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By In Culture, Theology, Worship

Holy Priest, Holy Warrior: Reflections on Psalm 110

Reading through Psalm 110, one cannot but help notice that by the end of the psalm, the dead bodies are piling up. In verse 1, Christ’s enemies are made into a footstool for his feet. In verse 2, he rules in the midst of his enemies — and has a scepter to smite them. In verse 5, he shatters kings on the day of his wrath. In verse 6, he executes nations and fills them with corpses. 

And yet right in the middle of this “messiah on the warpath” imagery, we have a reference to Christ being an eternal priest after the order of Melchizedek. It is perhaps easier for us to see how the battle imagery of the psalm fits with Jesus’ kingship. After all, we expect kings — especially Davidic kings — to be battlefield heroes. Jesus does not disappoint in that way. He strikes and smashes his enemies from the beginning to the end of this psalm. The psalm paints the portrait of an utterly victorious king.

But since the psalm also pays homage to Jesus’ priesthood, an astute reader might wonder where priestly imagery shows up in the psalm. I would contend that the battlefield imagery fits not only with the motif of Jesus as reigning king but also with him as everlasting priest. In the Bible, priests are warriors just as much as kings. Waging holy war has been a priestly calling from the beginning.

There is a lot of biblical evidence for this truth, and we will only survey a fraction of it here. Start with Adam. Adam was a priest, serving in the sanctuary of Eden. We know this because the verbs used to describe Adam’s task in Eden, “tend and keep,” or “serve and guard” (Gen. 2:15), are used later to describe the tasks of the priests at the tabernacle, e.g., Num. 3:7-8. A priestly vocabulary is used for Adam’s task from the very beginning; he is to guard and keep Eden, just as the later priests would guard and keep the tabernacle. Of course, this also came to mean that he was to guard and keep the woman (the embodiment of Eden) after she was created, just as the priests were to guard and keep the people of Israel (the living tabernacle).

When Adam was told to guard the Garden, he should have deduced that there would be an invader. And sure enough, an intruder shows up. As soon as the serpent started questioning God’s Word to the woman, Adam should have stepped between the serpent and the woman to protect her. He should have silenced the lying serpent by crushing its head. That was his priestly task, and because he failed at that priestly task, he lost both his priesthood and his sanctuary. Adam should have piled up at least one corpse in Eden; he should have made the serpent a footstool for his feet. He should have ruled in the midst of his enemy (the serpent) by shattering and executing the serpent in a show of righteous wrath. Unfortunately, he did none of those things. What should have been the day of his power became a day of weakness and failure. He failed as a priest because he failed to fight. He refused to exercise holy violence and so he lost his holy status and access to the holy place.

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By In Church, Worship

Ecclesiology 101: The assembly must assemble

In this series: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6

Ecclesiology is the study of the church. Various aspects of the church and church governance are covered in ecclesiology, usually in abstract terms. This is good and necessary, but I want to take a more practical approach. I want to talk about ecclesiology from a layperson’s perspective: What does it mean to be the church? How do we function together? What are our duties toward one another? In this series, I hope to lay forth an outline of how the church is to be the church. I will not be focusing on outward-facing ministries of the church (e.g. evangelism), but on inward-facing ministries.

Defining terms

First things first: What does it mean to be a part of the church? To answer this question, we must first determine what the word “church” means. Most Christians know that the church isn’t a building, though we sometimes speak that way. “The church is people!” we rightly proclaim (Matthew 18:17, Acts 11:26).

From there, we might say that the church consists of anyone saved by the atoning work of Jesus (Ephesians 5:25, 1 Corinthians 1:2). In this usage, any self-professed Christian – anyone who believes in Jesus – is a part of the church.

But more fundamentally, the church is an “assembly” or a “congregation.” The word translated as “church” in our Bibles is the Greek ekklesia, which literally means “to call together” or “to assemble.”

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By In Family and Children, Worship

Summer Vacation and the Necessity of Worship

As summer heats upon us, many of us will be vacationing all over the country. As a pastor, I have noticed that church members generally don’t think much about the role the summer season has on us as Christians. I am particularly troubled by Christians who treat vacation as not only a break from work but also a break from Church. To some, if vacation happens to involve a Sunday then so be it. It becomes the ideal day to travel to your favorite summer destination. After all, you are not missing work; you are only missing Church.

Hebrews does not treat this subject lightly. a  The author forbids the non-assembling of ourselves. He treats it as a kind of schism; division. Hebrews calls us not to forsake the gathering. The angels and archangels engage in heavenly worship day and night, and we are invited to join in this duty of worship each time we are gathered together on the Lord’s Day. After all, God has made us one.

Vacation is no substitute for worship. Missing the Lord’s Day gathering on vacation for any trivial reason is to mock the tearing of the veil, which gave us access to the heavenly throne of grace. It belittles the work of Christ who conquered our divisions and united us to Himself.

