Coming soon.....
Blogging in the name of the Lord, Series 4.
A new set of conversations with top theology bloggers.
A new set of conversations with top theology bloggers.
Showing posts with label Blogging in the name of the Lord series 3. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Blogging in the name of the Lord series 3. Show all posts
Thursday, October 02, 2008
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Series 3 "Box Set"
Back in the beginning of 2008 I launched Series 3 of the Blogging in the Name of the Lord interviews. The series isn't quite complete yet, with two interviews still outstanding. But here is a round up of the series so far together with some extras. I hope you'll enjoy this special edition "box set" of theological conversations. The banter between Derek Thomas and Carl Trueman is one of the highlights of the current set of interviews. Watch out for Series 4 in the next month or so. Tim Challies (forthcoming)
Jason Goroncy (forthcoming)
Extras
These aren't really Blogging in the Name of the Lord interviews as the subjects aren't bloggers, but here are some other recent interviews:
Friday, February 22, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Carl Trueman
This is the fifth in our series of interviews with Christian bloggers. In the hot seat today is...
GD: Hello Carl Trueman and welcome to Exiled Preacher. Please tell us a little about yourself.
CT: I'm an Englishman. I teach church history at Westminster Theological Seminary in the States, where I also serve as Academic Dean and Vice President for Academic Affairs. I have a wife, Catriona (a Gael from the Isle of Lewis), and two sons, John and Peter. I like to run long distances, and I'm a very part-time part-time follower the greatest rugby club in the known universe: Gloucester.
GD: So, you're a church historian. What's the point of knowing all that old stuff?
CT: Christianity is an historical religion. It is only as we understand the past, how the Bible's teaching has been transmitted to us through history, that we can truly understand the significance of our position in the present. To be clueless about history is to absolutise the present. I think Karl Marx put it nicely: men make history, but they do not make the history that they choose. We are, individually and corporately, determined to an extent by the past; learning about that past liberates us.
GD: Well, I can see that the Early Church Fathers with their creeds and that are important, and the Reformation just rocks. But who cares about the Medeivals, weren't they all just monks and popes or something?
CT: I used to think that; but study of post-Reformation Protestantism (that of the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) has convinced me that much of what is basic to our Christian doctrine in the Reformed tradition (e.g., the nature of God, necessity, predestination etc) was self-consciously appropriated by the Reformed from medieval theology. After all, why reinvent the wheel? If good arguments on these points were made in the Middle Ages, it would be foolish not to use them.
GD: Fair enough. Who has most influenced your theological development?
CT: Theologically, I'm deeply indebted to J I Packer. Martin Luther is a constant part of my theological diet. Other theologians I love to read are Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Owen, Blaise Pascal, B B Warfield, Cardinal Newman, and Herman Bavinck. Of more recent writers, D A Carson and C J Mahaney. CJ has had a deeper impact on my life perhaps than any other recent author -- the deceptive simplicity of his practical writings is simply beautiful and, on a practical level, very convicting.
GD: You recently called yourself a "bog standard evangelical". Do you have to be a Presbyterian to be bog standard, or can I (a Baptist) join in?
CT: Sure. The whole point is that we set the doctrinal bar pretty low for bog-standardism so you should be able to scrape in, even without a decent doctrine of the church.
GD: Are you talking to me? I was going to let you to plug your new book. I'm not so sure now. But to just show you how gracious we Baptists (with our eminently biblical doctrine of the church) can be, I'll still allow the plug. You have just brought out a new title, John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man, (Ashgate, 2007 - here). What draws you to the great Puritan divine and what lessons does he have to teach us today?
GD: So, you're a church historian. What's the point of knowing all that old stuff?
CT: Christianity is an historical religion. It is only as we understand the past, how the Bible's teaching has been transmitted to us through history, that we can truly understand the significance of our position in the present. To be clueless about history is to absolutise the present. I think Karl Marx put it nicely: men make history, but they do not make the history that they choose. We are, individually and corporately, determined to an extent by the past; learning about that past liberates us.
GD: Well, I can see that the Early Church Fathers with their creeds and that are important, and the Reformation just rocks. But who cares about the Medeivals, weren't they all just monks and popes or something?
CT: I used to think that; but study of post-Reformation Protestantism (that of the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) has convinced me that much of what is basic to our Christian doctrine in the Reformed tradition (e.g., the nature of God, necessity, predestination etc) was self-consciously appropriated by the Reformed from medieval theology. After all, why reinvent the wheel? If good arguments on these points were made in the Middle Ages, it would be foolish not to use them.
GD: Fair enough. Who has most influenced your theological development?
CT: Theologically, I'm deeply indebted to J I Packer. Martin Luther is a constant part of my theological diet. Other theologians I love to read are Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Owen, Blaise Pascal, B B Warfield, Cardinal Newman, and Herman Bavinck. Of more recent writers, D A Carson and C J Mahaney. CJ has had a deeper impact on my life perhaps than any other recent author -- the deceptive simplicity of his practical writings is simply beautiful and, on a practical level, very convicting.
GD: You recently called yourself a "bog standard evangelical". Do you have to be a Presbyterian to be bog standard, or can I (a Baptist) join in?
CT: Sure. The whole point is that we set the doctrinal bar pretty low for bog-standardism so you should be able to scrape in, even without a decent doctrine of the church.
GD: Are you talking to me? I was going to let you to plug your new book. I'm not so sure now. But to just show you how gracious we Baptists (with our eminently biblical doctrine of the church) can be, I'll still allow the plug. You have just brought out a new title, John Owen: Reformed Catholic, Renaissance Man, (Ashgate, 2007 - here). What draws you to the great Puritan divine and what lessons does he have to teach us today?
CT: He has a profound grasp of the holiness and grace of God; he has a very high view of divine authority, specifically as manifested in the unique, inspired, inerrant scriptures. He also did theology in a learned, Catholic fashion, wrestling with the biblical text, moving from exegesis to doctrinal synthesis in a manner which respected the great theology of the church of times past.
GD: Naturally, Owen was very decent Independent (as are many Reformed Baptists), rather than a Presbyterian. Now, why should pastors be interested in church history, for the sermon illustrations?
GD: Naturally, Owen was very decent Independent (as are many Reformed Baptists), rather than a Presbyterian. Now, why should pastors be interested in church history, for the sermon illustrations?
CT: Of course. But also to enable us to grasp the depth of the Christian tradition and also to understand our own context better. Moving to a foreign country allows the emigrant to understand their adopted culture and the one they have left behind better. Doing history is like visiting a foreign country. As we learn to see and think as saints of previous generations, we learn also to think critically about our current situation.
GD: What, in your view are the key differences between Evangelicalism and Fundamentalism?
CT: It depends on how you define them. In America, fundamentalism carries strong connotations of a dispensational eschatology and various cultural taboos -- no alcohol etc. Then, evangelicalism has come to be defined more by institutions (colleges, publishers etc) than by specific doctrinal commitments. Both terms are, I think, unhelpful, but we probably have to use them. Evangelical now needs to be qualified -- `liberal', `open', `conservative' etc.
GD: If you could travel through time and meet one person from church history, who would it be and what would you say?
GD: What, in your view are the key differences between Evangelicalism and Fundamentalism?
CT: It depends on how you define them. In America, fundamentalism carries strong connotations of a dispensational eschatology and various cultural taboos -- no alcohol etc. Then, evangelicalism has come to be defined more by institutions (colleges, publishers etc) than by specific doctrinal commitments. Both terms are, I think, unhelpful, but we probably have to use them. Evangelical now needs to be qualified -- `liberal', `open', `conservative' etc.
GD: If you could travel through time and meet one person from church history, who would it be and what would you say?
CT: Martin Luther. `Can I join you for one of your round-the-beer-table theological discussions?'
GD: You engage in a little blogging over at Reformation 21. What, in your estimation are some of the strengths and weaknesses of blogging as a medium for theological reflection?
CT: Few strengths. It's all too anarchic. I think fun and information sharing are the best it can do. Weaknesses: feeds narcissism; allows any old nutcase to present themselves as a serious player in theological and ecclesiastical discussion.
GD: And that's a bad thing? Now seriously, I hear that you are a bit of a Mosher, with a special love for Led Zeppelin. The great Welsh theologian, Derek Thomas recently expressed concern that heavy rock head-banging may have a damaging effect on one's finely tuned theological mind? Care to respond?
GD: You engage in a little blogging over at Reformation 21. What, in your estimation are some of the strengths and weaknesses of blogging as a medium for theological reflection?
CT: Few strengths. It's all too anarchic. I think fun and information sharing are the best it can do. Weaknesses: feeds narcissism; allows any old nutcase to present themselves as a serious player in theological and ecclesiastical discussion.
GD: And that's a bad thing? Now seriously, I hear that you are a bit of a Mosher, with a special love for Led Zeppelin. The great Welsh theologian, Derek Thomas recently expressed concern that heavy rock head-banging may have a damaging effect on one's finely tuned theological mind? Care to respond?
CT: Passing by the rather incoherent concept of a `great Welsh theologian', I think anyone who has ever watched the VH-1 program, `On this Rock' and listened to Ozzie Osbourne parsing the differences between supra- and infra-lapsarianism, Eddie Van Halen critiquing the Bultmannian program of demythologising, or Ian Gillan explaining the differences between Lutherans and Reformed on the communication of attributes will immediately realise that Dr Thomas is talking out of his hat. Del-Boy -- if you're reading this, you're a disgrace, boyo!
GD: I think we can conclude from your answer that head-banging does affect the mind. Name your top three songs or pieces of music (no LZ allowed), we've had enough of them.
