Tag Archives: The Law

Emil Brunner’s Simple Faith (6)

Theology, , , ,

God’s Will for Humankind

In his reflection on the nature of human being, Emil Brunner suggests that the ‘image of God’ is a dynamic becoming:

He created man as a personal being, that is as a being that does not simply develop of itself into that for which God created it, but rather as a being who achieves his destiny only by saying his ‘yes’ to it (51).

Persons achieve or realise their ‘true’ humanity as they hear and receive the Word of God addressed to them. In chapters 10-13 of his little book Our Faith he explores the nature and contours of this Word, beginning with the Law.

Brunner begins with human experience of ‘law’ in general: our experience of cultural and social laws, of the laws of physics, of the human freedom and sense of autonomy that tempts us to think that we might be a ‘law unto oneself.’ Perhaps we can be even our own god! Yet, says Brunner, we find our autonomy limited and ultimately doomed. We find ourselves in environments we are unable to change or to bend to our will. We are confronted, finally, by the inevitability of death and with it all our God-pretensions. Brunner thus argues from a learned sense of law to establish an understanding of that which stands over against us and for which we are responsible: the Law of God.

The divine law is God’s will for humankind. “Every man, Jew or Christian, believer or atheist, cultured or uncultured, has some knowledge of this law. Every man has the consciousness of ‘responsibility’” via the faculty of conscience (46). This law is a reflection of the Creator’s good will for human life and it is just as inviolable as the laws of nature (47). Further, God has supplemented conscience by giving his people a written Law which is really a reiteration of “the natural laws of true human life” (46).

God’s law reveals that God wants something of us and that we are accountable for it. What is it that God desires? Brunner’s answer is threefold: something new every moment (!), only a few things—the Ten Commandments, and indeed, only one thing—the first commandment, for “he who keeps the first commandment keeps all the rest” (49). To have God alone as our God is to have a Master and thereby to forsake all alternatives, including especially the desire to be our own master. “God wants only that we should be that for which He created us. He created us ‘in His image’” (49). In binding us to himself God binds us also to others for the command to love God includes within itself the command to love our neighbour.

The Commandment of God is what God wants of us. But if we understand the words concerning the image of God, we also know what God wants for us. That God first loved us, before He demanded anything of us, and that He demands nothing more than that we should accept His love, that is, react to love with love, is simply what we call faith. … God’s incomprehensible, undeserved Love; and whosoever does that fulfils the will of God (49-50, original emphasis).

Of course, humanity has failed to keep God’s commandments and his law. We have supplanted God’s rule in the attempt to be our own master, seeking to live without and apart from God. We misuse our freedom of choice to do that which God does not will.

But God in His creative goodness, having given man freedom to choose for himself, gave him something more in that when he sinned he might not wholly corrupt his life and the life of others, might not wholly deviate from God’s way. This gift is the Ordinances of God (52).

The ordinances of God are those regularities of the natural ‘order’ in which human life is set. More particularly, they are limits and realities implanted in our very nature by God, which we can know intuitively, and which we can but ought not to transgress.

The most important of these ordinances is the fact that God has so organized human life that no man can live for himself. He cannot live without the other. Man needs woman, woman needs man. … Human life is so ordered by God because God has created man for love (53).

The ordinances of God can be endangered by human wilfulness, and, says Brunner, this has never been more apparent in world history than ‘today’ (53). The individual’s will for mastery, for autonomy, for independence tears at the very fabric of relationship and society.

The man who recognizes nothing higher than reason becomes ‘independent’—he no longer needs others, he is his own master—even his own God. And then human fellowship is dissipated like a string of pearls when the cord is cut. What binds us together is the Ordinances of God, behind which stands God’s love. He alone who is bound to God, and through God to his neighbour, can really become a man (54).

God’s address to humanity takes not only the form of law but also promise. Indeed, “God is not primarily the lawgiver, but the lifegiver” (55). The law functions to make us aware of our failure to do what God wills. But in itself it is a gift of divine love given to us for our good. Brunner acknowledges that the commandments do not begin with Thou shalt Not but with I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. All humanity have some inkling of the divine demand but the knowledge of the promise is strictly the message of the Bible.

