What is the “Image of God?”

In the last few blog posts I shared a bit about how to approach the “image of God” and some of the shared assumptions most theologians have about the doctrine. Now we can finally turn our attention to the meaning of the “image of God” in contemporary theology.

This term’s meaning typically falls into one of four categories: Structural, Relational, Functional, and Dynamic.

Structural Accounts
Structural accounts of the image of God argue that there is some substantial or structural feature of humanity that humans share with God. Historically this similarity has been located in the soul or in rationality or the will. When theologians have attempted to discern the structural similarities between God and humans, they have typically taken one of two approaches. They either begin by looking at the rest of creation in an attempt to discern how humans are different from other created beings or they look directly to God to discern what features humans share with him. The structural view is no longer popular among theologians, although it maintains a high level of influence in popular thought. There are a few reasons why the structural view has fallen out of favor. First, the structural view lacks exegetical basis. Although arguments could be made for how scripture teaches that humans have (or are) a soul or that humans are rational beings these arguments are not connected in a significant way to passages which address the imago Dei. Second, the structural view tends to exclude those who lack features deemed normative. If rationality defines what it means to be made in the image of God, then young children and those with several mental incapacities would not be considered to be made in the image of God. Third, many of the features of humans that have been thought to ground the uniqueness of human beings from animals have been shown to be shared features. Rationality or the will are no longer considered to be the exclusive possession of humans. Other animals display rationality. The difference seems to be one of degree and not kind. Finally, the features which ground the structural view tend to be disembodied features. This does not take into account the embodied nature of humans nor does it account for the embodied nature of the image of God.

Relational Accounts
If structural accounts of the image of God have fallen out of favor among systematic theologians, then relational accounts have now become the most popular account. According to relational accounts, it is some particular relation that forms the basis for being made in the image of God. Sometimes this relation is thought to be humanity’s relational nature, which is shared with God. Other times, it is thought to be a particular relation that humanity bears to God. Calvin for example advocates for the image of God as being a relation of “mirroring.” Humans image God as a mirror images it’s subject. More commonly, theologians have argued that humans are relational just like God. Karl Barth grounds his relational doctrine of the image of God in the fact that within God there is an I-Thou relationship. Just like there is an I-Thou relationship in God marked by unity and difference, humans experience a relationship of unity and difference in their sexuality. There is unity and difference, Barth says, between male and female. The advantage of this view is that it is highly embodied and that it has an exegetical basis. Moltmann, also takes his cues from Trinitarian theology. He argues that much like God, who is a social Trinity, humans are found in community marked by sexual differences. Moltmann explicitly argues against accounts of the image of God based on psychological analogies to the Trinity and chooses to ground the imago Dei in the social Trinitarian account of perichoresis. The primary critique leveled against relational accounts is that they tend to derive from social Trinitarianism (only non-social Trinitarians will find this critique significant) and that they rely on the modern I-Thou philosophy of thinkers like Buber.

Functional Accounts
If structural accounts have fallen out of favor, relational accounts have become primary among theologians, then functional accounts have won the day among biblical scholars. Functional accounts argue that the image of God is a particular function that humans carry out. This function is usually described in reference to the ancient near eastern context of Genesis. Most ANE scholars recognize religious and political language in Genesis’ use of selem and demut. In Egypt and Babylon, the term was often used to denote the representative function of idols or kings, standing as the personal presence of a god. Accordingly, the have the idol or image of a diety present was to have the diety there. Similarly, the king stood as an image of the diety, representing the deity’s authority in that location. The notion also carried political implications. Kings might set up an image or a statue of themselves in some far off location to denote their presence. Given this ANE background it seems as though to say that humans are made in God’s image means that humans represent his presence. It also means that humans rule on his behalf. This has been described by biblical scholars like G.K. Beale, Richard Middleton, and N.T. Wright as a vice-regent role. The human’s function, as the image of God, then, is to represent God and to rule on his behalf. This view has the strengths of having a strong exegetical basis. Its biggest weaknesses, however, is that it might be an instance of “parallelomania.” This is a term used by biblical scholars to denote that too much is being drawn from parallel concepts found in the bible’s cultural backgrounds. Also, it may be the case that the function is a result of being made in the image, not that the function is the image itself. Thus we are still left asking, what does it mean to be made in the image of God?