CT: I think `Down in a Tube Station at Midnight' by The Jam is excellent. The Jam are surely one of the most underrated bands of that whole punk-New Wave transition period of the late 70s to early 80s. On the whole, however, I tend to think in terms of albums: I often play The Who, Live at Leeds (the deluxe edition with the version of Tommy); Springsteen, Darkness on the Edge of Town (`Badlands' and 'Promised Land' have both provided me with quotations for sermons); and, just recently, I have greatly enjoyed Pink Floyd's Pulse. There is an amazing live version on this of `Comfortably Numb.'
GD: I think we can conclude from your answer that head-banging does affect the mind. Name your top three songs or pieces of music (no LZ allowed), we've had enough of them.
CT: I think `Down in a Tube Station at Midnight' by The Jam is excellent. The Jam are surely one of the most underrated bands of that whole punk-New Wave transition period of the late 70s to early 80s. On the whole, however, I tend to think in terms of albums: I often play The Who, Live at Leeds (the deluxe edition with the version of Tommy); Springsteen, Darkness on the Edge of Town (`Badlands' and 'Promised Land' have both provided me with quotations for sermons); and, just recently, I have greatly enjoyed Pink Floyd's Pulse. There is an amazing live version on this of `Comfortably Numb.'
GD: Cool, you like the Jam! English head-banging Presbyterians can't be all bad. 'Down in the Tube Station' is one of my favourite songs. But how you can like the Jam and Pink Floyd beats me. Now, what do you miss most about good old Blighty?
CT: Family; Bon Accord Free Church of Scotland in Aberdeen, where I was privileged to serve as an elder. Then, in no particular order, decent pubs and beer, proper chocolate, spaghetti hoops, Indian food, Branston pickle, marmite, thoughtful newspapers, Harry Hill, Terry Wogan's Breakfast Show, orthodox Christians who are left of center in politics.
GD: Don't they have Branston pickle in the US? How can you bear it over there? Right, what is the most helpful theological book that you have read in the last twelve months? It is a must read because?
GD: Don't they have Branston pickle in the US? How can you bear it over there? Right, what is the most helpful theological book that you have read in the last twelve months? It is a must read because?
CT: Rober Kolb and Charles P Arand, The Genius of Luther's Theology. Just a great book on the central gospel truths as expressed by Luther. The older I get, the more I crave the simple stuff. This isn't simple, in the sense of being lightweight, but it focuses so beautifully and pastorally on the basics.
GD: What is the biggest challenge facing evangelicals today, and how should we respond?
GD: What is the biggest challenge facing evangelicals today, and how should we respond?
CT: Church discipline. It's virtually meaningless in a world of motor cars and multiple choice for church. Yet, if it is as central to the success of Christian discipleship as history would suggest, we are in real trouble.
GD: Church discipline is certainly a problem area. Which (if any) theology blogs do you enjoy?
GD: Church discipline is certainly a problem area. Which (if any) theology blogs do you enjoy?
CT: I don't read blogs. I occasionally get sent stuff by friends that they have read and which they think is interesting; but I am just too busy to do it myself.
GD: Well, Carl, I'd better not keep you any longer. Thanks very much for stopping by for this conversation. Bye!
Next up will be one of two people, depending who can be bothered to respond to my questions first.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Colin Adams
This is the fourth in our series of interveiws with Christian bloggers. In the hot seat today is....
Next up will be a head-banging English Presbyterian theologian. Guess who?
GD: Hello and welcome, Colin. Could you tell us a little bit about yourself?
CA: Well first and foremost I'm blessed to be a Christian: I have known the Lord Jesus Christ in a personal way since I was five years old. Additionally, I am married to my treasured wife Nicki and am greatly blessed to have three children: Glen, Rebekah and Grace. What else can I say?... I'm from Scotland - born and bred - and spent the first 23 years of my life living in the Glasgow area. For the last five years I've 'defected' to Glasgow's ancient rival, Edinburgh, enjoying ministry with Charlotte Baptist Chapel. In my current manifestation, I serve the congregation as an Associate Pastor, a role which involves regular preaching and discipleship of university students.
CA: Strangely, my wife. Months prior to UW's launch, she and some friends had kickstarted a blog (titus2talk) in relation to Biblical Womanhood. It looked like a lot of fun! One day Nicki asked me whether I had ever thought of starting a blog myself. Knowing that I could never sustain such an endeavour without picking the right subject, I decided to focus on preaching; something I'm very passionate about.
GD: What have you found most enjoyable about blogging?
CA: Two things: personal reflection and interpersonal relationships. On the one hand, having to post something every day on the subject of preaching has disciplined me to continue thinking 'out loud' about the subject. Like most people, my tendency is to want to 'settle' with what I've already learned. In this regard, the blog is a preventative, as well as a productive measure. On the other hand, I really have enjoyed getting to know other believers (especially pastors) from all across the world. Already, the blog has established new relationships and created unlikely opportunities.
GD: What are some of the dangers of blogging?
CA: I think blogging could become a form of escapism, so that in an inordinate amount of time is given to it. I suppose this would be especially bad for pastors who might be tempted to flee the responsibilities of watching the flock, praying for and preaching to the sheep. a move that would lead to disastrous consequences. For this reason, I try only to read my blog-reader once a day and only write for a short 'designated time' (usually during my lunch break). I want to ensure it doesn't steal time at home, for example.
GD: What does your family think of your blogging habit?
CA: My wife is supportive, though in the earlier stages (when I was less thought through about time management) - I'm not so sure. Thankfully, my wife sees great value in biblical preaching, which I suppose makes a big difference...
GD: Where did you train for the Christian Ministry?
CA: Over the space of four years, I obtained a BA Theology (Honours) from International Christian College in Glasgow, a merger of Glasgow and Northumbria Bible colleges. However, I would also say that these last five years have been invaluable terms of 'practical' ministry training. There is only so much you can learn in the theoretical sphere.
GD: Very true. But what is the most important lesson that you learned from your studies?
CA: That rigorous exegesis must underpin biblical exposition. Learning to exegete biblical texts was one of the primary reasons I went to seminary in the first place. Beforehand, I could stand up and speak to people with an open bible, but I wasn't sure it was the bible I was actually teaching .
GD: Who was the most influential figure in your theological development?
CA: I'm not one of those who has a theological hero; though like many others I have enormous respect for the likes of Augustine, Calvin, Edwards and their ilk. In the modern day, John Piper has perhaps influenced me more than anyone else, particularly shaping my thinking with regards the doctrine of God, Reformed Theology, and complementarianism.
GD: Who has taught you most about preaching?
CA: Every preacher needs an 'expository model', who they can learn from first hand. In my case, that person has been Peter Grainger (the Senior Pastor of Charlotte Baptist Chapel). It has been a priceless experience to personally benefit from his ministry, but also watch and learn as he explains and apples biblical texts week after week. In my time at the Chapel, pastor Grainger has worked through (in whole) 1 Corinthians, Mark and Luke's gospel, Jeremiah, Philippians, the minor prophets (overviews), and James. From him I've learned many things, but perhaps most of all he has modelled gripping introductions, clear structure, direct and pastoral application, and above all gospel-earnestness.
GD: Do you use sermon notes when preaching or are you an extemporary preacher?
CA: I'm not ashamed to say that I would struggle to preach without notes - we all have different abilities - however in my case I aim not to 'read the sermon.' Obviously, we are there to speak to people and that involves good eye contact which all out reading precludes. For this reason, I prayerfully read through the manuscript two or three times prior to preaching, so that I know it fairly thoroughly. The greatest compliment I receive is when people say its not obvious that I'm using notes. On the other hand, if I have something that is sensitive to say, requiring careful wording, I may for a sentence or two rather obviously read my notes. Sometimes its more important to say things right than pass a 'communications' exam.
GD: As far as you are concerned, what is the most spiritually challenging aspect of the preaching ministry?
CA: Preaching the passage to oneself. It is 'relatively' easy to study the text, construct the outline, work out the application (for others) and then deliver the sermon to the congregation. In this, the preacher can be bypassed altogether. However it is much more profitable (and painful) for God's Word to speak to the preacher first, before applying that message to their flock. Normally the preacher then becomes a more authentic and able conduit for speaking the message. He ceases to lecture and starts to preach a Word that is changing his life. Yet because this approach requires my regular and humble submission to God's Word, it is challenging. Properly done, this practice 'breaks me' every week.
GD: Do you believe that Ministers need to seek the Spirit's empowering presence to make their preaching into an encounter with the living God?
CA: Well, yes - any Christian minister should wish to be filled with the Holy Spirit in the act of preaching! That said, I suspect there is a lot of foggy thinking about how this comes about. First, we find in Acts that Spirit-filled proclamation of the gospel followed fervent prayer. Second, since the Spirit and Word are closely intertwined, the Spirit-filled preacher must be a Word-filled preacher. (That is, we should not mistake relying on the Spirit in the pulpit for replacing rigorous preparation in the study). Finally, we should perhaps reflect on our own personal purity, specifically in relation to 'grieving the Spirit' in a way that would subsequently affect our preaching.
GD: If time travel were possible, which historic preacher might you like to hear and why?
CA: It sounds cliche, but probably Charles H Spurgeon. If for no other reason than to see and hear first hand what all the hype was about! I hear he was pretty good :)
GD: Apparently, yes. If you had to recommend three books on preaching, what would they be?
CA: Christ Centered Preaching by Bryan Chapel, The Supremacy of God in Preaching by John Piper and Lectures to My Students by Charles Spurgeon.
GD: What is the most helpful work of theology that you have read in the last twelve months. It is a must read because....
CA: Just recently I thoroughly enjoyed reading through Pierced for our Transgressions, and the plaudits given to this book are well deserved. It is a must read because the heart of Jesus work on the cross - what has been historically called 'penal-substitution' - is coming under increasing attack in the days in which we live. Yet for all its critics, penal substitution is pervasively biblical and utterly necessary for our salvation to be achieved. Pierced for our Transgressions demonstrates this masterfully.
