Josh King

Matthew 13:47-50 & Perform No Appendectomy!

If these parables formed a body, would the parable of the dragnet be the appendix? Seemingly all it does is repeat part of the parable of the weeds. Does this parable contribute anything unique?

I think this parable, while teaching the same truths seen in the parable of the dragnet, does contribute something unique. While there unity among all these parables, they are all parables about the kingdom, there is also diversity and progression; with that being the case why repeat an earlier theme? Also, while there are other parables that build on each other and repeat the same idea, such as the parables of the mustard seed and leaven and the parables of the treasure and the pearl, notice how these follow one another. If the parable of the dragnet is meant to do nothing more than repeat the truths of the parable of the weeds why insert so many other parables in between them?

There are two things that make this parable unique, its emphasis and its context.

Whereas the parable of the weeds stresses the delay between the inauguration of the kingdom in sowing the good seed of salvation and the consummation of the kingdom bringing full salvation and judgment, the parable of the dragnet the emphasizes judgment alone. The parable of the weeds answers the question, “Why if the kingdom has come is there still evil present?” The parable of the dragnet warns of certain judgment. D.A. Carson points out the different emphasis saying, “Whereas the parable of the weeds focuses on the long period of the reign of God during which tares coexist with the wheat and the enemy has large powers, the parable of the net simply describes the situation that exists when the last judgment takes place.” In the parable of the weeds we are told of the state of both the weeds and the wheat at the close of the age (vv.42-43), here we are told only of the state of the bad fish. The first parable is an explanation, this one is a warning.

But it is the context that I think makes this parable most distinct and powerful. I think the word that makes it explode with power is the first one, “again”. Initially I thought of this word as nothing more than connective tissue. I read some great commentators who made much of the “again” in v. 45 as indicating the close connection between the parables of the treasure and pearl. I agree there is a close connection, but was bothered by their ignoring the “again” in v. 47. Then I thought what if the “again” is meant to show the relation of all three parables? I believe it is.

How do they relate? It’s like this, the kingdom of heaven will eternally be for you either treasure or torment. The kingdom brings both salvation and judgment, so it will either be your greatest delight or your greatest fright. All that God is will either be for you to enjoy, or for you to fear. God is holy, infinite, sovereign, incomprehensible, self-sufficient, immutable, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal, righteous, and faithful. Will you know all that God is as your eternal and deepest delight or dread?

Tolle Lege: Future Grace

Readability: 3

Length: 401 pp

Author: John Piper

Here is savory truth, slow cooked to intensify flavor over thirty-one days. Here are thirty-one meditations that are deeply theological and deeply practical. With all of the contemporary discussions concerning the gospel, law, and sanctification, this book written more than a decade earlier is now even more helpful and needed. Piper shows that we are sanctified by faith, but that we must fight for faith, and that specifically the faith that we fight for is faith in future grace. Future Grace will show you the God-glorifying nature of faith, the promises it leans into, and give instruction on how to fight for faith in those promises. Most helpful are the smattering of chapters that deal with fighting the specific sins of pride, anxiety, shame, impatience, covetousness, bitterness, despondency, and lust. This will prove to be a hard read for some. I’ll give you Piper’s own words why you should read this book anyway:

Every book worth reading beckons with the words, “Think over what I say.” I do not believe that what I have written is hard to understand – if the person is willing to think it over. When my sons complain that a good book is hard to read, I say, “Raking is easy, but all you get his leaves; digging is hard that you might find diamonds.”

There are diamonds here. Here are a few:

Sin is what you do when your heart is not satisfied with God. No one sins out of duty. We sin because it holds out some promise of happiness. That promise enslaves us until we believe that God is more to be desired than life itself (Psalm 63:3). Which means that the power of sin’s promise is broken by the power of God’s. All that God promises to be for us in Jesus stands over against what sin promises to be for us without him.

I conclude that the New Testament teaches us to obey the commandments of God – the law of Christ – by faith in future grace. The commandments of Christ are not negligible because we are under grace. They are doable because we are under grace.

Hell will not be able to blackmail heaven into misery. God’s judgment will be approved, and the saints will experience the vindication of truth as a great grace.

