The essence of the Christian religion consists in the reality that the creation of the Father, ruined by sin, is restored in the death of the Son of God, and re-created by the grace of the Spirit into a kingdom of God (112).
That is one seriously loaded statement. But it lays down the sort of holistic understanding of Christianity that we so desperately need.
Over the past month, I have (very) slowly been making my way through William Willimon's book, Pastor: The Theology and Practice of Ordained Ministry. In a section discussing different images and models of pastoral ministry, Willimon suggests the recovery of a classical form of Christian ministry:
There is much to be said for the pastor being educated in the classical forms of Christian ministry. The church has much experience as a minority movement. We need to draw from that experience today. In that regard, I predict a recovery of the classical shape of ministry: to teach, to preach, and to evangelize through the ministries of the Word, sacrament, and order. I sense the end of a proliferation of ministerial duties and a reclamation of the essential classical tasks of Christian ministry. Because so many of our people have not been well formed in the faith, pastors must now stress doctrine, the classical texts of our faith, our master narratives, the great themes. The culture is no longer a prop for the church. If we are going to make Christians, we must have a new determination to inculcate the faith. In some ways our age parallels that of the Reformation, in which the church was faced with a vast undereducated, uninformed, unformed laity and clergy. Pastors need to be prepared to lead in catechesis, moral formation, and the regeneration of God's people.
He argues that we no longer live in a culture where Christianity holds a prominent place. As Christians, we are now living in a context in which the idea of being aliens and strangers in the land must be recovered. This was the situation of the early church, and it shaped the way they carried out their ministry. In particular, they invested a great deal of time and energy into the formation of believers. As we now find ourselves in a similar context, Willimon suggests that
more of our pastoral time, in this missionary situation, will be spent in catechesis, the formation of Christians who have the equipment they need to survive as Christians.
I often hear people react against the idea of catechesis because of an assumption that it is mere indoctrination, drilling purely intellectual and academic theological propositions into the heads of children. This, unfortunately, may have been the experience of some – to be honest, this was partly my own experience – but Willimon helpfully points out that catechesis instead is about the holistic formation of believers, equipping them with the tools necessary not only to think rightly, but to live rightly in the world.
In order to understand more fully what catechesis is supposed to entail, it is helpful first to have a well-rounded definition of the practice. The Catechism of the Catholic Church provides one such definition:
Catechesis...[includes] especially the teaching of Christian doctrine imparted, generally speaking, in an organic and systematic way, with a view to initiating the hearers into the fullness of Christian life....catechesis is built on a certain number of elements of the Church's pastoral mission...[including] the initial proclamation of the Gospel or missionary preaching to arouse faith; examination of the reasons for belief; experience of Christian living; celebration of the sacraments; integration into the ecclesial community; and apostolic and missionary witness (II, 5-6).
Catechesis is not just about intellectual matters, but it is about the whole of the Christian life. Recovering this sort of ministry is crucial for discipleship, and thus of great importance for pastoral ministry.
David Jackman, in his book, Spirit of Truth, writes of the Holy Spirit's work in opening our hearts and minds to the truth:
He does not reveal new truth, but leads us into the whole truth which is already set forth in Jesus, above whom there could be no fuller revelation of God's truth.
The Holy Spirit does not set us free to wander into new realms of 'revelation', secretly given or privately received. For the power of the Spirit is not revealed in secret, mystical messages given to a few super-spiritual people. His power is seen in the proclamation of Jesus Christ as the way, the truth and the life.
Just as Jesus says in John 14:26, "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you."
In his book, Gospel and Kingdom, which is one of the volumes in the very helpful Goldsworthy Trilogy, the Australian biblical theologian, Graeme Goldsworthy, discusses how the understanding that the Old Testament forms an integral part of the history of redemption has been lost in our day. We have moved towards focusing on the individual and his or her personal appropriation of faith instead of first recognising the work of God in history as part of a much larger story and framework. He writes,
Failure to grasp this truth – largely because the proper study of the Old Testament has been neglected, has aided and abetted one of the most unfortunate reversals in evangelical theology. The core of the gospel, the historical facts of what God did in Christ, is often down-graded today in favour of a more mystical emphasis on the private spiritual experience of the individual. Whereas faith in the gospel is essentially acceptance of, and commitment to, the declaration that God acted in Christ some two thousand years ago on our behalf, saving faith is often portrayed nowadays more as trust in what God is doing in us now. Biblical ideas such as 'the forgiveness of sins' or 'salvation' are interpreted as primarily describing a Christian's personal experience. But when we allow the whole Bible – Old and New Testaments – to speak to us, we find that those subjective aspects of the Christian life which are undoubtedly important – the new birth, faith and sanctification – are fruits of the gospel. This gospel, while still relating to individual people at their point of need, is rooted and grounded in the history of redemption. It is the good news about Jesus, before it can become good news for sinful men and women. Indeed, it is only as the objective (redemptive-historical) facts are grasped that the subjective experience of the individual Christian can be understood (20-21).
