Jesus is a Warrior

 Among my mix of commentaries (liberal to conservative to theological to rhetorical to grammatical) I always appreciate Dale Ralph Davis.  Going through Joshua 10 this week in sermon prep, I found this great quote by Davis.  The textual background is Joshua 10.10-11, where YHWH is the subject of quite a few killer verbs: threw [them] into a panic, killed, chased, threw hail at, and struck down the enemies.  It is hard to miss the fact that YHWH is on the warpath, making war with and killing his enemies. 

“It is too bad much of the church has lost this vision of God or Christ as the warrior who fights for his people.  Too many of us regard this conception as substandard, by which we mean it does not fit our sentimental twentieth-century graven images of what God ought to be like.  The imagery seems too violent.  And we do the same for the Lord Jesus, with perhaps not a little help from church school materials.  The popular image of Jesus is that he is not only kind and tender but also soft and prissy, as though Jesus comes to us reeking of hand cream.  Such a Jesus can hardly steel [solidify - sl] the soul that is daily assaulted by the enemy.”

“We need to learn the catechism of Psalm 24.  Question: Who is the King of glory?  Answer: Yahweh, strong and mighty!  Yahweh, might in battle! (Ps 24.8).  We must catch the vision of the Faithful and True sitting on the white horse, the One who ‘judges and makes war’ in righteousness (Rev 19.11-16).  No mild God or soft Jesus can give his people hope.  It is only as we know the warrior of Israel who fights for us (and sometimes without us) that we have hope of triumphing in the muck of life.”

Well put!  The quotes are taken from Davis’ commentary on Joshua, pages 81-2.  By the way, these commentaries are great even for “average” students of the Bible who just want an accessible commentary to read with the scriptures.  Davis has commentaries on 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, and Judges.  The price is also right: they are all around $10.

shane lems

sunnyside, wa

O Ye of Little Faith!

 What do you tell someone who believes in Jesus but is distressed because his faith is so weak?  Many of us have experienced this or seen it first hand.  An older man in the hospital cannot sleep because he’s worried about a past sin; a woman with a tender conscience isn’t sure she belongs to Jesus even though she truly loves his word.  What do we say to those (or ourselves!) when faith is at its low point?  Puritan Thomas Brooks said it well.

“A weak faith doth as much justify and as much unite a man to Christ as a strong faith.  It gives a man as much title to and interest in Christ as the strongest faith in the world.”

“The promises of eternal happiness and blessedness are not made over to the strength of faith, but to the truth of faith; not to the degrees of faith, but to the reality of faith.  No man that is saved is saved upon the account of the strength of his faith, but upon the account of the truth of his faith.”

“The weakest faith shall grow stronger and stronger.  A weak believer shall go on from faith to faith.  Christ is the finisher as well as the author of our faith (Rom 1.17, Heb 12.2).  Christ will nurse up this blessed babe, and will not allow it to be strangled in its infancy.”

“A little faith is faith, as a spark of fire is fire, a drop of water is water, a little star is a star, a little pearl is a pearl.  Truly, thy little faith is a jewel that God doth highly prize and value.”

“Well remember this, that the least measure of true faith will bring thee to salvation, and possess thee of salvation, as well as the greatest measure.  A little faith accompanies salvation as well as a great faith, a weak faith as well as a strong.  Therefore do not say, O precious soul, that thou has not that faith that accompanies salvation, because thou hast not such a strong faith, or such and such degrees of faith.”

True faith (whether strong or weak) saves because its object (Jesus) is always strong!

Above quotes from Thomas Brooks, Heaven On Earth, p. 215-216.

shane lems

sunnyside wa

Christ Plays In 10K Places

  I need to read books like this one, even if it is long, delightful, unsettling, funny,  valuable, and odd all at the same time.  I’ve read Peterson’s A Long Obedience and his The Contemplative Pastor, and since then I made a “book-berith” (book-covenant) with myself to read or re-read at least one of his books each year.  In case you haven’t read much of Eugene Peterson, he’s sort of a good mixture of Karl Barth, John Calvin, Will Willimon, Wendell Berry, Marva Dawn, and Marilynne Robinson all put together – with a little Bernard of Clairvaux as well. 

Peterson is a word-smith, a story-teller, a follower of Jesus who stays away from the bells and whistles sort of American spirituality.  He isn’t afraid to slow down, enjoy the sparrows, and describe in 50 pages the beautiful fact that Jesus-who-is-God made everything and upholds everything, from meadow to mountain.  Here’s a section he wrote about Sabbath, the first day of the week consecrated by Jesus in his resurrection.

“Sabbath is a deliberate act of interference, an interruption  of our work each week, a decree of no-work so that we are able to notice, to attend, to listen, to assimilate this comprehensive and majestic work of God, to orient our work in the work of God.”

“When we remember the Sabbath and rest on it we enter into and maintain the rhythm of creation.  We keep time with God.  Sabbath-keeping preserves and honors time as God’s gift of holy rest: it erects a weekly bastion against the commodification of time, against reducing time to money, reducing time to what we can get out of it, against leaving no time for God or beauty or anything that cannot be used or purchased.  It is a defense against the hurry that desecrates time.”

