Earthy Signs of Israel’s Restoration

February 28, 2017March 3, 2017 / Matt Emerson / 3 Comments

At the end of Hosea, God promises to restore Israel, and he declares his redemptive purposes using the earthy symbols of grain and vine:

They shall return and dwell beneath my shadow;
they shall flourish like the grain;
they shall blossom like the vine;
their fame shall be like the wine of Lebanon (Hos. 14:7).

The following book, Joel, reverses this earthy restoration with a promise of YHWH’s judgment:

The fields are destroyed,
    the ground mourns,
because the grain is destroyed,
    the wine dries up,
    the oil languishes (Joel 1:10).

Notice that a third earthy element, oil, is added into the mix. We could also add here the sign of water; throughout the Old Testament, water is a sign of judgment in both its excess (e.g. Genesis 6) and its lack, as well as a sign of restoration (e.g. Ezek. 47:1-12). For Israel, then, the earthy signs that they are looking for, the signs that demonstrate that YHWH has renewed them through his Messiah and Spirit, are water, oil, grain, and vine (cf. also Deut. 7:13 for the initial promise of blessing via these elements). Israel’s redemption is pictured as a redemption of the Land, and particularly of those four elements.

When Jesus comes, he comes as Israel’s Anointed – “Messiah” just means “anointed one.” He is anointed both at the beginning of his ministry in baptism and at the end of his ministry, just before his Passion, with oil (Matt. 26:6-13). In other words, Jesus embodies these restorative signs of Israel’s salvation, water and oil, in his Messianic anointing. With respect to the grain and vine, two elements crucial to Israel’s commemorative and formative Passover meal, Jesus embodies these as well, this time in the Last Supper. As he breaks the bread and takes the cup, identifying them as his body and blood, he is taking up the rich symbolism of Israel’s redemptive hope and culminating it in himself. There is now bread to eat, and there is now the fruit of the vine to drink – in Christ. We could also point to the “I AM” statements in John; Jesus is, among other things, Israel’s Bread, Light (associated with oil lamps), Living Water, and Vine.

Jesus, in other words, takes all these earthy symbols of Israel’s redemptive hope upon himself, and fulfills them. Jesus is the fulfillment of all of Israel’s hopes, including its hope of restored Land. By taking these earthy symbols on himself, Jesus is declaring that in him Israel, including the Land itself, is redeemed. All of Israel’s promises, including the Land promises, are fulfilled in the incarnate Son.

But neither Jesus nor the NT stop there with respect to these symbols. These earthy symbols are not only fulfilled in Jesus but also instituted as signs of his Kingdom. Jesus is Israel’s Messiah and King, but he does not isolate the presence of the Kingdom in his person. Instead, through pouring out his Spirit at Pentecost, Jesus spreads his Kingdom from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth via the proclamation of the gospel by his Church. And as his Spirit-filled Church expands, they bring with them signs of the Kingdom, namely the Lord’s Supper and Baptism. These two ordinances are instituted by Christ as signs of the Kingdom because they are signs of Israel’s redemption in him and therefore also signs of Israel’s restoration as YHWH’s people in Christ’s multi-ethnic church.

Jesus’ body and blood – Israel’s redeemed grain and vine – are proclaimed to us in the Supper, and therefore the Supper is a sign of Israel’s redemption. Jesus’ death and resurrection are proclaimed to us in baptism, and therefore our identification with Christ in our submergence into and reemergence out of the waters is a sign of Israel’s redemption. And as we anoint ministers, we anoint them (historically with oil) to minister the Word – the vehicle of Christ’s authority in his Church – to his people. The congregation sits under the kingship of the anointed Christ as anointed ministers proclaim his Scriptures. The Church’s symbols are therefore Israel’s symbols, and thus as the Church worships Christ they are doing so as the renewed and restored Israel, the Israel of God, because they are united to Israel’s Messiah who redeemed Israel in his own flesh.

Saul and the Restoration of Israel

February 27, 2017 / Matt Emerson / 5 Comments

In the Old Testament, Israel becomes divided long before the United Monarchy splits. At the end of Judges (chs. 19-21), a Levite takes a Judahite concubine and spends the night with her in Gibeah, a city which belonged to Benjamin. In a horrifying echo of Sodom and Gomorrah, the men of Benjamin come to rape the Levite, but he gives them his concubine instead. The Levite, who either kills her or finds her dead the next morning, cuts her up into twelve pieces and sends them throughout the land, presumably one piece to each tribe.

After the tribes assemble to decide what to do, they inquire of the LORD at Bethel, and he tells them to go up against Benjamin. Twice they ask, twice God tells them to go into battle against their brothers, and he also makes clear that Judah should be the tribe that leads the charge (20:18). When they ask a third time (reminiscent of Gideon’s obstinacy), God tells them that he has given Benjamin into their hand (Judges 20:28). This phrase, plus the fact that “the whole city [of Gibeah] went up in smoke into heaven” (v. 40), clues readers in on the fact that God has put the ban (herem) on Benjamin. While the Conquest began with a ban on Jericho (Joshua 6), it appears here to be ending with Judah putting the ban on Benjamin.

