Book Review – The Message of Joel, Micah & Habakkuk (David Prior)

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The commentary on Joel starts by helping us to visualise the plague of locusts and the devastating effect they would have had on Joel’s community. We have almost no historical background on Joel, but his call to repentance for a nation that had lost its spiritual life is as relevant today as ever. Prior provides an overview of the teaching on “the day of the Lord” from the prophets – a day of decisive judgement on which the people were naively assuming they would be vindicated and saved. Nothing less than a genuine and heartfelt repentance from the whole community was required if they were to escape calamity. In response to the people’s repentance, Joel prophesies blessing restored in the near future, the Spirit’s outpouring (fulfilled at Pentecost) and then finally the “day of the Lord” would arrive. In the third chapter Prior draws parallels with modern day nations as judgement is pronounced.

Micah writes to an affluent society who were sidelining God and growing richer at the expense of the poor. It was also a time of political upheaval with the Assyrian empire invading Samaria during his ministry. Prior follows most commentators by dividing the book into three cycles of threat and promise. He does a good job of filling in a lot of the background details (such as the significance of the places) and pointing out where allusions to other Old Testament books are being made. This allows the essence of the prophetic message to be seen in passages that most Bible readers will skip over quite quickly as a generic list of judgement prophecies. As he comments on Micah’s indictment of the pride, greed and injustice of his day, Prior himself takes on a prophetic edge speaking forthrightly into modern political and cultural situations.

Habakkuk is introduced to us as a man zealous for God living in a society filled with violence. Again we are encouraged to see contemporary parallels. Prior spends most time on chapter two as Habakkuk asks the difficult questions of God boldly and yet reverently and waits for his response. He is rewarded with his answer in the form of a vision, but it wasn’t necessarily what he wanted to hear. Finally, Prior argues that Habakkuk has matured through the course of the book, demonstrated as he comes to a place where he rejoices in God purely because of who he is, irrespective of his own personal circumstances.

Prior has provided a helpful resource on these three Old Testament books. It took me longer than I expected to read, perhaps because it is a bit heavy-going in places. In many ways it is like reading the biblical books themselves – there are sections that can seem hard and dry interspersed with some real high points. Its best feature is the way that Prior gives us a feel for what issues these three men might address were they preaching today.

Book Review – One Thing (Sam Storms)

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Those who are familiar with the writings of John Piper, and in particular, “Desiring God” will inevitably notice significant similarities as they read this book. First off, Storms has been persuaded by Jonathan Edward’s link between glorifying God and enjoying God. This leads him to embrace John Piper’s concept of “Christian hedonism” – living for pleasure in God as the best (and only) way to glorify God.

Storms moves on to discuss enjoying the beauty of God, and uses the book of Revelation as he talks about being lost in wonder. In these early chapters then, Storms succinctly and persuasively champions the cause of enjoying God, and his more accessible style will certainly be appreciated by those who find Piper’s writings a bit dense.

Mid-way through the book, Storms begins to encourage us to see the glory of God in creation. He devotes a whole chapter to help us grasp the immense scale of the universe, without assuming any specialised scientific knowledge on the part of its readers. It will seem oversimplified to some, and this part of the book is generously scattered with quips presumably to help those who balk at the thought of studying science.

In fact, much of the later sections of the book read like typed transcripts of sermons, which perhaps goes some way to explain the occasional digressions (e.g. can God create a stone too big for him to lift?). He has a good array of illustrations and examples which should stick in the readers memory, and his use of Greek mythology to help explain the how joy in God aids the believer’s battle against sin is outstanding. The book closes appropriately with a discussion of heaven and also a brief note on the second coming, which is refreshingly free from speculation about how and when.

Storms deserves credit for bringing such an important subject like this into a format that can be appreciated by a wider audience than those who like to read Edwards or even Piper. If you want a point by point argument for Christian Hedonism, Piper is your man, but if you just want to be inspired to enjoy God as much as possible, then this is the book for you.

Book Review – Receiving the Holy Spirit and His Gifts (Terry Virgo & Phil Rogers)

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This short book aims to provide an introduction to the subject of Baptism in the Holy Spirit, and to encourage the readers to seek this experience if they have not already received it. Theologically the authors’ stance is that baptism in the Holy Spirit is distinct from conversion and is normally evidenced by speaking in tongues or prophesying. A brief rebuttal of alternative viewpoints is offered, though this is by no means thorough.