Without the redemptive work of God in history through Jesus, we have no hope. This work of God is the starting point of faith.
A recent book, Jesus, Paul, and the People of God: A Theological Dialogue with N.T. Wright, is a collection of essays from a range of different scholars, interacting with Wright's thought on a number of different issues. Among the essays is one by Wright himself on Pauline studies and the life of the church. In that essay, just before the conclusion, Wright makes an important remark about the necessity of theology for the church. He says:
We need theology... We need it, not because it's a nice thing to get our ideas sorted out and our heads organised so that we can do the jigsaw of all these wonderful ideas. We need it because without prayerful reflective investigation of who God is, who the people of God are and what is the hope that belongs to our calling, without that prayerful, wise investigation the worldview whose central symbol is the one church of Jesus Christ will not be sustainable. Think of the churches that have given up theology, and you'll see what I mean.
I was walking along Westbourne Avenue in Hull today, and just happened to notice this small plaque on the side of one of the houses. While she only lived there a year, it was nonetheless very interesting to discover that Dorothy Sayers had lived here in Hull.
The one thing I am here to say to you is this: that it is worse than useless for Christians to talk about the importance of Christian morality, unless they are prepared to take their stand upon the fundamentals of Christian theology. It is a lie to say that dogma does not matter; it matters enormously. It is fatal to let people suppose that Christianity is only a mode of feeling; it is virtually necessary to insist that it is first and foremost a rational explanation of the universe. It is hopeless to offer Christianity as a vaguely idealistic aspiration of a simple and consoling kind; it is, on the contrary, a hard, tough, exacting and complex doctrine, steeped in a drastic and uncompromising realism.
Those are words to pay close attention to. Sayers is right on the mark – doctrine matters enormously.
Many biographies of Martin Luther contain the story of when he froze at the altar offering a prayer at his first mass. He later recounted,
With what tongue shall I address such majesty, seeing that all men ought to tremble in the presence of even an earthly prince? Who am I, that I should lift up mine eyes or raise my hands to the divine Majesty? The angels surround Him. At His nod the earth trembles. And shall I, a miserable little pygmy, say 'I want this, I ask for that'? For I am dust and ashes and full of sin and I am speaking to the living, eternal, and true God.
This recollection allows us to observe in the young Luther a limited grasp of the character of God and our relation to him. He certainly had a strong sense of God's majesty and approached him with a deep sense of reverence and fear. But it is clear that he did not yet understand the work of Christ, which enables believers to "draw near to God with a sincere heart and full assurance of faith" (Heb. 10:22). God is great to be feared, but he is also a loving Father who invites us to draw near to him.
Tracing the development of his thinking on prayer is quite interesting. Later in life, he would come to treasure prayer so much that he is reported to have spent three hours each day praying. One of his students, during the famous Table Talk sessions, recorded Luther saying,
O how great and upright and godly Christian’s prayer is! how powerful with God; that a poor human creature should speak with God’s high majesty in heaven, and not be affrighted, but, on the contrary, knoweth that God smileth upon him for Christ’s sake, his dearly beloved Son. The heart and conscience, in this act of praying, must not fly and recoil backwards by reason of our sins and unworthiness, and must not stand in doubt, nor be scared away.
Notice Luther's shift in perspective here. Where at first the majesty of God caused him to feel unworthy, now he marvels that we should not be scared away by this. He himself wrote,
We pray after all because we are unworthy to pray. The very fact that we are unworthy and that we dare to pray confidently, trusting only in the faithfulness of God, makes us worthy to pray and to have our prayer answered... Your worthiness does not help you; and your unworthiness does not hinder you. Mistrust condemns you; but confidence makes you worthy and upholds you.
Of course, there is much for us to learn from Luther's understanding of prayer. His transparency is good for us to see because many of us find our understanding of prayer developing on the same trajectory as Luther's. We might begin by trembling before our awesome God, but as we come to understand who he is and what Christ has done in reconciling us to him, we come to recognise the intimate relationship we can have with God. And in time we come to realise what a treasure it is to be able to come before a holy and righteous God with such confidence in his love for us, knowing that he hears and answers our prayers.
These sorts of videos where someone draws while another person narrates seem to be trendy these days. I've mentioned before the importance of recognising the value of our work, and so I found this video to be particularly good. It's so important for those in our churches to see their Monday-Saturday work as a calling, not just something they do to pay the bills. Let's keep working to help people see the significance of their vocation, and their work as an act of worship.
Many biographies of Martin Luther contain the story of when he froze at the altar offering a prayer at his first mass. He later recounted,