A curse for us

"Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: 'Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree.'"

Galatians 3:13 is one of the Bible's clearest short statements of penal substitution, and thus of the authentic gospel (which it is Paul's purpose to defend, Galatians 1:6-9). (Penal substitution has been discussed here most recently here, here, here).

What is taught us in this verse?

1. We were exposed to the curse of the law: we were under it, and stood in need of redemption from it. (Note that Paul is writing to uncircumcised Gentile Christians here - this is not just Jews who were under it. This observation has implications for various other theological ideas floating around).
2. Christ is the one who has brought us out from under this curse. He redeemed us.
3. He did this by himself taking the curse upon himself. He hung on a tree: he was cursed.

That's penal substitution. Penal substitution means two ideas: there was a punishment due (a penalty), and that somebody else other than the offender suffered it (substitution).

Many theologians have toiled long and hard to make this an obscure, difficult or controversial question. Regrettably, some solidly evangelical men have also fallen into the trap set for them of talking of penal substitution as a "model", implying that it is a human reconstruction, one possibly viewpoint amongst many. But it is not a difficult one, nor one alternative on a menu. It is a simple statement of what Christ did, from which all the other benefits and achievements of Calvary flow out: it is the foundation that undergirds everything else that can be said. (e.g. Calvary is the great victory over the powers of evil, "Christus Victor", precisely because by a substitutionary atonement, Christ has robbed those powers of their hold over man - sin being forgiven, God no longer needs to punish man, or leave him to be a slave to his sinful nature; the possibility of new birth and a new life and new society is opened up, and hell is raided for its inhabitants, etc.).

According to Paul, this is the gospel, and no other alternatives are allowed; indeed, they are all damnable - Galatians 1:6-9. It's there in words of very few syllables.

Peter at Antioch again

Earlier this week I posted some thoughts from studying Galatians 2:11-24, when Peter came to Antioch and Paul opposed him in public.

As I've reflected on this passage further, I'd like to ask.... what exactly does it mean?

On one level I know what it means. It tells us what happened when Peter came to Antioch, of course.

The question is, though, why is Paul telling us about this? In other words, what exactly is the passage's function within the whole letter? How does it advance the case that Paul is making?

Paul's case, as outlined in 1:6-9, is simply this: that there is only one gospel, and it is the gospel that Paul preached - not the gospel of the "Judaisers".

Any kind of "mirror-reading" of chapters 1 and 2 will make clear that the Judaisers were trying to persuade the Galatians that there was a gap between Paul and Peter's apostleship and their gospel - with Paul on the losing end. Paul was some kind of subordinate, and had mangled the message somewhere in transmission when bringing it (allegedly) from Jerusalem.

Within this context, how exactly does Galatians 2:11-24 function? Here the mirror-reading is more difficult I think. Were the Judaisers spreading a false report of Peter's trip to Antioch that Paul wanted to correct? Or is Paul simply continuing to demonstrate that he was not inferior to Peter, shown by the fact he had once even publicly rebuked him? Were the Judaisers making Peter seem infallible in everything he did (perhaps Peter also had begun to separate from Gentiles in Jerusalem too, and the Judaisers were using this report?), and was Paul's purpose to correct this untruth? Is Paul's purpose simply, like in 2:1-10, to show that his gospel had been publicly vindicated with Peter present?

Or is it a combination of these things, or some others too? The answer to this question seems impossible to be dogmatic about. God has not revealed the answer to this question. So how does this then affect how we preach it? For a lot of the preaching, it makes no difference - we'll have to spend a good deal of time explaining what happened and what it meant, and how it fits in the overall scheme is not affected by this so much. But it still makes some difference - we have to give some account of the purpose of the passage if people are meant to understand the book as a whole and not just individual verses her and there.

