, through the death of Christ for their sins, they will be raised up with Christ in the age to come.

So what’s the point?

This, I believe, is a most helpful passage in orienting us to what is primary for Paul, and by implication, what ought to be primary for us as well. When people read our books and blogs, or listen to our sermons, or attend our worship services, what do they perceive is “of primary importance” to us? I hope it is not that we are “Reformed,” or that we subscribe to “the Reformed Confessions,” or that we are “Presbyterian” in our church government. I hope it is that we love, preach, and live out of the apostolic gospel of Christ’s death for our sins.

This is also relevant for us in helping us to decide what our relationship ought to be with broader evangelicalism, and indeed with all professing Christians. They may be confused about many matters. They may have a low view of the church and the sacraments. They may be too quick to reject the traditions and creeds of the church. They may hold to something less than a purely monergistic soteriology. They may think baptism must be preceded by a profession of faith. But if they have received, stand firm in, and preach this gospel, then they are to be received as brothers in Christ and to be encouraged to continue in the gospel, even as we also discuss other matters with them (just as Paul does in his letters to the Corinthians). This is why I am much more concerned about those so-called evangelicals who are denying penal substitution, than I am about evangelicals who disagree with me on infant baptism, for example.

Of course, I realize that there are other essentials not addressed by Paul in this immediate paragraph, such as Christology and justification by faith alone, that must also be taken into account. These should also be understood as presupposed and can be fleshed out by other NT passages. My point is that the saving work of Christ on the cross was central to Paul’s preaching and that this ought to inform our priorities today as well.

In his latest book, Everything Must Change, McLaren talks about the biggest threats facing the globe at present — war, racism, poverty, global warming, etc. — but fails to discuss the one thing needful.  Richard Mouw has a good post that effectively responds to this nonsense. 

Have you seen Brian McLaren’s latest book Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007)? Yikes, it’s a doozy. Scot McKnight has been summarizing/reviewing it on his blog. Basically McLaren asks “What are the biggest global problems we face right now?” (war, racism, genocide, poverty, global warming, and capitalism are high on his list) and then tries to restate the “gospel” in a way that it provides the answers. Using N. T. Wright’s work on Jesus as a guide, McLaren interprets Jesus’ message of the kingdom as a here-and-now solution to these global problems. In one appalling section of the book he compares the “conventional view” of the gospel with the “emerging view” (p. 78):

The Human Situation: What is the story we find ourselves in?

Conventional View: God created the world as perfect, but because our primal ancestors, Adam and Eve, did not maintain the absolute perfection demanded by God, God has irrevocably determined that the entire universe and all it contains will be destroyed, and the souls of all human beings — except for those specifically exempted — will be forever punished for their imperfection in hell.

Emerging View: God created the world as good, but human beings — as individuals, and as groups — have rebelled against God and filled the world with evil and injustice. God wants to save humanity and heal it from its sickness, but humanity is hopelessly lost and confused, like sheep without a shepherd, wandering further and further into lostness and danger. Left to themselves, human beings will spiral downward in sickness and evil.

Note that the conventional view is caricatured, as if it claims that “the entire universe and all it contains will be destroyed,” leaving only a whole bunch of immortal souls, some in hell and some in heaven. While there is some variation in the conventional view over the degree of continuity between the present creation and the new heavens and earth, all orthodox theologians follow Scripture and envision a future for creation and emphasize the glorification of the body.

As far as the emerging view goes, I find it interesting that McLaren regards the problem primarily in terms of sickness, confusion, wandering, and danger. There is a reference to “rebellion” at the beginning, but the focus is on structural sin and injustice in society, downplaying personal guilt before a holy God.

McLaren goes on to describe the solution (p. 79):

Jesus’ Message: How did Jesus respond to the crisis?

Conventional View: Jesus says, in essence, “If you want to be among those specifically qualified to escape being forever punished for your sins in hell, you must repent of your individual sins and believe that my Father punished me on the cross so he won’t have to punish you in hell. Only if you believe this will you go to heaven when the earth is destroyed and everyone else is banished to hell.” This is the good news.

