Category Archives: Theology

Baptism, Church History, Faith and Works, Polls, Salvation, Theology, Top Ten Posts of 2010

What Were the Reformers’ Views on Infant Baptism? – #6 Post of 2010

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

According to church historian John Hannah, there were four major Protestant streams that developed during the Reformation in the 16th century: Anglicanism, Lutheranism, Calvinism, and Anabaptism.  Each of these streams placed great stress on the idea of salvation by faith alone, yet they did not all agree on what infant baptism means or whether it should even be done.

To my knowledge, all the reformers rejected baptism as the cause of a believer’s salvation; again, salvation is by faith.  An infant obviously cannot believe on her own, so if baptism is only a sign of the faith a person possesses, then why are infants baptized?

First, let’s look briefly at Calvinism.  According to Hannah, “Calvin defended the baptism of infants, believing that children of the godly are born members of the church by virtue of the hereditary nature of the Abrahamic covenant, circumcision having been replaced in the New Covenant with baptism as a sign.”

For Calvin, since infants were circumcised under the Old Covenant, infants should be baptized under the New Covenant.  Infant baptism does not cause regeneration, but it ensures that the child will be taught what she needs to know about Christ when she gets older, so that she can then exercise her own faith.  If she dies before she can exercise her own faith, Calvin believed that God could still save her, as He is not limited to save only those who exercise faith (although that is the normal way).

The Anglicans closely followed Calvin on the issue of infant baptism.

Luther also held very similar views to Calvin.  He believed that infants, who cannot exercise faith, should be baptized because of the faith of their parents and church family.  The faith of the church family could not directly save the infant, but their faith would later help the child to grow in knowledge and receive her own faith from God.  Again, infant baptism signifies the entrance of the child into the church where she can be instructed.

The last group, the Anabaptists, differ greatly from the other three streams.  The Anabaptists believed that a sign should always follow the thing it signifies, not anticipate it.  Hannah explains further Anabaptist views: “People are born into the world lost and need to be regenerated.  One does not enter the church as a citizen as one enters the state.  In the latter one is naturally born into it; in the former one is spiritually born into it.  The state is not the church; the church is not the state.”

The earliest confession of the Anabaptists states: “Baptism shall be given to all those who have learned repentance and amendment of life, and to all those who walk in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and wish to be buried with him in death. . . . This excludes all infant baptism . . . .”

So what do you think?  Should infants be baptized?  Please vote in the poll below.

Bible Interpretation, Books of the Bible, Church History, Eschatology, Polls, Theology, Top Ten Posts of 2010

Did the Early Church Believe in a Literal Thousand-Year Reign of Christ on Earth? – #10 Post of 2010

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

The Book of Revelation, according to some Christians, teaches a literal thousand-year reign of Christ on earth after his second coming (see Rev. 20).  This will then be followed by the creation of a new heaven and new earth. This view is known today as premillenialism.

But there are other Christians, in fact, the majority, who interpret the thousand years in Rev. 20 as a spiritual reign of the church which started at Christ’s first coming and ends at his second coming.  This view is known today as amillenialism.

The proponents of both of these views have an array of arguments to support their positions, but what was the view of the early church?

It seems that up until the third century, the early church was primarily premillenialist.  Writers like Irenaeus, Justin Martyr, and Tertullian all thought the second advent of Christ was imminent and that he would inaugurate his thousand-year reign on earth.

The tide, however, started to turn with the writings of Origen in the early third century, who adopted an allegorical method of interpreting Revelation.  Origen believed that the thousand years represented a spiritual reign of the church.  His disciple, Dionysius of Alexandria, continued the attack against premillenialism and turned the eastern church away from it.

In the western church, Augustine, in the late fourth century, began to teach amillenialism, siding with the Alexandrians in the east.  His views of eschatology (the end times) were detailed in his most famous work, The City of God.

From the time of Augustine until the Reformation in the sixteenth century (~1,100 years), amillenialism was the dominant view in the church.

The story obviously doesn’t end there, but you now have a brief introduction of what happened in the first fifteen hundred years of Christianity with respect to the millennium scribed in Rev. 20.

What about you?  Which view do you think is more likely correct?  Do you think there will be a literal thousand-year reign of Christ on earth (i.e., premillenialism) or do you think the thousand years mentioned in Rev. 20 is a spiritual reign of the church which ends at Christ’s second coming (i.e., amillenialism)?

Atheism, Morality, Philosophy, Theology

Is God the Source of Morality?

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

Christians assert that God is the only source of morality.  Wanting to reject this assertion, atheists sometimes offer a counter-argument which claims to invalidate the Christian God as the source of morality.