Of course, in chapter 21, Israel fails at the task given to them and goes back on their oath to refuse marriage of their women to Benjaminite men. As they failed at Ai and elsewhere in Joshua and Judges, so they fail here at the end of the Conquest narrative. The book ends with Israel fractured – seen especially in the division between Judah and Benjamin – and disobedient, because “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25).

The problem persists in 1 Samuel. A Benjaminite, Saul, is appointed as Israel’s first king (1 Samuel 9), because the people want “a king like the nations” (1 Sam. 8:19-20). Saul is by any account a miserable failure; he’s a bad shepherd, priest, prophet, and king. God revokes his kingship in 1 Samuel 15 and instead appoints his own king, David, son of Jesse, from the tribe of Judah. The rest of 1 Samuel consists of another war between Benjamin and Judah, this time with the Benjaminite, Saul, attempting to place the ban on the Judahite, David.

Israel is saved from this conflict in 2 Samuel, when David ascends to the throne over all Israel. Via his coronation by all Israel, whom he calls “his bone and flesh,” David the Judahite heals the division between Judah and Benjamin. His repeated acts of kindness to Saul’s Benjaminite family, seen most strikingly in his treatment of Mephibosheth, only serve to heighten the author’s pointed statement that it is through this king of Judah that Israel has become one nation again.

After David’s and his son Solomon’s death, though, Israel is once again divided. The Southern Kingdom is at odds with the Northern Kingdom. Judah is once again at war with Benjamin and his brothers. This time, the wound remains open. Israel is never again formally or fully one people. They functionally and spiritually remain in exile, lacking a king, a Temple, a land, a rest, and a unified nation.

It is in this context of longing for return from exile that Jesus enters as Israel’s Messiah. YHWH himself comes via the incarnation of God the Son to heal Israel. Jesus calls twelve disciples, reorients Israel’s feasts around himself, and claims authority over Israel’s institutions and places. In this broad sense, Jesus, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, heals Israel. The Davidic King has once again and finally restored the tribes of Jacob.

But the NT authors knew the history of Israel, and Luke specifically does not leave the restoration of Israel to that broad sense. In the book of Acts, Luke wants to communicate that Jesus came, died, rose, and sent his Spirit to heal Israel and thereby heal the world. The culmination of Israel’s healing comes in Saul’s conversion (Acts 9).

Saul is a leader of his Jewish people. Saul is a Benjaminite. Saul persecutes the son of David and his people. Saul wants to enact the ban on the Lion of Judah and his followers. Saul the Benjaminite is once again at war with the son of David, the Judahite.

On the Damascus Road, Judah and Benjamin meet one last time. Given the history of Israel, and given Saul’s own actions to this point, we might expect here for the Judahite king to enact the ban on Saul the Benjaminite. We might expect, in other words, for Jesus, the Lion of Judah, to destroy the Benjaminite who is tormenting true Israel. We might expect for the blinding light to consume Saul and send him up like smoke to heaven. Instead, righteousness and peace, as ever, kiss one another in the Messiah. Jesus, the Davidic king of Judah, conquers Saul the Benjaminite not through physical destruction but through spiritual conversion. Judah and Benjamin are now at peace, as Saul serves the Son of David. Now, because Israel is restored, the gospel can go forth to the Gentiles – which is the story the remainder of Acts tells.

The Damascus Road is a beautiful personal conversion story, to be sure. But it is on a larger scale the conversion and restoration of Israel, as Saul finally bows to David, and as Benjamin and Judah finally are restored to one another.

Guarding the Good Deposit and Ministering Sound Doctrine

February 22, 2017February 22, 2017 / Matt Emerson / 1 Comment

As a Baptist, I am staunchly in favor of religious liberty for all and the individual freedom of conscience required for that collective liberty. I’m also in favor of congregational rule in local churches. And more generally as a Protestant, I definitely confess sola scriptura. This does not mean, however, that I’m against confessions and creeds or their derivative authority.

I’ve written elsewhere about what it means for confessions and creeds to have derivative authority – that is, authority that is derived from its faithfulness to Scripture, the ultimate authority – and how that relates to the Protestant commitment to sola scriptura. Here I only wish to highlight the fact that Scripture itself suggests that Christ’s ministers are to disciple believers via passing on sound doctrine. In other words, confessing sola scriptura does not negate the (derivative, secondary) authority of tradition, but rather it is in these supremely authoritative scriptures that we find an analogy to tradition’s authority in Jesus and the apostles commanding Christians to disciple believers precisely by carefully passing down a summary of their teachings.