Dynamic Accounts
A fourth, common view about the image of God that is held in contemporary theology is the dynamic understanding of the concept. Accordingly, the image is something that is primarily eschatological. This view does not deny that humans were made in the image of God, as it states in Genesis, nor that humans don’t currently posses the image of God. Rather it places the emphasis on the future, as the telos of the image of God is actually found in the eschaton. Isaac Dorner represents this view well when he says that the image of God is our current endowment but that it is also our destiny. As I noted above, most theologians agree that there is a dynamic aspect built in to the biblical understanding of the image of God. There are some theologians, however, who emphasize this more than other. Wolfhart Pannenberg, for example, is one such theologian. He argues for a Christological account of the image of God, however, he argues that the Christological fulfillment of the image belongs to humanity proleptically. Grenz, who studied under Pannenberg, also emphasizes the dynamic nature of the image of God. Like Pannenberg, Grenz emphasizes that Christ is the true image of God. He is the perfect image of God. Accordingly, human beings who have put their faith in Christ, are being transformed into his likeness. This is a process that occurs in this life and is completed in the eschaton. One beneficial feature of the dynamic view, is that it can be added to any of the other views of the imago Dei. The relational theologian can say that the relationship comes to its completion in the eschaton, the functional theologian can say that we will rule in perfect unity with God’s will in the new creation.

Six Assumptions About The Meaning of the “Imago Dei”

Although there is deep disagreement concerning what being made in the image of God means, most theologians share a common set of assumptions regarding the doctrine. Let me share a few – specifically six – of those assumptions with you.

  1. Most theologians agree that the terms in Genesis 1, selem and demut, connote reflection and representation in some sense.
  2. They agree that selem and demut, that is, “image” and “likeness” do not mean two different things. That “image” and “likeness” meant two different things was a common assumption of Patristic and medieval reflection on the doctrine. The view that these words meant two completely different things is rejected by John Calvin and by modern exegetes.
  3. Theologians agree that understanding the ancient near eastern context in which Genesis was written is significant for understanding the terms.
  4. Theologians recognize that imaging necessarily requires embodiment. There is no space in the Bible for a non-embodied image.
  5. Theologians recognize that in the New Testament, the term image of God is Christological.
  6. Most theologians recognize that there is a dynamic element to the image of God. Those in the Western tradition have typically argued that the image was once perfectly possessed by Adam, but that it was marred or lost at the fall. Those who are in Christ are growing into the image of God once again. Eastern traditions have emphasized that Adam was created in an immature state, and that the goal was to grow up more fully into the image of God.

These six assumptions aren’t universally shared by all theologians, but they are indeed assumed by most theologians working on the topic today. In a subsequent post I will address some different views concerning the image of God.

These 6 assumptions are based on Marc Cortez’s book Theological Anthropology: A Guide for the Perplexed.

Constructing Landscapes of Interiority in Second Temple Judaism

Yesterday I had the privilege of attending day two of the 2019 Payton Lectures at Fuller Seminary. The speaker was Carol Newsom, from Emory. Her topic for the lecture series was senses of the self in ancient Judaism. Below are my notes from yesterday’s lecture.

Q:How strange and different were the ancient Israelites?

  • Questions about same/different arise when we try to study cultures of the ancient world – “the past is a foreign country…”
  • Yet scholars have tended to assume that the experience of being a self was the same back then as it is now – but now we know that the concept of self is a changing experience (see Taylor’s Sources of the Self)
    • What about the ancient Israelite concept of the self?
  • Devito: The ancient Israelite self is different
    • Its deeply embedded in social identity
    • Embedded and undefined boundaries
    • Doesn’t exalt autonomy – emphasizes obedience
    • Inwardness was lacking
    • In other words – Israelite was socio-centric and not ego-centric — this ends up in two different understandings of the self

 

Q: Did the ancient Israelite sense of self lack a robust interiority (i.e. culture of interiority)?

  • See David Lambert for a critique of this lack of a culture of interiority
  • Newsom suggests: All people experience inner conflict – we are emotional animals – but not every culture tells you to pay particular attention to and cultivate these practices.
  • Our cultural practices (symbols and stories) reinforce certain synaptic patterns and make certain connections stronger in our minds, so it does shape and reshape the brain, making us different people — We become different selves than we would be if we were equipped with different cultural tools

 

Biblical Sense of Interiority

  • There is an awareness of interiority
    • Thoughts described as in the heart
    • God searching hidden aspects
    • Basic distinction between knower and agent (I and Me)
  • In post-exilic period the importance/attention paid to the sense of interiority grows
  • See the Psalm 51 for an example of the “split” subject (structure of self-alienation that creates an interior landscape)

“Sin is the ultimate pre-existing condition, and no your insurance won’t cover it.”

