Biblical theology

It’s important! When actual counseling situations arise - as they have - and you need to explain what Jesus means when he’ll separate the wheat from the tares or goats from the sheep, what system of biblical narrative could you offer in that moment? The one that makes arbitrary xyz fruit the underpinning of one’s standing with God? Or the one that stresses preaching the truth of the gospel to believer and nonbeliever with equal, unyielding emphasis?

These are the implications of one’s biblical theology. Or a new believer wants to know the significance and purpose of the sacraments, i.e., baptism and the Lord’s supper. Your understanding of the covenants, the continuity or newness of them, will let them know how each sacrament edifies the believer and community of believers. Extremely practical stuff.

Don’t stop at systematic theology. Know the Bible as one huge chunk: how is the gospel (the coming kingdom of God) heralded throughout the ages? Doing so, at the very least, will edify your private worship of God as one whose sovereign hand cannot be hindered in blessing his people. And the best thing you can do for your church is increase your private worship.

Specifically, you can start at any number of systematic buckets (end-times, sacraments, covenants) and compare each biblical theologies’ (covenantal or dispensational) treatment against the Bible’s own hermeneutic (hinted in John 5:39, Luke 24:27). Personally, the hermeneutical lens I prescribe to is the one that magnifies the Father’s sovereignty, Christ’s sufficiency, and the spirit’s consistent, unthwarted execution of a masterful redemptive plan.

Private bible interpretation

One of the gems of reformation doctrine is the enabling of an individual to interpret scripture without a church cardinalship breathing down your neck or supervising your every step. “Sola fide” came out of a presumed “sola scriptura,” in that Martin Luther referred to the authority of scripture over all other man-made doctrine.

The fine print for us now is recognizing that the original authors had a specific context, intent, style and audience. We would do well, with our privilege to read and study scripture, to study it accurately. Peter writes in his second epistle how there is such a thing:

And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. (2 Peter 1:19-21)

A couple chapters later, the author confirms that there are indeed right and wrong interpretations for scripture, regardless of whether the reader initially understands (here referencing Paul’s epistles):

There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. (2 Peter 3:16-17)

These verses on interpretation, thankfully, do not leave much room for interpretation. Before we quickly pull out John 3:16, Jeremiah 29:11, or Philippians 4:13 to apply to a situation, let’s take some time to contextualize the author’s intent within that whole passage according to the audience’s situation. This is crucial in grasping God’s revealed will for us. In addition, be wary when pastors pull out shotgun verses on a topical sermon to back up an argument without regard to the history behind the verse.

Flesh worshipper

When I share my testimony, it's usually about the BYG Christmas service during my senior year. An event where I felt like I met God. Truth is, I probably wasn't saved until last semester - or at least when I was assured I was saved.

The year after my first church experience was a rollercoaster. Being identified as a Christian was something I could get behind because all my cool friends were also Christian. I took it seriously sometimes too; coming into Penn freshman year I had a 95 theses ready to combat the evils of evolutionary Inner Fishes. Pretty sure that stigmatized me as the preppy churchboy. In the mean time, my life was marked with constant fights with my family in addition to leaving two embittered pseudo-girlfriends in my wake. Is this the picture of 1 Thessalonians 5:24?

The question is: Did I love Christ? I really liked the worship songs that declared God faithful and loving and awesome, but all the songs and messages about Jesus' sacrifice I came to find... dull and offensive. Used to elegant theorems dictating universal truths, I could glean some faith in a powerful Creator that devised the Big Bang and brought forth the millions of solar masses and quasars chewing through each other for survival. But to make the story ugly and unclean by something as local as the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ was cringe-worthy. So unfulfilling, so undramatic, so anticlimactic.

I could have literally attended a synagogue or mosque those couple of years and my worship would not have been different. What was actually happening? I thought I was worshipping the LORD. but lo! I was bearing no fruit and living in sin. I was learning a bucketload of material on God's commands but I did not feel God's presence, and when I did it was His anger at my continual disobedience. My heart would be continually ridden with guilt and discouragement.

Fast-forward to Fall 2010 and you see a Willis that is, well, different. He knows Christ and obeys Him. He's not afraid to die for Christ, break up with his girlfriend for Christ, or drop out of school for Christ. What changed? The Spirit pointed me to things I once overlooked (John 16:13). My knowledge of the law no longer became a stumbling block, but rather was redeemed in coming to know grace in a fuller sense. Writing my "testimony" in preparation for baptism led me to reevaluate the origins of what caused my soul to stir that one BYG service: Ephesians 3:19 talks about whose love? Christ's. Christ is the lover of my soul!

Thank God Jesus acted so locally, so personally! Theocentricity without Christcentricity is judgement. Worshipping the LORD without praising Christ is worshipping one's own flesh, merely worshipping the potential happiness that this LORD could provide. Worship like this will lead to "dryness," and Christians should never be dry. If one is to worship in spirit and truth (John 4:23-24), they are to know the law, know the punishment for breaking the law, then be secure in the law fulfiller. May preaching be dispensed with 90% law and 10% grace, so that people may be first terrified of their disease and recklessly seize the cure without argument.

"Blinded men are ever prone to imagine that they have religious feelings because they have sensuous animal feelings in accidental juxtaposition with religious places, words or sights. This is the pernicious mistake which has sealed up millions of self-deceived souls for hell." - W. Robert Godfrey

"No Christ in your sermon, sir? Then go home, and never preach again until you have something worth preaching.
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And I mean by Christ not merely his example and the ethical precepts of his teaching, but his atoning blood, his wondrous satisfaction made for human sin, and the grand doctrine of ‘believe and live.’" - C.H. Spurgeon

"Terror accomplishes no real obedience. Suspense brings forth no fruit unto holiness. No gloomy uncertainty as to God’s favour can subdue one lust, or correct our crookedness of will. But the free pardon of the cross uproots sin, and withers all its branches. Only the certainty of love, forgiving love, can do this." - Horatius Bonar

For if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. For necessity is laid upon me. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! (1 Corinthians 9:16)

What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed, and in that I rejoice. (Philippians 1:18)

Guys, do not seek an experience but seek Christ.

2 Peter 3:18, Titus 3:4-8