Emerging View: Jesus says, in essence, “I have been sent by God with this good news — that God loves humanity, even in its lostness and sin. God graciously invites everyone and anyone to turn from his or her current path and follow a new way. Trust me and become my disciple, and you will be transformed, and you will participate in the transformation of the world, which is possible, beginning right now.” This is the good news.

Again, distortion. McLaren’s crass characterization of the atonement hints that he agrees with some of the criticisms currently being leveled against penal substitutionary atonement — it sanctions violence, it pits the Father against the Son, it is cosmic child abuse, and/or it does not reflect God’s love. McLaren ignores the Trinitarian and Chalcedonian context of the atonement which orthodoxy has always maintained. The Father loves the Son, even when the Son is undergoing divine wrath for us, for the Father is most exalted and most pleased by his Son’s obedience unto death. Furthermore, the giving up of his Son to bear divine wrath in order to satisfy divine justice is an expression of the Father’s own love for sinners.

With regard to his own view, notice the inherent moralism of his gospel. One simply changes his or her current path and becomes a disciple of Jesus with the goal of trying to transform the world. In other words, repentance means switching from the Republican Party to the Democratic Party, switching from being a gas-guzzling, capitalist consumer to a Prius-driving, recycling, African-orphan-adopting, war protestor.

Further clarification is provided in the next section (pp. 79-80):

Purpose of Jesus: Why is Jesus important?

Conventional View: Jesus came to solve the problem of “original sin,” meaning that he helps qualified individuals not to be sent to hell for their sin or imperfection. In a sense, Jesus saves these people from God, or more specifically, from the righteous wrath of God, which sinful human beings deserve because they have not perfectly fulfilled God’s just expectations, expressed in God’s moral laws. This escape from punishment is not something they earn or achieve, but rather a free gift they receive as an expression of God’s grace and love. Those who receive it enjoy a personal relationship with God and seek to serve and obey God, which produces a happier life on Earth and more rewards in heaven.

Emerging View: Jesus came to become the Savior of the world, meaning he came to save the earth and all it contains from its ongoing destruction because of human evil. Through his life and teaching, through his suffering, death, and resurrection, he inserted into human history a seed of grace, truth, and hope that can never be defeated. This seed will, against all opposition and odds, prevail over the evil and injustice of humanity and lead to the world’s ongoing transformation into the world God dreams of. All who find in Jesus God’s hope and truth discover the privilege of participating in his ongoing work of personal and global transformation and liberation from evil and injustice. As part of his transforming community, they experience liberation from the fear of death and condemnation. This is not something they earn or achieve, but rather a free gift they receive as an expression of God’s grace and love.

McLaren gets the conventional view right when he says that Jesus saves people from the righteous wrath of God, a view that he obviously rejects. I’m not sure about the comment at the end that obeying God produces a happier life on earth; that may be true of the prosperity gospel, but biblical Christianity teaches that suffering, cross-bearing, self-denial, and dealing with adversity are an integral part of what it means to live in union with Christ.

Regarding his own view, I love the slogan that Jesus came to save the earth. Apparently, this is meant literally. Why not say, Jesus came to save the whales. Or, Jesus came to solve global warming. Or, Jesus came to prevent genocide. If that is why he came, his coming doesn’t seem to have been terribly effective. Of course, the orthodox view does affirm that all evil will be expunged from this physical creation and that a renewed, glorified creation will emerge out of the fires of judgment at the end of time. But that is something that we must patiently wait for at the parousia of Christ. We cannot work for it.