Second Temple Interiority

  • New concept of inclinations which are objectified as innate psychological dispositions
  • Shift from outward object of desire to inner part of oneself that needs to be controlled
  • See the Two-Spirits Teaching of the DSS
    • Spirit of Truth and Spirit of Perversity – that struggle in the heart of a person. They correspond to external transcendent powers but also to interior principles.

Book of Job

  • Constructs Job as a character of psychological depth – contrast between prose and poetry – The author makes the content of Job’s psyche a point of interest for us
    • How pain distorts what one desires/sense of time
    • Refers to distress and inability to control his own psychological space
    • Engages in mental projection – hypothetically changing his mental state
    • How it engages the experience of cognitive dissonance
    • Psychological turns (ex: Bitterness in 9:14-33 then a turn)
  • Even without a tradition of a psychic drama – the author of Job explores the landscape of interiority that manifests itself in cognitive dissonance

Landscapes of Interiority for “Fun” and “Entertainment” in Bible – Theory of Mind

  • Theory of Mind – is that stranger friendly or hostile, is that collegue withholding information, what does my friend think about her feelings for her significant other
    • We are only somewhat good at “mind reading” – it’s the basis for a lot of comedy
  • Mind reading is a fundamental part of the human tool kit
    • Yet – many cultures don’t put an emphasis on this
    • Literary scholars argue that “mind reading” becomes a prominent action with the rise of novels…
  • Ancient Israel developed “theory of mind” in ways that other ANE cultures didn’t
    • However, their use of “theory of mind” is a lot more rare than we are used to
    • Examining cases of deception shows this a bit, but the author doesn’t really make mind-reading a focus of attention
  • One clear example of “mind reading”
    • Ex: Conversation between David and Jonathan
      • Jonathan thinks he knows his father’s intentions but David disagrees and provides a different “mind reading” than Jonathan.
      • David thinks he knows what Saul thinks about what Jonathan will think about Saul thinking something about David.

Theory of Mind in 2nd Temple Literature

  • See book of Esther – Haman thinks he can read the mind of the king, only to realize he is bitterly mistaken when the honors are given to Mordecai. IN this case the audience is in the know about the mistaken case of mind-reading.
  • Book of Ruth – Reader is supposed to fill in gaps about: Naomi’s silence…. What is Naomi and Ruth’s intent when she asks Ruth to sneak into Boaz’s place? These are gaps in the intentions/mental state of characters – what does she think he thinks? What do we think he thinks? The author exploits theory of mind to complicate the story.
  • Book of Jonah – Only after chapter 4 that we the reader discover that we have misinterpreted Jonah’s state of mind in the beginning of the story. The mind-reading joke is on us. This is a very sophisticated use of theory of mind.
  • The authors use their understanding of how people understand other people’s states of mind – this puts a focus on interiority in ways that was not all that common prior to the 2nd temple period.

 

Conclusion

The increased concern for sin and anxiety was developed in forms of prayer that drew attention to self-alienation and inner conflict, the author of job examines the textures of mental distress and develops novel ways of depicting cognitive dissonance, in 2nd temple literature we see sophisticated and playful uses of theory of mind.

Its interesting that the kind of development of interiority in ancient Israel is also occurring in Greece during this period. This doesn’t mean that there was dependence but its an interesting fact of history.

What’s The Proper Starting Point for Our Theology of the Image of God?

Where do we begin when reflecting upon what it means to be made in the image of God? First, this question assumes that we ought to even reflect upon this question. David Kelsey questions this assumption. He rightly points out that the doctrine is rarely explicitly stated in the Old Testament. In fact, it appears, explicitly, three times in Genesis (chapters 1, 5, and 9). So instead of reflecting on the image of God as a way to get at the question, “what does it mean to be human” Kelsey prefers to focus on the Old Testament’s wisdom literature. For it is in the wisdom literature that we get a clearer picture of the daily, common, experience of what it is to be human. Should we follow Kelsey in his approach? Kärkkäinen, rightly, suggests that we should not. He provides several reasons why. First, such an approach pits certain parts of the biblical canon against the other. Second, the New Testament explicitly picks up the language of the image of God, applying it to Christ. Third, just because the term is not often used explicitly in the Old Testament, that does not mean that the concept does not inform the rest of it’s anthropology. Finally, as an organizational tool, the doctrine does much to help us reflect on what it means to be human as well as how to treat other human beings with dignity.