Any thoughts? My (I hoped educated) best guess is that Paul is, for the best of motives, having to expose to the Galatians that Peter is not all that the Judaisers have made him out to be. It is a historical argument, refuting the idea that Peter was the super-apostle whose teachings (though these actually totally agreed with Paul's, as 2:1-10 established - and necessarily so, as my understanding is that the apostles were inspired and infallible in all their teaching) and practices were the guide to judge the others by. He's demonstrating that the Judaisers' reconstruction simply doesn't work when tested by what had really gone on down the years.

A pastor - the last thing to be?

Have you ever heard this kind of advice? "If you are wondering if you should be a pastor... then consider if there is anything else you desire to be. Only be a pastor if you find you cannot avoid it - that you are compelled to it."

I think that is profoundly unbiblical advice. It's a romantic kind of idea - the idea that the Holy Spirit always gives the same kind of experience to everyone who he intends to be in pastoral ministry: that he chases you down, that you resist, and that he gets you in the end. That might be the experience of some and make for good reading, but making it a rule for all I think has no Scriptural precedent and its effect will be to prevent people from entering ministry who ought to.

The Biblical rule I believe is that God gives you a gift and then you are responsible to use it, whatever it is (e.g. Romans 12:4-8). If you are gifted for pastoral ministry, then you should exercise that gift - and if you find out that you are gifted to the extent that you ought to be devoted to it full-time, then you devote yourself to it full-time.

Your emotional and other internal experiences along the way may involve all kinds of thing. You may be reluctant, or you may be eager (e.g. 1 Timothy 3:1). The struggle might be long, or almost non-existent. The question "did you make sure you tried to resist to see if you were compelled to it?" is not a Scriptural one. The Scriptural one is, "If Jesus has given you a 'talent', are you making sure you're employing it so that you can give an account for it later?"

Whose children? The miseries of modern secularism

This news story reports that a UK parliamentary committee is advising that the right for parents to decide whether their children should receive their (state) school's sex education lessons should be revoked, and the school should have the authority instead.

Of course, for "school", read "state" - because the schools will be following centralised government "guidelines" when making these decisions.

This is the ultimate state take-over of parenthood. Once the state awards itself the right to control sex education against the wishes of parents - as sensitive and personal a topic as there can be - then that's about it. What rights should not belong to the state in preference to parents, if this one should? If the state knows more about how to teach your children about sex than you do, then what does it not know?

But note this.... the way this issue has been framed, the battle is already lost. The right is already awarded. If a parliamentary committee can legitimately discuss what rights you should or shouldn't have, then that committee has already deified itself. If it's up to them whether to let you be a parent or not, then in reality they are already the parent and not you - they've just kindly let you have a play at it for a while.

Historically, it was believed that individuals and parents possessed certain inalienable rights. Rights were not awarded or withdrawn by committee: they existed by virtue of your existence, as a human being made by God. It was not up to governments to decide if they liked it or not: parents and individuals were entities existing in the sight of God just as much as governments were. Each had their own sphere, and each was accountable to God for not overstepping. Government no right to invade the family.

This comes from a Christian world-view, where each of the individual, the family (and the church) as well as the government exists as an entity under God. Where God rules over men. Each is answerable for itself, and has no right to trample the rights of another in a different sphere.

But in the secular world-view, God is abolished. There's nothing (in our thinking) over-head. This means nothing to keep each in its own place. Historically, for a time each then wanders around in its own confusion. But inevitably, and normally sooner rather than later, government starts to climb out of its place to assert its rights over all other spheres. In the absence of a God that government is answerable too, government then starts to make individuals and families answerable only to itself. The idea of inalienable rights of families disappears from view, and all must submit to the all-powerful state. Nothing is inalienable - government committees can then decide every question they please.

Result: eventually, a centralised, totalitarian nightmare. The 20th century ought to have taught us this, with its all-powerful states: Hitler's Germany, Stalin and Lenin's Russia, Pol Pot's Cambodia, Hoxar's Albania, etc.

