Part of my new job as a teacher is teaching (go figure) a 12th grade Theological Foundations and Apologetics class. We are starting out the year working through several books, articles and teachings on the Trinity. In many of these readings (from within the church and without) there is a great deal of reference to contradiction, paradox and mystery. Here is a great summary of the distinction between Contradiction, Paradox and Mystery:

1. Contradiction – something that defies the laws of logic and therefore is inherently unintelligible.
2. Paradox – something that sounds contradictory, but upon closer scrutiny the tension is resolved.
3. Mystery – things that we as yet do not understand. R.C. Sproul elaborates by saying that these are things “we believe to be true, but we don’t understand how or why it is that they are true.”

Using the Trinity as an example, it appears that a contradiction exists. How can God be both One and Three? A more than surface-level look at the Doctrine of the Trinity reveals that we believe that God is not One in precisely the same way He is Three. Does this leave room for Mystery and Paradox from a finite human standpoint? Yes. Is it a contradiction? No.

“…My peers and I were among the first ones to experience grade inflation, where we got A’s for excavating our feelings and “doing our best” at calculus. We were among the first to be programmed for self-esteem, as we learned that having a pulse made us wonderfully special. For as long as we can remember, we’ve been destined for superstardom. Some of us have been prepped for elite schooling since before we could use the potty, and we’ve been on the traveling soccer teams before we knew not to touch the ball with our hands. We’ve been stuffed full of praise for mediocrity and had our foibles diagnosed away with hyphenated jargon and pop psychology.
It’s no wonder we expect people to affirm us for everything, criticize us for nothing, and pay us for anything we want to do.” -Kevin DeYoung, Just Do Something: A Liberating Approach to Finding God’s Will

DeYoung nails it. If you haven’t read this book, you should. In the age of the adultolescent DeYoung’s advice is sage, and his voice should be heard amidst and above the pseudo-spiritual ramblings of some/many popular Christian authors.

Check out Tyson’s blog here: http://heytyson.blogspot.com

One of my new favorite theologians is Stanley Hauerwas. Although he is not a fan of the title, he was named the Best Theologian in America by Time in 2001. In this clip he discusses his thoughts on the healthcare debate, but midway through makes a thought provoking statement about how we educate our nation’s Doctors vs. how we educate our pastors.

The whole thing is interesting, but be sure to hear what he says from minutes 1:30-3:00.

What do you think? Valid argument or not?

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In no particular order:

• The Pope
• Church Elders
• Scripture
• Your interpretation of Scripture
• Creeds & Confessions

Please rank 1 for highest authority over your life, and 5 for lowest authority over your life. I’ll share my rankings soon, but I’d love to hear yours for now, however informed or uninformed you feel.

In his regular Q&A, John Piper was asked if he had any words of caution for the “New Reformed” movement that has become more and more popular of late, especially in the younger circles. In his answer (available here) he makes the following observations:

On the dangers of the contemporary worship awakening:

The danger of the contemporary worship awakening is that we love loving God more than we love God.

On the dangers of the new reformed movement:

The danger of the New Reformed movement is making theology God instead of God God. Loving doing theology rather than loving God.

A great reminder of the dangers of each extreme. Thanks to @lukesammons for the link!

“The Bible is God’s revelation of Himself to humankind.  Don’t miss how big that is…God (infinite) reveals Himself to humans (finite).  In order to communicate truths that are way beyond our grasp, the Bible uses human terms like Father.  We all have fathers.  Some of us have bad fathers, or absent fathers.  Some of us have good fathers.  There are some ways in which earthly fathers help us know what our heavenly Father is like, and many ways in which our earthly fathers will hinder our thoughts of God.  For those of us who don’t know our fathers, or have abusive fathers, the very thought of a heavenly “father” is offensive.  “Why would I want another father?  All they do is hurt me…let me down.”  Even those of us with good, loving fathers can mislead us in our thoughts of our Heavenly Father.  We think of God as basically the same as us…maybe a little older and wiser.  A big cuddly figure who bandages our spiritual skinned knees.  So what does it mean that God is Father?  Three things: He is the Original Source.  He has a Son.  We can be adopted as His Sons and Daughters.”