Kelsey’s approach represents one way to interact with the doctrine of the image of God, there are, however, other ways to approach the topic. One way to approach is experientially. This approach begins with some kind of human experience and then fills out what it means to be made in the image of God in light of those experiences. Those “experiences” might consist of the experience of being marginalized (e.g. feminist, womanist, black theologies), the experience of hybridity or mestizaje (Latina/o) theologies, or the deliverances of scientific findings. Another approach is to begin reflection on the topic based upon certain theological convictions. There are two main ways that represent this approach: Trinitarian and Christological approaches. Trinitarian approaches are represented by theologians like Colin Gunton in Persons Human and Divine. It is represented by Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen in Creation and Humanity. Other representatives include Thomas Smail, Jurgen Moltmann, Stanley Grenz, and other social Trinitarians. The most prominent example of this approach is that of Zizioulas. On the other hand there are Christological approaches. This approach assumes that whatever it means to be human is defined Christologically. Marc Cortez, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Karl Barth, Oliver Crisp, Frederich Schleiermacher, and Kathryn Tanner represent this approach. It should be noted that these two positions overlap in some significant ways. Moltmann for example speaks of the imago Christi and Grenz speaks of humanity’s destiny as being Christologically informed. Barth’s doctrine of the imago Dei is also informed by the I-Thou relationship in the Trinity which is reflected in human sexual differences.

So where should we begin? Probably the beginning.

Where is the beginning? That’s for you to decide….

Tyndale Fellowship Conference Philosophy of Religion Lineup

In June I will be hopping over the pond to take part in the Tyndale Fellowship’s Philosophy of Religion conference. The line up of speakers includes several friends of mine who will undoubtedly be presenting great papers. The Tyndale Lecture will be given by Harry Bunting. His talk is titled “Prolegomena to a Christian Moral Anthropology.”
Here is a brief abstract:
Recent years have witnessed several notable defences of the classical theory of human evil by Augustinians and also by analytical philosophers. This is significant since the intellectual environment has, for some time, been hostile to such a view.

The Lecture will examine the plausibility of this key concept of Judaic-Christian moral anthropology. Issues dealt with will include the belief that evil is a ‘privation’ rather than a real property, that it cannot intelligibly be viewed as innate, that it is less important since it is a ‘thin’ moral concept, that the moral accountability which it presupposes cannot span more than one life.

The human identity issues which arise in these discussions will also be explored; and the ways in which various conceptions of moral identity open up tensions between rational and revealed understandings of human nature, human weaknesses and the capacity of human beings to flourish.

Here is the rest of the conference schedule:
Monday 24 June

3:00 pm Check in

3:30 pm Registration and Welcome

4:30 pm Session I

Chris Woznicki – ‘Are we free to pray?’

Ben Page – ‘How is God specially present in certain locations?’

6:00 pm Supper

7:30 pm Tyndale Lecture at Wolfson

Tuesday 25 June

8:00 am Breakfast

9:00 am Prayers

9:30 am Session II

Max Baker-Hytch – ‘Organic wholes and the problem of divine hiddenness’

Mike DeVito, Kegan Shaw and Tyler McNabb – ‘Proper Functionalism and Epistemological Disjunctivism: A Synergistic Proposal’

11:00 am Coffee

11:30 am Session III

Joseph Diekemper – ‘Technological enhancement of the human person and the imago Dei’

Phillip Kremers – ‘The Objection of Horrendous Deeds’

1:00 pm Lunch

4:00 pm Coffee

4:30 pm Session IV

David Worsley – ‘A Tale of Two Gardens’

Carl Hildebrand – ‘Weaknesses of Will: Some Philosophical Reflections on St Paul’s Body of Death’

6:00 pm Supper

7:30 pm Tyndale Lecture at Wolfson (Philosophy of Religion)

Henry Bunting – Prolegomena to a Christian Moral Anthropology

Wednesday 26 June

8:00 am Breakfast

9:00 am Prayers

9:30 am Session V

Yang Guo – ‘Mere Christianity: More or Less’