The test of whether our faith is the kind of faith that justifies is whether it is the kind of faith that sanctifies.

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The Pugilist: Convictions

No convictions, no Christianity Scanty convictions, hunger-bitten Christianity. Profound convictions, solid and substantial religion. -B.B. Warfield, in The Theology of B.B. Warfield by Fred Zaspel

Matthew 13:44-46 & Happy Hobos

If these two parables were Americanized they would end with the “man”, perhaps a tenant farmer, being vindicated as he now lives in a plush mansion with tricked-out camels, and the merchant being famous, having sold the pearl for many times what he bought it. But neither the man, nor the merchant sell their treasure to buy other things, rather, they sell all other things to buy the treasure. The merchant doesn’t buy the pearl to sell it; he sells all to buy the pearl. The kingdom of heaven is not a means to an end, it is the end.

Some today buy stunning pieces of art and rare artifacts, not to profit from them, but to simply enjoy them. Still its unheard of for a lavishly wealthy person to go for broke to own a single piece of art.

Merchants were extremely wealthy and powerful, and this merchant was certainly so, searching only for fine pearls (likely the most valued jewel of the time by Romans). Imagine hearing that a Bill Gates joyfully liquidated every asset to own one piece of art. There is video of footage of the former business magnate now gone hobo standing on the street corner with a grin on his face staring at his piece of art.

I think you would conclude either one of two things must be true. Your first impulse is that he must be nuts. But then you grow curious. You haven’t seen the work of art. What if glory and beauty exist that are really worth that price tag? Wouldn’t it be wonderful?

There is a glory this stunning. It is a glorious mystery revealed to some (13:11). They see the hidden treasure others don’t. To others their actions look absurd, but if you have seen the value of the kingdom, you know it’s worth sacrificing everything for. That’s the way we ought to live, as hobos with a smile on our face enjoying a treasure others can’t see, making them think, “What if a glory like that really exists? I don’t know that it does, but wouldn’t it be wonderful if it did?”

The Pugilist: It Is Not Faith that Saves…

It is not faith that saves, but faith in Jesus Christ: faith in any other saviour, or in this or that philosophy or human conceit (Col. 2:16, 18, 1 Tim. 4:1), or in any other gospel than that of Jesus Christ and Him as crucified (Gal. 1:8, 9), brings not salvation but a curse. It is not, strictly speaking, even faith in Christ that saves, but Christ that saves through faith. The saving power resides exclusively, not in the act of faith or the attitude of faith or the nature of faith, but in the object of faith; and in this the whole biblical representation centres, so that we could not more radically misconceive it than by transferring to faith even the smallest fraction of that saving energy which is attributed in the Scriptures solely to Christ Himself. -B.B. Warfield, The Biblical Doctrine of Faith

Matthew 13:31-35 & Marvel at the Shrub

No good Jew doubted that the Kingdom would be glorious, that was expected. What was a shocking stumbling-block, and what Jesus was communicating here, is that it would grow from the smallest, most humble and insignificant of beginnings.

I am not an optimist in regards to history or the future. I don’t suspect that humanity is steadily progressing, nor that the kingdom will ultimately win over the world before Jesus’ return, but I am not a pessimist either. What can we expect in the future? I think things will get both better and worse. The parable of the weeds reminds us that the kingdom hasn’t come in all its fullness yet; and that until the end of the age, evil will grow and our salvation will not be complete. But the parables of the mustard seed and the yeast remind us that the kingdom is growing, and that God’s mission is global.

Our Western eyes too often look on the 20th century as a time of decline for the church; as though she has lost her power and influence. We are missionally myopic judging the whole of Christianity in light of ourselves. I think our arrogance is displayed when speak in such ways as this, “Things are so bad here – Jesus must be coming soon!” Indeed He may come soon, but from a global perspective Christianity has flourished as never before. Consider the following figures (taken from Let the Nations be Glad by John Piper and Operation World by Jason Mandryck):

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Europeans dominated the world church, with approximately 70.6 percent of the Word’s Christians. By 1938, on the eve of World War II, the apparent European domination of Protestantism and Catholicism remained strong. Yet by the end of the twentieth century, The European percentage of world Christianity had shrunk to 28 percent of the total; Latin America and Africa combined provided 43 percent of the world’s Christians.