I’m one who is appreciative of a liturgical Lord’s Day service, where the rhythm of the liturgy reflects the orderly rhythm of salvation: God is here, humble yourselves, receive his forgiveness in Christ, sing to him, hear him speak, and leave with his Amen resting upon you.  I feel badly for those who go to worship only to be more busy and chatty there than they are during the week.  Here’s how Peterson puts it.

“Pastors and congregational leaders commonly cram the Lord’s Day with work: committees, meetings, projects, mission and social activities.  Much doing and much talking displace Sabbath quietness and stillness.  Typically, congregational leaders, knowing that they have these people all to themselves for a few hours just one day a week, conspire to get them involved in anything and everything they think will be good for their souls and good for the church.  Well-intentioned but dead wrong.  All the leaders do is get them so busy for the Lord that they have no time for the Lord, pour in so much information about God that they never have a chance to listen to God.”

It’s been fun making my way through this book.  I’m not convinced by everything Peterson says, but I could use a good dose of his reverence for words, for the ordinary, for attending to God in the day-to-day grind we call life.

Almost forgot: WTS books has Christ Plays on clearance for under 14.00 – get one before they’re gone!

shane lems

Elders: Shepherding, Leading

“Leading is probably what comes to mind when most elders think about their responsibilities.  Characteristic of this leadership is that it is motivated by the well-being of the flock, not for the leaders’ gain.  Peter describes this leadership as ‘not lording it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock’ (1 Peter 1.3).”

“The story is told about a group of tourists in Israel who had been informed by their Israeli tour guide, after observing a flock and their shepherd, that shepherds always lead their flocks from the front.  He told his attentive listeners that they never ‘drive’ the sheep from behind.  A short time later they drove past a flock along the road where the shepherd was walking behind them.  The tourists quickly called this to their guide’s attention and he stopped the bus to step out and have a word with the ‘shepherd.’  As he boarded the bus he had a sheepish grin on his face and announced to his eager listeners, ‘that wasn’t the shepherd, that was the butcher!’”

“In leading the flock shepherds must be motivated by love for the Lord and for the well-being of the sheep.  It must be evident to the congregation that the leadership of the elders is exercised for the good of the people and not for the benefit of the leaders.  Even when leaders are developing plans on the macro (bigger) level, this should take into account their interaction with the sheep on the micro (smaller) level.”

Timothy Witmer, The Shepherd Leader (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2010), 156.

shane lems

The New Living Translation

Along with quite a few other translations of the Bible, I’ve been using the New Living Translation for a while now (the updated edition).  Though it is not my favorite translation, and though I’ve seen some weaknesses in the translation, there are certain aspects of it I appreciate.  For example, I like the modern language – this is a good translation to use for those not accustomed to detailed grammatical phrases, older language, and unfamiliar vocabulary.  Sometimes I use the NLT in a prison setting or when I preach at a funeral (or other event) where the people are not very familiar with biblical language.

I like the NLT for OT and Gospel narratives (specifically as I’m working through Joshua).  However, I’m not as excited about the NLT in some of the Pauline epistles, because smoothing things out too much can take away from the tighter epistle constructions and thoughts.

In case you’re interested, here are some scholars and teachers that worked on the NLT Bible translation team.

OT: Daniel Block, Gordon Wenham, R.K. Harrison, V. Phillips Long, Bill T. Arnold, Ray B. Dillard, Tremper Longman, Al Wolters, Mark Futato, Doug Green, Richard Pratt, Willem VanGemeren, Joyce Baldwin, and Douglas Gropp (just to name a few).

NT: Craig Blomberg, Don Hagner, Darrell Bock, D. A. Carson, Douglas Moo, Tom Schreiner, Moises Silva, Klyne Snodgrass, Greg Beale, Robert Mounce, and F.F. Bruce (just to name a few).

To be honest, I’m not really “married” to a specific translation.  I try to do most of my work out of the original, though I do tend to gravitate around the NIV and ESV. I sometimes use the NKJ as well, but I’m not a Majority Text guy.  Furthermore, the archaic English grammar and stiff translation method of the NKJ can be pretty frustrating – try reading a long OT narrative from the NKJ out loud to people who never speak or read this type of old English.  You get a few puzzled looks as you’re stumbling through the odd grammatical phrases.  For example, take Joshua 8.4: it will come about, when they come out against us as at the first, that we shall flee before them. Who speaks like that? (By the way “at the first” simply means “like they did before.”)  As a side note, I’m not one who thinks that archaic grammar is more reverent than everyday grammar.

When people ask about translations, I say two things 1) don’t make your favorite translation a litmus test of orthodoxy and 2) use a few different translations in your reading – some “word for word” (NASB, NKJ) and some “thought for thought” (NIV, NLT) and some in between (ESV, RSV).  Remember that every translation makes thousands of interpretive moves as they translate the original to English.

Looking back at the last 10 years of my Christian walk, I noticed that my Bible reading time has increased when I purchase a new translation, because I want to see how they translated my favorite passages.  This leads me to read more of it and it becomes an enjoyable reading experience for me.

All in all, while I don’t think the NLT will ever be my primary translation, I do think it is valuable to have on my shelf.  It is an OK translation to consult when doing textual work, biblical studies, and as I said above, reading the Word to people who are unfamiliar with the scriptures.  If you’re not familiar with it and have been wanting to check out a different translation, you may want to check out the NLT.

shane lems