GD: PFOT seems to be a popular choice for interviewees here. Deservedly so. Now, tell us your top three songs or pieces of music.
CA: There's nothing like a thousand voices (well, almost!) singing "Oh for a thousand tongues to sing." As well as that wonderful song, I also love one of Charles' Wesley's other creations: "Jesus, the name high over all." Regarding songs of a newer vintage, I greatly appreciate the hymns of Stuart Townend and Keith Getty. I particularly like the words and music of "Oh, to see the Dawn" (This the Power of the Cross) and "My Heart is Filled with Thankfulness." Moreoever, despite its relative age (!) "In Christ Alone" remains a real favourite of mine.
GD: Some good choices there. "In Christ Alone" is a contemporary classic. Lastly, which blogs do you enjoy reading most and why?
CA: I guess I especially gravitate towards blogs that speak particularly toward pastoral ministry. Pure Church, Biblical Preaching, Pulpit Magazine, Church Matters, Expository Thoughts would be just some of my regular stops. Like many others, I'm in cyber-awe of Tim Challies, while Justin Taylor links me to everything.
GD: Well Colin, thanks for taking the time to drop in for this conversation. See ya!
Next up will be a head-banging English Presbyterian theologian. Guess who?
Monday, January 14, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Dave Bish
This is the third in our series of interviews with Christian bloggers. In the hot seat today we have...
GD: Hello, Dave Bish and welcome to Exiled Preacher. Please tell us a little about yourself.
DB: Hi Guy. I'm 28 and have been a Christian for 10 years. I grew up in a church-going family attending the local liberal-anglo-catholic village church. I faced with the crisis moment of going off to University and realising I could leave give it up, but the gospel found me through Bible readings and Anglican liturgy. Now, I look back and see God opening my eyes to the inescapable beauty and glory of Jesus Christ that that sinful teenager really needed.
During my time at University I met my wife Em who is a music teacher who I'd recruited to sing in my student-band. We still occasionally write songs together through I'm just as happy to be cooking with her, watching weird films or building a garden shed.
Over the last decade I've spent 3 years studying maths, one year selling money in a high street bank, a few months as a pro-web designer for a dotcom at the height of the boom and the rest working with UCCF:The Christian Unions in South East and South West England.
GD: Your blog is called "the blue fish project". What made you start blogging?
DB: I've run the blue fish project since sometime in 1998/9. It was a forum for evangelistic articles and theological musings of a young Christian, all of which are now lost to the sands of time which is probably a good thing.
GD: Why "the blue fish project"? Sounds kind of cool, but is there some kind of deep, hidden meaning?
DB: Thank you. In honesty there isn't anything that deep to it! Some suggest is the phonetic similarity to my name but that's simply not the case.
Essentially when I was a student we developed an evangelistic website to go with a course we were running in our Christian Union. The course initially had a purple and orange fish for a logo and then Ire-coloured it blue which was a great improvement. Later we dropped the course but I kept the website and the fish and developed the name which is probably something of a variation on The Blair Witch Project which was released around that time.
GD: Oh, so that's it? It's just about a blue fish. Ah well. Now, what to you enjoy most about blogging?
DB: I find writing really helps me to think, always has. If that was all then I'd just write a private journal. Blogging adds an audience which means there is some accountability but also the opportunity to encourage and inform others. That adds extra satisfaction and motivation to the writing.
GD: What bugs you most about blogging?
DB: Personally I really enjoy it and don't feel that it's ever been a burden to keep it up. If it was I'd stop probably. About blogging more broadly, much of what is blogged is written from a position of fairly high ignorance. My own blogging included at times I'm sure. I love protestant freedom to study the Bible but wading through the sea of shared ignorance can be a challenge and something we have to be aware of.
GD: Right, you are UCCF Team Leader. What does that involve?
DB: UCCF is the family of University and College Christian Unions in Great Britain, part of a global family (IFES) in 152 nations. We're basically about seeing student-led gospel-loving mission teams active on campus to make disciples. As Team Leader my part in the equation is to supervise local staff who in turn serve these Christian Unions, in my case across the South West. That involves a mix of discipleship and management and several other things. In our region this year we have five staff and nine volunteers who work with us on our Relay-discipleship training programme.
I'm also able engage in some front line student work which includes speaking at CU team meetings, evangelistic events and training weekends. Last term that meant teaching John's gospel in Falmouth and Exeter, Luke's gospel in Bath and speaking on a couple of weekends on 2 Timothy. Ahead I'll be teaching Galatians in Plymouth and engaging with the ideas of Richard Dawkins at Exeter, along with the question of why God sends people to hell.
Looking ahead I'm excited by where UCCF is going. In September we'll-hold our largest student leaders conference (hopefully with 900people), joined by John Piper where we'll launch our fifth gospel project. This is an initiative to release about 400,000 copies of Mark's gospel into the hands of Christian students to give to students who aren't Christians. I'm excited to be developing some of the accompanying resources this term as we head towards the launch. Nothing compares to seeing God's word spreading.
In all this I'm seeking to see students in Christian Unions, grasping a vision for being mission teams on their campuses, centred on the gospel, confident in the scriptures. In line with this my highlight of last term was seeing about 200 students gather for an event we called Transformission, exploring the glory of the cross throughout the scriptures. Solid doctrinal stuff warmly taught by our Theology Advisor Mike Reeves (see forthcoming TheologyNetwork.org).
GD: How would you assess the spiritual state of student life in the UK?
DB: The ever growing student world is marked by the same apathy and antipathy as the rest of society towards the gospel. Ultimately any analysis is going to be both negative and positive. Our campuses are full of human beings who will be the movers and shakers in the years ahead and by and large they do not know Christ. The harvest field is big and ever growing. Many of those have never set foot in a church, never opened a Bible and don't know the first thing about the gospel. Some of the baggage is clearing away but evangelisation is hard.
That said, I see great signs of life in many students. It was a delight to see 700 student leaders at our national conference last September centred around exposition of Romans and training tracks on Doctrine of God, Revelation, Salvation and Creation. I rejoice at the appetite I see in Christian students for the word of God, and their passion to make Christ known where they are.
GD: I suppose that University Christian Unions attract a large range of students with an evangelical church background. This must give you a good insight as to what is happening in the churches. What gives you encouragement and what causes you concern in what you see?
DB: Again much of both. Clearly many churches are doing outstanding ministry to teenagers. I'm blown away by the maturity, depth and clarity of many first year students who throw themselves into godly living and gospel proclamation. I've met students in the past term who have come to study but consider making Christ known to be vital, and they're seeing friends become Christians!
The other side of the coin is an often woeful Biblical illiteracy which leads to a small and lifeless Christianity that easily compromises with the world and lacks joy. Whilst many churches must be opening the Scriptures with their teenagers it would appear many are-not. That is deeply concerning.
The situation is never too pessimistic though. God changes people through his word, and opportunities abound to open the scriptures with students and see them transformed by the Spirit.
GD: UK Christian Unions have been subject to some discriminatory measures in the last few years. What's going on?
DB: They say what happens in society has previously happened in the Universities. If so, there may be challenging days ahead. A number of Christian Unions have begun to feel pressure from Students Unions Equal Opportunities policies that exclude societies who wish to have membership and leadership restricted to those who share the convictions of the society. Basically that means it breaks the rules for a Christian Union to insist on having Christian leaders.
This has played out in some loss of privileges and difficulties in obtaining facilities at times. We're hopeful of resolution and glad of partnership with the National Union of Students in developing guidelines for Students Unions and Christian Unions. As our society at large grapples with the shift from being a so-called Christian nation to being much more pluralistic we need to engage with these kind of issues. Things may not always workout in our favour, and I'm reminded that we're never promised an easy life as we life and speak for Jesus.
GD: You are also involved in the excellent "BeginningWithMoses" website. What kind of things might readers find over there?
DB: Our goal is to draw people into God's word with a particular emphasis on Biblical Theology, keeping God's word in it's context in God's story of salvation. The site is overrun with book blurbs and reviews and articles. The two star attractions I would say are David Gibson's paper Assumed Evangelicalism which many have found to carry incredible insight into the state of the church. The second is our Biblical Theology Briefings which are papers we commission from preachers who provide their sermon text and their working, helping us to see why they said what they said, what pitfalls they tried to avoid and what resources were helpful.
GD: Who has had the most influence on your theological development?
DB: The shockwaves of Norman Grubb's question in 1919 are clearly influential as I've spent most of my Christian life involved in the ministry of UCCF. I suppose two people have been particularly formative. One is Graeme Goldsworthy through his books on Biblical Theolgy, like Gospel and Kingdom which set my bearings in approaching God's word (along with Peter Jensen's The Revelation of God). Six weeks waiting for a credit check to come through so I could start working for a bank in the summer of 2002 was well invested in Biblical Theology, shortly after which I found myself caught up in BeginningWithMoses.org.
Secondly, John Piper's work has been influential. I suppose I've felt the effects of his work especially with reference to the sovereignty of God and to preaching (via the heavyweight The Justification of God and heartwarming The Supremacy of God in Preaching). In the Christian Union at Bath I was often involved in leading worship, and I observed the strange effects of my keyboard playing on people as we sang. That drove me into God's word and to seeing the connection between the glory of God and evangelism, particularly in Acts 17v16-17 as Paul is provoked by idolatry and so proclaims Christ. It was a life changing moment when I opened Let the Nations be Glad in 2002 to find that someone else had noticed this connection before. My Christianity was gradually rewired from defaulting to a fairly arminian charismaticism to being a God-centred Reformed Charismatic.
Working that out into a life and ministry that loves the gospel of grace former colleague Marcus Honeysett (author of Finding Joy) was very helpful. He tells, in Finding Joy, of the day he asked a Christian Union "when you do evangelism, why do you do it?" only to discover "because you make us feel guilty when we don't" - adventures with Marcus, and the deep pleasure of studying Galatians with many have worked the doctrines of grace into my heart and from their into life, firstly in my ministry as a husband and then with UCCF, my local church and beyond.
