Book Review/Summary - The True and Visible Church -and- The Form of a Christian Congregation (C.F.W. Walther)

To begin, we will take Walther's definition of what a church is:

• "An Evangelical Lutheran local congregation is a gathering of believing Christians at a definite place, among whom the Word of God is preached in its purity according to the Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church and the holy Sacraments are administered according to Christ's institution as recorded in the Gospel, in whose society, however, false Christians and hypocrites will always, and manifest sinners may sometimes, be found."

Walther also lists six duties of an Evangelical Lutheran Congregation independent of the state:

1. Have public meetings, where adult male members of the congregation are entitles to active participation by way of speaking, deliberating, voting, and resolving. Subjects of the meeting include doctrine, election or appointment of officers, church discipline, public offenses, quarrels among members, matters of good order, and the like.
2. See that the Word of God may richly dwell and have free scope in its midst.  The Word of God must be believed, taught, confessed, and preached, as well as the sacraments administered.
3. Care for the purity of doctrine. All the members of the congregation must strive to grow, and be enriched, in all utterance and in all knowledge.
4. Look after the temporal welfare of its members.
5. See that all things be done decently and in order.
6. Endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of love and Peace also with other parts of the Orthodox Church.

The Seven Deadly Sins

The 4th century monk Evagrius Ponticus developed a list of "eight evil thoughts" In AD 590, a little over two centuries after Evagrius wrote his list, Pope Gregory I revised this list to form the more common "Seven Deadly Sins", basically by combining vainglory and hubris into pride. 

The most common Biblical references are Proverbs 6:16: "There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him:"  and Galatians 5:19 (which I have a previous post on those here): "Now the works of the flesh are evident:"  However, comparing these to each other and to the seven deadly sins, I just don't see it. In the Proverbs verse, using numbers in x, x+1 is called a "graded numerical literary device" to emphasize something and show it is important. Hands that shed innocent blood is the only one that can be civilly punished.  The sowing of discord is the only one not associated with a body part. The sins are adjectives to the body part, showing that sin is the corruption of creation. It also describes and characterizes our bodies as sinful, showing original sin and total depravity.

Also, if there were deadly sins, why would they not be the Ten Commandments. Or even more, why not the only "unforgivable sin" of Matthew 12:31: "And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven." More importantly, the mindset behind this idea is completely backwards. If you think sins you are doing are deadly, then you have faith and Jesus died for them and they can be forgiven.  However, if you think sins you are doing are not deadly, then you don't take them seriously enough and are secure in sin. This is when you are in trouble.

Just for fun:

From: http://thisisindexed.com

Education

Now that I have kids in school, questions about what to do for their education comes up. What school should they go to, how to pay for college, etc…. One thing that is clear is that the education (both of secular and religious matters) is the responsibility of the parents. This is a great responsibility, because, Proverbs 22:6 tells us, "Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it."  Conversely, in Hosea 4:6, we learn, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge."

Some parents use this for justification for homeschooling, which is fine, but not necessary, in my opinion. Others use it as justification for private schools, where their children can get the "best education money can buy". Still other parents use this as justification for religious private schooling. To me, it does not matter and a good public school can work as well. What is the most important is the parents are engaged, which has actually been shown to be the most important indicator of student success.

However, it is done, religious instruction is as important, more important actually, as secular and it is also the parents' responsibility. Martin Luther recognized this and so he wrote his small catechism as a resource for parents to teach their kids at home. Nowadays, we have delegated that responsibility to Confirmation, or catechism class, and parents think they are off the hook. In reality we can delagate the teaching of it, but not the responsibility for it. From that comes downplaying the importance of this education. I think Herman Sasse said it best, when he said:

“We recognize for too seldom that religious and confirmation instruction and the Sunday school can in no way give what previous generations knew from home through Bible reading and what was learned from pious parents. Today the need of the hour for the Lutheran Church is to become a teaching church again…. Do we really believe that the members of our congregations take so much with them from a few hurried hours of confirmation instruction… that they are able to live on it throughout their whole lives as people who daily return to their baptism?”

Not only is religious instruction important, but practice is of the utmost importance to be taught, which is not done at all in most churches. Sasse says elsewhere, “We need extensive instruction in the liturgy.” Not only should the liturgy and practice be taught, but once it is, it actually teaches us even more. Pastor Mark Surburg says,

"The liturgy is also one of the most important tools for pastoral care that the Church possesses. The repetition of the liturgy is not mere repetition. Instead it is implanting words [the Word of God] into us so that are ready to be used by the Holy Spirit in the reception of Christ’s gifts and the response of praise – no matter where this takes place. The repeated use of the liturgy makes it part of us and thereby allows us to experience the Divine Service in spite of age and illness.

"It is therefore crucial that we teach our children the liturgy – both for the present and the future. This is a task that a congregation needs to take seriously in the weekly celebration of the Divine Service, in Sunday school and in catechesis at all levels."

Irenaeus on the Tetramorph, Gospels, and the Four Corners of the Earth

I always found the ancient "four elements" (air, earth, fire, and water) interesting and new that they often corresponded to temperaments or humors int eh ancient world. When I was reading Irenaeus it peaked my interest when he discussed how Ezekiel's (and Revelation's) four living creatures (the tetramorph) corresponded to the gospels, the four corners of the earth, and the four temperaments. After looking into it more, here is a table I developed that compares all of those types of things I could find.

To be fair and complete, there are other theories as well. Some other theologians disagreed with Irenaeus on which gospel was represented by which animal. Also, some have claimed that the location and population of the 12 tribes of Israel prophecy of Jesus and the Gospel as well.  Here is a diagram of that.