The challenge is often referred to as the Euthyphro Dilemma because it was first raised in Plato’s dialogue Euthyphro.  The argument goes like this.  Either something is good because God commands it, or else God commands something because it is good.

Christians have problems with both options.  If you say something is good because God commands it, then right and wrong are arbitrary.  God could command tomorrow that murder, rape, and theft are right, and that love, kindness, and generosity are wrong.  That seems bizarre; it runs counter to all of our common moral intuitions.  It also conflicts with traditional and orthodox concepts of the Christian God.  If murder and rape can be declared good, then we have no idea what kind of God we are worshiping.

On the other hand, if God commands something because it is good, then goodness exists outside of God.  The ground for morality would then be independent of God –  a stand-alone entity.  God would be subservient to this source of morality, and therefore not God at all.  The Christian God is not subservient to anything outside himself.

What is the solution to this dilemma?  Christians have split this apparent dilemma by offering a third option: goodness is part of God’s nature.  God, according to Christians, is the good.  God commands the good because he is essentially good.  His nature does not change, so he cannot declare murder to be right tomorrow.  On the other hand, morality does not exist outside of him, but as part of him.  He is only subservient to himself, which is no subservience at all.

It turns out that no dilemma really exists once you understand the nature of God.  He truly is the source for all moral values and duties.

Religion, Theology

What Is the Christian Worldview? Part 2

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

In part 1 I introduced eight questions that every worldview should answer.  These eight questions are as follows:

  1. What is ultimate reality?
  2. Where did the world around us come from and what is its nature?
  3. What are human beings and where did they come from?
  4. Why do humans suffer?
  5. Is there a way for humans to be saved from suffering?
  6. How do I know right from wrong?
  7. What is the meaning or purpose of my life?
  8. What happens to me when I die?

Christianity offers profound and, what’s even more important, true answers to these questions.  The first four answers were provided in part 1, so now we will look at the answers to the final four questions.

Question 5: Is there a way for humans to be saved from suffering?

Christians believe that the only way humans can be ultimately saved from suffering is to be reconciled with God.  This reconciliation was made possible by the death and resurrection of the Son of God, Jesus Christ.  Once a person trusts Christ for their salvation, suffering in this life becomes bearable and pregnant with meaning, for the Son of God is with us in our suffering and promises to bring good out of it.

Question 6: How do I know right from wrong?

Christians believe that there exists an objective moral law that is based on the nature of God.  God reveals his perfect moral nature both through moral commands which he has communicated in the Bible, and through a common moral conscience which God has given all humans.

Question 7: What is the meaning or purpose of my life?

Christians believe that the purpose of life is to do the will of God and to enjoy God forever.  One of the beauties of Christianity is that God has given us great leeway to pursue myriad interests and passions in this life, as long as we always keep Him front and center in our lives.

Question 8: What happens to me when I die?

Christians believe that there is an afterlife for every human.  The afterlife can be spent either in the presence of God forever or separated from God forever.  God respects human freedom such that He does not force anyone to spend an eternity with Him.  Jesus Christ’s sacrificial death and resurrection provides the only means for any human to spend eternity with God.  Those who reject Jesus’ sacrifice for humanity will forever be separated from God.  Those who trust in Jesus’ sacrifice will spend a blissful eternity with the ultimate source of all that is good and the only being who can fulfill all human desires, God.

The Christian answers to these eight questions are unique among all the world’s religions and philosophies.  It is important to note that we don’t hold the Christian worldview because it works, or because it feels good, or because it’s emotionally satisfying, but because we think it is true.  We think that the Christian worldview most accurately describes reality the way it really is.

Religion, Theology

What Is the Christian Worldview? Part 1

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Stained glass at St John the Baptist's Anglica...

Post Author: Bill Pratt

According to James Sire in The Universe Next Door, a worldview is the following:

A commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true, or entirely false) which we hold (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) about the basic constitution of reality, and that provides the foundation on which we live and move and have our being.

It’s how we view the world!  All of us have a worldview, whether we realize it or not.  For those of us who are Christian, our faith heavily informs our worldview, or at least it should.  A person’s worldview should ideally answer a set of questions which are foundational to human existence.  These questions can be asked in several ways, but here are my versions of these questions:

  1. What is ultimate reality?
  2. Where did the world around us come from and what is its nature?
  3. What are human beings and where did they come from?
  4. Why do humans suffer?
  5. Is there a way for humans to be saved from suffering?
  6. How do I know right from wrong?
  7. What is the meaning or purpose of my life?
  8. What happens to me when I die?