With that in view, here are a few things I recommend for those going on vacation this summer:

First, avoid falling into the trap that a few good Christians gathered at a camp or a resort constitute the Church on Sunday. You may enjoy Christian fellowship, be challenged by an exhortation, but this does not constitute heavenly worship. It may be simply a Bible study, but worship is not a Bible study; it is the very entrance of God’s people into the heavenly places through the work of the Spirit.

Second, before going on vacation google churches near the area. If you are not able to find a church that resembles yours, look to explore a bit outside your tradition. Learn to love the universal church. Find an evangelical congregation that loves the Bible.

Third, avoid making Sunday morning plans. Let your family–especially those who are not Christians traveling with you–know that Sunday worship is non-negotiable. If they are nominal Christians or unbelievers, let them know beforehand that their Sunday morning plans will not include your family. b There is no need to theologize about these issues with other family members or feel you have to offer a treatise on the matter (since it may lead to unnecessary arguing). Let them know if they insist, that this is a commitment you made as a family long ago.

Finally, when visiting other churches, teach your children (and yourself) to avoid criticizing the Church’s practices that differ from your own. Use this time to explain to the little ones about the beauty of the universal church.

The Lord’s Day is a day of rest. It is the feast God has prepared for you. Under normal circumstances,c there is no other place for you to be.

  1. Calvin reviews the nature of coming together that naturally ensued when the walls of partition were broken down: “It is an evil which prevails everywhere among mankind, that every one sets himself above others, and especially that those who seem in anything to excel cannot well endure their inferiors to be on an equality with themselves. And then there is so much morosity almost in all, that individuals would gladly make churches for themselves if they could; for they find it so difficult to accommodate themselves to the ways and habits of others.  (back)
  2. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord  (back)
  3. Of course, there are too many obvious reasons to not be in church like sickness, childbirth, and emergencies of every kind, though I argue that these are rarely the reason people do not come to church during vacation  (back)

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By In Theology, Worship

Epiphany as the paradigm for discipleship

Epiphany is a season of growth represented by the color green which is a fitting way to train the Christian to see this season as a paradigm for discipleship. There is—I believe—a case to be made that different phases of Church life offer us different ways of growing in the faith. But Epiphany clearly establishes a pattern for discipleship. When we consider the gifts of the magi in light of the overwhelming biblical data, we can develop a model of discipleship that is both biblical and practical.

Training our Bodies

Our evangelical churches stress the importance of discipleship. It is good and necessary. But discipleship in broader evangelicalism is often discussed in the context of intellectual learning; a fact-finding mission. I propose there is more to discipleship than facts. Discipleship in the Bible is also the cultivation of bodily postures and biblical manners. The Bible trains us to move and live and to have our being in God. Any model of discipleship that does not include learning to kneel, raise hands, eat, sing, bless, receive, give, sit, stand is dishonoring biblical discipleship. When we formulate discipleship curriculum without incorporating common biblical rituals, we are secularizing biblical formation and turning it into an encyclopedic course fit for the Bible trivia team.

But discipleship is for the little babies and every person whom Jesus claims as his own. If we see discipleship as training in worship, then bodily actions make sense. This is the common thread of the Psalter and other prophetic writings.

Epiphany is training in bodily postures because worship demands our bodies as well as our souls. We have too often looked at worship as only an exercise in listening and gathering data. We want to listen; we want our children to listen and to learn facts about God, but more than that our goal in discipling our children and one another is to worship through bodily habits that form them into God-honoring saints.

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By In Culture, Family and Children, Worship

God Is (Not Reckless) Love

Guest post by Rev Sam Murrell of Oak Harbor, Washington

Image may contain: 1 person, smiling, closeupSam is the pastor of Grace by the Sea Anglican Church. He holds a Bachelors in Music from Covenant College and an MDiv from Covenant Seminary.  He is currently a Biblical Worldview Teacher at Little Rock Christian Academy. He and his wife Susan have eleven children and twenty-one grandchildren.

Cory Asbury’s hot new Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) anthem Reckless Loveco-written with Caleb Culver and Ran Jackson, has taken the evangelical church by storm since its release in October of 2017. It may well join the ranks of the most popular CCM songs of all time along such titles as MercyMe‘s I can Only Image (1999), Oceans (Where My Feet May Fail), which appeared from the Australian worship group Hillsong United in 2013, and more recently Chris Tomlin‘s cloying Good Good Father(2013). Both young and old professors of Christ are raising their hands in ecstasy as they sing of the “reckless love” their God has for them. But should the response to this song be one of jubilant enthusiasm? Is this song worthy appropriate of corporate worship?

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By In Podcast

Episode 26: Billy Graham & The End of an Era

The Rev. Billy Graham died on February 21, 2018, just shy of his 100th birthday. In this episode of the Kuyperian Commentary, Pastor Uri Brito and Dustin Messer discuss the important role that Billy Graham plays in the sociology of American Christianity.

