Book of Concord FTW

I just recently finished listening to my Kindle read me the Book of Concord. This is my second time through and my first time since becoming a Lutheran. I would encourage anyone who is interested in Lutheranism to read it and I would especially encourage Lutherans to take the time to read it. There are many books you could read on Lutheran doctrine but the Book of Concord tells you what it actually means to be a Lutheran. Compared to the confessions of Protestant church bodies it is quite large but it's full of Scripture. The Scriptures aren't just referenced in a footnote as some kind of proof-text but are found throughout. It also provides plenty of patristic evidence throughout that this is not some new doctrine but the historic Christian faith. I don't think there are any other confessional standards that have as much Christology either. And while the Reformed and Presbyterian confessions establish theological boundaries that allow for various positions, the Lutheran confessions tend to provide an actual and definitive confession of the truth.

The Trinitarian Argument For the Limited Atonement

One of the common arguments for the limited atonement is that the members of the Trinity have the same goal and purpose and therefore the Son would not die for those whom the Father did not elect. According to those making this argument, a universal atonement would put the Son in conflict with the Father.

The first problem with this argument is epistemological. The argument assumes that through our fallen human reason we can get inside of God's head and figure out what God would do in a particular circumstance. God explicitly says in Scripture that His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts but the argument assumes that they are. In reality, everything about the atonement is mysterious, paradoxical, and runs counter to our human reason and yet they latch on to one piece of it and think they can arrive at some theological truth via human reason.

The Trinity itself is revealed in Scripture but is beyond all human reason. God is one being and three persons as Scripture tells us, but whenever someone tries to explain this in a way that is reasonable they end up denying either the threeness or oneness of God. God is far greater than any of us and it shouldn't be any surprise that God is incomprehensible apart from His self-revelation. It's not surprising that most Calvinist churches have abandoned the Trinitarian worship of the historic liturgy in favor of more reasonable forms of worship.

The incarnation defies all human reason. God dying for sinners defies all human reason. The meaning of the atonement cannot be arrived at with our reason but must be revealed to us by God. I would argue that any argument that demands that the atonement be reasonable has presuppositions behind it that if taken to their logical conclusion would lead to a denial of the atonement completely. There is nothing reasonable about God dying for us sinners who killed Him. Annihilation would be reasonable. I think if the Calvinist presuppositions are taken seriously, not creating us in the first place would actually be the only reasonable option. The doctrine of the limited atonement is in fact a distraction from the absolutely confounding and offensive reality of the crucifixion itself. It turns our eyes away from God bleeding and dying for us to the hidden God which is not revealed but what we think we can figure out.

The limited atonement is also contrary to the plain teachings of Scripture. The Calvinist has explanations for all the passages you can produce just like every theology has some sort of answer for passages that contradict it, but it's hard to believe that Jesus or the Apostles would speak in the way that they do if they actually believed in a limited atonement. I've never heard Calvinists speak in the way that the Scriptures speak about the atonement without lots of qualifications and insertions. A Calvinist would never speak of those who deny the Master who bought them unless they are preaching on that specific passage and then they will spend the first half of the sermon telling you about why it doesn't mean what it sounds like it means. The Calvinist will never say with the Apostle Paul that all men who died in Adam were justified in Christ on the cross.

There is no conflict between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God loved the world and sent His Son to die for it. God desires the salvation of all men. We may not understand why God does not then elect all men but it's foolish to try to twist the clear passages of Scripture to make God act in a way that we think is appropriate because the crucifixion shows that God does not act in ways that we think are appropriate.

The Trinitarian argument for the limited atonement seems to assume a god who doesn't do more than he absolutely has to. But God is gracious and mericful and bestows His good gifts upon all men. The promises of God in Christ are far too wonderful to consider reasonable or try to explain away. Instead we should cling to them in faith. Christ died for sinners. That's good news because you're a sinner.

Would the Apostles Say What They Said If They Believed What You Believe?

This issue came up in a recent podcast by Jordan Cooper and I've thought about it myself many times. Every theological tradition within Christianity has its way of explaining texts within Scripture to fit its theology. There are ways of getting around just about anything. But would the Apostles say what they said if they held to your theology? Would your theology guide you to state what the Apostles say in the very same way that they said? The ability to say what the Apostles said on a particular topic without adding caveats and qualifications is a very valuable tool in arriving at the same theology as the Apostles.

