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Word of the Week: Theology Proper

After several weeks of hiatus, I’m back to posting a regular word of the week theology post. Our most recent theme addressed the doctrine of revelation. In these posts we explored terms related to the Word of God and how we can trust it.

The next theme we are going to work through is theology proper, or the doctrine of God. In the spring, I posted on theology as something more than an academic discipline. In the next number of posts, I’m going to work through terms related specifically to the doctrine of God.

Remember, theology is the study of God and God’s relation to the world. The doctrine of revelation (our most recent theme) studies how God makes himself known to us through general and special revelation. The doctrine of Christ (which we started with in January) studies how God revealed himself to us through his Son, Jesus Christ. In theology proper, we are going to reflect on the character, attributes, and glory of God. This will be a daunting task.

No book, article, sermon, or blogpost can exhaust the wonders, glories, and majesty of God. One of the reasons for the hiatus over the last few weeks is my personal hesitancy in how to explore the doctrine of God adequately and accurately in a blogpost format.

As a result, the subsequent posts regarding God, his character, his person, and his attributes will be limited. I will attempt to choose terms that I can explain clearly and accurately in the limits of a blogpost. I will also aim to reflect what I believe to be one of the primary truths of Scripture–God is knowable.

Theological terms and doctrinal studies can become academic or dry. As a bit of a theology nerd, I have been known to bore a congregation (or my family) by diving too far down into theological minutia. But this is not what theology is supposed to be. Theology is supposed to be about God making himself known and accessible to us.

Jesus prayed in John 17:3, “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.”

The primary purpose of studying the doctrine of God is to know God through Jesus Christ. My hope is that the posts that follow in the weeks to come will help us to know God better.

In his classic book, Knowing God, J. I. Packer observed:

We must say that knowing God involves, first, listening to God’s Word, and receiving it as the Holy Spirit interprets it, in application to oneself; second, noting God’s nature and character, as his Word and works reveal it; third, accepting his invitations and doing what he commands; fourth, recognizing and rejoicing in the love that he has shown in thus approaching you and drawing you into this divine fellowship.

J. I. Packer, Knowing God, 37.

So let us approach these posts in the following ways:

  • We approach the study of God with humility recognizing the greatness, majesty, and grace of God.
  • We approach the study of God with curiosity recognizing that we will never exhaust the truth and truths about God in our finite understanding.
  • We approach the study of God with fear (awe and reverential respect) recognizing that God in his holiness is to be feared.
  • We approach the study of God with faith recognizing that God revealed himself to us through his creation and his Word reflecting God’s desire to make himself known to us.
  • We approach the study of God with gratitude recognizing the privilege of knowing God and being known by God.
  • We approach the study of God with perseverance recognizing that we will never exhaust the knowledge of God in our finitude.
  • We approach the study of God with submission recognizing that what God reveals about himself to us should result in repentance, change, and obedience in our relationship to him.

In next week’s post, we will begin with several of the primary names God uses in Scripture when he reveals himself to us.

Photo by KEEM IBARRA on Unsplash

Hang in There

Over the last couple of years one of our staff members has shared a recurring encouragement to me. Mike Matheney has said to me to “Hang in there.”

In normal (pre-covid) circumstances and ministry, hanging in there is another way of encouraging perseverance. Over the last 18 months or so that phrase has taken on heightened significance.

Sometimes, it feels like we are barely hanging on.

In his book, Seven Leaders: Preachers and Pastors, Iain Murray reflected upon pastor and mentor Kenneth MacRea. MacRea pastored in a remote village off the coast of Scotland. When he was eighty MacRea penned these pertinent and insightful words:

There is only one thing I know I can do well. I cannot lead, but I can truthfully say that I am able to hang on. It may arise from natural stubbornness, but I know that popular religious movements which, despite their lack of scriptural support, carry away so many good people, leave me entirely unaffected. I believe that I can set my teeth and hold on, but that is all I am good for.

Kenneth MacRea, quoted by Iain Murray in Seven Leaders.

Did you catch that phrase, “able to hang on”? The context in the chapter reflects on pastoral ministry and theological fidelity, but the phrase is applicable in our situations today.

I’m writing this reflection on the day our county schools begin again. There is a lot going on in our lives. There are a lot of tensions and difficulties surrounding us in our community, in our personal lives, and across the world.

Are you able to hang on?

  • For some of us, hanging on has meant remote school, sending your kids back to school, and worrying about the spread of Covid in school.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant dealing with sickness and recovering much more slowly than we would like.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant grieving without the normal experiences of visitation, a funeral, and friends/family to hug and visit during the death of a loved one.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant a loss of job or loss of freedom.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant learning to do your job differently and changing habits and practices just to get by.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant internal and psychological pressures that no one else will ever know.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant remaining faithful to a spouse who doesn’t act with love toward you and trying to sustain a marriage that you’re not sure will make it.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant learning new coping mechanisms to deal with the stresses of a pandemic and all the ways it has affected our lives.
  • For some of us, hanging on has meant __________________ (you can fill in the blank here).

You get it, don’t you? Maybe last month, maybe last year, maybe as you’re reading this right now, you’re just hanging on.

Some of us have both our hands wrapped around our situations hanging on rather easily. Others of us are hanging on with only one hand. And for probably more than a few of us, we feel like our fingers are slipping and we’re losing our grip.

What happens if you let go?

What happens if your grip slips?

What happens if you can’t hold on any longer?

If you are follower of Jesus, remember this.

If you let go, if your grip slips, if you stop hanging on, then you will be ok. Jesus is holding on to you and holding on for you.

Jesus gave us this assurance:

27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”

John 10:27-30

Jesus promised that he is hanging on to us. Jesus promised that the Father is hanging on to us. And no one (circumstance, burden, difficulty, sickness, person, Satan, etc.) can pull us from the hand of our Savior.

No matter what’s going on today, this week, or in the internal processes of your life, remember that you are in the hands of Jesus.

Hang on. Hold on. Don’t let go. Trust in the Lord. Take time to read Psalm 31. Pray for the Lord’s deliverance and rescue. Take time to read John 10. Rest in the hand of Jesus.

Hang in there. But if you let go, remember that Jesus won’t.

Photo by Dương Trần Quốc on Unsplash