James Elliott – ‘Ecumenical Theology and the Epistemology of Disagreement’

11:00 am Coffee

11:30 am Session VI

Jamie Collin – ‘Eternity, Foreknowledge, and Petitionary Prayer for the Past’

Matt Hart – ‘On God’s Loving and Hating’

1:00 pm Lunch

New Podcast Interview: “Why I am Not (Yet) A Conditionalist”

About a month ago I joined Chris Date at the Rethinking Hell 2019 Far West Chapter Symposium to discuss my theological reservations about conditionalism and my convictions which prevent him from embracing a conditionalist doctrine of hell.

In case you aren’t familiar with the term conditionalism or annihilationism, this is the view of hell where “in the end God will grant immortality only to those who meet the condition of being united to Christ in faith. The risen lost will instead be annihilated: denied the gift of immortality, dispossessed of all life of any sort, and painfully executed, never to live again.” (Sprinkle)

Conditionalism/Annihilationism is often contrasted with the view called Eternal Conscious Torment, the view according to which those who are in hell are there everlastingly and are aware of the fact that God is actively punishing them for their sins.

Personally, I hold to a version (albeit a nuanced version) of ECT. You can read about it at Themelios.

You can listen to my interview on the Rethinking Hell Podcast here: Rethinking Hell.

The “Other” True Meaning of Christmas

The cross is the focal point of the gospel. Paul says as much when he tells the church in Corinth that he “decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2). But just because the cross is the focus of the saving work of Christ, that doesn’t mean that the other parts of Christ’s life—his birth, life, resurrection, ascension—aren’t without saving significance.

This Christmas, as we stop to reflect on our Savior’s birth, we should remember that without the incarnation the cross would have never happened. However, we should also remember that the incarnation is more than just a necessary step towards the cross! According to a number of important theologians across the history of the church, the incarnation has other pastoral and salvific implications. This season let’s slow down from the hustle and bustle of Christmas preparations to reflect on what the saints who have come before us have said about what the miracle of incarnation means for our salvation.

Athanasius (296–373)

Although being himself powerful and creator of the universe, he [i.e. Christ] prepared for himself in the virgin the body as a temple, and made it his own, as an instrument, making himself known and dwelling in it. And thus, taking from ours that which is like, since all were liable to the corruption of death, delivering it over to death on behalf of all, he offered it to the Father, doing this in his love for human beings…. [so] that as human beings had turned towards corruption he might turn them again to incorruptibility and give them life from death.

Cyril of Alexandria (c. 375–444)

As I have said, the Son came, or rather was made man, in order to reconstitute our condition within himself: first of all in his own holy, wonderful, and truly amazing birth and life. This was why he himself became the first one to be born of the Holy Spirit (I mean of course after the flesh) so that he could trace a path for grace to come to us. He wanted us to have this intellectual regeneration and spiritual assimilation to himself, who is the true and natural Son, so that we too might be able to call God our Father, and so remain free of corruption as no longer owning to our first father, that is Adam, in whom we were corrupted.

John Calvin (1509–1564)

[Christ’s] task was to restore us to God’s grace as to make of the children of men, children of God; of the heirs of Gehenna, heirs of the Heavenly Kingdom. Who could have done this had not the self-same Son of God become the Son of man, and had not so taken what was ours as to impart what was his to us, and to make what was his by nature ours by grace?… Ungrudgingly he took our nature upon himself to impart to us what was his, and to become both Son of God and Son of man in common with us.

Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758)

Christ took the nature of a creature, not only because the creature’s great love to him desired familiar communion with him, more familiar than his infinite distance would allow, but also because his great love to us caused him to desire familiar communion with us. So he came down to us, and united himself to our nature.

The infinite love which there is from everlasting between the Father and the Son is the highest excellency and peculiar glory of the Deity. God saw it therefore meet that there should be some bright and glorious manifestation made of [it] to the creatures, which is done in the incarnation and death of the Son of God. Hereby was most clearly manifested to men and angels the distinction of the persons of the Trinity. The infinite love of the Father to the Son is thereby manifested, in that for his sake he would forgive an infinite debt, would be reconciled with and receive into his favor and to his enjoyment those that had rebelled against him and injured his infinite majesty, and in exalting of him to that high mediatorial glory; and Christ showed his infinite love to the Father in his infinitely abasing himself for the vindicating of his authority and the honor of his majesty. When God had a mind to save men, Christ infinitely laid out himself that the honor of God’s majesty might be safe and that God’s glory might be advanced.