Though there are two authors, who seem to write separate chapters, there is no indication of who is writing at any one time, which can make the anecdotes somewhat confusing (has the author two wives?). Apart from this, the style is not too heavy and should be accessible to most readers.

It functions as a study guide, often asking the reader to look up particular passages before commenting on them. After dealing with baptism in the Spirit, there is a discussion of spiritual gifts and the need for ongoing filling with the Spirit. Overall this is a good book to introduce the baptism in the Holy Spirit to those in charismatic or Pentecostal churches. Those who want all their theological questions answering may need to do some additional reading, but those simply hungry to experience God in a new and dynamic way could find that this contains all they need to know.

Book Review – The New International Commentary on Acts (F F Bruce)

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The book of Acts is something of a hermeneutical minefield, due to the many different ideas of how to apply the various practices and experiences of the early church and apostles. Bruce mainly avoids comment on these issues, preferring to simply help us get to the bottom of what the text is saying, and showing how the author achieves his purpose of demonstrating that Christianity was not an illegal or subversive religion. He provides excellent background information on the historical, geographical and political features that provide the setting for the book of Acts. It is also a useful source of information for correlating the biographical information in the epistles with Luke’s account.

Although Bruce is willing to discuss matters of theology, he nowhere attempts to develop a Lukan pneumatology or ecclesiology which is probably a good thing, given how controversial these would prove to be (and in any case it is doubtful that Luke expected his writing to be used in that way). His comments are also fairly terse in passages where a less technical commentary might offer some more devotional thoughts. For example, while Bruce provides background details on all the people and places named in Acts 20:4, he only comments briefly on Paul’s great statement in Acts 20:24. Having said that, where he does permit himself briefly to expound a text, his insights are often profound. I actually found the final section of the commentary to be the most enjoyable, as Bruce attacks some of the petty criticisms of Paul from other commentators who judge him for some of his statements during the trial narratives.

It is in fact often when he is engaging with other commentators that the best of Bruce comes out. He is never overt about his personal faith or direct with the moral or theological lessons he draws out, but as he takes down other arguments he leaves the reader to fill in the blanks. He states that Paul is Luke’s hero, and in places hints that the same could be said of himself.

The NICNT commentaries do a good job of keeping secondary issues out of the main text by making extensive use of footnotes and this volume is no exception. Bruce provides his own translation of Acts, and each section of text is followed with a brief introduction before the comments which are usually on one or two verses at a time. This format means that people studying individual sections can get a good sense of context. As with other NICNT commentaries, the introduction is comprehensive without being long-winded. Bruce tentatively accepts Luke as the author but does not presume to suggest his own date (other than saying it is a first century composition), preferring to summarise the options.

Those who need some quick points of application for sermons or Bible study groups may find that this commentary is too “academic” for their liking. However, for those wanting to wrestle with the text themselves, it gives the firm footing of properly understanding the historical context that is necessary before trying to extrapolate principles for today’s Christians.

Book Reviews

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I have prepared my book reviews for the last two months but I am making a couple of changes to the way I publish them. The first is that I will post each review separately. This allows me to link to a specific book review. It also stops me rushing to finish books at the end of the month.

Also I will no longer stop rate books out of five in my reviews. This is for a number of reasons. First, I found I was rating many good books as 3/5 and some reasonable ones as 2/5 simply so I could reserve the higher ratings for really good books, but it seemed like an insult to what was otherwise a good piece of work. It probably would have been better if my scale was out of 10 rather than 5. Second, my criteria for rating a commentary are different to those for other types of book, which made it look like I recommended reading more commentaries than anything else. Finally, I make a lot of use of other people’s reviews, and what I want to know is what the book contained, what they liked and disliked and why. So my reviews from now on will hopefully give you a better understanding of what I consider to be the strengths and weaknesses. Ratings are only useful if you have exactly the same requirements for a book as the person doing the review.

You can in fact, still see my preferred ranking of commentaries by filtering on a specific book on my commentaries page, and I do intend to still mark those books that would have earned a 5/5 in some special way (perhaps an “outstanding” award).

