What Can Miserable Christians Sing?

By Carl R. Trueman

     “Having experienced — and generally appreciated — worship across the whole evangelical spectrum, from Charismatic to Reformed — I am myself less concerned here with the form of worship than I am with its content. Thus, I would like to make just one observation: the psalms, the Bible’s own hymnbook, have almost entirely dropped from view in the contemporary Western evangelical scene. I am not certain about why this should be, but I have an instinctive feel that it has more than a little to do with the fact that a high proportion of the psalter is taken up with lamentation, with feeling sad, unhappy, tormented, and broken.

     In modern Western culture, these are simply not emotions which have much credibility: sure, people still feel these things, but to admit that they are a normal part of one’s everyday life is tantamount to admitting that one has failed in today’s health, wealth, and happiness society. And, of course, if one does admit to them, one must neither accept them nor take any personal responsibility for them: one must blame one’s parents, sue one’s employer, pop a pill, or check into a clinic in order to have such dysfunctional emotions soothed and one’s self-image restored.

     Now, one would not expect the world to have much time for the weakness of the psalmists’ cries. It is very disturbing, however, when these cries of lamentation disappear from the language and worship of the church. Perhaps the Western church feels no need to lament — but then it is sadly deluded about how healthy it really is in terms of numbers, influence and spiritual maturity. Perhaps — and this is more likely — it has drunk so deeply at the well of modern Western materialism that it simply does not know what to do with such cries and regards them as little short of embarrassing. Yet the human condition is a poor one — and Christians who are aware of the deceitfulness of the human heart and are looking for a better country should know this.

     A diet of unremittingly jolly choruses and hymns inevitably creates an unrealistic horizon of expectation which sees the normative Christian life as one long triumphalist street party — a theologically incorrect and a pastorally disastrous scenario in a world of broken individuals. Has an unconscious belief that Christianity is — or at least should be — all about health, wealth, and happiness silently corrupted the content of our worship? Few Christians in areas where the church has been strongest over recent decades — China, Africa, Eastern Europe – would regard uninterrupted emotional highs as normal Christian experience.

     Indeed, the biblical portraits of believers give no room to such a notion. Look at Abraham, Joseph, David, Jeremiah, and the detailed account of the psalmists’ experiences. Much agony, much lamentation, occasional despair — and joy, when it manifests itself — is very different from the frothy triumphalism that has infected so much of our modern Western Christianity. In the psalms, God has given the church a language which allows it to express even the deepest agonies of the human soul in the context of worship. Does our contemporary language of worship reflect the horizon of expectation regarding the believer’s experience which the psalter proposes as normative? If not, why not? Is it because the comfortable values of Western middle-class consumerism have silently infiltrated the church and made us consider such cries irrelevant, embarrassing, and signs of abject failure?

     I did once suggest at a church meeting that the psalms should take a higher priority in evangelical worship than they generally do — and was told in no uncertain terms by one indignant person that such a view betrayed a heart that had no interest in evangelism. On the contrary, I believe it is the exclusion of the experiences and expectations of the psalmists from our worship — and thus from our horizons of expectation — which has in a large part crippled the evangelistic efforts of the church in the West and turned us all into spiritual pixies.

     By excluding the cries of loneliness, dispossession, and desolation from its worship, the church has effectively silenced and excluded the voices of those who are themselves lonely, dispossessed, and desolate, both inside and outside the church. By so doing, it has implicitly endorsed the banal aspirations of consumerism, generated an insipid, trivial and unrealistically triumphalist Christianity, and confirmed its impeccable credentials as a club for the complacent. In the last year, I have asked three very different evangelical audiences what miserable Christians can sing in church. On each occasion my question has elicited uproarious laughter, as if the idea of a broken-hearted, lonely, or despairing Christian was so absurd as to be comical — and yet I posed the question in all seriousness. Is it any wonder that British evangelicalism, from the Reformed to the Charismatic, is almost entirely a comfortable, middle-class phenomenon?”

The Wages of Spin: Critical Writings on Historical and Contemporary Evangelicalism

     Carl R. Trueman is Professor of Historical Theology and Church History at Westminster Theological Seminary (PA). He is the author of a number of books, including John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man (Ashgate, 2007) and Republocrat: Confessions of a Liberal Conservative (P and R, 2010).

By Gleason Archer Jr.

 Numbers

     The Hebrew title for this book is Bemiḏbār (“in the wilderness of”), taken from the first verse: “And Jehovah spake unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai” (ASV). The LXX labels it Arithmoi, or Numbers, because of the prominence of census figures in this book. And yet the Hebrew title is quite appropriate to its general theme: Israel under God’s training in the wilderness. Historical narrative occupies a larger proportion of this book than is the case in Leviticus or Deuteronomy, and the period of years involved is far greater (forty years of discipline) than in the other books of the Pentateuch (excluding Genesis ).