Charles Hodge (1797–1878)

The Scriptures teach that the Logos is everlasting life, having life in Himself, and the source of life, physical, intellectual, and spiritual. They further teach that his incarnation was the necessary condition of the communication of spiritual life to the children of men. He, therefore, is the only Savior, and the only source of life to us. We become partakers of this life by union with Him.

Concluding Thoughts

Athanasius, Cyril, Calvin, Edwards, and Hodge would have all recognized that the incarnation was a necessary prelude to Christ’s work on the cross, after all, if Christ wasn’t fully God and fully man then Christ couldn’t pay for our debt of sin. Yet for these five men the incarnation meant so much more! The incarnation was the moment when the Son entered into our lowly estate, uniting the divine nature to our human nature, so that we could become children of God and have the gift of life. It is ultimately by our union with Christ that we are “lifted up to participate in the very light, life, and love of the Holy Trinity.” So while it is right to remind ourselves that the true meaning of Christmas is that Christ was born as a human so that one day he could die in our place on the cross, we must not forget the “other” meaning of Christmas, namely that the Son of God became man so that we might have life as the sons and daughters of God.

Originally Posted at TGC Canada.

Jonathan Edwards Center Inaugural Conference

In less than two weeks Gateway Seminary will be hosting the first conference at their new Jonathan Edwards Center. The lineup looks great. You can register here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/regeneration-revival-and-creation-the-jonathan-edwards-center-conference-tickets-48045672901

If you are on the fence about going, here are the plenary speakers’ paper titles:

Plenary Speakers

Douglas Sweeney – Distinguished professor of church history and the history of Christian thought and director of the Jonathan Edwards Center at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. “‘The Most Important Thing in the World’: Jonathan Edwards on Rebirth and Its Implications for Christian Life and Thought.”

Michael Haykin – Professor of church history and biblical spirituality and director of the Andrew Fuller Center for Baptist Studies at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. “‘The Advancement of Christ’s kingdom in the World’: Jonathan Edwards and the Concert of Prayer for Revival: Origins and Legacy.”

Oliver Crisp – professor of systematic theology at Fuller Theological Seminary and a professorial fellow at the Institute for Analytic and Exegetical Theology at the University of St. Andrews. “Jonathan Edwards on Creation and Divine Ideas.”

And here are the list of breakout sessions:

Parallel Sessions

Session 1

Walter Schultz, University of Northwestern-St. Paul: “Must God Create? Dispositions and the Freedom of God in Jonathan Edwards’ End of Creation” [Moderated by Rob Caldwell]
Lisanne Winslow, University of Northwestern-St. Paul: “A Great and Remarkable Analogy: Edwards’ Use of Natural Typology in Communicating Divine Excellencies” [Moderated by Ken Minkema]
Mark Hamilton, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam: “Pantheism After All? Regeneration, Divine Ideas, and the Visio Dei in Jonathan Edwards” [Moderated by John Shouse]
Eundeuk Kim, Calvin Theological Seminary: “An Edwardsian Public Theology on Human Freedom” [Moderated by Mark Rogers]
Obbie Tyler Todd, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary: “Lord of His Treasures: Regeneration as the Work of the Son in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards” [Moderated by Jason Wright]

Session 2

Peter Jung, Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University: “Jonathan Edwards and the New Perspective on Paul’s Justification” [Moderated by Kyle Strobel]
Chris Woznicki, Fuller Theological Seminary: “The Metaphysics of the Jonathan Edwards’s “Personal Narrative”” [Moderated by John Shouse]
Andrew Sparks, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary: “Free Will: Continuity from Calvin to Edwards” [Moderated by Rob Caldwell]
Brandon Crawford, Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary: “Jonathan Edwards on the Nature of Christ’s Atonement” [Moderated by Adriaan Neele]
Mark Rogers, Fellowship in the Pass Church: “Jonathan Edwards, Revival, and the Use of Means” [Moderated by Rob Boss]

Books Read in 2018

As usual here is the list of books I read in during the year. Books published in 2018 are marked by an asterisk. Out of the books published in 2018 my two favorites–in no particular order–were 1) Conformed to the Image of His Son – Haley Goranson Jacob and 2) Resourcing Theological Anthropology – Marc Cortez.