You can evaluate any person’s worldview by asking them for answers to these questions.  Not only will you have a fascinating conversation, but you will learn what makes the other person tick.  You will get to see the world through their eyes.

So the next obvious question is this: how would a Christian answer these eight questions?  Christianity certainly offers compelling responses to these questions, as you would expect.  Below I will give you brief answers and then perhaps we can flesh them out if you (my blog-reading friends) would like to discuss them in the comments.

Question 1: What is ultimate reality?

Christians believe that the ultimate reality is God.  The Christian God has a number of qualities, but here are some of the most important: God is infinite, personal, sovereign, good, holy, transcendent, omniscient, and omnipotent.

Question 2: Where did the world around us come from and what is its nature?

Christians believe that the world around us is composed of time, space, matter, and energy, as scientists have demonstrated.  We believe that this physical world was spoken into existence by God.  We believe that God is separate from the world and not actually part of the world.

Question 3: What are human beings and where did they come from?

Human beings are soul and body.  We possess spiritual and physical dimensions.  We are created in the image of God, which means we represent God on earth as his representatives.  Being in God’s image, humans are also personal, intelligent, and moral beings.

Question 4: Why do humans suffer?

Humans suffer because of the Fall.  The Fall occurred when the first two human beings, Adam and Eve, rejected God and sought to usurp his position.  This rebellion – acting in a way contrary to God’s will –  introduced the disease of sin into the world, a disease which is passed on to every human generation.  All human suffering is ultimately the result of this pivotal event in human history.

I’ll finish up with answers to the last four questions in the next post.  See you then!

Philosophy, Theology

Is God Subject to Logic?

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

Over the past couple years of blogging, one of the most common areas of confusion in the blog comments has been about the relationship between logic and God.  Did God create logic like he created humans?  Did logic exist before God, so that God is subject to logic?  Can’t God do away with the laws of logic?  Can’t he violate the laws of logic?

The first thing we need to do is define what logic is.  A simple definition of logic is “the study of right reason.”  The foundation of right reason is embodied in three laws of logic that are undeniable.

The law of non-contradiction states that a thing cannot be both A and non-A at the same time and in the same sense.

The law of excluded middle states that a thing is either A or non-A.

The law of identity states that if a thing is A, then it is A.

All logic, and thus all right reasoning, is built off of these three laws.  They are undeniable.

So now to the question.  Are these laws subject to God or is God subject to them?

The answer is that the laws of logic are part of the nature of God.  In other words, logic is built into God.  He did not create logic like he created humans, but neither did logic exist as some sort of entity outside of God.  Since God has always existed, and the laws of logic are based in God, then the laws of logic have always existed as well.

Can God violate the laws of logic?  No, because he cannot not be himself.  Whatever God is, he is eternally.  God does not shut down various attributes of his being, like cutting off lights in different parts of the house.  God is logical, he always has been logical, and he always will be logical.

Someone might object, “Doesn’t this mean God is limited by logic?”  This objection has always struck me as strange because logic is synonymous with rationality.  Is God limited to being rational?  Well yes, in the same way he is “limited” by his goodness, or his beauty, or his holiness.  God is never evil, ugly, or unholy; likewise, God is never illogical or irrational.

It is extremely important to note that humans could never know anything about God without the laws of logic.  Without the laws of logic, God could exist and not exist, God could not be God, God could be good and non-good (evil), and so forth on and on.  Logic is essential to our knowing God.  Christians who denigrate logic are, in effect, denigrating the foundational tools that we have to know anything about God.

Another objection that has been raised is that since God can do the impossible, then when we say he cannot be illogical, then we are saying he cannot do the impossible.  The misunderstanding comes from the word impossible.  Biblically, God may do what is impossible for human beings to do, but the Bible does not say that God can do what is logically impossible.

For example, objectors may argue, “God can raise people from the dead, but that’s impossible!”  Well, that’s impossible for humans, but it’s not logically impossible.  There is a big difference between the two.

In summary, logic is built into God as part of his nature, so God is not subject to logic as if logic is some force outside of him.  But he is “subject” to logic because he cannot deny himself.

Jesus Christ, Theology

An Illustration of the Incarnation from the Movie Avatar

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

Although I have written negatively of the overall theme and message of Avatar, there is an interesting analogy of the Incarnation of Christ that can be taken from the film.  I heard this analogy in a podcast by William Lane Craig, and I think it may help some people understand this important Christian doctrine.

Craig was debating a Muslim recently and he wanted to help the Muslim audience understand how Jesus could be both God and man at the same time.  The doctrine of the Incarnation states that Jesus is one person who possesses two natures, one divine and one human, but Muslims sometimes struggle with this concept, thinking that if Jesus is human, he cannot also be God.

