Archive for the ‘Theology’ Category

Posted on January 17, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Idolatry in Noble Tasks

I think sometimes I get myself into some sort of internal conundrum trying to have a water-tight take on specific doctrines. I don’t think I’m trying to get all my important doctrines squared off into neat little boxes so that I can take the moral high-ground on everyone else and point fingers. That’s really not my intent. I think I quest more for neat formulas because I vest confidence in those formulas as I proceed in ministry and life.

So for example, at the moment I’m frantically scratching my head over the doctrine of the church. There are a number of loose ends that I’d love to see neatly tied up. Why? So that I can tell the world off because they’ve all got church wrong? No – simply so that I can do church properly myself. And herein lies the problem. It becomes a trust problem. My confidence in ministry and life becomes vested in how well I’m able to intellectually tie together my framework about specific doctrines. Now even though many of those doctrines might be closely tied to Christ, they are themselves not Christ and my pursuit of them can therefore become idolatrous.

I wonder if some of us truly believe that we can become idolatrous in our doctrinal quests and miss the Christ under whom all our doctrines should be subservient? I must quest for knowledge, I must quest for truth, I must quest for doctrinal clarity where possible, but I must quest with Christ as my master and nothing else. Anything less is religious idolatry and depreciates the very point of knowledge, truth and doctrine.

Posted on January 17, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Quote of the Week

“This internet is a wonderful tool, isn’t it? Incredible insight with very little actual knowledge.“  – Michael Spencer responds to some would-be Christian watchdogs prowling around the internet looking for minute discrepancies to devour without understanding.

Posted on January 16, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

2008 Preliminary Reads

Here are some of the reads I’m intending to attempt along with all my college reading in the first two months or so of the year:

A Clear and Present Word – Mark D. Thompson

I’m busy with this one at the moment – almost halfway through. Thompson makes quite a compelling case that not only is God a speaking God but he is a speaking God that intends for his communication to be known by those he has created. I just finished a brilliant section where he tackles the issue of human language and exposes the potential problems it poses for communication between a transcendent God and his human creations.

Post-Christendom – Stuart Murray

I’ve read a fair amount of good reviews about this one so I thought I’d better check it out. I’d like to also match up the way he qualifies post-christendom with the current South African Christian context and see how true his picture rings here.

Neither Poverty nor Riches – Craig L. Blomberg

I live in South Africa where poverty and riches live side by side in a way that is found almost nowhere else in the world. I think, therefore, a thorough knowledge of what the scriptures say on the issue, authored by a proven biblical scholar, is a must for me and other ministers in this country.

Posted on January 15, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

iPod therefore I Am

George Whitefield College is running its annual ‘Summer School of Biblical Christianity’ from 23 Jan to 1 Feb 2008 at their campus in Muizenberg, Cape Town. They’re offering courses on Biblical Theology, Church Response to Contemporary Issues, New Testament Greek, Old Testament Hebrew, Advanced Exegesis and Post-Graduate Research. I’ll be attending the Post-Graduate Research course.

What was really interesting to me is that Mark Norman will be down from Pretoria to teach 6 sessions on understanding postmodernism entitled ‘iPod therefore I Am‘. Here’s his schedule:

Part 1: Understanding Postmodernism – The differences between ‘Premodern’, ‘Modern’ and ‘Postmodern’ societies.

Part 2: Postmodernism and the Problem of Truth – A Christian critique of postmodern views of knowledge and truth.

Part 3: Postmodernism, Terrorism and Fundamentalism – The new global war and what it means for the church.

Part 4: Postmodernism and African Thought – How post-colonial African thought relates to postmodernism and its relevance for the church.

Part 5: Postmodernism and the Use of Language – A study of postmodern approaches to language, with special relevance to Jacques Derrida.

Part 6: Postmodernism and the Stories We Live In – Are you living in the Christian story?

Mark’s talks will take place in the mornings of each day prior to the other Summer School classes.

For more information contact GWC  (021) 788-1652

Or see the college website.

Posted on January 11, 2008 - by Stephen Murray

Thanks for all the Literature Bart and Co.

After watching those Ehrman lectures I was wondering to myself how I might pastor people who came to me distressed after reading a book like ‘Misquoting Jesus‘ or far less scholarly literature like the ‘Da Vinci Code‘. So I did some searching around to see how many people have written academic responses to these sorts of works but written them at a popular level – as Ehrman himself does. Now we all know about the glut of literature written in response to the ‘Da Vinci Code‘ but what else is out there?

What I noticed, without having read much of it at all, but through reading reviews by other top scholars, is that there seems to be a whole lot of really decent literature out their refuting people like Ehrman, Price, Pagels and of course Mr. Brown.  Top evangelical scholars like Darrell Bock, Daniel Wallace, NT Wright, and others have written quite a few works. And so in once sense I’m glad that Ehrman and co. wrote these books because its made a whole lot of good Christian scholarship, in this area, available to so many more people than we previously had. As has always been the case in history, the church is writing theology for each occasion and there is some quality coming out.