Looking ahead I'm getting into Calvin's Institutes and the Puritans, mostly thanks to the energy of UCCF's Theology Advisor Mike Reeves. Already they're stunning and shaping me.
GD: Last year, IVP published Pierced for our Transgressions: Rediscovering the glory of penal substitution. Why is IVP/UCCF so passionate about defending penal substitutionary atonement?
DB: The centrality of penal substitution is hardwired into the whole history of IVP, UCCF and the global IFES family. We formed through a break away from the Student Christian Movement about 90 years ago, when a student, Norman Grubb asked "is the atoning blood of Christ central to what you do?". The reply given was "we believe it, but it is not central". And so Grubb and his gospel partners walked away to start what we now call UCCF The Christian Unions. We're passionate about it because it's absolutely vital. Take away penal substitution and everything else falls apart eventually.
History has shown us that by keeping this at the heart of what we do vast numbers of students have been reached with the gospel as this movement of cross-centred mission teams has spread globally. It would seem that this has had a deep impact of the church in the UK and Ihope will continue to do so.
It's no surprise that we in UCCF found ourselves at the heart of controvery over penal substitution last year. In our day the goalposts have moved. The SCM leaders still believed the doctrine and that can't be taken for granted today. Still we press on in good company, illustrated through the endorsements on Pierced for our Transgressions and the birth of New Word Alive this coming Easter.
150 years ago Charles Simeon was involved in student work in Cambridge and said that nominal Christians could prove the importance of the cross, but it's real Christians who glory and delight in it, and would shudder at the thought of glorying in anything else. UCCF cannot move from such cross-centred ground.
GD: I'm reading Pierced for our Transgresstions at the moment and very good it is too. What is the most helpful theological book that you read in the last twelve months? It is a must read because?
DB: If we take Pierced for our Transgressions as a must read then I'd have to say, Sam Storms' Signs of the Spirit is my 2007 book of the year. The essence of the book is Jonathan Edwards classic but virtually unreadable Religious Affections. Storms interprets the book to make it an incredibly readable guide to what real Christian life looks like.
GD: I haven't seen Storm's book, but I didn't find Religious Affections inaccessible and I read it as a relatively young believer. But anything that introduces people to the riches of Edwards can't be bad. Care to share your top thee songs or pieces of music?
DB: In an attempt to sound slightly cultured, I really like Elgar's Enigma Variations but that comes from a very narrow classical experience. More recently I enjoyed Eyes Open by Snow Patrol. I spent a week listening to the album whilst preparing to preach on Ecclesiastes 1 last year, which was good. On a more 'worship song' level Grace Unmeasured by Bob Kauflin of Sovereign Grace Ministries is a real favourite for it's devotional reformed theology.
GD: If you like Elgar's Enigma Variations, you should try his Violin Concerto (Nigel Kennedy) and Cello Concerto (Jacqueline DuPre). Eyes Open is a good album with some great songs. But I'd better not say any more about by enjoyment of pop/rock music. One of my informants tells me that some preacher is going around denouncing pastors who make lists of "worldly music" on their blogs. I wonder who he's getting at? I don't really go in for 'worship songs', unless it's Welsh Revival Hymns or something. Now, which theology blogs do you most enjoy and why?
DB: Martin Downes writes from deep wells of study and wisdom so I always appreciate his blog. Likewise Adrian Reynolds is very helpful. Neither of them blog as much as I'd like but I know I'll always find good reformed theology from them and they should be more widely read than they are. Outside the UK, Mark Lauterbach is a great blessing to the church with his consistently gospel-centred blogging. I'd also want to include photo blogger Dave Simpson, who doesn't strictly write anything. He is however a Christian with an eye for the mundane, spotting things that God sees and we often neglect.
GD: Well, thanks for dropping by for this conversation Dave. It's been great talking to you.
The next candidate for the "hot seat" is......Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Derek Thomas
This is the second in our series of interviews with Christian bloggers. In the hot seat today we have...
Derek Thomas
GD: Hello Derek Thomas and welcome to Exiled Preacher. Please tell us a little about yourself.
DT: Thanks for inviting me to the Exiled Preacher, Guy. Your site is one of my favorites (I’ve succumbed to American spelling on all things containing the diphthong ou! Truth to tell, I can’t be bothered switching language preferences on Microsoft Word!) [That's OK, so long as you don't start speaking with an Americano-Welsh accent like Catherine Zeta-Jones. GD]
Well, like yourself, I’m an exiled Welshman. In fact, I have lived outside Wales more than I have lived in it. I grew up in a small village called Llanybydder on a dairy farm, was converted through reading John Stott’s Basic Christianity in 1971, graduated from Aberystwyth University in Applied Mathematics in 1974 and left my homeland in 1976. I still have family who live in or near Carmarthen, so I make my annual pilgrimage back and break into song crossing the (new) Severn Bridge!
I studied theology at Reformed Theological Seminary (1976-78) and did doctoral studies in the mid-90s. For almost seventeen years, I was minister of an Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Belfast (where W. J. Grier had been their only minister for half a century). I now teach Systematic and Practical Theology at RTS (since 1996) and am on staff at First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, Mississippi where my good friend Ligon Duncan is the senior minister. I am also the Editorial Director of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals’ ezine, Reformation21.
O yes, I am also married to Rosemary (coming up to 32 years) and have two children and one granddaughter.
And a dog named Jake.
And a cat named Maxamillian Beauregard!
GD: That's a funny name for a cat. Now, where did you train for the Ministry and what did you find most helpful in your training?
DT: Ah, as I said, I studied at Reformed Theological Seminary (which then had only campus in Jackson, Mississippi). I still look back on it with a great deal of affection. I had the privilege of having John R. de Witt as my Systematics professor whose love of historical theology gave kindled in me a respect for the reformed tradition. He was at the time translating Ridderbos’s volume on Paul from the original Dutch (he was related to him) and so a nuanced respect for both biblical and Systematic Theology came through in that Vosian-Ridderbosian tradition with its high view of covenant theology. His own doctoral work had been in the Westminster Assembly and my respect for the Westminsterian tradition was cemented during those years, too.
My greatest privilege was sit under Simon Kistemaker’s lectures and act as his student assistant. His lectures were never terribly exciting—just very sound and very earnest. No one could make New Testament Introduction (authorship of 2 Peter, or the latest theological vagaries of Willi Marxsen on the resurrection) sound so earnest as Dr. Kistemaker.
What I got most of all from my seminary training was an unshakeable confidence that no matter what theological skepticism may arise, the inerrancy of the Bible will stand the test. Thirty years later, I have never questioned the Bible’s inerrancy. I’ve come across many a thorny problem, but I still believe the Bible’s foundational authority—in “jots and tittles.” I am grateful to the seminary for that fact more than any other.
GD: Who taught you most about preaching?
DT: Geoff Thomas! I’m a great fan of Animal Planet on TV and often hear about the importance of “imprinting”—when new born infants “imprint” on those they first come across and regard them as their parents. Within a month or so of my conversion, I heard “Geoff” preach (on Matthew’s Gospel). It was passion incarnated in a wiry Welsh persona and I was won over within seconds. His Westminster Seminary infused theology: lots of John Murray-esque carefully crafted theological divisions, E. J. Young’s careful exegesis of the text and a steam-roller Van Tillian apologetic. And, of course, a love and respect for Lloyd-Jones (though less so then than now, I think—the young man’s daring to be different).
Preaching is best caught than taught, I think (and these days I teach young, and not-so-young, men how to preach!), and for me, I have surely been influenced, subliminally if in no other tangible way, by the preaching of such living (!) examples as Sinclair Ferguson, Al Martin, John Stott, Donald Macleod, and in more recent years, Ligon Duncan. To this day, however, after preaching now for some 35 years, I still find myself gesticulating and “Geoff” comes to mind (as much in my wife’s as in mine!). It has been thirty years since I sat under his preaching, but I still find myself unconsciously mimicking him.
GD: You spent some years in pastoral ministry before becoming a theology professor. What was the wisest piece of advice that you were given as a pastor?
DT: I can’t answer this question without thinking of something John Piper said in a class I was teaching and to which I’d invited him to address. He was asked this very question by a very serious-minded young man and a Piper-groupie! Without a second’s hesitation, Piper answered, “Eight hours sleep a night!” To this day, I’m not sure whether he was trying to destroy an all too obvious idol or giving sane and very practical advice. If it was the latter, I have never kept it a single day!
However, it is a great, if difficult, question! Something I heard someone saying of a statement by Robert Murray McCheyne: “that a congregation will forgive you almost anything so long as they think that you love them.” I never rose to those heights and the dear folk in Belfast could raise a series of failings on my part, but I still think this is the best advice to give a young minister. In America especially, the ministry has become a professional activity: ministers have offices where people come for a consult if necessary but in Belfast it was a requirement to be in the homes of people and involved in the most intimate way in their lives.
GD: How does having been a pastor affect you approach to teaching theology?
DT: In every possible way, I hope. I have no interest in teaching anything I cannot use for preaching. There’s a branch of theology that is so utterly academic and theoretical that I cannot maintain any interest in it. Of course, I am still a pastor and preach every week, often more than once a week. I am constantly preparing sermons and finding myself asking how does this or that piece of theology apply to this or that situation that I am aware of in the congregation. I often think of those words of J. I. Packer in Knowing God: “Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfolded, as it were, with no sense of direction and no understanding of what surrounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose your soul.”
GD: Who was the most influential figure in your theological development?
