April 24, 2015

The Armenian ‘Tragedy,’ and A Plea for the Study of History

By Clarke Morledge
A conflict of versions of history: Armenians claim that 1.5 million of them were killed in 1915-16 in the former Turkish Ottoman Empire. Turkey has a lower figure of 500,000. (photo credit: AFP/Getty, from the The Independent)

A conflict of versions of history: Armenians claim that 1.5 million of them were killed in 1915-16 in the former Turkish Ottoman Empire. Turkey has a lower figure of 500,000. (photo credit: AFP/Getty, from The Independent)

April 24, 2015 marks the 100th anniversary of the beginning of the Armenian “tragedy” where up to 1.5 millions Armenians in Turkey, most of them Christian, were killed in the shadow of the First World War. I say tragedy because for many in Turkey today, the thought of calling it the Armenian genocide is considered offensive. From that perspective, what happened to those Armenians was non-systematic, a part of the chaos of war. The term genocide is a powerful, loaded word, stirring up controversy in the minds of many.

We live in an age where history is often pooh-poohed as being nothing more than a boring recitation of dates and facts that means nothing to most people. Folks are a lot more excited to play with their iPhones and their other latest technological gadgets than they are to think about Turkish and Armenian versions of something that happened one hundred years ago.

But such a dismissal of the study of history is completely wrong headed. History is mostly about the stories of people. These are stories about children, parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. These are stories that shape the way we view the world around us. History tells us about who we are.

History is even more important for the Christian, since the Bible is essentially the telling of God’s Story. The Bible gives us the authoritative account of God’s redemptive history of humankind. That is why any church worth its salt will retell the story of the Bible week after week after week, so that our minds and hearts might be saturated by the work of God in history.

Make an investment in the study of history. You will learn things about yourself and God that you might never have learned before.

Here is Philip Jenkins, professor of history at Baylor University, telling us about the story that unfolded among the the Turkish and Armenian people, including their Christian communities, one hundred years ago.

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April 23, 2015

Does Romans 8:26 Refer to a Private Prayer Language?

By Clarke Morledge
The "gift of tongues" as "groanings too deep for words?"

The “gift of tongues” as “groanings too deep for words?”

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words (Romans 8:26 ESV).

I remember the first time I ever heard people “speaking in tongues.” A friend of my father’s had invited my dad and I to attend a Full Gospel Businessmen‘s fellowship meeting. I was only about 13 years old and we had a very nice dinner with men dressed in suits and ties… and chocolate ice-cream for desert. Yum-yum.

But then the meeting took an odd turn when guitar-led singing soon began, and I started to hear some of the men around me saying some rather funny things. As they were singing, I could not understand what words they were using. It clearly was not English! Was it gibberish? I could not help but to look around the room, eyes wild open, trying to figure out what in the world was going on!  It was like something out of 1 Corinthians 14!

My dad and I had a rather quiet ride in the car going home that night. Now, you have to know my dad. He is not one for displaying emotion, being rather stoic in personality but always with something articulate to say. But the whole evening left my dad uncharacteristically speechless…. and it left me with a lot of questions.
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April 22, 2015

Martyn Lloyd-Jones: Logic on Fire

By Clarke Morledge

Martyn-Lloyd Jones (1899-1981) was the most influential British preacher of the 20th century, rivaled perhaps by only John R. W. Stott. As a young man from Wales, Jones had trained to be a medical doctor, but wrestled with a calling to preach. View an interview with him here on Veracity.

Upon taking the pulpit at Westminster Chapel in London, Jones became known as a scholarly yet fiery, verse-by-verse expositor of the Bible. In his series on the Book of Romans alone, he delivered at least 366 sermons on the 16 chapters of this great letter by the Apostle Paul. That’s a good six years plus of preaching week by week just on one book of the Bible!