 Outline of Numbers

 Underlying Principles in Numbers

A Survey of Old Testament Introduction

“But Jesus never said, ‘I am God.’ ”

By Eric Chabot 1/24/2017

     Whenever the deity of Jesus comes up in conversations with people from different faiths, it is common to hear the standard objection, “But Jesus never said, ‘I am God.’” How might we approach this objection?

     In his book The Case for the Real Jesus: A Journalist Investigates Current Attacks on the Identity of Christ (Case for ... Series), Lee Strobel says that if you search for Jesus at Amazon.com, you will find 175, 986 books on the most controversial figure in human history. The New Testament does not reveal Jesus as any ordinary prophet or religious teacher. Rather, it reveals Him as God incarnate (John 1:1; 8:58-59;10:29-31;14:8-9;20-28; Phil. 2:5-7; Col. 2:9; Titus 2:13; Heb. 1:8; 2 Pet. 1:1).

     There are some good reasons as to why Jesus would never say “I am God.” The Jewish Scriptures forbids worshiping anyone other than the God of Israel (Ex. 20:1–5; Deut. 5:6–9). And for Jesus to ever say something so explicit would insinuate that he was calling upon his audience to believe in two “Gods”- the God of Israel and Jesus. Also, for Gentiles, such a claim would allow for Jesus to fit nicely into their polytheism (the belief in many gods).

The Institutes of the Christian Religion

Translated by Henry Beveridge

     19. The reader now perceives with what fairness the Sophists of the present day cavil at our doctrine, when we say that a man is justified by faith alone (Rom. 4:2). They dare not deny that he is justified by faith, seeing Scripture so often declares it; but as the word alone is nowhere expressly used they will not tolerate its being added. [417] Is it so? What answer, then will they give to the words of Paul, when he contends that righteousness is not of faith unless it be gratuitous? How can it be gratuitous, and yet by works? By what cavils, moreover, will they evade his declaration in another place, that in the Gospel the righteousness of God is manifested? (Rom. 1:17). If righteousness is manifested in the Gospel, it is certainly not a partial or mutilated, but a full and perfect righteousness. The Law, therefore, has no part in its and their objection to the exclusive word alone is not only unfounded, but is obviously absurd. Does he not plainly enough attribute everything to faith alone when he disconnects it with works? What I would ask, is meant by the expressions, "The righteousness of God without the law is manifested;" "Being justified freely by his grace;" "Justified by faith without the deeds of the law?" (Rom. 3:21, 24, 28). Here they have an ingenious subterfuge, one which, though not of their own devising but taken from Origin and some ancient writers, is most childish. They pretend that the works excluded are ceremonial, not moral works. Such profit do they make by their constant wrangling, that they possess not even the first elements of logic. Do they think the Apostle was raving when he produced, in proof of his doctrine, these passages? "The man that does them shall live in them," (Gal. 3:12). "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them," (Gal. 3:10). Unless they are themselves raving, they will not say that life was promised to the observers of ceremonies, and the curse denounced only against the transgressors of them. If these passages are to be understood of the Moral Law, there cannot be a doubt that moral works also are excluded from the power of justifying. To the same effect are the arguments which he employs. "By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin," (Rom. 3:20). "The law worketh wrath," (Rom. 4:15), and therefore not righteousness. "The law cannot pacify the conscience," and therefore cannot confer righteousness. "Faith is imputed for righteousness," and therefore righteousness is not the reward of works, but is given without being due. Because "we are justified by faith," boasting is excluded. "Had there been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the Scripture has concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe," (Gal. 3:21, 22). Let them maintain, if they dare, that these things apply to ceremonies, and not to morals, and the very children will laugh at their effrontery. The true conclusion, therefore, is, that the whole Law is spoken of when the power of justifying is denied to it.

20. Should any one wonder why the Apostle, not contented with having named works, employs this addition, the explanation is easy. However highly works may be estimated, they have their whole value more from the approbation of God than from their own dignity. For who will presume to plume himself before God on the righteousness of works, unless in so far as He approves of them? Who will presume to demand of Him a reward except in so far as He has promised it? It is owing entirely to the goodness of God that works are deemed worthy of the honor and reward of righteousness; and, therefore, their whole value consists in this, that by means of them we endeavor to manifest obedience to God. Wherefore, in another passage, the Apostle, to prove that Abraham could not be justified by works, declares, "that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect," (Gal. 3:17). The unskillful would ridicule the argument that there could be righteous works before the promulgation of the Law, but the Apostle, knowing that works could derive this value solely from the testimony and honor conferred on them by God, takes it for granted that, previous to the Law, they had no power of justifying. We see why he expressly terms them works of Law when he would deny the power of justifying to theme--viz. because it was only with regard to such works that a question could be raised; although he sometimes, without addition, excepts all kinds of works whatever, as when on the testimony of David he speaks of the man to whom the Lord imputeth righteousness without works (Rom. 4:5, 6). No cavils, therefore, can enable them to prove that the exclusion of works is not general. In vain do they lay hold of the frivolous subtilty, that the faith alone, by which we are justified, "worketh by love," and that love, therefore, is the foundation of justification. We, indeed, acknowledge with Paul, that the only faith which justifies is that which works by love (Gal. 3:6); but love does not give it its justifying power. Nay, its only means of justifying consists in its bringing us into communication with the righteousness of Christ. Otherwise the whole argument, on which the Apostle insists with so much earnestness, would fall. "To him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness." Could he express more clearly than in this word, that there is justification in faith only where there are no works to which reward is due, and that faith is imputed for righteousness only when righteousness is conferred freely without merit?