January

  1. An Introduction to Torrance Theology – Gerrit Dawson
  2. Resourcing Theological Anthropology – Marc Cortez*
  3. Being Human in God’s World: An Old Testament Theology of Humanity – Gordon McConville
  4. Calvin’s Doctrine of Man – T.F. Torrance

February

  1. The Soul of Theological Anthropology – Joshua Farris
  2. Petitionary Prayer – Scott Davison
  3. What is History? – E.H. Carr
  4. The Historian’s Craft – Marc Bloch

March

  1. Jonathan Edwards: An Introduction to His Thought – Oliver Crisp and Kyle Strobel*
  2. Church History: An Introduction to Research Methods and Resources – James Bradley and Richard Mueller
  3. Annihilation – Jeff VanderMeer
  4. Still Evangelical? – Mark Labberton*

April

  1. Radical Discipleship: A Liturgical Politics of the Gospel – Jennifer McBride
  2. God Over All: Divine Aseity and the Challenge of Platonism – William Lane Craig
  3. Approaching Philosophy of Religion – Anthony Thiselton*

May

  1. The Allure of Gentleness – Dallas Willard
  2. A Treatise on Jonathan Edwards: Continuous Creation and Christology – S. Mark Hamilton
  3. Jonathan Edwards on God and Creation – Oliver Crisp

June

  1. The Holy One in Our Midst: An Essay on the Flesh of Christ – James Gordon
  2. Praying with Confidence: Aquinas on the Lord’s Prayer – Paul Murray
  3. The Lord is Good: Seeking the God of the Psalter – Christopher Holmes*
  4. Mind, Brain, and Free Will – Richard Swinburne

July

  1. What Sort of Human Nature: Medieval Philosophy and the Systematics of Christology – Marilyn McCord Adams
  2. The Humanity and Divinity of Christ: A Study of Pattern in Christology – John Knox
  3. The Brain, the Mind, and the Person Within – Mark Cosgrove*
  4. The Atonement – William Lane Craig*

August

  1. The Crucifixion – Fleming Rutledge
  2. The Divine Image: Envisioning the Invisible God – Ian McFarland
  3. Prayer, Middle Knowledge, and Divine Human Interaction – Kyle DiRoberts*

September

  1. Christology: A Guide for the Perplexed – Alan Spence
  2. John Calvin: A Biography – T.H.L. Parker
  3. The Dawn of the Reformation – Heiko Oberman
  4. Theological Anthropology: A Guide for the Perplexed – Marc Cortez
  5. Patterns in History: A Christian Perspective on Historical Thought – David Bebbington
  6. The Landscape of History: How Historians Map the Past – John Lewis Gaddis
  7. Were they Preaching “Another Gospel”? Justification by Faith in the 2nd Century – Andrew Dauton-Fear

October

  1. Judaism Before Jesus – Anthony Tomasino
  2. Cur Deus Homo – Anselm
  3. The Doctrine of Grace in the Apostolic Fathers – T.F. Torrance
  4. The Human Condition: Christian Perspectives Through African Eyes – Joe Kapolyo

November

  1. The Greco-Roman World of the New Testament Era – James Jeffers

December

  1. God the Son Incarnate – Stephen Wellum
  2. Paul and the Person – Susan Eastman*
  3. What is Regeneration? – Matthew Barrett
  4. Conformed to the Image of His Son – Haley Goranson Jacob*
  5. Human Nature from Calvin to Edwards – Paul Helm*
  6. In His Image: 10 Ways God Calls us to Reflect his Character – Jen Wilkin*

I Celebrate the Day

A few weeks ago I found an old IPod shuffle. Its that one Ipod I lose about every 9 months and find it again in the most random place. Anyway I’m glad I found it because it has a random Christmas album from a bunch of “Tooth and Nail” and BEC artists. Well, it has one of my favorite pop-punk Christmas songs, Relient K’s “I Celebrate the Day.” The last line is fantastic:

I celebrate the day that you were born to die so I could one day pray for you to save my life.

Now, I would say that Christ came to do more than just die for us. Christ came so that we could become God’s sons and daughters and share in his own Life. Or as T.F. Torrance put it, Christ came so that we would be “lifted up to participate in the very light, life, and love of the Holy Trinity.” But still, that one line from the song gets me every time.