In addition, McLaren never answers his own question, “Why is Jesus important?” If God’s goal was to plant a seed of grace that will prevail to overcome all the evil and injustice in this world, why was the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Son of God necessary? If the conventional view is correct, that Jesus came to accomplish the salvation of the elect through the atonement, then the incarnation, death, and resurrection make sense. But if the emerging view is correct, there is no reason for it. On McLaren’s view, Jesus would seem to be relevant merely in the sense that he taught some good things about loving our neighbors, turning the other cheek, and being non-violent. But there would seem to be no evident need for the pre-existent Son of God to be born of a virgin, to take a true human nature into personal union with himself, to become obedient to the point of death thus undergoing the wrath of God in our place, to be raised on the third day, and to be vindicated and exalted at the right hand of God. That’s a pretty elaborate metaphysical Rube-Goldberg machine on McLaren’s view. All God really needed to do, in Bob Newhart fashion, was to send a new prophet to tell the planet-destroying, violent, racist, capitalist world to “Stop it!”

I also detect a hint of Open Theism here. God is working with the world and with us in order that we might together create the world that God dreams of. God isn’t a coercive God. So he invites us participate with him in this creative, transformative enterprise. We don’t know if it will work, but we can know that God aches over the pain, evil, suffering, and injustice in the world as much as we do. But we have hope because Jesus planted a seed that will grow — if we nurture it.

I don’t know about you, but I’d rather stick with the “old, old story” of personal guilt, God’s holy wrath, Christ’s atonement (obedience unto death), and the hope of the resurrection. Yes, Christians ought to be deeply involved in doing good deeds that are helpful to our neighbors — all kinds of good works, from adopting unwanted babies, to seeking racial reconciliation in our communities, and even to recycling if need be. But we do so in order to bring glory to Christ and to adorn the gospel, not to save the earth. We leave that job to Christ at the end of the age.

PCA pastor Tim Keller understands the difference between legal and evangelical repentance. This is taken from a summary by Darryl Dash of a lecture he gave in the UK: 

Luther understood that the gospel - salvation by grace through faith through the substitutionary work of Christ alone - brings a paradoxical personal identity that nobody else has. We are simultaneously sinners (in ourselves) and completely accepted (in Christ) - simul iustus et peccator. We have Christ’s righteousness. We understand that we’re sinners but infinitely loved. We’re as loved now as we will be a million years from now.

This means that we are weaker and more sinful than we ever before believed, but also more loved and accepted than we ever dared hope.

If that is the case, the way that you can tell that you are a Christian who understands the gospel, rather than a religious person, is how you handle repentance. If you are religious, repentance is occasional and traumatic. It’s what you do to get out of the sin bucket into the love bucket. Repentance then becomes another weapon in your arsenal of self-salvation. It becomes a work. But you never know if you’ve been repentant enough.

But if you believe the gospel, then we understand that the gospel has nothing to do with our performance. This gives us the freedom to see sin everywhere in our lives … To the degree that we understand the gospel, we are free to admit the worst about ourselves finally. Repentance isn’t how we get right with God; it’s just the right response. It gives immediate assurance.

HT: Between Two Worlds

Read the whole thing. Pastor Keller also has some really interesting things to say about how we as evangelicals should respond to the criticisms and concerns of the emerging folks without totally re-engineering the gospel.

When the sermons of Tobias Crisp (d. 1643) were reprinted in 1690, they were attacked by legalists like Richard Baxter as antinomian. This sparked the Crispian or Neonomian Controversy in England. The legalists not only attacked Crisp and his defenders but also implied that imputation leads to license. In response, the classic doctrine of justification by faith was defended by a Presbyterian minister named Robert Traill in A Vindication of the Protestant Doctrine concerning Justification from the Unjust Charge of Antinomianism (1692). I love this particular quote:

But do not some abuse the grace of the gospel and turn it into wantonness? Answer:  Yes, some do, ever did, and still will do so. But it is only the ill-understood and not believed doctrine of grace that they abuse. The grace itself, no man can abuse, for its power prevents its abuse. Let us see how Paul, that blessed herald of this grace (as he was an eminent instance of it) deals with this objection (Rom. 6:1, etc.). How does he prevent this abuse? Is it by extenuating what he said (Rom. 5:20), that grace abounded much more where sin had abounded? Is it by mincing grace smaller so that men may not choke upon it or have too much of it? Is it by mixing something of the law with it, to make it more wholesome? No, but only by plainly asserting the power and influence of this grace, wherever it really is, as he does at length in that chapter. This grace is all treasured up in Christ Jesus, offered to all men in the gospel, poured forth by our Lord in the working of faith, and drunk in by the elect in the exercise of faith. And it becomes in them a living spring, which will, and must, break out and spring up in all holy conversation.