Systematics and Common Places

 

Since, I said that this blog was my "common places" in the "about" tab, for my 100th blog post, I thought I would finally explain what I mean by that. This blog is and has been my attempt to document my systematic study of theology and dogma of the Christian Church as correctly exposited in the Lutheran Confessions. I have attempted to label the blogs along the lines and terminology of the common places of systematics, and am attempting to hit all of the categories.

Biblical Theology is reading the Bible as a progressive history of God revealing Himself.

Historical Theology is the study of Church history. It can be thought of as a continuation of Biblical theology.
            We are not in a vacuum, but a historical community of believers, church fathers, and false teachers.

Definition of terms
Doctrine: The teaching. The body of teachings, integrated as a whole

Dogma: divinely revealed doctrine that is objectively true

Systematic Theology (Systematics): Classification and categorization of theological topics (dogma)

Common Places (or Loci): Writing down the systematic categories in common categories
Dogmatic Theology (Dogmatics): Bring all teachings concerning each diving truth (dogmata) together and arrange them systematically, keeping the whole teaching (doctrine) in mind

Prolegomena
Methods and presuppositions before beginning theological studies

            Hermeneutics: The study of interpretation theory.  (The art, theory, and practice of interpretation).

                        Exegesis (draw out): Critical explanation or interpretation of a text, especially religious. 
                        This is why we say that scripture interprets scripture.

                        Eisegesis (draw in): Reader imports own, or subjective meaning into text.
                        This should never be done.

Revelation and the Authority of Scripture (Bibliology)

            Origins and Authenticity

            Canon

            Necessary

            Sufficiency

            Clarity

            Inspiration/Revelation - The actual Words of God

Inerrancy - Without errors

            Infallibility - Not able to have errors

            Efficacy - Effective, successful in producing the effect. It does what it says.

God (Theology Proper)

            One God

Three Persons
                        Father (Paterology)
                        Son (Filiology)
                        Holy Spirit (Pneumatology)

Attributes
                        Omnipotent - all powerful
                        Omniscient - all knowing
                        Omnipresent - all present
                        Omnibenevolent - all good
                        Omnificent - all creating

Creation (Cosmology)

            Origin of the universe
            Origin of humans

Spiritual Beings (Angelology)

            Angels

            Fallen Angels (Demonology)

Sin and the Fall (Hamartiology)

The Nature of Humanity (Anthropology)

The Person (Christology) and Work (Objective Soteriology - applied universally) of Jesus

The Son

The Word (Logos)

Incarnation, Virgin Birth, Life, Ministry, Death, Resurrection
            Divinity and Humanity

Messiah, Redeemer

Justification/Salvation (Subjective Soteriology - applied personally)

            Justification, Grace, Faith

Regeneration and Rebirth

Repentance and Forgiveness

Predestination and Free Will

The Nature of Church and its Practices (Ecclesiology)

            The two kingdoms, ecclesiastical authority and civil affairs

Sacraments (sacramentology)

            Worship

            Mission (Missiology)
            Vocation

            Office of the Ministry (Pastoral Theology)

                        Homiletics: General principles of rhetoric to public preaching
                        (study of composition and delivery of sermon or religious discourse)
                        Catechesis: Teaching the faith

The Christian Life

Obedience

Sanctification

Consummation (Eschatology)

            Death (Individual Eschatology)

End of the world (General or Cosmic Eschatology)

Judgment, Heaven, Hell

Resurrection

Favorite Tweets

So, I finally broke down and got a twitter account.  I thought I would put my top 15 favorite so far here. Who knew there was such good (and funny) theology on the interwebs?

 

Philippians 2:1-11 - Imitating Christ's Humility

I.) Verses 1,2

  1.) What does like-minded mean in verse 2?

a.) Text note says “not uniformity in thought but the common disposition to work together and serve on another – the ‘attitude of Christ’ (attitude in v. 5)

            b.) Romans 12:16

            c.) Romans 14:1-2,4

            d.) Romans 15:5,6

  2.)We need unity in the Church. Like minded = be in harmony with each other and have an attitude like Christ.  Common goal/end/purpose. Common doctrine and faith.

II.) Verses 3,4

  1.)How then, do we act or What does Humility entail?

            a.) John 13:13-15

            b.) Look at example of Christ.

III.) Verses 6-11

  1.) Christ shown as the ultimate example.

  2.) 6-11 are historically called the “Mind of Christ.”  Does it fully describe his attitude?  His mind?  Is there a difference?

  3.) What is the difference between humiliation and humility?

            a.)Definitions:

            Humiliate – to cause to feel shame

            Humility – humble quality

  4.) Jesus “taking the vary nature of a servant while he was really “in very nature God” exemplified his humility while dying on the cross humiliated him.

IV.) Verse 6

  1.) What the heck does that mean?

a.) Could not physically grasp all of God’s power due to holding back – not even he knew when the last day was.

b.) Could not be mentally grasped or understood.

V.) Verse 7

  1.) “made himself nothing” literally means “emptied himself”  Text note says He did not do this by giving up his deity.  He chose to lay aside his glory and being humiliated.

VI.) Verse 8

  1.) “Obedient” – Hebrews 5:7-8

            a.) Did Jesus need to learn obedience?  Does he learn anything?

            b.) “Once made perfect” implies he wasn’t always.

VII.) Verse 9

  1.) John 17:5 – asking to regain previous position of glory (occurred at resurrection).  Exchange humiliation for glorification.  Key word - Previous

VIII.) Verses 10,11

  1.) Fulfilling the prophecy - Isaiah 45:23