Here is where the movie Avatar comes in.  The hero of the movie, Jake Sully, is a crippled human that cannot walk.  As the movie progresses, Sully is able, through technology, to take on the nature of one of the natives of the planet Pandora, the Na’vi.

Sully’s mind unites with a Na’vi body, and for the rest of the movie he is both human and Na’vi; he possesses two natures.  Like Jesus, Sully is one person with two natures.  Sully can do things in his Na’vi nature that he cannot do in his human nature, like moving his legs and physically connecting his mind with the planet Pandora.  Likewise, Jesus is able to do things in his divine nature (e.g., raise people from the dead, still storms)  that He cannot do in his human nature.

Like any analogy, this one has its weaknesses, but I thought it was an interesting way to illustrate the Incarnation using the plot of a popular movie.  If it helps you, great!  If it doesn’t help, forget about it.

General Apologetics, Theology

What Is Christian Faith?

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

One of the most abused words in the English language is the word faith.  For skeptics, faith is believing in something despite reason.  For some religious folks, faith is simply the expression of positive emotions toward God.  Others claim faith is purely intellectual.

Can we more rigorously define what faith is?  I think we can, and I will call on Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli to help out, from their book Handbook of Christian Apologetics.

Kreeft and Tacelli first differentiate between the object of faith and the act of faith.

The object of faith includes all the things that are believed about God, as communicated by the Bible.  These things that are believed are expressed in propositions (e.g., Jesus is the Son of God).  These propositions, however, are only pointers.  They direct our attention to the real object of faith, God.  If the real object of faith is God, then why do we need all the propositions that capture our beliefs about God?  Kreeft and Tacelli explain, “Without propositions, we cannot know or tell others what God we believe in and what we believe about God.”

The act of faith consists of more than just belief.  There are four components of faith: 1) emotional, 2) intellectual, 3) volitional, and 4) heart.  Let’s look at each of these one at a time.

Emotional faith is “feeling assurance or trust or confidence in a person.  This includes hope (which is much stronger than just a wish) and peace (which is much stronger than mere calm).”  Emotional faith is the weakest component of faith because emotions change so frequently.

Intellectual faith is belief.  According to Kreeft and Tacelli, intellectual faith is more stable than emotional faith.  Strongly held beliefs will tend not to change often.  They cite the definition of intellectual faith from the Baltimore Catechism: “the act of the intellect, prompted by the will, by which we believe everything God has revealed on the grounds of the authority of the One who revealed it.”

Volitional faith is an act of the will.  “This faith is faithfulness, or fidelity.  It manifests itself in behavior, that is, in good works. . . . For the root of volitional faith – the will – is the faculty or power of the soul that is closest to . . . the ‘heart’.”

Heart faith is the very center of a person’s being, the center of their soul.  This is the “I” where the emotions, intellect, and will reside.  “The heart is where God the Holy Spirit works in us. . . . With the heart we choose our ‘fundamental option’ of yes or no to God, and thereby determine our eternal identity and destiny.”

All four of these components of faith work together, with the heart being the intersection of them all.  Faith is, therefore, not just about emotions or intellect.  Faith involves the entire person – every part.

The interaction of the intellect and the will are particularly interesting.  Kreeft and Tacelli describe how they work together:

The intellect is the soul’s navigator, but the will is its captain. . . . The will can command the intellect to think, but the intellect cannot command the will to will, only inform it, as a navigator informs the captain.  Yet the will cannot simply make you believe.  It can’t force the intellect to believe what appears to it to be false, or to disbelieve what seems to it to be true.

We could also add that if the emotions are predisposed against believing, then faith can be thwarted.  This is why purely intellectual appeals to a non-believer may not be effective.  If their emotions and/or will are set against faith, then intellectual arguments cannot bring them to God.  Likewise, purely emotional appeals may appear to work for a short time until that person has time to think about their beliefs and decide they are not reasonable (they have an intellectual problem).  There are even people who will to believe, but their intellect and/or emotions stand in the way.

Christian faith deals with the whole individual, so the takeaway is that the church can never become one dimensional and forget that will, intellect, emotions, and finally the very heart of a person must all express faith.

Atheism, General Apologetics, Theology

Does the Size of the Cosmos Render Man Insignificant?

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

That is the popular view among materialists (those who deny the existence of anything but the material world).  They beg us look at the sheer immensity of the universe and then look at the tininess of the human race in contrast.  The idea that man is special, that man holds a privileged seat in the cosmos is simply ridiculous, they claim.