Robert Traill, Justification Vindicated (Puritan Paperbacks, Banner of Truth, 2002), p. 41.

Some might object to my interpretation of Col 1:12 that it is too one-sidedly legal. Rather than seeing the verb “to qualify” in forensic terms, i.e., as equivalent to justification, they might argue that the verb refers to, or at least includes, the work of progressive sanctification whereby God makes us more holy and thus renders us ontologically “fit” for heaven. Advocates of this alternative interpretation might appeal to the latter part of the verse, which says that the Father has ”qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints (lit., the holy ones) in the light.” The reference to “the holy ones” here could be taken as implying that we are rendered fit to have a share in the inheritance by actually being made holy in our persons.

Some responses:

(1) I don’t think the verb “to make sufficient, to qualify” fits the role of progressive sanctification in making us fit for heaven. Sanctification does not make us “sufficient” to enter heaven, since it is imperfect in this life. Personal holiness may be necessary for heaven (”the holiness without which no one will see the Lord,” Heb 12:14), but by its very nature it can’t render us qualified to enter heaven. I think Paul would say that if we want to be qualified to enter heaven on the basis of our personal obedience, that obedience must be perfect (Rom 2:13).

(2) It is telling, I think, that Paul uses the aorist participle here: “the Father who qualified us” (ὁ ἱκανώσας). Had he been thinking of the life-long process of sanctification that is never complete in this life, he probably would have used a present participle, “the Father who is making us fit.”

(3) The preceding context (vv 9-11) deals with sanctification. Since the day Paul heard about the conversion of the Colossians, he has not ceased praying for them that God would “fill [them] with the knowledge of his will … so that [they] would walk in a manner worthy of the Lord unto all well-pleasing, bearing fruit in every good work.” Then in vv 12-14 the focus of Paul’s concern shifts from sanctification to its gospel motivation:  “joyfully giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance,” etc. We can only begin to please the Lord and bear good fruit if we are first assured of our judicial standing. The linkage between the two is ”joyfully giving thanks” for the finality of what the Father has done for us. He has qualified us for heaven by rescuing us from the domain of darkness, transferring us into the kingdom of his dear Son, accomplishing our redemption, and granting us the complete remission of all our sins in Christ. Thus, the assurance of the objective atonement and its legal consequence (being qualified to inherit) causes us to joyfully give thanks to the Father, and that, in turn, motivates us to want to please the Lord and grow in sanctification.

For these reasons, I don’t think the verb “qualified” includes progressive sanctification. At most it may include definitive sanctification, but that is merely another aspect of the forensic benefits of the cross.

Why, then, does Paul mention “the saints” in v 12? I think he is using traditional Jewish terminology here. The whole phrase sounds like something straight out of Qumran:  “a share in the lot of the saints in the light.” By using this traditional language, Paul is acknowledging the principle that only the righteous, the holy ones, have a right to inherit the glory of the age to come. Therefore, it is all the more amazing, and all the more productive of “joyful thanks to the Father,” that he has caused us sinners, lost in our sins under the dominion of darkness, to be qualified - by grace alone, by Christ alone - to share in the inheritance in the light!

