Links Matter

A few links...

John Piper has written a manuscript responding to N.T. Wright's view of justification.  Who knows if/when we will see it since he is seeking the thoughts of others on it, but the conversation at Justin Taylor's blog about it is already interesting.  Piper wrote this on his summer sabbatical at Cambridge.

Brian Spears writes on the 10 things you'll learn by visiting other churches.  Always helpful for those of us who too rarely get to visit other churches.

The Church Planting Resources site is looking good, and is now considered to be 83% sexier (according to Drew Goodmanson).  It's a site for "free exchange of information to help build the Kingdom and ultimately spread the gospel." 

Comback Churches has some good stuff from Ed Stetzer, including his "Stirring the Waters" articles.

And have I mentioned before the PeopleGroups website?  Some good, basic demographic stuff for you.

Comments

[Scott M]

I remain confused about the apparent disturbance Wright's perspective on justification. Especially when I see comments like this one by Piper:

Few things are more precious than the truth of justification by faith alone because of Christ alone.

This clearly implies that Wright somehow denies this truth. I went back and reread one of Wright's papers on justification, The Shape of Justification, and I just don't see it.

Of course, this whole salvation by works vs. salvation by faith thing in its modern context has always been confusing to me. I'm only recently learning more about 2nd Temple Judaism, but I've known a number of present-day Jews (some in my family by marriage) and have known they certainly aren't doing anything that others seem to call attempting to "earn" salvation through the works of the law. Rather, they keep Torah out of love for God and because they are Jews, God's chosen people. (Nor has it ever appeared reasonable to me to claim Paul could have meant anything other than Torah by his use of Law.)

I have long known a lot about ancient pagan cultures and this Christianized extrapolation upon them that they somehow had any concept of doing good deeds or 'works' in order to achieve some sort of afterlife 'salvation' is just nuts. That may sound blunt, but it's true. The closest you come is perhaps ancient Norse beliefs which provided Valhalla for the valiant warrior, but I doubt the Christianized West would call their deeds to earn it 'good works'. Hmmm. There was also Platonism which focused on attaining the right knowledge for a blissful afterlife (and was probably a key influence in the Gnostic strand of the early Christian church). But there was nothing vaguely like this thing Christians have imposed on the text called 'salvation by works righteousness'. Paul could not have been writing to dispute a concept that did not exist.

What was the issue? Especially for Galatians? Heck, it's spelled out in both Acts and the letter itself. 'Judaizers' had followed Paul and were telling the Gentile believers that in order to be part of the group God had justified, they had to become Jews (through the proselyte process which included circumcision) which, of course, also meant keeping Torah. But the key issue of dispute was not about whether or not Torah 'saved', but whether or not Gentile believers first had to become Jews before they could follow Jesus or if God's new people consisted of all those who followed Jesus by faith with no other membership requirements.

And in that context, the things Wright says make a lot of sense. But he always maintains (as he does in the paper above) that faith and nothing else is the "badge of membership". Piper's comment leads me to expect we'll have another round of people talking past not to each other. Hopefully not, but we'll see.

[D. Goodmanson]

Thanks Steve, I'm still working on the book tagging you sent my way! BTW - You'll be happy to see a few resources (such as: Seven Seasons of Church Planting & Why Plant Churches) from Tim Keller under the new Strategy section on Church Planting Resources.

Nothing as good as your resource listing though...

[Mike]

Scott... Love your comments. I did an independent study on the new perspective on Paul and had to read many, many pieces [on both sides of the supposed "theological fence"]. You did a good job of framing the discussion. The issue is that reformed theology reads Paul through a Lutheran lens. The issue is that Luther, in trying to move away from a works based salvation he saw in Catholicism, transported that same ideology onto Paul and the Judaism of his day. This can be clearly seen in Luther's own writings...

"To want to be justified by the works of the Law is to deny the righteousness of faith... [to be] self-righteous... This righteousness of the Law which they [the Jews] think they are producing is in fact nothing but idolatry and blasphemy against God." [Luther's Works, 26:253-54]

The problem is what you stated - Judaism is not a works based religion, as the Israelites were chosen by grace [Deut. 7.6-8]. The Torah was a gift, a way of living in harmony with God in the covenant. It was never seen as a way of earning salvation. In fact Paul even says that in the keeping of the law he was blameless. He even mentions a "righteousness of the law". Somehow we need to rectify some of what we see in the text.

One key issue centers around the term "works of the law". Until the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, no one knew what the term meant. After the scrolls were found, there were found references to "works of the law" as a boundary issue, an identity marker if you will. What Paul is arguing against is not a works based system, but is actually holding up a "more pure form" of being in covenantal relationship with God. He is reminding the people that God is still faithful to the convenant, and he will be the one to redeem Israel. Their trust in the "works of the law" [specifically Sabbath-keeping, kosher food laws, and circumcision" were not something that could trust in to be a part of the covenant. They are not rites of passage, that actually saved someone. In effect, they had misplaced their trust/faith in the "works of the law" and forgotten the covenantal God that stood behind these things.

In Jesus, Paul saw that God was bringing the covenant to a climax, he was fulfilling and pouring out the awaited new covenant, hence no longer needing the "works of the law", but God would now "circumcise their hearts" [there's a definite reason for this phraseolgy for Paul]. They would be his people and he would be their God. The covenant, that the Jews kept to themselves, gaurdaing it with the "works of the law" was now put back in it's proper place as a covenant which was available to all humanity, which the nation of Israel was supposed to play the role of priest [Exodus 19.5-6]

The argument is way more involved that this...

Wright would absolutely agree with Piper in many areas of justification. For Wright justification is by faith alone, and is by the work of Jesus alone. The one thing that may be the issue is that Wright is not a reformed theologian [but there are many out there who are not that are not doing damage to the gospel]. My hope is that Piper is careful, not creating a straw-man argument that talks past each other as you have said.

[NOTE - Sorry for the long comment post... and Steve, love your blog my brotha!]

[Garrett]

Mike,

You are correct. We need to move beyond an absolute dependence on a 16th Century Lutheran worldview. Wright has explained himself ad infinitum on the subject of justification, particularly here:

http://www.athanasiuspress.org/inventory.html?invid=1

He said in effect, "I'm able to affirm everything you are saying as reformed folk, but I'm not going to change my technical theological terminology to suit your tastebuds...I'm not Presbyterian." Bravo. We need to get a fresh grip on developments in historical theology that Luther and the Westminster divines could only dream of.

Regarding Piper, he's a good preacher and devotional writer but a scholarly level exegete? C'mon, Wright's the NT scholar of our day. Do we really need yet another second-tier edition to the bash the NPP clique?

Frankly, I think "Jesus and the Victory of God" is the most helpful text/commentary, bar none, for those preaching through the Gospels.

[Steve McCoy]

Without getting into the positions on this issue or taking sides, I do think Piper is a scholarly level exegete. He has a PhD from U of Munich in New Testament Studies. He taught at Bethel College before pastoring. If we want to critique Piper's points, feel free to do so. But I don't think we can downplay his scholarly abilities.