The arch-materialist Carl Sagan (as quoted from The End of Christianity: Finding a Good God in an Evil World by William Dembski) had these thoughts on the matter:

Because of the reflection of sunlight . . . the earth seems to be sitting in a beam of light, as if there were some special significance to this small world.  But it’s just an accident of geometry and optics. . . . Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light.  Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark.

Does the size of the universe relative to man render him insignificant?  Maybe if you’re a materialist, but not if you’re a Christian.  Scripture declares that God has created man in his image, that man indeed has a special seat of honor in the universe.  Theologically, Christians recognize that the materialist argument fails.  Scientifically, works like The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos Is Designed for Discovery demonstrate that the earth is unique in its ability to support advanced life and to enable scientific discovery.

As Dembski points out, G. K. Chesterton wrote one of the most memorable responses to the materialist claim of man’s insignificance in his classic work Orthodoxy.  Here is Chesterton speaking of the materialist Herbert Spencer:

He popularized this contemptible notion that the size of the solar system ought to over-awe the spiritual dogma of man. Why should a man surrender his dignity to the solar system any more than to a whale? If mere size proves that man is not the image of God, then a whale may be the image of God. . . . It is quite futile to argue that man is small compared to the cosmos; for man was always small compared to the nearest tree.

What the size of the universe tells us is how awesome God is, not how insignificant man is, for man has always been spatially smaller than what surrounds him (e.g., whales and trees).  As Psalm 19 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.  Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.”

Philosophy, Theology

Can Words Describe God? Part 2

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Post Author: Bill Pratt

In the last post, we talked about how equivocal God-talk is self-defeating and how univocal God-talk lowers God to the level of a finite being.  The only solution seems to be analogous God-talk.  So how does analogous God-talk work?

Analogous God-talk ultimately tells us what God is like, but it does not describe him exactly as He is.

How does this work?  According to Geisler, “The definition of the attribute applicable to both God and creatures must be the same, but the application of it differs, for in the one case (God’s) it is applied without limits, while in the other (humankind’s) it is predicated with limitations.” (emphasis added)

Take the example of goodness.  The definition of good is “that which is desired for its own sake.”  Now, when we take that concept of good and use it to describe God and man, we retain the same definition.  But when we apply it (predicate it) to God, we apply it in an unlimited way.  God is unlimited good, whereas man is limited good.  God is good infinitely while man is good finitely.  God is to be desired for his own sake absolutely, while man is to be desired for his own sake relatively.

Another example would be the concept of being.  Geisler says, “Likewise, being may be defined univocally as “that which is,” but this univocal concept is predicated of God and creatures in an analogous way. God is “that which is” infinitely; a creature is “that which is” only finitely. Or, more properly, God is Existence and creatures merely have existence.”

Geisler further explains:

Generic concepts are univocal when abstracted, but analogical when asserted of different things, as man and dog are equally animal but are not equal animals. Animal is defined the same way (say, as “a sentient being”), but animality is predicated differently of Fido and of Socrates (c. 470–399 B.C.). (Socrates possesses animality in a higher sense than Fido does.) Likewise, both the flower and God are said to be beautiful, but God is beautiful in an infinitely higher sense than flowers are.

While this tells us nothing directly about the similarity between God and creation, it does inform us about the difference between an infinite being and a finite being. For if beauty means “that which, being seen, pleases,” then the pleasure of the beatific vision of God is infinitely greater than the pleasure of viewing a flower.

What about all the concepts of God that are applied negatively, such as eternal (non-temporal), uncaused (not caused), and immutable (not changing)?  The reason these concepts are negated is because their definitions contain limits or imperfections.  God, as an infinite (not limited) being, cannot be limited by any concept when it is applied to Him.  Time, causation, and change are all concepts which would make God dependent on something else – they all limit his being.  Therefore these terms must be negated.

Here is the bottom line.  We can never describe, with language, exactly who God is, but we can say what He is like.  We can take finite concepts and apply them to God in an infinite (unlimited) way.  That is the best we can do using human language.

An additional point needs to be made.  Some people find analogous God-talk to be difficult to understand (it can be more abstract that some people are comfortable with), and so they brush it aside and collapse their language back to univocal God-talk.  The danger, of course, is that when you start talking about God as a finite being, then you are lowering him to a creature.

Mormon theology is the poster child for univocal God-talk gone wild.  God is created, God is material, God is in time, and so forth and so on.  The Mormon God is not transcendent, is not infinite, is not uncaused –  he is just like the rest of us, a creature.  Is this the God that is presented in Scripture?  I think not.