21. Let us now consider the truth of what was said in the definition--viz. that justification by faith is reconciliation with God, and that this consists solely in the remission of sins. We must always return to the axioms that the wrath of God lies upon all men so long as they continue sinners. This is elegantly expressed by Isaiah in these words: "Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear: but your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear," (Isaiah 59:1, 2). We are here told that sin is a separation between God and man; that His countenance is turned away from the sinner; and that it cannot be otherwise, since, to have any intercourse with sin is repugnant to his righteousness. Hence the Apostle shows that man is at enmity with God until he is restored to favour by Christ (Rom. 5:8-10). When the Lord, therefore, admits him to union, he is said to justify him, because he can neither receive him into favor, nor unite him to himself, without changing his condition from that of a sinner into that of a righteous man. We add, that this is done by remission of sins. For if those whom the Lord has reconciled to himself are estimated by works, they will still prove to be in reality sinners, while they ought to be pure and free from sin. It is evident therefore, that the only way in which those whom God embraces are made righteous, is by having their pollutions wiped away by the remission of sins, so that this justification may be termed in one word the remission of sins.

22. Both of these become perfectly clear from the words of Paul: "God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and has committed unto us the word of reconciliation." He then subjoins the sum of his embassy: "He has made him to be sin for us who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him," (2 Cor. 5:19-21). He here uses righteousness and reconciliation indiscriminately, to make us understand that the one includes the other. The mode of obtaining this righteousness he explains to be, that our sins are not imputed to us. Wherefore, you cannot henceforth doubt how God justifies us when you hear that he reconciles us to himself by not imputing our faults. In the same manner, in the Epistle to the Romans, he proves, by the testimony of David, that righteousness is imputed without works, because he declares the man to be blessed "whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered," and "unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity," (Rom. 4:6; Ps. 32:1, 2). There he undoubtedly uses blessedness for righteousness; and as he declares that it consists in forgiveness of sins, there is no reason why we should define it otherwise. Accordingly, Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, sings that the knowledge of salvation consists in the forgiveness of sins (Luke 1:77). The same course was followed by Paul when, in addressing the people of Antioch, he gave them a summary of salvation. Luke states that he concluded in this way: "Through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins, and by him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses," (Acts 13:38, 39). Thus the Apostle connects forgiveness of sins with justification in such a way as to show that they are altogether the same; and hence he properly argues that justification, which we owe to the indulgence of God, is gratuitous. Nor should it seem an unusual mode of expression to say that believers are justified before God not by works, but by gratuitous acceptance, seeing it is frequently used in Scripture, and sometimes also by ancient writers. Thus Augustine says: "The righteousness of the saints in this world consists more in the forgiveness of sins than the perfection of virtue," (August. de Civitate Dei, lib. 19, cap. 27). To this corresponds the well-known sentiment of Bernard: "Not to sin is the righteousness of God, but the righteousness of man is the indulgence of God," (Bernard, Serm. 22, 23 in Cant). He previously asserts that Christ is our righteousness in absolution, and, therefore, that those only are just who have obtained pardon through mercy.