DT: John Calvin and John Owen mostly. Iain Murray told me (back in 1977), “make one theologian your life’s interest and hobby.” It was good advice. He suggested I make Samuel Davies (1723-1761, Fourth President of Princeton) and, of course, of Welsh descent! I never did make Davies the focus of my study, but another of Welsh Descent: John Owen. But in the late eighties, I was gripped by a passion for Calvin that led to doctoral studies based on his sermons on Job. Today, my library contains over a thousand volumes on Calvin alone!
The opening sentence of The Institutes of the Christian Religion alone is worth a lifetime’s contemplation: “Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.”
Not everyone would agree, of course. My favorite criticism of Calvin (monstrously over-done and deliciously vitriolic) is by Will Durant, the famous author of the eleven-volume series, The History of Western Civilization. “We shall always find it hard to love the man, John Calvin,” Durant writes, “who darkened the human soul with the most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honored history of nonsense.” Who would desire to read anything by Will Durant after that?
What is it about Calvin that so inspires me? [Hey, I ask the questions around here! GD] This: his disciplined style, his determination never to speculate, his utter submission to Bible words as God's words, his submission to Christ’s Lordship, his sense of the holy, his concern to be as practical as possible; the fact that godly living was his aim and not theology for the sake of it. In a forest of theologians, Calvin stands like a Californian Redwood, towering over everyone else.
GD: Some scholars have suggested that systematics should be abandoned in favour of biblical theology. How do you view the relationship between the two disciplines?
DT: People who say things like that need counseling! They definitely shouldn’t be let lose in seminaries or the pulpit. It is a bit like suggesting that all you need be a good doctor is study the intricate workings of the heart or brain without ever studying human anatomy! In order to appreciate the parts one needs to understand the whole. I drive these days using a GPS system. They are one of God’s great gifts to us who cannot read a map! But the art of trying to get from one point to another is to understand where these points are in relationship to each other. For that, I need the map to “pan-out” to see the big picture. I need from time to time very detailed maps of the center of this or that city, but I also need to know how to get there and how to back again.
GD: What do you make of Kevin Vanhoozer's theodramatic proposals?
DT: Tricky question! Does anyone really understand what Vanhoozer is saying? Or for that matter, Lindbeck and von Balthasar, both of whom have influenced Vanhoozer, I think, on the use of “theo-drama”. All three have hoisted their sails to the ship called “The Wreck of Hodge” blaming him for reducing theology to something essentially cognitive and propositional. Vanhoozer’s postconservative (rather than postliberal as Lindbeck) and postfoundationalist approach—“canonical-linguistic” as Vanhoozer prefers to call it (privileging neither propositional truth abstracted from the diverse literary genres of Scripture nor certain types of procedure for generating knowledge), is (in my opinion, open to interpretive diversity. If I’m not mistaken, this is where Vanhoozer wants us to get to: “The nonreductive evangelical catholic orthodoxy advocated in the present work is itself an attempt to preserve both the diversity and the integrity of a theological dialogue already canonized in Scripture.” The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Westminster John Knox, 2005), 275–76.
But, I may be misreading him. That’s a very real possibility given the level of complexity at which he writes.
GD: What do you enjoy most about being a systematic theologian?
DT: Twenty weeks of vacation! I’m kidding. Seriously, I have to pinch myself every day to think that I get paid to do this! My calling and inclination coincide and this is a sweet providence indeed. I get to study a little bit of everything! Not just this or that part of Scripture but the whole of it – in relation to history and Christian thought and philosophy. In the words of the sixteenth century theologian, William Perkins: “I study the science of living blessedly forever.” [A Golden Chain, 1616 edition , 11]. I’ve always liked that definition basically because the systematic study of God fills me with a joy that is unspeakable and full of glory.
GD: Having twenty weeks holiday must be nice, though. You no doubt have lots of time for writing and stuff. You have already written several books including biblical commentaries and theological works. Are you working on anything at the moment?
DT: “Working” is a good verb for it. I recently co-authored a book with my wife called Love, Sex and Marriage published by Evangelical Press! I’m terrified now that I’ll be asked to speak on this theme at conferences everywhere! I am also co-editing (with John Tweeddale) a volume for 2009 celebrating the 500th anniversary of Calvin’s birth. It will consists of around twenty chapters written by very well-known authors on aspects of Calvin. The Banner of Truth is set to publish that work. I’m also trying to put together a volume in the Reformed Expositional Commentary series (P & R) on Acts. And further on the horizon is a book on the theology on Bunyan.
GD: All sounds very interesting. Right, you recently wrote that, "It is to be feared that the democratisation of the theological process (every blogger now demands the right to have centre stage and equal validity) destabilises serious theological engagement. The church's affirmation of its 'tradition' becomes engagement with last week's posting." Ouch! Have you anything good to say about theology blogging?
DT: Did I really write that? [Yes, you did! - here] Well, it’s true that the blogosphere has given every Joe Wannabee the sense of entitlement to be heard on every possible topic under the sun without any kind of peer review. I famously had a student try and tell me his opinion of something John Calvin had written (which I’d just informed the class about) that he’d never read. I said, “Your opinion is invalid. If you have not read it in context, frankly I’m not interested in your opinion. Nor should anyone else.” He was offended and told me so. I told him that he needed to see how postmodern he was!
There are good blogs and bad blogs. But blogs are here to stay. They give us an insight to what people, who otherwise might have been talking privately in a coffee shop, are saying and thinking. Frankly, if that’s all it is meant to be, I have no problem with it. But blogs need to be modest about their own self-importance in the theological world. Except for yours, Guy, which is great!
GD: You have been known to blog over at Reformation 21. I suppose that's all right then?
DT: Well, yes! I am the grand Poobah of that blog!
GD: Apparently you are a big fan of the gargantuan works of Wager, Bruckner and Mahler. That's like heavy, man. Care to name your top three pop or rock songs?
DT: Rock passed me by, I’m afraid. I seem to recall the Beatles et al of the sixties, but even then I was more into Beethoven than the Beatles. I do like some current popular music, for about three minutes! Even as I write, Donner (The Niebelungen god of thunder) is singing, “He da! He da! He do!” Is that not deep or what?
GD: I didn't know that Wager went in for "He da! Ho da!" type lyrics. That sounds kind of cool. I'll have to order a box set of the Ring Cycle straight away. Now we're on the subject of music, I must put this question to you: Are you, like me, worried that listening to heavy rock music like Led Zeppelin and all the head-banging that goes with it might have a damaging effect on the mind of a theologian?
DT: My good friend Carl Trueman is a case in point, don’t you think? His head needs examining, if you ask me and I blame Zeppelin. You’re right on the money, Guy!
GD: What made you think that I meant Carlos the Mosher? Now to Welsh issues. Do you still get the hireath, if so what do you miss most about Wales? The weather perhaps?
DT: My favorite movie is, How Green Was My Valley (1941)! Brilliant! When they gather outside the coal mine and start singing, well… I’m a puddle. I’ve not read Richard Llewellyn’s book written in 1939 (I believe), but I must get round to it one day.
It’s all very eschatological, don’t you think? What I miss isn’t there anymore. I went to visit the farm I grew up on a few years ago and was summarily told I was on private property. Actually, I was on a main road merely looking at the house. Home, I have decided along with the puritans, must be viewed sub specie aeternitatis. The home I long for is the Wales of the new creation. Yes, Wales in a new earth. What a prospect!
DT: Thanks for inviting me to the Exiled Preacher, Guy. Your site is one of my favorites (I’ve succumbed to American spelling on all things containing the diphthong ou! Truth to tell, I can’t be bothered switching language preferences on Microsoft Word!) [That's OK, so long as you don't start speaking with an Americano-Welsh accent like Catherine Zeta-Jones. GD]
Well, like yourself, I’m an exiled Welshman. In fact, I have lived outside Wales more than I have lived in it. I grew up in a small village called Llanybydder on a dairy farm, was converted through reading John Stott’s Basic Christianity in 1971, graduated from Aberystwyth University in Applied Mathematics in 1974 and left my homeland in 1976. I still have family who live in or near Carmarthen, so I make my annual pilgrimage back and break into song crossing the (new) Severn Bridge!
I studied theology at Reformed Theological Seminary (1976-78) and did doctoral studies in the mid-90s. For almost seventeen years, I was minister of an Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Belfast (where W. J. Grier had been their only minister for half a century). I now teach Systematic and Practical Theology at RTS (since 1996) and am on staff at First Presbyterian Church in Jackson, Mississippi where my good friend Ligon Duncan is the senior minister. I am also the Editorial Director of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals’ ezine, Reformation21.
O yes, I am also married to Rosemary (coming up to 32 years) and have two children and one granddaughter.
And a dog named Jake.
And a cat named Maxamillian Beauregard!
GD: That's a funny name for a cat. Now, where did you train for the Ministry and what did you find most helpful in your training?
DT: Ah, as I said, I studied at Reformed Theological Seminary (which then had only campus in Jackson, Mississippi). I still look back on it with a great deal of affection. I had the privilege of having John R. de Witt as my Systematics professor whose love of historical theology gave kindled in me a respect for the reformed tradition. He was at the time translating Ridderbos’s volume on Paul from the original Dutch (he was related to him) and so a nuanced respect for both biblical and Systematic Theology came through in that Vosian-Ridderbosian tradition with its high view of covenant theology. His own doctoral work had been in the Westminster Assembly and my respect for the Westminsterian tradition was cemented during those years, too.
My greatest privilege was sit under Simon Kistemaker’s lectures and act as his student assistant. His lectures were never terribly exciting—just very sound and very earnest. No one could make New Testament Introduction (authorship of 2 Peter, or the latest theological vagaries of Willi Marxsen on the resurrection) sound so earnest as Dr. Kistemaker.
What I got most of all from my seminary training was an unshakeable confidence that no matter what theological skepticism may arise, the inerrancy of the Bible will stand the test. Thirty years later, I have never questioned the Bible’s inerrancy. I’ve come across many a thorny problem, but I still believe the Bible’s foundational authority—in “jots and tittles.” I am grateful to the seminary for that fact more than any other.