But even if we have been taught it, what can we do about it? With God abolished from the secular mind, there's no other reality there to keep the state in its place. There is, unless God himself is merciful and restrains the evil or even turns it around by a work of revival, a tragic inevitability. With no God to worship and serve, we must end up having to serve man: there is no alternative. "Progressive" and "modern" are the words the authors of this tragedy use - but history tells us that "regressive" and "miserable" are far more accurate. God-less utopias do not exist. Man is never truly free until he is in the delightful "slavery" of acknowledging and obeying his Maker. Then he is truly free, free to do what he was made for, and what he ought, and what is right.

The alternative is man's freedom: the true slavery, where you cannot even instruct your own children about something so intimate as sex as you see best without the state, by force of law, over-riding your wishes. May Jesus have mercy on the modern UK!

The duty of joy

Religions have all kinds of duties, commonplace and esoteric. (Some of the esoteric ones are a good proof that the religion in question originated in the mind of man and not God.... for example, only a man who lived in the east and was ignorant of polar regions could have come up with a binding requirement that you should fast at certain times of year whilst the sun is up. Bit tricky when the sun is up for months at a time, or if this only gives you 2 hours in the middle of the night to eat, n'est ce pas?)

Christianity, being uniquely true, has a unique and surprising duty: joy! Not only joy, but continual, permanent joy. "Rejoice in the Lord always", wrote the apostle Paul (Philippians 4:4). These were no glib words; Paul knew all about suffering and persecution - about being rejected, beaten, in fear of his life, being pressed down by all the problems of his churches, etcetera. Just a few lines later he acknowledged this all, and yet said "I have learned, in whatever condition I am in, to be content" (Philippians 4:11).

The key to rejoicing is in the words "in the Lord". The son or daughter who is heir to a king, and who knows that final victory is already won and that the crown is certain can never have more than temporary sorrow. Sorrow is real, but it can never overcome the joy. Christ has conquered, he loves us, and is returning. To not have our Christian lives characterised by joy is inconsistent. A Christian can give way to long-term depression only if he or she lets the truth take a secondary seat.

We are not meant to endure trials, teeth gritted. We are meant to rejoice through them. The pain is real - but the joy ought to be even more real. This is not pie-in-the-sky head-in-the-clouds stuff: it's following Jesus, who "for the joy set before him, endured the cross" (Hebrews 12:1-2). Amidst many trials and Christian duties we can forget that one of the truest tests of all of our faith is to see whether we go through life with joy, or not. One of the most important duties of all, by which our real standing will be seen, is to rejoice.

How are you doing?

Sobering lessons from when Peter came to Antioch (Galatians 2:11-21)

When Peter came to Antioch, he ate with Gentile Christians: in violation of the ceremonial laws of Moses. But Peter knew that the ceremonial laws were no longer binding; Christ had purified all things. Peter himself had had this made graphically clear to him in his vision before the conversion of Cornelius (Acts 10). The middle wall of partition had been pulled down once and for all through the Messiah who died for the sins not of Israel alone, but of all the world.

Later on, though, when certain men came representing James (whether officially or purportedly is not significant: if Peter could err in this matter, so could James), he stopped. Why? The Bible says "fear" (Galatians 2:12). From that moment on, Peter became a hypocrite. He preached a law-free gospel that places all men everywhere on an equal footing: Jew and Gentile alike sinners before God, and able to be justified by God's grace through faith alone; able to fellowship together at the Lord's Supper in the same way. He preached that righteousness does not come from the law, but is a free gift to all in Christ. Yet whilst he preached this, he started again to rebuild the distinctions between Jew and Gentile by separating himself from his non-Jewish brothers, refusing to treat them as equals and enjoy fellowship with them on that basis. He ate with them at the Lord's Supper: but not at the ordinary meals of every day! His gospel which he never stopped to preach, and his practice became two contradictory messages.

I think this passage has wide-ranging applications today. Here are just a few lessons from consideration of what Peter did:

• Good men, even the best and most used, can make catastrophic mistakes. As Isaiah 2:22 in the KJV memorably says, "Cease ye from man".
  