1. Christ Passes on Sound Doctrine

I could go all the way back to the OT and Deuteronomy 34 here, but I’ll stick with the NT for now. Jesus conveys the importance of tradition and its role in discipling his followers in many places; here, I’ll highlight two. First, on the Emmaus Road in Luke 24, Jesus schools his followers on how to read the Old Testament. We are not given the details of this discussion, but instead Jesus gives his apostles a “rule” to follow regarding how to read God’s Word. What we have in the NT is the administration of that rule via the apostolic deposit, i.e. the NT itself. The rule’s application has been inscripturated and thus serves as the rule itself – to be in accordance with Jesus’ rule is to be in accordance with the NT. Nevertheless, Jesus’ instructions here can serve as an analogy to the authority of doctrine. Doctrine is derivatively authoritative insofar as it is faithful to the inscripturation of Jesus’ rule – the Bible.

We also see Jesus commanding his disciples not only to baptize new believers but to teach all of Christ’s followers to obey “everything I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19). This summary statement includes what the apostles later write under the inspiration of the Spirit in the NT. He was telling them to pass on what he had taught them, which I would venture to say included how to read the OT Christologically, what to believe about Jesus, and how to follow him. Of course, now that Christ’s teaching is inscripturated, Matthew 28 just is referring to the NT. There is no outside equally authoritative tradition. My only point here is that Jesus’ command gives analogous credence to the idea of holding believers accountable to a summary of Christian teaching.

This is a direct command from Jesus to pass on something that is not Scripture itself but rather a faithful summary – Jesus’ faithful summary! – of Scripture. We do not have the Luke 24 conversation recorded. Arguably, we do not have everything that Jesus commanded (John 20). These instructions are passed down via the NT, and our subsequent administration of it must find itself in accordance with this inscripturated application of the rule. In other words, Jesus’ rule, in both Luke 24 and Matthew 28, is administered in his inspired Word. Our job now is to make sure what we pass down is in accordance with this supreme authority, the inspired Word of God in the Prophets and Apostles.

2. Paul Commands Timothy and Titus to Pass On Sound Doctrine

In the Pastoral Epistles, we find numerous instructions by Paul to both Timothy and Titus to pass on what they have learned to others. For example:

…remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine (1 Tim. 1:3).

…the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient…and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted (1 Tim. 1:9-11).

If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed (1 Tim. 4:6).

Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching (1 Tim. 4:16).

Teach and urge these things. If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit and understands nothing (1 Tim. 6:2-4).

O Timothy, guard the good deposit entrusted to you (1 Tim. 6:20).

Follow the pattern of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus (2 Tim. 1:13).

By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you (2 Tim. 1:14).

…what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also (2 Tim. 2:2).

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus (2 Tim 3:14-15).

[An overseer] must hold firmly to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it (Titus 1:9).

But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1).

We could add to this references to “the faith” and either guarding it or departing from it, as well as the hymns (e.g. 1 Tim. 3:16) and references to trustworthy sayings. In any case, from the list above it is apparent that Paul had trained Timothy and Titus in sound doctrine and expected them to pass it on to those they were discipling, and so on (2 Tim. 2:2). He seems to be referring to a summary statement about who Jesus is, what he’s done, and how to know him. There also may be some hermeneutical guidelines (e.g. a rule of faith) a la Luke 24 in mind in these passages, especially when Paul references speculation and Jewish genealogies and myths. Of course, what Paul is referring to as “the good deposit,” “the faith,” “sound doctrine,” “the teaching,” etc. is what then became inscripturated in the NT. Once again, there is no inspired authority outside of Scripture. But our point here is that these instructions by Jesus and Paul give us analogies to the ministerial role of tradition subsequent to the writing of the NT.

3. Ministers Pass on Sound Doctrine

These examples demonstrate that both Jesus and Paul (and I’d argue we could include the other apostles) commanded Christians to pass on sound doctrine. There’s no time to expand on this here, but, to clarify briefly, they also are clear that this “deposit” is faithful to the Word God has already given to his people in the OT and to the Word he was giving at the time to the apostles. In other words, this “deposit” was only authoritative insofar as it was faithful to God’s inspired and inerrant Word, both as it already existed in the OT and was being written in what we now call the NT. Of course, that sound doctrine and teaching was subsequently inscripturated in the NT. We do not have any source of inspired authority outside of Scripture. But, by way of analogy, ministers are still called to pass on sound doctrine that is in accordance with Scripture.

Tradition, then, is not at odds with Scripture per se, but is rather the God-ordained means of stewarding the faithful summary of Scripture. Tradition is a steward, or minister, of Scripture’s main point. It is a minister of how to read Scripture. It does not stand over Scripture, but like any good minister is used to pass on what has been entrusted to it. In this sense, it is authoritative, but only secondarily and derivatively. We could say the same thing about pastors and congregations; the authority that God has entrusted them is ministerial, and only effective insofar as they are faithful to the ultimate authority, God’s Word.