GD: Who taught you most about preaching?
DT: Geoff Thomas! I’m a great fan of Animal Planet on TV and often hear about the importance of “imprinting”—when new born infants “imprint” on those they first come across and regard them as their parents. Within a month or so of my conversion, I heard “Geoff” preach (on Matthew’s Gospel). It was passion incarnated in a wiry Welsh persona and I was won over within seconds. His Westminster Seminary infused theology: lots of John Murray-esque carefully crafted theological divisions, E. J. Young’s careful exegesis of the text and a steam-roller Van Tillian apologetic. And, of course, a love and respect for Lloyd-Jones (though less so then than now, I think—the young man’s daring to be different).
Preaching is best caught than taught, I think (and these days I teach young, and not-so-young, men how to preach!), and for me, I have surely been influenced, subliminally if in no other tangible way, by the preaching of such living (!) examples as Sinclair Ferguson, Al Martin, John Stott, Donald Macleod, and in more recent years, Ligon Duncan. To this day, however, after preaching now for some 35 years, I still find myself gesticulating and “Geoff” comes to mind (as much in my wife’s as in mine!). It has been thirty years since I sat under his preaching, but I still find myself unconsciously mimicking him.
GD: You spent some years in pastoral ministry before becoming a theology professor. What was the wisest piece of advice that you were given as a pastor?
DT: I can’t answer this question without thinking of something John Piper said in a class I was teaching and to which I’d invited him to address. He was asked this very question by a very serious-minded young man and a Piper-groupie! Without a second’s hesitation, Piper answered, “Eight hours sleep a night!” To this day, I’m not sure whether he was trying to destroy an all too obvious idol or giving sane and very practical advice. If it was the latter, I have never kept it a single day!
However, it is a great, if difficult, question! Something I heard someone saying of a statement by Robert Murray McCheyne: “that a congregation will forgive you almost anything so long as they think that you love them.” I never rose to those heights and the dear folk in Belfast could raise a series of failings on my part, but I still think this is the best advice to give a young minister. In America especially, the ministry has become a professional activity: ministers have offices where people come for a consult if necessary but in Belfast it was a requirement to be in the homes of people and involved in the most intimate way in their lives.
GD: How does having been a pastor affect you approach to teaching theology?
DT: In every possible way, I hope. I have no interest in teaching anything I cannot use for preaching. There’s a branch of theology that is so utterly academic and theoretical that I cannot maintain any interest in it. Of course, I am still a pastor and preach every week, often more than once a week. I am constantly preparing sermons and finding myself asking how does this or that piece of theology apply to this or that situation that I am aware of in the congregation. I often think of those words of J. I. Packer in Knowing God: “Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfolded, as it were, with no sense of direction and no understanding of what surrounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose your soul.”
GD: Who was the most influential figure in your theological development?
DT: John Calvin and John Owen mostly. Iain Murray told me (back in 1977), “make one theologian your life’s interest and hobby.” It was good advice. He suggested I make Samuel Davies (1723-1761, Fourth President of Princeton) and, of course, of Welsh descent! I never did make Davies the focus of my study, but another of Welsh Descent: John Owen. But in the late eighties, I was gripped by a passion for Calvin that led to doctoral studies based on his sermons on Job. Today, my library contains over a thousand volumes on Calvin alone!
The opening sentence of The Institutes of the Christian Religion alone is worth a lifetime’s contemplation: “Nearly all the wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.”
Not everyone would agree, of course. My favorite criticism of Calvin (monstrously over-done and deliciously vitriolic) is by Will Durant, the famous author of the eleven-volume series, The History of Western Civilization. “We shall always find it hard to love the man, John Calvin,” Durant writes, “who darkened the human soul with the most absurd and blasphemous conception of God in all the long and honored history of nonsense.” Who would desire to read anything by Will Durant after that?
What is it about Calvin that so inspires me? [Hey, I ask the questions around here! GD] This: his disciplined style, his determination never to speculate, his utter submission to Bible words as God's words, his submission to Christ’s Lordship, his sense of the holy, his concern to be as practical as possible; the fact that godly living was his aim and not theology for the sake of it. In a forest of theologians, Calvin stands like a Californian Redwood, towering over everyone else.
GD: Some scholars have suggested that systematics should be abandoned in favour of biblical theology. How do you view the relationship between the two disciplines?
DT: People who say things like that need counseling! They definitely shouldn’t be let lose in seminaries or the pulpit. It is a bit like suggesting that all you need be a good doctor is study the intricate workings of the heart or brain without ever studying human anatomy! In order to appreciate the parts one needs to understand the whole. I drive these days using a GPS system. They are one of God’s great gifts to us who cannot read a map! But the art of trying to get from one point to another is to understand where these points are in relationship to each other. For that, I need the map to “pan-out” to see the big picture. I need from time to time very detailed maps of the center of this or that city, but I also need to know how to get there and how to back again.
GD: What do you make of Kevin Vanhoozer's theodramatic proposals?
DT: Tricky question! Does anyone really understand what Vanhoozer is saying? Or for that matter, Lindbeck and von Balthasar, both of whom have influenced Vanhoozer, I think, on the use of “theo-drama”. All three have hoisted their sails to the ship called “The Wreck of Hodge” blaming him for reducing theology to something essentially cognitive and propositional. Vanhoozer’s postconservative (rather than postliberal as Lindbeck) and postfoundationalist approach—“canonical-linguistic” as Vanhoozer prefers to call it (privileging neither propositional truth abstracted from the diverse literary genres of Scripture nor certain types of procedure for generating knowledge), is (in my opinion, open to interpretive diversity. If I’m not mistaken, this is where Vanhoozer wants us to get to: “The nonreductive evangelical catholic orthodoxy advocated in the present work is itself an attempt to preserve both the diversity and the integrity of a theological dialogue already canonized in Scripture.” The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Westminster John Knox, 2005), 275–76.
But, I may be misreading him. That’s a very real possibility given the level of complexity at which he writes.
GD: What do you enjoy most about being a systematic theologian?
DT: Twenty weeks of vacation! I’m kidding. Seriously, I have to pinch myself every day to think that I get paid to do this! My calling and inclination coincide and this is a sweet providence indeed. I get to study a little bit of everything! Not just this or that part of Scripture but the whole of it – in relation to history and Christian thought and philosophy. In the words of the sixteenth century theologian, William Perkins: “I study the science of living blessedly forever.” [A Golden Chain, 1616 edition , 11]. I’ve always liked that definition basically because the systematic study of God fills me with a joy that is unspeakable and full of glory.
GD: Having twenty weeks holiday must be nice, though. You no doubt have lots of time for writing and stuff. You have already written several books including biblical commentaries and theological works. Are you working on anything at the moment?
DT: “Working” is a good verb for it. I recently co-authored a book with my wife called Love, Sex and Marriage published by Evangelical Press! I’m terrified now that I’ll be asked to speak on this theme at conferences everywhere! I am also co-editing (with John Tweeddale) a volume for 2009 celebrating the 500th anniversary of Calvin’s birth. It will consists of around twenty chapters written by very well-known authors on aspects of Calvin. The Banner of Truth is set to publish that work. I’m also trying to put together a volume in the Reformed Expositional Commentary series (P & R) on Acts. And further on the horizon is a book on the theology on Bunyan.
GD: All sounds very interesting. Right, you recently wrote that, "It is to be feared that the democratisation of the theological process (every blogger now demands the right to have centre stage and equal validity) destabilises serious theological engagement. The church's affirmation of its 'tradition' becomes engagement with last week's posting." Ouch! Have you anything good to say about theology blogging?
DT: Did I really write that? [Yes, you did! - here] Well, it’s true that the blogosphere has given every Joe Wannabee the sense of entitlement to be heard on every possible topic under the sun without any kind of peer review. I famously had a student try and tell me his opinion of something John Calvin had written (which I’d just informed the class about) that he’d never read. I said, “Your opinion is invalid. If you have not read it in context, frankly I’m not interested in your opinion. Nor should anyone else.” He was offended and told me so. I told him that he needed to see how postmodern he was!
There are good blogs and bad blogs. But blogs are here to stay. They give us an insight to what people, who otherwise might have been talking privately in a coffee shop, are saying and thinking. Frankly, if that’s all it is meant to be, I have no problem with it. But blogs need to be modest about their own self-importance in the theological world. Except for yours, Guy, which is great!
GD: You have been known to blog over at Reformation 21. I suppose that's all right then?
DT: Well, yes! I am the grand Poobah of that blog!
GD: Apparently you are a big fan of the gargantuan works of Wager, Bruckner and Mahler. That's like heavy, man. Care to name your top three pop or rock songs?
DT: Rock passed me by, I’m afraid. I seem to recall the Beatles et al of the sixties, but even then I was more into Beethoven than the Beatles. I do like some current popular music, for about three minutes! Even as I write, Donner (The Niebelungen god of thunder) is singing, “He da! He da! He do!” Is that not deep or what?
GD: I didn't know that Wager went in for "He da! Ho da!" type lyrics. That sounds kind of cool. I'll have to order a box set of the Ring Cycle straight away. Now we're on the subject of music, I must put this question to you: Are you, like me, worried that listening to heavy rock music like Led Zeppelin and all the head-banging that goes with it might have a damaging effect on the mind of a theologian?
DT: My good friend Carl Trueman is a case in point, don’t you think? His head needs examining, if you ask me and I blame Zeppelin. You’re right on the money, Guy!
GD: What made you think that I meant Carlos the Mosher? Now to Welsh issues. Do you still get the hireath, if so what do you miss most about Wales? The weather perhaps?
DT: My favorite movie is, How Green Was My Valley (1941)! Brilliant! When they gather outside the coal mine and start singing, well… I’m a puddle. I’ve not read Richard Llewellyn’s book written in 1939 (I believe), but I must get round to it one day.