23. Hence also it is proved, that it is entirely by the intervention of Christ's righteousness that we obtain justification before God. This is equivalent to saying that man is not just in himself, but that the righteousness of Christ is communicated to him by imputation, while he is strictly deserving of punishment. Thus vanishes the absurd dogma, that man is justified by faith, inasmuch as it brings him under the influence of the Spirit of God by whom he is rendered righteous. This is so repugnant to the above doctrine that it never can be reconciled with it. There can be no doubt that he who is taught to seek righteousness out of himself does not previously possess it in himself. [418] This is most clearly declared by the Apostle, when he says, that he who knew no sin was made an expiatory victim for sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him (2 Cor. 5:21). You see that our righteousness is not in ourselves, but in Christ; that the only way in which we become possessed of it is by being made partakers with Christ, since with him we possess all riches. There is nothing repugnant to this in what he elsewhere says: "God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us," (Rom. 8:3, 4). Here the only fulfillment to which he refers is that which we obtain by imputation. Our Lord Jesus Christ communicates his righteousness to us, and so by some wondrous ways in so far as pertains to the justice of Gods transfuses its power into us. That this was the Apostle's view is abundantly clear from another sentiment which he had expressed a little before: "As by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous," (Rom. 5:19). To declare that we are deemed righteous, solely because the obedience of Christ is imputed to us as if it where our own, is just to place our righteousness in the obedience of Christ. Wherefore, Ambrose appears to me to have most elegantly adverted to the blessing of Jacob as an illustration of this righteousness, when he says that as he who did not merit the birthright in himself personated his brother, put on his garments which gave forth a most pleasant odour, and thus introduced himself to his father that he might receive a blessing to his own advantage, though under the person of another, so we conceal ourselves under the precious purity [419] of Christ, our first-born brother, that we may obtain an attestation of righteousness from the presence of God. The words of Ambrose are,--"Isaac's smelling the odour of his garments, perhaps means that we are justified not by works, but by faith, since carnal infirmity is an impediment to works, but errors of conduct are covered by the brightness of faith, which merits the pardon of faults," (Ambrose de Jacobo et Vita Beats, Lib. 2, c. 2). And so indeed it is; for in order to appear in the presence of God for salvation, we must send forth that fragrant odour, having our vices covered and buried by his perfection.

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[402] See Institutes, Book 2 chap. 6 and 7, and Book 3 from the commencement to the present chapter.

[403] Latin, "etiam dum Latine legitur."--French, "mesme en Grec et en Latin;" even in Greek and Latin

[404] French, "Dont il appert qu'il note ces deux choses comme opposites, Estre justifies et Estre tenu coulpable; à ce que le proces soit fait à l'homme qui aura failli;"--whence it appears that he sets down as oppopsites the two things, To be justified, and To be held guilty, in that the process is brought against man who has failed.

[405] French "Que les poures ames ne sauroyent comprendre en telle obscurité la grace de Christ;"--that poor souls cannot in such obscurity comprehend the grace of Christ.

[406] French, "C'est, que l'ame est de l'essence de Dieu;"--that is, that the soul is of the essence of God.

[407] French, "Mais comme le principe qu'il prend est comme une seche, laquelle en jettant son sang qui est noir comme encre, trougle l'eau d'alentour pour cacher une grande multitude de queuse;"--But as the principle which he adopts is like a cuttlefish, which, casting out its blood, which is black as ink, troubles the water all around, to hide a great multitude of tails.

[408] French, "Quant à d'autres folies extravangantes d'Osiander, tout homme de sain jugement les rejettera; comme quand il dit que la foy est Jesus Christ, autant que s'il disoit, qu'un pot de terre est le thresor qui est caché dedans;"--As to the other extravagant follies of Osiander, every man of sound judgment will reject them; for instance, when he says that faith is Jesus Christ, as much as if he said, that an earthen pot is the treasure which is hidden in it.

[409] French, "Faisant samblant de les rauir à la divinité d'icelui;"--under pretence of leading them to his divinity.

[410] French, "Il magnifie la justice de Dieu tant et plus; mais c'est pour triompher comme s'il auoit gagné ce poinct, que la justice de Dieu nous est essencielle;"--He magnifies the righteousness of God above measure; but it is to triumph, as if he had gained this point, that the righteousness of God is essential to us.

[411] The French adds "signifiant, que ceux desquels il parle ont nagé entre deux eaux; pource qu'ils aimoyent mieux garder leur bonne reputation au monde, qu d'etre priser devant Dieu;"--meaning, that those of whom he speaks were swimming between two streams; that they preferred keeping their good reputation in the world, to being prized in the sight of God.

[412] French, "Pour ceste cause j'ay accoustume de dire que Christ nous est comme une fontaine, dont chacun peut puiser et boire à son aise et à souhait; et que par son moyen les biens celestes sourdent et decoulent à nous, lesquels ne nous profiteroyent rien demeurans en la majesté de Dieu, qui est comme une source profonde;"--For this cause I am accustomed to say, that Christ is to us like a fountain, of which every man may draw and drink at his ease, and to the fill; and that by his means heavenly blessings rise and flow to us, which blessings would profit us nothing, remaining in the majesty of God, which is, as it were, a profound abyss.

[413] The Latin, "ideo Zuinglianos odiose nominat;" is in the French simply, "condamne furieusement;"--furiously condemns.

[414] Latin, "crassa mixtura;"--French, "mixtion telle que les viandes qu nous mangeons;"--mixture such as the victuals we eat.

[415] The French adds, "Osiander tire de la que Dieu a meslée son essence avec la nostre;"--Osiander implies from this that God has mingled his essence with ours.

[416] French, "Ainsi ils disent que cela n'appartient de rien aux bonnes oeuvres des fideles qui se font par la vertu du Sainct Esprit;"--Thus they say that has no reference at all to the good works of believers, which are done by the power of the Holy Spirit.