• Even the best men can be defeated by that most miserable of motives : the fear of man. As the same verse reminds us, that is man, "whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?" And though our lives are but a shadow and a mist - this monster, the fear of man, stalks us all at all times, and we scarcely realise how much "danger money" we hand over to pay off its demands day by day. If this happens to apostles - how much more to us? "The fear of man brings a snare: but whoever puts his trust in the Lord shall be safe." - Proverbs 29:25.
• The behaviour of great leaders is not to be our guide: Scripture and truth are. Great leaders can and do lead great numbers of people astray! The powerful example of Peter led even Barnabas astray (Galatians 2:12). This is Barnabas, an early leader in the Antioch church which led the way in treating Gentiles as full equals of Jews (Acts 11:19-20). Barnabas, who had been a pioneer leader alongside Paul in the first organised missions to the Gentiles, preaching the law-free gospel openly and widely (Acts 13:1ff). Just because Spurgeon, Stott, Lloyd-Jones, Whitefield, Packer, Hodge, Masters, MacArthur, Piper, Carey, Carson, Olyott, or whoever your particular present favourite is did it or does it, so what? We must take responsibility for our own countless blunders, and they for theirs. Hero-worship is not a Christian virtue.
• The errors of great men and even apostles do not fall short of practices which can totally deny the heart of the gospel. Peter continued to preach the gospel flawlessly, as a Spirit-guided apostle of Christ. He declared justification by faith alone. But in his practice, as Galatians 2:14-16, he was effectively declaring justification by Jewish works. There was only ever one man whose practice was without error, and that is why we are called Christians are not Petronians or Paulicians! How tragic: and one more reason to cling closer to Christ, not putting our trust even in the best of Christian leaders. I think some of the men I named above deny the gospel in practice in the manner that Peter did. How can some of them remain in denominations whose official leadership does not teach the evangelical gospel, and where the denomination as a whole has no clear position on whether the evangelical gospel is true or not, or compulsory or not, or whether we can instead substitute it for liberalism or Roman Catholicism? I believe that they would resign immediately if their churches appointed flamboyant and unrepentant bank-robbers, homosexuals or murderers at the top of the leadership: yet if the top of the leadership is not evangelical, that is apparently OK? Is this because they believe outward morality is more important than the gospel? Surely not... but it is the error of Peter. These men teach justification by faith alone; but in practice tolerate all kinds of other justifications.
  
• In making his blunder, Peter actually went backwards. He had once eaten with Gentiles; even for many years. Even the best men and leaders can backslide. What Peter once knew very clearly, he apparently then suppressed and/or forgot. Our past attainment is no guarantee of future faithfulness: even for apostles! May God have mercy on us all!

It's worth noting that some years later in 2 Peter 3:15 that Peter affectionately calls Paul - who publicly rebuked him for his error - "our beloved brother". Proverbs 27:5-6 - “Open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.” Proverbs 9:8 - "Do not reprover a scorner, in case he hates you: rebuke a wise man, and he will love you." Peter received the rebuke, repented, and loved Paul for recovering him. Lessons for us in there too!

Are science and atheism compatible?

One of the most-read blogs on the Guardian is presently this one, by Andrew Brown, entitled "Are science and atheism compatible?".

Brown does not offer a very penetrating analysis of the question, in my opinion. He does not define what he means by "science", and following that failure mostly flounders around in generalities. If he does actually answer his own question, it is not clear to me what the answer is. His main point seems to be that the rise of scientific knowledge and the fall of religious belief are not as closely correlated in reality as campaigning atheists would have us believe.

Instead of defining science, Brown begins with an in-from-left-field announcement of something totally non-obvious, thus:

Obviously the two [i.e. science and atheism] are closely linked, in as much as science assumes the falsity or at least irrelevance of supernaturalism.

This statement is a category mistake. Science, when properly defined, is the study of nature in order to search for general principles which can describe observed behaviour and predict future behaviour. Science studies the natural world in order to be able to describe patterns.