It’s all very eschatological, don’t you think? What I miss isn’t there anymore. I went to visit the farm I grew up on a few years ago and was summarily told I was on private property. Actually, I was on a main road merely looking at the house. Home, I have decided along with the puritans, must be viewed sub specie aeternitatis. The home I long for is the Wales of the new creation. Yes, Wales in a new earth. What a prospect!
GD: I know what you mean I don't feel totally at home in England. But when I visit Wales, I don't really belong there either. My home village of Bassaleg has changed considerably and old friends have moved on. An eschatological Wales is a very inviting prospect indeed. But back to the present, what would you say is the biggest challenge facing evangelicalism today?
DT: Evangelicalism faces many challenges but I am fearful that given the way the New perspective on Paul has taken root so easily within evangelicalism, our sense of how firmly rooted we are in foundational truths has been severely shaken. I’m not sure the new perspective is itself the biggest challenge, but it is a crucial one – one in which the very gospel itself is at risk.
GD: What is the most helpful work of theology that you have read in the last twelve months. It is a must read because?
DT: John Piper’s The Future of Justification: A Response to N. T. Wright (Crossway, 2007). No one can avoid the new perspective’s intrusion into the interpretation of the most important doctrine of all—justification by faith. Everyone who has an interest in a clear understanding of the doctrine which Luther described as the ‘standing or falling of the church” should read it carefully. We owe Piper an immense vote of thanks for writing this book and helping the church in its hour of need.
GD: Lastly, which (if any!) theology blogs do you enjoy reading most and why?
DT: Apart from ref21, yours, of course! And Mohler’s. And my wife and daughter are chipping in, “Girl Talk”.
DT: Apart from ref21, yours, of course! And Mohler’s. And my wife and daughter are chipping in, “Girl Talk”.
GD: We'll it's been tidy talking to you, Derek. Thanks for dropping by for this conversation.
Stay tuned for more Blogging in the name of the Lord interviews.....
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Blogging in the name of the Lord: Paul Helm
This is the first in a new series of interviews with Christian bloggers. In the hot seat today we have...
GD: Hello Paul Helm, and welcome to Exiled Preacher. Please tell us a little about yourself.
PH: Thanks for inviting me to answer a few questions, Guy. I greatly enjoy Exiled Preacher, and your help with my own site has been invaluable. As you know!
I taught for many years at the University of Liverpool, then moved to King’s College, London in 1993, resigning in 2000, and I am now ‘freelance’. I am a compulsive writer, fairly bad-tempered, and privacy matters to me, which is why this answer is short!
GD: Your blog is called Helm's Deep. What kind of thing might readers find there?
PH: You called it that, remember? [Oh yes, you have me to blame for that. I couldn't resist punning your name with the scene of a great battle in Lord of the Rings (GD).] It’s chiefly a discussion of issues in which theology and philosophy intersect. Each month I try to post the draft of a paper that is ‘in press’, and an ‘Analysis’ in which I discuss an issue (in 2000 words or so) where philosophical ideas may illuminate or clarify theological positions. This month, for example, I have a concluding Analysis on making choices between alternatives when the evidence for each alternative balances, or is unknown, and the choice must be made. At the far end of ‘guidance’, you might say. Along with this there’s the concluding half of a longer paper on one of my favourite themes, God and time. Shortly I’ll have Analyses on the will of God, and papers on the problem of evil, Edwards on the Trinity, and J.I. Packer’s ‘Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God, to mark its 50th anniversary.
GD: Do you think that blogging has a useful part to play in the theological process?
PH: No more than the printing press does. In my case more people read the sort of thing I write than would otherwise be the case. But most religious blogs I come across are dire.
GD: Are you a theological philosopher or a philosophical theologian?
PH: The first, I suppose, since philosophy is what I am trained in.
GD: Tertullian said, of philosophy, "What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?" How would you answer that question?
PH: I don’t think Tertullian was quite correct if his words are taken to advocate a principled avoidance of philosophical concepts and arguments. When in Athens Paul did as the Athenians did, and quoted Aratus and Epimenides with approval, and of course he has extended arguments, as in I Corinthians 15. This has to be weighed, however, against what he wrote to the I Corinthians 1 and 2 about the wisdom of this world.. Philosophy is necessary for at least two reasons: one is that the opponents of the faith often resort to philosophical concepts and arguments (sometimes without realizing it) and have to be answered in kind, and the other is the principle ‘the meaning of Scripture is scripture’.
GD: Who has had the biggest influence on your theological development?
PH: Theological development, did you say? I’m not sure there’s been much of that since I was about 18. Up till then, my father. There’s been a bit of theological intensification since.. But in my case How I Have Changed My Mind would be the title of a rather slim book. When I was about 18 ‘Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God bowled me over.
GD: The validity of systematic theology is much under discussion at the moment. In his contribution to Always Reforming, Richard Gamble seemed to argue that systematics should transmute into biblical theology. In his The Drama of Doctrine, Kevin Vanhoozer has proposed that theology should be reconfigured in terms of theo-dramatics. Do you believe that systematic theology as practiced by Hodge and Berkhof has a role in contemporary theological reflection?
PH: For some reason the phrase ‘systematic theology’ has prestige. So there are all sorts of crazy proposals for calling this and that ‘systematic theology’. (It’s rather like someone wanting to call some Heath-Robinson contraption a Rolls Royce). The content of systematic theology should correspond with the label on the jar; it should be systematic, that is, connected up, coherent, consistent, contemporary, and as clear as can be, and it should be about God and his ways.. In view of these requirements, the Hodge-Berkhof tradition of systematic theology is indispensable. What I have chiefly complained about in print (in my usual cantankerous way) is that Hodge and co. have been dismissed in a shamefully unscholarly manner by various evangelical theologians (not including Richard Gamble) who should have known better – he is allegedly ‘foundationalist’, an ‘Enlightenment’ thinker, ‘inductive’, ‘scientific’, as a result of which he and his kind have been rubbished.. These epithets have been hurled at the poor man from ignoramuses who do not seem ever to have bothered to open the first pages of volume I of his Systematic Theology to see how he actually operates. What kind of scholarship is that?
There may well be other types of theology besides ‘systematic theology’ but they should be clearly labeled too.
GD: In your book, John Calvin's Ideas, you argue that the Reformer was no stand alone figure, divorced from the currents of medieval scholasticism that preceded him and the Reformed scholasticism that followed him. I think that the point was well made. But in which ways does Calvin stand out from the scholastic crowd?
PH: In at least these ways: He was of an anti-speculative turn of mind, and hence generally (though not always) spurned ‘What if?’ questions that the scholastics tended to favour. And he was firm on faith as involving fiducia and as well as assensus, which as a result makes theology a much more practical business than the run of the mill medieval scholastics thought of it. Augustine was a great influence of course, but then he also influenced Thomas Aquinas. But what evangelical these days reads anything before Luther? Or C.H. Spurgeon?
GD: In your contribution to Engaging with Barth, you discuss the theologian's doctrine of election. As I understand it, Barth held that God constituted Jesus as the elect man for the sake of all humanity. Evangelicals will have problems with his construction because of its universalistic overtones. But it seems to me that Reformed theology has often downplayed the role of Christ in election, making the doctrine seem a little abstract and remote. Calvin, however taught that Christ is the "mirror of our election". Would you agree that we should return to a more Christ-centred doctrine of election?
PH: I think that we ought to have problems with Barth’s construction not only because of what you mention, but also because it diminishes and even eliminates divine freedom.
But yes, the Pauline idea of union with Christ is fundamental provided that it is carefully handled Believers are chosen in Christ, but not (as far as I can see) because of Christ. Calvin’s phrase about Christ as the mirror of election has more to do with assurance than with the character of election per se.
GD: Does God take risks?
PH: No. He knows the end from the beginning and works all things after the counsel of his own will. However, ‘risk’ can be used to name some of what we, as creatures, are not sure of, and it may be said that the Incarnate Logos took risks in this sense, but I don’t favour such talk. It does not seem to resonate with what we find in the Gospels. (See Light Upon the River, Hymn Texts by Christopher M. Idle (St Matthias Press, 1998), note to ‘And did you risk yourself, O Christ?’ (p.134))
GD: This year marks the 250th anniversary of the death of Jonathan Edwards. What, in your assessment are the some of the key strengths and weaknesses of the great man's theology?
PH: The strength is also the weakness: a confidence in human reason which is in some respects breathtaking (the relentlessness of his argumentation in Freedom of the Will), in other respects ridiculous (his view of the continuity of things and people through time, as expressed in his Great Christian Doctrine of Original Sin). In many ways he is an archetypal 18thcentury figure. Interesting that the influence of the Enlightenment should reach so powerfully into the recesses of New England; there is irony here, an arch-conservative using the ‘latest thought’ (in Edwards’ case Newton and Locke), to assist ole’ time religion. Perhaps there’s a lesson for us.
While one cannot but recognise his greatness Edwards has always seemed to me to have been a tiresome person, aristocratic, tactless and remote, and something of a know-all (justifiably perhaps!), but not someone I’d like to have had as a pastor. Sorry, I’m straying from your question.
GD: Tell us the most helpful theological book that you have read in the last twelve months. It is a must read because?
PH: ‘Helpful’ is an unhelpful word for me. I’m often helped by ‘unhelpful’ books. However, among the helpful books I’m helped by are some of the writings of John Frame, a long-standing friend. I think his Salvation Belongs to the Lord: An Introduction to Systematic Theology, (P & R, 2006), is very good.
GD: I too enjoyed Frame's book (see review here). Care to share your top three songs/pieces of music?