[417] French, "Mais pource que ce mot Seule, n'y est point exprimé, ils nous reprochent qu'il est adjousté du notre;"--but because this word Alone is not expressed, they upbraid us with having it added of our own accord.

[418] French, "Ceci est fort contraire a la doctrine ci dessus mise: car il n'y a nulle doute que celui qui doit cercher justice hors de soy-mesme, ne soit desnué de la sienne propre;"--This is quite contrary to the doctrine above laid down; for there is no doubt, that he who is to seek righteousness out of himself, is devoid of righteousness in himself.

[419] French, "Sous la robbe;"--under the robe.

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     Christian Classics Ethereal Library / Public Domain

     Institutes of the Christian Religion

Science, God, and Knowing

By Lenny Esposito 3/1/2014

     Today, people look to scientists to find the answers to our problems in the world. But does science have limits? Are there other ways to know something as fact? And how are questions about God and religion tested scientifically? In this series of audio podcasts, Lenny shows why scientific objections to God fail.

• Science, God, and Knowing (Part 1)
• Science, God, and Knowing (Part 2)
• Science, God, and Knowing (Part 3)
• Science, God, and Knowing (Part 4)

1 Samuel 9

By Don Carson 8-17-2018

     Occasionally someone comes along who shows exceptional promise from his or her youth, and then lives up to that promise. But that does not seem to be the common way of things. Who would have thought that a minor painter from Vienna could become the monstrous colossus the world knows as Adolf Hitler? Who would have thought that a failed haberdasher from Missouri, a chap with a high-school education, would succeed Roosevelt, drop the atom bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, sack General Douglas MacArthur, and order the racial integration of the armed forces?

     Consider Saul (1 Sam. 9). He was a Benjamite, and thus from the little tribe reduced in numbers and prestige by the horrible events recorded in Judges 19–21. He was not even from a major clan within that tribe (1 Sam. 9:21). Physically he was a strapping young man, getting on with the farming chores his father assigned him, with no pretensions—so far as we know—of glory or power. Indeed, in the next chapter he has to be cajoled from his hiding place in the luggage to come out and accept the acclaim the people wanted to give him.

     It is not yet the time to trace all the things that went wrong—some of them will be mentioned in later meditations. But people with even a cursory knowledge of Scripture know what a mixed character Saul turned out to be, and how tragic his end. What should we learn?

     (1) If we ourselves are on an upward curve of great promise, we must resolve to persevere in the small marks of fidelity and humility. A good beginning does not guarantee a good end.

     (2) If we are responsible for hiring people, whether pastors and other Christian leaders or executives for a corporation, although some of us prove more insightful and farsighted than others, all of us make mistakes—for the simple reason that, quite apart from the bad choices we make, a good choice can turn into a bad choice (and vice-versa) because people change.

     (3) It follows that every organization, not least the local church, needs some sort of mechanism for godly removal of leaders who turn out to be evil or woefully inadequate. That wasn’t possible in ancient Israel, so far as the king went. It is not only possible but mandated so far as New Testament leadership is concerned.

     (4) Only God knows the end from the beginning. After we have exercised our best judgment, nothing is more important than that we should cast ourselves on God, seeking to please him, trying to conform our judgments to what he has disclosed of himself in his Word, trusting absolutely in the only One who knows the end from the beginning.

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Don Carson is research professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, and co-founder (with Tim Keller) of The Gospel Coalition. He has authored numerous books, and recently edited The Enduring Authority of the Christian Scriptures (Eerdmans, 2016).

Read The Psalms In "1" Year

Psalm 35

7 For without cause they hid their net for me;
without cause they dug a pit for my life.
8 Let destruction come upon him when he does not know it!
And let the net that he hid ensnare him;
let him fall into it—to his destruction!

9 Then my soul will rejoice in the LORD,
exulting in his salvation.
10 All my bones shall say,
“O LORD, who is like you,
delivering the poor
from him who is too strong for him,
the poor and needy from him who robs him?”

By James Orr 1907

III. GENERAL LAWS OF PROGRESSIVE REVELATION

We shall perhaps get nearer the truth in this matter, and conserve what is of value in the above explanations, if, beginning at the other end, we assume the reality of revelation, and ask how, and under what limitations, revelation could enter into such a history as man’s. We shall not assume that the development is normal; on the contrary, we shall allow it to be in many ways evil; we shall take for granted that slavery, polygamy, cruelty, etc., are wrong, and that this must have been God’s judgment on them then as it is now. How then explain the apparent tolerance and sanction of such evils?