“He [Graham] was just this larger-than-life personality,” remarked Dustin Messer, “who was able to rally such disparate fractions of Christendom in a way very few were able to do before him—and certainly no one is able to do today.”

Pastor Uri Brito reflects on Graham’s commitment to simplicity, personal integrity, and prayer. “Billy Graham maintained and preserved, what we would call, a very simple message and definition of the Gospel in full reliance on the Holy Spirit.”

The world of Evangelicalism in the West was shaped by men like Billy Graham and the two explore what the future of American Christianity might look like in the next generation of Evangelicalism.

The two also discuss the legacy of Billy Graham as the scorn of both theological liberals and Christian fundamentalists.

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By In Family and Children, Theology, Wisdom, Worship

Epiphany and Purpose

God’s people are a missionary people, and this is not true only of the New Testament church. God called Abraham to bless the Gentiles through him, and one of Israel’s recurring sins was her failure to carry out this mission. Israel was supposed to evoke praise from the Gentiles, but instead , er idolatries and sins caused the Lord’s name to be blasphemed. (more…)

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By In Podcast, Worship

Episode 24: On Music Making Culture

In this episode of the Kuyperian Commentary Podcast Jarrod Richey and Derek Hale discuss music making in our culture.

The Desert of Musical Literacy

Jarrod begins with the observation, “Everybody in the world has music around them all the time, and yet, no one can make it. Everybody has a device, everybody has access to the world’s greatest music (and the world’s worst music) at the touch of a button or the click of an app. And yet, very few people have formal music training, have the ability to make music, or to be what we would call literate in music.” (more…)

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By In Podcast, Worship

Episode 22: Singing Through Advent

In this Episode of the Kuyperian Commentary Podcast, Pastor Uri Brito and Mr. Sean Johnson discuss our worship music for the Advent season.

The two discuss the important theme, tone, and composition distinctions between Advent and Christmas hymns. Pastor Uri Brito mentions the Cantus Christi Hymnal and The Lutheran Hymnal which both include a section of Advent hymns.

The two also discuss their favorite examples of Advent songs.

  1. O Come O Come Emmanuel” (8th Century, translated by John Mason Neale)
    The words for “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel” comes from the seven verse poem that dates all the way back to the 8th century.
  2. “Savior of the Nations, Come”
    The original version of Savior of the Nations, Come was St. Ambrose’s Veni, Redemptor Gentium composed in the late fourth century.
  3. “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day”
    A Christmas carol based on the 1863 poem “Christmas Bells” by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
  4. Comfort, comfort Ye my people
    This song is based on Isaiah 40 to express the hope that Judah’s exile in Babylon was almost over.

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By In Music, Podcast, Worship

Episode 8b, Fighting Musical Relativism in the Church with James B. Jordan

In part two of this series on music, Jarrod Richey again interviews James B. Jordan, scholar in residence at the Theopolis Institute (Birmingham, Alabama) and founder of Biblical Horizons.

On this podcast, Jordan addresses the question of the appropriateness of music in worship, the use of chant in the Protestant tradition, and musical instruments.

Jordan makes the argument that “worship shouldn’t sound like the rest of the week.” He acknowledges that this often makes modern worshippers uncomfortable, but points to John Calvin’s example of teaching the Genevan Psalter, then strange and unfamiliar to the adults, to children. “Do you want you children growing up not knowing the psalms?” asks Jordan. “Or are you willing to set aside what makes you feel good for the sake of your kids?”

Demystifying chant, Jordan points out that part of the problem is the English language itself. He explains that “other languages don’t have two different words for sing and chant.” Jordan surveys the various Protestant uses of chant and explains the surprisingly recent history of what we think chanting sounds like.

Finally, James B. Jordan offers practical wisdom for pastors and worship leaders on how to develop music in their local congregations. “Don’t do anything that calls attention to yourself,” says Jordan, who prefers to see the leaders in worship as servants, not performers. On the issue of instruments in Worship, Jordan playfully tackles to the controversy of guitars and explains how the pipe organ most fully respects the orchestral dignity of the worship service.

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About James B. Jordan

James B. Jordan Theopolis Biblical Horizons His father was a professor of French Literature and his mother a piano teacher and a poetess. Jordan graduated from the University of Georgia in 1971 with a degree in Comparative Literature and studies in music and political philosophy. He finished his master’s degree in systematic theology at Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia and was awarded the D. Litt. degree from the Central School of Religion, England, in 1993.

Jordan is the author of several books, including The Sociology of the Church (1986); Through New Eyes: Developing a Biblical View of the World (1988); Creation in Six Days (1999); and several books of Bible exposition, worship, and liturgy.

Music:

Psalm 119 – Psalm Sing, Christ Church, Moscow, ID.
Rendition of Psalm 119 by Dr. David Erb.

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