PH: Not easy. I enjoy the standards of classical music, and also W. Coast Jazz - Mulligan, Chet Baker, Miles Davis, Brookmeyer, etc. I’m also interested in jazz improvisations of classical themes and classically-influenced jazz from players such as Jacques Loussier, and more recently e.s.t.. In 2008 I’d like to explore the music of David Rhys-Williams a bit.
On another note I value Stuart Townend’s hymns, as many do, and also the ‘classical tradition’ of Watts, Charles Wesley, the Olney Hymns, Toplady etc.. But their use is rapidly vanishing; the days when people learned Christian doctrine by singing it are going, and we are being offered Telly-Tubby lyrics instead.
GD: Singing "eh-oh" a la the Telly-Tubbies doesn't quite seem appropriate for Christian worship. Watts, Wesley and Townend are much better. Now, what, in your view is the great challenge that faces evangelicalism today and how ought we to respond?
PH: To remain true to evangelicalism while nevertheless gaining the attention of people who are (apparently) a thousand miles away from it.
GD: Which theology blogs do you find helpful?
PH: I browse hardly at all. But as I said earlier, I am a fan of ‘Exiled Preacher’. That’s surely a positive note to end on!
PH: Thanks for inviting me to answer a few questions, Guy. I greatly enjoy Exiled Preacher, and your help with my own site has been invaluable. As you know!
I taught for many years at the University of Liverpool, then moved to King’s College, London in 1993, resigning in 2000, and I am now ‘freelance’. I am a compulsive writer, fairly bad-tempered, and privacy matters to me, which is why this answer is short!
GD: Your blog is called Helm's Deep. What kind of thing might readers find there?
PH: You called it that, remember? [Oh yes, you have me to blame for that. I couldn't resist punning your name with the scene of a great battle in Lord of the Rings (GD).] It’s chiefly a discussion of issues in which theology and philosophy intersect. Each month I try to post the draft of a paper that is ‘in press’, and an ‘Analysis’ in which I discuss an issue (in 2000 words or so) where philosophical ideas may illuminate or clarify theological positions. This month, for example, I have a concluding Analysis on making choices between alternatives when the evidence for each alternative balances, or is unknown, and the choice must be made. At the far end of ‘guidance’, you might say. Along with this there’s the concluding half of a longer paper on one of my favourite themes, God and time. Shortly I’ll have Analyses on the will of God, and papers on the problem of evil, Edwards on the Trinity, and J.I. Packer’s ‘Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God, to mark its 50th anniversary.
GD: Do you think that blogging has a useful part to play in the theological process?
PH: No more than the printing press does. In my case more people read the sort of thing I write than would otherwise be the case. But most religious blogs I come across are dire.
GD: Are you a theological philosopher or a philosophical theologian?
PH: The first, I suppose, since philosophy is what I am trained in.
GD: Tertullian said, of philosophy, "What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?" How would you answer that question?
PH: I don’t think Tertullian was quite correct if his words are taken to advocate a principled avoidance of philosophical concepts and arguments. When in Athens Paul did as the Athenians did, and quoted Aratus and Epimenides with approval, and of course he has extended arguments, as in I Corinthians 15. This has to be weighed, however, against what he wrote to the I Corinthians 1 and 2 about the wisdom of this world.. Philosophy is necessary for at least two reasons: one is that the opponents of the faith often resort to philosophical concepts and arguments (sometimes without realizing it) and have to be answered in kind, and the other is the principle ‘the meaning of Scripture is scripture’.
GD: Who has had the biggest influence on your theological development?
PH: Theological development, did you say? I’m not sure there’s been much of that since I was about 18. Up till then, my father. There’s been a bit of theological intensification since.. But in my case How I Have Changed My Mind would be the title of a rather slim book. When I was about 18 ‘Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God bowled me over.
GD: The validity of systematic theology is much under discussion at the moment. In his contribution to Always Reforming, Richard Gamble seemed to argue that systematics should transmute into biblical theology. In his The Drama of Doctrine, Kevin Vanhoozer has proposed that theology should be reconfigured in terms of theo-dramatics. Do you believe that systematic theology as practiced by Hodge and Berkhof has a role in contemporary theological reflection?
PH: For some reason the phrase ‘systematic theology’ has prestige. So there are all sorts of crazy proposals for calling this and that ‘systematic theology’. (It’s rather like someone wanting to call some Heath-Robinson contraption a Rolls Royce). The content of systematic theology should correspond with the label on the jar; it should be systematic, that is, connected up, coherent, consistent, contemporary, and as clear as can be, and it should be about God and his ways.. In view of these requirements, the Hodge-Berkhof tradition of systematic theology is indispensable. What I have chiefly complained about in print (in my usual cantankerous way) is that Hodge and co. have been dismissed in a shamefully unscholarly manner by various evangelical theologians (not including Richard Gamble) who should have known better – he is allegedly ‘foundationalist’, an ‘Enlightenment’ thinker, ‘inductive’, ‘scientific’, as a result of which he and his kind have been rubbished.. These epithets have been hurled at the poor man from ignoramuses who do not seem ever to have bothered to open the first pages of volume I of his Systematic Theology to see how he actually operates. What kind of scholarship is that?
There may well be other types of theology besides ‘systematic theology’ but they should be clearly labeled too.
GD: In your book, John Calvin's Ideas, you argue that the Reformer was no stand alone figure, divorced from the currents of medieval scholasticism that preceded him and the Reformed scholasticism that followed him. I think that the point was well made. But in which ways does Calvin stand out from the scholastic crowd?
PH: In at least these ways: He was of an anti-speculative turn of mind, and hence generally (though not always) spurned ‘What if?’ questions that the scholastics tended to favour. And he was firm on faith as involving fiducia and as well as assensus, which as a result makes theology a much more practical business than the run of the mill medieval scholastics thought of it. Augustine was a great influence of course, but then he also influenced Thomas Aquinas. But what evangelical these days reads anything before Luther? Or C.H. Spurgeon?
GD: In your contribution to Engaging with Barth, you discuss the theologian's doctrine of election. As I understand it, Barth held that God constituted Jesus as the elect man for the sake of all humanity. Evangelicals will have problems with his construction because of its universalistic overtones. But it seems to me that Reformed theology has often downplayed the role of Christ in election, making the doctrine seem a little abstract and remote. Calvin, however taught that Christ is the "mirror of our election". Would you agree that we should return to a more Christ-centred doctrine of election?
PH: I think that we ought to have problems with Barth’s construction not only because of what you mention, but also because it diminishes and even eliminates divine freedom.
But yes, the Pauline idea of union with Christ is fundamental provided that it is carefully handled Believers are chosen in Christ, but not (as far as I can see) because of Christ. Calvin’s phrase about Christ as the mirror of election has more to do with assurance than with the character of election per se.
GD: Does God take risks?
PH: No. He knows the end from the beginning and works all things after the counsel of his own will. However, ‘risk’ can be used to name some of what we, as creatures, are not sure of, and it may be said that the Incarnate Logos took risks in this sense, but I don’t favour such talk. It does not seem to resonate with what we find in the Gospels. (See Light Upon the River, Hymn Texts by Christopher M. Idle (St Matthias Press, 1998), note to ‘And did you risk yourself, O Christ?’ (p.134))
GD: This year marks the 250th anniversary of the death of Jonathan Edwards. What, in your assessment are the some of the key strengths and weaknesses of the great man's theology?
PH: The strength is also the weakness: a confidence in human reason which is in some respects breathtaking (the relentlessness of his argumentation in Freedom of the Will), in other respects ridiculous (his view of the continuity of things and people through time, as expressed in his Great Christian Doctrine of Original Sin). In many ways he is an archetypal 18thcentury figure. Interesting that the influence of the Enlightenment should reach so powerfully into the recesses of New England; there is irony here, an arch-conservative using the ‘latest thought’ (in Edwards’ case Newton and Locke), to assist ole’ time religion. Perhaps there’s a lesson for us.
While one cannot but recognise his greatness Edwards has always seemed to me to have been a tiresome person, aristocratic, tactless and remote, and something of a know-all (justifiably perhaps!), but not someone I’d like to have had as a pastor. Sorry, I’m straying from your question.
GD: Tell us the most helpful theological book that you have read in the last twelve months. It is a must read because?
PH: ‘Helpful’ is an unhelpful word for me. I’m often helped by ‘unhelpful’ books. However, among the helpful books I’m helped by are some of the writings of John Frame, a long-standing friend. I think his Salvation Belongs to the Lord: An Introduction to Systematic Theology, (P & R, 2006), is very good.
GD: I too enjoyed Frame's book (see review here). Care to share your top three songs/pieces of music?
PH: Not easy. I enjoy the standards of classical music, and also W. Coast Jazz - Mulligan, Chet Baker, Miles Davis, Brookmeyer, etc. I’m also interested in jazz improvisations of classical themes and classically-influenced jazz from players such as Jacques Loussier, and more recently e.s.t.. In 2008 I’d like to explore the music of David Rhys-Williams a bit.
On another note I value Stuart Townend’s hymns, as many do, and also the ‘classical tradition’ of Watts, Charles Wesley, the Olney Hymns, Toplady etc.. But their use is rapidly vanishing; the days when people learned Christian doctrine by singing it are going, and we are being offered Telly-Tubby lyrics instead.
GD: Singing "eh-oh" a la the Telly-Tubbies doesn't quite seem appropriate for Christian worship. Watts, Wesley and Townend are much better. Now, what, in your view is the great challenge that faces evangelicalism today and how ought we to respond?
PH: To remain true to evangelicalism while nevertheless gaining the attention of people who are (apparently) a thousand miles away from it.
GD: Which theology blogs do you find helpful?
PH: I browse hardly at all. But as I said earlier, I am a fan of ‘Exiled Preacher’. That’s surely a positive note to end on!
GD: You are too kind. Thanks very much for stopping by for this conversation.
Who will be the next candidate for the hot seat? You'll have to wait and see.
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