Great Deal on Some Classical Music

The 99 Most Essential Masterpieces of the Classical Era for $1.99. I've bought a few of these deals as an inexpensive way to develop a reasonably broad range of some classics. Some experts may argue that these recordings aren't the best available, but I've never been disappointed, and you can't beat the price with a stick.

Some Interesting Tweets and Other Things of Less Significance

1. Sometimes who makes a point is as compelling as the point itself:

Kauflin: Sunday AM musical skill is meant to increase congregational participation, not overpower it.

. . . and . . .

More Kauflin: If people need vibey intros, [guitar] effects, cool licks & low lights to engage w/ God, we're misleading, not leading them.

His second statement, in particular, is a helpful repudiation of the belief common among charismatics and Pentecostals that our worship atmosphere (for lack of a better term) is able to invoke a manifestation of the Holy Spirit.

2. Once you reach the conclusion that there's no need for a pastor to preach to an assembled congregation in their presence, this is a minimal and rational step:

Driscoll: Pre-recording 2 sermons today. Allows me to go to Zac’s baseball tourney with my family rather than not seeing them on Father’s Day.

3. And finally, some of you may have heard some people trying to figure out what's wrong with the young'uns and what should be done about it. I'd just like to suggest that there is no problem worth solving, to which "you need to have a Facebook" is a solution.

Contrasts in Pastoral Transitions

John Piper (age 65) discusses the issue—challenging because it's "not in the Bible"—with Tim Keller (60-ish) and Don Carson (64) . . .



. . . and describes Bethlehem's ongoing process as well as his personal intentions:

My proposal to the elders—and it comes from Noël and me, not just me (we have talked a lot about this, as you can imagine)—is that I transition from pastor for preaching and vision to a fulltime writing and BCS teaching and mentoring and wider speaking role on June 30, 2014—three years from now. And that we be very intentional and prayerful and thoughtful about a successor in those years.

John MacArthur (who turns 72 on Sunday) reflects briefly on the same topic as he concludes a decades-long project of preaching through the New Testament:

I want to let you know that I'm not planning a retirement. I've told the elders, as long as I make sense, leave me alone. [audience laughter] When I don't make sense, just try to convince me that I don't make sense. [audience laughter] That's the problem, isn't it, so, drag me out of there.

Direct Mail Levity

James MacDonald's new study:

And from BJU:

A dude. Wearing jacket and tie. On the lawn. Reading a book on separation. To two girls.

SALE: Biblical Theology Series

Just an FYI here. This series is worth getting to know. I've read or am generally familiar with just a few volumes, but those have been extraordinarily helpful. I'd recommend this one in particular.

Couple caveats: 1) If you're completely new to biblical theology, they may not be the best place to start, and 2) These prices are better than usual and cheaper (from the ones I checked) than Amazon, but they're not going to blow your doors off. Still, if you want to pick up a couple, this seems like the time to do it.

Sloppy Talk About the Church's Mission

Previously, I've alluded to those who suggest that the Church's mission must be equivalent to Jesus' mission. Two primary concerns: 1) Often, they make the argument in a dismissive way, as if anyone who thinks the issue demands substantive discussion or nuance is obtuse. 2) They're wrong, and a sure implication of getting this one wrong is a redefinition of the Church's mission, often resulting in the marginalization of gospel proclamation.

I appreciate how Michael Horton addressed the issue, and I particularly appreciate that he addressed it in the context of a conference examining the implications of the gospel for all of life. Horton:

Our mission is qualitatively different from God's mission. God sends us on a mission, but it's a different mission than the mission he sent his Son on. It's different from the mission he sent his Spirit on. The Son could redeem the world. We can't. Again, loose talk—loose talk in the Church today about our redeeming activity in the world. WE should never, ever sully that wonderful word by saddling it to us as the subject of the verb. When it comes to redeeming anything, we are not the subject of the action. Jesus Christ is. Jesus is the unique, only, exclusive Redeemer of the world.

"Well, we're extending his redemption." No, we're not. There is no extension. He accomplished it once and for all. "Well, we are extensions of his incarnation." No, we're not. We're members of his body. I wasn't born of a virgin. I didn't suffer under Pontius Pilate. I wasn't crucified. I wasn't raised on the third day.

We preach not ourselves but Christ, and we are his ambassadors! Paul says, "Let's get that right. We are not the message. We're the messengers." So our mission is qualitatively different from God's. But because he finished his mission in his Son—his mission of redeeming—and he sent his Spirit to open the hearts of those to whom we speak, we have a mission that is guaranteed success.

In the Interest of Fairness and Honor, Where It's Due

Previously, I've obliquely pointed out the irony of a militantly separatist institution naming a dorm after Bibb Graves.

Well, Bibb's been expunged. I (and people better-connected than I) am unaware of any public explanation, but I'm assuming that a thoughtful insider did some good work. Thanks to you, and all who advanced this decision.

Father Abraham

Part 1 of this series based on Steve Wellum's chapter, "Baptism and the Relationship Between the Covenants" [PDF], in Tom Schreiner and Shawn Wright's Believer's Baptism, provided a brief summary of main contours in Covenant Theology. Part 2 focused on the "seed" theme in the Bible, reaching the conclusion that the term is used in four related but distinct ways. Part 3 traced Wellum's argument that Christ fulfills ALL the OT covenants.