Posted on December 5, 2007 - by Stephen Murray

Restorative Eschatology – An Open Forum

Due to the success of the last Open Forum I’ve decided to make them a regular occurrence here at ‘…daylight‘. This time I want to build upon something I noted in the last forum and one of the comments that was posted in response. I noted that our gospel definitions did not include the subjects of heaven or hell and that this was peculiar because often evangelicals are accused of reducing the gospel to a ‘get out of hell free’ ticket. Chris Gensheer who blogs at Intersection made the following astute comment in response:

One of the reasons why I think “heaven and hell” were not mentioned is because I think there is something of a turn within evangelicalism from a “turn or burn” eschatology, to a restorative eschatology.

So here’s the topic of the new forum. What does a restorative eschatology look like? Does it mean we all become post-mills? Does it mean that the New Creation is realized in this age as more and more people live out what it means to follow Jesus? Or does it mean that even though this world will pass away, because of the New Creation we must live with a restorative hope that works itself out in the present age?

So once again I’ll get the ball rolling: I’m not a post-mill, I’m more a-mill. I would argue however that because I believe that God will make a New Creation one day, and because I am positionally a member of the New Creation already in Christ, I must live restoratively now in this life.

Alright peeps, your turn (and remember be nice and no essay-length comments please). BTW – If you don’t understand some of the terminology in this post then follow the links for definitions.

Posted on November 27, 2007 - by Stephen Murray

Kimball on Hell

Dan Kimball has some very astute words regarding the subject of ‘hell’ which he preached on three times this last Sunday. He’s definitely worth a read and perhaps a decent, humble and thoughtful corrective to some emerging theologies that are preparing for Christianity without hell.

Posted on November 21, 2007 - by Stephen Murray

How am I to Respond?

Dion has written a post on discouragement. In it he mentions that one of the things that has discouraged him recently is the response of the conservatives to Desmond Tutu’s statements earlier in the week (See Dion’s mention of those responses here). Now I am a conservative and I did respond to Tutu’s words. I don’t know if Dion had me in mind when he wrote those posts, I don’t even know if he read my post. He definitely didn’t mention me or my blog in either of his posts and so as I write this post I write it not in response to Dion, or even someone like Gus who commented on my post. I write rather as a kind of open question to anyone who is willing to propose an honest answer. Here is my dilemma/question:

I wish to know how I ought to respond to someone like Tutu when he makes the statements that he makes. I, along with many other evangelicals, believe that homosexual practice is sin in the eyes of God. I absolutely detest homophobia and hope that in my life and ministry it will be evident to all that I am as accepting of homosexuals as I am of anyone else on this planet. Yet I still stand with a prolific leader of the church in my country making statements that I am convinced to my core are not in accordance with Scripture. How should I respond? Do I ignore my convictions for the sake of a percieved unity when in my heart of hearts I know that God (if he truly has spoken by his scriptures) laments those statements of Tutu’s?

I desire to be beyond reproach in the way I use this blog as a mouth piece. I desire to be gracious and display humility at all times when interacting with those with whom I disagree. But I cannot ignore my convictions. So how should I respond?

Posted on November 19, 2007 - by Stephen Murray

Preaching Errors According to Manchester #3

Part #1

Part #2

Simon Manchester’s third error – ‘System beats Text’:

Even more common than this manner-over-matter preaching is the system-beats-text preaching. This is the widespread danger of dragging every text through the grid of one doctrine that ignores the point of the original passage. For example, one overseas preacher seems to put every passage through the ‘justification by faith’ grid. He is clever and insightful and searching – you’re on the psychiatrist’s couch in no time! – but there is this sa/bad taste left in your mouth that the biblical book was in the service of an idea. ‘Bible-combing’ preaching also has its systematic strengths but often seems to neglect each biblical writer’s specific point in favour of the biblical overview. For example, if Jesus is teaching on people in prison (Matt 25:31-46), it is dangerous to start collecting ‘prison’ references and miss the point in the passage that Jesus will one day announce those who took his ‘brothers’ seriously. Much better to stay with the text in hand until the main point is clear.

My own view, for its worth, is that this is the single biggest problem in preaching in our ‘Reformed’ camp. I’ve often heard of it referred to as ‘the dreaded sack of knowledge’. The need to systematize everything just hinders us from seeing the point of each individual text. If God wanted us to have a systematics text book he would have given us one – but he didn’t, he gave us a story. We might find that certain doctrines would be better nuanced if we tried to avoid this trap even when we’re doing systematic theology. We need to preach the text, not our systems.

Posted on November 16, 2007 - by Stephen Murray

Last Day…Ever!

Today is my last day of undergraduate theology lectures ever! I’ve been a registered undergraduate student for over 8 years now in various disciplines (for those of you in the States – we don’t have the MDiv. type degree here in South Africa – if you’ve got an undergraduate in something else and you want to train for the ministry you have to another undergraduate in theology). One more year of postgrad next year and then its time to stop collecting letters after my name and start working!