The full treatment of this subject would involve the careful consideration of God’s general relation to the evil of the world. The truth is here again illustrated that there is no difficulty in theology which does not emerge equally in philosophy; or, as Butler pointed out, that there is no difficulty in revelation which has not its counterpart in God’s ordinary providence. From the abstract or doctrinaire point of view, it may seem a strange thing that God should uphold, or have anything to do with, a world that has evil in it at all; should permit, and be patient of, that evil; should allow it to develop, and overrule it for His own purposes; should seem, by His silence and seeming indifference, to connive at the crimes and iniquities of which so large a part of the history of mankind is made up. The sword of the Israelite is, after all, only a more acute form of the problem that meets us in the providential employment, in even more horrible forms, of the sword of the Assyrian, the Chaldean, or Roman, to inflict the judgment threatened of God on Israel itself. Yet only a little reflection is needed to show that, if the world is to be upheld, governed, and judged, at all, it is only in some such way that even the Holiest can govern and judge it. As Paul says, in repelling the objection that God is unrighteous in taking vengeance for sins which He has overruled for His own glory: “God forbid; for then how shall God judge the world?” Let us see how this bears on the progressiveness of revelation.

1. One thing plain is, that, at whatever point revelation begins, it must take man up at the stage at which it finds him. It must take him up at his existing stage of knowledge and culture, and with his existing social usages and ethical ideas. Just as it was remarked above of the prophet, that it is psychologically inconceivable that he should be lifted out of all the forms of his existing consciousness, and transported into conditions for which no analogy was found in the contents of that consciousness; so it must be said of historical revelation, that it could not at a stroke annihilate existing conditions, and create a world of new ones. Revelation must begin somewhere, and must work patiently in accordance with the laws of historical development; must lay hold on what is better to counterwork and gradually overcome what is worse; must be content to implant principles, and bear patiently with much remaining evil, till the good has time to grow, and to give rise to a new order of things that will supplant the old. This is the true side of the law of evolution, and it applies in grace, as well as in nature. We see this law in operation even under Christianity. There is not a word in Christ’s teaching, e.g., any more than there is in Paul’s, directly denouncing slavery, or instigating to a revolt against it. Yet nothing is plainer than that slavery is opposed to the fundamental ideas and principles of Christ’s religion, and that in proportion as these prevail it is bound to be abolished. We speak of the imperfections of the Old Testament; but we should remember how far, as already hinted, society is even yet from being able to conduct its business on the ideal principles of Christ’s religion. We have, e.g., to tolerate and regulate houses for the sale of intoxicants; we use oaths, which Christ says “come of evil”; we sanction, and occasionally even glorify, war, which is as frightful a contradiction of Christ’s principles as it is possible to conceive. We do not dispute that war — defensive war — is sometimes a necessity; but this only illustrates what we mean, that there is a distinction between principles and the possibility of giving them complete effect at once. Christ condemns war in no other way than He condemns slavery, i.e., the fundamental principles of His religion contradict it; but it needs time to educate the public conscience to the point of abhorring it as it should, and finally of replacing it by more rational methods of settling international disputes.

2. Given this as a first principle, that revelation, where - ever it begins, must take up man as it finds him, a second will easily be deduced, viz., that revelation can be held responsible only for the new element which it introduces — not for the basis on which it works, or for everything in the state of mind, or limited outlook, of the recipient, with which it happens to be associated. Revelation does one thing at once — implants a truth, constitutes a relation, establishes a principle, which may have a whole rich content implicit in it, but it cannot convey to the recipient from the first a full, all - round apprehension of everything which that principle involves. On the contrary, such applications must necessarily have adaptation to the stage of morality or of social institutions then existing, and it is only gradually that the principle can be clearly disengaged from its temporary form. In the reception of revelation, therefore, two elements have constantly to be distinguished — the one, the form of consciousness, or state of view and moral feeling, into which the revelation is introduced; this may be relatively low and undeveloped; the other, the new element of revelation itself, which is the positive and germinal factor, and represents the real stage in the advance. There need be no dubiety, or lack of clearness or positiveness, in this new element; it is a pure, original point of knowledge or insight, but its authority extends only to itself, and cannot be employed to sanction every other element associated with it in the same consciousness. For example, the days of the Judges are acknowledged to have been in many ways rude and barbarous; we have seen that the Bible itself declares this. It is no argument, therefore, against the reality of revelation in that age that the Spirit of God came on men — as on Jephthah — whose modes of speech and action (as in his ideas of God, or his vow about his daughter) show many traces of the rudeness of the times. So again, Deborah was a real prophetess, i.e., she possessed from God’s Spirit the qualification necessary for judging and rallying by her word the tribes of Israel. But her song of victory, with its panegyric of Jael, shows that, with all her inspired exaltation, she yet stood on the ground of her age in her judgment of deeds which a purer stage of enlightenment would condemn. The same principle applies to certain of the imprecations, and the frequent prayers for the destruction of enemies, in the psalms — on which more is said below. It is the course of revelation which alone can correct these defects of its earlier stages, and, by revelation growing out of revelation, enable the world and the Church to transcend the lower stages altogether.