Owen's Syllogism and the Limited Atonement

The classic book defending the doctrine of the Limited Atonement is John Owen's The Death of Death in the Death of Christ. The book is lengthy but his argument is summarized in the following way:

The Father imposed His wrath due unto, and the Son underwent punishment for, either:

1. All the sins of all men.

2. All the sins of some men, or

3. Some of the sins of all men.

In which case it may be said:

That if the last be true, all men have some sins to answer for, and so, none are saved. That if the second be true, then Christ, in their stead suffered for all the sins of all the elect in the whole world, and this is the truth. But if the first be the case, why are not all men free from the punishment due unto their sins? You answer, “Because of unbelief.” I ask, Is this unbelief a sin, or is it not? If it be, then Christ suffered the punishment due unto it, or He did not. If He did, why must that hinder them more than their other sins for which He died? If He did not, He did not die for all their sins!

Owen concludes that if the first is true, then Jesus did not die for the sin of unbelief. The problem with this reasoning is that the Scriptures say that damnation is the result of unbelief. So, Owen's argument is really with the Scriptures themselves. The Scriptures never say that the damnation is the result of Jesus not dying for anyone. In fact, we have examples in Scripture of people whom the Scriptures say Jesus bought but that end up denying Christ and end up perishing. No matter how much Owen tries to make these texts say something different, it's pretty clear that anyone who held to a limited atonement would not say the things that Scripture says. There's a reason why you don't really find anyone teaching a doctrine of limited atonement until the medieval scholastic period.

The Scriptures use a variety of language to speak of Christ's atonement. Sometimes they speak of the atonement as a ransom. Some of the church fathers concluded that since in a human ransom one party must be paid for another that in the atonement Christ is paying the Devil. The Scriptures never say that Christ is paying the Devil but these church fathers pushed the picture further than Scripture does. Owen and the Calvinists essentially do the same thing with the legal language used in Scripture. In an ordinary legal setting if one person takes the place of another for punishment, the guilty person cannot be punished for the crime. But the Scriptures never teach us that if Christ suffered for someone that person will be saved on the last Day and that it would be unjust to punish that person. In Romans 5 we learn that all who died in Adam are justified in Christ and yet we learn elsewhere that this justification is received through faith which itself is a gift of God. The only way to say that someone was not justified upon the cross according to Romans 5 is to say that they did not die in Adam. The only reason given in Scripture for why someone who was justified on the cross does not receive that justification is because of unbelief.

Even Owen's argument just by itself leads to absurdity because if Christ did not die for someone it would be hard to explain how unbelief could be a sin. In the Gospel we are called to believe that Christ died for our sins. If Jesus didn't die for that person then it would be sinful for the person to believe that Jesus died for him. The doctrine of the limited atonement has the wrong starting point for doing theology. It starts from the glory of God. But Paul said he preached nothing but Christ-crucified. Christ-crucified is the central teaching of the Scriptures. If you begin with Christ-crucified you don't have to explain away what the Scriptures clearly teach and you can have confidence that Jesus really did die for you and pay for your sins. If Jesus only died for some you can never be certain you are among those for whom Jesus died because if you fall away from the faith you will just have to conclude that you never had faith to begin with.

Faith and Despair

The Christian world tends to view despair and unbelief as things which cannot exist in someone who has true faith. But in The Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope, Melanchthon says that the true worship of God is faith struggling against despair. Luther's own accounts of his own Anfechtungen are well known and have led many to conclude that he was mentally ill and that his theology should not be trusted. But what do the Scriptures say?

In Romans 7, Paul tells us of his own despair. In Mark 9, a father who had a demon-possessed son confesses both his belief and unbelief. The Psalms were given as a prayer-book for the ancient Israelites and for the Christian church and the majority of them are lamentations in which we confess our despair and even cry out in anger toward God for His failure to act.

The most shocking and paradoxical cry of despair in all of Scripture is Jesus' use of the Psalms on the cross, especially when He cries out, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" In this cry we can see both  unimaginable faith and unimaginable despair exhibited in the most profound way. Truly Christ has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. We truly have a high priest who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses and who has felt our despair. God uses this despair to drive us to prayer just as it drove Christ to prayer and it's foolish to try to be polite and hide our despair from God. Instead, we are invited in the Psalms to cry out in our despair to God. By being honest about our own despair we are able to reach out to our brothers and sisters in Christ in their despair and bear one another's burdens. We need not be afraid of those who question or doubt.