He was not afraid to ruffle some feathers. He was thoroughly Reformed in his theology, an unapologetic critic of Arminianism and champion of the sovereignty of God, and he showed great restraint in voicing his frustration with dispensationalism. Yet he was a man of controversy of his own making, too, criticizing other evangelical leaders who were not severe enough in distancing themselves from more liberal wings of the church, while ironically embracing a tentative yet curious acceptance of a more charismatic form of Christian faith.

Nevertheless, Martyn Lloyd-Jones was passionate about helping believers understand God’s Word and live it out at the most profound level. In an age where many churches shy away from verse-by-verse teaching in favor of more thematic approaches to pulpit teaching, evangelicalism today would do well to learn from the example of the “Doctor,” even if one does not fully find themselves in agreement with all of Martyn Lloyd-Jones teachings, many of them having been preserved in audio form by the MLJ Trust.

A new film is out now documenting this man’s life: Logic on Fire, available here.

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April 20, 2015

An apologist walks into a bar…

By John Paine

Reasonable Faith, Dallas Bar

 

Wish I’d been there for this event.

Craig at Bar

HT: Reasonable Faith

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April 18, 2015

Accessible Theology

By John Paine
The Lord Is My Shepherd

“The Lord Is My Shepherd” by Eastman Johnson, 1863

We enjoy sharing art on Veracity. Art inspires thinking in a way that connects with the soul.

After several months of workaday grind and spending way too much time in front of computers, Marion and I took an Easter weekend trip to DC for some rest and relaxation. We toured the Smithsonian museums and attended the Nationals opening day game. A particular highlight of the trip was our visit to the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Among the wondrous paintings on permanent display is Eastman Johnson’s masterpiece, The Lord Is My Shepherd, painted just after the announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation. Historians and art students have spent considerable energy interpreting this painting in the context of the struggle to abolish slavery in 19th century America. They cite Johnson’s sympathetic portrayal of slaves and Native Americans in many of his paintings, his abolitionist views, and his artistic, social, political, and Transcendentalist influences.

Regardless of the analysis, The Lord Is My Shepherd is an evocative portrayal of personal discipleship. However you interpret the historical and societal context, the painting depicts a man quietly reading the Bible. He is not reading the 23rd Psalm, as the title may suggest. He is at the beginning of the Bible—some have suggested in Exodus, given the theme of slavery. He is searching the Scriptures on his own. The title hints at his emotional frame of mind as he does so. Perhaps he is looking for comfort or reassurance in a time of great difficulty. Maybe there’s more to it than that. Maybe not. Either way, it’s personal discipleship.

In historical context, it used to be very difficult to study the Bible—even if you were among the privileged few who could read.

Accessible Theology

We have come a long way since 1863. Access to top-notch seminary classes is freely available—instantly. While a degree or certification may be out of reach for those who cannot afford the time or tuition costs, new Internet tools are available to help you if you just want to learn. For free.

Dallas Theological Seminary records an impressive volume of classroom teaching sessions by some of today’s best instructors and theologians. They serve the videos and transcripts of these classes in a large, online catalog that can be accessed from their mobile app. Entire courses on a wide variety of topics from Old and New Testament surveys, to Jewish history, to the Reformation, to just about every kind of doctrine and theological topic you can imagine. Want to study heaven or hell? How about inerrancy, the reliability of the manuscript documents and translations, eschatology, development of the canon of Scripture, apologetics, religious pluralism, world religions, and so forth? What are your thoughts on cessationism, annihilationism, creationism, evolution, Arminianism, Calvinism, sacramentalism, eschatology, covenant theology, dispensationalism, and Eastern Orthodoxy? How well formed are your doctrinal beliefs? Maybe you just have a simple but deep question, like “How did we get the Bible?” Thanks to Dallas Theological Seminary, you can now freely audit courses that will inspire and help shape your beliefs and thinking.

To get the app, click on the image below and follow the instructions. Play around with the menu and find some courses or presentations that interest you. This app is a prerequisite for our next post on how we got the Bible. There is a particularly good session from Darrell Bock, a Veracity Top Scorer Award winner, on the New Testament canon that I would like to share with you. But you’ll need this app first. Enjoy!


Dallas Theological Seminary App

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