Some argue that the doctrine of justification cannot be the heart of Paul’s gospel since justification is reserved almost entirely to two of his letters, Romans and Galatians. But this simply isn’t true. Although it is explained at greater length in those two epistles, Paul’s “justification/righteousness” theology also shows up in 1 Cor 1:30; 6:11; 2 Cor 3:9; 5:21; Phil 3:9; and Tit 3:7. These are brief statements to be sure, but their very brevity suggests that they are concise summaries of Paul’s well-known teaching.

In addition, as James Barr pointed out, the concept can be present even if the terms are absent. For example, Col 1:12 says: “joyfully giving thanks to the Father who has qualified (τῷ ἱκανώσαντι) us to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light.” In Paul’s thought, only the righteous are qualified to obtain a share in the eschatological inheritance in glory (Rom 2:7-10, 13). To say that the Father has qualified us is to imply that he treats us as righteous and therefore as fit to obtain a share in the eschatological inheritance. 

Here are some of the lexicons on ἱκανόω:

LSJ: “make sufficient, qualify”
Thayer: “make sufficient, render fit”
BDAG: “to cause to be adequate, make sufficient, qualify”

It is used elsewhere in the NT only in 2 Cor 3:5-6 where Paul says that he is not sufficient/qualified in himself, but that God has made him sufficient/qualified to serve as a minister of the new covenant.  

So also in Col 1:12 Paul teaches that though we are not fit in ourselves, by God’s act in Christ we have been made legally fit. The immediate context makes clear that the Father’s act of making us fit/qualified for heaven is characterized by the following:

(a) It is based on divine grace, as evidenced by the fact that Paul exhorts us to “joyfully give thanks to the Father” for so qualifying us (cf. also the explicit reference to “the grace of God” in v. 6). 

(b) Being qualified for heaven is a consequence of a sovereign, divine rescue-operation (”He rescued us from the domain of darkness …”  v. 13a). Lost in the guilt and bondage of sin, we could not rescue ourselves. The Father had to do it by sending his own Son as an apocalyptic inbreaking of divine power (cf. “who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from this present evil age,” Gal 1:4).

(c) We are qualified to inherit, not because of any worthiness in us, but because we have been transferred into the sphere of the very love that the Father has for his own dear Son (”… and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son,” lit., “the Son of his love” [ὁ υἱός τῆς ἀγάπης αὐτοῦ], v. 13b).

(d) Our qualification to inherit is grounded in the work of Christ who redeemed us by his death and resurrection (”in whom we have redemption [ἀπολύτρωσις],” v. 14 - cf. Rom 3:24 where “redemption” is tied to justification). The accent is not on God’s work in us (sanctification) but on God’s work for us (the cross and resurrection, i.e., the atonement).

(e) We aren’t qualified to inherit because God has changed us into good people, but because of a legal transaction, namely, having the guilt of our sins wiped away (”in whom we have … the remission of our sins,” v. 14). N.B.: “forgiveness” is too weak a translation of ἄφεσις. In the LXX this term is used to refer to the complete “release/cancellation” of debts so that poor Israelite families would not lose their apportioned lot in the inheritance through debt-bondage.

Thus, Col 1:12 seems to contain all of the elements of Paul’s doctrine of justification without using the word ”justification.” And since this is the content of ”the word of the truth of the gospel” (v. 5) that Epaphras preached, we may conclude that the Father’s act of making us fit for heaven through the atoning death of Christ lies at the heart of the gospel.

I agree that Paul’s doctrine of justification is not the center of his theology. The center of Paul’s theology is the gospel of God’s Son (Rom 1:1-2), centered on the cross and resurrection of Christ (1 Cor 15:3-4). But in order to explicate what Christ has done for us in his death and resurrection, the doctrine of justification plays an absolutely essential role. The primitive Palestinian church confessed that “Christ died for our sins.” Paul the theologian came along and fleshed out what that means:  He died and rose again so that the guilt of our sins might be removed and that we might be made legally fit to have a share in the inheritance. 

Or to use Paul’s longer version of the primitive death-formula: “He was handed over to death [by God] for our transgressions and was raised to life [by God] for our justification” (Rom 4:25).