3. A third principle follows. As, in virtue of the foregoing, revelation can be held responsible only for the new element it introduces, and not for the basis on which it works, or for everything in the state of mind of its recipients, so, conversely, it is the function of revelation to lay hold on whatever better elements there may be in that state of mind, in order, by their means, to overcome the imperfections, and create something higher. This is the educational function in revelation, which can only reach its end by working with such means as the imperfect state affords towards the production of a more perfect. An illustration of the principle in question is found in the command to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. In so far as this command supposes as its background the heathen custom of the sacrifice of children, it falls under the two former principles that revelation takes up a man at the stage at which it finds him, and is not responsible for the basis on which it works; but in so far as it uses this basis to elicit a singular proof of Abraham’s faith, and actually to put the stamp of divine condemnation on human sacrifice in Israel, it falls under the third, or educative, principle. For even in this most hateful form of heathen sacrifice, as has often been pointed out, there was a nobler element present. This nobler element was the idea of the surrender of the dearest and best to God, and it was God’s will to elicit and conserve this spiritual fruit, while rejecting as abhorrent the form in which it was embodied. So the usage of blood - revenge is one of the rudest methods of justice in a tribal state of society; yet, by limiting and regulating this usage by the law of the cities of refuge, its worst effects were checked, and the way was prepared for its ultimately dying out altogether. The legislation on marriage and divorce put salutary restrictions on polygamy, and the wanton putting away of a wife, and, after the exile especially, monogamy, though not universal, seems to have become the rule. The same principle applies in some degree even to what jars upon us most — the apparent sanction given to the spirit of revenge, or, as it may be better put, the restricted range of the spirit of mercy. There is here, as elsewhere on this subject, great need for careful and balanced statement. It is perfectly certain that the Mosaic religion, taken as a whole, inculcated mercy with a decision and earnestness that no other religion before Christianity ever showed; it is equally certain that hatred and revengefulness, as private passions, are constantly condemned. But where enmity to God, or antagonism to His cause, was concerned, the stage at which we find ourselves in the Old Testament is one of uncompromising hostility. It is the principle of justice, in all its stern severity, not yet that of mercy, that rules; and little distinction is made between the transgressor and his sin. The judgment falls unsparingly on the wrong-doer, and, in the tribal stage of society, on all that are his. This principle is applied, in the case of presumptuous or public transgression, as relentlessly within Israel, and upon Israel, as it is without Israel. The destruction of the Canaanites is the most extensive, as it is the most awful, application of it, but it is no more than an application. And even this stage, with its inevitable defects, was one that had to be gone through — as no one has shown more strikingly than Professor Seeley, in his Ecce Homo, — if the higher result was to be attained.

In general, then, we perceive that revelation, without parting with anything of its reality or authority, is, in the truest sense, an organic process — a growing from less to more, with adaptation at every point to the stage of development of its recipients — a light shining often in a dark place, but still shining more and more unto the perfect day. Its higher stages criticise, if we may so speak, its lower; shed off temporary elements; disengage principles from the imperfect forms in which they are embodied, and give them more perfect expression; yet unfailingly conserve, and take up into the new form, every element of permanent value in the old. Prophecy does not let fall one element that was of permanent value in the law; Christianity conserves every jot and tittle of the spiritual content of both law and prophets.

The Problem of the Old Testament

The Coming Prince

By Sir Robert Anderson 1841-1918

Chapter 7 The Mystic Era Of The Weeks

[1] See pp. 44-47, ante.

[2] All these words point to practical benefits to be conferred in a practical way upon the people, at the second advent of Christ. Isaiah 1:26 is a commentary on "bringing in righteousness." To take it as synonymous with declaring God's righteousness (Romans 3:25) is doctrinally a blunder and an anachronism. To any whose views of "reconciliation" are not based on the use of the word in Scripture, "making reconciliation for iniquity" will seem an exception. The Hebrew verb caphar (to make atonement or reconciliation) means literally "to cover over" sin (see its use in Genesis 6:14), to do away with a charge against a person by means of bloodshedding, or otherwise (ex. gr. by intercession, Exodus 32:30), so as to secure his reception into Divine favor. The following is a list of the passages where the word is used in the first three books of the Bible: Genesis 6:14 (pitch); 32:20 (appease); Exodus 29:33, 36, 37; 30:10, 15, 16; 32:30; Leviticus 1:4; 4:20, 26, 31, 35; 5:6, 10, 13, 16, 18; 6:7, 30; 7:7; 8:15, 34; 9:7; 10:17; 12:7, 8;14:18, 19, 20, 21, 29, 31, 53; 15:15, 30; 16:6, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 20, 24, 27, 32, 33, 34; 17:11; 19:22; 23:28. It will be seen that caphar is never used of the expiation or bloodshedding considered objectively, but of the results accruing from it to the sinner, sometimes immediately on the victim's death, sometimes conditional upon the action of the priest who was charged with the function of applying the blood.  The sacrifice was not the atonement, but the means by which atonement was made.  Therefore "the preposition which marks substitution is never used in connection with the word caphar" (Girdlestone's Synonyms O. T., p. 214.) Making reconciliation, or atonement, therefore, according to the Scriptural use of the word, implies the removal of the practical estrangement between the sinner and God, the obtaining forgiveness for the sin; and the words in Daniel 9:24 point to the time when this benefit will be secured to Judah. "In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and uncleanness" ( Zechariah 13:1 ); that is, the blessings of Calvary will be theirs; reconciliation will be accomplished for the people. In keeping with this, transgression will be restrained (see use of the word in Genesis 8:2; Exodus 36:6); i. e., they will cease to transgress; sins will be sealed up, — the ordinary word for securing a letter (1 Kings 21:8), or a purse or bag of treasure ( Job 14:17 ); i. e., sins will be done with and put away in a practical sense; and vision and prophet will likewise be sealed up, i. e., their functions will be at an end, for all will have been fulfilled.