In 1900, Africa had 10 million Christians, representing about 10 percent of the population; by 2000, this figure had grown to 360 million, representing about half the population. Quantitatively, this may well be the largest shift in religious affiliation that has ever occurred, anywhere.

The number of African Christians is growing at around 2.36 percent annually, which would lead us to project a doubling of the continent’s Christian population in less than thirty years.

“This past Sunday more Anglicans attended church in each of Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda than did Anglicans in Britain and Canada and Episcopalians in the United States combined.”

“The number of practicing Christians in China is approaching the number in the United States.”

“Last Sunday . . . more Christian believers attended church in China than in all of so-called ‘Christian Europe.’”

‘Live bodies in church are far more numerous in Kenya than in Canada.”

“More believers worship together in Nagaland than in Norway.”

“More Christian workers from Brazil are active in cross cultural ministry outside their homelands than from Britain or from Canada.”

Last Sunday “more Presbyterians were in church in Ghana than in Scotland.”“The survival and growth of the Church in China are two of the decisive events of our generation. The staggering recent growth of the Chinese Church has no parallel in history – from 2.7 million evangelicals in 1975 to over 75 million in 2010.”

Some look at these figures and say, “Yeah, but they’re not all truly regenerate.” I agree, but many are sons of the kingdom; and oh how sad it is if you don’t have eyes to see the glory of the kingdom and rejoice in it.

We need to be aware, and we need to praise God. We need to be kingdom-minded people. The mustard seed is a shrub – marvel at it!

Tolle Lege: Killing Calvinism

Readability: 1

Length: 105 pp

Author: Greg Dutcher

Douglas Wilson has written about the YRR (Young, Restless, and Reformed) becoming the OSR (Old, Settled, and Reformed), and how this could be a good thing. Restlessness is not always a virtue. Growing old is not an evil. Old, settled wisdom will trump young, restless zeal any day. Give me Gandalf over Pippin. Restlessness is a virtue when folly rules, otherwise is it is the folly.

I rejoice in the recovery of reformed theology by my peers, but many of us, self included, do need to grow up, and settle down. Many wise men have called for young Calvinists to be locked up for the first years after they believe the doctrines of grace. Greg Dutcher calls them cage stage Calvinists. They are ready to fight, and with purpose, but so were Simeon and Levi. Zeal without wisdom is dangerous. It can be as dangerous as the untruth that opposes the doctrines we love. If Satan can’t get you to preach a lie, he will be content if you preach the truth in a hellish way.

Greg Dutcher has done all the YRR a favor in Kiling Calvinism. I believe it will be an ent-draught to many a zealous Pippin who took the palantír, growing them up into the Peregrin Took who cleansed the shire of orc-men.

(If you don’t understand any of this YRR talk, good for you. If I lost you with all of the LOTR (Lord of the Rings) references, shame on you!)

Windshields are one of those technological wonders we have all gotten used to. In fact, they work best when you don’t notice them, when they are invisible so that all you can see is what they reveal.

I am concerned that many Calvinists today do little more than celebrate how wonderfully clear their theological windshield is. But like a windshield, Reformed theology is not an end in itself. It is simply a window to the awe-inspiring universe of God’s truth, filled with glory, beauty, and grace. Do we need something like a metaphorical windshield of clear, biblical truth to look through as we hope to marvel at God’s glory? Absolutely. But we must make sure that we know the difference between staring at a windshield and staring through one.

While all true disciples are theologians, not all theologians are true disciples. If knowing the Bible and understanding theology were reliable measures of discipleship, Satan would be the greatest disciple ever. After all, his knowledge of Scripture is exceptional and he’s been observing the spiritual realm for quite a long time.