“Why is it so important that we live the Christian life in community? As strong, healthy and safe as we think we are, every single one of us is just a phone call away from having our lives completely fall apart. Every single one of us will have times where we doubt and struggle with our faith. Every single one of us will feel so alone that we wonder if anyone else understands what we’re going through. The first word of the Nicene Creed means that God designed Christianity and the Church so that every single one of us is responsible for every single one of us both in times of suffering and in times of great joy. You need me, and I need you.”

“Why does Christianity need boundaries? Because anyone can make claims about God and the Bible. Especially with the quick and easy access we have to information today, a guy living in his parent’s basement has just as much say as the Biblical Scholar who spent 40 years in study and teaching. The basement blogger and the Biblical Scholar both hold opinions about God, but that doesn’t mean that they are both right. Having and expressing your opinion is not wrong when you are talking about which team is better, or what top looks best with those shorts. When you are talking about the God of the Universe, on the other hand, you must make sure that your “opinion” is right. Otherwise you run the risk of leading yourself and others away from the one True God you claim to believe in.”

One historic use of the word Amen is to affirm that whatever was said previously was in fact true and the Word of God. When a prophet would speak, those listening would weigh whatever was said against what they knew to be true about God based on what He had revealed to them. If the saying was true and affirmed by Scripture, they would say Amen, which can be translated as “let it be true”.

One of the reasons the religious leaders of Jesus’ day wanted him dead was his consistent use of the phrase “Amen, Amen I say to you..” before he began teaching. This was a big deal because Jesus wasn’t saying, “listen to me and then decide if what I say agrees with what God says”, but instead says “The following are the actual words of God…”

A good teacher would not claim to be authoritatively speaking the words of God. People wanted Jesus dead because He claimed to be God. Listening to a man who claimed to be God is foolish, unless he is right. Jesus the Christ was either God or a crazy man who should never be followed. I recognize that believing today that the historical person of Jesus really is who he claims to be can be seen as strange. But this is not nearly as foolish or naive as calling this same man a good teacher two thousand years down the road.

One of the great things about Scripture is that anyone can pick up the Bible and read and understand the redemptive plan God has for his people. The Westminster Confession of Faith affirms (ch.1 section 7) that:

those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed for salvation, are so clearly propounded, and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

That doesn’t mean that there are no confusing sections, chapters or books. It makes sense that when an infinite God reveals Himself to finite man there can be some confusion. So where do you go when you come across a passage that does not make sense? This is a short list of places I turn when I don’t understand Scripture.

1. Try a Study Bible. This is the Bible, along with brief commentary from (usually) respected Biblical scholars and pastors. I highly recommend the ESV Study Bible.
2. Find a Good Commentary. There are thousands of commentaries available. I would recommend speaking with your pastor, a professor or seminary student (who knows who to ask), and checking out review sites such as BestCommentaries. There are at least two “levels” of commentaries: ones that focus on the whole Bible and ones that focus on a specific book. If you are looking to buy a commentary, maybe start with a respected one on the Whole Bible, just the Old Testament, or just the New Testament. If you still want to look deeper at a specific passage or book, look for a good commentary on that specific book.
3. Find a Good Sermon or Lecture. There is a plethora of solid sermons and lectures available for free on almost any topic or passage you can think of. If looking for a sermon, I recommend two places. One is John Piper’s ministry website, where they have archived thousands of sermons from the past 20+ years all available for free. The second is Matt Chandler’s sermon archive available at The Village Church website. Both of these men have had a significant influence on my understanding of Scripture. If you want to learn even more, I also highly recommend listening to lectures available on iTunes U from seminaries across the country, including RTS and DTS.
4. As an added bonus, as I was working on this post The Village Church put out a list of recommended resources as well. You can access it here.

(Photo licensed under Creative Commons and taken by Carson Coots)