Being the study of the natural world, science can by definition make no assumptions or statements about either the falsity or irrelevance of the supernatural. It is not within its remit. Looking at nature to discover what is beyond nature is a self-contradiction. Asking science to make such statements is like asking a tennis umpire to declare a player off-side, or asking a soccer referee to send the goalkeeper off for LBW. (For non-British readers, off-side is a soccer rule, and LBW comes from the world of cricket!). It is out of scope. "False" or "irrelevant" are rulings that can only be made for something "in scope". Brown appears to be talking about "scientism" (the unprovable philosophical assumption that every question is potentially satisfiable by science), not true science.

It's important also to recognise that science is descriptive, not prescriptive. When science codifies its predictions and calls them a "law", this needs to be understood with care. The word "law" has misled many people. To predict, using Newton's "laws" of gravity, at what time the sun will rise tomorrow is quite different to explaining why the motions predicted will take place. The law tells us what we expect to see - but not why we see that thing. To say that a force of gravity is at work that obeys an inverse-square law is one thing; but to account for that force and why it is inverse-square instead of something totally different is something else. Science can note that an inverse-square law appears to consistently be at work (description); but to account for that law (prescription) is something very different.

This leads to the search for a "theory of everything". Perhaps the inverse-square law, and every other law, are natural consequences of some other working within nature. But even if they were - then that other working within nature would also need accounting for. Either then you have an infinite chain of causes, or at some point you have to allow the supernatural: that nature is ultimately caused by something beyond nature. Ultimately, nature itself needs accounting for. Searching within nature to account for nature is absurd. In other words, making science the arbiter of supernaturalism is absurd. Richard Dawkins argues that we cannot attribute the cosmos to an intelligent being, because then we would have to account for that intelligent being. But this argument only works if the intelligent being is itself within nature, and not outside it. And the Christian claim which Dawkins hopes to refute is precisely the latter: thus, Dawkins' argument is irrelevant. Dawkins has not faced up to the regress in his own position - if physical forces are sufficient to account for all we find in nature, what accounts for those physical forces themselves? Other physical forces? Or are they just suspended over nothing, having no origin and needing no explanation? This is ultimately a philosophical question, not a scientific one. Science cannot decide it, nor is it meant to.

The fact is that science itself needs accounting for, and cannot account for itself. Why should everything work together in an orderly way? Why should we be able to reduce our observations to rationally understandable principles and then generate descriptions from them? Whence this comprehensibility and orderliness?

If science needs accounting for, then the question ought to be, "does atheism count for science better or worse than theism does?". This is the question that Brown ought to ask, but skips over because he appears to have been led by such as Dawkins to confuse science with a particular (and erroneous) brand of philosophy. Theism accounts for science very well by stating that nature is orderly and understandable to human minds because it is itself created and ordered by a divine mind who fashioned it and us for each other. We were made to live in the world and to harness it. The belief that God is orderly in his being and ways and that he made us to enjoy his creation generates the expectation that nature will be orderly and possible for us to investigate and harness for our use. That is precisely why modern science was born out of the soil of Christian Europe - people expected that studying the works of their Creator would be a fruitful enterprise, not a random and frustrating one. They did not believe that order came from chaos, and so they studied the Creation expecting to find order that could be described in orderly ways: exactly what happened.

How, though, does atheism account for science and for nature itself? It does not, and cannot. Ruling out the possibility of a mind being behind the cosmos, atheism leaves scientific "laws" hanging in mid-air: they just exist, whether we like it or not and we cannot tell you why. For an atheist, the scientific enterprise is essentially a huge irrational faith-leap: he has no reason for believing that nature should be coherent or comprehensible, but he investigates it with that expectation anyway. It's just pot luck, a fortuitous hand dealt to us! (But who set up the pot, and who was the controller dealing the hand?) The compatibility between his mind and the objects being studied by his mind is just a big happy fluke. Ultimately atheism is not supported by science; rather, it removes its foundations.