Dividing Lines 1: The Charismatic Gifts

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Some people divide evangelicals into two groups – the charismatics and the noncharismatics over the issue of “spiritual gifts”. This is probably over-simplistic and three groups would be a bit more representative (as Jeremy Pierce pointed out responding to my rather vague description of charismatic in an earlier post).

The name charismatic comes from a Greek word used in 1 Cor 12 to describe “spiritual gifts”. Of course, a large number of spiritual gifts are non-contentious (such as teaching, administration etc) and are often referred to as “natural”. However, there are a number that are patently supernatural such as prophecy, speaking in tongues, healings and miracles. The first of our three groups are known as cessationists – they believe that the general availability of these gifts has ceased. They have various biblical and historical arguments for this, and therefore view any claims to modern day manifestations of these gifts as spurious.

Then we have the charismatics, who have existed in small numbers throughout church history, but exploded onto the scene in the last 100 years or so with the Pentecostal and charismatic movements. They actively seek God for more manifestations of these supernatural gifts, especially prophecy, tongues and healing. It would be considered somewhat disappointing for a few meetings to go by without these gifts being evidenced. Tongues speaking in private is also stressed as an important spiritual discipline.

Finally there are the noncharismatics, who are the hardest to define. They sometimes call themselves “open but cautious” with regards to these spiritual gifts. They consider the charismatics to be right in saying that the gifts are available, but wrong in the way they emphasise them and make them so important. Many are deeply concerned about some of the practises and attitudes in charismatic churches, even doubting whether the Spirit of God is truly at work, but they do not attempt to argue a cessationist stance, and are theoretically willing to welcome these gifts in their own churches should God so desire to bestow them. But the onus is most definitely on God to give – they have no plans to ask. So the difference between a charismatic and a noncharismatic is not so much about doctrine but emphasis and a debate between the two rarely has them completely disagreeing but repeatedly saying “Yes, but…”.

Don Carson, who would probably classify himself a “noncharismatic”, writes of the suspicion with which the noncharismatics (including the cessationists here) view the charismatics, and vice versa:

It is probably fair to say that both charismatics and noncharismatics (if I may continue to use those terms in nonbiblical ways) often cherish neat stereotypes of the other party. As judged by the charismatics, noncharismatics tend to be stodgy traditionalists who do not really believe the Bible and who are not really hungry for the Lord. They are afraid of profound spiritual experience, too proud to give themselves wholeheartedly to God, more concerned for ritual than for reality and more in love with propositional truth than truth incarnate. They are better at writing theological tomes than at evangelism; they are defeatist in outlook, defensive in stance, dull in worship, and devoid of the Spirit’s power in their personal experience. The noncharismatics themselves, of course, tend to see things a little differently. The charismatics, they think, have succumbed to the modern love of “experience”, even at the expense of truth. Charismatics are thought to be profoundly unbiblical, especially when they elevate their experience of tongues to the level of theological and spiritual shibboleth. If they are growing, no small part of their strength can be ascribed to their raw triumphalism, their populist elitism, their promise of shortcuts to holiness and power. They are better at splitting churches and stealing sheep than they are at evangelism, more accomplished in spiritual one-upmanship before other believers than in faithful, humble service. They are imperialistic in outlook (only they have the “full gospel”), abrasive in stance, uncontrolled in worship, and devoid of any real grasp of the Bible that goes beyond mere proof-texting.

I can testify that Carson’s portrayal of the attitudes of these groups towards each other is all too often accurate. What is more sad is that also in many cases the substance of the allegations is fairly accurate as well. But I do not believe that these weaknesses on each side should cause us to simply choose which group’s failings we feel most comfortable with and decide whether we are more comfortable being in a “Word-based” noncharismatic church or a “Spirit-led” charismatic church. As I discussed in my previous post, I am convinced that an evangelical appreciation of the Word is not incompatible with a charismatic experience of the Spirit. This, I know is the goal of many churches, including those in New Frontiers, which the church I belong to is part of. There are other groups too, like Sovereign Grace who have a similar passion, as well as growing numbers of churches within the established denominations. My prayer is that they will achieve this right balance of emphasis and which will move us some way to a point where the labels “charismatic” and “noncharismatic” will no longer be necessary.