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The Pugilist: The Law Presupposes Grace

The piety of the Old Testament thus began with faith. And though, when the stage of the law was reached, the emphasis might seem to be thrown rather on the obedience of faith, what has been called ‘faith in action,’ yet the giving of the law does not mark a fundamental change in the religion of Israel, but only a new stage in its orderly development. The law-giving was not a setting aside of the religion of promise, but an incident in its history; and the law given was not a code of jurisprudence for the world’s government, but a body of household ordinances for the regulation of God’s family. It is therefore itself grounded upon the promise, and it grounds the whole religious life of Israel and the grace of the covenant God (Ex. xx. 2). It is only because Israel are the children of God, and God has sanctified them unto Himself and chosen them to be a peculiar people into Him (Deut. xiv. 1), that He proceeds to frame them by His law for His especial treasure (Ex. xix. 5, cf. Tit. ii. 14). Faith, therefore, does not appear as one of the precepts of law, nor as a virtue superior to its precepts, nor yet as a substitute for keeping them; it rather lies behind the law as its presupposition. – B.B. Warfield, The Biblical Doctrine of Faith

Tolle Lege: Practicing Affirmation

Readability: 1

Length: 160 pp

Author: Sam Crabtree

Why read a book on affirmation? Does man really need to be praised? You might think that you have some strong theological reasons for not praising others more. You may reason that it is more loving to show someone Christ’s glory than their own. That showing a person their depravity and Christ’s glory and salvation are the kinder act. But are praising people and praising God at odds?

Why should you want to affirm people? Because you want to praise God! Total depravity does not mean we never affirm a person, rather it means we always know to whom all glory is due whenever any human does anything good, true, or beautiful.

Affirmation should be worship, or we shouldn’t do it. God alone is due all the glory, and this does not mean the neglect of affirmation, but laboring at it. Here is a book that directs affirmation towards its proper end. It does not entreat you to labor at affirmation with man or manipulation as a goal, but with the glory of God as a goal. For this reason I affirm this book. It is Christ-glorifying. I thank God for Sam Crabtree and Practicing Affirmation, because God is due the glory.

When our mouths are empty of praise for others, it is probably because our hearts are full of love for self.

Good affirmations are God-centered, pointing to the image of God in a person. The only commendable attributes in people were given to them. Everything is from God, through God, and to God so that in all things—including the commendable qualities in people—he might get the glory: “‘Who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?’ For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” (Rom. 11:35–36).

[Paul] didn’t thank people for things; he thanks God for people.

We help people be shallow when we focus our compliments on their braiding of hair, wearing of gold, putting on of clothes, sequins, piercings, and tattoos (see 1 Peter 3:3-4).

Be careful what you affirm. You may get more of it. Just as there are superior ways of correcting, there are superior ways of affirming.

If we affirm trendy clothing, we may get more shallow trendiness.

If we affirm accessories, we may get an emphasis on accessorizing.

If we affirm only winning, we may get an increase in unscrupulous win-at-any-cost attitudes and behaviors.

If we affirm things like Scripture memory and serving others less than we affirm dance lessons or soccer performance, we may discover a corresponding set of values and priorities developed in the life of the affirmed.

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The Pugilist: Fight for Words

I think you will agree with me that it is a sad thing to see words like these die like this. And I hope you will determine that, God helping you, you will not let them die thus, if any care on your part can preserve them in life and vigor. But the dying of the words is not the saddest thing which we see here. The saddest thing is the dying out of the hearts of men of the things for which the words stand. As ministers of Christ it will be your function to keep the things alive. If you can do that, the words whichexpress the things will take care of themselves. Either they will abide in vigor; or other good words and true will press in to take the place left vacant by them. The real thing for you to settle in your minds, therefore, is whether Christ is truly a Redeemer to you, and whether you find an actual Redemption in Him,- or are you ready to deny the Master that bought you, and to count His blood an unholy thing? Do you realize that Christ is your Ransomer and has actually shed His blood for you as your ransom? Do you realize that your salvation has been bought, bought at a tremendous price, at the price of nothing less precious than blood, and that the blood of Christ, the Holy One of God? Or, go a step further: do you realize that this Christ who has thus shed His blood for you is Himself your God? -B.B. Warfield, “Redeemer” and “Redemption”