That is the biblical message, not what God wants of us, but what He desires for us; no what we should do, but what God does and gives. The Law of God is everywhere, the Promise of God is only in the Bible—the promise, namely, that God comes to His sick, rebellious people, to heal them, the message of the ‘Saviour,’ the healing, saving, forgiving, and redeeming God. This promise is really the Word of God. … God desires nothing of us save that we allow Him to bestow life upon us (57, original emphasis).

The 2019 Annual Vose Lecture

Theology, , , , ,

On August 2, 2019 Ben Witherington III delivered the Annual Vose Lecture on the theme, “A Singular Jesus in a Pluralistic Culture.” In essence, the lecture was an applied New Testament apologetics within a Wesleyan Evangelical framework of thought. Witherington explored Jesus’ self-understanding as reported in the gospels, assessing the historical worth of this portrayal, and arguing that an incarnational understanding of Jesus is a necessary deduction from the New Testament data, and the foundation of Christian witness in a pluralistic context.

Witherington began by identifying two well-known key phrases in the ministry of the historical Jesus: his use of the title “Son of Man,” and his use of the imagery and language of “the kingdom of God.” He argued that these two concepts appear together in only one Old Testament text: Daniel 7:13-14, with the additional note that in vv. 25-27 the kingdom is given to the saints. Witherington argued that Jesus believed that he was both divine and human, and that he used the Son of Man title to indicate this. The title encompasses the fullness of Jesus’ person. As many other scholars have also argued, Jesus selected this relatively obscure title to set himself forth on his own terms, and in so doing, avoided other terms loaded with contemporary pre-conceptions and significance which were antithetical to the message he sought to communicate.

Turning to the issue of pluralism, Witherington insists that the Christian claim of Jesus’ uniqueness and supremacy is not about the wisdom or value of other cultures or their beliefs, but about the central question and reality of salvation. Jesus’ claim was unique, as was his death and resurrection, and his relationship with the Father. He was also sinless although Witherington, applying his Wesleyan framework to Christology, argues that Jesus could have sinned but did not. Jesus’ incarnation was a genuine embrace of a fully human life with all its limitations and possibilities. He was certainly tempted to use his divine powers (e.g. to turn stones into bread) but did not, for he did not access the inherent divinity of his person. His life was one of divine self-limitation without any aspect of loss of the divine being.

This was much more a popular than an academic lecture and much appreciated, especially by the ordinary church-goers who made up a sizable chunk of the audience. Witherington presented a thoroughly Evangelical account of apologetics grounded in substantial New Testament theology. The lecture both supported and called for a robust confidence in the gospel on the part of everyday believers as they encounter the challenge to faith in Jesus Christ in a culture that espouses the equivalence of just about any and all worldviews, spiritualities, and perspectives.

On Saturday morning following the public lecture, Ben Witherington addressed a second more academic lecture to another audience on the theme of “Paul, Covenantal Theology, and the Law.” In this thoughtful and thought-provoking lecture Witherington insisted that the Law must be understood within its Old Testament / Ancient Near Eastern context, that the Mosaic covenant was a covenant of both grace and law—and indeed all the biblical covenants had this feature. The New Covenant was not a renewal of the Old Covenant, i.e. as one covenant with diverse administrations, but was an entirely new covenant.

Witherington explored in some detail key New Testament texts such as 2 Corinthians 3, Galatians 4:1-8, Philippians 3: 4-8, before turning his attention especially to Romans (something we asked him to do). There he explored Paul’s thought in Romans 10; 7:7-25; and 8:1-4. He argues that Paul considered that the Law was a temporary arrangement for Israel (the paidagōgos or “child-minder”) until they should come “to maturity.” The believer has been set free from sin and death, and so also from the Law. Thus they are not under the Law of Moses, but under the Law of Christ.

Both lectures were followed by a lively Question & Answer session, and by ongoing conversation after the formalities were concluded. It was a privilege to have such an accomplished New Testament exegete and commentator visit Vose Seminary and bring the wealth of his learning to our community. Further, Ben Witherington’s Wesleyan commitments also brought a fresh flavour to the lectures; it is not that often that this perspective has been so competently and enthusiastically presented and defended (in my experience at least) in Perth in recent years. Despite his great learning, massive literary output, and global stature, Ben wore his learning lightly. I am sure that those who attended the lectures were certainly enriched by what he presented. This was the third Annual Vose Lecture, and a very fine addition to this growing heritage.