Word and Spirit

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I thought I would post something to explain why my site is called wordandspirit, since a number of my non-Christian friends have assumed that it is something to do with ghosts, and even to Christians the phrase can mean a variety of different things.

Where have you heard the phrase before?

Well there are numerous churches, books and events that all use the phrase in their name. It is a real favourite with evangelical charismatics (which is pretty much what I am). For example, David Pawson’s helpful book on uniting evangelicals and charismatics is called “Word and Spirit Together”.

There are a few places where the two terms appear together in the Bible, but only occasionally are the concepts of the “Word of God” and the “Spirit of God” directly linked in the same verse. Perhaps 2 Sam 23:2 or Acts 4:31 are the origins of the phrase.

Two extremes

You may also have come across the following classic (and rather cheesy) Christian quote:
With the Word but not the Spirit you dry up
With the Spirit but not the Word you blow up
But with the Word and the Spirit you grow up
(I tried to find out who originally said this, but although it is quoted hundreds of times on the web there is no general agreement)

The saying warns against two possible extremes:

First, consider a church that prides itself in being a “Word” church. That is, it places a high importance on being Bible based, having Bible teaching and believing sound Biblical doctrine. It is possible that despite this noble aim, it actually ends up being a place of dry orthodoxy, with a religion that is in the head but not the heart. Little or nothing is experienced of the Spirit of God moving in individual lives. Instead, spiritual wellbeing is viewed as correctly avoiding all doctrinal errors.

Second, consider a church that prides itself in being a “Spirit” church, that is, it places a high importance on encouraging prophecy and tongues and other manifestations of the Spirit in its meetings. It is possible that the Bible becomes neglected, and therefore there is no discernment of what constitutes a genuine work of the Spirit. Anything and everything goes with anyone who cares to question being labelled as judgemental. If left unchecked false teaching and immoral behaviour can creep in undetected.

A false antithesis

But of course in fact there is no conflict between the Word and the Spirit. The Spirit inspired the Word, and when he moves he will not act in contradiction to that Word. Careful Bible study and expository preaching do not quench the Spirit but rather allow him to speak. And there is nothing unbiblical about manifestations or gifts of the Spirit. In fact there is a good deal of attention given in the New Testament to the varied work of the Spirit.

I imagine that every evangelical church would want to characterise themselves as a “Word and Spirit” church, but the two extremes described above are very real dangers. Hopefully the theology expressed on this website will avoid either extreme and fully embrace all that the Word of God has to say and all that the Spirit of God wants to do.

I am well aware that many evangelicals believe it is more or less impossible to hold to charismatic views and still be fully committed to the Bible. I have compiled a list of around 40 criticisms or biblical arguments that I have heard levelled at charismatic churches in recent years. If I find the time I will post some thoughts on these over the coming weeks.

Why Word and Spirit?

Which brings me back to where I started. Why did I call my website wordandspirit? It wasn’t my first choice for a domain name, but it is one I am pleased with. My passion for studying the Word of God is the reason for my commentaries page, book reviews and articles. But I admit that I have posted very little here on the doctrine of the Spirit. This is partly because I am aware that a lot of controversy surrounds this question so I want to be especially careful what I say. It is also because I have been mainly thinking and studying in other areas in recent years.

However, the time has come for me to apply my mind once more to the New Testament teaching on the “charismatic” issues. I have recently finished reading Bruce’s commentary on Acts (which I studied as part of course on Acts with a very Pentecostal emphasis), and I also recently read a short book on the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. I now am beginning some studies in 1 Cor 11-15 for a series of Cell Group meetings in the next few months, which has given me a chance to re-read Don Carson’s “Showing the Spirit” as well as use my NICNT 1 Corinthians commentary by Fee in earnest for the first time. I am anticipating that some articles and blog entries with a charismatic focus will come out of all this over the coming weeks.