[3] According to Browne (Ordo Saec., §§. 254 and 268) the Exodus was on Friday the 10th April, B. C. 1586; the passage of Jordan was the 14th April, B. C. 1546; the accession of Solomon was B. C. 1016, and the foundation of the Temple was the 20th April, B. C. 1013. He therefore accepts St. Paul's statements unreservedly. Clinton conjectures that there was an interval of about twenty-seven years before the time of the Judges, and another of twelve years before the election of Saul, thus fixing on B. C. 1625 as the date of the Exode, extending the whole period to 612 years. Josephus reckons it 621 years, and this is adopted by Hales, who calls the statement in Kings "a forgery." Other chronologers assign periods varying from the 741 years of Julius Africanus to the 480 years of Usher, whose date for the Exode — B. C. 1491 — has been adopted in our Bible, though clearly wrong by ninety-three years at least. The subject is fully discussed by Clinton in Fasli Hell., vol. 1., pp. 312-313, and by Browne, reviewing Clinton's arguments, in Ordo Scec., §. 6, etc. Browne's conclusions have much to commend them. But if others are right in inserting conjectural periods, my argument remains the same, for any such periods, if they existed, were obviously excluded from the 480 years on the same principle as were the eras of the servitudes. (This subject is discussed further in App. 1.)

[4] Judges 3:8, 14; 4:2, 3; 6:1; 13:1. The servitude of Judges 10:7, 9 affected only the tribes beyond Jordan, and did not suspend Israel's national position.

[5] The Israelites were nationally God's people as no other nation ever can be; therefore they were dealt with in some respects on principles similar to those which obtain in the case of individuals. A life without God is death. Righteousness must keep a strict account and sternly judge; or grace may pardon. And if God forgives, He likewise forgets the sin (Hebrews 10:17); which doubtless means that the record is wiped out, and the period it covers is treated as though it were a blank. The days of our servitude to evil are ignored in the Divine chronology.

[6] thlipsis, Matthew 24:21; Daniel 12:1 (LXX)

[7] kai epi to hieronn bdelugma ton eramoseon, Daniel 9:27; to bdelugma eramoseos, Daniel 12:11 (LXX.); hotan oun idate to bdelugma tas eramoseos to rhathen dia Danial tou prophatou, estos en topo hagio, Matthew 24:15. Comp. 1 Maccabees 1:54, okodomasan bdelugma eramoseos epi to phusiastapion. This passage in Matthew affords an unanswerable proof that all systems of interpretation which make the seventy weeks end with the coming or death of Christ, and therefore before the destruction of Jerusalem by Tiffits, are wholly wrong. And that that event was not in fact the terminus of the era is plain from Matthew 24:21-29, and Daniel 9:24.

[8] Making all allowance for the contemptible time-serving of Josephus and his admiration for Titus, his testimony on this point is too full and explicit. to admit of doubt (Wars, 6., 2, §. 4).

The Continual Burnt Offering

By H.A. Ironside - 1941

March 29

Psalm 23:1  The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.   ESV

Psalm 23:1  The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
2  He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
3  He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.

4  Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.

5  You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies;
you anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
6  Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.


Psalm 34:9  Oh, fear the LORD, you his saints,
for those who fear him have no lack!
10  The young lions suffer want and hunger;
but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing.   ESV

Since the Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want:
Rest — “He maketh me to lie down.”
Refreshment — “He leadeth me beside the still waters.”
Restoration — “He restoreth my soul.”
Guidance — “He leadeth me in the paths of righteousnes.”
Confidence — “I will fear no evil.”
Companionship — “Thou art with me.”
Comfort — “Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”
Provision — “Thou preparest a table.”
Unction — “Thou anointest my head.”
Satisfaction — “My cup runneth over.”
Protection — “Goodness and mercy shall follow me.”
A Home at last — “I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”