Now, I want to highlight two of Wellum's conclusions, which are rooted in what we've considered so far (and by "we" I mean me and the two other people reading this). First:

To be a member of Abraham’s family now is not tied to a specific physical lineage, nor circumcision, nor any kind of physical links to other believers. Rather, one becomes a part of Abraham’s family only through faith union in Christ brought about by the Spirit (Gal 3:26–29). Thus, in the coming of Christ, a new era of redemptive history has dawned where the structures, types, and shadows of the old have given way to the reality and fulfillment of what the OT was all along pointing to (pg 143-144 in the PDF).

And another conclusion:

[Equating the Abrahamic Covenant with the New Covenant] not only fails to do justice to the diverse aspects of the Abrahamic covenant, but also to the way that covenant is ultimately fulfilled in Christ. So Israel, as a nation, is a type of the church. But this is the case, not because the church is merely the replacement of Israel, but because Christ, as the true seed of Abraham and the fulfillment of Israel, unites in himself both spiritual Jews and Gentiles as the “Israel of God” (Gal 6:16). There is continuity, but also important discontinuity. . . . The new covenant people of God are all those, regardless of ethnicity or circumcision, who have confessed Christ as Lord, the true/spiritual seed of Abraham. It includes all those who believe in Christ and who have been born of his Spirit (pg. 144 in the PDF).

What's most intriguing to me about Wellum's arguments is that they're targeted at a flawed presupposition of Covenant Theology, but they also critique Dispensational conclusions. (And I've only quoted the passages that apply most directly to both systems.) Covenant Theology denies differences between the biblical covenants; Dispensationalism denies that the Church is a full participant in the New Covenant—or even a participant at all. More on that, as well as ironic similarities between CT and D, to come.

800 Pound Gorillas

1. Is there any possibility that something is profoundly wrong with a culture that produces this (not to mention the events behind it)? That's not to indict any particular individual or the host venue. We (and I'm surely a part of that "we") are shaped by our culture, often in ways we neither desire nor perceive. Still, as long as precious few either detect the aroma or speak truthfully about what it smells like, the putrefaction will progress.

2. I wish I could say I found this not to be credible, but personal experience will not allow it:

Tina then went off to college -Maranatha Bible College in Wisconsin where one of the Deans advised her to 'keep her mouth shut' about what happened to her.
by Amy Coveno / WMUR Staff at Mon May 23 2011 12:48:09 GMT-0500 (CDT)

3. Speaking of products of a culture . . . I haven't yet heard anyone make an observation about "jihad Christianity," but Phil Johnson and Justin Taylor may tell us all we need to know, not that it's all we actually know—not by a long shot.

4. Just as a breath of fresh air, here's an entirely different sort of conversation–simply fascinating.

The Convergence of Covenant Fulfillment in Christ

This post is part 3 of a series based on Steve Wellum's chapter, "Baptism and the Relationship Between the Covenants" [PDF], in Tom Schreiner and Shawn Wright's Believer's Baptism. Part 1 provided a brief summary of main contours in Covenant Theology. Part 2 focused on the "seed" theme in the Bible ("offspring" in some translations) and examined the biblical usage of the term, reaching the conclusion that the term is used in four related but distinct ways in the text. The two long quotations in those posts were part of Wellum's summary and critique of Covenant Theology.

Now that we've set a bit of the context of Wellum's argument, we're getting closer to the point I want to emphasize. Between the two passages I quoted previously, Wellum focuses on the relationship of the Abrahamic Covenant to the Mosaic, Davidic, and New Covenants:

In the OT none of the covenant mediators—whether Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, or David—fulfilled their role and brought about the promise; they only typified and anticipated the one to come (Rom 5:14). Only our Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man, fulfills the roles of the previous covenantal mediators and brings about the promises stretching back to Gen 3:15. That is why the NT presents Christ as nothing less than the Lord as well as the last Adam, the true seed of Abraham, David’s greater Son, who ushers in a new covenant—a covenant which all the previous covenants anticipated and typified.

In Christ, all the promises of God are yes and amen (2 Cor 1:20). That is why in Jesus and his cross work, the desperate plight begun in Eden now finds its solution as the last Adam, the obedient Son, has accomplished his saving work. The promise that God himself must be the Savior of his people is fulfilled for he himself is the Lord. Indeed, the death of Jesus, the crime of all crimes, is nevertheless determined by the divine plan (Acts 2:23). Why? To bring to fulfillment what God had promised through the prophets, that Messiah would suffer (Acts 3:18) in order to save his people from their sins (Matt 1:21).

In Jesus Christ, the prophetic anticipation of God’s coming to save in and through David’s greater Son is fulfilled. Indeed, as D. A. Carson reminds us, “the promise that through Abraham’s seed all the nations of the earth will be blessed, gradually expanded into a major theme in the Old Testament, now bursts into the Great Commission, the mushrooming growth of the Jewish church into the Gentile world, the spreading flame reaching across the Roman Empire and beyond, in anticipation of the climactic consummation of God’s promises in the new heaven and new earth.” [Paragraph divisions and boldface type added. This portion is taken from pgs. 139-140 in the PDF and pgs. 131-132 in the print edition.]

In Part 4, I plan to build on this platform to take a closer look at our union with Christ and the ironic similarities between Covenant Theology and Dispensationalism.