In Other Blogs This Week…

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The most exciting post of the week comes from Parableman about commentaries. As well as pointing out that Denver had updated their lists, he has updated his own superb recommendations and posted news of forthcoming volumes. He has his ear to the ground on who is writing what, and I was particularly pleased to see that there will be Pillar commentaries on Hebrews by O’Brien and Galatians by Carson. Not only that but BEC will publish on Galatians (by Silva) and Hebrews (by Carson again), so we will have a wealth of commentaries coming on these two books. This throws me into a quandry because I was about to buy NICNT Hebrews by Bruce and something on Galatians (Longenecker or Witherington). Should I wait? … Can I wait?

My brother has started his own blog. It’s quite useful as I don’t get round to phoning him as often as I should so I get to keep up to date on what’s going on. Adrian Warnock will be pleased that this is another New Frontiers blog as he goes to a New Frontiers church in Cambridge where he is a student. He mainly writes about his computer and his course on audio technology.

Finally, I discovered the Challies dot com blog this week (thanks again to Adrian Warnock) He posts a number of good book reviews which is why I have subscribed to his RSS feed. On his “about me” page he describes himself as follows:

I am…
*Christian* – I affirm that Jesus is my Lord and Saviour.
*Protestant* – I affirm the five “solas” of the Reformation.
*Reformed* – I affirm the principles known as Calvinism.
*Evangelical* – I believe the gospel (which is the original and truest meaning of “evangelical”).
*Fundamentalist* – I believe in “a return to fundamental principles and a strong or rigid adherence to these principles.”
*Conservative* – I am generally traditional and restrained in my beliefs and cautious towards change, especially when it seems to be change just for the sake of change.
*Liberal* – I am not limited to traditional views. I find much beauty in traditional Protestantism, but realize that in some areas traditions are not Scriptural. Where that is the case I am open to change and improvement.

So he sounds like a good bloke in my books. I would describe myself in pretty much the same way, apart from adding “Charismatic” to the list, meaning “- I believe in the ongoing availability and relevance of all the gifts mentioned in the New Testament and the importance of seeking to be filled with the Holy Spirit.”

Some new articles

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I have uploaded a few new articles to my theology page.

Two are actually articles that I wrote last year but never got round to proof-reading and uploading to my site:
In at the Deep End (Mark 6:7-13;30-32) looks at Jesus sending his disciples out on his first mission, and the instructions he gave them.
On a Plate (Mark 6:14-29) tackles the story of the beheading of John the Baptist.

More recently, I have been writing and article on the lessons that may be gleaned from Exodus 18 (the story of Jethro’s advice to Moses), particularly in relation to church growth. The church I attend has been discussing the challenges related to growing larger recently and at a day conference I attended today, Exodus 18 came up as the speaker’s main text. This gave me the inspiration to put the finishing touches on my article and upload it.
Sharing the Load (Ex 18:1-27)

Piper on Romans

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Fans of John Piper will probably be aware of the Biblical Preaching website that hosts his weekly sermons in MP3 format. He has been preaching a series on Romans that started back in 1998 and is still going (over 160 sermons later). In fact he seems to be stuck in Romans 12 at the moment. Anyway, the good news is that they have also been adding older sermons to the site and now the archive goes back as far as the first sermon on Romans.

Not many preachers could get away with preaching for so long on just one book, although Piper is a lightweight compared to Lloyd-Jones’ 368 or so sermons on Romans (and he didn’t even finish the book).

I am reminded of Spurgeon’s comments on preachers who embark on series of sermons in his classic book “Lectures to My Students”:

“I have a very lively, or rather a deadly, recollection of a certain series of discourses on the Hebrews, which made a deep impression on my mind of the most undesirable kind. I wished frequently that the Hebrews had kept the epistle to themselves, for it sadly bored one poor Gentile lad. By the time the seventh or eighth discourse had been delivered, only the very good people could stand it; these, of course, declared that they never heard more valuable expositions, but to those of a more carnal judgment it appeared that each sermon increased in dullness. Paul, in that epistle, exhorts us to suffer the word of exhortation, and we did so. Are all courses of sermons like this? Perhaps not, and yet I fear the exceptions are few, for it is even said of that wonderful expositor, Joseph Caryl, that he commenced his famous lectures upon Job with eight hundred hearers, and closed the book with only eight! A prophetical preacher enlarged so much upon ‘the little horn’ of Daniel, that one Sabbath morning he had but seven hearers remaining.”