On the Preaching of Law-Gospel-Law and the Epistles

In the land of the Lutheran interweb in the last few years there has been on-going debate on whether pastors should stick with a Law-Gospel format or preach some form of Law-Gospel-Law (the last "Law is sometimes replaced with instruction/Mystical-Union/Third Use of the Law/Exhortation, etc.). This debate is closely tied to Lutheran debate over the doctrine of sanctification. I think both sides have some legitimate concerns.

Those in support of the Law-Gospel-Law paradigm direct us to Paul's letters where Paul seems to use this paradigm as well as to selections from the Book of Concord, sermons of Luther, and elsewhere. They perceive an antinomianism among the strict Law-Gospel advocates.

Those in the strict Law-Gospel camp are concerned that Law-Gospel-Law will lead to an unlawful use of the Law. They perceive a legalism among the Law-Gospel-Law advocates and regard the charges of antinomianism against the strict Law-Gospel law defenders as proof. They claim that if you have already preached the Law to convict people of their sins, people already know what they should be doing and don't need you to circle back around with the Law again. Those in the strict Law-Gospel camp believe that those in the Law-Gospel-Law camp are trying to preach a specific third use of the Law which those in the Law-Gospel camp say is impossible to do. They believe that those in the Law-Gospel-Law camp are looking to the Law for their sanctification (and some in the Law-Gospel-Law camp have made some contradictory statements regarding this issue).

The letters of Paul were originally written to be read as entire sermons and it's difficult to escape the fact that they don't follow a strict Law-Gospel paradigm. However, they also don't quite do what at least some of the Law-Gospel-Law advocates are doing. Some of the Law-Gospel-Law advocates breeze through the Law in a generic way, quickly mention that Jesus died for your sins, and then spend the rest of the sermon instructing in "holy living." Paul doesn't do this. Paul hammers us with the Law, gives us the wonderful sweetness of Jesus in the Gospel, and then exhorts us in a Christocentric way. I think Will Weedon actually does a good job of this with his Law-Gospel-Mystical Union model. In some other examples I've seen, the Law is weakened, the Gospel is weakened, and even the exhortations are weakened as people turn Paul's imperatives into subjunctives.

I've heard some pastors who do good job of preaching the Law-Gospel paradigm when preaching the Gospels but then attempt to switch to Law-Gospel-Law when preaching on a section of the Epistles and often the Law, Gospel, and exhortation all get softened and lack the force found in the original text. I think at least part of this may be due to the difficulties in preaching on a section of the Epistles. The Epistles were originally written as whole sermons and so if you break them up into smaller sections and you are preaching on a section of exhortations the temptation is to put all the force behind the exhortations. My suggestion as an armchair sermon hearer is to follow the general outline for your sermon structure of the entire Epistle even if you are only preaching a section that has exhortations. The exhortations can still be preached as Law and Gospel. I think this would even work more naturally on a Gospel reading where you are not preaching on one section of someone else's sermon.

But rather than the continuous debate, I really think that actual examples and critiques from each party would be the most beneficial. It often seems that people are talking past one another and creating caricatures of one another. I think pointing to specific examples of both good and bad preaching would be less divisive.

Lutheran Church: What is Wrong With You?

Over the past couple of years I've been contacted by people from some other church body that are interested in Lutheranism. They want the liturgy and Lutheran preaching. Unfortunately, although there are often LCMS churches located in close proximity to them, they often don't have the historic liturgy and the preaching is not Lutheran. Why put Lutheran on your sign if you don't want to be Lutheran? Nobody would start a group to support the Republian party and then get all their teachings materials from the Democrats. If you agree with the teachings of Max Lucado, maybe you're really a Campbellite. If you agree with the teachings of Rick Warren and Beth Moore, maybe you're really Southern Baptist. If you don't agree with them, why would you let them teach through Bible studies in your church? Christ washes you in the waters of Holy Baptism and gives you His body and blood to drink, why would you trade that for a bowl of evangelical pottage?